Using coaching techniques to teach information literacy to first year English undergraduates

This is a report on how I integrated coaching techniques into my teaching of information literacy(IL)to 28 FHEQ Level 4 (Year 1) English undergraduates at Brunel University London, UK, during January 2021-April 2021. This was part of a compulsory module, titled Digital Literacy. During this time, it was held online due to COVID-19 lockdowns and, since restrictions have been lifted, I have started teaching this face to face in a flat classroom on the University campus

Using coaching tools to develop professional practice holistically

Copyright © The Author(s) 2020. Do you teach or train others? Are you passionate about delivering a great learning experience to them? Are you considering working towards professional accreditation and have been putting it off? Are you tired of faffing around and want to get your focus back? Are you ambitious but concerned about burning out? Do you need some space and time – where no-one is vying for your attention – to gain clarity, develop your practice and explore how you can be of service to your participants, your colleagues and your loved ones while not losing yourself in the process? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then you may find this article helpful. Its aim is to provide an overview of a few select tools to help teaching and training professionals articulate their purpose, craft a teaching identity and philosophy, and get the most out of training received – with a few self-care tips thrown in for good measure! As we move to a world where increasingly roles are being replaced by automation, we need to focus on what makes us individual, personalised humans (Gleeson, 2018). I hope that this article will provide a starting point.The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article

Utilising coaching to enhance teaching practice

Are you passionate about delivering a great learning experience to those you teach? Are you ambitious but concerned about burning out? Do you need some space and time to gain clarity, develop your practice and explore how you can be of service to your participants, your colleagues and your loved ones, while not losing yourself in the process? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then you may find this chapter helpful. This chapter aims to provide the 'air and space and light and time' for educators to reflect upon and to challenge their practices. It will provide an in-depth look at a few select tools to help teaching and training professionals articulate their purpose, craft a teaching identity and philosophy, and get the most out of training received. There will be a focus on self-care throughout. To teach well we must know ourselves, be authentic and inspire others with our passion and continued desire to learn. We must recognise when work is done well. We must support each other, sharing information and working collegiately and collaboratively. As we move to a world where increasingly roles are being replaced by automation, we need to focus on what makes us individual, personalised humans (Gleeson, 2018). I have shared my own experiences in the spirit of being vulnerable and ‘walking my talk’. I am sharing my beliefs and the rationale behind my practice, as well as the experiences and techniques I have picked up over the extent of my career. My intention is that this chapter will encourage others to develop teaching practices for the benefit of our students and our workplaces while not burning out in the process. As I share my background, philosophy and approaches I would invite you to be considering yours at the same time before we come on to the practical exercises

Trophic Conditions and Planktonic Processes of Semi-arid Floodplain Lakes Inundated with Environmental Flows

Shallow floodplain lakes are critical components of semi-arid floodplain wetland systems. Delivery of environmental flows that aim to sustain ecological processes of semi-arid floodplain wetlands has enhanced inundation of shallow lakes in inland Australia. To maximise environmental flow outcomes to support floodplain productivity and ecosystem functions, environmental managers would benefit from knowing whether semi-arid floodplain lakes function as a sink or source of atmospheric carbon. We investigated abiotic conditions, and rates of planktonic respiration and primary productivity of phytoplankton during summer under environmental flow conditions in three floodplain lakes of the lower Murrumbidgee River, Australia. All lakes showed mesoeutrophic to hypereutrophic characteristics and significant within- and between-lake variability in abiotic conditions, planktonic processes, and associated carbon balance. Nevertheless, the mean net primary productivity of phytoplankton in the lakes (364-1,674 mg C m-2 day-1) were up to about three times greater than in other semi-arid floodplain wetlands of southeast Australia. Therefore, shallow floodplain lakes in semi-arid regions have great potential to function as a sink of atmospheric carbon through planktonic metabolism during summer. A spatial hierarchical framework for lake functional response to inundation is proposed to support decision-making and to maximise the benefits of environmental flow regimes for floodplain lakes

5-Year Follow-Up of a Telephone Intervention to Increase Fruit and Vegetable Consumption in Preschoolers: The ‘Healthy Habits’ Cluster Randomised Trial

Little is known about the long-term impact of telephone-based interventions to improve child diet. This trial aimed to assess the long-term effectiveness (after 5 years) of a telephone-based parent intervention in increasing children’s fruit and vegetable consumption. Parents of 3–5 year olds were recruited from 30 Australian preschools to participate in a cluster randomised controlled trial. Intervention parents received four, weekly, 30-min support calls aimed at modifying the home food environment. Control parents received printed materials. Consumption was assessed using the Fruit and Vegetable subscale of the Children’s Dietary Questionnaire (F&V-CDQ) (children) and daily servings of fruit and vegetables (children and parents) via parent telephone interview. Of the 394 parents who completed baseline, 57% (99 intervention, 127 control) completed follow-up. After 5-years, higher intervention F&V-CDQ scores, bordering on significance, were found in complete-case (+1.1, p = 0.06) and sensitivity analyses (+1.1, p = 0.06). There was no difference in parent or child consumption of daily fruit servings. Complete-case analysis indicated significantly higher consumption of child vegetable servings (+0.5 servings; p = 0.02), which was not significant in sensitivity analysis (+0.5 servings; p = 0.10). This telephone-based parent intervention targeting the family food environment may yield promising improvements in child fruit and vegetable consumption over a 5-year period

An empirical investigation of the emergent issues around OER adoption in Sub-Saharan Africa

In the past few years, Africa has joined the rest of the world as an active participant in the Open Educational Resource (OER) movement with a number of home-grown and externally driven initiatives. These have the potential to make an immense contribution to teaching and learning in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). However, certain barriers prevent full participation. This paper reports on qualitative research that sought to investigate SSA's readiness to adopt OERs. This study involves three case studies based in higher education institutions involved in OER projects and located in Kenya, Uganda and South Africa. Contrary to the popular belief, findings indicate that low technological levels in Africa do not necessarily impede the adoption of such educational technologies; the real challenges facing the readiness to adopt OERs appear to be related to socio-economic, cultural, institutional and national issues. This paper argues for a complete mind shift in how people perceive OERs. It also proposes raising awareness of OERs at all levels, involving institutions and government, versioning OERs for the African context and conducting more research on OER adoption

Exercise capacity reflects airflow limitation rather than hypoxaemia in patients with pulmonary arteriovenous malformations

Background: Pulmonary arteriovenous malformations (PAVMs) generate a right-to-left shunt. Impaired gas exchange results in hypoxemia and impaired CO2 clearance. Most patients compensate effectively but a proportion are dyspneic, and these are rarely the most hypoxaemic. Aim: To test degrees of concurrent pathology influencing exercise capacity. Design: Replicate, sequential single centre, prospective studies. Methods: Cardiopulmonary exercise tests (CPET) were performed in 26 patients with PAVMs, including individuals with and without known airflow obstruction. To replicate, relationships were tested prospectively in an independent cohort where self-reported exercise capacity evaluated by the Veterans Specific Activity Questionnaire (VSAQ) was used to calculate metabolic equivalents at peak exercise (METS N = 71). Additional measurements included oxygen saturation (SpO2), forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1), vital capacity (VC), exhaled nitric oxide (FeNO), haemoglobin and iron indices. Results: By CPET, the peak work-rate was only minimally associated with low SpO2 or low arterial oxygen content (CaO2=1.34 x SpO2 x haemoglobin), but was reduced in patients with low FEV1 or VC. Supranormal work-rates were seen in patients with severe right-to-left shunting and SpO2 80% predicted. VSAQ-calculated METS also demonstrated little relationship with SpO2, and in crude and CaO2-adjusted regression, were lower in patients with lower FEV1 or VC. Bronchodilation increased airflow even where spirometry was in the normal range: exhaled nitric oxide measurements were normal in 80% of cases, and unrelated to any PAVM-specific variable. Conclusions: Exercise capacity is reduced by relatively mild airflow limitation (obstructive or restrictive) in the setting of PAVMs

Metropolis simulations of Met-Enkephalin with solvent-accessible area parameterizations

We investigate the solvent-accessible area method by means of Metropolis simulations of the brain peptide Met-Enkephalin at 300$K$. For the energy function ECEPP/2 nine atomic solvation parameter (ASP) sets are studied. The simulations are compared with one another, with simulations with a distance dependent electrostatic permittivity $\epsilon (r)$, and with vacuum simulations ($\epsilon =2$). Parallel tempering and the biased Metropolis techniques RM$_1$ are employed and their performance is evaluated. The measured observables include energy and dihedral probability densities (pds), integrated autocorrelation times, and acceptance rates. Two of the ASP sets turn out to be unsuitable for these simulations. For all other systems selected configurations are minimized in search of the global energy minima, which are found for the vacuum and the $\epsilon(r)$ system, but for none of the ASP models. Other observables show a remarkable dependence on the ASPs. In particular, we find three ASP sets for which the autocorrelations at 300$$K are considerably smaller than for vacuum simulations.Comment: 10 pages and 8 figure

Realising angelic designs using logiak

ANGELIC is a methodology for encapsulating knowledge of a body of case law. Logiak is a system intended to support the development of logic programs by domain experts, and provides an excellent environment for the rapid realisation of ANGELIC designs. We report our use of Logiak to realise ANGELIC designs, using both Boolean factors and factors with magnitude