...2013 C Copyright ⃝ 2013 Educational Testing Service ISSN: 1530-5058 print / 1532-7574 online DOI: 10.1080/15305058.2012.690012 Writing Essays on a Laptop or a Desktop Computer: Does It Matter? Guangming Ling and Brent Bridgeman Educational Testing Service To explore the potential effect of computer type on the Test of English as a Foreign Language–Internet-Based Test (TOEFL iBT) Writing Test, a sample of 444 international students was used. The students were randomly assigned to either a laptop or a desktop computer to write two TOEFL iBT practice essays in a simulated testing environment, followed by a survey of computer experience. The survey results suggested that the participants had extensive experience using computers, had more experience with laptops than with desktops, and preferred using the laptop computers to the desktop computers. The computer type (laptop or desktop computer) was found to have a negligible effect on essay performance (essay score, essay length, and writing speed). However, other factors, including gender, regional background, daily experience with laptop or desktop computers, preference for a particular pointing device, and previous TOEFL experience, were found to be significantly related to essay performance but did not interact with computer type. Keywords: computer type effects, desktop, e-rater, essay length, essay score, laptop, writing speed INTRODUCTION When large-scale computer-based testing began in the early 1990s, testing centers were equipped...
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...Copyright © 2013 by McGraw-Hill Education. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the United States Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. ISBN: 978-0-07-180360-1 MHID: 0-07-180360-2 The material in this eBook also appears in the print version of this title: ISBN: 978-0-07-180359-5, MHID: 0-07180359-9. E-book conversion by Codemantra Version 1.0 All trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners. Rather than put a trademark symbol after every occurrence of a trademarked name, we use names in an editorial fashion only, and to the benefit of the trademark owner, with no intention of infringement of the trademark. Where such designations appear in this book, they have been printed with initial caps. McGraw-Hill Education eBooks are available at special quantity discounts to use as premiums and sales promotions or for use in corporate training programs. To contact a representative please visit the Contact Us page at www.mhprofessional.com. Trademarks: McGraw-Hill Education, the McGraw-Hill Education logo, 5 Steps to a 5 and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of McGraw-Hill Education and/or its affiliates in the United States and other countries and may not be used without written permission. All other trademarks are the property...
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...TRADE JURNAL Leisure Arts in Bookstore Push Milliot, Jim. Publishers Weekly255.41 (Oct 13, 2008): n/a. 1. ------------------------------------------------- Full text 2. ------------------------------------------------- Abstract/Details Turn on hit highlighting for speaking browsers by selecting the Enter button Hide highlighting Abstract TranslateAbstract Craft book publisher Leisure Arts has signed on with Midpoint Trade Books as part of its effort to expand its presence among booksellers. Throughout its history, Leisure Arts has focused its sales operation on crafts stores. Details Subject Book industry; Bookstores; Distributors; Agreements; Distribution channels Company / organization Name: Leisure Arts NAICS: 511120; Name: Midpoint Trade Books Inc NAICS: 422920, 511130 Title Leisure Arts in Bookstore Push Author Milliot, Jim Publication title Publishers Weekly Volume 255 Issue 41 Pages n/a Number of pages 1 Publication year 2008 Publication date Oct 13, 2008 Year 2008 Section Foreword; New Channel Publisher PWxyz, LLC Place of publication New York Country of publication United States Publication subject Publishing And Book Trade, Library And Information Sciences ISSN 00000019 CODEN PWEEAD Source type Trade Journals Language of publication English Document type News ProQuest document ID 197101688 Document URL http://search.proquest.com.ezaccess.library.uitm.edu.my/docview/197101688?accountid=42518 ...
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...UNIT 1: INVESTMENT IN INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL LEAD-IN Discuss the implications of the following statements for academic study. 1. Money spent on the brain, is never spent in vain. 2. An educated workforce is a key driver of national economic growth. 3. The top ten in-demand jobs in 2010 didn’t exist in 2004. Universities are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t exist yet. 4. The amount of new technical information is doubling every two years. For students starting a 4-year technical degree this means that half of what they learn in their first year of study will be outdated by their third year of study. VOCABULARY ACTIVATOR Guess, how many English words you already know. You can check it by googling ‘Oxford 3000’. This is the list of 3000 most important and useful English key-words selected for foreign users of the English language by a group of language experts and experienced teachers. The words which one is likely to meet while studying at an English-speaking university are compiled into the Academic Word List (AWL). The third list of words you are expected to know is the terminology of your future area of professional expertise. Now check, how well you know campus vocabulary. In pairs, look at each set of words below and try to decide whether they are the same or different. If different, what is the difference? a) high school / higher education / tertiary education b) department / faculty / school of … c) arts...
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...SOCIAL PROBLEM Educational Inequality: A Social Problem in the U.S. SOCIAL PROBLEM Educational Inequality: A Social Problem In the U.S. Introduction: The goal of education is to make sure that every student has a chance to excel, both in school and in life. Increasingly, children's success in school determines their success as adults, determining whether and where they go to college, what professions that they enter, and how much they are paid. Why is that getting a good education is dependent upon a person’s socioeconomic status? Education is a right in the U.S, but it seems to be accessible for the privilege. Why do we have inequality in education? Let’s look at different views explaining some possible causes or contributors to this issue. “Social inequality is the expression of lack of access to housing, health care, education, employment opportunities, and status. It is the exclusion of people from full and equal participation in what we, the members of society, perceive as being valuable, important, personally worthwhile, and socially desirable. Economic inequality is expressed through the unequal distribution of wealth in society. This has obvious ramifications in terms of the unequal distribution of what that wealth may purchase; housing, health care, education, career prospects, status - in our society, access to all these things is largely dependent on wealth. Because of the nature of our society - post industrial, competitive, capitalist, commercially driven...
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...offer so much more to the class than just the information. They offer themselves. A collective definition of a teacher, is someone who “yearns to help children learn, watch them grow, and make a meaningful difference in the world” (Teacher Support Network, 2007, para. 2). This definition must be the main reason as to why individuals pursue teaching as a career. Generally the pay is low to fair, but the overall rewards are much greater, for as a teacher one can touch the hearts of the young and open their minds in order to tap their thirst for knowledge. ------------------------------------------------- [edit]The Long Road Becoming a teacher is a lengthy process obtained by numerous routes, such as night school or attending a four year college. Regardless of the process it is important to obtain at least a Bachelors degree in the desired teaching area, as well as a teacher certification which should include clinical experience (Lewis, L., Parsad, B., Carey, N., Bartfai, N., Farris, E. & Smerdon, B., 1999, para. 3). The average starting salaries were about $31,704 in the year 2003-04, whereas the average teaching salary was about $46,597 for the year 2004-2005 (Pearson Education Inc, table). Compare this to the average cost of living in the United States today which is continually rising (Boskey, para. 3). style="background-color: #FFF7F7;border: solid 1px #FFBDBD; padding: 1em;" valign=top | Teacher's Salaries Across the US | Teaching is not a pocket cushining job, but...
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...Qualitative Approaches to Classroom Research 1 Qualitative Approaches to Classroom Research with English Language Learners Patricia A. Duff University of British Columbia Address: Department of Language & Literacy Education University of British Columbia 2125 Main Mall Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z4 Canada Courier: 2034 Lower Mall Road University of British Columbia Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2 Canada Qualitative Approaches to Classroom Research 2 ABSTRACT This chapter provides an overview of recent qualitative research in classrooms examining English language learners (ELLs). I first present common features of qualitative research and review debates regarding research paradigms in the social sciences and humanities. I also discuss the role of triangulation and capturing participants’ insider or emic perspectives in qualitative research and highlight various data collection methods and ways of combining macro-level and micro-level analyses, particularly in ethnographic research. Ethical issues, difficulties obtaining informed consent in classroom research, and criteria for evaluating qualitative research are then considered. Three qualitative studies that have been deemed exemplary and meritorious by scholars in English language education are then presented and some common themes in current qualitative classroom research with ELLs are identified. The chapter concludes with directions for future qualitative research. Introduction Over the past 2 decades, research...
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...Instructor’s Manual and Test Bank to accompany A First Look at Communication Theory Sixth Edition Em Griffin Wheaton College prepared by Glen McClish San Diego State University and Emily J. Langan Wheaton College Published by McGrawHill, an imprint of The McGrawHill Companies, Inc., 1221 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020. Copyright Ó 2006, 2003, 2000, 1997, 1994, 1991 by The McGrawHill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. The contents, or parts thereof, may be reproduced in print form solely for classroom use with A First Look At Communication Theory provided such reproductions bear copyright notice, but may not be reproduced in any other form or for any other purpose without the prior written consent of The McGrawHill Companies, Inc., including, but not limited to, in any network or other electronic storage or transmission, or broadcast for distance learning. PREFACE Rationale We agreed to produce the instructor’s manual for the sixth edition of A First Look at Communication Theory because it’s a first-rate book and because we enjoy talking and writing about pedagogy. Yet when we recall the discussions we’ve had with colleagues about instructor’s manuals over the years, two unnerving comments stick with us: “I don’t find them much help”; and (even worse) “I never look at them.” And, if the truth be told, we were often the people making such points! With these statements in mind, we have done some serious soul-searching about the texts that so many teachers—ourselves...
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...A Passage to India E. M. Forster Online Information For the online version of BookRags' A Passage to India Premium Study Guide, including complete copyright information, please visit: http://www.bookrags.com/studyguide−passageindia/ Copyright Information ©2000−2007 BookRags, Inc. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. The following sections of this BookRags Premium Study Guide is offprint from Gale's For Students Series: Presenting Analysis, Context, and Criticism on Commonly Studied Works: Introduction, Author Biography, Plot Summary, Characters, Themes, Style, Historical Context, Critical Overview, Criticism and Critical Essays, Media Adaptations, Topics for Further Study, Compare &Contrast, What Do I Read Next?, For Further Study, and Sources. ©1998−2002; ©2002 by Gale. Gale is an imprint of The Gale Group, Inc., a division of Thomson Learning, Inc. Gale and Design® and Thomson Learning are trademarks used herein under license. The following sections, if they exist, are offprint from Beacham's Encyclopedia of Popular Fiction: "Social Concerns", "Thematic Overview", "Techniques", "Literary Precedents", "Key Questions", "Related Titles", "Adaptations", "Related Web Sites". © 1994−2005, by Walton Beacham. The following sections, if they exist, are offprint from Beacham's Guide to Literature for Young Adults: "About the Author", "Overview", "Setting", "Literary Qualities", "Social Sensitivity", "Topics for Discussion", "Ideas for Reports and Papers". © 1994−2005, by Walton Beacham. All other...
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...BARACK OBAMA'S SOUTH CAROLINA SPEECH Introduction In this paper, I shall analyze US Presidential hopeful Barack Obama's South Carolina victory speech from a particular pragmatic perspective. In particular, I shall explore the idea that this speech is constituted by many voices (in other words, it displays polyphony, to use an idea due to Bakhtin 1981, 1986) and that the audience is part of this speech event, adding and contributing to its text in a collaborative way (in particular, in constructing meaning). As many are aware (including the journalists who report day by day on Barack Obama's achievements), Obama uses the technique of 'personification' (The Economist, Dec 13th, 2007). When he voices an idea, he does not just expose it as if it came from himself, but gets another person (fictitious or, plausibly, real) to voice it. Since in an electoral speech, he cannot reasonably get people on stage to voice his ideas, he personifies ideas by narrating what people told him. His stories are his way of personifying his ideas. The discourse strategy he uses serves to reverse the direction of influence from the people in control to the people controlled (see van Dijk 2003). Duranti (2006b) writes that The language of politics has been presented and studied in terms of its ability to persuade an audience (of peers, subjects, and superiors) to go along with the speaker's view of the world and his or her proposal (Perrot 2000). In much of this literature, the successful political...
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...Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication: Royal, Brandon The little gold grammar book : mastering the rules that unlock the power of writing / by Brandon Royal. ISBN 978-1-897393-30-7 Library of Congress Control Number: 2009909354 In addition to the paperback edition, this book is available as an eBook and in the Adobe PDF file format. Technical Credits: Cover Design: George Foster, Fairfield, Iowa, USA Editing: Jonathan K. Cohen, Irvine, California, USA This book’s cover text was set in Minion. The interior text was set in Scala and Scala Sans. Contents Introduction Chapter 1: The 100-Question Quiz Subject-Verb Agreement Pronoun Usage Modification Parallelism Comparisons Verb Tenses Diction Review Idioms Review Answers to The 100-Question Quiz Chapter 2: Grammatical Munchkins The Eight Parts of Speech Parts of Speech vs. The Seven Characteristics Other Grammatical Terms Chapter 3: Word Gremlins Diction Showdown 200 Common Grammatical Idioms Chapter 4: Putting It All Together 30 All-Star Grammar Problems Answers and Explanations Editing I – Tune-up Editing II – Punctuation...
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...this situation sounds familiar, you may find it reassuring to know that many professionals undergo these same strange compulsions before they begin writing. Jean Kerr, author of Please Don’t Eat the Daisies, admits that she often finds herself in the kitchen reading soup-can labels—or anything—in order to prolong the moments before taking pen in hand. John C. Calhoun, vice president under Andrew Jackson, insisted he had to plow his fields before he could write, and Joseph Conrad, author of Lord Jim and other novels, is said to have cried on occasion from the sheer dread of sitting down to compose his stories. To spare you as much hand-wringing as possible, this chapter presents some practical suggestions on how to begin writing your short essay. Although all writers must find the methods that work best for them, you may find some of the following ideas helpful. But no matter how you actually begin putting words on paper, it is absolutely essential to maintain two basic ideas concerning your writing task. Before you write a single sentence, you should always remind yourself that 1. You have some valuable ideas to tell your reader, and 2. More than anything, you want to communicate those ideas to your reader. These reminders may seem obvious to you, but without a solid commitment to your own opinions as well as to your reader, your prose will be lifeless and boring. If you don’t care about your subject, you can’t very well expect anyone else to. Have confidence that your ideas are...
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...Foreign Language Annals Á vol. 43, No. 1 27 Language-Learning Motivation During Short-Term Study Abroad: An Activity Theory Perspective Heather Willis Allen University of Miami Abstract: This study investigated the development of language-learning motivation during short-term study abroad (SA) for six intermediate-level students of French. Taking an activity theory perspective, findings demonstrated that one of two orientations motivated participants to study or continue studying French at the college level: linguistic motives or career-oriented motives. The choice to study abroad was seen as either a critical step to achieving fluency or a means of travel and cultural learning. Enhanced language-learning motivation emerged to varying degrees for participants with linguistically oriented motives for learning French who viewed SA as a languagelearning experience but not for participants with primarily pragmatic reasons for learning French and participating in SA. Implications of the study include the need for curricular intervention in student learning abroad. Key words: French, activity theory, learning motivation, second language learning, self-regulation, study abroad Introduction From the 1960s through the mid-1990s, research on study abroad (SA) largely supported the notion that it is an ideal means of learning a foreign language. Moreover, foreign language professionals often impart this view to students, typically based on their own successful if not life-transforming...
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...Resources for Teaching Prepared by Lynette Ledoux Copyright © 2007 by Bedford/St. Martin’s All rights reserved. Manufactured in the United States of America. 2 1 f e 0 9 d c 8 7 b a For information, write: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 75 Arlington Street, Boston, MA 02116 (617-399-4000) ISBN-10: 0–312–44705–1 ISBN-13: 978–0–312–44705–2 Instructors who have adopted Rereading America, Seventh Edition, as a textbook for a course are authorized to duplicate portions of this manual for their students. Preface This isn’t really a teacher’s manual, not, at least, in the sense of a catechism of questions and correct answers and interpretations. Because the questions provided after each selection in Rereading America are meant to stimulate dialogue and debate — to generate rather than terminate discourse — they rarely lend themselves to a single appropriate response. So, while we’ll try to clarify what we had in mind when framing a few of the knottier questions, we won’t be offering you a list of “right” answers. Instead, regard this manual as your personal support group. Since the publication of the first edition, we’ve had the chance to learn from the experiences of hundreds of instructors nationwide, and we’d like to use this manual as a forum where we can share some of their concerns, suggestions, experiments, and hints. We’ll begin with a roundtable on issues you’ll probably want to address before you meet your class. In the first section of this manual, we’ll discuss approaches to...
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...The Big-Five Trait Taxonomy: History, Measurement, and Theoretical Perspectives Oliver P. John and Sanjay Srivastava University of California at Berkeley Running head: Big Five Trait Taxonomy Final draft: March 5, 1999 Author's Address: Oliver P. John Department of Psychology University of California, MC 1650 Berkeley, CA 94720-1650 W: (510) 642-2178; H: 540-7159; Fax: 643-9334 Email: ojohn@socrates.berkeley.edu; sanjays@socrates.berkeley.edu To appear in L. Pervin and O.P. John (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (2nd ed.). New York: Guilford (in press). 2 Taxonomy is always a contentious issue because the world does not come to us in neat little packages (S. J. Gould, 1981, p. 158). Personality has been conceptualized from a variety of theoretical perspectives, and at various levels of abstraction or breadth (John, Hampson, & Goldberg, 1991; McAdams, 1995). Each of these levels has made unique contributions to our understanding of individual differences in behavior and experience. However, the number of personality traits, and scales designed to measure them, escalated without an end in sight (Goldberg, 1971). Researchers, as well as practitioners in the field of personality assessment, were faced with a bewildering array of personality scales from which to choose, with little guidance and no overall rationale at hand. What made matters worse was that scales with the same name often measure concepts that are not the same, and scales with different...
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