Telling Stories Together: A collaborative technology-based curriculum project for an endangered language community

Language revitalization efforts are enhanced not only when the language is brought to new users, but also when it is brought into new domains of use. This project creates a template for computer-assisted language learning that aims to maximize L2 learning through task-based, constructivist uses of free Web 2.0 tools. This template includes two sets of parallel activities. For each set, students work together to brainstorm, illustrate, write, edit, and publish a story, conducting all activities in the L2. One set directs students to record native speakers retelling stories they know in their language, while the second develops a new story from the students’ own life experiences or imaginations. Each step of the writing process will be completed using a specific open-access online tool: • Stage 1: Pre-write – This stage uses SoundCloud, a free web-based audio recording and streaming tool which can upload files from a computer, or record directly into the website. • Stage 2: Story development and illustrations – This stage uses Flickr, a free photography and image hosting site, to find images that illustrate or relate to the stories. • Stage 3: Collaborative writing – This stage uses Google Docs. The first team transcribes a known story recorded from an elder while the second develops and elaborates its new story. • Stage 4: Editing and revising – This stage employs Google Tasks to complete revising and editing. • Stage 5: Publishing – This final stage uses Lulu, an internet-based self-publishing service. These tools accommodate special circumstances faced by many indigenous communities. Many communities who fit this intended design have a very small pool of potential language learners, and such small numbers make it difficult to teach separate classes for students at varying proficiency levels; this template accommodates this by employing activities in which learners at every level (beginning, intermediate, advanced, and native speakers) can take leading roles. Additionally, having the entire story-building process take place via low cost web tools means that students can participate and collaborate remotely, if geography or other factors make a physical language classroom impractical. At the end of this project, the learners will have potentially produced two new texts, one based on a traditional story and one based on in-language creative writing. This project, therefore, empowers young learners to be active language revitalizers, not just through their own language acquisition, but also through development of materials that contribute to the literary corpus of their community

String universality in ten dimensions

We show that the ${\cal N}=1$ supergravity theories in ten dimensions with gauge groups $U(1)^{496}$ and $E_8 \times U(1)^{248}$ are not consistent quantum theories. Cancellation of anomalies cannot be made compatible with supersymmetry and abelian gauge invariance. Thus, in ten dimensions all supersymmetric theories of gravity without known inconsistencies are realized in string theory.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, LaTeX. v2: typos corrected on version appearing in PR

Oral History Report: William Davis

This is an interview with William Davis who served in World War II. This article talks about his life during World War II

Soil and Plant Property Differences among High-yield Soybean Areas in Arkansas

Continued achievement of soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] yields greater than 6719 kg ha-1 (100 bu ac-1) will depend on decreasing the yield gap, which is contingent on gathering more information regarding the soil physical, chemical, and microbiological environment and the main plant factors contributing to high-yield soybean. Therefore, understanding the main factor differences between high- and average-yield areas may provide insight for making management decisions to increase yields. The objectives of this study were i) to evaluate the effects of region and soil depth on soil property differences between high- and average-soybean-yielding areas, ii) to determine which soil properties are most related to ultra-high soybean yields, and iii) to identify correlations among aboveground biomass and seed nutrient concentrations from various growth stages and soil properties for high- and average-yielding fields. In each of seven regions of the “Grow for the Green” yield contest in Arkansas, one contest-entered, high-yield (HY) area in close proximity to one average-yield (AY) area were plant-sampled at three growth stages in 2015 and soil sampled from two depth intervals (0- to 10- and 10- to 20-cm) in each yield area immediately prior to or just after harvest in 2014 and 2015. In 2014 and 2015, yields in the AY areas averaged 4633 kg ha-1 (69 bu ac-1), while yields in the HY areas averaged 5647 kg ha-1 (84 bu ac-1). Averaged across soil depth and years, selected measured soil properties differed (P \u3c 0.05) between HY and AY areas within at least one region. Averaged across regions, Shannon’s microbial diversity was greater (P \u3c 0.05) in HY than in AY areas. Averaged across growth stage, some plant properties were greater (P \u3c 0.05) in HY areas, while others were greater (P \u3c 0.05) in AY areas across regions. Since this study encompassed a wide variety of landscapes and soybean management systems across Arkansas, results of this study have the potential to help growers better understand soil and plant properties in their own fields that contribute to or hinder achieving ultra-high soybean yields, which may contribute to minimizing the soybean yield gap

Recording to revitalize: Language teachers and documentation design

As language communities lose their last first-language speakers, many turn to language teachers to carry on the important work of language maintenance and revival. How can we design documentation projects that will be useful for these future language users? This paper outlines findings from interviews conducted with ten teachers of Native languages of the Pacific Northwest. These teachers identified specific, concrete areas where language documentation has helped them in their revitalization work, and areas where there are noticeable and often frustrating gaps. Their reflections and observations lead to several concrete suggestions for what linguists can add to their documentation efforts, and also underscore the potential richness of a project designed with teachers in mind. Collaboration with future language revitalizers could be greatly beneficial both to language communities and to linguists.National Foreign Language Resource Cente

Remittances, Inequality and Poverty: Evidence from Rural Mexico

Economic research has produced conflicting findings on the distributional impacts of migrant remittances, and there has been little research on the effects of changes in remittances on poverty. This paper utilizes new data from the Mexico National Rural Household Survey, together with inequality and poverty decomposition techniques, to explore the impacts of remittances on rural inequality and poverty. Our findings suggest that remittances from international migrants become more equalizing (or less unequalizing), as well as more effective at reducing poverty, as the prevalence of migration increases.Labor and Human Capital,

Dispersal in microbes: fungi in indoor air are dominated by outdoor air and show dispersal limitation at short distances.

The indoor microbiome is a complex system that is thought to depend on dispersal from the outdoor biome and the occupants' microbiome combined with selective pressures imposed by the occupants' behaviors and the building itself. We set out to determine the pattern of fungal diversity and composition in indoor air on a local scale and to identify processes behind that pattern. We surveyed airborne fungal assemblages within 1-month time periods at two seasons, with high replication, indoors and outdoors, within and across standardized residences at a university housing facility. Fungal assemblages indoors were diverse and strongly determined by dispersal from outdoors, and no fungal taxa were found as indicators of indoor air. There was a seasonal effect on the fungi found in both indoor and outdoor air, and quantitatively more fungal biomass was detected outdoors than indoors. A strong signal of isolation by distance existed in both outdoor and indoor airborne fungal assemblages, despite the small geographic scale in which this study was undertaken (<500 m). Moreover, room and occupant behavior had no detectable effect on the fungi found in indoor air. These results show that at the local level, outdoor air fungi dominate the patterning of indoor air. More broadly, they provide additional support for the growing evidence that dispersal limitation, even on small geographic scales, is a key process in structuring the often-observed distance-decay biogeographic pattern in microbial communities

FARM-LEVEL RESPONSE TO AGRICULTURAL EFFLUENT CONTROL STRATEGIES: THE CASE OF THE WILLAMETTE VALLEY

This article examines economic incentives and other mechanisms to offset non-point source pollution from agriculture. A biophysical simulator to estimate technical relationships is linked to linear programming models for representative farms in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. The models are then optimized for profit maximization under alternative non-point pollution control policies. The results indicate that site-specific resource conditions and production possibilities greatly influence policy effectiveness and the cost of achieving pollution abatement. Nevertheless, some abatement is possible on all farms for relatively little cost.Environmental Economics and Policy,