Search results for: explainable machine learning

Authors: Abdul Razak Bin Ahmad, Mohd Mahzan Awang

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Appreciation of patriotism value is important for every student to be able to become a quality citizen and good for the country. Realizing this situation, Malaysia has introduced history education for primary school students since 2014. One of the aims is to provide basic knowledge on patriotism as well as to promote patriotic behaviour among school pupils. In order to examine the relationship between the students’ knowledge and their behaviour, a survey study was carried out. A set of questionnaire was designed and developed based prior studies on history education and patriotism. The sample of this survey was 153 primary school students aged 12 years old (Standard Six). Data collected and analysed using SPSS (Statistical Package for The Social Science 20.0). The results showed that the level of knowledge and patriotism practise at the moderate levels. Inferential statistic results revealed that there is no significant difference between genders with regards to patriotism knowledge and patriotism practice through history education subject. Results also demonstrated that there is a significant relationship between knowledge and the practice of patriotism values among the students. This means that knowledge on patriotism is important for promoting patriotic behaviour and practice in primary schools. This study implies that teaching students to understand and comprehend the concept of patriotism is vital to promote patriotic behaviour among students. Therefore, teachers should master pedagogical skills and good content knowledge on patriotism as mechanisms to promote effective learning in history education subjects. creativity in teaching history education subjects is also needed.

Keywords: history education, knowledge, primary school, patriotism values, teachers

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Authors: Kolade Olawande Owoeye, George Weir

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Terrorism and extremism activities on the internet are becoming the most significant threats to national security because of their potential dangers. In response to this challenge, law enforcement and security authorities are actively implementing comprehensive measures by countering the use of the internet for terrorism. To achieve the measures, there is need for intelligence gathering via the internet. This includes real-time monitoring of potential websites that are used for recruitment and information dissemination among other operations by extremist groups. However, with billions of active webpages, real-time monitoring of all webpages become almost impossible. To narrow down the search domain, there is a need for efficient webpage classification techniques. This research proposed a new approach tagged: SentiPosit-based method. SentiPosit-based method combines features of the Posit-based method and the Sentistrenght-based method for classification of terrorism and extremism webpages. The experiment was carried out on 7500 webpages obtained through TENE-webcrawler by International Cyber Crime Research Centre (ICCRC). The webpages were manually grouped into three classes which include the ‘pro-extremist’, ‘anti-extremist’ and ‘neutral’ with 2500 webpages in each category. A supervised learning algorithm is then applied on the classified dataset in order to build the model. Results obtained was compared with existing classification method using the prediction accuracy and runtime. It was observed that our proposed hybrid approach produced a better classification accuracy compared to existing approaches within a reasonable runtime.

Keywords: sentiposit, classification, extremism, terrorism

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Authors: Janet B. Badong-Badilla

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In Jesuit universities, laypersons, who come from the same or different faith backgrounds or traditions, are considered as collaborators in mission. The Jesuits themselves support the contributions of the lay partners in realizing the mission of the Society of Jesus and recognize the important role that they play in education. This study aims to investigate and generate particular notions and understandings of lived experiences of being a lay partner in Jesuit universities in the Philippines, particularly those involved in higher education. Using the qualitative approach as introduced by grounded theorist Barney Glaser, the lay partners’ concept of being a partner, as lived in higher education, is generated systematically from the data collected in the field primarily through in-depth interviews, field notes and observations. Glaser’s constant comparative method of analysis of data is used going through the phases of open coding, theoretical coding, and selective coding from memoing to theoretical sampling to sorting and then writing. In this study, Glaser’s grounded theory as a methodology will provide a substantial insight into and articulation of the layperson’s actual experience of being a partner of the Jesuits in education. Such articulation provides a phenomenological approach or framework to an understanding of the meaning and core characteristics of Jesuit-Lay partnership in Jesuit educational institution of higher learning in the country. This study is expected to provide a framework or model for lay partnership in academic institutions that have the same practice of having lay partners in mission.

Keywords: grounded theory, Jesuit mission in higher education, lay partner, lived experience

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Authors: Arth J. Shah, Madhu R. Kamble

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Voice biometric liveness detection is customized to certify an authentication process of the voice data presented is genuine and not a recording or synthetic voice. With the rise of deepfakes and other equivalently sophisticated spoofing generation techniques, it’s becoming challenging to ensure that the person on the other end is a live speaker or not. Voice Liveness Detection (VLD) system is a group of security measures which detect and prevent voice spoofing attacks. Motivated by the recent development of the Kolmogorov-Arnold Network (KAN) based on the Kolmogorov-Arnold theorem, we proposed KAN for the VLD task. To date, multilayer perceptron (MLP) based classifiers have been used for the classification tasks. We aim to capture not only the compositional structure of the model but also to optimize the values of univariate functions. This study explains the mathematical as well as experimental analysis of KAN for VLD tasks, thereby opening a new perspective for scientists to work on speech and signal processing-based tasks. This study emerges as a combination of traditional signal processing tasks and new deep learning models, which further proved to be a better combination for VLD tasks. The experiments are performed on the POCO and ASVSpoof 2017 V2 database. We used Constant Q-transform, Mel, and short-time Fourier transform (STFT) based front-end features and used CNN, BiLSTM, and KAN as back-end classifiers. The best accuracy is 91.26 % on the POCO database using STFT features with the KAN classifier. In the ASVSpoof 2017 V2 database, the lowest EER we obtained was 26.42 %, using CQT features and KAN as a classifier.

Keywords: Kolmogorov Arnold networks, multilayer perceptron, pop noise, voice liveness detection

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Authors: Beng Yew Low, Cher Liang Cha, Cheng Yong Teoh

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Due to a lack of continual assessment or grade related data, identifying first-year engineering students in a polytechnic education at risk of failing is challenging. Our experience over the years tells us that there is no strong correlation between having good entry grades in Mathematics and the Sciences and excelling in hardcore engineering subjects. Hence, identifying students at risk of failure cannot be on the basis of entry grades in Mathematics and the Sciences alone. These factors compound the difficulty of early identification and intervention. This paper describes the development of a predictive analytics model in the early detection of students at risk of failing and evaluates its effectiveness. Data from continual assessments conducted in term one, supplemented by data of student psychological profiles such as interests and study habits, were used. Three classification techniques, namely Logistic Regression, K Nearest Neighbour, and Random Forest, were used in our predictive model. Based on our findings, Random Forest was determined to be the strongest predictor with an Area Under the Curve (AUC) value of 0.994. Correspondingly, the Accuracy, Precision, Recall, and F-Score were also highest among these three classifiers. Using this Random Forest Classification technique, students at risk of failure could be identified at the end of term one. They could then be assigned to a Learning Support Programme at the beginning of term two. This paper gathers the results of our findings. It also proposes further improvements that can be made to the model.

Keywords: continual assessment, predictive analytics, random forest, student psychological profile

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Authors: Lina T. Codilla

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This study primarily designed a laboratory activity in ecology to demonstrate the allelopathic property of the Philippine Chromolaena odorata L. (hagonoy) leaf extracts to Lycopersicum esculentum (M), commonly known as tomatoes. Ethanol extracts of C. odorata leaves were tested on seed germination and seedling growth of L. esculentum in 7-day and 14-day observation periods. Analysis of variance and Tukey’s HSD post hoc test was utilized to determine differences among treatments while Pre–test – Post–test experimental design was utilized in the determination of the effectiveness of the designed laboratory activity. Results showed that the 0.5% concentration level of ethanol leaf extracts significantly inhibited germination and seedling growth of L. esculentum in both observation periods. These results were used as the basis in the development of instructional material in ecology. The laboratory activity underwent face validation by five (5) experts in various fields of specialization, namely, Biological Sciences, Chemistry and Science Education. The readability of the designed laboratory activity was determined using a Cloze Test. Pilot testing was conducted and showed that the laboratory activity developed is found to be a very effective tool in supplementing learning about allelopathy in ecology class. Thus, it is recommended for use among ecology classes but modification will be made in a small – scale basis to minimize time consumption.

Keywords: allelopathy, chromolaena odorata l. (hagonoy), designed-laboratory activity, organic herbicide students’ performance

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Authors: Sanjeev Sharma

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We are living in the information age. Information is not only important to an individual but also to researchers, scientists, academicians and all others who are doing work in their respective fields. The 21st century which is also known as the electronic era has brought several changes in the mechanism of the libraries in their working environment. In the present scenario, acquisition of information resources and implementation of new strategies have brought a revolution in the library’s structures and their principles. In the digital era, the role of the library has become important as new information is coming at every minute. The knowledge society wants to seek information at their desk. The libraries are managing electronic services and web-based information sources constantly in a democratic way. The basic objective of every library is to save the time of user which is based on the quality and user-orientation of services. With the advancement of information communication and technology, the libraries should pay more devotion to the development trends of the information society that would help to adjust their development strategies and information needs of the knowledge society. The knowledge-based society demands to re-define the position and objectives of all the institutions which work with information, knowledge, and culture. The situation is the era of digital India is changing at a fast speed. Everyone wants information 24x7 and libraries have been recognized as one of the key elements for open access to information, which is crucial not only to individual but also to democratic knowledge-based information society. Libraries are especially important now a day the whole concept of education is focusing more and more independent e-learning and their acting. The citizens of India must be able to find and use the relevant information. Here we can see libraries enter the stage: The essential features of libraries are to acquire, organize, store and retrieve for use and preserve publicly available material irrespective of the print as well as non-print form in which it is packaged in such a way that, when it is needed, it can be found and put to use.

Keywords: knowledge, society, libraries, culture

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Authors: Saman Shafei

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Tourism has improved for several reasons, with the main objective of producing economic benefits, including foreign exchange earnings, income generation, employment, rising government incomes, and contributing to the financing of tourism infrastructure, which also has public consumption. Although today the interests of the tourism industry are not overlooked by anyone, the expansion and development of tourism services and products can make it competitive, and in this competition, those who bring creativity and diversity are ahead of other competitors. Developing creative tourism as third-generation tourism can help to attract visitors, increasing demand and diversifying it, achieving new markets and boosting growth. Creative tourism is a journey aimed at achieving a brand –new experience and is along with collaborative learning of arts, cultural heritage, or specific features of a place, and provides useful communication with the inhabitants of the tourism destination who is creators of the living culture of that place. The present study aims to identify and introduce the capabilities of the city of Isfahan in IRAN for the development of creative tourism and the role of creative tourism on the destination and the local community of this city. The research method is descriptive-analytical and field method, interviewing tool and questionnaire have been applied to obtain research findings. The results indicate that the city of Isfahan has the potential to develop creative tourism in the field of traditional handicrafts and traditional foods, and developing this kind of tourism will lead to the development of sustainable tourism in this destination and will bring numerous benefits for the local community.

Keywords: creative tourism, tourism, Isfahan city, sustainable tourism development

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Authors: Nina Dziatzko, Christopher Stehr, Franziska Struve

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Intercultural competence as an explicit required skill nearly never appears in job advertisements in international or even global contexts. But especially those who have to deal with different nationalities and cultures in their everyday business need to have several intercultural competencies and further a global mind-set. This way the question arises how potential future global managers can be trained to learn these competencies. In this regard, it might be helpful to see if different types of intercultural trainings have different effects on those skills. This paper outlines lessons learned based on the evaluation of two different intercultural trainings for management students. The main differences between the observed intercultural trainings are the amount of theoretical input in relation to hands-on experiences, the number of trainers as well as the used methods to teach implicit cultural rules. Both groups contain management students with the willingness and perspective to work abroad or to work in international context. The research is carried out with a pre-training-survey and a post-training-survey which consists of questions referring the international context of the students and a self-estimation of 19 identified intercultural and global mind-set skills, such as: cosmopolitanism, empathy, differentiation and adaptability. Whereas there is no clear result which training gets overall a significant higher increase of skills, there is a clear difference between the focus of competencies trained by each of the intercultural trainings. This way this research provides a guideline for both academicals institutions as well as companies for the decision between different types of intercultural trainings, if the to be trained required skills are defined. Therefore the efficiency and the accuracy of fit of the education of future global managers get optimized.

Keywords: global mind-set, intercultural competencies, intercultural training, learning experiences

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Authors: Gloria Toledo, Andrea Lizasoain, Leonardo Mena

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Immigration has largely increased in Chile in the last 20 years. About 6.6% of our population is foreign, from which 14.3% is Haitian. Haitians are between 15 and 29 years old and have come to Chile escaping from a social crisis. They believe that education and work will help them do better in life. Therefore, rates of Haitian students in the Chilean school system have also increased: there were 3,121 Haitian students enrolled in 2017. This is a challenge for the public school, which takes in young people who must face schooling, social immersion and learning of a second language simultaneously. The linguistic barrier affects both students’ and teachers’ adaptation process, which has an impact on the students’ academic performance and consequent acquisition of Spanish. In order to explore students’ academic performance and interlanguage development, we examined how L1 teachers assess Haitian high school students’ written production in Spanish. With this purpose, teachers were asked to use a specially designed grid to assess correction, accommodation, lexical and analytical complexity, organization and fluency of both Haitian and Chilean students. Parallelly, texts were approached from an error analysis perspective. Results from grids and error analysis were then compared. On the one hand, it has been found that teachers give very little feedback to students apart from scores and grades, which does not contribute to the development of the second language. On the other hand, error analysis has yielded that Haitian students are in a dynamic process of the acquisition of Spanish, which could be enhanced if L1 teacher were aware of the process of interlanguage developmen.

Keywords: assessment, error analysis, grid, immigration, Spanish aquisition, writing

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Authors: An-Na Li, Ying-Yu Chen, Chang-Kuang Chiou

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Food tourism is one of the growing industries and areas of interest in the tourism industry today. The Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs) are aware of the importance of gastronomy in order to stimulate local and regional economic development. From the heritage and cultural aspects, gastronomy is becoming a more important part of the cultural heritage of region and countries. Heritage destinations provide culinary heritage, which fits the current interest in traditional food, and cuisine is part of a general desire for authentic experiences. However, few studies have empirically examining food tourist’s behavior. This study examined the effects of cuisine experience, emotions and tourists’ revisit intentions. A total of 402 individuals responded to the on-site survey in the historic town of Lu-Kang in Taiwan. The results indicated that tourists’ cuisine experience include place flavor, media recommended local learning, life transfer and interpersonal share. In addition, cuisine experience had significant impacts on emotions, which in turn cuisine experience and emotions had significant effects on tourists’ revisit intentions. The findings suggested that the cuisine experience is a multi- dimensions construct. On the other hands, the good quality of cuisine experience could evoke tourists’ positive emotions and it plays a significant role in promote tourist revisit intentions and word of mouth. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.

Keywords: culinary tourism, cuisine experience, emotions, revisit intentions

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Authors: U. Ugochukwu, J. Lee, P. Conley

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According to a recent survey by the UT Southwestern Workplace Safety Committee, the three most common on-the-job injuries reported by workers at the medical center are musculoskeletal injuries, slip-and-fall injuries and repetitive motion injuries. Last year alone, of the 650 documented workplace injuries and accidents, 45% were seen in employees in their first-two years of employment. UT Southwestern New Employee On-Boarding program was created and modeled to follows OSHA’s model that consist of: determining if training is needed, identifying training needs, identifying goals and objectives, developing learning activities, conducting the training, evaluating program effectiveness, and improving the program. The hospital’s management best practices were recreated to limit and control workplace injuries and accidents. Regular trainings and workshops on workplace safety and compliance were initiated for new employees. Various computer workstations were evaluated and recommendations were made to reduce musculoskeletal disorders. Post exposure protocols and workers protection programs were remodeled for infectious agents and chemicals used in the hospital, and medical surveillance programs were updated, for every emerging threat, to ensure they are in compliance with the US policy, regulatory and standard setting organizations. If ignorance of specific job hazards and of proper work practices is to blame for this higher injury rate, then training will help to provide a solution. Use of this program in training activities is just one of many ways UT Southwestern complied with the OSHA standards that relate to training while enhancing the safety and health of their employees.

Keywords: ergonomics, hazard, on-boarding, surveillance, workplace

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Authors: Bahia Braktia, Ahlem Ghamri

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Years ago, faculties and administrators realized that students entering college were not prepared for the academic sphere; however, as a type of collaborative learning, peer-review gave students a social context in which they could learn more efficiently. Peer-review has proven its effectiveness in higher education. Numerous studies have been conducted on peer review and its effects on the quality of students’ writing, and several publications recommended peer-review as part of the feedback process. Student writers showed a tendency towards making significant meaning-level revisions and surface-level revisions. Last but not least, studies reported that peer-review helps students develop their self-assessment skills as well as critical thinking. The use of peer-review has become well known and widely adopted to the L2 classroom environment. However, little is known about peer review on translation students. The purpose of this study was to investigate the students' perspective on peer-review, and whether this method affected the quality of their translation. A mixed method design was adopted. Students were requested to translate two texts from Arabic into English, and they gave and received structured feedback to their classmates' translations. A survey was administered, followed by semi-structured interviews, to examine the students' attitudes toward peer-review. The results of the study showed that peer-review was considered a good proofreading method for most students. The students also showed a positive attitude toward it, and they reported that they benefited from the interaction with their peers. The findings implied that the inclusion of peer-review can be an effective pedagogical practice for teaching translation and writing to foreign language learners.

Keywords: language teaching, feedback, peer-review, translation

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Authors: Christos Theoharatos, Dimitris Tsourounis, Spiros Oikonomou, Andreas Makedonas

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This paper focuses on the problem of visually inspecting and recognizing the road conditions in front of moving vehicles, targeting automotive scenarios. The goal of road inspection is to identify whether the road is slippery or not, as well as to detect possible anomalies on the road surface like potholes or body bumps/humps. Our work is based on an artificial intelligence methodology for real-time monitoring of road conditions in autonomous driving scenarios, using state-of-the-art deep convolutional neural network (CNN) techniques. Initially, the road and ego lane are segmented within the field of view of the camera that is integrated into the front part of the vehicle. A novel classification CNN is utilized to identify among plain and slippery road textures (e.g., wet, snow, etc.). Simultaneously, a robust detection CNN identifies severe surface anomalies within the ego lane, such as potholes and speed bumps/humps, within a distance of 5 to 25 meters. The overall methodology is illustrated under the scope of an integrated application (or system), which can be integrated into complete Advanced Driver-Assistance Systems (ADAS) systems that provide a full range of functionalities. The outcome of the proposed techniques present state-of-the-art detection and classification results and real-time performance running on AI accelerator devices like Intel’s Myriad 2/X Vision Processing Unit (VPU).

Keywords: deep learning, convolutional neural networks, road condition classification, embedded systems

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Authors: Ofelia A. Damag

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The study was focused on the development and assessment of the illustrated language activities of the 1996 Edition of the Portage Guide to Early Education. It determined the extent of appropriateness, applicability, time efficiency and aesthetics of the illustrated language activities to be used as instructional material not only by teachers, but parents and caregivers as well. The eclectic research design was applied in this study using qualitative and quantitative methods. To determine the applicability and time efficiency of the study, a try out was done. Since the eclectic research design was used, it made use of a researcher-made survey questionnaire and focus group discussion. Analysis of the data was done through weighted mean and ANOVA. The respondents of the study were representatives of Special Education (SPED) teachers, caregivers and parents of a special-needs child, particularly with difficulties in learning basic language skills. The results of the study show that a large number of respondents are SPED teachers and caregivers and are mostly college graduates. Many of them have earned units towards Master’s studies. Moreover, a majority of the respondents have not attended seminars or in-service training in early intervention for them to be more competent in the area of specialization. It is concluded that the illustrated language activities under review in this study are appropriate, applicable, time efficient and aesthetic for use as a tool in teaching. The recommendations are focused on the advocacy for SPED teachers, caregivers and parents of special-needs children to be more consistent in the implementation of the new instructional materials as an aid in an intervention program.

Keywords: illustrated language activities, inclusion, portage guide to early education, special educational needs

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Authors: Subir Gupta, Subhas Ganguly

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In this paper, we demonstrate the new area of application of image processing in metallurgical images to develop the more opportunity for structure-property correlation based approaches of alloy design. The present exercise focuses on the development of image processing tools suitable for phrase segmentation, grain boundary detection and recognition of micro-constituents in SEM micrographs of ferrite and pearlite steels. A comprehensive data of micrographs have been experimentally developed encompassing the variation of ferrite and pearlite volume fractions and taking images at different magnification (500X, 1000X, 15000X, 2000X, 3000X and 5000X) under scanning electron microscope. The variation in the volume fraction has been achieved using four different plain carbon steel containing 0.1, 0.22, 0.35 and 0.48 wt% C heat treated under annealing and normalizing treatments. The obtained data pool of micrographs arbitrarily divided into two parts to developing training and testing sets of micrographs. The statistical recognition features for ferrite and pearlite constituents have been developed by learning from training set of micrographs. The obtained features for microstructure pattern recognition are applied to test set of micrographs. The analysis of the result shows that the developed strategy can successfully detect the micro constitutes across the wide range of magnification and variation of volume fractions of the constituents in the structure with an accuracy of about +/- 5%.

Keywords: SEM micrograph, metallurgical image processing, ferrite pearlite steel, microstructure

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Authors: Karen V. Lee

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The significance of this study involves autoethnographic research about a music teacher learning about the socialization of gender issues in teaching. Mentorship involving intervention helps with the consequences influencing a transgendered music teacher. Basic storytelling methodology involves the qualitative method of research as a theoretical framework where the author provides a storied reflection about political issues surrounding teachers and the sociology of gender. Sub-themes involve counseling, adult education to ensure students and teachers receive social, emotional, physical, spiritual, and educational resources that evoke visceral, emotional responses from the audience. Major findings share how stories are helpful resources for others who struggle with the socialization of gender. It is hoped the research dramatizes an episodic yet incomplete story that highlights the circumstances surrounding the protagonist having his sex reassignment surgery during his undergraduate education degree. In conclusion, the research is a reflexive storied framework that embraces a positive outlook about a transgendered teacher during his masectomy. The sensory experience seeks verisimilitude by evoking lifelike and believable feelings from others. Thus, the scholarly importance of the sociology of gender and society provides transformative aspects that contributes to social change. Overall, the surgery surrounding the story about transgendered issues are not uncommon in society. Thus, continued education supports the moral mission to help teachers overcome and understand issues of gender that can socially impacts their professional lives as teachers.

Keywords: sociology of gender, transgender, music teachers, story, autoethnography as research, ideology

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Authors: Anny Lucrece Nlend Nkott, Ludovic Temple

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The appearance in 2012 of the CRISPR-CaS9 genome editing technique marks a turning point in the field of genetics. This technique would make it possible to create new varieties quickly and cheaply. Although some consider CRISPR-CaS9 to be revolutionary, others consider it a potential societal threat. To document the controversy, we explain the socioeconomic conditions under which this technique could be accepted for the creation of a rainfed rice variety in Madagascar. The methodological framework is based on 38 individual and semistructured interviews, a multistakeholder forum with 27 participants, and a survey of 148 rice producers. Results reveal that the acceptability of genome editing requires (i) strengthening the seed system through the operationalization of regulatory structures and the upgrading of stakeholders' knowledge of genetically modified organisms, (ii) assessing the effects of the edited variety on biodiversity and soil nitrogen dynamics, and (iii) strengthening the technical and human capacities of the biosafety body. Structural mechanisms for regulating the seed system are necessary to ensure safe experimentation of genome editing techniques. Organizational innovation also appears to be necessary. The study documents how collective learning between communities of scientists and nonscientists is a component of systemic processes of varietal innovation. This study was carried out with the financial support of the GENERICE project (Generation and Deployment of Genome-Edited, Nitrogen-use-Efficient Rice Varieties), funded by the Agropolis Foundation.

Keywords: CRISPR-CaS9, varietal innovation, seed system, innovation system

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Authors: Elaine Marta Pereira Aaltonen

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Effective school leadership materialised in educational settings through the high standard professional performance of senior and middle leaders, has increasingly become an education policy priority around the world due to a wide recognition that schools need knowledgeable, skilled, and committed leaders, along with great teachers, in order to ensure outstanding education at all levels of schooling. The scope of this paper is the work of middle leaders, whose direct influence on teachers and classroom teaching, thus, on student learning outcomes, is a key component for successful school systems. It particularly aims at sharing some of the findings obtained through an academic study recently carried out by the same researcher, which was focused on enhancing understanding about aspects related to the professional performance of educational middle leaders, applied to the context of the lower elementary school division of a private mainstream school located in Brazil. The master´s dissertation findings included identifying the roles performed by a team of educational middle leaders throughout the year of 2021, as well as gaining insights on their perceptions about the roles performed, both through an electronic questionnaire and individual face-to-face interviews. Not only the roles of the middle leaders who participated in the research have been identified through the qualitative case study undertaken, but additional research finding lying within the sphere of the categorisation of such roles, based upon coherent domains of practice, has possibly been made. Hence, the main purpose of this paper is to outline the findings concerning the current roles played by educational middle leaders.

Keywords: roles, middle leaders, educational leadership, school leadership, and management

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Authors: A. Ashraff

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The increasing importance of the web as a medium for electronic and business transactions has served as a catalyst or rather a driving force for the introduction and implementation of recommender systems. Recommender Systems play a major role in processing and analyzing thousands of data rows or reviews and help humans make a purchase decision of a product or service. It also has the ability to predict whether a particular user would rate a product or service based on the user’s profile behavioral pattern. At present, Recommender Systems are being used extensively in every domain known to us. They are said to be ubiquitous. However, in the field of recruitment, it’s not being utilized exclusively. Recent statistics show an increase in staff turnover, which has negatively impacted the organization as well as the employee. The reasons being company culture, working flexibility (work from home opportunity), no learning advancements, and pay scale. Further investigations revealed that there are lacking guidance or support, which helps a job seeker find the company that will suit him best, and though there’s information available about companies, job seekers can’t read all the reviews by themselves and get an analytical decision. In this paper, we propose an approach to study the available review data on IT companies (score their reviews based on user review sentiments) and gather information on job seekers, which includes their Psychometric evaluations. Then presents the job seeker with useful information or rather outputs on which company is most suitable for the job seeker. The theoretical approach, Algorithmic approach and the importance of such a system will be discussed in this paper.

Keywords: psychometric tests, recommender systems, sentiment analysis, hybrid recommender systems

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Authors: M. Kozłowski, M. Kadela

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Foamed concrete is known for its low self-weight and excellent thermal and acoustic properties. For many years, it has been used worldwide for insulation to foundations and roof tiles, as backfill to retaining walls, sound insulation, etc. However, in the last years it has become a promising material also for structural purposes e.g. for stabilization of weak soils. Due to favorable properties of foamed concrete, many interests and studies were involved to analyze its strength, mechanical, thermal and acoustic properties. However, these studies do not cover the investigation of fracture energy which is the core factor governing the damage and fracture mechanisms. Only limited number of publications can be found in literature. The paper presents the results of experimental investigation and numerical campaign of foamed concrete based on three-point bending test of beams with initial notch. First part of the paper presents the results of a series of static loading tests performed to investigate the fracture properties of foamed concrete of varying density. Beam specimens with dimensions of 100×100×840 mm with a central notch were tested in three-point bending. Subsequently, remaining halves of the specimens with dimensions of 100×100×420 mm were tested again as un-notched beams in the same set-up with reduced distance between supports. The tests were performed in a hydraulic displacement controlled testing machine with a load capacity of 5 kN. Apart from measuring the loading and mid-span displacement, a crack mouth opening displacement (CMOD) was monitored. Based on the load – displacement curves of notched beams the values of fracture energy and tensile stress at failure were calculated. The flexural tensile strength was obtained on un-notched beams with dimensions of 100×100×420 mm. Moreover, cube specimens 150×150×150 mm were tested in compression to determine the compressive strength. Second part of the paper deals with numerical investigation of the fracture behavior of beams with initial notch presented in the first part of the paper. Extended Finite Element Method (XFEM) was used to simulate and analyze the damage and fracture process. The influence of meshing and variation of mechanical properties on results was investigated. Numerical models simulate correctly the behavior of beams observed during three-point bending. The numerical results show that XFEM can be used to simulate different fracture toughness of foamed concrete and fracture types. Using the XFEM and computer simulation technology allow for reliable approximation of load–bearing capacity and damage mechanisms of beams made of foamed concrete, which provides some foundations for realistic structural applications.

Keywords: foamed concrete, fracture energy, three-point bending, XFEM

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Authors: Alvaro Aguinaga, Carlos Avila, Edgar Cando

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This article proposes a n-layer architecture, with a web client as a front-end, for the development of a virtual platform for process simulation on CNC machines. This Open-Source platform includes a CAD-CAM interface drawing primitives, and then used to furnish a CNC program that triggers a touch-screen virtual simulator. The objectives of this project are twofold. First one is an educational component that fosters new alternatives for the CAD-CAM/CNC learning process in undergrad and grade schools and technical and technological institutes emphasizing in the development of critical skills, discussion and collaborative work. The second objective puts together a research and technological component that will take the state of the art in CAD-CAM integration to a new level with the development of optimal algorithms and virtual platforms, on-line availability, that will pave the way for the long-term goal of this project, that is, to have a visible and active graduate school in Ecuador and a world wide Open-Innovation community in the area of CAD-CAM integration and operation of CNC machinery. The virtual platform, developed as a part of this study: (1) delivers improved training process of students, (2) creates a multidisciplinary team and a collaborative work space that will push the new generation of students to face future technological challenges, (3) implements industry standards for CAD/CAM, (4) presents a platform for the development of industrial applications. A protoype of this system was developed and implemented in a network of universities and technological institutes in Ecuador.

Keywords: CAD-CAM integration, virtual platforms, CNC machines, multi-layer based architecture

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Authors: A. Myrzabekova, D. Nurmukhamed, K. Nurumov, A. Zhulbarissova

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It is widely believed that stress can affect teachers’ intention to change the workplace. While existing research primarily focuses on the intrinsic sources of stress stemming from the school climate, the current attempt analyzes educational policies as one of the determinants of teacher’s intention to leave schools. In this respect, Kazakhstan presents a unique case since the country endorsed several educational policies which directly impacted teaching and administrative practices within schools. Using Teaching and Learning International Survey 2018 (TALIS) data with the country specific questionnaire, we construct a statistical measure of stress caused by the implementation of educational policies and test its impact on teacher’s intention to leave through the logistic regression. In addition, we control for sociodemographic, professional, and students related covariates while considering the intrinsic dimension of stress stemming from the school climate. Overall, our results suggest that stress caused by the educational policies has a statistically significant positive effect on teachers’ intentions to transfer between schools. Both policy makers and educational scholars could find these results beneficial. For the former careful planning and addressing the negative effects of the educational policies is critical for the sustainability of the educational process. For the latter, accounting for exogenous sources of stress can lead to a more complete understanding of why teachers decide to change their schools.

Keywords: educational policies, Kazakhstani teachers, logistic regression factor analysis, sustainability education TALIS, teacher turnover intention, work stress

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Authors: Juanita Morris

Abstract:

The purpose of this study will examine the mediating relationships between the theories of intelligence, mathematics anxiety, gender stereotype threat, meta-cognition and math performance through the use of eye tracking technology, affecting student perception and problem-solving abilities. The participants will consist of (N=80) female graduate students. Test administered were the Abbreviated Math Anxiety Scale, Tobii Eye Tracking software, gender stereotype threat through Google images, and they will be asked to describe their problem-solving approach allowed to measure metacognition. Participants will be administered mathematics problems while having gender stereotype threat shown to them through online images while being directed to look at the eye tracking software Tobii. We will explore this by asking ‘Is mathematics anxiety associated with the theories of intelligence and gender stereotype threat and how does metacognition and math performance place a role in mediating those perspectives?’. It is hypothesized that math-anxious students are more likely affected by the gender stereotype threat and that may play a role in their performance? Furthermore, we also want to explore whether math anxious students are more likely to be an entity theorist than incremental theorist and whether those who are math anxious will be more likely to be fixated on variables associated with coefficients? Path analysis and independent samples t-test will be used to generate results for this study. We hope to conclude that both the theories of intelligence and metacognition mediate the relationship between mathematics anxiety and gender stereotype threat.

Keywords: math anxiety, emotions, affective domains fo learning, cognitive underlinings

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Authors: Abidoye James Alabi

Abstract:

This study investigated the effect of video-based instructional strategy on junior secondary school academic achievement in social studies. The influence of gender on the academic achievement of student taught with video-based instructional strategy was also examined. The study adopted a pre-test and pro-test control group quasi-experimental design. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 40 students from two schools in Akure town in Ondo State. The researcher developed instructional video package on social studies concept which was used as treatment instrument for the experimental group while the control group was exposed to conventional teaching method. The instruments used in this study are social studies achievement test and instructional video package (IVP). T-test statistic was used to analyse the hypotheses. The findings revealed that experimental group performed better than the control group. It was also shown that gender has no significant effect on students’ academic achievement when exposed to an instructional video package. It was recommended that appropriate training and workshop should be organized by the government for the social studies teachers for effective use of instructional video package in order to enhance teachers productivities and learning among students in secondary schools.

Keywords: instructional video package, conventional teaching method, social studies, junior secondary school

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Authors: Sriram Kashyap Prasad, Ionut Florescu

Abstract:

This study models the intraday asset prices as driven by Markov process. This work identifies the latent states of the Hidden Markov model, using limit order book data (trades and quotes) to continuously estimate the states throughout the day. This work builds a trading strategy using estimated states to generate signals. The strategy utilizes current state to recalibrate buy/ sell levels and the transition between states to trigger stop-loss when adverse price movements occur. The proposed trading strategy is tested on the Stevens High Frequency Trading (SHIFT) platform. SHIFT is a highly realistic market simulator with functionalities for creating an artificial market simulation by deploying agents, trading strategies, distributing initial wealth, etc. In the implementation several assets on the NASDAQ exchange are used for testing. In comparison to a strategy with static buy/ sell levels, this study shows that the number of limit orders that get matched and executed can be increased. Executing limit orders earns rebates on NASDAQ. The system can capture jumps in the limit order book prices, provide dynamic buy/sell levels and trigger stop loss signals to improve the PnL (Profit and Loss) performance of the strategy.

Keywords: algorithmic trading, Hidden Markov model, high frequency trading, limit order book learning

Procedia PDF Downloads 153

Authors: Abdiwahab Guled

Abstract:

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that emanates from a broad range of conditions, which affect the communication skills, social skills. It causes restrictive and repetitive behaviors to individuals. The number of children with ASD is an increasing prevalence around the world. Virtual reality (VR) is an assistive technology, which puts the learner in an immersive learning environment. It allows the learner to interact with that environment in a seemingly real or physical way using special electronic equipment, such as headsets. This exploratory study examines the potential benefits that VR may provide to improving the communication skills of children with ASD. Educating a child with ASD is challenging because access to services, resources, and support for autistic children is inadequate. Therefore, this study intends to investigate the challenges of teaching children with ASD and how VR might help teachers to improve the communication skills of these children with ASD. Online research and literature review were used as a method to gather previously published studies to identify the research gap and provide the groundwork for future studies. Results show that VR offers potential benefits to improving the communication skills of children with ASD but there is a gap in our understanding of the functionalities of all the features of VR technology and how we can utilize it to improve the communication skills of children with ASD. Communication is a broad subject and it is impossible for one study to evidently define the speech challenges of autistic children and provide an irrefutable solution. Therefore, this study proposes further research to dissect how can VR be used to improve the different communication challenges that impede the everyday functioning of autistic children.

Keywords: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD), autistic, Asperger, Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS), virtual reality (VR).

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Authors: Fatin Khairani Khairul 'Azam

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Reading comprehension requires the formation of an articulate mental representation of the information in a text. It involves three interdepended elements—the reader, the text, and the activity, all situated into an extensive sociocultural context. Incorporating metacognitive think-aloud strategy into teaching reading comprehension would improve learners’ reading comprehension skills as it helps to monitor their thinking as they read. Furthermore, by integrating Digital Educational Learning Initiative Malaysia (DELIMa) platform in teaching reading comprehension, it can make the process interactive and fun. A quasi-experimental one-group pre-test post-test design was used to identify the effectiveness of using metacognitive think-aloud strategy via DELIMa platform in improving pupils’ reading comprehension performance and their perceptions towards reading comprehension. The participants of the study comprised 82 of form 1 pupils from a secondary school in Pasir Gudang, Johor, Malaysia. All participants were required to sit for pre-and post-tests to track their reading comprehension performance and perceptions. The findings revealed that incorporating metacognitive think-aloud strategy is an effective strategy in teaching reading comprehension as the performance of pupils in reading comprehension and their perceptions towards reading comprehension were improved during the post tests. It is hoped that the findings of the study would be useful to the teachers incorporating the same strategy in teaching to improve pupils' reading skills. It is suggested that future study should involve the motivation factor of the participants on incorporating think-aloud strategy into teaching reading comprehension as well.

Keywords: DELIMa Platform, ESL Learners, Metacognitive Strategy, Pupils' Perceptions, Reading Comprehension, Think-Aloud Strategy

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Authors: S. Zith Dey Babu, S. Kour, S. Verma, C. Verma, V. Pathania, A. Agrawal, V. Chaudhary, A. Manoj Puthur, R. Goyal, A. Pal, T. Danti Dey, A. Kumar, K. Wadhwa, O. Ved

Abstract:

Background: Skin cancer is now is the buzzing button in the field of medical science. The cyst's pandemic is drastically calibrating the body and well-being of the global village. Methods: The extracted image of the skin tumor cannot be used in one way for diagnosis. The stored image contains anarchies like the center. This approach will locate the forepart of an extracted appearance of skin. Partitioning image models has been presented to sort out the disturbance in the picture. Results: After completing partitioning, feature extraction has been formed by using genetic algorithm and finally, classification can be performed between the trained and test data to evaluate a large scale of an image that helps the doctors for the right prediction. To bring the improvisation of the existing system, we have set our objectives with an analysis. The efficiency of the natural selection process and the enriching histogram is essential in that respect. To reduce the false-positive rate or output, GA is performed with its accuracy. Conclusions: The objective of this task is to bring improvisation of effectiveness. GA is accomplishing its task with perfection to bring down the invalid-positive rate or outcome. The paper's mergeable portion conflicts with the composition of deep learning and medical image processing, which provides superior accuracy. Proportional types of handling create the reusability without any errors.

Keywords: computer-aided system, detection, image segmentation, morphology

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Authors: Arum Perwitasari

Abstract:

Learning L2 sounds is influenced by the first language (L1) sound system. This current study seeks to examine how the listeners with a different L1 vowel system perceive L2 sounds. The fact that English has a bigger number of vowel inventory than Javanese and Sundanese L1 might cause problems for Javanese and Sundanese English language learners perceiving English sounds. To reveal the L2 sound perception over time, we measured the mouse trajectories related to the hand movements made by Javanese and Sundanese language learners, two of Indonesian local languages. Do the Javanese and Sundanese listeners show higher velocity than the English listeners when they perceive English vowels which are similar and new to their L1 system? The study aims to map the patterns of real-time processing through compatible hand movements to reveal any uncertainties when making selections. The results showed that the Javanese listeners exhibited significantly slower velocity values than the English listeners for similar vowels /I, ɛ, ʊ/ in the 826-1200ms post stimulus. Unlike the Javanese, the Sundanese listeners showed slow velocity values except for similar vowel /ʊ/. For the perception of new vowels /i:, æ, ɜ:, ʌ, ɑː, u:, ɔ:/, the Javanese listeners showed slower velocity in making the lexical decision. In contrast, the Sundanese listeners showed slow velocity only for vowels /ɜ:, ɔ:, æ, I/ indicating that these vowels are hard to perceive. Our results fit well with the second language model representing how the L1 vowel system influences the L2 sound perception.

Keywords: velocity profiles, EFL learners, speech perception, experimental linguistics

Procedia PDF Downloads 219