Group items tagged

The author reports on the study "To Read or Not to Read," which was released by the United States National Endowment for the Arts. The study found that Americans read less in 2007 compared with previous years. The study found that reading abilities for teenagers and adults have declined, whereas reading abilities for younger children have increased. The impact which the decline in reading abilities has had on American workers is discussed. The author states that the amount of time which people read on a daily basis has declined. (Abstract from EBSCO.)

A film on OhioLINK. Why do girls demonstrate greater reading and writing ability than boys? Is the female brain hardwired for faster verbal development? Should men let women do the talking? This program studies language differences between the sexes and explores the possibility that many communication skills are gender-specific. Following two teams of well-educated adults as they undergo a crash course in broadcast journalism, the program documents wide variations between male and female abilities to verbally multitask, and examines distinctions in physical interaction, eye contact, and other behavioral factors. Clinical evidence regarding the significance of testosterone levels is also explored. (45 minutes)

This article discusses what is critical thinking and tells about how there is no set definition. There are also many people who have tried to develop ways in which to measure ones critical thinking abilities. One such case was a study where they examine students' exams from a college class about Sociology of Marriage and Family and they discussed the results and findings from this study. This article is noteworthy due to its analysis of critical thinking and its interesting study.

This article is about children growing up in a world of technology. The way technology effectcs growing readers and their learning abilities. It also touches on how it changes the way they perceive reading.

The Author suggests that many of Americans Financial difficulties are brought about as a result of a lack of self-regulation. A lack of financial literacy can hit lower-income families the hardest because of their ability to be exploited. Consumers with lack of financial knowledge find themselves caught up in short term benefits rather than long term benefits. Proper knowledge of strategies would enable many individuals to avoid problems and better prepare themselves for the future by protecting themselves in the present.

In this article the authors talk about how students need an engaging work environment to work to their greatest ability, especially in the field of mathematics. It is often difficult to establish high-level tasks for students because these tasks often cause more uncertainty and stress for students since there is more risk involved. Also, provided in the article is a conceptual framework that is a framework for mathematical tasks. The purpose of this study was to show how classroom factors influenced student's engagement of mathematical tasks.

This research was conducted between 12 young obese male students. A series of mental tests as well as a physical abilities test was administered and results were compared to those of healthy-weighted boys of the same age. Results showed no difference between mental tests of obese and normal boys, however the Wisconsin card sorting test demonstrated that obese boys had more difficulty as the test involved continuous shifting of the body. I do not find this study beneficial to my research. It provides factual information, but I feel that it could only serve to demonstrate how obesity can cause negative effects within young children.

This article in the USA Today talks about the Kindle and IPhone. These devices have the ability to put books on the screen and able you to read any time. On the IPhone or IPod Touch the books come up on the screen. With the Kindle, it does the same thing as the IPhone, but it also reads to you.

The author discuses how students researches have begun to diverge from the library for quite some time now and Google Scholar is just more evidence of this. He describes how the lack of student tendency to use the library has struck fear into both university faculty and librarians. He then discusses a number of different approaches that colleges and universities are taking. Some have a strict no Google Scholar, others do not dismiss or endorse it, posting agendas that point users towards the library, and some accept Google Scholar as good enough for student use. This article describes what researchers desire and the ability of Google Scholar to provide this information.

The Author suggests that many of Americans Financial difficulties are brought about as a result of a lack of self-regulation. A lack of financial literacy can hit lower-income families the hardest because of their ability to be exploited. Consumers with lack of financial knowledge find themselves caught up in short term benefits rather than long term benefits. Proper knowledge of strategies would enable many individuals to avoid problems and better prepare themselves for the future by protecting themselves in the present.

This article is from EBSCO. Research was done to find relationships between ethnicity, gender, fast food walk-ability and physical activity in regards to obesity. The relationships show that there is significant variability among gender and ethnicity in regards to obesity. This article may be helpful for students seeking information on fast food and obesity relationships.

The author discusses the difference of a number of federated and public search engines including MetaLib, WebFeat, Google, and Google Scholar. It explains how MetaLab and WebFeat are more accurate in their searches and more objective in the way they display their results. It also describes that educational literacy is still apart of federate search engines, while Google lacks this ability. The author makes important points about the unreliability of Google; however, he/she discusses the use of Google shopping and other Google additions that do not pertain to research on Google reliability.

This article tries to determine if Google Scholar meets the ACRL Information Literacy Standards, which is a measure of a sites ability to meet the informational needs of students and researchers. It discusses Google Scholars inability to create an advance search option that limits types of sources and sort hundreds of articles. The authors later go on to recommend different approaches to researching the same material. This article effectively discusses how Google works to meet researchers' needs as well as ACRL Information Literacy Standards.

An OhioLINK film from the series "Childhood Development: A Cognitive Approach to Developmental Psychology." Starting right from infancy, this program charts the development of language during childhood. Basic language acquisition, learned from rudimentary and higher-level child/caregiver interactions, is described. Aspects of competence that go beyond the purpose of simple communication are also considered, including the skill of using conversation for establishing and furthering social relationships, the ability to employ language as a part of games, the capacity to understand jokes, and the awareness of what other people know and understand at various stages of maturation. (25 minutes)

A film on OhioLINK. This program uncovers what happens in our minds when we learn, remember, and imagine. It reveals how neurons and synapses lay down knowledge in the brain; ways to improve our ability to acquire knowledge, including increased intake of omega-3 fatty acids; how to manipulate memory to recall information more easily; the powerful influence of subliminal messages; and what actually happens during a "eureka moment" and how to have more of them. Stories of a midwife cramming for exams and a firefighter who used intuition to save lives are featured. Original BBCW broadcast title: Get Smart. (60 minutes, color)

Health literacy is basic reading and numerical skills that allow a person to function in the health care environment. Even though most adults read at an eighth-grade level, and 20 percent of the population reads at or below a fifth-grade level, most health care materials are written at a 10th-grade level. Older patients are particularly affected because their reading and comprehension abilities are influenced by their cognition and their vision and hearing status. Inadequate health literacy can result in difficulty accessing health care, following instructions from a physician, and taking medication properly. Patients with inadequate health literacy are more likely to be hospitalized than patients with adequate skills. Patients understand medical information better when spoken to slowly, simple words are used, and a restricted amount of information is presented. For optimal comprehension and compliance, patient education material should be written at a sixth-grade or lower reading level, preferably including pictures and illustrations. All patients prefer reading medical information written in clear and concise language. Physicians should be alert to this problem because most patients are unwilling to admit that they have literacy problems. (Am Fam Physician 2005;72:463-8. Copyright© 2005 American Academy of Family Physicians.)

The Educational Testing Service, the nonprofit group behind the SAT, Graduate Record Examination and other college tests, has developed a new test that it says can assess students' ability to make good critical evaluations of the vast amount of material available to them.

In this article the authors examine different self-concepts of 3000 students in England between the ages of 13 and 14 years. The subjects tested were English, science, and mathematics. The results were found to be similar to other test that had been done before. An interesting finding was that boys had significantly higher self-concept scores than girls, except for in English.