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West Virginia University's five-year preservice teacher education program prepares general education teachers for students with special needs. Using a strand approach, special education learning outcomes and competencies have been incorporated into core education courses. A survey of 72 program participants and 11 faculty members indicates satisfaction with the program. (Contains references.) (Author/CR)

Discusses the participation of students with disabilities on the Stanford Achievement Test in West Virginia and the testing guidelines and testing Accommodations used. The effects of the inclusion of students with disabilities on class standings and teacher attitudes towards the participation of students with disabilities are addressed. (CR)

This article explains four teacher-developed mnemonic learning strategies--one for learning the steps of long division, one to teach decision making, one for developing homework skills, and one for preparing and giving a speech. (DB)

Methods for teaching higher order thinking skills to students with special needs are considered. These include microthinking skills (e.g., classification); critical thinking skills; and major thinking operations (e.g., problem solving, decision making, and conceptualizing). Strategies for teaching individual skills and for incorporating thinking skills into life skills are offered. (DB)

Ravenswood High School (West Virginia) implemented a 1-year project to increase regular education inclusion and success of 44 students with disabilities. Attitudes of 36 regular and special teachers, 96 parents, and 232 students indicated support for collaborative effort to further inclusive education. (PB)

This article describes methods for teaching higher level thinking skills to children. A four-step teaching plan utilizing Beyer's Taxonomy of thinking skills provides a sequential technique for teaching these skills as do increased verbal interaction, skillful questioning, and use of knowledge organizers. The I PLAN strategy can aid decision making and problem solving. (Author/DB)

This article explores the future of special education within four contexts: service delivery systems, personnel qualifications, emerging technologies, and policy developments. The paper argues for participation by all educators in active efforts to promote "best" policies and practices for the education of all children with special needs. (Author/DB)

Using data from the national Phi Delta Kappa study (22,018 students; 9,652 teachers; and 276 principals), it was found that 64 percent of the students eligible for special education services were categorized as learning disabled and that students with special education labels were at greater risk to fail in school than students not so labeled. (DB)

Chatbots have proven to be effective tools in the fields of marketing, sales, customer relationship management and many other applications. This research explores the opportunities for chatbots to contribute to the promotion of scientific research and initiatives. The Etelman Observatory Research Center of the University of the Virgin Islands (UVI) houses the Virgin Islands Robotic Telescope (VIRT), a fully-automated, robotically controlled, and queue-driven 0.5 meter research grade telescope. The Etelman Observatory's mission is to be a world-class research and education center that engages with the local community through various outreach activities in all its initiatives. Given the challenges of physical presence during the COVID-19 crisis, Observatory personnel decided to adopt chatbot technology to engage interested parties over the Internet in its key scientific instrument for astrophysics -- VIRT. VIRTBot is a chatbot designed to provide VIRT with a voice that interested community members can engage with directly. The team implemented VIRTBot with Amazon Web Services (AWS) technologies in the cloud and deployed the solution online. Volunteers were surveyed about their knowledge of the Observatory's activities after reviewing either an FAQ or engaging with VIRTBot. The study demonstrated that the FAQ outperformed VIRTBot in terms of knowledge dissemination, but VIRTBot outperformed the FAQ in measures of interest and engagement. Our research suggests that, under the right conditions, chatbots improve engagement over traditional web resources in promoting STEM educational initiatives to the public. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A life career education program for 35 elementary multiply handicapped retarded students resulted in positive changes in areas of academics, communication, interest, self-concept, self-help, and task performance. (CL)

A bulletin board learning center was used to improve the spelling performance of students with learning disabilities in grades five-six. Using a fishing theme, the bulletin board became part of an instructional approach which involved tape recordings of spelling words, tactile learning, matching words to scrambled letters, completing cloze exercises, etc. (JDD)

This paper explores two common threads in IS education, constructivist approaches like active learning and the multidisciplinary educational objectives of Information Systems as a discipline, and demonstrates how these themes are well paired. The paper builds on prior research into effective applications of interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary computing education (Fee, Holland-Minkley, & Lombardi, 2017) and presents a deep survey of the literature in IS education to identify the primary forms that multidisciplinary education takes within the classroom or curriculum. This survey demonstrates how the multidisciplinarity of IS is consistently enhanced by the application of constructivist techniques. The discussion addresses how the predicted benefits of both using constructivist approaches and including multidisciplinary content within a course are well aligned with the objectives of IS education. This will include considering how these two elements of IS education can be paired to support greater diversity and inclusion within the discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper continues previously published research on instructional methods for distance education courses affected by unique and challenging circumstances including technology constraints, time, distance and natural disasters. In this study, we examine the impacts of synchronous, online, and rich media instructional techniques on student learning in a database design and development course. Using backward stepwise elimination and linear regression, we examine environmental and instructional variables to evaluate their impact on student performance on a Structured Query Language (SQL) assessment. We find, somewhat surprisingly, that a live, synchronous session with students through the online video conferencing system Zoom, did not have the desired and positive effect on student learning outcomes that we hypothesized. Possible reasons, including student and instructor unfamiliarity with the platform are discussed. We also find that increased student attention to instructional materials on Blackboard, and increased use of Codecademy.com tutorials and exercises, did produce significant, positive student achievement on the SQL assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Distance education has taken on many forms and evolved tremendously with the advancement of new technologies, however impediments remain as we attempt to deliver instruction to student audiences across a variety of locations. This paper presents a case study which examines a particularly unique set of challenges: delivery of an information systems course to graduate students who live on disparate islands in the Caribbean. The authors examine a number of factors that impact student learning through both quantitative and qualitative means, concluding that the degradation of instructor presence, regardless of cause, is the primary reason for decreased student performance in the multi-site Information Systems classroom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Molecular mechanisms that regulate carbon flux are poorly understood in algae. The Δ glgC mutant of the cyanobacterium Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803 is incapable of glycogen storage and displays an array of physiological responses under nitrogen starvation that are different from wild-type (WT). These include non-bleaching phenotype and the redirection of photosynthetically fixed carbon towards excreted organic acids (overflow metabolism) without biomass growth. To understand the role of gene/protein expression in these responses, we followed the time course of transcripts by genome-scale microarrays and proteins by shotgun proteomics in Δ glgC and WT cells upon nitrogen starvation. Compared to WT, the degradation of phycobilisome rod proteins was delayed and attenuated in the mutant, and the core proteins were less degraded; both contributed to the non-bleaching appearance despite the induction of nblA genes, suggesting the presence of a break in regulation of the phycobilisome degradation pathway downstream of nblA induction. The mutant displayed NtcA-mediated transcriptional response to nitrogen starvation, indicating that it is able to sense nitrogen status. Furthermore, some responses to nitrogen starvation appear to be stronger in the mutant, as shown by the increases in transcripts for the transcriptional regulator, rre37 , which regulates central carbon metabolism. Accordingly, multiple proteins involved in photosynthesis, central carbon metabolism, and carbon storage and utilization showed lower abundance in the mutant. These results indicate that the transition in the central carbon metabolism from growth to overflow metabolism in Δ glgC does not require increases in expression of the overflow pathway enzymes; the transition and non-bleaching phenotype are likely regulated instead at the metabolite level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Field testing of The Career Adaptive Behavior Inventory activities with 27 mildly and severely mentally handicapped students resulted in statistically significant pretest/posttest differences in leisure time, self-concept, responsibility, and self help. (CL)

A survey of students earning special education degrees in 1985 addressed job satisfaction, teacher-training program evaluation, and job stress factors. Of the 54 respondents, 88 percent found special education to be a personally satisfying career, but 48 percent said they would select another profession if given the opportunity to begin again. (JHZ)

Twenty faculty members who participated in workshops emphasizing sensitivity toward the handicapped demonstrated a statistically significant positive attitude change toward mainstreaming, although their knowledge about P.L. 94-142 (the Education for All Handicapped Children Act) and the learning characteristics of handicapped students did not increase. (CL)

Beta-adrenergic agonists and antagonists have been shown to alter theophylline pharmacokinetics. It was the purpose of this study to characterize further the effects that terbutaline and propranolol have on theophylline disposition. In nine healthy male volunteers, mean parameters for theophylline disposition did not change after four days of terbutaline (5 mg q8h). Theophylline clearance, however, did change within the subjects. Clearance increased in five subjects, decreased in three, and remained unchanged in one volunteer. Pretreatment with four days of terbutaline (5 mg q8h) and propranolol (60 mg q8h) significantly decreased mean theophylline clearance (60.1 ± 12.9 vs 40.6 ± 9.9 mL/min/1.73m2; P < .01) increased half-life (8.37 ± 1.77 vs 12.32 ± 2.70 hours; P < .05), and increased postinfusion theophylline concentration (13.5 ± 2.7 vs 18.95 ± 2.5 μg/mL; P < .001). In five subjects theophylline clearance increased after terbutaline pretreatment (64.6 ± 13.0 vs 75.0 ± 13.9 mL/min/1.73m2). The percentage increase ranged from 3.9 to 28.5%. These subjects were restudied after receiving propranolol alone (60 mg q8h). Comparison between the propranolol and terbutaline study and the propranolol alone study indicated no mean change in clearance in these five subjects (41.8 ± 12.7 vs 36.1 ± 5.1 mL/min/1.73m2). Thus it appears that the changes observed in these five subjects after terbutaline pretreatment may have been random in occurrence as has been shown to occur with theophylline disposition and are not related to terbutaline pretreatment. It is concluded that beta-2 adrenergic stimulation does not alter theophylline pharmacokinetics, whereas nonselective beta-adrenergic antagonism profoundly affected theophylline disposition. This is an additional reason not to use propranolol in patients who receive theophylline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]