Robust variable selection in partially varying coefficient single-index model

By combining basis function approximations and smoothly clipped absolute deviation (SCAD) penalty, this paper proposes a robust variable selection procedure for a partially varying coefficient single-index model based on modal regression. The proposed procedure simultaneously selects significant variables in the parametric components and the nonparametric components. With appropriate selection of the tuning parameters, we establish the theoretical properties of our procedure, including consistency in variable selection and the oracle property in estimation. Furthermore, we also discuss the bandwidth selection and propose a modified expectation-maximization (EM)-type algorithm for the proposed estimation procedure. The finite sample properties of the proposed estimators are illustrated by some simulation examples.The research of Zhu is partially supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (NNSFC) under Grants 71171075, 71221001 and 71031004. The research of Yu is supported by NNSFC under Grant 11261048

Simple scheme for two-qubit Grover search in cavity QED

Following the proposal by F. Yamaguchi et al.[Phys. Rev. A 66, 010302 (R) (2002)], we present an alternative way to implement the two-qubit Grover search algorithm in cavity QED. Compared with F. Yamaguchi et al.'s proposal, with a strong resonant classical field added, our method is insensitive to both the cavity decay and thermal field, and doesn't require that the cavity remain in the vacuum state throughout the procedure. Moreover, the qubit definitions are the same for both atoms, which makes the experiment easier. The strictly numerical simulation shows that our proposal is good enough to demonstrate a two-qubit Grover's search with high fidelity.Comment: manuscript 10 pages, 2 figures, to appear in Phys. Rev.

The centrality of subject matter in teaching thinking: John Dewey’s idea of psychologizing the subject matter revisited

This paper attempts to reveal the central role of subject matter in teaching thinking, and in so doing, criticise the skill-oriented approach adopted in Singapore. Based upon Dewey's idea of psychologizing the subject matter, this paper introduces the idea-based approach in which subject matter is used as the most important intellectual resource for developing thinking and as a central framework for introducing educative experience. Focusing on the assumptions about subject matter, learning to think, and teaching thinking, a comparison and contrast between the two approaches has been made to reveal the problems inherent in the skill-oriented approach. This paper contends that the skill-oriented approach fails to consider subject matter to be the most important resource in developing thinking. It is grounded in a faulty assumption which separates subject matter and thinking. It creates a tendency of ignoring the concepts, principles, and criteria embodied in subject matter in disciplining and enhancing thinking, of reducing teaching thinking into generic techniques, and of restricting and undermining the impulses, dispositions, and freedom of learners. Further, this paper espouses an approach which combines teaching subject matter for conceptual understanding and developing higher-order thinking together, based upon Dewey's idea and current advances in cognitive psychology

Constructing Chinese didactics: (Re)discovering the German didactics tradition

The article traces the influence of the German didactics tradition on the development of didactics in China from a historical perspective and by analyzing the ways of constructing Chinese didactics in three contemporary didactics texts. It compares and contrasts the German didactics tradition with Kairov’s didactics and American theory of instruction—two “didactics” traditions that have significantly determined and shaped how didactics is conceived and developed in China. The article argues for a (re)discovery of the German didactics tradition, and discusses the implications for constructing Chinese didactics within the current social, cultural, and educational context of schooling in China. It addresses how Chinese didactics can be constructed in a more thoughtful and better informed manner, in a way that embodies real Chinese characteristics

Bringing curriculum theory and didactics together: a Deweyan perspective

Using Dewey’s method of resolution for resolving a dualism exemplified in The Child and the Curriculum, this article reconciles and brings together two rival schools of thought – curriculum theory and didactics – in China. The central thesis is that the rapprochement requires a reconceptualisation of curriculum theory and didactics in light of the Practical and the German Didaktik tradition, respectively, together with an understanding of their complementary relationship within the societal, institutional and instructional contexts of schooling. The article concludes by drawing implications for reconstructing curriculum theory and didactics within the context of China’s recent curriculum reform and for the international dialogue of curriculum vs. Didaktik

Powerful knowledge, transformations and Didaktik /curriculum thinking

From the vantage point of knowledge transformations entailed in curriculum making, this article seeks to contribute to a rethinking of the concept of powerful knowledge. It makes a case for linking the teaching of content knowledge to the development of human powers (understanding, ways of thinking, capabilities and dispositions) by way of knowledge transformations. The article starts by examining three perspectives or contributions to knowledge transformations: (1) Bernstein’s recontextualisation; (2) Chevallard’s didactic transposition; and (3) Gericke et al.’s transformations. This is followed by a discussion of what transformations entail from the perspective of Bildung-centred Didaktik, and what transformations mean in today’s context if education is centrally concerned with the development of human powers. It concludes by questioning the conflation of powerful knowledge with disciplinary knowledge

Bringing knowledge back in: perspectives from liberal education

From the vantage point of liberal education, this article attempts to contribute to the conversation initiated by Michael Young and his colleagues on ‘bringing knowledge back’ into the current global discourse on curriculum policy and practice. The contribution is made through revisiting the knowledge-its-own-end thesis associated with Newman and Hirst, Bildung-centred Didaktik and the Schwabian model of a liberal education. The central thesis is that if education is centrally concerned with the cultivation of human powers (capacities, ways of thinking, dispositions), then knowledge needs to be seen as an important resource for that cultivation. A theory of knowledge is needed that conceives the significance of knowledge in ways productive of this cultivation. Furthermore, a theory of content is needed that concerns how knowledge is selected and translated into curriculum content and how content can be analysed and unpacked in ways that open up manifold opportunities for cultivating human powers

Constructing ‘powerful’ curriculum theory

This article addresses how ‘powerful’ curriculum theory might be constructed from the perspective of the German Didaktik tradition—highly compatible with Schwab’s the Practical. To start with, I scrutinize Joseph Schwab’s model of curriculum planning and Wolfgang Klafki’s model of lesson preparation and examine two theories of content that underpin the two models. Invoking the German Didaktik tradition, I next explicate a distinctive form of theorizing that yields powerful curriculum/Didaktik theory. I argue that Didaktik, together with the Practical, provides a viable way of constructing powerful curriculum theory—exemplified by a theory of knowledge and a theory of content—in the current context. I conclude by drawing implications for our understanding of the powers of professional educational knowledge and for tackling the current crisis in educational theory