English 102 - Spring 2009

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)

Could help students develop their methods for observing children. This program asserts that the testing of a causal hypothesis involving cognitive development is best done through a combination of observational and experimentational methods. Kathy Sylva and Peter Bryant, both of the University of Oxford, and other researchers share their insights into categorizing and codifying patterns of play through observation, avoiding common experiment-related pitfalls such as covariation and unintentional bias, and mitigating artificiality, a challenge to practitioners of both approaches. (25 minutes)

A film on OhioLINK. The development of language in babies and young children.

A film on OhioLINK. Eager for knowledge, a child is by nature curious about everything. Why, then, is school such an unpleasant place for some children? In this program, teachers, researchers, a psychoanalyst, a neurologist, a neurobiologist, a psychomotor specialist, and others examine the process of learning and the classroom as a learning center. Mastery of reading and writing, the key to unlocking all forms of communication and the entry point to many other exciting domains, is emphasized. In addition, the concept of multiple intelligences is explored. (52 minutes, color)

A film on OhioLINK. How could a child be a top math student yet not be able to read? Why can another child read well but not be able to write a paragraph that makes sense? While watching children being taught new ways to learn, this program offers expert insight into the nature of learning disabilities, why learning disabilities may also be accompanied by ADHD or social disorders, and what can be done to help children learn to compensate and succeed. A Meridian Production. (16 minutes, color)

A film on OhioLINK. Could be useful background information for those researching bilingualism. Melvyn Bragg begins the story of English in Holland, finding ancestral echoes in the Frisian dialect. What follows is a chapter on survival as the English language weathers Viking and Norman invasions, vying with and eventually absorbing rival tongues. Lively settings such as village pubs and markets bring home the lasting influence of Anglo-Saxon, Old Norse, and Old French. The connection between Christianity, Latin, and an alphabet is explored, as well as the role of the language's first champion, King Alfred the Great. Nobel prize-winning poet Seamus Heaney reads from and discusses the first epic in English, Beowulf. This menu-driven disc can be viewed using a DVD player or computer DVD-ROM drive. (50 minutes, color) Part of the "Adventures in English" series.

A film on OhioLINK. Could be helpful for those students studying Biblical literacy. In late-medieval England, English quietly ousted French in law and government but the move to make it God's language meant bloodshed. This enhanced DVD looks at the battle for a Bible in English, a struggle with huge impact on the language itself. Dramatic readings from successive English Bibles show the language's evolution. Location footage and original manuscripts illustrate key figures and events, such as John Wycliffe, the Lollards, and the first English Bible; William Langland's Piers Plowman; Henry V's official correspondence; the role of the Chancery or English civil service; William Caxton's printing press; William Tyndale's translation; and the King James Bible. Can be viewed using a DVD player or computer DVD-ROM drive. (50 minutes, color) Part of the "Adventures of English" series.

Nothing, actually. Aside from our panic that the Internet is melting their brains.

This paper investigates gender differences in academic performance among university athletes at an NCAA Division I school. Using regression analysis, the findings suggest that background scholastic achievement variables and race influence university academic performance for student athletes, but sport participation measures and race are negatively related to university academic performance for males only. The consequences of inequalities between men's and women's athletic programs are explored. Implications for academic programs are discussed. (Abstract from author as it appears on EBSCO.)

A film on OhioLINK. Could be helpful for students researching bilingualism. This menu-powered DVD explores how America's rise as an economic power made it the driving force behind the spread of English in the 20th century. A world tour illustrates how English has mixed with other languages from "Franglais" in France to "Singlish" in Singapore and how the dollar's power, coupled with the lure of consumerism, has made English the international trade language. Bringing it full circle, host Melvyn Bragg returns to the British Isles to survey English as it is spoken there now, measuring the influence of American slang and vocabulary from other languages. Can be viewed using a DVD player or computer DVD-ROM drive. (50 minutes, color)\n\nPart of the "Adevnture of English" series.

A film available on OhioLINK. TV and radio commercials, Web sites and banner ads, magazine ads, pop songs, photos, and even news articles and textbooks: all of them are sending messages to influence the reader/viewer/listener. How do they grab the attention? What are they selling-a product or service? a lifestyle? an ideology?-and why? Would a different media consumer interpret the message differently? This program raises more questions than it answers, which is the whole point: to prompt students to question, question, question the messages they are bombarded with daily. Savvy media consumers aren't born; they're made, and this program is an excellent tool for shaping the classroom dialogue. (35 minutes)

A film on OhioLINK. Could be useful for students analyzing the rhetoric of politics. As Maya Angelou points out in The Power of Speech, "If the words and delivery are powerful, they echo down the centuries." To emphasize the point, Angelou and other writers and orators examine the moving oratory of 14th-century tax protester John Ball, 19th-century slave Sojourner Truth, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Each speaker's technique is examined within the context of why the speech is being delivered, and to whom. Examples of how great orators throughout history have used their skills for good and evil drive home the immense power of the spoken word. A BBC Production. (30 minutes)

A film on OhioLINK. Could be helpful for students researching bilingualism. "Amok," "boomerang," "bungalow," "bangle," "dumdum," "plonk," "assassin"?these are some of the many words that have entered English by way of colonial expansion. This enhanced DVD explores how the British Empire in its heyday exported its language around the globe and how different forms of speech and vocabulary, as well as different attitudes to English, developed out of that colonial expansion. Rich variations of dialect, accent, and slang are heard in many samples from India, the Caribbean, and Australia. Can be viewed using a DVD player or computer DVD-ROM drive. (50 minutes, color) Part of the "Adventure of English" series.

A film on OhioLINK. Implications of such de facto linguistic hegemony in a world of high-tech haves and have-nots.

The British tackled their own education gender gap by letting boys be boys -- with mixed results.

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.

A fantastic article! "The most creative act a human can engage in is not repeating an answer, it is forming a good question." Truer words have never been spoken. Think about this as you write your research papers!

While girls surge ahead in all subjects at school, boys are lagging behind. Is "girl power" to blame? Do boys need their own dose of "empowerment"?

This article is concerned with what it may mean to individuals to engage in practices that are physically challenging and risky. The article questions the assumptions that psychological health is commensurate with maintaining physical safety, and that risking one's health and physical safety is necessarily a sign of psychopathology. The research was based upon semi-structured interviews with eight extreme sport practitioners. The interviews were analysed using Colaizzi's version of the phenomenological method. The article explicates the themes identified in the analysis, and discusses their implications for health psychology theory and practice.

A partnership between the software giant and the Philadelphia School District is an innovative solution to an urban crisis. But can public education survive private management?