Capital Formation and Economic Growth in Nigeria

The impact of capital formation on the economic growth of Nigeria was studied using multiple regressions technique It was ascertained that in the short run gross fixed capital formation had no significant impact on economic growth while in the long run the VAR model estimate indicates that gross fixed capital formation total exports and the lagged values of GDP had positive long run relationships with economic growth in Nigeria It was equally ascertained that there exists an inverse relationship between imports IMP Total National Savings TNSV and economic growth while GDP was seen to have a unidirectional causal relationship with export EXP Gross fixed capital formation GFCF Import IMP and Total national saving TNSV The study therefore recommended that the federal government of Nigeria should reprioritize her needs by cutting down on her bogus bourgeoning recurrent expenditures which is about 70 of her total expenditure profile This will help free up the much needed savings for investments in infrastructural development The study further recommends that Nigerians must be made to mobilize the desired level of gross national savings that could be big enough to attract foreign direct investments This is very vital as FDI will help to complement our domestic savings The study further recommends that government should work on her potentially exportable commodities the proceeds of which should be utilized in the procurement of needed technical tools and components Lastly basic infrastructures like good roads electricity supply and security must be seen to be adequate This will help to reduce the drudgeries associated with setting up of industrie

Nutraceutical Importance of Sesame Seed and Oil: A Review of the Contribution of their Lignans

Sesame seed is widely used in food and nutraceutical industries in many countries because of its high oil, protein and antioxidant contents. Sesame oil contains sesamin, sesamolin and sesaminol lignan fractions, which are known to play an important role in its oxidative stability and antioxidative activity. It is widely known as one of the natural health promoting foods that has the potential to prevent various disorders such as hypertension, hypercholesterolemia cancer and aging. Additionally, sesame oil may be useful in managing oxidative stress-associated diseases such as atherosclerosis, diabetes mellitus, obesity, chronic renal failure, rheumatoid arthritis, and neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's disease. Moreover, sesame oil has multiple physiological functions such as decreasing blood lipids and arachidonic acid levels, increasing antioxidative ability and γ-tocopherol bioavailability, and providing anti-inflammatory function and potential estrogenic activity. Many health promoting effects are attributed to its lignans. Hence, this article highlights and discusses the potential health promoting effects of sesame and its oil with emphasis on the contribution of lignans. Keywords: Functional food, Health promotion, Lignans, Nutraceutical, Sesam

In Their Own Voices: First Nations Students Identify Some Cultural Mediators of Their Learning in the Formal School System

Theories of cognition argue that children develop thinking, communication, learning, and motivational styles consistent with the culture into which they are socialized. Cultural socialization, therefore, influences how students learn, particularly how students mediate, negotiate, and respond to curriculum materials, instructional strategies, learning tasks, and communication patterns in the classroom. But what specific aspects of culture influence the learning of a particular group of students? The author set out to answer this question in relation to First Nations students by conducting research among First Nations students in a Winnipeg high school. Five culturally relevant themes were identified that provide insights into the development of appropriate instruction for preservice teachers for the enhancement of cross-cultural communication, the design and implementation of assessment strategies, and the creation of effective instructional materials. These are traditional Aboriginal approaches to learning, patterns of oral interaction, concepts of self, curriculum relevance, and the educator's interpersonal style.Selon les théories sur la cognition, les enfants développent des structures de raisonnement, de communication et d'apprentissage ainsi que des schèmes motivationnels qui correspondent à la culture dans laquelle ils sont socialisés. La socialisation culturelle influencerait donc l'apprentissage des élèves, surtout la façon dont ils abordent et manipulent la matière, les stratégies d'enseignement, les activités d'apprentissage et les modèles de communication dans la salle de classe. La question qui se pose est donc la suivante: quels sont les aspects culturels qui agissent sur l'apprentissage d'un groupe donné d'élèves? L'auteur a voulu répondre à cette question par rapport aux élèves des Premières Nations en étudiant des Autochtones fréquentant une école secondaire à Winnipeg. On a identifié cinq thèmes culturellement significatifs susceptibles de guider la formation des stagiaires dans le but d'enrichir la communication interculturelle, améliorer la conception et la mise en œuvre de méthodes d'évaluation et encourager la création de matériel didactique efficace. Il s'agit là d'approches autochtones traditionnelles à l'apprentissage, aux modèles d'interaction orale, aux concepts du moi, à la pertinence du programme d'études et au style de l'enseignant en relations humaines

On the sources of African philosophy

No Abstrac

Curriculum as Cultural Practice: Postcolonial Imagination

The opportunity to take familiar curriculum concepts/ideas and re-imag-ine and re-articulate them in ways that facilitate the development of new habits of mind is exciting for me for a number of reasons. First, it brings to the forefront what I have been “preaching ” in my academic work for some time now, namely, that alternative sites for curriculum theorizing could be generated from already established curricular metaphors/concepts and their reflections in practice. Second, the move itself is a recognition that multiple modes of theoretical representation emerge from genuinely valuing alter-native insights and perspectives grounded in a dynamic variety of human experiences, thereby adding richness and complexity to curriculum and curriculum discourse. Third, it is an opportunity for me to closely examine a popular and taken-for-granted curriculum metaphor—“curriculum as cultural practice”—and demonstrate how, historically, it has been mediated through a colonial imagination “contrived to the disbenefit of the other” (London, 2001, p. 45). The intent here is to re-imagine and re-theorize thi

Implementasi Pembelajaran Daring Menggunakan Whatsapp Grup Pada Mata Pelajaran PAI di SMK Negeri 1 Modayag Barat

Studi ini mengkaji tentang Implementasi Pembelajaran Daring Menggunakan WhatsApp Group Pada Mata Pelajaran PAI di SMK Negeri 1 Modayag Barat. Penelitian ini menggunakan pendekatan kualitatif, data-data penelitian dikumpulkan dengan menggunakan metode observasi, wawancara, dan dokumentasi. Pengumpulan data dilakukan untuk memperoleh data primer dan data sekunder di lapangan. Data tersebut kemudian dianalisis menggunakan reduksi data, penyajian data, dan penarikan kesimpulan. Hasil penelitian menunjukan bahwa: 1). Pembelajaran daring terbilang tidak efektif dikarenakan siswa sulit memahami pelajaran PAI apalagi tidak ada tatap muka langsung guru dan siswa. 2). Faktor Penghambat dalam pembelajaran daring menggunakan WhatsApp Group ini sedikit ada kendala dikarenakan siswa yang tidak mempunyai hp, kemudian kendalanya bisa di penyetoran tugas karena tidak bertatap muka langsung jadi siswa agak kesulitan untuk belajar. Sedangkan faktor pendukung yaitu siswa yang memiliki hp jadi siswa bisa melihat tugas yang diberikan guru melalui WhatsApp Group dan Evaluasi yang dilakukan guru pada saat daring yaitu dengan dilihat dari siswa sering mengerjakan tugas dan kehadiran jadi itu bisa menjadi bahan evaluasi guru kepada siswa. Kata Kunci: Implementasi, Pembelajaran Daring, WhatsApp Group, Mata Pelajaran PAI

Regression and Classification for Direction-of-Arrival Estimation with Convolutional Recurrent Neural Networks

We present a novel learning-based approach to estimate the direction-of-arrival (DOA) of a sound source using a convolutional recurrent neural network (CRNN) trained via regression on synthetic data and Cartesian labels. We also describe an improved method to generate synthetic data to train the neural network using state-of-the-art sound propagation algorithms that model specular as well as diffuse reflections of sound. We compare our model against three other CRNNs trained using different formulations of the same problem: classification on categorical labels, and regression on spherical coordinate labels. In practice, our model achieves up to 43% decrease in angular error over prior methods. The use of diffuse reflection results in 34% and 41% reduction in angular prediction errors on LOCATA and SOFA datasets, respectively, over prior methods based on image-source methods. Our method results in an additional 3% error reduction over prior schemes that use classification based networks, and we use 36% fewer network parameters

An Analytic Search for the Elements of Naturalized Epistemology in John Locke

Naturalized epistemology is an approach to the theory of knowledge that emphasizes the application of methods, results, and theories from the empirical sciences. It contrasts with approaches that emphasize a priori conceptual analysis or insist on a theory of knowledge that is independent of it. In most cases when reference is made to naturalized epistemology, reference is only made to W. V. Quine, Alvin Goldman and Thomas Kuhn, but this piece argues that John Locke had made enormous contributionto the development of Naturalised Epistemology. The researcher observes that Locke’s break away from traditional epistemology as the Father of British Empiricism and his psychology based theory of knowledge was a foundation to the evolution of naturalised epistemology.Key Words: John Locke, Development, Naturalized, Epistemology, Analytic,Elements

The Indispensability of the Basic Social Values in African Tradition: A Philosophical Appraisal

There are indispensable basic social values in African tradition which are for genuine development. The West in her own ways has attempted to jettison these values for theirs to take place, but in all, it is seen that theirs do not tally with the African society. Also, the Western aim is to render Africa dependent on them. The indispensability of African basic values presupposes that Africa has value system that is in consonance with her environment and conditions, and any way to displace it renders the society backward. These values are the guiding principles for genuine development which must remain indispensable to the Western values of colonialism, neo-colonialism and imperialism. With emphasis on these basic values by her leadership the future of Africa (and Nigeria in particular) will be of radical development

Teachers' Perceptions of the Integration of Aboriginal Culture Into the High School Curriculum

Recently activities surrounding the integration of Aboriginal cultural knowledge, content, and perspectives into the school curriculum have increased in an attempt to increase school success and retention among Aboriginal students. But how do public schoolteachers, mainly non-Aboriginal and belonging to Canadian mainstream culture, perceive this integration? An ethnographic study conducted among 10 teachers from three public high schools revealed that although there was an expressed openness to the integration of Aboriginal knowledge and perspectives into the school curriculum, in practice little or only moderate headway is being made. What teachers integrated, how they integrated it, and what they perceived as challenges to, and facilitators of, integration are discussed in this article. Based on the research findings, 10 recommendations are made to guide policy and practice in the integration of Aboriginal perspectives.L'intégration dans le programme d'études d'un contenu autochtone impliquant des connaissances et des perspectives culturelles, s'est intensifiée ces derniers temps. Cette tentative vise à améliorer la performance scolaire des élèves autochtones et les maintenir aux études. Comment les enseignants dans les écoles publiques, qui sont majoritairement non-autochtones et membres de la culture canadienne dominante, perçoivent-ils cette intégration? Une étude ethnographique auprès de 10 enseignants dans trois écoles secondaires publiques a révélé que même s'ils manifestent une ouverture quant à l'intégration au programme d'études des connaissances et des perspectives autochtones, dans la pratique, peu de progrès sont réalisés dans ce domaine. Cet article porte sur le matériel que les enseignants ont intégré et comment ils l'ont fait. De plus, on y discute les points de vue des enseignants sur les éléments qui se dressent comme obstacles à l'intégration et ceux qui en facilitent la mise en œuvre. S'appuyant sur les résultats de la recherche, on présente dix recommandations offrant des lignes directrices pour les politiques et les pratiques dans l'intégration de perspectives autochtones