Search

Peer Review of Teaching (PRT) programmes have been implemented in the Higher Education context to ensure teaching is a collaborative, evolving and inspiring activity in an era of ever shrinking resources. These programmes are reported to have many benefits but are notoriously difficult to implement and even more difficult to sustain, with research implicating the mechanics and specific characteristics featured in the programmes as vital to their ultimate success. This paper addresses this issue through first, detailing one version of a PRT programme implemented at one institution and second, by reporting on how the participants of this programme viewed its specific characteristics. Data from participant interviews and forms provide both confirmation of the efficacy of certain features, such as receiving feedback and having the opportunity to observe others and also provide more detail on some lesser researched features, such as the relevance of discipline and number of observations.

This article outlines a structured investigative activity for students in lower secondary school. It was developed for the Australian Mathematics and Science Partnership Programme, a government initiative intended to promote the employment of more hands-on investigations in secondary science within Australian schools. The investigation focuses on water purification and is intended to develop conceptual knowledge of this topic and also high-level skills such as experimental design, particularly in relation to identifying and controlling variables. The investigation is outlined in detail and was trialed with practicing science teachers, school students and preservice secondary teachers. All of these groups provided feedback in various forms that indicated the investigation was valuable, relevant, interesting and allowed students to take some responsibility for their own inquiry learning.

For nearly two decades, the Australian national project Advancing Science and Engineering through Laboratory Learning (ASELL), has been using an evidence based approach to improve undergraduate experiments. This paper presents the ASELL Students Laboratory Experience (ASLE) survey, administered to 2691 students in five disciplines: biochemistry, biology, chemistry, physics, and pharmacology. The 14 item survey probes students’ perceptions of an experiment, practical or fieldwork. An exploratory factor analysis extracted two factors, ‘experiment-based motivators’ and ‘course-level resources’, and both factors correlate well with ‘overall’ learning experiences. Each survey item was also compared to the ‘overall’ learning experiences of the experiment, revealing the most critical elements of each experiment. The implications of this analysis, for practitioners is that the survey items in the ‘course-level resources’ taper off indicating that after an optimum value, further investment in these aspects do not necessarily influence student perceptions of their learning experiences. On the other hand, the survey items in the ‘experiment-based motivators’ behave differently in that they do not taper off indicating that further investment can influence experiences. How these factors relate to the overall experience suggest they correspond to the well-known two-factor theory of motivation.

It has been established that the incorporation of active learning experiences in the context of university lectures increases overall student learning. This study contributes to the literature by examining iterations of incorporating interactivity where the ‘intensity’, in terms of the content, structure and time spent on different in-class activities is varied. The study described in this paper deals in some depth with the use of worksheets during lectures on the topic of circular motion. The study was done with a total of 1405 students studying first-year physics over five years at Mahidol University, Thailand. Over these years, the style of the worksheets as well as the in-class activities were modified. In the first year, the worksheet contained a subsection for note taking as well as problem-solving practice; in the second year, a problem-solving strategy was introduced; in the third year, a lecture demonstration with associated free-body diagrams was included; in the final two years, these diagrams were modified. There was a statistically significant difference between student performance on an examination question of circular motion between the first-year cohort and the cohorts of later years. However, the results for later years indicate a saturation of mean scores. This saturation level needs to be further investigated under different topics, with different cohorts and with different types of active learning.

Teachers need to design their courses to be as similar to real-life situations as possible as genuine learning emerges in real life as opposed to studying in class. Research-based learning is an innovative approach exploring many critical strategies for success in the twenty-first century. In it, students drive their own learning through inquiry, research, and projects that reflect their knowledge. This study aimed to compare research skills resulting from self-evaluations and from tests before and after a training program. The participants included 71 science teachers from the lower north-eastern part of Thailand who attended the Professional Development Program for School Science Research. The results from the self-evaluations indicated that the knowledge levels of research skills were highly relevant to the knowledge levels of research skills shown in the completion of the tests.

Microgreens are emerging functional foods of the 21st century. Compositional data of essential nutrients and anti-nutrient for ten culinary microgreens belonging to eight botanical families are reported in the present study. Microgreens were analysed for protein, dietary fibre profile, ICP-OES based elemental profile and ascorbic acid. Alpha-tocopherol and beta-carotene were analysed using HPLC-DAD. Nutrient Quality Score (NQS 11.2) was computed based on eleven desirable nutrients and two nutrients to be limited and reported for the first time in microgreens. The microgreens were found to be moderate to good sources of protein, dietary fibre and essential elements. They were excellent sources of ascorbic acid, Vitamin E and beta-carotene (pro-vitamin A), meeting 28–116 %, 28–332 %, and 24–72 % of reference daily intake of the respective vitamins. The study revealed low levels of oxalate, an anti-nutrient, in microgreens. Based on NQS 11.2, radish microgreens were found to be the most nutrient dense, followed by French basil and roselle microgreens. Least nutrient-dense microgreens were fenugreek and onion. The NQS 11.2 showed that all microgreens are 2–3.5 times more nutrient dense than spinach mature leaves cultivated under similar conditions. Overall, this study provided critical information useful in selecting microgreens for wholesome nutrition.

Typically, the format of online physics educational videos is closer in style to direct instruction rather than being interactive. One simple way of making videos more interactive is asking questions in one video, providing solutions in the second and seeking student reflection. This study utilises two physics education videos by Derek Muller (Veritasium) which were deployed with 508 first year physics students at The University of Sydney. The students watched the first video, which asked four physics questions, and were prompted to write down their answers. After this, the students were shown the solutions video and asked whether they changed, or did not change their answer, and their reasons for doing so. Data were analysed with a mixed-methods approach. While students whose answers did not match the solutions mostly modified their answers, a nontrivial percentage did not. An interesting finding is that the reasons provided for modifying or not modifying their answers are similar, or ‘mirrors’ of each other. We comment on the nature of the questions and the opportunities for learning by incorporating reflective thinking, particularly through videos that use a question, solution & reflection style.

Social network perspectives acknowledge the influence of disciplinary cultures on academics’ teaching beliefs and practices with implications for academic developers. The contribution of academic developers in 18 scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) projects situated in the sciences are explored by drawing on data from a two-year national project in Australia within a case study research design. The application of a social network lens illuminated the contribution of eight academic developers as weak ties who infused SoTL knowledge within teams. Two heuristic cases of academic developers who also linked across networks are presented. Implications of social network perspective are discussed.

Student experience surveys have become increasingly popular to probe various aspects of processes and outcomes in higher education, such as measuring student perceptions of the learning environment and identifying aspects that could be improved. This paper reports on a particular survey for evaluating individual experiments that has been developed over some 15 years as part of a large national Australian study pertaining to the area of undergraduate laboratories—Advancing Science by Enhancing Learning in the Laboratory. This paper reports on the development of the survey instrument and the evaluation of the survey using student responses to experiments from different institutions in Australia, New Zealand and the USA. A total of 3153 student responses have been analysed using factor analysis. Three factors, motivation, assessment and resources, have been identified as contributing to improved student attitudes to laboratory activities. A central focus of the survey is to provide feedback to practitioners ...

In this review of 64 articles published since the year 2000, a strong association between self-efficacy and student learning outcomes was apparent. Self-efficacy is also related to other factors such as value, self-regulation and metacognition, locus of control, intrinsic motivation, and strategy learning use. The review revealed that university student self-efficacy is higher under certain conditions than others, and that it can be improved. Examples of teaching strategies that may be used to improve self-efficacy are outlined. In screening articles for inclusion in the review, several conflicting definitions of self-efficacy arose. Clarification on the meaning and scope of the self-efficacy term is provided. The interpretation of the results of some studies reviewed was limited by design or analysis issues. Suggestions for addressing these issues in future research and evaluation work is given.

Our study capitalized on a unique natural experiment rather than a researcher-designed, randomized experiment whereby, thanks to the Australian Government's Digital Education Revolution, half of grade 9 students in 2008 received laptops and half did not. Consequently in late 2011, when these students sat for their grade 12 external examinations based on the same curriculum implemented across the state of New South Wales, half of them had been schooled with 1:1 laptops for over three years, and half without. With school principals and district administrators asking the question ‘what will these laptops do to our examination results?' this dichotomous scenario presented us with a unique opportunity to find out. The aim of this study was to evaluate if having 1:1 laptops was a predictor of success in the sciences in the external examinations. The science students (N = 967) from 12 high schools in Sydney, Australia were studied. Using socio-demographic, school and examination data, multiple regression analyse...

Exudates are commonly found in the retinal areas of patients suffering from high diabetes. Improper diagnosis of exudates leads to blurriness in vision, and eventually to blindness. Many machine learning algorithms have been developed to extract exudates and at the same time estimate the area of spread. This paper deals with various algorithms proposed for exudate extraction.

A review of the applications of antimicrobial nanomaterials and nanotechnology in improving various aspects of food safety and preservation is presented in this chapter. The review first summarizes the antimicrobial activity of a number of metallic and inorganic nanoparticles with the mechanism of action and factors affecting antimicrobial activity of the nanoparticles. Initially, an overview is presented of the applications of the nano-antimicrobials in active food packaging systems for preserving foods and for enhancing microbial safety of foods. The recent trend of using nano-based sensors in intelligent packaging systems for detection of microbial contaminants in foods, and the efficacy of nanocomposites in the prevention of biofilm formation and biofouling in food industry is also discussed. Acceptance of this novel technology in various aspects of food preservation and safety requires further studies to establish absence of adverse effects of nano-materials and their safe use on foods and food contact surfaces.

Influenza virus infections in humans remain a healthcare concern, and the need for vaccines, therapeutics and prophylactics remains a high priority. Understanding the molecular events associated with influenza-virus-induced pathology may lead to the identification of clinical disease biomarkers and novel antiviral targets. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are well-conserved endogenous non-coding RNAs known to regulate post-transcriptional gene expression as well as play a major role in many biological processes and pathways. Animal studies have demonstrated that miRNAs are involved in viral disease and controlling inflammation. In this study, we examined the differences in the miRNA expression profiles associated with the lung in mice infected with influenza viruses that varied in virulence and pathogenicity. A statistical model was employed that utilized changes in miRNA expression to identify the virus that was used to infect the mice. This study identified a unique fingerprint of viral pathogenicity associated with seasonal H1N1, swine H1N1 and highly pathogenic H5N1 in the mouse model, and may lead to the identification of novel therapeutic and prophylactic targets.

Science education research has built a strong body of work on students’ understandings but largely overlooked the nature of science knowledge itself. Legitimation Code Theory (LCT), a rapidly growing approach to education, offers a way of analyzing the organizing principles of knowledge practices and their effects on science education. This article focuses on one specific concept from LCT—semantic gravity—that conceptualizes differences in context dependence. The article uses this concept to qualitatively analyze tertiary student responses to a thermal physics question. One result, that legitimate answers must reside within a specific range of context dependence, illustrates how a focus on the organizing principles of knowledge offers a way forward for science education.

To evaluate temporal changes in recorded alcohol consumption in Sri Lanka during and after the armed conflict 1998-2013.District level alcohol sales, and mid-year population data for the whole study period (1998-2013) were consistently available from the Department of Excise and the Department of Census and Statistics for 18 of 25 districts. These data were used to estimate the recorded per capita consumption for the areas that were not directly exposed to the armed conflict. An interrupted time series design was employed to estimate the impact of the end of the armed conflict on recorded adult per capita alcohol consumption of population lived in the 18 districts.Adult per capita recorded alcohol consumption among Sri Lankans living in the 18 districts was 1.59 l of pure alcohol in 1998. This increased up to 2.07 l in 2009 and 2.55 l in 2013. Prior to the end of the conflict in 2009 adult per capita recorded consumption increased by 0.051 l of pure alcohol per year (95% CI: 0.029-0.074, P0.001); after 2009 this was 0.166 l per year (95% CI: 0.095-0.236, P0.001). Beer consumption showed the highest per capita growth compared with other beverages.Adult per capita recorded alcohol consumption among Sri Lankans living in areas that were not directly exposed to the conflict increased markedly after the end of the conflict. Rapid socio-economic development, alcohol industry penetration and lack of alcohol control strategies during the post-conflict period may have driven this increase.Adult per capita recorded alcohol consumption among Sri Lankans living in 18 districts that were not directly exposed to the armed conflict increased markedly after the end of the conflict in 2009, with a dramatic acceleration in the trend of per capita beer consumption.