Philippines Annexation Essay

Although controversial to some, the Americans made the right decision to annex the Philippines after successfully freeing them from Spanish tyranny and rule. Without American rule and support, the Philippines would have been an easy target to be taken over by Germany, England or Japan who all would have savaged the land and further suppressed the people. The Filipinos were weak, inexperienced and not ready to establish their own government and self rule themselves. During the time of the annexation, the Americans needed a strategic place in that part of the world to protect their interests, expand their trading partners and show the world they were a power to be reckoned with in spreading democracy. So even though the annexation of the Philippines was views by some as doing the same things as some of the other major countries, the Americans always viewed it as a short term solution to educate the people, help them establish themselves to self rule and to allow them time to prepare to protect themselves from other enemies. At the time the decision to annex the Philippines was made, there were other countries waiting and ready to attack and takeover the control that Spain had lost to the Americans. American rule allowed human rights, freedoms and quality of life that would not have been possible had America walked away and allowed the fledgling country try and rule itself. Germany, England, Japan and even Spain would have jumped at the opportunity to take over control of the Philippines and its many resources. Many important and profitable trade routes utilized the Philippines as a gateway to trade their goods and wares. Although it was profitable for the Americans to control this area and have access to the trade routes and resources, they were helping prepare the Filipinos to one day self rule and govern themselves as a free and independent country. Definitely not an opportunity they would have gained under rule of one of the other dominant and brutal governments. As Albert Beveridge so eloquently stated in â€Å"The March of the Flag† speech, â€Å"We can not retreat from any soil where Providence has unfurled our banner, it is ours to save†¦ for liberty and civilization. Having been brutalized  and controlled for so many years under the tyranny control of Spain and its leaders, the Filipinos were ill prepared and ready to set up their own government and rule for themselves. There would not have been any experienced and supported leader that would have gained the support of most Filipinos. This would have led to fractions fighting, internal battles and weakness within the country. These conditions would have made the Philippines an easy target to be retaken and lose their path to independence they had by being annexed by the Americans. The Americans trained their leaders, helped establish an internal military as well as set up a military base that helped to protect their people from outside attacks and takeovers from other coun tries. Even though others like Abraham Lincoln stated â€Å"that no man is good enough to govern another man without that other’s consent,† leaving the Philippines to be savaged by others would have been much worse for the Filipinos than the temporary annexation by the Americans. During the time the Americans defeated the Spaniards and gained control over Cuba and the Philippines, the world was in constant battle. Many of the powerful countries were trying to expand, conquer and takeover weaker countries and lands. The Americans who believe in democracy and freedom for people knew that they had to show their strength and protect others in the process. The part of the world where the Philippines lies was one of the most volatile and dangerous in the world. That being said, it also had some of the most profitable trade routes, richest resources and was a vital part of the world to have a stronghold. By following through with the annexation of the Philippines, the Americans were able to gain a stronghold on the other side of the world, enrich themselves by gaining access to the valuable resources that were so plentiful and to take the time to help spread freedom and democracy. William McKinley clearly believed and stated that â€Å" we could not turn them over to France and Germany – our commercial rivals in the Orient – that would be bad business and discreditable.† There were many arguments as to the merits of annexing the Philippines or to walk away and grant them their immediate freedom. The Filipinos had been tormented, had their land savaged and destroyed by Spain for so long, there was truly only one humane and correct decision and that was to annex the Philippines. The Americans although financially gained from the decision, never waivered from their long-term commitment to help to train, educate and prepare the Filipinos to  self-rule and govern. Establishing a stronghold in that part of the world helped the Americans establish themselves as a world power and leader in personal freedoms and spreading of democratic governments. With America and its military located on the Philippines they were able to protect the Filipinos from attacks from others with bad intentions such as Germany, England, Japan and Spain. During the time of American annexation, the Filipinos united together, learned the skills necessary to survive and protect themselves from others and over time gained the long-term independence and freedom they never would have secured if not for the annexation of the Americans.

Vinca plants

The experiment is to take 4 Vinci plants, which are about the same size, health, and flowering stages and find out which one will grow the best. Each of the plants will have 75 ml of a liquid dally for 10 days. My Grandma bought them from Loses on September 20, 2011 for me. Breakdown of the plants are as follows: Control plant will get tap water. Plant A will get Milk from the refrigerator. Plant B will get Lou Ana Pure Vegetable 011. Plant C will get sweet tea. We made up a pitcher Just for the experiment, so that It s the same every day.Experiment: Every day for 10 days put in 75 ml of liquid of a specific liquid into each plant and see which one will grow the best. Hypothesis: I think the one with milk is going to grow best of the three, not including the control. Milk is good for the body and I think it could also be good for plants. Day Before The Experiment Began: Mom got the plants for me from Loses the day before so they were fresh. Also will need 4 Styrofoam plates, 4 equal size containers for the liquids, masking tape, permanent markers, camera, and ruler. 1 . Take the plants to area they are going to e entire time.For me it was the covered lanai in the back of our house. 2. Put Styrofoam plates and place one under each plant – prevents cross contamination and keeps the table clean. 3. Get roll of masking tape and a permanent marker. 4. Cut tape into 4 equal strips. 5. Mark each strip with name and put on plant. 6. Collect the four containers for the liquids. 7. Put in 1st container water from the tap and put lid on it. In 2nd container, poured in 4 cups of milk, in 3rd container made up sweet tea and poured in 4 cups, and in final container poured in 4 cups of vegetable oil.Water and oil containers remained on the counter, and the milk and tea containers were in the refrigerator. Day Of The Experiment: I decided to measure and water my plants before school in the morning and early on the weekends. 1. Day one, I then took pictures of each plan t. 2. Then I measured each plant and wrote down the sizes in my Journal. 3. With a measuring cup, I measure out ml (1/C) of each liquid and pour it into the proper plant. I rinse out the glass cup in between each type of liquid. 4. I Jot down observations on the plants each day in a Journal. 5.I also look at the newspaper to e accurate on the temperatures for the day before and note it in the Journal, along with any weather (like rain, clouds, etc). 6. Repeat steps 1 thru 3 for the next 10 days. September 21, 2011 Day 1 of the Experiment: Observations: All four plants are new, very healthy and have many flowers in different stages of opening. Plants are in original container with Styrofoam plates under them so there is no cross contamination. Plants are in the covered porch area to keep from getting wet from any rain so they will not be contaminated by rain water. Get sun all afternoon.We took pictures and measurements of plants, as seen below. Control Plant – Water 9†³ tall Plant A- Milk Plant tall Plant C – Sweet Tea 8†³ tall 94/72 Very Sunny! All plants are the same height as yesterday. All still look very healthy. The water, sweet tea and milk plant were dry on the bottom today – oil was very wet. It had a good pool on plate. Flowers still look good on all. It was very sunny in the morning, warm and had a lot of rain in the afternoon. Control Plant – Water 9 h†Ã¢â‚¬  tall Plant C- Sweet Tea 8†³ tall 90/73 September 23, 2011 Day 3 of the Experiment: sweet tea, and milk plant were dry on the bottom today – oil was very wet.It had a good pool on plate. We had to dump out so it did not run all over the table. Flowers still look good on all – I am surprised. Had some sun before it rained. 91/72 September 24, 2011 Day 4 of the Experiment: plate NASTY!! It was full of stinky pond type scum. My mom made me change the plate because it stank and was worried about the small bugs flying around the plant. Oil and tea plants are okay. All plants are very moist. All plants still look okay. Pictures taken this morning to show new look. It was cloudy most of the day. Forecast calls for rain all weekend. 0 Control Plant – Water 10†³ tall Plant B -Oil 8 h† tallPlant C- Sweet Tea 9†³ tall 92172 September 25, 2011 Day 5 of the Experiment: They all look the same. Milk plant really stinks – small bugs flying around it. Cloudy most of the day. Plant A- Milk 9†³ tall Plant 8 w tall Plant C- Sweet Tea 8 h† tall 90/72 September 26, 2011 Day 6 of the Experiment: The milk plant stinks and there are bugs flying around it and the flowers are falling off. All others look okay. 0 Plant A -Milk 8 withal Plant B -Oil 8 w tall Plant C -Sweet Tea 8 h† tall 92/70 September 27, 2011 Day 7 of the Experiment: Milk plant really STINKS-there is a foam like scum that comes out after giving it a rink.The flowers are dying and falling off. Leaves not so big, plant looks worse today-leaves look less green than the others. The milk plant is SHRINKING!!!!!!!! Control Plant – Water 10 h† tall Plant A- Milk 7 h† tall Plant 8†³ tall Plants-sweetmeat 7†³ tall September 28, 2011 Day 8 of the Experiment: The control plant is doing The milk plant is The oil plant is kind slouchy. Sweet tea plant doing fine. Plant A- Milk 7†³ tall Plant B -Oil 7 h† tall September 29, 2011 Day 9 of the Experiment: The control plant is the only one doing good. All others are dying. Leaves all crinkled, plants leaning over.Milk plant still stinks. Gave it new plate hoping some of the bugs would go away. Cannot tell if others stink. Plant B -Oil 7 w tall 90/68 September 30, 2011 Day 10 of the Experiment: Milk plant is disgusting. It smells so bad that my grandma threw up when moving it this morning. Had to move plants away from the door – smell was too gross! New pictures of the plants were taken. All plants except control are dying . Leaves all crinkled all leaning over and the flowers are dying. Control plant looks great. Plant B -Oil 7†³ tall 90/67 All of the plants, except the control plant, are definitely dying.Apparently, you should never give plants anything but water. The dying plants have wilted leaves and the flowers are all crumpled up. The dying plants have all shrunk in size. The control plant is healthy green and tall. Plant A- Milk 6†³ tall Plant 6 h† tall Plant C -Sweet Tea 6 h† tall CONCLUSION OF MY EXPERIMENT: The only plant that did well was the one with plain water. My hypothesis was wrong. The milk plant did the worst by far! If I was to do this experiment again, I would never, and I mean never, pick milk as one of the liquids.I would like to try some more different liquids, like tap water with oracle grow (fertilizer) and made Cool-Aid, because it is basically water with sugar and food coloring. I would like to see if plant does well with Cool-Aid because it is almost all water and would like to know if the food coloring would change the color of the plant/flowers. I would like to run this experiment in the summer time when it is hotter and they would get more sunlight. Wonder if the failed plants would have died faster in hotter temperatures or if they would have fared better. My other thought on liquids was the try Coca-Cola as one of the liquids.

Investigating Probation Strategies with Juvenile Offenders

SUMMARY Investigating Probation Strategies with Juvenile Offenders: The Influence of Officers’ Attitudes and Youth Characteristics Benita Byers Ray Davis Jessica Hoff Jessica Stein Just 326 Juvenile Justice System September 14, 2012 Although large investments in resources are used to deal with delinquent youths, there have been only sporadic efforts to research effective probation practices.Since most youth encounters with the juvenile justice system, accounting for over 60%, occur under supervision by Probation Officers (POs), the Probation Practices Assessment Survey (PPAS) was used to evaluate various types of interventions. This was a web-based study that utilized a sample of 308 POs and measured deterrence, restorative justice, treatment, confrontation, counseling and behavioral tactics.For example, while Lipsey’s influential multi-study analysis shows that â€Å"probation has a small but significant impact on youth outcomes,† literature on inventive and pro gressive probation practices shows little improvement to date. There is little research that describes various probation strategies for youth and their effectiveness. Youth probation usually vacillates between punishment and rehabilitation. Historically, advocates of progressive approaches viewed punishment and its reliance on monitoring and rule enforcement as a response to poorly trained and overworked POs.On the other hand, rehabilitation has been viewed as a benevolent relationship between POs and youths with intent to humanize the juvenile justice system. During the mid through late 1900s, the public demanded a more disciplinary reaction to youth crime, advocates of victims rights wanted more input into the process and increasing support of the rehabilitative model caused three objectives, known as the ‘Balanced Approach’ to become prominent in addressing youth delinquency.To protect public safety, POs utilize deterrence-based interventions utilizing increased moni toring, fines, detention, and technical violation of probation to promote youth expectations that delinquency is not worth the cost. To hold youths accountable for their offenses, POs promote restorative justice policies through offenders meeting with their families, the victims and community members to decide together how the offender can best make amends and promote reconciliation, often through community service and restitution.To promote rehabilitation, POs utilize resources such as tutoring to improve school performance; family, substance abuse and/or mental health counseling; mentoring programs to model achievement based skills and increase access to resources; and, other programs to improve life chances. While the balanced approach suggests that POs utilize individualized treatment of offenders in order to exact the best outcomes, research shows that POs attitudes towards punishment and rehabilitation vary.Additional problems occur when longstanding biases influence POs attit udes. For example, these unconscious biases include higher expectations of recidivism and endorsing stronger attitudes of punishment towards youth offenders of color and â€Å"girls being seen as very difficult to work with†. Previous research has not addressed the different strategies and frequency of specific interventions with an individual within a specific period of time utilized by POs in dealing with youth delinquency as does the PPAS.This survey utilizes 28 items measuring the frequency of three case management approaches, as deterrence, restorative justice and treatment orientations, as well as compliance enhancing strategies, as confrontation, counseling and behavioral tactics, during the past three (3) months. Method A sample of 308 respondents completed the survey, recruited through an announcement in an electronic newsletter for POs with inclusion into a drawing for a $20 e-gift certificate to an online retailer as incentive.The respondents were to insert their n ames into an alphabetical list of their juvenile caseloads and select the next youth who was (1) formally adjudicated, (2) known to the respondent for at least three months, and (3) under 18 years old. The respondents completed 31 questions about youth demographics, offending characteristics and psychosocial characteristics, including five items combined to measure prior heath and social services involvement and five items combined to measure psychosocial needs.Thirteen items measure case management approaches, fifteen items measure compliance practices. Respondents reported their personal demographics, years of experience in juvenile justice settings and level of education, six items addressing their attitudes toward punishment, two items measuring their beliefs about POs helpfulness with youths who have alcohol and mental health problems and two items measuring their beliefs about the effectiveness of mandated treatment on drug and mental health problems.Out of all cases, only 56% were completed correctly with all variables. Data was imputed multiple times using the SAS Proc MI (Schafer, 1997). SAS Proc MI is an interactive procedure that replaces missing data with estimates based on observable relationships observed in the data. By introducing random error, multiple imputations result in a more accurate variance estimates compared to other imputation procedures (Allison 2002). When comparing the complete data analysis, the listwise deletion and the imputed data, they were unimportant.Nearly 25% of the youth were female and about 40% were of color. Usually, youth were approaching 16 years old, were 33% were 15 or younger and 67% had prior offences. Felony adjudications were most common, about 33% had property related offences, 25% had person related offences and 20% had drug related offences. The average youth a specialized intervention prior to their recent adjudication (specialized mental health, substance abuse, or child welfare) and had nearly three out of six risk factors.PO’s were 64% females, 83% were white and 23% had master’s degrees. Analysis started with a confirmatory factor analysis for 7 PPAS subscales: deterrence orientation, restorative justice orientation, treatment orientation, confrontational tactics, counseling tactics, behavioral tactics and contact frequency (Muthen & Muthen 1998-2006). This model had acceptable fit, however, it was unstable do to a high linear between the two factors: Deterrence and Confrontation. Several adjustments were made but they all continued to have errors.The final analysis examined the predictors of class membership. Ordinal regression was chosen because three classes possess ordinal-level qualities. The Latent Class Analysis began by estimating the optical number of groups or classes required to describe how probation practice clusters. Classes were not distinguished by a dominant subscale score, but rather by a general level across all of the subscale scores. Probation O fficers reported using restorative justice interventions less than any other approach.In terms of contact, Probation Officers averaged about 18 contacts to the youth, parents, schools and service providers during a three month period. In terms of youth’s age, odds of having a more intensive probation decreased 28% for every one year of increase. PO’s attitudes about the helpfulness of probation, an increase in one point increased the odds of more intensive probation by 38% while an increase in favorable attitudes from one standard deviation below the mean to one standard deviation above the mean, led to a fivefold increase in the odds of more intensive probation.PO’s implement a balanced approach with delinquent youths, they blend both accountability and rehabilitation based approaches. In case management approaches, PO’s use approaches informed by deterrence and treatment equally, but are less inclined by restorative justice. PO’s use confrontatio n, counseling and behavioral tactics about the same when it comes to compliance strategies. Probation practices vary along key youth and Probation Officers characteristics.PO’s that really agrees with punishments emphasizes accountability in their interventions and may make fewer contacts with youth and PO’s who endorse treatment would strongly focus on the rehabilitation aspects of supervision and devote more time to each case. Younger youths receive a more accountability approach and more frequent contacts than the older youths. PO’s giving more resources to younger youths may indicate greater hope or urgency, for prevention with these youths and more dependency from the older youths.Several predictions did not predict probation in this study, race and gender, they stand out as a key findings. Research with probation and the juvenile justice decision making strongly suggests that the juvenile court interventions are influences by race and gender. Youth race an d gender were not associated with probation practices in the current study suggests two alternatives. First, measures and methods employed in this study may not have been sufficiently sensitive to detect biased treatment leading to a type II error. It is apparent that youth with a higher cumulative risk and needs receive more probation approaches.This demonstrates the priorities of the PO’s convergence with the contemporary juvenile justice mandates which calls for individualized court interventions based on an assessment of risks and needs (Hoge, 2002; Howell, 2003). References Schwalbe, Craig S. and Maschi, Tina. (Oct. 2009). Investigating Probation Strategies with Juvenile Offenders: The Influence of Officers’ Attitudes and Youth Characteristics. Law and Human Behavior. Vol. 33, No. 5, Pp 357-367. Springer. Retrieved from JSTOR online 9/12/12 at 2:12pm. Schafer, J. L. (1997).Analysis of incomplete multivariate data. New York: Chapman & Hall. Schafer, J. L. , & Graha m, J. W. (2002) Missing data: Our view of the state of the art. Psychological Methods, 7, 147-177. Doi: 10. 1037/1082-989X. 7. 2. 147. Allison, P. D. (2002). Missing data. Thousand Oaks: Sage. Hoge, R. D. (2002). Standardized instruments for assessing risk and need in youthful offenders. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 29, 380–396. doi: 10. 1177/0093854802029004003. Howell, J. C. (2003). Preventing & reducing juvenile delinquency: A comprehensive framework. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Managing Virtual Teams Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Managing Virtual Teams - Essay Example Under the virtual arrangement, we shared out work and through communication while students go home, with some going as far as Europe but make tremendous contributions than when we at campus where laxity seems to crop up. In terms of the discussion given by Ernst, Hoegl and Siebdrat (2009), it is true that there must be a good coordination of the virtual team in order for results to be realized. The authors confirm my observation that my team relied on sharing out work and an active group leader who ensured that the necessary contribution was done through communication. According to Majchrzak, Malhotra and Rosen (2007), certain effective leadership of the team is very important in the determination of success of the virtual team. A different perspective is given by Balsmeier, Bergiel and Bergiel (2008) who argue that virtual teams face many challenges among them is the remote capacity to deal with conflicts since the members cannot have an open forum for immediate response likely to iron out differences. It is clear that a more keen interest must be paid to more seasoned organizations willing to adopt the virtual team arrangement. Among the best practices which must be implemented include a clear definition of the targeted goals and rewards for the team (Briggs, Nunamaker and Reinig, 2009). According to the author, this acts as a reminder of the need to keep motivated since there is lack of physical motivators. The authors also reckon that focus must be sustained and directed on the tasks. Familiarity is among the team members assists in understanding the contributions that each member can make. This implies that a virtual presence must be established through appropriate leadership guided by set out standards. Training of the team members may be useful and ensuring expeditious approach may also require anonymity for independence as

Implementation and Support Activities Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Implementation and Support Activities - Essay Example Therefore, organizations should have a budget for supporting and maintaining the systems that they have. Implementation activities are complex and interdependent as it involves the coordination of many people and tasks. The people involved perform implementation activities in programming and testing. It is risky as more time and resources are required while developing implementation activities (Satzinger, Jackson, & Burd 2010). The components used in software should minimize the use of recourse usage and maximize the testing of the system as well as to correct errors. Moreover, when implementing a change, the user, or the technical team need to know what parts need a replacement and ensure the resources required to implement the changes are secured (Yao, 2010). The design schedule and implementation activities need consideration and finally, the development of the testing plan for the changed system. In addition, implementation activities take place on a copy of the system that is operational. There is the production system that used on a daily basis, the test system that modifies the test changes. On the other hand, it is difficult to manage implementation, as activities should occur in a sequenced manner through monitoring the process. After the system is up and running, the user needs to be trained on using the new system. User support includes a help desk, a department that provides support to the end user. Help desks have employees who are trained to operate and install software’s. They also assist with any problems or questions that the user might have. Online documentation is built into an application and its main purpose is to provide the user with useful information that they can use whenever they need it. The technical team is a function within the IT department that offers maintenance services whenever needed. Additionally, system enhancement and maintenance activities ensure that there is proper functioning and the efficiency is

Movie Scene Analysis Assignment Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Scene Analysis Assignment - Movie Review Example Here too the director tries to be an unseen observer. The death of a Samurai and the raping of his wife is the core incident of the story. It was woodcutter in the forest who discovers the body of the killed samurai. A priest is also a witness. But during the trial four witnesses including the wood cutter and the priest give different verses of the incident. The film tells us that it is difficult or near impossible to reach the truth, merely through the versions of witnesses, for every one will have his or her perspectives of things and all human memory is clouded by one’s own judgment, perception and ego. A very interesting scene or sequence of the film is in the beginning where the woodcutter is walking through the forest with his axe slung on his shoulder. The scene is composed of very sensuous movement of the camera, and is of duration of two minutes. It has no dialogue. The scene is a part of a flash back; incidentally the whole film is a flash back. The scene is construc ted in 16 shots , of which the wood cutter appears in twelve .There are three prominent close ups--- A present time close up of the face of the wood cutter and past time close up of the hat of the lady raped , hanging on a bush. ... During the fifties this was considered to be a taboo in cinematography and the cameraman, Miyagava Kazuo defies this tradition and creates wonderful image on the screen. Camera looking direct to the sun may be common in films today. But during those days the belief had it that the sun rays entering direct into the lens would burn the film in the camera. But here the shot direct into the sun gives the viewer the mis-en-scene experience of the camera, or the viewer himself entering into the heart of the forest. He himself is entering the forest along with the camera. It leads the viewer into the light and shadow world of the forest where the human mind can lose its way. This shot and the whole scene was often cited as one of the most remarkable camera work in black and white cinematography. The movement of the object in front of the camera creates the mental mood of the scene. In this scene of the twelve shots in which the wood cutter appears, in shots 13 and 15 the wood cutter moves r ight to left of the camera, in shots 2, 4, 5 and 9 he moves left to right of the camera; in shots 3 and 16 he moves towards the camera and in shots 8 and 14 he moves away from the camera. The shot 11 is much more complicated as far the movement of the object with in the frame is concerned. Here the woodcutter moves left to right and then right to left .In shot 6 he moves first left to right and then towards the camera and finally away from the camera. Here Kurosawa creates a sort of a complex rhythmic montage, which concentrates on the contradiction of the movements with in the frame. This choreography of the movements of the character in front of the camera creates a feeling that he is walking wayward as if getting trapped some where. It symbolizes the fact that he is getting

Article critique Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Article critique - Essay Example Participants/Subjects The participants/subjects consisted of 22 adolescents between the ages of 13 and 19 from a school for children suffering from physical maladies. The students were selected from a random population sample and divided into two groups: an experimental group and a control group. Both groups were subjected to a three month training program which proceeded three times each week. Tests measuring walking speeds, gross motor skills and muscle tone were conducted both prior to and after the program commenced and ended. The control group’s program consisted of treatment and traditional physiotherapy which involved three exercise regiments with balance, gait, mat and â€Å"functional gross motor activities† (Chrysagis, et. al., 2012, p. 747). The experimental group’s program consisted of treadmill training without the use of support for body weight and with a â€Å"comfortable speed† (Chrysagis, et. al., 2012, p. 747). Findings At the conclusion of the three month program research findings indicated that there were appreciable differences between the experimental group and the control group in terms of GMF and walking speeds. In both cases, the experimental group’s GMF and walking speed scores were greater than those for the control group. There was no significant difference in the muscle tone outcomes between the two groups. Thus results of the study indicate that treadmill training may contribute to an improvement in walking speeds and GFM of ambulatory adolescents with cerebral palsy without having a negative impact on muscle tone. Limitations of the Study The study is limited by the fact that it was conducted among a relatively small population sample. The population sample consisted of only 22 adolescents and when divided into two groups further narrowed the sample down to 11 in each group. The validity of the results among such a small population is further compromised by the fact that the students were selecte d from the same school. Selecting all students from one facility where they share the same physical education regiment indicates that the results of the study may very well be related to other physical education activities shared by the group at school. The difference in the outcome may have been mere coincidence since the sample sizes were so small. A larger sample population among students from different schools would have made the results more valid. Authors Acknowledge Limitations The authors pointed out limitations of their own. The acknowledged limitations included the observation that the student participants were not tested for muscle strength and endurance and that the results of the test may have been influenced by muscle strength and endurance. The authors also noted that interventions and support during the training program by physical therapists might have contributed to the results of the study as well. Implications The study can be useful to physical education teacher s who train ambulatory students with cerebral palsy. It indicates that the treadmill can be a safe alternative for students with cerebral palsy to possibly improve walking speed and GMF, if used with the help of physical therapists or with close supervision. Next Study Based on the results of the study and the limitations reported I would conduct further research on the impact of the treadmill on muscle, tone, strength and endurance, GMF and Walking Speed of adolescents with

Valuing an IPO for aSstart-up Biotech Company Essay

Valuing an IPO for aSstart-up Biotech Company - Essay Example The company sees itself having unique intellectual property which will give it significant advantages in the area of greenhouse gas mitigation. This is seen as the largest market within their portfolio and with an equal degree of difficulty to establish when compared to other technologies such as cyanide recovery or caustic recycling. Hence it will have the greatest influence on pricing shares for an IPO. â€Å"To be the leading suppliers of propriety technologies to our customers from all over the world specially Australia with focus on providing technologies which can assist firms in creating a better environment for our future generations† We aim to become one of the leading players in offering propriety technology to most of the customers from Australia. Our focus therefore will be on providing technology which can assist our customers in creating a better environment for our future generations to come. Markets for such technologies are relatively large and can offer potential business prospects owing to the extent of their size and operations. For example, there are seven major oil refineries that are currently operating in Australia with almost 85% of the oil requirements are fulfilled through domestic production of oil and petroleum products.1 We therefore see a large market which can be potentially exploited in order to gain access to the market which is really more attractive for this type of business. Since consumers are becoming more and more savvy and are demanding firms to be more socially responsible. With more focus on implementing legislative frameworks which require firms to employ technologies which can help reduce the impact of pollution on the environment, we believe that the firms will be interested in acquiring such technologies which can assist them not only to meet the regulatory requirements but also fulfill the expectations

TIMED TEXTUAL ANALYSIS-- Film <Seven> the first five minutes in the Assignment

TIMED TEXTUAL ANALYSIS-- Film the first five minutes in the beginning - Assignment Example This quiet, sombre setting implies that this man is lonely and unhappy. When the camera moves quickly to a shot of this mans reflection in a mirror as he fixes his tie, this sense of loneliness is echoed again and we also get an idea of other aspects of his personality and life, namely, that he is a professional and that he is extremely orderly. He appears to be very well groomed and is adjusting his tie with detailed precision. It appears as though he is a professional and has an important job. Props are used strategically, as the camera quickly cuts to a stand where a line of objects is lain in a neat row. The neatness and organisation of these objects and of his bedroom has meaning, as they suggest this character is extremely tidy, efficient and orderly, and implies it may be reflected in his personality in other ways. The items includes a pen, professional badge and a knife, which suggests he works in law enforcement. We then see him go to his bed, which is made up perfectly, not unlike a hotel, very meticulous. The way in which so much information is given away here despite the character have no interaction with others and doing mundane activities, is an effective way to highlight the loneliness and sense of order and presentation the character possesses. Costume is also used to convey meaning. When we first see the protagonist, he is wearing a white shirt, a symbol that he is a good man. His suit also suggests that he is an important person in the society. The next scene is cut to extremely quickly and we are met with a very disturbing image which contrasts starkly with what we have previously seen. The quickness of the transition allows no time for the viewer to adjust and it seems a slight shock factor is used in the suddenness of this. The scene is of a dead, overweight man lying in a pool of blood. The scene is dark, dimly lit and appears quite grisly, suggesting malice. The dead body indicates that we are

Rate of reaction Essay Example for Free

Rate of reaction Essay Apart from these few improvements I think the equipment and the method I used was an appropriate way of investigating how concentration effects the rate of reaction on an enzyme. A variable that I could try for an extra experiment is temperature. I could try increasing the temperature of the catalase to see if increasing the temperature has the same effect on an enzyme as it does with concentration. This would help me to see which variable, temperature or concentration has a greater effect on the volume of oxygen produced from the reaction of an enzyme. I am going to work out the rate of reaction from the average value of each of the concentrations of hydrogen peroxide. I will work out the rate of reaction for every 10 second from the average values by using my graphs. Reaction Rate for the concentration of   Reaction Rate for the concentration of 6%  cm3/s From looking at these calculations I can say that for all the concentrations of hydrogen peroxide the reaction rate was fastest at the start of the reaction. During the reaction the rate decreased and eventually the reaction stopped. I can explain this by using the lock and key model. This occurs because the catalase is breaking the particles of the hydrogen peroxide to form into oxygen. This causes the hydrogen peroxide to get used up as the catalyst can alter the rate of reaction without getting used up. This then leaves the catalase to react with no substance. Data Logging Data logging is another experiment I did to extend my experiment. I looked at the enzyme activity experiment in a different way. This time I used the same quantity of catalase and hydrogen peroxide but instead of measuring the volume of oxygen produced, I found out the temperature increase for each of the different concentrations of hydrogen peroxide. Method 1. Collect all equipment and set the experiment up 2. Wear safety glasses as you are using chemicals 3. Pour 25cm3 of each concentration of hydrogen peroxide into a measuring cylinder 4. Pour each concentration of hydrogen peroxide into three different polystyrene cups 5. Measure 1mm of catalase into three different syringes 6. Make sure that the end of the probe is touching the bottom of the cup and that the hydrogen peroxide is completely covering it 7. Inject all three of the catalase at the same time into each polystyrene cup 8. At the same time start the computer as you inject the catalase, to start of the measurement of the temperature, of the hydrogen peroxide 9. Watch how the computer measures the temperature for 2minutes as it transfers all the information into a graph 10. Stop the graph at 2 minutes and print out the results Conclusion From my results I can see that the 6% concentration of hydrogen peroxide has given of the highest temperature. This is because the concentration of 6% has many particles of hydrogen peroxide which will have a greater chance of colliding with the catalase. The concentration of 1. 5% and 3% has given of less heat causing a lower temperature. This is because they have less particles of hydrogen peroxide to collide with the enzymes. This result can be explained by the kinetic and collision theory. The increase in heat gave an increase in the kinetic energy. This means that there would be more collision between the hydrogen peroxide particles and the catalase, which would lead to a better chance of collision being successful. This experiment is related to my first experiment as the increase in concentration gave off more oxygen which gave us an increase in temperature. I found out that the 6% concentration gave of the most oxygen which causes a rise in temperature and the 1. 5% gave of the least oxygen causing a lower temperature. The 6% also gave off the most oxygen in the shortest time whereas the 1. 5% concentration gave off the least oxygen in the longest time. From looking at my graph I can see that the 6% concentration had the steepest slope which if I relate back to my rates of reaction theory. I can say that the steeper the slope the faster the reaction. The 1. 5% concentration had the smallest gradient which means it had the slowest rate of reaction. Overall this proves my original prediction, that the 6% concentration of hydrogen peroxide has the fastest rate of reaction and the 1. 5% concentration has the slowest. Reaction Rates During a reaction, reactants are being used up and products are forming. The reaction rate tells us how fast the reaction is taking place. You can calculate the reaction rate by measuring how much reactant is used up or how much product forms in a given time. Reaction rate = change in amount of a substance time taken The reaction rate can also be calculated by using a graph. The slope of the graph tells us how quickly the reaction is happening. The steeper the slope, the faster the reaction Results from the Trial Experiment Time (s) Volume of O2 evolved (cm3) 1. 5% Volume of O2 evolved (cm3) 3% Volume of O2 evolved (cm3) 6% Average I did a trial experiment to help me understand the experiment. The trial experiment showed me how quickly each concentration of hydrogen peroxide produced the amount of oxygen gas in one minute. I also learnt that slow pressure is needed with the small gas syringe because too much pressure causes the catalase to spill out. Results from the concentration of 1. 5% Time(s) oxygen evolved (cm3)oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) average. I am going to use columns 5,6 and 7 for my average because these columns have the nearest results to each other and the range of results are realistic. Results from the concentration of 3% Time(s) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) average 1 I will be using columns 4,5 and 6 for my average because these columns have the nearest results to each other and the range of results are realistic. Results from the concentration of 6% Time(s) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) oxygen evolved (cm3) average. I will use column 2,3 and 4 for my average because these columns have the nearest results to each other and the range of results are realistic. Time (s) Temperature (oC) 1. 5% Temperature (oC) 3% Temperature Show preview only The above preview is unformatted text This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE Patterns of Behaviour section.

The Technological Change Of Frito Lay Information Technology Essay

The Technological Change Of Frito Lay Information Technology Essay The aim of this report is to perform a knowledge audit of Frito Lay, by gathering data, analyzing the findings and making suggestions for the best possibility of knowledge to be utilized in an organization. This report mainly highlights the main external factors that affect the organization, internal knowledge culture which builds an organization structure, technological change and some important points on knowledge workers and leaders. The major finding in this report is that the knowledge management is a key to achieving both scalability and business optimization. Knowledge management is an attractive concept to many organizations. It helps in understanding the needs and gaps in knowledge by simple analysis and helps in coping up with the globalization. Moreover, the knowledge leaders and workers will help to put the theories and ideas from papers to real world. FRITO LAY Intoduction Scope This report mainly focuses on knowledge audit about the external influences on the organization and how knowledge culture enhances the organization structure. Moreover, this report mainly highlights about the technology and how it will revolutionize the companys culture. Background Frito Lay sales force is facing an issue with finding and integration of organization data and customer sales account information. Mike Marino, vice president of customer development, stated that knowledge is trapped in files everywhere. Many sales people would ask the companys marketing and operation staff the same information over and over. And the staff has to perform the same task for endless times. For this reason Mike Marino, integrated a Knowledge portal in corporate intranet. This portal opens gates to all sales staff with same information. This information can be shared and updated at the same time moreover it will be available to any one for any location. This portal was tested with a sales pilot team and passed with flying colors. This report does knowledge audit on the knowledge needs and gap in Frito Lay organization. Identified and provided few knowledge audit tools used to gather present knowledge from an organization. Even tools have been mentioned which could be helpful for the case study. Purpose The purpose of this report is to generate a knowledge report by studying the important external factors that influence the organization, internal knowledge culture in an organization, technology change in an organization and some highlights on knowledge workers and leaders. Current Knowledge position of the Frito Lay In current knowledge position of Frito Lay has no centralized system and its sales team is not able to merge data of the corporate and the customer account information. Purpose of the organization Frito Lay falls under a private sector enterprise. A private sector company mainly looks for profits for their stakeholders while long lasting sustainability in the commercial market. Their main aim is to take advantage of their opportunities and consider profits as the most important result. The main funding is done by the stakeholders, to enhance the development and growth of the company. The key goal for Private Sectors Company is to make a balance among long term sustainability and short term profits. The CEO of the company is mainly responsible for creating a vision to the organization; generally he/she would be a highly experienced person in field and is responsible in the success of the business (Debowski 2006). The purpose of the Frito Lay is to focus on one single mission; to become worlds leading products company for the consumer who focus on convenient foods. They try to offer better opportunities for growth and improvement to their employees, business and the in communities where they work. Moreover, whatever they do, they struggle for honesty and integrity. Frito lays main vision is to improve all their features in which they operate- environment, social and economic. They try to implement this vision by programs and concentrate on environmental stewardship, steps that benefit society and building a good relationship among stakeholders. Moreover, they not only focus on financial success of the company but also in reducing environmental footprint by protecting natural resources and using renewable energy in order to reduce toxic emissions. The knowledge environment in which the organization exists external context When organizations are exposed to external environment, it will go through many changes. There are many factors like technological changes and globalization have brought many opportunities and caused threats in the marketplace (Debowski 2006). Globalization has provided an opportunity for businesses like Frito Lay to gain access all over the world but also brought international organizations to the home market which poses a threat to other companies. Globalization allows customers to check prices, services and reviews of the product from many providers before selecting their suppliers. Even if the supplier is at another end of the world could be located and contacted through telecommunications to meet customer requirements (Debowski 2006). Like discussed before, Globalization provides both opportunity and threat. The threat could be an increase number of competitions means customer are exposed to a wide range of products and services. Then we can assume that customer wont stick to one supplier as there are many, so customer loyalty cannot be trusted. Since costumer is exposed to many varieties of products, it will in turn increase the stress on organizations like Frito Lay to be more creative plus more responsive to the costs set by the competitors (Debowski 2006). The other external factor that affects organization is the pressure from the stakeholder. Since the investment become global, there will be continuous demands from stakeholders to improve market shares, cost reductions and increase in profits. Even technological change is a main factor that effects on business and also helps developing quickly. In case of Frito lay, the Globalization is forcing business to update their technology in order to compete in the market (Wimmer 2004). Technology has become a foundation to many organizations and work tasks, and allows effective communication and management (Debowski 2006). The organizational structure including the internal knowledge culture According to the Oliver Kandadi (2006 p.6) knowledge culture is A way of organizational life that enables and motivates people to create, share and utilize knowledge for the benefit and enduring success of the organization. This culture was seen in Frito Lay organization which was implemented by Mike Marino, vice president of customer development. The company bought a tool called Autonomy from navigator systems, a search engine that allows users to search information and explore new ideas through intranet sites. By the help of navigator system, new innovative ideas and solutions were developed through combined efforts. Once the system was centralized, knowledge sharing became top activity between staff members with the help of supervisor and leaders. After the implementation, employees are kept up to date about the issues, events and innovations. This internal culture has encouraged a regular communications all over the organization which helped openness, honesty and concerned for o thers is promoted. Knowledge culture allows employees to work together by sharing and learning from their peers and supervisors (Oliver Kandadi 2006). Organizational structure is an influencing element in creation and development of knowledge culture. It defines the way power and responsibility is performed in an organization and also distributes knowledge in a way that it will be easily adopted by the firm. Organizational structure allows employees to be grouped according to their functions or division or both. In Frito Lay, the company grouped sales team as a pilot team for the portal, which helped the firm to understand the new system (Debowski 2006). Knowledge workers According to Debowski (2006, p.31) knowledge workers use their heads more than their hands to produce value. Knowledge workers mainly work with their own knowledge to resolve issues or problematic situations. They try to learn new information to reshape their existing knowledge, by doing so they can apply these skills in a variety of areas to resolve issues, generate ideas, or develop new services and products (Prince, 2010). Their job mainly deals on the mental rather than muscle power and is characterized by non respective tasks. They use different methods to solve issues and they also have authority to decide which technique to use in order to achieve the success (Prince 2010). In the case study, Frito Lays vice president of customer development, Mike Marino and Price had many types of organizational knowledge (Debowski 2006). Knowledge that may possess many features, characteristics and value of different sources or systems that may be found in the Frito Lay organization. Knowledge that can identify people, groups and organization and techniques to link them. Understand how to carry out difficult task which require analytical skills such as researching, testing and innovating. An ability to observe, estimate and access correct knowledge sources. The sales pilot team was dispersed all over the country to collect information from the customers and analyze it with correct resources and then fed back it to the sales people in the organization. This flow of knowledge from knowledge workers to the organization will empower them with superior customer knowledge and competitive intelligence. Knowledge leaders Knowledge leaders are the pillars to the organization and support of knowledge management in a firm. These people provide the encouragement, set goals and vision to transform the knowledge concept in to a reality. By the circumstances of the organization, the knowledge leaders roles and responsibilities are designed. Knowledge leaders help to build an effective knowledge community. Their roles require them to understand the complex framework of the knowledge operations and ways communication and teamwork is built and strengthened (Debowski 2006). The generic attributes of knowledge leader were they contribute some important attributes which depend on understanding of process, systems and people The main concepts identified within the case study are disciplines of knowledge leadership, like willingness to share knowledge because it is seen as a power and also collaboration of their work with other organizations. Mike Marino acted as a Change Agent as he identified that knowledge was dispersed in various systems across their organization which created complexity for employees to retrieve data freely and there was inconsistency in data too. They solved this problem by sharing the knowledge all over the organization by developing a centralized system (KM portal) for all of their business processes (Debowski 2006). Another model that is clear in case study is generic attributes of the knowledge leader, for instance selecting an appropriate sales pilot team and sending them with knowledge management portal support across 10 different cites to by measuring up their performance with the normal teams which displays the qualities of strategic visionary and knowledge executor attribute of the knowledge leader (Debowski 2006). Technology Technology is a main factor that brings out a huge positive difference in an organization and also helps developing it growth rapidly. In case of Frito lay, due to no integration between business process for finding and merging data of cooperate and customer account information. After the implementation of Knowledge management system (KMS) it become a basic foundation to the organizations and work tasks by providing an effective communication and management (Debowski 2006). KMS provides a unified and functional platform in an organization on which many other knowledge activities flow and interconnect. It offers knowledge capture and sharing freely, readily and openly to all the stakeholders across the organization. Moreover, it also offers a channel to an individual user to acquire a document, send, share and create knowledge to meet the priorities of the organization. Basically there are four components in KMS; Business process management, Content management, Web content management and Knowledge application management. In case of Frito Lay, they have built knowledge management portal on the corporate intranet. It acts a centre point of access to various sources of information and offers individual access too. This type of system falls under content and business process management (Debowski 2006). The content management system is an intellectual content in KMS. It allows users to retrieve knowledge on particular theme and topic from the KM portal. It allows a wide range of strategies of indexing, storing and organizing the knowledge that are linked in KMS. Business process management defines the processes that are needed for an organization. Like in Frito Lay, these systems are linked to a knowledge management practices so that employees of the company have the access of accurate and up to date data to build up their knowledge (Debowski 2006). Knowledge resources and knowledge-sharing practices One of the core practices in knowledge management is knowledge repositories and knowledge sharing (Debowski 2006). Typically, knowledge repository outlook is like another web-based index. It provides many options to the users to explore with the main menu that offers wide range of access to the recognized knowledge resources from internal and external to the organization. Repositories act as a connection between the user and the core knowledge, working as a single point of entry to support users finding required information across the organization and also other organizations (Annunziata Levant 2002). Through repositories knowledge is shared among users, sharing knowledge has become institutionalized and ends up becoming a part of the routine daily life (Barnes 2002). The repository system used by the Frito Lay sales force was Autonomy. This system was acquired from a consultancy, Navigator systems from Dallas. This tool enables users to search all the way through various repositories like internet sites, spreadsheets and power point presentation (Huysman Writ 2002). It supports many salespeople to get all significant information from a variety of sources which allow them to achieve all the different data sets through one picture. Furthermore other features that we can see in this tool are; it links the organization data with internal sources and outside too, it is a search service that helps people to find data that is required and it also help to record solutions and best practices of other so that it can be shared with others (Barnes 2002). Knowledge needs The main goal of knowledge needs is to identify accurately about the knowledge the organization, its team and its people need at the moment and the knowledge they might need in the feature to achieve their goals and objective. The future strategy of an organization is enhanced due to knowledge needs analysis. This analysis can also find out the staff skills and capability of improvement needs and opportunities for training and developing, team spirit and relationship with staff, subordinated and peers (Ovio Komi-Sirvià ¶ 2002). Knowledge gaps A gap between the ideal world and the existing knowledge world is known as knowledge gap. Gaps may obstruct innovations, opportunities for organization improvement or impede technology implementation Often, the first task is to review the about the existing knowledge in the organization and then analyze who has it, where it is and which jobs the knowledge is used in. Moreover, when knowledge gaps are visible then it gives a confidence in decision making. It is important to identify knowledge gaps of two forms of knowledge, explicit and tacit knowledge (Debowski 2006). According to Lin, Yeh Tseng (2005 p.3) knowledge gaps can be viewed in four different aspects: strategic aspect, planning aspect, perception aspect and implementation aspect. Strategic aspect: This type of knowledge is necessary for the improvement of the organization competitiveness. Implementation aspect: Implementation of knowledge management. Plan aspect: The plan of knowledge management Perception aspect: To improve the organizations competitiveness as perceived by the top managers and employees. Questions What categories of knowledge do you use in your organization? How do you use each of that knowledge? From how many sources can you acquire the knowledge? Apart from yourself, who else use this knowledge? Is a specific knowledge is restricted to specific users? Justification For the first question, it was important to know how knowledge was divided into the firm and how many categories are present for the employees and teams in an organization. For the second question, how organization utilized that knowledge, for instance whether there are any restrictions or no restrictions. For the third question, how does the organization acquire knowledge, like internal and externally. For the fourth question, apart for the organization and its people, is that knowledge is utilized by other organization? Or it is used by the suppliers or other external factors. For the final question, are there any security constraints in the company, if there are then why those constraints. Knowledge audit Tools According to Ramalingam (2006 p.13) knowledge Audit offers a framework for gathering data, synthesising findings and making suggestions about the best way forward for knowledge and learning initiatives against a background of the broader structural and policy factors affecting an organization. In Frito Lay, the sales team has been given access to portal with different content as well as research abstracts, which was called as a performance scorecard (Chowdhury 2006). It is to evaluate the performance of the account. This tool comes under the balanced scorecard approach for measuring the performance on the four key aspects; financial investment, internal process, customer/stakeholders expectation and focus on learning and growth. This tool will help in measuring the performance of the employees and help in providing results on how effective the company is operating. The tools of knowledge audit are Knowledge Gap analysis: This tool shows the gaps that hold back technology implementations and hamper opportunities and block innovations. SWOT analysis: It is a strategic planning technique that is applied to calculate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats included in a project or an organization. Knowledge Taxonomy: it regulates a construction of knowledge map by describing an organizational knowledge and relationship. Exit Interviews: When an employee is leaving a company forever, then he/she will be taking knowledge along with them. So this tool will help to document that knowledge so that it can be utilised by other employees. Questionnaire: A research in conducted with a series of questions for the purpose of gathering data from large number of respondents. Recommendations Knowledge portal has made a huge difference to Frito Lays sales team. The portal acted as a central point for the whole organization by providing multiple resources as it provides an essential way to capture information. The implementation of portal has brought a lot of profits and made their work easy. However, this is the beginning stage of the progression and still a lot to come. Since the portal is implemented in only to team it is recommended to add its functional to other employees across the 3 divisions. Moreover, it would be better if this is added to their customers like supermarkets as it would help them to synching their knowledge with the organization for co promoting and co merchandising of products together. In future, the organization might implement other knowledge management systems like Web Content Management and Knowledge Application Management. Web content mainly deals with building an effective website structure through which users may access to the KMS Frito Lay can have advantage with this system as it will provide a direct communication with the client side. It will provide an easy user interface and it would even benefit the consumers too. Knowledge application management system would provide users with applications like word processing and emails. These applications will help the staff creating knowledge. Conclusion In conclusion, knowledge management is the key to every organization for opening a door full of opportunities and possibilities. KM portal has become a PepsiCo project as it has helped in improving employee retention rates and the efficiency of the companys operation too. Frito Lays sales team is able to capture the specific information of the corporate and customer sales account information from any location. It has reduced inconsistency and duplication of data which reduced the performing of same tasks over and over. Knowledge management is an attractive concept to many industries. It helps understanding the needs and gaps in knowledge by simple analysis and helps in coping up with the globalization. Moreover, the knowledge leaders and workers will help to put the theories and ideas from papers to real world.

Reading And Reading Processes

Reading And Reading Processes 1.2 Definition of Reading and Reading Processes It is hardly possible to carry out, or even read, a research on reading without an understanding of the word reading and the processes involved in it, and the present study is no exception. Reading plays such an essential role in educational settings that it has been defined as the most important academic language skill (Grabe Stoller, 2002). It is a psycholinguistic receptive process of written communication in that it starts with a linguistic surface representation encoded by a writer and ends with meaning that the reader constructs (Goodman, 1995). It is a process that involves the reader and the text in a dynamic and complex interaction in which a mental representation is constructed based on the meaning signaled by the writer and the readers goals and interests (Rumelhart, 1985; Stanovich, 1980). What is meant by the process is reading proper, i.e. the interaction between a text and a reader (Alderson, 2000, p. 3). In this process, what the readers do is look at print, decode the written words on the page, and determine their meanings and their relationships. The readers also think about what they are reading, what it means to them, how it relates to other things they have read before and to things they already know. Different readers will develop different understandings of what a text means. This is partly because a text does not contain meaning which has to be detected by a proficient reader as the product of reading. The product of the reading process is comprehension (Barry Lazarte, 1995). There may be as many different reading products as there are different readers. This is because readers may differ in their experiences and knowledge. In order for the reading product to be attained, readers employ two different approaches while engaged in the reading process (Nuttall, 2005), namely the bottom-up and the top-down approaches. Bottom-up, or data-driven, approaches are serial models (Alderson, 2000, p.16), where the reader begins with printed words, recognizes graphic stimuli, decodes them to sound, recognizes words and decodes meanings. According to Grabe and Stoller (2002), the bottom-up model suggests that reading follows a mechanical pattern in which the reader creates a piece-by-piece mental translation of the information in the text, with little reference from the readers own background knowledge. Top-down, or conceptually driven, processing is a complementary method of processing written text in which readers draw on their intelligence and experience to understand a text (Nuttall, 2005). According to the top-down model of the reading process, what the reader already knows is thought to determine in large part what s/he will be able to comprehend (Alvermann Phelps, 1998). The top-down model assumes that comprehending begins when a reader has access to appropriate background experiences and knowledge to make sense of the print. In other words, unlike the bottom-up model, the top-down model proposes that the reader makes educated guesses to predict the meaning of the print. As a matter of fact, what is emphasized in top-down processing, according to Alderson (2000), is the knowledge that a reader brings to text. This model is based on schema theory, which accounts for the acquisition of knowledge and the interpretation of text through the activation of schemata: networks of information stored in the brain which act as filters for incoming information (Ausubel, 1968; Bartlett, 1932; Carrell, 1983a; Carrell, Devine Eskey, 1988; Hudson, 1982). In this view, readers activate what they consider to be relevant existing schemata and map incoming information onto them. To the extent that these schemata are relevant, reading is successful. Nevertheless, neither the bottom-up nor the top-down approach, per se, is an adequate characterization of the reading process (Alderson, 2000). What readers need to employ while attending to texts is a combination of the two approaches, which, in Nuttalls words (2005), are used to complement each other. This inadequacy led to the introduction of a third approach, the interactive model. The interactive model of the reading process incorporates features of both the bottom-up and top-down models. In practice, a reader continually shifts from one focus to another, now adopting a top-down approach to predict the probable meaning, then moving to the bottom-up approach to check whether that is really what the writer says (Nuttall, 2005, p. 17). In this context, Alvermann and Phelps (1998) believe that the interactive model of reading process is a good descriptor of how students typically read their content area texts. They connect what they know about language, decoding, and vocabulary, or bottom-up skills, to their background experiences, prior knowledge, and familiarity with the topic being read, or top-down skills. Interestingly, these skills are compensatory to Stanovich (1980). He argues that when readers lack enough bottom-up skills, they may use top-down knowledge to compensate. Likewise, when they do not have enough background knowledge on the topic they are reading, they resort to their language skills to comprehend the text. Most of the current models of L2 reading comprehension, according to Nassaji (2007) are interactive in that L2 comprehension is considered to be a process consisting of both bottom-up and top-down processes. However, familiarity with reading models, alone, is not sufficient for the understanding of the factors involved in the reading process. Alongside the significance of the knowledge of the reading process, the importance of reading for ESL learners necessitates the understanding of the variables affecting a learners comprehension of texts. Research on reading variables has divided them into two major sections: factors within the reader, and aspects of the text to be read (Alderson, 2000). What is of focus in the present study is the former section, the reader variables. 1.4 Reader Variables Research has looked at the way readers themselves affect the reading process and product, and has investigated a number of different variables. Among them, two very important reader variables are topic familiarity (i.e. prior knowledge on topic), or background knowledge, (Bransford Johnson, 1972; Carrell, 1983a; Carrell Wise, 1998; Kintsch, 1992; Leeser, 2007; Moravcsik Kintsch, 1993; Nassaji, 2007; Young, 1991), and vocabulary knowledge (Alderson Urquhart, 1985; Anderson Freebody, 1983; Carrell, 1984; Koda, 1988, 2005; Qian, 1999). A definition of these variables seems indispensible to this research introduction. 1.4.1 Topic Familiarity Prior topic knowledge, and its influence on readers text comprehension is one of the variables being investigated in this study with regards to teachers intervention in the classroom. Therefore, an understanding of the concept seems essential for the reader. There is a substantial body of research in cognitive psychology supporting the idea that topic familiarity has a facilitative role in reading comprehension (e.g. Bransford Johnson, 1972; Kintsch, 1992; Moravacsik Kintsch, 1993). This role has been motivated through schema-based models of comprehension (e.g. Rumelhart. 1977, 1980) which posit that pre-existing schemata control comprehension. In other words, readers background knowledge contributes to their understanding of texts. When the term background knowledge is used, what is usually meant is a readers prior knowledge of the subject matter of the text. In this regard, Alvermann Phelps (1998) claim that What a person already knows about a topic is probably the single most i nfluential factor in what he or she will learn ( p. 168). The nature of the knowledge that readers have will influence not only what they remember of text, but also the product, i.e. their understanding of the text, and the way they process it (Bartlett, 1932; Carrell, 1984; Rumelhart, 1980; Alderson, 2000). The development of schema theory has attempted to account for the consistent finding that what readers know affects what they understand. Schemata are seen as interlocking mental structures representing readers knowledge (Alderson, 2000, p. 33). When readers process text, they integrate the new information from the text into their pre-existing knowledge or schemata. In addition, their schemata influence how they recognize information as well as how they store it (Carrell, 1983a). Researchers have distinguished different types of schemata, which will be discussed in detail in Chapter 2. Problems arise when a reader has no relevant schemata or an insufficient schema, if relevant schemata are not recalled, or if an existing schema is inconsistent with information in the text. Readers will often ignore ideas in a text that conflict with conventional real world knowledge (Alvermann, Smith, Readence, 1985). Students with reading difficulties appear to have particular trouble using their prior knowledge to modify misconceptions or to learn new information from reading (Holmes, 1983). Often, a reader who is struggling to understand a difficult text will follow isolated details in the text and as a result employ an inappropriate schema to fill in the gaps. A factor that has strong potential to affect readers comprehension, and can cause their misinterpretations is culture (Steffensen, Joag-Dev, and Anderson, 1979). Effects of cultural differences on reading recall, test scores and reading miscues have been consistently found in different studies (e.g., Carrell, 1984b; Dima ssi, 2006; Rice, 1980). This will be elaborated on in the next chapter. 1.4.2 Vocabulary Knowledge The second parameter that is probed in the study, the understanding of which is inevitable to the reader, is vocabulary knowledge. Successful comprehension is heavily dependent on knowledge of individual word meanings (Koda, 2005, p. 48). Research confirms a strong connection between readers vocabulary knowledge and their ability to understand what they read (Anderson Freebody, 1983; Davis, 1968; Koda, 2005; Qian, 1999). For example, Koda (2005) argues that there is a reciprocal relationship between word knowledge and comprehension. On the one hand vocabulary knowledge plays a crucial role in text understanding among both L1 and L2 readers, and on the other, vocabulary learning and processing are equally dependent on comprehension. She adds that the precise meaning of a particular word is determined in large part by the context in which it appears, and that this meaning is closely linked with readers real-life experience. However, in spite of overwhelming data available on their str ong connection there is little consensus as to the exact mutuality between the two (ibid.). While, traditionally, vocabulary has been viewed as the dominant factor in reading comprehension (Davis, 1968; Whipple, 1925, cited in Hiebert Kamil, 2005), a more recent view suggests a two-way link where the two are interdependent during their development process (Anderson Freebody, 1983). Anderson and Freebody evaluated two contrasting hypotheses: instrumental and knowledge. The instrumental hypothesis postulates a direct mutual tie between vocabulary and comprehension, maintaining that word knowledge facilitates comprehension. On the contrary, the knowledge hypothesis assumes an indirect link between the two, positing that their relationship is linked through a third phenomenon, background knowledge. In this view, vocabulary size reflects conceptual knowledge. Once readers have real-world experience, their text understanding is considerably improved. There will be more elaboration on this in Chapter 2. As was said earlier in this chapter, vocabulary knowledge and background knowledge, or topic familiarity, are two most important variables affecting students comprehension. Research has also shown that the most important problems teachers face in a reading class is unknown vocabulary and unfamiliar topic (Cabaroglu Yurdaisik, 2008). In order to have a better understanding of teachers contribution to the reading class with regard to these two parameters, an awareness of the teachers role in the reading class, which is another variable in the present research, seems inevitable. 1.5 Teachers Role It is believed that the role the teacher plays in reading instruction is significant in the degree of the effectiveness of a reading program (Blair, Rupley Nichols, 2007). In this regard, Duffy-Hester (1999) is convinced that the teacher is more important and has a greater impact than any single, fixed reading program, method, or approach (p. 492). However, it should be noted that it is not enough for a teacher to be a good person who loves working with students. They must be aware of the reading process and the teaching and learning of reading if they want their instruction to yield good results (Blair, Rupley Nichols, 2007). Good teachers understand that students need to be prepared to read before they are asked to (Alvermann Phelps, 1998). One way to prepare students for reading new topics is presenting basic background knowledge through brainstorming, question and answer, discussion on the topic, or pictures. Another way is providing students with topic related vocabulary and instructing them prior to reading (ibid.). These preparatory activities are usually practiced in the pre-reading phase, which, according to Chastain (1988), is meant to motivate students to want to read the assignment and to prepare them to be able to read it. Pre-reading activities provide a reader with necessary background to organize activity and to comprehend the material (Ringler and Weber, 1984). These experiences involve understanding the purpose(s) for reading and building a knowledge base necessary for dealing with the content, vocabulary, and the structure of the material (ibid.) Ringler and Weber argue that pre-reading activities elicit prior knowledge, build background and focus attention. In fact, it is in the pre-reading stage that teachers attempt to facilitate and enhance students comprehension of reading texts by topic familiarization and vocabulary introduction. Chapter 2 will discuss the pre-reading stage in detail. 1.6 Background to the Problem There is a considerable bulk of research on the comparison of the effectiveness and enhancing roles of topic familiarity and vocabulary knowledge in ESL reading (e.g. Afflerbach, 1986; Brantmeier, 2003; Carrell, 1987; Hammadou, 1991; Hudson, 1982; Johnson, 1982; Park, 2004a, 2004b; Swaffer, 1988). Studies on these two reader variables reveal that there is little consensus among the researchers as for their functions in ESL contexts. Some findings have shown a significant, positive effect for topic familiarity as either a main effect or as part of a complex interaction. For example, Johnson (1982) gave ESL readers a passage on Halloween and demonstrated that topic familiarity had a greater impact on comprehension than the pre-teaching of vocabulary. Also, Swaffer (1988) concludes, in her paper, that background knowledge can be more influential in reading comprehension than word knowledge. She further claims that topic familiarity facilitates language recognition, and recall of concepts. However, some other research in the literature indicates that vocabulary knowledge may be a more significant variable than prior knowledge on topic in ESL readers success. For example, Phillips (1990), reported by Hammadou (1991), finds that prior knowledge is insignificant when readers lack vocabulary knowledge and language proficiency. To Phillips, it is only when readers are proficient that high or low background knowledge comes into play and differentiates between readers levels of comprehension. But, perhaps the most comprehensive study on the effects of vocabulary pre-teaching and providing background knowledge on L2 reading comprehension was done by Park (2004b). He divided his 180 participants into three groups à ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬ the vocabulary group, the background knowledge group, and the control group, with different treatments. The results he attained were a) the scores of the vocabulary and background knowledge groups were significantly higher than those of the control group, b) the vocabulary group scored higher than the background knowledge group, although the difference between the mean scores of the two groups was not significant, and c) the effects of pre-reading activities on L2 reading comprehension differed by achievement level and text type. Nevertheless, to Tuero (1996), unknown vocabulary and prior knowledge play equally decisive roles in reading comprehension. She concludes, in her study, that background knowledge and vocabulary difficulty function independently and affect reading in different ways. Even though prior knowledge facilitates comprehension, vocabulary development is equally crucial to foreign language reading. As said earlier, unknown vocabulary and unfamiliar topic have been found to be the most important problems that teachers encounter in a reading class (Cabaroglu Yurdaisik, 2008). Therefore, to ensure students comprehension, teachers should concentrate on these two variables, because without comprehension reading would be meaningless. Different learners seem to approach reading tasks in different ways, and some of these ways appear to lead to better comprehension (Tercanlioglu, 2004). Research has shown that learners can be instructed to use appropriate reading strategies to help them improve comprehension and recall (Carrell, Pharis, Liberto, 1989), and that this instruction should include more pre-reading strategies than post-reading strategies (Cabaroglu Yurdaisik, 2008). However, what is of concern to the researcher is the degree of effectiveness of teachers instruction of these reading strategies. It is true that unknown vocabulary and unfamiliar topic are the most significant problems in a reading class. But, who should, or can, attend to these problems? Is it the teacher, the student, the author, or other variables that have this responsibility? Although there has been quite a lot of research on topic familiarity and vocabulary knowledge in reading comprehension, unfortunately, to date, there is no data available reflecting on the degree of effectiveness of the teachers presence at, or absence from an ESL reading class. In fact, the role of the teacher in enhancing students familiarity with texts topics and contents, and his/her role in vocabulary introduction have not been investigated yet. It is not clear to what extent teachers intervention facilitates students performance on reading comprehension and vocabulary tests. What if the teacher is not available for a pre-reading instruction? Does this mean that students have to postpone their reading activities, waiting for the unfamiliar topic and unknown vocabulary to be introduced by the teacher? In other words, should topic familiarization and vocabulary introduction be necessarily carried out by the teacher? The researcher believes this is a gap in the literature, which the present study seeks to fill. 1.7 Purpose and Design of the Study This study is an attempt to investigate in depth, in an explanatory mixed methods design, the degree of the effectiveness of teachers construction of background knowledge and his/her instruction of vocabulary at pre-reading stage in adult ESL reading comprehension. The influence of the teacher on the reading class, his/her contribution to students comprehension, and the facilitative role that s/he might play are the important aspects that this study aims to shed light on. The reason for conducting a mixed methods study is that the researcher attempts to combine both quantitative and qualitative data for more precise results. The explanatory mixed methods design, which is also called the two-phase model (Creswell, 2008), puts emphasis on quantitative data collection and analysis. In this method, the major aspect of data collection is quantitative, and a small qualitative component follows in the second phase of the research (ibid.). The quantitative phase of the study aims to test the following hypotheses: Teacher-directed topic familiarization enhances students performance on ESL reading comprehension tasks more than written introductions do. Dictionary use and teachers instruction of vocabulary yield the same results in students performance on vocabulary tests. To test the research hypotheses, this study seeks to answer three questions, and for the qualitative part of the research, RQ4 is supposed to serve the purpose. The research questions are as follows: RQ 1 To what extent does teacher-directed topic familiarization enhance students performance on multiple-choice reading comprehension tests? RQ 2 To what extent does teachers intervention help students recall of a reading passage? RQ 3 What are the differences between teachers instruction of vocabulary and dictionary use in students performance on vocabulary tests? RQ 4 What are students perceptions as to the teachers role in an ESL reading classroom? To answer RQs 1, 2, and 3, quantitative data suffices and serves the purpose, and that is why the researcher applies multiple choice questions and written recall tests. But, for RQ 4, it is deemed necessary to mix quantitative and qualitative data to obtain more detailed , specific information than could be gained from the results of statistical tests. Therefore, a 5-point Likert scale questionnaire is combined with semi-structured interviews to answer RQ 4. Details will be found in Chapter 3. 1.8 Significance of the Study Through his experience as an EFL teacher, the researcher has noticed that many EFL students face challenges whenever the reading comprehension process is altered by any unfamiliar reading task or assignment. He has also noticed that pre-reading instruction activities, including prior knowledge construction of unfamiliar topics, and teaching new vocabulary, play an important role in preparing students for the task and can help them become more aware of the characteristics of reading that are important to the task. This study will help teachers and educators find out the effectiveness and significance of teachers presence at, or absence from, the reading class. It is an attempt to explore teachers contribution to students reading comprehension, and tries to answer the question of whether or not, or to what extent, adult ESL students could be independent readers. This research will investigate, for the first time, the effectiveness of dictionary use as compared with the teachers vocabul ary instruction in enhancing students vocabulary knowledge in the reading class. Another significant viewpoint of the study is that, again for the first time, the teachers skill in familiarizing students with unfamiliar topics at pre-reading stage will be compared with the efficacy of written introductory data doing the same job of providing students with background knowledge on unfamiliar topics, hence the applicability of written pre-reading information in helping students text comprehension. All this will have implications for educators, teachers, practitioners, and researchers in the field of L2 reading comprehension, and will also help them design reading skill courses accordingly. It is hoped that the present research will make a positive contribution to the field of teaching second language reading. 1.9 Methodology The study was conducted with newly registered postgraduate students at the University of Malaya, Malaysia. The Institute of Graduate Studies (IGS) at UM administers regular English Placement Tests for those new students who do not possess any scores on either the TOEFL or the IELTS as the prerequisite for the registration for the university programs. Based on the students scores on the university Placement Test, the participants were assigned to two treatment groups, Group A and Group B, comprising 35 students each. To find the answers to RQs 1, 2, and 3, the participants were provided with three reading passages of unfamiliar topics and contents, which they read and were tested on, with a weeks interval between the tests. The difficulty levels of these passages were measured through the Flesch Readability Test (Flesch, 1948). A typical session ran as this: The participants in Group A received no teachers intervention. They were provided with some brainstorming questions, to which they received no answers, a list of the text concepts, and a written introduction, which were meant to help them construct background knowledge on the text they were going to read. The text this group read had a title, which is believed to have a role in helping students to construct prior knowledge (Hammadou, 1991). They were also given a list of the key vocabulary, and were encouraged to use their dictionaries to check words meanings. In short, Group A received any information which was thought to be necessary in rea ding the text, but in the form of written input. Group B, however, underwent teachers intervention. That is, it was the teacher who, in some pre-reading activities, familiarized them with the topic and content, and taught them the key vocabulary. Moreover, their text did not include a title, and no dictionary use was permitted in this group. This procedure was repeated for all the three passages. The participants were then assessed on comprehension and vocabulary after finishing each text. Each reading passage was followed by a free written recall test and a set of 20 multiple choice questions, 10 on comprehension and 10 on vocabulary. In fact, in the three treatment weeks, the students took three written recall tests, 30 comprehension and 30 vocabulary MCQs. Also, to find the answer to RQ4, on the students perceptions of the teachers role in a reading class, a 5- point Likert scale questionnaire was administered, and then through purposeful sampling, 20 of the participants, 10 from each group, were selected for an interview. Applied as one of the data collection tools, the free recall test is a measure in which readers write down as much as they can remember from what they have just read, without looking at the passage. According to Johnston (1983) and Bernhardt (1983), the recall measurement is a valid means of evaluating foreign language reading comprehension. This technique has been widely used in second language reading research (e.g., Carrell, 1987; Dimassi, 2006; Leeser, 2007; Young, 1999) Multiple choice tests, as another research tool, are common instruments for assessing reading comprehension (Alderson, 2000). To Koda (2005), they are the most popular format used in standardized reading comprehension tests. MCQs have been employed extensively in L2 reading assessment (e.g., Bugel Buunk, 1996; Carrell, 1987; Carrell Wise, 1998; Oded Walters, 2001; Park, 2004; Yazdanpanah, 2007), and, therefore, have been coupled with the free recall test to measure the participants reading ability. In addition, Likert scale questionnaires and interviews are two common techniques in measuring perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs in second language teaching and learning (DeVellis, 1991; Turner, 1993), and have been used widely in the literature (See Brown, 2006 2009; Richardson, 1996; Williams Burden, 1997; Yamashita, 2004, for Likert scale questionnaires, and Barkhuizen, 1998; Cabaroglu Yurdaisik, 2008; Conteh Toyoshima, 2005; Li Wilhelm, 2008, for interviews). Thus, the study has applied these tools to find the answer to RQ4. Details on the research instruments will be revealed in Chapter 3.

Labyrinth and Star Wars :: Movies Essays

Labyrinth and Star Wars It is amazing how in many stories a group of the most unlikely characters can overcome the most impossible odds. The battle of good vs. evil is reenacted in thousand upon thousand of movies. A lot of the times in these movies the group of heroes consist of very ordinary or odd characters, those who seem to possess few heroic traits. As seen in the movies Labyrinth and the first made Star Wars, a group of small and seemingly powerless characters can overcome great evils. The movie the Labyrinth tells a story about a group of unlikely heroes trying to make their way though a maze in order to defeat the Goblin King. The story starts out with the main character Sarah whom, without even realizing it, wishes her baby brother to be taken way by Jareth the Goblin King. He tells her that if she wants her brother back she will have to make her way through the labyrinth and to the castle beyond the Goblin City. She only has 13 hours to complete the seemingly impossible task or her little brother Toby will be turned into a goblin. While making her way through the twisted and endless maze Sarah runs into many weird characters. The first person she encounters is Hoggle a very untrustworthy dwarf whom is under the influence of Jareth. He is selfish and does things only if there is something for him to gain. He betrays Sarah many times throughout the movie, but in the end he proves himself to be more than a traitorous coward. Ludo is a yeti and despite looking vic ious is a gentle and caring monster. Ludo also has the power to control rocks. Sir Didymis is a loudmouthed, but noble knight who displays his valor throughout the movie. The four heroes manage to fight their way through the perilous labyrinth. The Goblin King Jareth is defeated and Sarah’s brother Toby is saved. Though the characters in this movie seemed to be nothing more than ordinary, and if not odd, they fought their way through labyrinth and conquered an entire army of evil goblins and their king. (Labyrinth 1986) Star Wars also tells of a similar story; the most unlikely set of people can stop an entire evil empire. The movie begins with Princess Leia’s capture by the evil empire. In an attempt to save herself and her mission plans, she sends two robots, R2D2 and C-3PO, to deliver a message to the illusive Ben Kenobi.

Essays --

Accounting is used as a tools to inform investors and other stakeholders about management’s performance. However, accounting standards permits management to use judgment in financial reporting methods for some accounts as they have best knowledge of its business so it can choose accounting alternatives that suit their business. With ability to choose its preferable reporting methods, estimates and disclosure, this flexibility creates opportunity for managers to distort earnings in which they adopt accounting methods that do not truly reflect firms’ financial status (Healy and Wahlen, 1999). In addition, due to the fact that management has better access to firms’ business transactions and operations than stakeholders do and auditing and monitoring system are not always effective, these lead to an information asymmetry problem which increases earnings management opportunity. For example, they can alter some information and do not disclose all the information to the stakeholders. This essay will first describe the definition of earnings management and its evolution. Then, the proxies used to detect earnings management will be illustrated. Next, the motives for earnings management and its effect on financial reporting process will be discussed. Subsequently, it will turn to the impact of debt financing on earnings management. Finally, this paper will examine the factors that may constrain the degree of earnings management. Definition of earnings management and its evolution Many researchers has given different earnings management definitions. For instance, Healy and Wahlen (1999,p.368) states that ‘Earnings management occurs when managers use judgment in financial reporting and in structuring transactions to alter financial repor... ...orts (Houqe et al., 2012) Also, the adaptation of widely-used accounting standards, for example, IFRS, may help prevent management from manipulating financial information and, therefore, improve the quality of earnings because such standards require managers to provide a true and fair view of its report and may help reduce the earnings management activities. Houqe et al. (2012) conclude that the adoption of mandatory IFRS increases the quality of earnings in the countries that provide strong protection for investors. However, there is some controversy if accounting standards would reduce earnings management. Tendeloo and Vanstraelen (2005, cited in Houqe et al., 2012) and Lin and Paananen (2009, cited in Houqe et al., 2012) find that after adopting IFRS, firms in Germany recorded more discretionary accruals and those accruals are lowly-correlated with cash flows.

Understanding Employment Responsibilities and Rights in Health Social Care

Understanding Employment Responsibilities and Rights in Health Social Care or Children's and Young People's Settings1. Know the statutory responsibilities and rights of employees and employers within own area of work1.1 List the aspects of employment covered by law. Almost every aspect of employment is covered by one or more laws, including: the handling and storage of information, equal opportunities, grievance procedures, health and safety, holiday entitlements, maternity/paternity pay, minimum wage, sickness absence and pay, working time limits, redundancy and retirement.1. 2 List the main features of current employment legislation. Employment rights, Equality and discrimination, Health and Safety, Data Protection.1. 3 Outline why legislation relating to employment exists. Legislation in relation to employment was created in order to prevent employers from abusing or taking advantage of workers, and provide minimum requirements in areas such as : minimum wage, safety standards, ho liday entitlement, maternity leave, redundancy payments, discrimination and equality, working hours, age requirement.1.4 Identify sources and types of information and advice available in relation to employment responsibilities and rights. Sources and types of information and advice available in relation to employment responsibilities and right are: ACAS, CAB, unions and representative bodies, work contract, policies and procedures, terms and conditions, and job descriptions.2. Understand agreed ways of working that protect own relationship with employer2. 1 Describe the terms and conditions of own contract of employment (see attached Offer of Employment).The terms and conditions which are covered in my contract are: my job title, hours of work, holiday entitlement, absence, sick pay, notice of termination, grievance procedure, and the disciplinary procedure.2. 2 Describe the information shown on own pay statement (see attached) My payslip contains the following information: my name and home address, tax code (Basic Rate), National Insurance Number, deductions (including tax and national insurance), year to date, the total that I have been paid so far this financial year, and net pay.2. 3 Describe the procedures to follow in event of a grievance. In the event of a grievance the very first step is talking to the manager. If the outcome is not satisfactory then you can make a formal grievance complaint. The procedure should include the following steps: writing a letter to your employer setting out the details of your grievance, next a meeting with your employer to discuss the issue, and finally if the employer’s decision is still not satisfactory then an appeal from the employer’s decision can be made.Your employer should arrange a further meeting to discuss your appeal, and you have a right to ask either a colleague from work or a trade union representative to accompany you to the meeting.2. 4 Identify the personal information that must be kept up to date with own employer The personal information that I must be kept up to date with my own employer are my mobile number, address, bank details, and new health information which could affect my job.2. 5 Explain agreed ways of working with employer The agreed ways of working with my own employer are within my job description.I am also expected to arrive at work on time, be polite and professional, to follow policies and procedures correctly to be respectful of other peoples’ background and personal choices. My own employer must provide me the correct tools I need to do my job in the best condition possible, as said in The Health and Safety Act, 1974 law (eg gloves and uniform). 3. Understand how own role fits within the wider context of the sector3. 1 Explain how own role fits within the delivery of the service provided.The service undertakes to provide everyone with a safe service which promotes clients’ independence, dignity, and choice, while ensuring their home i s a safe place to live; to promote clients’ control over their lives, maintaining skills and independence and ensure that all needs are met on an individual basis, encouraging the clients to make own, informed decision about how their needs are met. Similarly, my role is to provide care to a standard and in a way that is accepted and promoted by my company.3.2 Explain the effect of own role on service provision. By providing the clients with adequate care and following good practice I help to fulfil the company’s goals as well as meet the individuals’ needs. By supporting the clients in their physical care needs as well as social, intellectual and emotional needs, and liaising with other agencies, I promote the clients’ health and well-being.3.3 Describe how own role links to the wider sector. My role involves making sure that our clients are provided with adequate care and support.It is important to understand the limits of the role and seek assistance t o deal with issues which are beyond the scope of social care, and liaise with other agencies to provide seamless care such as arranging and attending appointments, carrying out treatment, and therapy regimes.3.4 Describe the main roles and responsibilities of representative bodies that influence the wider sector. The main bodies that influence the Health and Social Care sector are government departments, professional bodies, trade unions, various skills councils and regulatory bodies.The main roles and responsibilities of the government departments are a duty to promote the economic, social and environmental wellbeing of their communities. The professional bodies have a number of functions. They may set and assess professional examinations, provide support for Continuing Professional Development through learning opportunities and tools for recording and planning, publish professional journals or magazines, provide networks for professionals to meet and discuss their field of experti se, issue a Code of Conduct to guide professional behaviour, deal with complaints against professionals and implement disciplinary procedures.The representative bodies such as trade unions play an important role and are helpful in effective communication between the workers and the management. They provide the advice and support to ensure that the differences of opinion do not turn into major conflicts. The central function of a trade union is to represent people at work. But they also have a wider role in protecting their interests.The sector skills councils create the conditions for increased employer investment in skills which will drive enterprise and create jobs and sustainable economic growth. The regulatory bodies exercise a regulatory function: impose requirements, restrictions and conditions, set standards in relation to any activity, and secure compliance & enforcement. 4. Understand career pathways available within own and related sectors 4. 1 Explore different types of o ccupational opportunities.There are different pathways available within Health and Social Care sector, including: Adult Social Care, Healthcare: Arts Therapy, Clinical Support Staff/Healthcare Assistant, Dentistry & Dental Hygiene, Medical Doctors & Surgeons, Medical Sales & Marketing, Nursing & Midwifery, Paramedic & Ambulance Services, Physiotherapy, Rehabilitation & Occupational Therapy, Psychological Therapy, Speech & Language Therapy; Social Care: Adoption & Fostering, Alcohol & Substance Misuse, Children & Families, Domestic violence, Housing & Homelessness, Learning Disabilities, Mental Health, Older People, Physical & Sensory Impairment, Sexual Health, Social Work, Youth Work & Youth Justice.4. 2 Identify sources of information related to a chosen career pathway. There is information available in colleges and training organisations, websites like careerpath, careerprofiles, Jobsite UK, etc; also NHS Careers, Direct Gov Careers, and from your manager & colleagues).4. 3 Identi fy next steps in own career pathway.When I complete my QCF level 2 in Health and Social Care I would like to start level3. 5. Understand how issues of public concern may affect the image and delivery of services in the sector5. 1 Identify occasions where the public have raised concerns regarding issues within the sector. There have been numerous investigations into the quality of care provided by care homes and domiciliary care companies. The investigation into the abuse of children in North Wales care homes, and abuse of the elderly in Winterbourne View & Cedar Grove were started by individuals who complained either to CQC or various newspapers and television news broadcasters.5.2 Outline different viewpoints around an issue of public concern relevant to the sector.There are various viewpoints around cases of abuse which have caused a public concern. Lack of funding and government cuts, Lack of specialist training and keeping up to date with new guidelines and regulations, Lack of trust and belief with the companies which need to make profit, and the responsible bodies such as social services, CQC, the police, care providers and care staff, the families of the victims, inadequate sharing of information with various outsiders who have input to the care given, bureaucracy, etc.5. 3 Describe how issues of public concern have altered public views of the sector.With more than quarter of care companies are not meeting standards on care and welfare, the public have seemed to lost faith in such regulators and companies as this has been recurring for a number of years. The media have issued a lot of publicity stating how care companies, social services, and regulators have let the victims down by simply not taking these cases seriously enough and ensuring the well-being and standards are being met. BBC1 and Channel 4 have been the main channels on television who have reported on such cases from being under cover within the sector to show the public what can go wrong w ithin care.5. 4 Describe recent changes in service delivery which have affected own area of work.The number of reports of vulnerable elderly people has been on the increase over the recent years, and a need for changes within Health and Social Care sector has been highlighted. The areas of health and social care that have been identified as needing special attention: involvement, dignity and respect, meeting fundamental needs, access to information and support, partnership working, personalised services, effective commissioning, flexibility and creativity, inclusion, and carer as partners in care. Myself and my colleagues have been made aware of these areas and solutions to possible difficulties by received regular training on these issues.