Phonics Preparation in Teacher Education Programs

Phonics is the basis upon which the English-speaking world learns to read. Students learn phonics in early elementary school to learn to read; therefore, teachers need to have a working knowledge of phonics with which to instruct their students. However, a report by the United States Department of Education found that few preservice teachers were competent in phonics. Liberty University, which teaches phonics as part of its teacher education program, has conducted a study on the level of knowledge demonstrated by the preservice teachers upon completion of the phonics course. The Liberty University students’ scores compared favorably with the national average as reported by the United States Department of Education

Shannons\u27 George Liele’s life and legacy: An unsung hero (Book Review)

Shannon, D. (Ed.). (2012). George Liele’s life and legacy: An unsung hero. Macon, GA. Mercer University Press. 184 pp. $35.00. ISBN 978088146389

Snapshots from the South African War: The F.C. Cantrill Photograph Collection at the Canadian War Museum

The Canadian War Museum’s (CWM’s) Photographic Archives contains over 600 photograph collections or fonds. These include over 17,000 individual photographs, some with their original negatives, and more than 250 photo albums. This collection has been acquired from private sources, with the photographs for the most part representing the personal documentation of Canada’s military history by the participants. These have been brought together as part of the CWM’s mandate to collect, preserve and make available for research and exhibition the artifacts of the Canadian military experience. The collection of Frederick Charles Cantrill who served in the South African Constabulary from 1901 to 1903 is one of these.1 Larger than some, much smaller than others, this collection is typical of the personal photography undertaken by soldiers throughout the century. It is discussed here both as part of the CWM’s ongoing commemoration of Canadian participation in the South African War, and as an illustration of the interesting informal nature of many of the CWM’s photographic holdings. The article will examine Cantrill’s own story, the developments in photography that made his collection possible and, in the captions, assess what the photographs add to our understanding of Canadians in the South African War

Alternating knots with unknotting number one

We prove that if an alternating knot has unknotting number one, then there exists an unknotting crossing in any alternating diagram. This is done by showing that the obstruction to unknotting number one developed by Greene in his work on alternating 3-braid knots is sufficient to identify all unknotting number one alternating knots. As a consequence, we also get a converse to the Montesinos trick: an alternating knot has unknotting number one if its branched double cover arises as half-integer surgery on a knot in $S^3$. We also reprove a characterisation of almost-alternating diagrams of the unknot originally due to Tsukamoto.Comment: 38 pages, 15 figures. This a significant revision of the first version. A proof of Tsukamoto's work on almost-alternating diagrams of the unknot is now included. There is also an additional formulation of the main theorem which makes precise the signs of the unknotting crossings and the resulting half-integer surgeries. Some comments on potential further questions have also been adde

Open Educational Resources: Expanding the Conversation Regarding Adoption and Use on a College Campus

As more institutions explore Open Educational Resource (OER) initiatives, librarians should be involved in the campus-wide conversation. Also, OER means more than free online textbooks; a broader conversation needs to be prioritized as institutions step into the OER movement. This article is an adaptation of the author’s presentation at the 2016 Annual Conference of the Association of Christian Librarians, titled “Out of Bounds: Exploring Open Educational Resources.