English Homework: What Makes Sense?

Controversies over the amount and quality of homework assignments have been in the news for years (Lee and Pruitt 1979; Cooper 1989, 2007) and explosively so more recently due to attention brought about via films such as Race to Nowhere (Abeles et al. 2011). Some argue that homework does not provide much benefit for elementary school children and that it is only in the sixth grade that it starts to make sense (Cooper, Robinson, and Patall 2006; Kohn 2006). Others discuss the role of quality verses quantity (Cooper 1989; Thomas 1992; Warton 2001). A few articles address homework in foreign-language education (Wallinger 2000; Chang et al. 2014), and some pertain to adult foreign language learners.+ repphzhbib2016

Association between young learners' English language performance and teacher proficiency and experience with English

Elementary school English language teachers in Swiss public schools often undergo criticism due to their supposed lack of English language proficiency though this is only one small part of the full set of skills necessary for certification. This study set out to discover if young learner performance in reading, writing and listening after one or two years of instruction with the same teacher is associated with the teacher’s measured language proficiency, with the teacher’s feelings of improvement, with the teacher’s contact with English outside the classroom as well as with teacher profiles of time spent on reading, writing, speaking and listening skills in the classroom. Findings from this study suggest that neither teacher language proficiency nor teacher exposure to English outside of the classroom are determining factors in learner performance in the first two years of English instruction - indeed high levels of teacher proficiency in speaking and grammar here are negatively associated with learner performance. In this study, what positively associates with leaner performance is a teacher’s feeling of continually improving his or her speaking skills and instructional time on certain combinations of language skills. Implications from this research should help improve English language teaching effectiveness by refining priorities in teacher training.+repphzhbib2014

Association between young learners' English language performance and teacher proficiency and experience with English

Langues étrangères

Rapid evolution of coordinated and collective movement in response to artificial selection.

Collective motion occurs when individuals use social interaction rules to respond to the movements and positions of their neighbors. How readily these social decisions are shaped by selection remains unknown. Through artificial selection on fish (guppies, Poecilia reticulata) for increased group polarization, we demonstrate rapid evolution in how individuals use social interaction rules. Within only three generations, groups of polarization-selected females showed a 15% increase in polarization, coupled with increased cohesiveness, compared to fish from control lines. Although lines did not differ in their physical swimming ability or exploratory behavior, polarization-selected fish adopted faster speeds, particularly in social contexts, and showed stronger alignment and attraction responses to multiple neighbors. Our results reveal the social interaction rules that change when collective behavior evolves

Heteropentanuclear Oxalato-Bridged nd-4f (n=4, 5) Metal Complexes with NO Ligand: Synthesis, Crystal Structures, Aqueous Stability and Antiproliferative Activity

A series of heteropentanuclear oxalate-bridged Ru(NO)-Ln (4d-4f) metal complexes of the general formula (nBu(4)N)(5)[Ln{RuCl3(-ox)(NO)}(4)], where Ln=Y (2), Gd (3), Tb (4), Dy (5) and ox=oxalate anion, were obtained by treatment of (nBu(4)N)(2)[RuCl3(ox)(NO)] (1) with the respective lanthanide salt in 4:1 molar ratio. The compounds were characterized by elemental analysis, IR spectroscopy, electrospray ionization (ESI) mass spectrometry, while 1, 2, and 5 were in addition analyzed by X-ray crystallography, 1 by Ru K-edge XAS and 1 and 2 by (CNMR)-C-13 spectroscopy. X-ray diffraction showed that in 2 and 5 four complex anions [RuCl3(ox)(NO)](2-) are coordinated to Y-III and Dy-III, respectively, with formation of [Ln{RuCl3(-ox)(NO)}(4)](5-) (Ln=Y, Dy). While Y-III is eight-coordinate in 2, Dy-III is nine-coordinate in 5, with an additional coordination of an EtOH molecule. The negative charge is counterbalanced by five nBu(4)N(+) ions present in the crystal structure. The stability of complexes 2 and 5 in aqueous medium was monitored by UV/Vis spectroscopy. The antiproliferative activity of ruthenium-lanthanide complexes 2-5 were assayed in two human cancer cell lines (HeLa and A549) and in a noncancerous cell line (MRC-5) and compared with those obtained for the previously reported Os(NO)-Ln (5d-4f) analogues (nBu(4)N)(5)[Ln{OsCl3(ox)(NO)}(4)] (Ln=Y (6), Gd (7), Tb (8), Dy (9)). Complexes 2-5 were found to be slightly more active than 1 in inhibiting the proliferation of HeLa and A549 cells, and significantly more cytotoxic than 5d-4f metal complexes 6-9 in terms of IC50 values. The highest antiproliferative activity with IC50 values of 20.0 and 22.4M was found for 4 in HeLa and A549 cell lines, respectively. These cytotoxicity results are in accord with the presented ICP-MS data, indicating five- to eightfold greater accumulation of ruthenium versus osmium in human A549 cancer cells

Impact of COVID-19 on cardiovascular testing in the United States versus the rest of the world

Objectives: This study sought to quantify and compare the decline in volumes of cardiovascular procedures between the United States and non-US institutions during the early phase of the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the care of many non-COVID-19 illnesses. Reductions in diagnostic cardiovascular testing around the world have led to concerns over the implications of reduced testing for cardiovascular disease (CVD) morbidity and mortality. Methods: Data were submitted to the INCAPS-COVID (International Atomic Energy Agency Non-Invasive Cardiology Protocols Study of COVID-19), a multinational registry comprising 909 institutions in 108 countries (including 155 facilities in 40 U.S. states), assessing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on volumes of diagnostic cardiovascular procedures. Data were obtained for April 2020 and compared with volumes of baseline procedures from March 2019. We compared laboratory characteristics, practices, and procedure volumes between U.S. and non-U.S. facilities and between U.S. geographic regions and identified factors associated with volume reduction in the United States. Results: Reductions in the volumes of procedures in the United States were similar to those in non-U.S. facilities (68% vs. 63%, respectively; p = 0.237), although U.S. facilities reported greater reductions in invasive coronary angiography (69% vs. 53%, respectively; p < 0.001). Significantly more U.S. facilities reported increased use of telehealth and patient screening measures than non-U.S. facilities, such as temperature checks, symptom screenings, and COVID-19 testing. Reductions in volumes of procedures differed between U.S. regions, with larger declines observed in the Northeast (76%) and Midwest (74%) than in the South (62%) and West (44%). Prevalence of COVID-19, staff redeployments, outpatient centers, and urban centers were associated with greater reductions in volume in U.S. facilities in a multivariable analysis. Conclusions: We observed marked reductions in U.S. cardiovascular testing in the early phase of the pandemic and significant variability between U.S. regions. The association between reductions of volumes and COVID-19 prevalence in the United States highlighted the need for proactive efforts to maintain access to cardiovascular testing in areas most affected by outbreaks of COVID-19 infection

“BUT I KNOW THE WORD IN ENGLISH, JUST NOT IN GERMAN!” - THE UNFAIRNESS OF VOCABULARY -TRANSLATION TESTING AND LISTS

Due to convenience and expectations from parents, learners and other levels of schooling, Vocabulary-translation lists and test tests are one of the most frequent teaching and testing formats used in Swiss primary and lower secondary schools. This style of testing in ELT is, however, is fraught with problems ranging from the unfairness to learners who do not speak the local language (here German) at home, to the measures of what constructs are actually being assessed through such tests. Such tests are a frequent topic of discussion and discord in pre and in-service teacher training. In this paper, reasons for not using such tests and suggestions for alternative list forms and test types serving similar purposes are presented.  Article visualizations

DISFLUENCY IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING?

Desirable difficulties, coined by Bjork (1994), includes concepts such as spacing learning, interleaving, and disfluency, all of which can be practiced in the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classroom. Sans Forgetica, a disfluent font developed at RMIT University in Australia, was specifically designed to enhance learning. Seventy-two preservice elementary school teachers in Switzerland participated in this study aimed at increasing awareness of desirable difficulties in general, and more specifically in the role of disfluency in reading comprehension. No significant differences between participants receiving a text on scaffolding and desirable difficulties in EFL classrooms in Sans Forgetica or Arial were found yet this study contributes to a larger discussion of alternative practices in English language classrooms around the world