Teacher Knows Best: Adaptations to District-adopted Math Program as Shared by Elementary Math Teachers

Despite the resources and training provided, teachers make decisions to adapt from the written curriculum throughout their day. Some would argue that the teacher's ability to not only recognize when students are struggling, but to also be able to select adequate instructional strategies to reteach the concept, is their most valuable asset. The purpose of this dissertation was to examine the reasons why teachers adapt curriculum. This study involved 55 teachers from a Midwestern school district. The participants completed the Stages of Concern Questionnaire, a component of Frances Fuller's Concerns-Based Adoption Model, was administered to all K-5 staff in the school district. The Stages of Concern Questionnaire measured the relative intensity of concerns among teachers implementing a new math program. The results of the Questionnaire were used to select participants for a follow up interview. Participants were asked to reflect on the strengths of the math program, concerns they had about the math program. Teachers were also asked discuss what kinds of adaptations they make during instruction, and why. The interviews were analyzed to determine if patterns or themes emerged. The study showed that teachers often make adaptations including pre-meditated adaptations and reactionary adaptations. Teachers rationalize their need to adapt citing experience, training, and various student behaviors. Understanding teachers concerns in regard to their content and how those concerns relate to the adaptations that teachers make, could be used to design more meaningful professional development for staff. Professional development could be differentiated for the types of concerns that teachers have, provide opportunities for staff to address those concerns, and perhaps achieve higher learning gains with their students

Development of a questionnaire to determine change in the occupational performance of pre-school children with autistic spectrum disorders receiving occupational therapy - sensory integration

MSc (Occupational Therapy), Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the WitwatersrandAs there are no occupation based outcome measures evaluating the effect of occupational therapy in the pre-school child with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) an Occupational Performance Questionnaire (OPQ) was developed to address this. The OPQ was tested for content validity and reliability before a 12 month intervention study to establish construct validity and response to change in children with ASD receiving Occupational Therapy using a Sensory Integration frame of reference (OT-SI) was done. The results of 19 subjects on the OPQ were compared with the results on two other standardised measures -the Short Sensory Profile (SSP), and Parenting Stress Index (PSI-SF) at six monthly intervals. Convergent validity between family impact on the OPQ and the PSI-SF was moderate but for occupation performance on the OPQ and the SSP it changed from negligible to moderate over 12 months. The OPQ is responsive to change as correlations between improvements in the three outcome measures were moderate. The OPQ was found to still need attention in terms of item reliability and validity

Application of data envelopment analysis to measure technical efficiency on a sample of Irish dairy farms

peer-reviewedThe aim of this study was to determine the levels of technical efficiency on a sample of Irish dairy farms utilizing Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and to identify key management and production factors that differ between producers indentified as efficient and inefficient. DEA was used in this study to generate technical efficiency scores under assumptions of both constant returns to scale (CRS) and variable returns to scale (VRS). The average technical efficiency score was 0.785 under CRS and 0.833 under VRS. Key production characteristics of efficient and inefficient producers were compared using an analysis of variance. More technically efficient producers used less input per unit of output, had higher production per cow and per hectare and had a longer grazing season, a higher milk quality standard, were more likely to have participated in milk recording and had greater land quality compared to the inefficient producers

The C3b Receptor (CR1) on Human Blood Cells

The C3b receptor (CR1) was first isolated from human erythrocyte membranes in 1979 and shown to be a large single chain polypeptide glycoprotein with a molecular weight of 205,000 daltons. CR1 isolated from erythrocyte membranes has been shown in vitro to possess cofactor activity for the I mediated cleavage of C3b to iC3b and C4b to iC4b. It also plays a role in the prevention of lysis of bystander erythrocytes by its ability to cause the decay dissociation of C4b2a3b and C3bBb formed on these cells. In addition erythrocyte CR1 in vivo is thought to play a role in the transport of opsonised immune complexes from the circulation to the reticulo enclothrlial system where they can be removed. On unstimulated phagocytic cells the primary function of CR1 is the binding of complexes opsonised with C3 and C4 degradation while on stimulated phagocytes CR1 is able to directly mediate the phagocytosis of opsonised particles. CR1 may play a role in the regulation of B lymphocyte function and on kidney podocytes CR1 may serve to prevent complement activation on the basement membrane of the glomerulus

The role of the Suppressor of Hairy-wing insulator protein in chromatin organization and expression of transposable elements in Drosophila melanogaster

ABSTRACT Chromatin insulators are required for proper temporal and spatial expression of genes in metazoans. Insulators are thought to play an important role in the regulation of gene expression through the formation of higher-order chromatin structures. One of the best characterized insulators is the Drosophila gypsy insulator, which is located in the gypsy retrovirus. Several proteins are required for gypsy insulator function, including Su(Hw), Mod(mdg4), and CP190. In addition to the gypsy insulator, these proteins are located throughout the genome at sites which are thought to correspond to endogenous insulators. Analysis of the distribution of insulator proteins across a region of chromosome 2R in Drosophila polytene chromosomes shows that Su(Hw) is found in three structures differentially associated with insulator proteins: bands, interbands and domains of coexpressed genes. Bands are formed by condensation of chromatin within genes containing one or more Su(Hw) binding sites, while Su(Hw) sites in interbands appear to form structures normally associated with open chromatin. Bands characterized by the lack of CP190 and BEAF-32 insulator proteins are formed by clusters of coexpressed genes, and these bands correlate with the distribution of specific chromatin marks. Conservation of the band interband pattern, as well as the distribution of insulator proteins in nurse cells, suggests that this organization may represent the basic organization of interphasic chromosomes. We also show that, in addition to the gypsy insulator, sequence analysis predicts the presence of Su(Hw) binding sites within a number of transposable elements. Su(Hw) binds to predicted sites within gtwin and jockey, which possesses enhancer-blocking activity. Su(Hw) affects the tissue-specific expression of transposable elements, although this effect is unrelated to the presence of Su(Hw) binding sites within the element or control of the elements via the piRNA pathway. Additionally, the effect of Su(Hw) on transposable element expression often differs from that of Mod(mdg4). Taken together, these results suggest that insulator proteins associate specifically with, and may help to define, various levels of chromatin organization on polytene chromosomes. Also, gypsy insulator proteins may influence the expression of transposable elements in a way that does not depend on Su(Hw) binding sites within the elements themselves

Sisters and the English Household

Sisters and the English Household revalues unmarried adult sisters in nineteenthcentury English literature as positive figures of legal and economic autonomy representing productive labor in the domestic space. As a crucial site of contested values, the adult unmarried sister carries the discursive weight of sustained public debates about ideals of domesticity in nineteenth-century England. Engaging scholarly histories of the family, and providing a detailed account of the 70-year Marriage with a Deceased Wife’s Sister controversy, Anne Wallace traces an alternative domesticity anchored by adult sibling relations through Dorothy Wordsworth’s journals; William Wordsworth’s poetry; Mary Lamb’s essay “On Needle-Work”; and novels by Jane Austen, Elizabeth Gaskell, Charles Dickens, Dinah Mulock Craik and George Eliot. Recognizing adult sibling relationships, and the figure of the adult unmarried sibling in the household, as primary and generative rather than contingent and dependent, and recognizing material economy and law as fundamental sources of sibling identity, Sisters and the English Household resets the conditions for literary critical discussions of sibling relations in nineteenth-century England

Four-year and Seasonal Patterns of Herbaceous Layer Development in Hardwood Stands of the Fernow Experimental Forest, Parsons, WV

This study described patterns of herbaceous layer characteristics in watersheds of the Fernow Experimental Forest (FEF) in Parsons, WV. The purpose of this study was to examine four-year and seasonal patterns of change in herb layer species composition, cover, and richness within three stands of mixed hardwood forest. Sampling was conducted within seven circular plots (0.04 ha) in each of three watersheds of the FEF: WS3 (24-yr-old stand, previously clear-cut, receiving experimental nitrogen additions), WS7 (24-yr-old stand, previously clear-cut and treated with herbicide), and WS4 (\u3e85-yr-old stand, untreated, control). All vascular plants~ lm in height were identified to species in each of 10 1-m2 circular subplots per sample plot and estimated for cover (%). Results confirmed those of earlier studies on these same sites, that species composition was similar across all watersheds. For example, throughout the 1994 growing season, 3 5 species out of a total of 70 were found on all three watersheds, and seven out of ten dominant species were found on all three watersheds. Comparisons of July 1994 sampling to July sampling of 1991 and 1992 indicated higher herb layer richness in 1994 than the other years for all watersheds. Results of annual comparisons of herb layer cover were inconsistent among watersheds; however, cover on WS7 was an average of 30% higher than WS3 and WS4 each year. Results were not consistent with expected outcomes related to successional change in forest ecosystems. For example, mature WS4 showed no less change in four-year cover, richness or dominant species over the four year period than younger watersheds. Pronounced seasonal patterns were revealed in cover, composition, and richness. Monthly patterns for herb layer cover were quite similar among watersheds, with a maximum occurring in June. Monthly patterns of species richness varied somewhat among watersheds. Canonical discriminant analysis indicated that less important species were responsible for most of the dynamic variation among watersheds, in both long-term and seasonal patterns. These data suggest that the herbaceous layers of these hardwood stands are seasonally quite dynamic and respond sensitively to annual changes in abiotic environmental conditions