Digital Commons Network^™

A Defense Of Moderate Invariantism, Leo W. Iacono

Department of Philosophy: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This dissertation is a defense of moderate invariantism, the traditional epistemological position combining the following three theses: invariantism, according to which the word ‘know’ expresses the same content in every context of use; intellectualism, according to which whether one knows a certain proposition does not depend on one’s practical interests; and antiskepticism, according to which we really do know much of what we ordinarily take ourselves to know.

Moderate invariantism needs defending because of seemingly powerful arguments for contextualism, the view that, like ‘I’ and ‘now’, ‘know’ expresses different contents in different contexts. It has been argued that only contextualism …

An Uphill Battle: Incorporating Cooperative Learning Using A Largely Individualized Curriculum, Anna Anderson

Action Research Projects

In this action research study of my classroom of 8th grade mathematics, I investigated if cooperative learning could be an effective teaching method with the Saxon curriculum. Saxon curriculum is largely individualized in that most lessons could be completed without much group interaction. I discovered that cooperative learning was very successful with the curriculum as long as it was structured. Ninety-five percent of the students in the study preferred to work in groups, and I observed mathematical communication grow with most of the students. As a result of this research, I plan to continue to incorporate cooperative learning into my …

Improving Communication About Mathematics Through Vocabulary And Writing, Kelly Georgius

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Master of Arts in Teaching, Summative Projects

In this action research study, where the subjects were my 6th grade mathematics students, I investigated the impact of direct vocabulary instruction on their communication and achievement. I strategically implemented the addition of vocabulary study into each lesson over a four-month time period. The students practiced using vocabulary in verbal discussions, review activities, and in mathematical problem explanations. I discovered that a majority of students improved their overall understanding of mathematical concepts based on an analysis of the data I collected. I also found that in general, students felt that knowing the definition of mathematical words was important and that …

A Study Of The Summarization Of Word Problems, Tara Schwanebeck

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Master of Arts in Teaching, Summative Projects

This action research investigates my sixth grade mathematics students’ ability to solve word problems after instruction and practice using a specific word problem summarization worksheet. The worksheet was designed to break down word problems into smaller parts, helping students comprehend them and, in turn, find success that would enhance their confidence and ability to successfully solve word problems. The worksheets each had a different type of word problem, such as one-step, hidden information, or extra information. The final worksheet consisted of a mixed review of each type of word problem previously practiced in class. Using different types of data collection …

Wei Cheng: From An Elite Novel To A Popular Metaphor, Xi Shi

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

China Beat is a global operation (with posts being written thus far everywhere from Beijing to Boston, Colorado to Cambodia) but it is edited at the University of California, Irvine, and more than a few CB pieces have grown out of casual conversations held on this campus. This post, for example, began when one of us mentioned to Xia Shi, who moved here from Beijing last year to do graduate work in history, that an interesting essay on the novel Fortress Besieged had appeared in the June 12 issue of the New York Review of Books (alas, only a teaser …

The Career Of Major George Broadfoot In Afghanistan And The Punjab (1888), William Broadfoot

Digitized Afghanistan Materials in English from the Arthur Paul Afghanistan Collection

The career of Major George Broadfoot in Afghanistan and the Punjab compiled from his papers and those of Lords Ellsworth and Hardinge, by Major W. Broadfoot with portrait and maps.

An Improved String Composition Method For Sequence Comparison, Guoqing Lu, Shunpu Zhang, Xiang Fang

Department of Statistics: Faculty Publications

Background: Historically, two categories of computational algorithms (alignment-based and alignment-free) have been applied to sequence comparison–one of the most fundamental issues in bioinformatics. Multiple sequence alignment, although dominantly used by biologists, possesses both fundamental as well as computational limitations. Consequently, alignment-free methods have been explored as important alternatives in estimating sequence similarity. Of the alignment-free methods, the string composition vector (CV) methods, which use the frequencies of nucleotide or amino acid strings to represent sequence information, show promising results in genome sequence comparison of prokaryotes. The existing CV-based methods, however, suffer certain statistical problems, thereby underestimating the amount of evolutionary …

Advice, Cautions, And Opportunities For The Teachers Of Binational Teachers: Learning From Teacher Training Experiences Of Georgia And Nebraska Teachers In Mexico, Edmund T. Hamann

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

With the rapid growth and geographic spread of Mexican-origin student populations in the United States, the practice of U.S. teachers going to Mexico for travel study/professional development has become increasingly common. This paper considers what U.S teachers’ Mexican travel study experiences entail by looking at narratives from Nebraska and Georgia educators who made summer trips to Mexico to learn about Mexican education.

Significance Of The Influence Of World View And Racial Socialization On Death Anxiety Beliefs Of Blackamerican Men, Larry Cameron Menyweather-Woods

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Major sociological theories of violent crime have successfully linked criminal activity with socioeconomic status. The linkage of socioeconomic conditions to homicides has led to the theory that the primary determinant of violent crimes lies within a group’s value system and failure to integrate into the dominant culture’s value system crime only increases.

This study investigated whether world view, racial socialization and religion influence the death anxiety and death attitude of Blackamerican men ages 19-35 and 65 and older. If relationship existed, there would be an implied opportunity for building new strategies to decrease the incidence of homicides in the Blackamerican …

Making Strangers Indelible: Eggers, Ondaatje, And Civil War, Guy J. Reynolds

Department of English: Presentations

With no-doubt foreseen timeliness, the German social theorist Ulrich Beck argued in 2000 that a new era had begun. Describing a ‘Second Age of Modernity,’ he stated that ‘towards the end of the twentieth century the condition humana opens up anew… A new kind of capitalism, a new kind of economy, a new kind of global order, a new kind of politics and law, and a new kind of society and personal life are in the making, which both separately and in context are clearly distinct from earlier phases of social evolution.’ Beck pointed to an explosion of ‘empirical indicators …

More Evidence On The Value Of Chinese Workers’ Psychological Capital: A Potentially Unlimited Competitive Resource?, Fred Luthans, James Avey, Rachel Clapp-Smith, Weixing Li

Department of Management: Faculty Publications

As China continues its unprecedented economic growth and emergence as a world power, new solutions must be forthcoming to meet the accompanying challenges. We propose a positive approach to Chinese HRM that recognizes, develops and manages the psychological capital (PsyCap) of workers. After providing a brief overview of hope, efficacy, optimism, resilience and overall PsyCap in today’s Chinese context, the results of a follow-up study provide further evidence that the PsyCap of Chinese workers is related to their performance. The implications that this evidencebased value of Chinese workers’ psychological capital has for China now and into the future concludes this …

Academic Cultural Guides: Sponsors Of Academic Literacy Development, Luis Balmore Rivas

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This dissertation explores Hispanic/Latino students’ perceptions about language association and identity, the institution, and white professors at a small Midwestern liberal arts college. Issues addressed include the origin of a stigmatized relationship between Euro-Americans and Hispanics in the U.S. and its spill into academia, negative perceptions that affect students’ performance and persistence in the university, discussing the culture of power of the institution with students as a form of sponsorship, and providing academic literacy sponsorship through an Academic Cultural Guide role. The dissertation concludes with examples of strategies I have used in the first-year writing classroom to establish transparency of …

Five Sites For Lesson Plans And Teaching Materials On China

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

Many of us who write for China Beat are also teachers. There are multiple web resources that we use, recommend, and, in some cases, have even contributed to. If you teach about China, or are interested in learning more about how Chinese history is being taught in the United States, take a look at these innovative websites and programs.

1. Asia for Educators: Based at Columbia University, this website provides a variety of background information for educators on Asia history topics like the Song Dynasty, China and Europe comparisons, Chinese religion, and the Mongols. The website includes images, literature selections, …

Ken Saro-Wiwa’S Africana Womanist Vision Of Environmental Justice, Julie Iromuanya

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

My paper examines the feminist poetics of Ken Saro-Wiwa’s methodology of protest. Utilizing a gendered pathos, Saro-Wiwa evoked the female body as a metaphor, signaling a connection between the colonization of the land, indigenous peoples, and women in his speech. In the organization of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), he also utilized traditional West African systems that valued a complementary Africana womanist vision of community. In addition, the demonstration he is most remembered for is distinctly patterned after traditional West African female methods of protest. During the 1990’s, already as an established writer, Saro-Wiwa honed his …

Indians, “Esquimaux,” And Race: Identity And Community In The Lands West Of Hudson’S Bay In The Eighteenth Century, Strother Roberts

James A. Rawley Graduate Conference in the Humanities

This paper proposes that a cross-tribal sense of belonging, similar to modern conceptions of racism, facilitated the formation of multi-ethnic communities among the Indian populations living to the west of Hudson’s Bay in the eighteenth century.

Based upon observations made over the course of a century by employees of the Hudson’s Bay Company regarding the attitudes held by their Native American trading partners towards the region’s Inuit populations, this paper concludes that Indians living to the west of Hudson’s Bay in the eighteenth century constructed an inclusive trans-Indian sense of identity based, at least in part, on the exclusion of …

A Gravity Model Of Immigration, Joshua Lewer, Hendrik Van Den Berg

Department of Management: Faculty Publications

This paper develops a gravity model of immigration. Tests of the model using panel data for 16 OECD countries for 1991–2000 confirm the model’s high explanatory power, and examples illustrate its usefulness for testing other hypothesized determinants of immigration.

Graduate Connections- April 2008

Graduate Connections: A Newsletter for UNL Graduate Students

In This Issue:

Click on links to navigate the newsletter

Navigating Graduate School... 1

Mentoring Relationships that Last

Good Practices in Graduate

Education.................................. 3

The Responsible Conduct of Research

Teaching Tip ............................. 4

End of Semester Reflection

Essential Connections............... 5

Fellowship Opportunities on the Web

Professional Development........ 5

Writing a Teaching Statement

Principles of Good Writing

Interactions..................................8

NSF Doctoral Dissertation Awards

Grad Student Poster Competition Winners

Graduate Student Association News

Funding Opportunities................9

Resources for Researchers......11

NURAMP Workshops

Announcements........................11

Summer ITA Institute

SPEAK Test Dates

18^th Annual Campuswide TA Workshops

Commencement Changes …

Accessing High-Quality Instructional Strategies, Edmund T. Hamann, Jenelle Reeves, Bradley Baurain, Graciela Valenciano

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

Superintendent O'Connell's 2007 call for greater public attention to the racial achievement gap in education provides the backdrop for our report. This report is intended to provide research-grounded policy recommendations related to assuring all students access to high quality instruction. This includes describing what California teachers should be helped to do in California classrooms if these classrooms are to be rich and successful learning environments where students from the many backgrounds represented in the nation's largest system of schools are all to fare well academically.

Superintendent O'Connell has expressed particular concern with inequities in current practice and current outcomes, so …

Journal Of The National Collegiate Honors Council -- Volume 9, No. 1 -- Complete Issue

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

CONTENTS

Call for Papers
Submission Guidelines
Dedication to John Grady
Editor’s Introduction -- Ada Long

FORUM ON “HONORS CULTURE”
Defining Honors Culture -- Charlie Slavin
The Culture of Honors -- George Mariz
Creating an Honors Culture -- Jim Ford
Honors Culture Clash: The High Achieving Student Meets the Gifted Professor -- Annmarie Guzy
The Prairie Home Companion Honors Program -- Paul Strong
The Times They Are A-Changin’ -- Dail Mullins

RESEARCH ESSAYS
The New Model Education -- Gary Bell.
The Role of Advanced Placement Credit in Honors Education -- Maureen E. Kelleher, Lauren C. Pouchak, and Melissa A. Lulay
Towards …

The Culture Of Honors, George Mariz

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

What is it that we talk or write about when we talk or write about the culture of honors? Almost always we begin with the second term in the phrase, i.e., honors, the enterprise embodied in programs and colleges in which virtually all of the readers of this journal are engaged. If we think at all about the first term, culture, it is almost certainly for no more than a few minutes, if at all, and then move forward to the really important work. As I write this piece, I am at the moment creating a syllabus for a class …

China Travel: Finding The "Real" China, Kate Merkel-Hess

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

I recently received two new travel books (of sorts) in my mailbox, one of which I wrote a few short bits for. Beijing Time by Michael Dutton, with Hsiu-ju Stacy Lo and Dong Dong Wu, (due out in May from Harvard University Press) andUrbanatomy: Shanghai 2008, edited by Nick Land (published by China Intercontinental Press in 2007) fall at opposite ends of a rather loosely envisioned “travel book” spectrum, but both promise an on-the-ground look at “new” China.

Beijing Time, by Goldsmiths, University of London Professor of Politics Michael Dutton and independent scholars Hsiu-ju Stacy Lo and Dong Dong Wu …

Democracy Or Bust: Why Our Knowledge About What The Chinese Lack Is Really No Knowledge At All

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

An NPR report yesterday on the opening of a new session of the National People’s Congress in Beijing began with a disparaging comment to the effect that China is still a long way from democracy. As a statement of fact, this is no doubt both true and lamentable. As an attempt to convey useful knowledge to American listeners about China’s current situation, however, it seems to me nearly useless. Like many such statements, it is based on an implicit comparison between the Chinese political system and Western-style democracy. And like many such implicit comparisons, it falls victim to a particularly …

Meeting The Needs Of Ells: Acknowledging The Schism Between Esl/Bilingual And Mainstream Teachers And Illustrating That Problem's Remedy, Edmund T. Hamann

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

Nationwide, education researchers, policy makers, and school reformers agree that the education of English language learners (ELLs) is an increasingly important issue as (1) more students in more districts fit in that category (Ruiz-de-Velasco, 2005; Suarez-Orozco & Suarez-Orozco, 1999; Wortham, Murillo & Hamann, 2002); as (2) they, in aggregate, continue to fare less well than most other student populations (August & Hakuta, 1997; Callahan & Gindara, 2004; NCES, 1997); and as (3) policy compliance with the No Child Left Behind Act holds their schools accountable for their cumulative average yearly progress (Abedi, 2005; Crawford, 2004). There is also an emerging …

Successful Schooling For Ells: Principles For Building Responsive Learning Environments, Maria Coady, Edmund T. Hamann, Margaret Harrington, Samboen Pho, Jane Yedlin

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

Guiding Questions

• What are the goals of schooling in general and for ELLS in particular?
• What roles do language and culture play in teaching, in learning, and in the assessment of learning?
• How do we measure the successfulness of schooling for ELLs?
• What factors besides the quality of classroom instruction impact the education of ELLs? How?
• In addition to research-based, age-appropriate literacy instruction, what more do ELLS need in order to develop good literacy skills?
• What is the importance of parental and community involvement in the education of ELLs?

While measurable academic gains in …

Five Chinese Historical Events That Don’T Get Much Attention, Kate Merkel-Hess

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

After Jeremiah Jenne recently posed a question about “the most important Chinese historical figure most people have never heard of,” I got to thinking about the vast expanse of Chinese history that is so often neglected in favor of the (admittedly sometimes more-relevant) post-49 events. In chronological order, here are my five nominations for Chinese historical events I wish were more often talked and written about. What events make your list?

1. The An Lushan Rebellion

Led by the rogue general, An Lushan, the civil war that riled the Tang Dynasty from 755 to 763 caused death by violence and …

Graduate Connections- February 2008

Graduate Connections: A Newsletter for UNL Graduate Students

In This Issue:

Click on links to navigate the newsletter

Navigating Graduate School........... 1

The Dissertation Presentation

Good Practices in Graduate

Education........................................ 4

Helping Students Avoid Plagiarism

Code of Conduct for Teaching

Teaching Tip ...................................... 5

Identifying Relative Importance

Essential Connections...................... 6

Graduate Studies Web Site

Graduate Bulletin Online

Professional Development............... 6

Responding to Academic Job Offers

PFF Call for Nominations

Taking Charge of Your Professional Development

Solving a Teaching Problem

Interactions........................................10

Grad Award Winners

Grad Student Association News

Funding Opportunities.....................12

Resources for Researchers..............14

NEAR Center

Grant Writing Seminar

Announcements................................14

Grad Student …

University Students’ Conceptualization And Interpretation Of Topographic Maps, Douglas Clark, Stephen Reynolds, Vivian Lemanowski, Thomas Stiles, Senay Yaşar-Purzer, Sian Proctor, Elizabeth B. Lewis, Charlotte Stromfors, James Corkins

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

This study investigates the strategies and assumptions that college students entering an introductory physical geology laboratory use to interpret topographic maps, and follows the progress of the students during the laboratory to analyze changes in those strategies and assumptions. To elicit students’ strategies and assumptions, we created and refined a topographic visualization test that was administered before and after instruction to 26 students during the first semester of the study and to 92 students during the second semester. To more deeply understand how students think about and conceptualize topographic maps, we focused on eight individual students who were interviewed about …

China Annals: Interview With Ian Johnson

China Beat Blog: Archive 2008-2012

The China Beat will be posting periodic interviews with journalists who cover China in widely read newspapers and magazines in the US and UK. Our first interviewee is Ian Johnson, China journalist for the Wall Street Journal, and author of Wild Grass: Three Stories of Change in Modern China. In 2001, Johnson won the Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of China.

1) What was the most intriguing, amusing, inspiring, or eye-opening story that you have covered in China?

I think the favorite story I covered was about farmers in northern Shaanxi who were filing class-action lawsuits against the authorities for …

The Average Mutual Information Profile As A Genomic Signature, Mark Bauer, Sheldon Schuster, Khalid Sayood

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering: Faculty Publications

Background: Occult organizational structures in DNA sequences may hold the key to understanding functional and evolutionary aspects of the DNA molecule. Such structures can also provide the means for identifying and discriminating organisms using genomic data. Species specific genomic signatures are useful in a variety of contexts such as evolutionary analysis, assembly and classification of genomic sequences from large uncultivated microbial communities and a rapid identification system in health hazard situations.
Results: We have analyzed genomic sequences of eukaryotic and prokaryotic chromosomes as well as various subtypes of viruses using an information theoretic framework. We confirm the existence of a …

Living “Glocally” With Literacy Success In The Midwest, Loukia K. Sarroub

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

This article examines the concept of glocality as a way to better understand why immigrants, poor people, print-illiterate families, and boys are short-changed by schools that often operate under a deficit model or deprivation model in which students’ economic, language, and gender status is the main determinant for school success. The author offers for discussion a set of themes that address (a) the challenges of recent immigration and resettlement in the Midwestern region of the United States, (b) the concept of glocality in connection to youth literacies and transnationalism, (c) the Midwest as a glocal context, and (d) the implications …