scholarly journals Negotiating course material to counter poor learner motivation

Author(s):  
Tony Waterman

This paper details a teacher-implemented intervention, negotiating learner-generated materials, with the aim of improving low levels of learner motivation. This had resulted from the introduction of a problematic entry test policy acting as gatekeeper to an internationally-accredited diploma course in the learners’ specialized technical subject. For the learners, successful completion of the diploma course would guarantee social and financial benefits including promotion, increased salary and prestige within the military institution. However, an order came from the commanding officer that learners would only be accepted onto the diploma course if they attained an IELTS test score of Band 5. This requirement was not attainable by the learners in the time available and represented a threat to their career aspirations, which would negatively affect them personally, economically and professionally. Consequently, there was a substantial drop in learner motivation. An intervention was constructed and conducted during the course over a two-week period to supplement students’ course book in order to counter such poor levels of motivation. The study was set within the critical paradigm, using quantitative and qualitative data collecting methods to answer my research question: “To what extent does the intervention (asking learners to choose a topic, select original material, and suggest the type of tasks to be produced for the material) have a positive effect on learners’ levels of motivation?” Key findings included an observed increase in learner engagement and a greater level of concentration than in recent classes together with reduced learner worry about the IELTS test. Several conclusions are offered as to the efficacy of conducting such an intervention and how it could impact on learner motivation.

2021 ◽  
pp. 0095327X2098519
Author(s):  
Celeste Raver Luning ◽  
Prince A. Attoh ◽  
Tao Gong ◽  
James T. Fox

With the backdrop of the utility of grit at the individual level, speculation has begun to circulate that grit may exist as an organizational level phenomenon. To explore this potential construct, this study used an exploratory, qualitative research design. This study explored grit at the organizational level by interviewing leaders’ perceptions of what may be a culture of organizational grit. Participants included 14 U.S. military officers. Seven themes emerged relative to the research question: “What do U.S. military officers perceive as a culture of organizational grit?” Themes included professional pride, team unity, resilience-determination, mission accomplishment, core values, growth mindset, and deliberate practice. This study indicated that a culture of organizational grit is likely a combination of converging organizational elements. Overall, findings indicate that there may be a culture of organizational grit in the military and at the least, more research examining the concept is warranted.


2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andi Kristanto ◽  
Mustaji Mustaji ◽  
Andi Mariono

The use of e-learning is becoming the global issue now. In an educational field, there are many institutions already use it. The study very important aimed to test the feasibility and effectiveness the development of instructional materials e-learning based on the blended learning in audio/radio media development course. The background laid behind the problem is the experience the students had that is having difficulties in developing the audio/radio media manuscript. This caused by the limited time lecturer had to explain the screenwriting material, and duration the students had to write the audio/radio script, so it affected the lack of students’ understanding of the course material also to the students’ scriptwriting result which is not feasible to produce yet. Standard mastery of the subject specified within 6 (six) weeks in maximum, and the students should have been able to develop the script established on the rules of production. Thus, the outcome of this research would be the e-learning-based instructional materials based on blended learning, Semester Lesson Plan (SLP) audio/radio media. This inquiry aims at the improvement of the quality of the work of the audio/radio manuscript. This study implements the Research and Development methodology which is based on the steps generally refers to the opinion of Borg and Gall. The R & D steps was done with modified to simplify it into three main stages, namely the introduction, the development, and testing. Data obtained from the learning experts get the percentage of 91.67%, the course professionals and media specialists each earn a percentage of 100%. Based on these data, the model of blended learning instructional materials for the development of audio/radio media course that have been developed could be the solution of the research question stated that blended learning models of instructional materials that have been evolved are practical for use in learning instructional activity.


2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 639-651 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christiane Rochon ◽  
Bryn Williams-Jones

Military physicians are often perceived to be in a position of ‘dual loyalty’ because they have responsibilities towards their patients but also towards their employer, the military institution. Further, they have to ascribe to and are bound by two distinct codes of ethics (i.e., medical and military), each with its own set of values and duties, that could at first glance be considered to be very different or even incompatible. How, then, can military physicians reconcile these two codes of ethics and their distinct professional/institutional values, and assume their responsibilities towards both their patients and the military institution? To clarify this situation, and to show how such a reconciliation might be possible, we compared the history and content of two national professional codes of ethics: the Defence Ethics of the Canadian Armed Forces and the Code of Ethics of the Canadian Medical Association. Interestingly, even if the medical code is more focused on duties and responsibility while the military code is more focused on core values and is supported by a comprehensive ethical training program, they also have many elements in common. Further, both are based on the same core values of loyalty and integrity, and they are broad in scope but are relatively flexible in application. While there are still important sources of tension between and limits within these two codes of ethics, there are fewer differences than may appear at first glance because the core values and principles of military and medical ethics are not so different.


2008 ◽  
pp. 142-172 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Kentor ◽  
Edward Kick

After the “peace bonus” era, global military expenditures have escalated sharply despite some worldwide declines in military personnel. Theories on the economic impacts of the military institution and escalated military spending greatly differ and include arguments that they either improve domestic economic performance or crowd out growth-inducing processes. Empirical findings on this matter are inconclusive, in part due to a failure to disentangle the various dimensions of military expenditures. We further suggest that modern sociology's relative inattention to such issues has contributed to these shortcomings. We explore a new dimension of military spending that clarifies this issue—military expenditures per soldier —which captures the capital intensiveness of a country’s military organization. Our cross-national panel regression and causal analyses of developed and less developed countries from 1990 to 2003 show that military expenditures per soldier inhibit the growth of per capita GDP, net of control variables, with the most pronounced effects in least developed countries. These expenditures inhibit national development in part by slowing the expansion of the labor force. Labor-intensive militaries may provide a pathway for upward mobility, but comparatively capital-intensive military organizations limit entry opportunities for unskilled and under- or unemployed people. Deep investments in military hardware also reduce the investment capital available for more economically productive opportunities. We also find that arms imports have a positive effect on economic growth, but only in less developed countries.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 188-200
Author(s):  
Chiemela Godwin Wambu ◽  
Amaechi Ehimatie

Nigerian military history is an aspect of Nigerian history that reconstructs the philosophies, beliefs, life and times of military personnel in relation to time and place. On the other hand, strategic studies involve a study of the security policies and political conduct of states in their interaction within the international system. Since it is the military institution that implements these security policies, itself central to the objectives of states in international politics, it is logical  to view military history and strategic studies as pivotal to the securitydevelopment of the Nigerian nation as it is for every other nation. Given this understanding, this study attempts to situate Nigerian military history and strategic studies as imperatives for national security development in Nigeria. To achieve its goal, the paper employs mostly secondary and but a few primary sources subjected to content historical analysis from which it was deduced that military history and strategic studies are important for the advancement of security development in Nigeria. Keywords: Military, Strategic Studies, History, Security


The research addresses the selection process for the naval pentathlon team of the Naval Academy. Hypothesis: The motor performance criterion in the selection of athletes is not enough, and the performance in training and competitions can be improved if athletes’ attitude towards and motivation for performance are added to the selection. Subjects: The basis for selecting the research subjects were military students who had already passed a first stage of selection when being admitted to the military institution. Methods: Bibliographical study, pedagogical observation, experiment, questionnaire survey, mathematical and statistical method, graphical method. The first stage was oriented towards the selection of a group of 30 subjects (out of 200) using psychomotor performance as a criterion, and the second stage was focused on selecting the representative team of the Naval Academy by means of two opinion questionnaires meant to reveal the subjects’ attitude towards and motivation for performance and competition. Results: We identified the group of 15 athletes who met the conditions of having good motor skills and an optimal attitude towards the preparation for performance within a rigorously planned training system, with coaching sessions designed to facilitate the maximisation of their performance. Conclusion: The selection process will be oriented towards the subjects with specific motor skills in swimming, running and utilitarian routes, but also with real potential for training – improvement of these skills and development of good exercise capacity, all this facilitated by a proper attitude and motivation.


2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 158-193
Author(s):  
Per Anders Rudling

This article is part of the special cluster titled Conceptualizations of the Holocaust in Germany, Lithuania, Poland, and Ukraine since the 1990s, guest edited by Grzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe. In 2007, Roman Shukhevych (1907–1950), the commander of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), was designated an official Ukrainian state hero. He has since become the object of an elaborate cult of personality. Lauded for his resistance to the Soviet authorities in 1944–1950, Shukhevych is highly controversial in neighbouring Poland for the ethnic cleansing that the UPA carried out in 1943–1944, as he commanded that organization. Over a few months, the UPA killed around ninety thousand Poles, expelling hundreds of thousands of others. The brutal efficiency of this campaign has to be seen in the context of the larger war, not least Shukhevych’s training by Nazi Germany, in particular the military experience he obtained as a captain in the Ukrainian formation Nachtigall, and as a commanding officer in Schutzmannschaft Battalion 201, which served in occupied Belorussia. This article is an attempt at reconstruct Shukhevych’s whereabouts in 1942, in order to establish the context and praxis under which Shukhevych operated until deserting the auxiliary police in January 1943.


2019 ◽  
pp. 0095327X1989471 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lindy Heinecken ◽  
Nina Wilén

This study focuses on soldiers returning from peacekeeping missions and the challenges they experience adapting to the home environment in the postdeployment phase. The article focuses on South African peacekeepers returning from missions in Darfur/Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Burundi. Interviews with 50 South African peacekeepers on the challenges they face in terms of their homecoming, family reintegration, and military support were conducted. Overall, the study found that both external military factors such as deployment length and nature of mission, and internal factors specific to the soldier affected reintegration. We highlight three major findings of our study: Firstly, our analysis show that peacekeepers across gender, rank, and race identify the absence from their children as a major challenge. Secondly, while relational turbulence characterized by ambivalence and concerns about infidelity was prevalent among all, there was a clear difference in the answers between the male and female peacekeepers. Thirdly, a large majority voiced the need for more support from the military institution for their families, before, during, and after deployment.


2016 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-84 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ross McGarry

The purpose of this article is to illustrate prescient issues relating to current and ex-military communities in the United Kingdom who have featured heavily within the policy arena over the past decade in relation to several key areas of importance. It will be illustrated how this population becomes visible within the public imagination (via military losses), how discourses relating to the harms they experience are structured and articulated within political and policy domains (particularly in relation to mental health) via “state talk” (qua Sim), and what the potential social consequences are for politically rendering an unproblematized populist view of current and ex-military communities (i.e., pending crises). This argument is made with the express intention of reengaging critical recognition of the distancing of the military institution from the physical and psychological vulnerability of those who have participated in war and military environments. This is an argument returned to pertinence from the recent publication of the Chilcot Inquiry into British involvement in the Iraq war.


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