A Pilot Study On Classroom Observation Education Essay

Chapter 4This chapter describes a pilot survey conducted after the preliminary survey and before the chief survey. It begins by a brief debut given in subdivision 4.1, followed by treatments on the sample choice, observation agenda and pre and station session interviews in subdivision 4.2. Section 4.3 covers the schoolroom observations. Gesture cryptography, including the written text, coding jobs and policy, and consequences of the cryptography are included in subdivision 4.4. Discussion and decision concentrating on schoolroom observation and metaphoric gestures are covered in subdivision 4.5. The chapter ends with the deductions for the chief survey explored in subdivision 4.6.4.1 About the Pilot StudyThis pilot survey built on a old little graduated table preliminary survey ( chapter 3 ) . The purposes were: ( a ) to see existent clip schoolroom observation ; ( B ) to prove out and better the observation agenda and interview inquiries ; ( degree Celsius ) to research whether Chin ese music instructors used metaphoric gestures and if so, what these metaphors were and where they were used ; and ( vitamin D ) to prove out and develop metaphoric gesture designation processs. The focal point was limited to music Sessionss in junior high schools because in the preliminary survey, more metaphors were found from the junior degree than from the simple degree. The information of this pilot survey were transcribed from three general music Sessionss taken by Wang, a music instructor in a junior high school in Taiwan.4.2 Before the Observation4.2.1 Sample SelectionSituated in a in-between to upper-middle category suburb of a major northern metropolis, Wang ‘s school was founded in 1988, with 4,268 pupils and 113 categories in 2006. It is considered to be a large school, comparative to the official norm of 1,299 pupils per junior high school in Taiwan for the school twelvemonth 2005-2006 ( Department of Statistics, Ministry of Education of Taiwan ) . The informations were collected in general music categories with pupils aged between 12 and 14. Each category contained around 35 pupils, and talk was the lone type of interaction observed. The consequences of t he preliminary survey showed that metaphor denseness may differ because of learning content. Therefore the Sessionss observed for this pilot were limited to music theory, music history, and music grasp. Wang ( a anonym ) had received her MA in musicology four old ages antecedently and since so had been learning music in the same junior high school. Bing really open-minded about taking portion in research and being observed, Wang was one of the really first music instructors I contacted for the preliminary survey. Since so she had been helpful in replying my inquiries and supplying me background information about the state of affairs of music instruction in junior high school degree in Taiwan. After the preliminary survey, I emailed her to inquire her permission for me to come in her schoolroom and video-record a twosome of Sessionss, and she agreed to take part. Music lessons form portion of the Humanistic disciplines and Humanities class class in junior high schools in Taiwan ( see subdivision 2.4.1 ) , and hence music, humanistic disciplines, and executing humanistic disciplines portion one text edition. â€Å" The humanistic disciplines subdivision negotiations about utilizing different colorss to stand for the four seasons, and the music subdivision negotiations about Vivaldi. So it occurred to me that it ‘s a good chance to give a talk on the Baroque epoch and present Vivaldi ‘s The Four Seasons to them, † ( Wang, pilot interview 2 ) . At the clip when this study was written, MOE of Taiwan did non supply one â€Å" standard † version of the text edition, and schools were free to take the version they preferred. Wang therefore on a regular basis designed the content of her lessons. â€Å" The text edition references nil about the Baroque epoch so I make my ain PowerPoint slides to assist pupils set up the background cognition † ( Wang, the same interview ) . Teachers are allowed to re-arrange the order of the instruction contents and set related things together. In some schools, music instructors have to learn executing humanistic disciplines, but this was non the instance in Wang ‘s school, where there were three single instructors for the three bomber classs: music, humanistic disciplines, and executing humanistic disciplines.4.2.2 Observation Schedule and InterviewsAfter Wang agreed to take part in the survey, I explained to her about the research through electronic mail. She understood that the research was about schoolroom discourse and hence suggested me to put the observation clip at a hebdomad after the mid-term test, when she was approximately to present the Baroque epoch to her pupils. One month before the schoolroom observation, Wang and I met to discourse which classes to detect, including when I should get, where I should sit and how best to put up the recording installation. In add-on, Wang approximately explained what sort of schoolroom activities would be involved and what she intended to learn. Wang was told that the s urvey was about schoolroom talk and the thought was to detect a session with every bit much talk involved as possible. She hence suggested Sessionss chiefly covering music history and music grasp. This meeting is classed as pilot interview 1 ( for more inside informations, see Appendix B ) . A real-time observation agenda was designed, with a intent of associating the schoolroom activities and metaphor usage. As can be seen from the agenda ( see Appendix C ) , both start and terminal times of the activities needed to be specified and during each activity, runs of metaphors and gestures needed to be made, so that I could acquire a basic sense of where bunchs of metaphors and gestures most frequently occurred ( though in the event it proved about impossible for me to number them during categories, something which will be discussed subsequently in 4.6.1 ) . In add-on, the observation agenda covered: administration of the category, stuffs, and musical instruments used, and the linguistic communication used by the instructor and pupils. A general feeling of schoolroom ambiance would be noted as H ( high ) , F ( carnival ) , or L ( low ) to see if schoolroom atmosphere is related to metaphor usage. A follow-up interview ( pilot interview 2 ) with Wang was conducted after detecting the three Sessionss. The face-to-face semistructured interview took topographic point in Wang ‘s music schoolroom during her interruption, enduring 42 proceedingss. Again, I was permitted to enter it, and at the same clip made notes while Wang was speaking. A list of information or inquiries I planned to seek or inquire, translated from Chinese ( the linguistic communication used during the interview ) into English is appended ( Appendix D ) . In the interviews, information was sought about Wang ‘s educational background and working experience, and inquiries covered how Wang prepared for the category and aimed to explicate new constructs, how Wang thought about metaphors and gestures, and if she used them to assist her Teach. Mandarin Chinese was used throughout the interview. Notice that the Numberss are for the convenience of composing up the study ; the inquiries were asked without any specific order. During the interview with Wang, the above subjects were covered. To Wang, metaphor helped the pupils to link music and their day-to-day life experiences. She gave an illustration of the birds, Canis familiariss, spring air current, and summer boom in Vivaldi ‘s The Four Seasons. However, she did non normally interpret music in her ain manner when introducing or depicting it- † I merely interpreted the music in the manner which the composer marked on the music manuscript † ( Wang, pilot interview 2 ) . Although overall the interviews went swimmingly, it was realised that some inquiries were excessively general and more inquiries about metaphor and gestures were needed. Detailss are discussed in 4.6.1.4.3 During the ObservationFor the first session, I entered the music schoolroom with Wang around 15 proceedingss before the session began. Wang told me that because of the limited Numberss of music schoolrooms, music instructors in her school had to take bends utilizing them. It was Wang ‘s bend to hold one of the music classrooms that semester and hence she was allowed to remain in the room waiting for the pupils to get. The excess clip proved utile from the point of position of puting up the picture equipment. The chief equipment in the music schoolroom included a piano, an electronic piano, a chalkboard with clean musical staff, an LCD projector, a DVD participant, and a few classical instrumentalists ‘ portrayals and illustrations of musical instruments on the walls, etc. Wang had to supply her ain laptop. Figure 4.1 illustrates the layout of the schoolroom where the three observed Sessionss took topographic point. The two black circles on the top exposure indicate where the picture recording equipment was placed and where I sat. The picture recording equipment started to enter when the pupils started to walk into the schoolroom. It was non turned off until the category was dismissed and the schoolroom was empty. Neither the instructor ‘s nor the pupils ‘ seats were moved. As a nonparticipant research worker, I tried to maintain the schoolroom the manner it was without me. I sat at the dorsum of the schoolroom next to the picture recording equipment, to take field notes which might be helpful during the readying of the transcripts. Photographs were besides taken earlier or/and after Sessionss. The picture recording equipment started to enter when the pupils started to walk into the schoolroom. It was non turned off until the category was dismissed and the schoolroom was empty.Figure 4.1. Pilot survey: Music schoolroom scene.For most of the clip the pupils could non see me during the categories. However, there was one clip, while Wang corrected a pupil ‘s thumbing while playing the recording equipment, another pupil kept turning and gesticulating â€Å" YA † ( the V mark, with his index and in-between fingers of his right manus raised and the staying fingers clenched, palm facing outwards ; a really popular gesture in Taiwan when being photographed ) toward the picture recording equipment. Wang noticed it. She asked the pupil to stand up and present himself to the picture recording equipment, and encouraged him to give a solo public presentation for two bars, and so the session continued. This was the lone break caused by the research worker ‘s presence during the Sessionss I observed. The talk construction of the three Sessionss I observed was rather similar. It was because Wang designed and followed her ain instruction course of study for each twelvemonth of the pupils, and besides because the three Sessionss I observed were all in the same twelvemonth ( twelvemonth seven ) . The session started with playing the recording equipment. Wang reviewed the piece she had taught in the old session with the whole category and so selected a few pupils to stand up and play separately, in order to detect how much pupils had learned ( Wang, pilot interview 2 ) . Then she taught one new piece by showing and playing with the whole category. After the recording equipment playing, the talk portion â€Å" episode † ( Lemke, 1990 ) started. Wang began by presenting the recording equipment ensembles: bass, tenor, alto, soprano and sopranino recording equipments. Then she introduced some of import epochs in musical history, with a focal point on the Baroque. To this terminal, Wang gave pupils some background cognition about the features of the music, musical instruments, and some celebrated instrumentalists, before presenting Vivaldi and his concerto, The Four Seasons. By and large talking, the observation agenda proved easy to tag. Keeping records based on schoolroom activities made it easy to remember what happened in the Sessionss, and there was adequate clip to maintain records for most of the classs, except for the Numberss of lingual metaphor and gesture used. Second it became clear that some classs needed to be farther specified-this will be discussed subsequently in 4.6.1.4.4 Gesture CodingMcNeill ‘s strategy ( see subdivisions 6.3.2 for a reappraisal of the literature and 6.3.3 for a treatment, on gesture categorization systems ) applied in this survey required inquiring what significances and maps a gesture possessed. In other words, the classs were non based on merely one aspect of a gesture. For illustration, iconics and metaphorics were more semantically oriented, while deictics were more pragmatically oriented. Because of this, each class was non treated as discrete or reciprocally sole, but as holding characteristics that may b e present in changing grades, and perchance in combination. Therefore, the ultimate end of gesture cryptography is to place the extent to which each characteristic is present, instead than sort the gestures ( Eisenstein & A ; Davis, 2004 ; McNeill, 1992 ) . In this pilot so it is really of import to put up a cryptography policy to bespeak when to categorize a gesture by its significance and when by map. More inside informations are discussed in 4.4.3. Two programmers were involved in gesture cryptography in order to prove out McNeill ‘s process and increase the dependability of the survey. The other programmer, a alumnus pupil in the Department of Educational Studies at the University of York, was a native talker of Chinese with some cognition of metaphor holding conducted her MA research on the subject. McNeill ‘s three chief gesture categories-deictics, iconics, and metaphorics-were introduced before I asked her to categorize the gestures which Wang used. Due to clip restriction, merely a portion of the hearing to The Four Seasons from Wang ‘s first session was selected. The portion was chosen for its heavy distribution of gestures. It lasted for five proceedingss and ten seconds, with 35 gestures identified by me antecedently. More inside informations about gesture cryptography are discussed in 4.4.4.4.4.1 Data ChoiceDue to the limited clip available, merely one session was chosen for gesture cryptography. The ground for taking the first session was that although the construction of the three Sessionss was similar, the first session was more complete and covered all the activities from recording equipment playing, a talk on the Baroque epoch, to music hearing, with a more even allotment of clip, than the other two Sessionss. Types of activities affair here because if Numberss of gestures differ in different types of activities ( and it seems so from the consequences ) , affecting more activities in the informations can cut down the hazard of any possible gesture loss.4.4.2 Transcribing the DataBoth gestures and address were transcribed. Speech was transcribed to the full from the videotape in Chinese. The written text of gestures included three stairss: ( a ) place the motions that were gestures ( here gesticulations ) ; ( B ) place the shot of the each gesture ; and ( degree Celsius ) locate the boundaries of the gesture phases in the relevant portion of the phonological written text.4. 4.3 Coding Problems and PolicyThe consequences of the gesture classification from the two programmers were compared. Unlike deictics, which were all agreed by both programmers, iconics and metaphorics seemed to represent the more debatable classs. One of the illustrations was where Wang lifted her left manus at shoulder tallness with her thenar confronting up and wiggled her center, ring, and small fingers fast in bend when stating the word zhuangshiyin ( â€Å" shake † ; actual interlingual rendition: â€Å" ornament notes † ) . Although both programmers agreed that Wang was keeping an unseeable fiddle and playing the shakes, we however coded it otherwise. The other programmer coded it as metaphoric, because the referent of the gesture, zhuangshiyin, was interpreted as a lingual metaphor itself. I coded it as iconic because the gesture in fact was stand foring what was explicit in the attach toing address and therefore had a close relation to the gesture. This helped develop one of the coding policies later-gestures attach toing metaphors in address were non decidedly considered to be metaphorics. Another job related to the programmers ‘ differential focal points and readings of the same gesture. Wang said, â€Å" The boom came fast and went fast. Then it became quiet once more. † In the first sentence she began by traveling her left arm from left to compensate with the thenar confronting up and fingers curving and so moved the arm back to the left without altering the form of the thenar. For the 2nd sentence, she turned over her left thenar to confront the land with consecutive fingers and pressed down the thenar a small spot in the air. The different cryptography concerned the first sign phrase. When I coded them, I focused on the motions of the arm, which was moved from left to compensate, and so back to the left, which seemed to bespeak â€Å" came † and â€Å" went † in address. Therefore the gestures were coded as iconic ( instead than metaphorics, which was clarified subsequently ) . On the other manus, the other programmer focused on the form of the thenar, which changed from a thenar with curled to consecutive fingers. She interpreted the curling fingers as stand foring the â€Å" fast † in address, while the consecutive fingers represented the â€Å" quiet, † and so she coded them as metaphoric. What was stupefying was that none of us thought about construing the same gesture each other ‘s manner before holding the treatment. Our in agreement place was to category the gestures as iconics, because both of us agreed that it was more common to see such gestures looking along with â€Å" came † and â€Å" went † than â€Å" fast † and â€Å" quiet. † In add-on, what the other programmer received before coding might hold affected her. She used my written text of gestures while categorizing the gestures. Although the gestures were described in a descriptive linguistic communication, it was found subsequently that some of the written text was in fact subjective. For illustration, descriptions such as â€Å" the right manus drew a form of flash visible radiation † or â€Å" the left manus indicated composure † were already readings and they could be misdirecting to the other programmer. These jobs non merely predicted what may go on during the cryptography procedure for the chief survey, but besides helped develop the cryptography policy to be used, which is discussed below. Identifying Gestures In this survey, â€Å" gesture † specifically refers to gesticulation. Any thumbing the instructor used to show how to play the recording equipment, or the conducting gestures frequently used while the category was playing the recording equipment were beyond the range of this survey and excluded. The reading of Wang ‘s gestures was made from the research worker ‘s position, and it is deserving observing that this might differ from the reading from the talker ‘s or the addressee ‘s positions ( A. Cienki, personal communicating, June 3, 2008 ) . Metaphorics Metaphorical gestures were defined as gesticulations which present a more abstract referent in footings of a more concrete image and prosecute a cognitive procedure of understanding one thing in footings of something else. This definition dovetails moderately good with Lakoff and Johnson ‘s conceptual metaphor theory, the theoretical model on which this nowadays survey was built, and at the same clip does non belie the Pragglejaz definition of metaphorically used lexical points applied in the survey ( discussed in subdivision 3.3.2 and subsequently in 6.4.2 ) . One illustration is when Wang said gangqin de yinse yue lai yue xizhi ( â€Å" the timber of the piano becomes more and more delicate, † and gestured utilizing a unit of ammunition and half-open thenar confronting up attach toing the word â€Å" delicate. † Here, the gesture carries the double construction required by a metaphoric, in which the representation of the daintiness of the timber ( a more abstract referent ) by the gesture is presented as what appears to be an image of a bud waiting to open ( a more concrete base ) . Deictics versus Metaphorics Both McNeill ‘s deictics and iconics were re-defined for the present survey. Harmonizing to McNeill, abstract indicating gestures which imply a metaphorical image are besides included in the class of deictics. For illustration, gestures were used in my informations to indicate at an bing physical topographic point, but they referred to as an abstract construct of where the talker had been earlier. When Wang said â€Å" Did we merely say that ornament is popular in Baroque epoch, † she raised her left index finger to indicate to the â€Å" thought † which she merely mentioned in the same session. Pragmatically speech production, these gestures were indicating gestures ( deictics ) , but semantically speech production, the topographic point which the gestures pointed to was interpreted as someplace else based on the address context. In other words, such gestures engaged a cognitive procedure of understanding something ( the physical topographic point which the gestu re pointed at ) in footings of something else ( the existent infinite or thought which the middleman talked about antecedently ) and hence were classified as metaphoric. Iconics versus Metaphorics Gestures in a context where the Vehicle of a metaphor is explicitly flagged both by the custodies and by linguistic communication were classified as iconic. That is, if a instructor says â€Å" music is a container † and gestures a container, the gesture will be categorised as iconic instead than metaphoric because the gesture may attach to metaphor, but itself represents the actual signifier of the word â€Å" container † ; nevertheless, if the same gesture accompanies the sentence â€Å" we can experience the unhappiness in his music † , it will be classified as metaphoric. An effort was therefore made to separate between sign illustrations of verbal metaphors and gestures that were themselves metaphoric. This besides explains why the gesture â€Å" came † and â€Å" went † attach toing Wang ‘s vocalization of journey metaphor, â€Å" the boom came fast and went fast, † which was discussed before in this subdivision was coded as iconi cs instead than metaphorics.4.4.4 MethodAfter transcribing the address of the whole session, the picture infusion was watched by the two programmers individually, concentrating on merely the gestures. Every gesture Wang used was categorised into one of the three types of gesture: deictic, iconic, and metaphoric. It was decided to group the gestures into merely three classs instead than five ( including beats and cohesives ) because these three classs are more related to the focal point of the survey. Reasons for categorizing the gestures into three instead than two ( metaphorics and nonmetaphorics ) were that these were the three most popular gestures and that distinguishing deictic from iconic gestures would assist supply a better apprehension of what other types of gestures the instructor used along with metaphor in address besides metaphoric gestures. The 13.5 % dissension of the coding consequences between the two programmers was compared and discussed, until each gesture was classified into one of the three classs. The gestures were so highlighted on the transcript by utilizing three different colorss, to ease denseness and distribution analysis. Finally, maps of the gestures were noted.4.4.5 ConsequencesThe continuance of Wang ‘s direction in the recordings was 46 proceedingss, numbering 8,964 characters transcribed. In the session, 89 gestures were identified ; 43 % were iconics, 30 % metaphorics, and 27 % deictics. Every gesture was categorised. The distribution was such that over 75 % of them fell in the subdivisions on Listening to The Four Seasons ( 42 % ) and the talk on the Baroque epoch ( 35 % ) . Merely 1 % of the gestures occurred in the gap and the recording equipment drama subdivisions. Deictics Wang used deictics to indicate at objects. Her superciliums rose when she started the inquiry â€Å" Can you see the word, Baroque, in the text edition † and looked at the pupils. Her left index finger pointed forwards. Then when Wang said the focal point of the inquiry zhege zi ( â€Å" the word † ) , she raised her right manus and pointed at the screen behind her with her index finger. When she pronounced the word, â€Å" Baroque, † she turned her upper organic structure, half confronting the screen and looked for one second at the Chinese characters for â€Å" Baroque † written on the screen. Extract 11 [ a? †° c?†¹a? ° e ¬ ] a [ †° a? « eˆâ„ ¢aˆâ€ ¹ a ­- cs„ aZY?-†¡ ] i?YBaroquei†°Ã¢â‚¬â„¢Ã¢â‚¬ °i?Y [ Ni you kandao keben ] shibushi [ you xie zhege zi de yuanwen ] ? Baroque, youmeiyou? [ you have see casebook ] ( Q ) [ have write this word ( DE ) etymology ] Baroque ( Q ) Can you see if the English word, Baroque, is in the text edition? However, deictics were non ever used to indicate to something concrete. For illustration, when listening to the first motion of The Four Seasons, Wang compared the fiddles ‘ shake to birds tweet in the spring. When she asked the category to pay attending to a certain portion of the tune, she repeatedly put her index finger of her right manus following to her right ear and pointed to the air. Wang kept reiterating this gesture whenever she tried to pull the category ‘s attending to the music. Therefore, it appeared to be the music she was indicating at, although it was non concrete, or even seeable at all. The undermentioned infusion is another illustration of indicating to the unseeable. Wang asked the category if they still remembered what instruments she had mentioned earlier in the same session. The first reply â€Å" cembalo † came from a pupil and every bit shortly as Wang heard it, she raised her right index finger, indicating. Wang so repeated the reply and gave her response, â€Å" really good. † It is arguable whether Wang ‘s finger was indicating to the word, â€Å" cembalo, † or the pupil who gave the reply, but in either instance the gesture was categorised as deictic. Extract 12 Thymine: ‘aˆ‘ a†°Ã¢â‚¬ º?†°? e ? µ?e cs„ ‚aâ„ ¢? †° aâ€Å"?a?†ºi?Y adult females gangcai shuo liuxing de yueqi you naxie we merely say popular ( DE ) instrument have ( Q ) What are the popular instruments we merely mentioned? Second: a ¤Ã‚ §e? µc dajianqin cembalo Harpsichord. Thymine: [ ] a ¤Ã‚ §e? µciaaie‚„†° a‘?i?Y [ ] daijianqin henhao haiyou Ne [ ] cembalo really good still have Q [ ] Harpsichord. Very good! What else? Second: a? ¦ ‚aâ„ ¢? xian yueqi threading instrument Stringing instrument. Thymine: [ ] a? ¦ ‚aâ„ ¢?ie?za ai [ ] xian yueqi feichang hao [ ] twine instrument really good [ ] String instrument. Very nice! Iconics Iconics were the most common type of gesture in Wang ‘s category, and most of them appeared in the talk on the Baroque epoch and The Four Seasons subdivision. Gestures bespeaking Numberss and for presentation frequently fall in this class. For illustration, Wang held both weaponries set in forepart of her thorax, with both thenars confronting the land and put her lingua out, when depicting a puppy sitting lazily in forepart of a house in summer, while listening to the 2nd motion of The Four Seasons: â€Å" Because it ‘s excessively hot, the doges put their linguas out, right? † In the undermentioned illustration, Wang compared the difference between the flute and recording equipment while she was explicating why the recording equipment was translated as zhidi ( â€Å" perpendicular flute † ) . A flute, nevertheless, is held horizontally by the participant which is why it is besides named hengdi ( â€Å" horizontal flute † ) in Mandarin Chinese. When she asked the undermentioned inquiry, she used both custodies to copy gestures of both flute and recording equipment participants, to underscore the different waies in which two musical instruments were played. Extract 13 e†¢Ã‚ ·c ¬Ã¢â‚¬ º a ®? [ c†º?e‘- a ] e‚„ [ ? ©Ã‚ «e‘- a ] i?Y changdi Ta shi [ zhizhe chui ] hai [ hengzhe chui ] flute ( 3SG ) is [ perpendicular blow ] or [ horizontal blow ] Make you play the flute vertically or horizontally? The referent of the gestures did non ever appear at the same clip when the referent was uttered in address. In Extract 14, Wang used her right manus to indicate to the pillars in the schoolroom on her right and so left side, when she was speaking about the architecture of the edifices in the school. After she pointed to the pillar on her left side, she used both her pollex and index fingers of the right manus and moved the arm heterosexual and vertically, up down and back up. These gestures were iconics, stand foring â€Å" consecutive lines † in address. Next, when she talked about the lines in Baroque edifices, she used her right thenar to do a simple â€Å" U † curve in the air. Here in gesture, the soft â€Å" U † curve motion was contrasting with the old gesture of traveling the right pollex and index finger vertically, but in address, the adjectival â€Å" curved † contrasting with the adjectival â€Å" consecutive † in the first line did non follow straight until the 3rd line. The gesture preceded the word that related to it semantically. It seemed to back up the hypothesis that although gestures and address were different ocular and verbal elements, someway they were in fact conceptually integrated in an thought unit ( Cienki & A ; Muller, 2008 ; McNeill, 2005 ) . Extract 14 [ ?Y ±a ­? a ] [ e c†º? c ·s cs„ ] i?Ya °?aa °?i?Yc ·s a c °?a- ® [ zhuzi shibushi ] [ dou shi zhi xiantiao de ] duibudui xiantiao biddy kiandan pillar ( Q ) all are consecutive line ( DE ) ( Q ) line really simple [ The pillars are ] [ in consecutive lines ] , are n't they? Very simple lines. a a ·Ã¢â‚¬ ºa†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¹ ?â„ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Y cs„ ?â„ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡aˆâ„ ¢ [ ?ˆZei?Y†e ce ¤Ã¢â‚¬ ¡ia °?aa °?i?Y ] keshi baluoke shiqi de shihou [ zenmeWang bijiao fanfu duibudui ] but Baroque epoch ( DE ) clip ( Q ) more complicated ( Q ) But how approximately in the Baroque epoch? More complicated, is n't it? [ c ·s †e ? ¬? ] †° e? ±a ¤s cs„ ?†ºS? a °?aa °?i?Y [ xiantiao bijiao Army Intelligence ] you xuduo de quzhe duibudui [ line more good ] have many ( DE ) curved ( Q ) [ Lines are, good, ] more curving, are n't they? Metaphorics In entire, 30 % of the gestures were metaphorics and it was interesting that metaphorics occurred in about all the eight different schoolroom activities. The lone two exclusions were the gap and stoping comments which Wang made ; Wang used no gestures at all in her gap comments. SPACE AS TIME TIME IS AN ENITITY MOVING TOWARD THE SPEAKER is one of the conceptual metaphors shared by both English and Mandarin Chinese. For illustration, in Mandarin Chinese people say shengdanjiei kuailai lupus erythematosus, which means â€Å" Christmas is nearing, † and xingqitian guo lupus erythematosus means â€Å" Sunday passed. † Time is so thereby conceptualised as something traveling in infinite, and this can be seen even more clearly with gestures. Extract 15 was from Wang ‘s session when she introduced the different periods in musical history. She explained the order of the Renaissance and the Baroque. Firstly she raised her left arm, straightened out her five fingers, with the thenar confronting down, at about eyebrow tallness, and so moved her manus down to the tallness of her thorax. The two points in the infinite indicated the two different clip ranges in musical history and TIME is therefore represented as SPACE by the gesture. However, it is interesting in t his illustration that clip travelled in different waies in address and gesture ; in address, clip moved toward the talkers, but in the gesture it moved from up to down. In fact, the metaphor the gesture expressed here exists entirely in footings of gesture, non in address ( c.f. , subdivision 7.4.8 ) . That is, one would non state in Mandarin Chinese â€Å" the Baroque is at the underside of the Renaissance † to intend the same thing. Extract 15 -†¡e-?a? ©e [ e?Za?†  ?†°? a ·Ã¢â‚¬ ºa†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¹ ] wenyifuxing [ guolai cai shi baluoke ] Renaissance [ come yet is Baroque ] The Baroque comes after the Renaissance. SPACE IS IMPORTANCE Another conceptual metaphor suggested by the gestures is SPACE ( UP ) AS IMPORTANCE. This has a really close relation with the common conceptual metaphor in address: SIZE ( BIG ) AS IMPORTANCE. In Mandarin Chinese, district attorney ( â€Å" large † ) can be used as an adjectival to depict something of import. In Extract 16, Wang told the category that there were some of import periods in musical history. When she said that â€Å" there are some of import and large periods, † she lifted up her left arm with her unfastened thenar confronting down, so traveling increasingly downwards, stopped at different highs. Alternatively of ranking the periods from large to little by gestures, she ranked them from up to down. It was another illustration of different metaphors being used in address and co-speech gestures. Extract 16 eY‚ ? ­Ã‚ ·a a?S cs„ a?† Y a-† †° aaˆâ€ ¹ [ e†¡?e ¦?cs„ a ¤Ã‚ §cs„ ?â„ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Y ] yinyue lishi Shang de fenqi o you jige [ zhongyaode dade shiqi ] music history up ( DE ) period ( PRT ) have several [ of import large period ] About the periods in musical history, some are of import and large. Detached SPACES AS DIFFERENT PARTS OF AN EXPOSITION Metaphoric gestures which separate different parts of an expounding appeared more than one time, and although in address Wang ever said â€Å" FirstaˆÂ ¦moreoveraˆÂ ¦and thenaˆÂ ¦ , † she did non ever use the same gestures for them. Sometimes she gestured the Numberss â€Å" one, † â€Å" two, † and â€Å" three † even though she did non verbally say any Numberss. At other times, she merely turned over the other thenar from confronting the land to confronting upwards, when traveling to a new construct or thought in address. Such metaphoric gestures distinguish different parts of an expounding being made as separate ( downwards and upwards, or right and left ) infinites. For illustration, when Wang reviewed the chief points she had mentioned in category about Vivaldi, and asked the category to compose the chief points down in their ain text edition, she said â€Å" firstaˆÂ ¦moreoveraˆÂ ¦and thenaˆÂ ¦ , † and gestured wi th her right index finger indicating to different fingers of her left manus, to bespeak alterations of subject.4.5 Discussion and Conclusion4.5.1 Classroom ObservationLesson construction and activities involved Figure 4.2 shows the comparative sum of clip Wang spent on different activities across the three Sessionss. The two chief activities were recorder playing and a talk on the Baroque epoch, which between them accounted for about 2/3 of the entire clip. Besides Wang spent 15 % of clip listening to The Four Seasons with the category. The two parts where metaphors and gestures were used most frequently were the talk on the Baroque and listening to music, which took more than 2/5 of a session.Figure 4.2. Pilot survey: Relative clip spent on activities across Wang ‘s 3 Sessionss.Gesture usage and schoolroom ambiance For schoolroom ambiance on the agenda, three degrees were defined: high ( H ) was recorded when the category showed enthusiasm and the dB degree in schoolroom was high. Fair ( F ) was noted when merely a portion of the category responded to the instructor and the remainder remained soundless. Low ( L ) indicated that the category was quiet and seemed non to pay attending to the instructor, or when silence occurred after inquiries. It is of import to observe that the three degrees were comparative instead than absolute.Figure 4.3. Pilot survey: Gesture frequence and schoolroom atmosphere.It was assumed that there would be a positive correlativity between the figure of gestures and schoolroom atmosphere. However, the three boxes in Figure 4.3 show the topographic points where the two factors suggest a negative correlativity. It seemed that in the parts of talk where Wang used a certain figure of gestures did non needfully do the category more enthusiastic about their acquisition. One o f the possible accounts was that more gestures were made due to the low schoolroom ambiance. Interviews Both the interviews I had with Wang before and after the category Sessionss were face to face and semistructured. Most inquiries I had were unfastened inquiries. Making the interview semistructured allowed me to make a more natural talk ambiance without jumping the inquiries to which I wanted replies. The instructor would so be free to speak whatever their feelings and/or ideas were toward certain inquiries. At the same clip, nevertheless, I needed to maintain an oculus on both clip control and interview way to do certain I got the replies to the planned inquiries. Normally I did non disrupt Wang but tried to direct her dorsum to the subjects when she began to speak something unrelated. By and large talking, Wang ‘s replies were consistent because she echoed her ain point of positions when giving replies to different inquiries. For illustration, when asked how she prepared to explicate new constructs ( inquiry six ) , she indicated that music did non be entirely and a instructor had to assist pupils construct up the whole context in footings of clip, topographic point, and how people lived and thought at that peculiar clip, in order to understand a piece of music. She emphasised that music and other artistic signifiers such as architecture and humanistic disciplines were closely related, which she kept adverting when replying how she decided if the stuffs were suited for the category ( inquiry five ) and why music instruction was of import to her ( inquiry two ) .4.5.2 Metaphorical GesturesFunctions of Metaphoric Gestures In Wang ‘s Sessionss, different maps of co-speech gestures were examined and the followers were the three chief 1s found: ( a ) to underscore, ( B ) to visualize, and ( degree Celsius ) to put up. First, gestures helped underscore what Wang wanted to state. Normally underscoring gestures accompanied a verbal look incorporating Numberss, which highlighted different facets of a subject. These gestures could be metaphorics or iconics. They were used when the instructor helped the pupils to either prevue the chief points or reexamine the chief thoughts which were traveling to be introduced. These gestures seemed intended non merely to assist indicate out the of import chief points, but besides to do it easier for the category to follow the instructor ‘s expounding. Deictics which pointed out the subject being talked about in address besides seemed to underscore points and promote hearers to pay more attending to the subject. Second, gestures were used to visualize the abstract. Wang made a large horizontal â€Å" S † form with her left arm when stating the category that the tune they were listening to was depicting the spring zephyr. The metaphoric gesture all of a sudden made the line of the tune seeable. Besides, in Extract 14, Wang drew consecutive lines in the air while she was explicating the simpleness of the school ‘s edifice compared with Baroque ‘s complication. These iconics therefore helped visualize the abstract thought of simpleness. Finally, gestures were used by Wang to show ( positive ) feedback. As shown in Extract 12, alternatively of indicating to any pupil after Wang asked the inquiry to put up a specific pupil to reply, she pointed after hearing the response from the pupils. Almost every bit shortly as she completed the gesture, she repeated the reply from the pupil. It seemed that Wang ‘s finger was activated by the voice which produced the reply, and the index finger stopped in the air and headed in the way of where precisely the reply had come from. By making so, the attending of the category was drawn to the reply, followed by the positive response, â€Å" really nice, † made by Wang to the pupil concerned. Relationss of Metaphoric Gestures and Speech As the focal point is on metaphor and metaphoric gestures in this survey, Table 4.1 shows the dealingss between vocalizations and co-occurring metaphoric gestures. The consequences support the findings from other surveies in English ( Cienki, 1998 ; Cienki & A ; Muller, 2008 ) .Table 4.1Relationss Between Utterance and Co-occurring Metaphoric GesturesRelationss Example Notes 1 The same metaphor expressed in address and gesture â€Å" The timber of the piano becomes more and more delicate. † The gesture depicts a beginning sphere ( â€Å" delicate † ) in address by a unit of ammunition and half-open thenar confronting up. 2 A metaphor expressed in gestures but non in the co-occurring address â€Å" FirstaˆÂ ¦moreoveraˆÂ ¦and thenaˆÂ ¦ † The index finger of one manus points to the fingers of the other manus. The metaphoric gesture distinguishes different parts of an expounding being made by stand foring them as separate infinites. 3 Different metaphors expressed in address and gesture â€Å" About the periods in musical history, some are of import and large. † ( Extract 16 ) Address and gesture portion the same mark sphere of the metaphor ( of import ) , but the beginning sphere is characterised otherwise in address ( large ) and the gesture ( high ) . 4 Metaphors expressed by gestures ne'er appear in lingual signifier in Mandarin Chinese â€Å" The Baroque comes after the Renaissance. † ( Extract 15 ) What the gesture expresses here is that â€Å" Baroque is at the underside of the Renaissance. † Such an look is non usually used in address to intend that the Baroque comes after the Renaissance.34.6 Deductions for the Main Study4.6.1 Classroom ObservationResearcher ‘s function as a non participant Although my purpose was to maintain the schoolroom as it was before my entry, this was about impossible to make. As shortly as a pupil noticed that there was a alien in the room, things became different. Some pupils reacted to Wang ‘s inquiries more actively ; some tried to acquire Wang ‘s attending more enthusiastically than of all time, which I did non gain until Wang indicated the fact in category. Some pupils besides kept turning about during the Sessionss to see what I was making while others were funny about my reaction when a gag was told. Wang seemed to be natural in forepart of the video-recorder. She rarely looked at the video-recorder and in the three Sessionss I observed for two yearss, no particular reactions because of the presence of the video-recorder were found. Young mentioned that she had been observed for several times by the other instructors ( pilot interview 2 ) , and it might explicate why she looked rather natural in forepart of it. From the research worker ‘s point of position, come ining schoolrooms is a necessity for this survey because it allows one to acquire a better thought of the schoolroom ambiance and the context, which can non be wholly caught by watching a videotape, allow entirely an audio tape. However, it can be hard to judge if the information collected are affected due to any camera consequence ( Mackey & A ; Gass, 2005 ) . Classroom observation will stay the chief method of roll uping informations for the chief survey, and farther treatment on its job and how to undertake it in the chief survey is given in subdivision 5.10. Observation agenda The observation agenda helped me to track the procedure of each session during and after Sessionss. With the agenda, it was easy to turn up where I was in the session whether I sat in the schoolroom or watched the recorded picture at place. Overall the prepared observation agenda proved easy to tag. The classs ( activity, start and terminal clip, Numberss of lingual metaphor and gesture, participant administration, stuffs, instruments, linguistic communication used, and schoolroom atmosphere ) of the observation agenda were clear, although some needed to be clarified or deleted. It proved impossible to maintain accurate runs of lingual metaphors and gestures during the three Sessionss, even though I forced myself to seek to make it for a short period of clip during one of the Sessionss. Therefore this was non used for the chief survey. Some classs need to be redefined. There was a categorization named â€Å" Individual † in the participant administration subdivision ( see Appendix C ) and when I designed the agenda, I was believing about points where the instructor spent her clip on merely one peculiar pupil. That is, the instructor might travel following to the pupil or inquire the pupil to come to her, doing it clear that a certain period of the instructor ‘s clip was being devoted to one individual pupil. However, during the three Sessionss, this sort of single administration ne'er happened. Alternatively, another sort of single administration kept looking. Wang would speak to one peculiar pupil in forepart of the whole category. Although the conversation was non limited to the two ( Wang and the pupil ) , it was decided to code it as â€Å" single † participant administration. It was decided for the chief survey to include both the above types of participant administration as â€Å" single. † Classs of images and audio tape confused me at first during the observation. The chief stuff Wang used in her categories was PowerPoint slides, and the slides included non merely text, but images and sounds. It was decided that the categorization â€Å" images † should be extended non merely to palisade charts or postings, but besides to images provided electronically. The categorization â€Å" audio tape † was modified to â€Å" audio sound, † which included sounds whether provided by PowerPoint or by the piano played by Wang in category. In add-on, the categorization â€Å" PowerPoint † was added. Hence, when Wang showed a image of a Baroque palace via PowerPoint, both classs of â€Å" image † and â€Å" PowerPoint † were ticked. The class of â€Å" schoolroom ambiance † was deleted for the chief survey because focal points of the survey were modified and schoolroom ambiance was no longer an issue in the chief survey. A modified observation agenda based on the pilot survey for the chief survey is appended ( see Appendix E ) . Interview inquiries After the pilot interviews, it was discovered that inquiries six and eight were excessively general for the interviewee to reply. Furthermore, none of the inquiries was about gestures and hence this needed to be added. Besides, for inquiries four, five, and six, alternatively of inquiring the general state of affairs, inquiries were modified to promote the interviewee to reply based on the Sessionss being observed, instead than give general statements which the interviewee thought s/he â€Å" was supposed to make. † Finally, the order of the inquiries was rearranged to make a better flow of the conversation, although it was ne'er fixed. A list of modified inquiries for the chief survey is appended in Appendix F.4.6.2 Gesture CodingGesture Coding In this pilot, the other programmer was provided a transcript with both address and gestures. For the chief survey, the other programmer will be provided video cartridge holders and a written text of the instructors ‘ address merely. S/he needed to transcribe gestures get downing from placing stages of them to avoid the subjective reading of my description of the gestures. It can be really hard to code gestures without video-recording the Sessionss, and even with the picture, it can still take a batch of clip to reiterate playing one cartridge holder until gestures are decently transcribed. Both ocular and audio information are important, for the former records the motion inside informations without being interpreted into words, while the latter provides the address context. Overall, gesture classs are defined non merely by the manus gesture but besides by the function of gesture within the lingual context. Therefore it is about impossible to code gestures by kinetic motion informations entirely, and it is one of the grounds why gesture cryptography can be both clip and attempt consuming.

Junk Food

The argument as to whether or not schools should be able to sell junk food is a highly controversial topic. To begin with, there is the problem to defining junk foods. Are we talking about potato chips, soda, and Twinkies? What about fried chicken fingers, cheeseburgers, and pizza-foods many schools serve? Most cases, when faced with the decision, a child will no doubt choose what is offered without knowing it is a health issue. What would a change in the availability of these snacks teach children?Some argue that removing these snacks from schools takes away rights. Although the selling of unhealthy foods serves as a source for additional revenue for schools, school administrators should ban the sale of items that promote an unhealthy lifestyle. Not only does junk food cause unhealthy eating habits that lead to child hood obesity, but it also contributes to health issues such as diabetes, heart disease. Fast food or junk food has had a big effect on the community that many people do n’t realize.The industry markets foods to kids often advertizing to them on their way home from school and during programming watched after school. A lot of the food Is high in sugar and fat. Public opinion on the issue is varied. Poor eating habits developed at an early age can lead to a lifetime of health issues. School is where children spend most of their time, and it’s where we lay the foundation of healthy habits. In an online poll 40% of parents stated that their child doesn’t eat breakfast on a regular basis.That means 20 to 50 percent of these students total daily calories are coming from these unhealthy lunches and vending machines at school. This can be a can of soda, perhaps washing down a chocolate bar followed by a bag of potato chips. Students may be junk food junkies but the schools are hooked as well and have become increasingly dependent on the revenue that soda and candy machines bring in each year. While soda sales may help supplement the sch ool's bottom line, health experts are increasingly worried that soft drinks are contributing to a student's poor health. t was concluded that teen-aged boys' soda consumption has tripled in the last 20 years and doubled for girls. Teens now drink twice as much soda as milk. On the other hand, children are taught in the classroom about good nutrition and the value of a healthy lifestyle, but we continue to make the junk food available to them. Our children's eating habits are engrained in them from a young age, so what are we teaching our children? At what cost is it ok for junk food to be available o them at school? For the first time, the government is proposing broad standards to make sure all foods sold in schools are healthier. Under the Agriculture Department proposed on 2/1/2013, food like fatty chips, snack cakes, nachos and mozzarella sticks would be taken out of lunch and vending machines, to be replaced by baked chips, trial mix, and diet soda. Food sold through vending ma chines has never before been federally regulated. Junk Food The argument as to whether or not schools should be able to sell junk food is a highly controversial topic. To begin with, there is the problem to defining junk foods. Are we talking about potato chips, soda, and Twinkies? What about fried chicken fingers, cheeseburgers, and pizza-foods many schools serve? Most cases, when faced with the decision, a child will no doubt choose what is offered without knowing it is a health issue. What would a change in the availability of these snacks teach children?Some argue that removing these snacks from schools takes away rights. Although the selling of unhealthy foods serves as a source for additional revenue for schools, school administrators should ban the sale of items that promote an unhealthy lifestyle. Not only does junk food cause unhealthy eating habits that lead to child hood obesity, but it also contributes to health issues such as diabetes, heart disease. Fast food or junk food has had a big effect on the community that many people do n’t realize.The industry markets foods to kids often advertizing to them on their way home from school and during programming watched after school. A lot of the food Is high in sugar and fat. Public opinion on the issue is varied. Poor eating habits developed at an early age can lead to a lifetime of health issues. School is where children spend most of their time, and it’s where we lay the foundation of healthy habits. In an online poll 40% of parents stated that their child doesn’t eat breakfast on a regular basis.That means 20 to 50 percent of these students total daily calories are coming from these unhealthy lunches and vending machines at school. This can be a can of soda, perhaps washing down a chocolate bar followed by a bag of potato chips. Students may be junk food junkies but the schools are hooked as well and have become increasingly dependent on the revenue that soda and candy machines bring in each year. While soda sales may help supplement the sch ool's bottom line, health experts are increasingly worried that soft drinks are contributing to a student's poor health. t was concluded that teen-aged boys' soda consumption has tripled in the last 20 years and doubled for girls. Teens now drink twice as much soda as milk. On the other hand, children are taught in the classroom about good nutrition and the value of a healthy lifestyle, but we continue to make the junk food available to them. Our children's eating habits are engrained in them from a young age, so what are we teaching our children? At what cost is it ok for junk food to be available o them at school? For the first time, the government is proposing broad standards to make sure all foods sold in schools are healthier. Under the Agriculture Department proposed on 2/1/2013, food like fatty chips, snack cakes, nachos and mozzarella sticks would be taken out of lunch and vending machines, to be replaced by baked chips, trial mix, and diet soda. Food sold through vending ma chines has never before been federally regulated.

How Classroom Environments Affect Child Development Essay

When it comes to education so many different factors can affect a child’s learning and development in a classroom. First of all the temperature of the main class of which the child is learning in so such as the heating/air conditioning, if the classroom is too hot, eg. On a hot day a child may feel sick/dizzy this will affect the child’s concentration and well being similar to a highly air conditioned classroom where it may be extremely cold the child may get ill because of it. Another important part of a child’s education is having the right equipment to enable them to learn so ensuring the equipment the child uses is not outdated, broken or dangerous is essential to give the child the best learning experience possible, as children with excellent facilities are likely to enjoy school more and find school easier because they have the access they need to give them the ability to learn. Space is really important especially with children, so the size of the classroom can impact a child’s learning experience, small cramped classrooms, which could be overcrowded due to a large amount of pupils could make it hard for pupils to concentrate or in some extreme cases dangerous. So having a classroom a good/reasonable size in proportion to the amount of students attending is essential. Although this usually depends greatly on the location of the school as students from a city are more likely to have larger classes than those of a rural setting. Read more: Influences that affect children’s development essay This leads on to the next point, of other students affect a child’s learning experience, if a class is full of disruptive pupils a child is not going to learn as well as a classroom which is full of students which are quiet and willing to learn. Teachers have a massive impact on a classroom, their behaviour and characteristics can affect the learning of their class. Even tempered, fair, humorous teachers have a much more positive influence on learning experience than a moody, unfair, overly strict teacher. If a child is falling asleep, getting ill regularly, is lacking in performance or regularly disrupting classes they may be struggling. This is when you would approach the teacher and discuss the child’s behaviour and performance and the possible reasons behind the child’s behaviour this may mean more structured lessons, more one on one time, change of seating arrangements etc. but this may be monitored, and the teacher may follow this up with a discussion with the child’s parent if necessary.

New Perspective Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

New Perspective - Essay Example To be able to feel what they feel as they see that world as being one of them and not as an outsider poking in. I would also be in touch and be friends with those whom many consider as a â€Å"threat† and see how they perceive things. The only downside to it is that I will also share the prejudices against them and will run the danger of being ostracized. Having a different religion which allows multiple wives (up to four) might allow me to experience how it is to live in an extended family; with different wives or husbands with children or siblings with different mothers or fathers. If the extended family proves to be cohesive, that would be a very strong support system. The downside to it however is that the arrangement is prone to jealousy especially with the wives who has a common husband. And if the husband does not have much, it will really cause trouble on how to keep the multiple wives. If I choose to work in the Middle East or any Arab country, the adjustment would be easier on my part as I will be accepted by the host country as one of their own sharing the same kind of Faith. Although this would subject me to discrimination in non-Muslim country where prejudices against Muslims is strong. I would have the chance to befriend and be really close with peers from school who are Mohammedans. In turn, I will have the opportunity to learn what a typical student does; and see for myself if they are different from us. But this is with the risk that I will be viewed with skepticism for bonding with Muslims and might be accused of being a terrorist! Before the change, I have to admit that I share the prejudices against Muslims. Admittedly, I too view them with skepticism and a bit of fear and spite. But after undergoing the change and living their world, that perspective will change as I understand them more. That

Theory and Knowledge Development in Nursing Article

Theory and Knowledge Development in Nursing - Article Example While patient cases will have similarities, each case is also uniquely different and may require a different process of determining solutions. A patient is inherently individualistic, based on social and economic factors as well as the type of illness involved. What may work for one patient, may not work for another patient, due to differing circumstances of age, eating habits, social structure and economic environment such as working status or for those who are unemployed. Nursing morals and ethics will also come into play when confronted with issues of insurance coverage and what solutions are available as defined by the coverage, if there is any coverage. Consequently, right answers in one case may not be right in another, based on principles which are not always absolute (Nourreddine, 2001). Nursing Theory as a Guide for Knowledge When evaluating nursing knowledge, nurses will ask themselves what they know; what the extent of that knowledge is, based on how that knowledge is atta ined through various methods, and whether it is appropriate. Epistemology is the term used for the study in the theory of knowledge which has several basic types. Empiric knowledge is developed through scientific observations, suitable testing and ability to replicate and validate the information. Personal (priori) knowledge is attained from thought processes alone. Intuitive knowledge comes from feelings and hunches that come from unconscious recognition of experiences or patterns as known from previous experiences or by some type of educational process. Somatic knowledge is experience attained from a physical experience which becomes a learned process through conducting physical tasks. Ballet dancers and gymnasts are great examples of those with somatic knowledge. Metaphysical knowledge which is a spiritual precept of knowledge gained by acknowledging a higher power other than ourselves through religious practices, miracles, extrasensory perceptions, near-death experiences, and ot her conventions which are not scientifically proven, at least not currently. Esthetics is the knowledge of beauty and harmony, expression through creativity and art, and development of values which sustains these. Finally, moral and ethical knowledge is based on the concepts of what is considered right and wrong, based on social values and surrounding environment (McEwen & Wills, 2010). In nursing knowledge, it is not based simply on the scientific proof, but also on the social and behavioral sciences as well and, therefore, nurses rely on multiple genres of knowing. Carper (1978) presented four fundamental basic concepts which applied to nursing knowledge: empirics as the scientific form of knowledge, esthetics, personal knowledge and ethics. Empirical knowledge is gained through laws and theories which describe, explain and predict various phenomena, based on factual evidence (Carper, 1978; Carper, 1992; McEwen & Wills, 2010). This would be most evident in clinical practice conduc ted within the environment of the emergency department because split-second decisions must be made and they can only happen when there is enough knowledge from structural theory and from experience gained through other case experiences of trauma and sudden illnesses. Personal knowledge is ga

No need for topic Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

No need for topic - Assignment Example To justify racial discrimination, skin color was considered as an important qualification for members to fit into a certain group in the civil society. South America and South Africa were subjected to long periods of slavery and segregation based on race. Comparative history in America shows that the North and South regions differed greatly in their outlook toward slavery. American sectional conflict was experienced as the conflicting interests between the South and the North became evident over the debate about slavery. The North was known for its development and high profits earned from cotton farming while the South blamed Northern exaggeration in economic exploitation for their backwardness. However, the North considered slavery to be the stumbling block to South’s development. From 1830, the debate about slavery hardened between the two sections with the South defending it by saying that it benefited the Negroes (Frederickson 156). On the contrary, the Northerners argued that it was inhumane to violate human rights through subjecting them to bondage, repression and brutality inherent in slavery. The aggression between the two sections over slavery led to an antislavery movement in the American revolution that led to the abolishment of African slave trade by the congress. According to Douglass (Para 4), 4th of July is the day for celebration of independence and political freedom for the United States from colonialism. It reminds them of the acts, memories and the wonderful tell signs associated with liberation from colonial rule. The attainment and celebration was the beginning of a new life in the United States because it gave citizens the civil rights and freedom opportunity to participate in the building of the young American state. The term river is used to mean people’s actions, which may improve the well being of the society if positively initiated. On the other hand, if executed under fury

Discuss the analytical foundations of the Phillips curve Essay

Discuss the analytical foundations of the Phillips curve - Essay Example most of the policy makers believed that unemployment and inflation could not occur at the same time and whichever occurred, it became a major determinant of the policies that would be adopted by a given economy. Another issue that the economists believed was that it was possible to achieve one objective without having negative implications on the other. However, the research that Philips undertook in 1958 provided information that generated quite a number of questions to those assumptions. On his part, Philips used the available UK data to make an analysis on the rates of inflation and unemployment in UK. After plotting the result of the research, Philips noted that there existed an inverse relationship between wage inflation and unemployment. As a way of checking the relevance of the Philips conclusion, other economists used price inflation instead of wage inflation and noted that the results were similar curves and this became the origin of the Philip curve. This paper seeks to dis cuss the analytical foundations of the Phillips curve as well as how unemployment rate of 5% may be inflationary in one country, while it is deflationary in another country. According to the curve, any change in the level of unemployment produced a predictable as well as direct impact on the level of price inflation. Philips, together with other policy makers adopted the relationship between the two variables and noted that an increase in aggregate demand as well as fiscal stimulus in the economy triggers various responses. First, they noted that an increase in demand as the spending by the government rises results into national growth. This is followed by falling on the pool of unemployed. On their part, firms will be involved in competing for fewer workers available in the economy by increasing their nominal wages making the workers to have a higher bargaining power as they seek to have their nominal wages raised further (Forder, 2014). As the economy gets near to full capacity,

N&S Finance Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

N&S Finance - Essay Example Quick ratio Quick ratio, just as current ratio, is a measure of the company’s liquidity level, only that Quick ratio excludes inventory. This ratio is significantly below the current ratio, which could be an indication that the company is maintaining a high level of inventory. In case the company’s inventory is not easily convertible into liquid cash, then its financial position is at crossroads because it may experience difficulties paying its short-term creditors. The management should also consider whether the company is experiencing sales difficulties because that could be the reason why its inventory level is quite high. If this is the case, strategies should be crafted to increase conversion of inventory into cash so the liquidity could get better. Nonetheless, the positive increase from 0.83 to 0.95 is remarkable and if this trend continues, the company will not have liquidity problems. Accounts receivable turnover This ratio also shows the company’s liqui dity level. It is a strong indicator of how the management has efficiently employed the accounts receivable. A ratio of 6.63 in 2009 is remarkably big, meaning that collection of accounts receivable and extension of credit to customers was operated efficiently. Alternatively, this may indicate that the company operated, chiefly, on cash basis. The drastic fall of the ratio in 2010 could send alarm signals to the management that something is wrong especially if this sale is not as a result of a shift from cash sales to credit sales. For instance, this could imply that the debtors are servicing their dues very slowly or even defaulting. Average Collection period Average collection period reflects the period that it takes for the company to receive its accounts receivables. The 53.03 days for 2009 is an ideal period because the company will be assured of conversion of its receivables into cash in less time and use the money to pay its bills. However, 214.38 days for 2010 is very high, and this means that the company may be headed for liquidity problems as a result of customers delaying or defaulting on their dues. This, in turn, will cause cash shortage and hence the company may not be able to meet its administrative and operating expenses. The management should revise its debt collection policies to avoid experiencing liquidity problems. Inventory turnover The inventory turnover for 2009 is 6.5 times, but this reduced to 3.96 times in 2010. This implies that the company’s sales have started moving slowly, which is discouraging because this will most likely affect the profits directly. This, however, could be a sign that the company is increasing its inventory. Decline in inventory turnover will result to cash shortage and hence this trend should be averted. Total asset turnover Total asset turnover indicates how the management has invested the assets to generate revenue. The higher the ratio the better because it shows that the assets are applied more eff iciently. Reduction of this ratio from 0.93 in 2009 to 0.71 in 2010 is a cause for alarm because it indicates that the company’s assets are used less effectively, to generating income. The management should seek ways of boosting sales to ensure this ratio is restored to an optimum level. Debt to total assets Debt to total assets shows the company’s financial leverage, by revealing the proportion of the total assets that are funded by debt. In 2009, 47.14% of the assets were financed by creditors

Marketing 3000 Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Marketing 3000 - Assignment Example The company tried to capture new customers but forgot that their products were bought by their traditional customers. Once the Starbucks old buyers lost their feel, faith and the attachment with the company, their paths diverted. Starbucks now was no more a place to visit where customers could have a healthy talk. It became a place from where people could purchase items and move on. So, the Starbucks experience changed and with that changed the Starbuck customer. 3. A kid would get bored by playing with the same toy over and over again. Same phenomenon applies to the customers and the products they buy. People want something new and unique. This was an uphill task the company had to face in order to re attract their old customers and regain their present buyers. For this purpose, they gave a new look to their company, not by expanding the number of stores, rather by expanding, introducing and diversifying their products. They cheapened the prices of the coffee and worked to improve the quality of their items so that they could again reach the hearts of their customers. They realized that by not changing much of their terms and conditions, they could do a lot for the betterment of their consumers as well as for the company itself. 4. This is a question that can certainly take Starbucks to the peak since its emergence or can bring it to a halt for the years to come. The company has just faced a downfall and is again trying to get on their feet. If the owners and the responsible people take necessary steps to bind the company together, only then can it come out of the sorrows of defeat else the worst could be a complete shut down for the Starbucks company. Starbucks will not be able to enjoy the same comfort level and revenue from their costumers. It’s simply because their quality has gone down, irrespective of the steps they are taking now, and because of the competition in the market. Their competitors are also here to

Catcher in the Rye chapter 14 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Catcher in the Rye chapter 14 - Essay Example That, and if he really had been shot in the stomach, instead of punched. This falls under Holden’s views of what is, or is not, phony. The whole scene he imagined was phony. There was not even the slimmest chance that it could happen, even if he did have what it took to follow through with it. He found the perfect definition of phony within himself; he thought of a complete scenario, played it through in his mind, and then came back to reality again. â€Å"What I really felt like, though, was committing suicide. I felt like jumping out the window. I probably would’ve done it, too, if I’d been sure somebody’d cover me up as soon as I landed. I didn’t want a bunch of stupid rubbernecks looking at me when I was all gory.† This quote shows a bit of a reflection on how Holden views himself, though it can be interpreted in two ways. One, his overall feelings are that he would feel ashamed for committing suicide, and not wanting others to know how weak he is. Two, he could feel that he is too high above those that would be interested in his committing suicide. Either way, he does not want the involvement of others in his extremely personal affairs. Holden’s character grows a little bit more in this chapter. The opening scene of the chapter shows Holden thinking about and talking out loud to his deceased younger brother Allie. Holden’s sense of guilt towards his younger brother is obvious is this section. While Holden says that he sometimes talks to Allie when he feels depressed, it seems that by doing this it only feeds his depression. Holden seems even more vulnerable in this chapter, by the way he reacts to Maurice and Sunny, and by his thoughts regarding suicide towards the end of the chapter. He lets his weakness show by crying during his encounter with Maurice, and then by showing that Maurice intimidates

Neo-Liberalism and Global Environmental Governance Essay

Neo-Liberalism and Global Environmental Governance - Essay Example Human activities whether political, economic, or social have to be managed as subsets of ecosystems and the environment. Environmental governance involves the government, business society, and the civil society and necessitates the incorporation of alternative governing systems such as the watershed based management (Kutting, 2004). The global community has proven incapable of meeting these requirements, which has led to environmental degradation and the emergence of new environmental problems. The international community is experiencing several problems due to globalization. Globalization has led to the improvement of the logistic systems, changes in business and demographic trends and rapid technological progress. This process, however, has led to social and environmental marginalization, widening the gap between the rich and the poor, and increasing the gap between information and technology in the rich and poor countries and social groups. Sustainable development calls for the go vernance of globalization by applying international laws, civil sector domain, and the private sector. The global community has participated in several summits for sustainable development in order to address these issues. ... Resource depletion and environmental degradation could undermine the economy and have to be addressed by all sector actors. Neoliberal institutions argue that international institutions have considerable power to mobilize policymaking towards sustainable environmental governance. Some actors argue that a body high up in the UN hierarchy has to be established in to deal with global environmental and developmental problems. This body would have a mandate and funds to coordinate and centralize environmental and developmental problems within the UN. Economic governance was developed by the UN to promote economic prosperity. The World Bank was established to lend capital to governments for development and poverty alleviation. The GATT agreement promoted global prosperity through the establishment of free markets. The World Bank together with donor governments promoted the idea of liberal market themes, which would also govern resource allocation. UNEP has enacted several laws in the areas of marine pollution, disposal of hazardous wastes, and depletion of the ozone layer. This body linked development and environmental depletion, which forced developed nations to reduce its budgetary allocation. The developed framework has established several institutions in various countries that deal with environmental issues. Developed nations have in the past used environmental laws to limit innovation, intellectual property protection, and macroeconomic management in developing countries. Several developing countries have acquired development loans from the World Bank and other developed nations. These loans have increased the national debt of these countries, making poverty levels unmanageable. These governments spend most

Ownership of Two Contrasting Businesses Essay Example for Free

Ownership of Two Contrasting Businesses Essay Asda is the second largest retailer in the UK, and it has been the largest subsidiary of the Wal-Mart family of companies since 1999. The UKs supermarket sector has also become more competitive. This contest between retailers in the marketplace helps to keep prices down. It also makes sure that organisations always produce and sell the goods that consumers really want. Asda is engaged in food, clothes, electronic and furniture selling. Consumers like price competition, as it means they can buy goods at low prices and save money. Asda is a large national company that makes a profit and it is private as well. Asda has a limited liability which means that they might lose the money they have invested in a business. This company is an incorporated business and it is also a public limited company. The main aims and objectives of Asda are: †¢To provide goods and services that is cheap and affordable to consumers to the public, to reduce the cost †¢To recycling their waste †¢To supporting voluntary services Oxfam is a small not-for-profit organisation and it is a global company because it operates in countries around the world. It is owned by Oxfam Trading Limited Companies and it is in private sector. The main aims and objective of this company are: †¢To Aid third world countries in any way they can †¢To relieve poverty, distress and suffering †¢To educate people about the nature, causes and effects if poverty †¢To campaign for a fairer world †¢To encourage western nations to supply aid to third world countries.

IKEA Current Operations and Future Strategies

IKEA Current Operations and Future Strategies IKEA was founded by Ingvar Kamprad in the year 1943. It started as a small town Swedish furniture company that was founded on the principles low prices and good quality. This simple idea was able to transform the organization along with strategic management and excellent decision making. It now has over 250 stores and a presence in 30 countries. IKEA has become an international giant with whom local furniture companies have to struggle against. The fundamentals of the organization did not change drastically with expansion however the organization did adapt to the culture and practices in the host countries. The strategy was simple, give the people lower price compared to the peers, allow them to check the quality, do no compromise on the quality, save on costs from every possible angle and make them feel happy about the purchases they made (10 Keys to IKEAs Low Prices, 2009). This made their brand strong and helped in vertical and horizontal integration and expansion. IKEA maintained strong ties to its home country. Its colors are a representation of the Swedish flag and its name is the initials of its founders name along with the initials of the town he was born in. The organization has used policies that have baffled researchers and lead to various analyst studying its reasons for success. TASK 1 APPLICATION OF THEORIES AND STRATEGIES When IKEA was first created, its owner had the vision of making it an international giant. He had started international meetings and proceeded for a quick expansion strategy of the organization. No other furniture company has had such an exponential growth in only a few years. First, it expanded from a small town to chains all over Sweden. This was not an easy task. The organization had no means of managing so many stores however through the excellent entrepreneurship of its founder, his strategy and global vision, the organization grew strong. The stores main concern would be to find ways in which they could decrease costs. They started with lowering electricity costs during day time by opening windows; they used energy saving lights and did not have a large profit margin in the start. They then expanded to Germany, France and other European nations. Once they expanded to other countries, they maintained the same policies and store strategies in every store. This was done through im peccable management practices, which further helped the organization open stores in other continents. IKEAs business model became famous and the store called for publicity. Their process analysis and operational strategies are unique. All of their decisions have been successful and their management of inventory, staff and stores is one of the best in the world. IKEA used to purchase raw materials from manufacturers but after it expanded internationally, it started its own production company. This resulted in saving costs as well as making new designs reach the stores faster with the least amount of compromise on quality (Ikea: How the Swedish retailer became a global cult brand, 2005). They started economies of scale by starting a production company near its stores. These companies were generally located in areas where labor was cheap and it would be cheaper to ship the goods. They also used a very different style of marketing technique which concentrated on making people happy and reaching out on their base emotions. Most of the stores which sold products at lower prices were considered to have cheap quality like Wal-Mart; therefore IKEA had to use a lot of advertising to put the simple message across that the quality was not compromised in the deal. They did so by hosting customer parties, sending free samples, giving huge discounts and maintaining a happy customer care service. This increased their goodwill. They also took active participation in local events and helped the community, increasing their goodwill and sales. IKEA believed in constant innovation which is one of the reasons for its strong presence. It comes up with furniture pieces that are classic and as well as new. This adds to its brand presence along with rotation of furniture so that the customers are never viewing the same thing each time they visit. Another strategy that IKEA came out with was to keep huge inventories in its stores. This would mean more space and more wastage as well as high inventory management costs however compared to the costs of maintaining the stores, the predicted sales were higher. This made them even more famous because they were the only store which was capable of holding huge inventories allowing customers to buy any product by jus t entering the store. They managed to do so by holding flat line products. These products would them have to be assembled by the customer hence they were made in an easy to assemble manner. By holding flat ling products, the organization could store millions of product. These strategies enabled them to increase their market share (Ikea Components is Setting practical Business Targets, 2011). COST ANALYSIS OF CURRENT OPERATIONS IKEA is a privately held organization. It has seen an increase in costs over the last couple of years and is struggling to survive given the recent global recession and low sales turnover. Although its new and innovative strategies have increased sales and helped them earn profits, the margin of profits and the sales turnover has decreased along with increase in the cost of raw materials and operations. An increase in sales from Euro 21534 million in 2008 to a Euro 21846 million in 2009 is considered slow however considering the marking conditions, it is above its peers. IKEA needs to find more ways to cut costs in order to generate healthier results. It has started doing so by creating solar powered lamps etc and using solar power and saving on electricity. Its costs increased from Euro 7078 million in 2008 to Euro 7198 million in 2009. Reducing its costs will also be another challenging for the organization (Process Analysis Model, n.d.). OPERATION MANAGEMENT ISSUES IN PRODUCT DESIGN OPERATIONS IKEA is strongly linked to its product and organization design. The process from which production starts until it reaches the stores and makes sales is very commendable for an international giant like IKEA. Although the operation process has been commendable there are still a few loopholes in the process. The main problem concerning IKEA is its inventory storage. Warehousing costs are on the high. The organization cannot afford to store thousands of products for each different store. This would not only mean high cost of storage but also wastages in products. Once the product gets old, it needs to be replaced by other more innovative products. This makes the lifecycle of the furniture short and increases the wastages that the organization will have to incur. Currently IKEA ships the unwanted goods to other stores where it might have a high demand however this not only adds to the risks of no sale but also increases the cost of shipping. Since it produces flat line furniture, the place taken up is not a lot but the store has expanded into all departments of housing and office furniture hence has to bear a high cost of storage. A good option available to the organization is to display goods in the store and ship the goods later to the customers through mail. This would help in preventing storage costs, cost to keep inventory management and save on any kind of wastages. The organization can also concentrate on re using the unsold furniture into other products. Since the organization owns its own production company, it can re use the unsold pieces of furniture and make other innovative products. Currently it does not pay too much attention into re using and re cycling however if it wants to keep costs low it needs to consider this alternativ e (SWOT Analysis and Sustainable Business Planning, 2011). Another Operation management issue with IKEA is that the organization is extremely large. It not only needs to concentrate on maintaining the current stores but also on expansion into other countries. IKEAs expansion into India and other developing countries is on the hold. It has been extremely conservative in its approach to expansion and trying to be overly cautious. A good example is its indecision over opening stores in China. Once the company decided that China would be a good market, its management was scared to take the risk of entering a market where consumers were traditional and other furniture retails offered cheaper products. However, the expansion went very well and China has been a very good turnover for the organization. The government too was pleased with IKEA. Hence IKEAs management needs to take more risks and consider global expansion while maintaining the quality of products and service given and lowering costs. By using process model analysis on the organizations approach to its day to day operations, the following flow chart was developed. A process flow chart is required in order to recreate the design of the organization and understand the process in a simplified manner. The flow chart contains these symbols and meaning: Operations Inspection Transportation Delay Storage Flowchart The above flowchart shows that there is a lot of time that is wasted in the transportation of the goods as well as in inspection of the products. Waste recovery has not been given a lot of attention as required and time spent on planning needs to be increased in order to develop products that lead the furniture market. Analysis models using classifier analysis, location analysis, cost and duration analysis and resource analysis have shown that the organization has been using all possible forms of increasing business however there is more scope and a lot it can do to improve its current standards. It does not utilize its resources like space for storage, marketing for customers and training employees for better customer satisfaction and higher sales. It is very conservative in its approach to location and store openings and production company locations. It needs to get more aggressive in order to build a stronger more stable and more profitable brand. The overall design of the organization is excellent with importance given on lowering costs; the only problems are inventory management and cautious expansion. MODULE 2 QUALITY MANAGEMENT IKEAs simple business strategy of low prices has created a lot of trouble for the organization. By lowering prices, the quality of products offered lowered and although the organization has been thriving to maintain its quality it has sometimes been unable to meet international standards. The products are also a little below quality but their quest for lowering prices has also affected their quality of service offered. Customer care does not get proper attention and the workers do not have the time or resources for proper international training (Levine, 2010). The organization is barely scrapping through with the quality required which has adversely affected the business. The sales have gone down and prospective sales from elite consumers have seen a sharp decline. Another noticing factor on quality management is the advertising campaigns that the organization holds. They are unable to research well on the market because of being very cost conscious and have therefore missed out on their target customers in their marketing plan. Because IKEA is an international brand, it not only has to consider international policies but in order to do well in the host country, the organization also needs to pay special attention to the customs and traditions of the host country. It has been failing to do so correctly resulting in profits dwindling below expectations in certain regions and countries like the United States (Levine, 2010). IKEA is a privately held organization, hence information on IKEA is difficult to attain. IKEA follows a very difficult return service with delays and sometimes refusal to take back the goods purchased by consumers. This reflects back on their credibility and goodwill. For any organization that works directly with customers, service needs to be impeccable especially for an international organization like IKEA however IKEA has not been very good with its quality management approach. The organization has however taken a lot of steps to maintain its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and taken many steps to make a difference in the host country. IKEA can take many steps to improve quality. The organization can adopt TQM (Total Quality Management) in its operations in order to ensure quality. It needs to spend money on its processes however the returns it could possibly earn are potentially higher than the costs. The organization needs to adopt a six sigma approach to management and strategically increase the quality of products and service provided. This should increase collectively in all the stores. It has been seen that most of the sales come from EU nations which makes up of about 50% of its sales with only 5% coming from North America. This is a potentially untapped market and IKEA needs to improve quality and assure the consumers of its products and quality so as to increase its potential in not only the markets it already has a presence in but also the markets in which it plans to open stores. IKEA can use the theories for quality improvement in order to manage the quality. Management stresses on the following important principles and theories for quality improvement that IKEA can use to its advantage. 1. Develop customer focus in each step of the process and train employees to provide the best customer satisfaction. IKEA depends on its consumers and it needs to prove to the consumers that they can depend on IKEA as well. Customer focus is very important internally as well as externally in the workings of the organization. 2. Leadership. The international size of the organization makes it difficult for them to manage and lead the process. Leadership is required for each different store and all the leaders need to have a similar set of rules, aims and objectives. This can be done by training each leader of the store together. With the values that needs to be used in the organization. 3. Process based quality management. One theory of quality management states that if each process in the organization deals with the optimum use of resources and time, the overall outlook of the organization will be much different. 4. Decision making approach of the organization needs to change. The management needs to realize that they can no longer be over cautious in their approach if they want to gather all the market share and potential sales if they continue being conservative. They need information that is correct and they need to work slowly because of their mere size but they also need to take an aggressive role in this slow recession filled economy in order to survive and compete. 5. Continual improvement in quality. Quality management is not a onetime approach, the organization has to imbibe it into its day to day workings, control the quality and give feedback on the improvements done. The constant feedbacks would be supplied along with the advantages that the organization achieved due to the process of quality management. IKEA can also use the Crosby theory of quality management which stresses on zero errors, prevention of errors, quality being an adherence to requirement and quality as being a price paid for non conformity. It sets goals for lower period of days so that the results would show, it requires total commitment from the upper management, encouragement to the employees, training given accordingly, creating incentives for high sales, determining the costs for quality etc. TASK 3 IKEA being the worlds leading furniture retailer does not utilize its capacity or use capacity management to its advantage. It uses Data Core Virtual Storage Solutions globally considering its size. The new version uses auto provisioning which is allocation of products to its demand, auto failover which is mirroring and using high availability in its products and snapshot functions which means creating backup for all the information that is feed from all its stores worldwide. The software is the latest and expected to improve the management of inventory. Before the implantation of the software, IKEA struggled with its supply chain management. It sometimes had over supplied products and sometimes there was a lag in products which diminished demand. Since it is not an internet based supplier, it needs to keep a good amount of product as reserves. It needs to create a balance between oversupply and under supply so as to reduce wastages. IKEA has tried to take advantage of the technologi cal improvements to sort out its supply chain management. The organization had earlier used JDA system in 2006 to solve its problems in supply chain management (IKEA Services, 2011). For an organization like IKEA the primary concern in capacity management are as follows: 1. It needs a technology that can forecast with a great level of accuracy based on past results and future market environment the market demand and supply movements. This forecasting accuracy will help the organization improve its functions and save millions of dollars in shipping, storage and recycling. 2. It needs an approach that improves the sales forecasts and predicts consumer behavior. The predictions need to be translated into sales figures so that the organization can plan on expansion and innovation. All the departments in the organization are interrelated and using capacity management to its highest level could help create more potential from the other departments as well. 3. Another area where IKEA needs to focus on is the anticipation of problems before they occur. A large organization is prone to have problems in its supply chain management and capacity management however if it is in a position to predict the changes and challenges well ahead of time, it can be better prepared for the threat or even to a certain extent help prevent it. This is an integral part of management function through which the organization can gain further market share and capital. 4. Transportation and logistics methods need to be simplified with each consignment being traceable so that the management can better predict the product whereabouts and avoid loss in transportation. With the rise in fuel costs the management needs to carefully lay out its supply chain management as well as logistics problems. With over 12000 products and 250 stores in 30 countries the organization needs better capacity management solutions (Supply Chain Management, 2006). IKEA store layout is in the form of a maze. The consumers need to walk through different custom rooms build to give them an idea of the product they might like. The stores are therefore multi layered with additional space given for storage. This has proven to be a good thing because this marketing strategy makes the customers view all the products and increases sales. It does however have the following disadvantages: It wastes a lot of its store space It confuses the customers who find it difficult to return to the product they liked before It irritates consumers who are looking for a particular product and have to go through the entire store for it and it wastes a lot of time which consumers do not prefer. However, this marketing strategy is important but it can be improved upon to avoid the above hindrance. There are many other store formats that the organization can select from instead of its free flow layout. An image of the store layouts is mentioned below. Therefore IKEA can select a grid layout or a spine layout to avoid confusion. Having different layout on each store can also be helpful and avoid any wastage of space. Since the organization has 20000 products they need to be displayed in an arranged format with utmost importance given to layout so that they appear attractive for the customers to buy. The lighting also should be set up in a way that enhances the qualities of the products. The benefits of having a store layout are that it helps the customers organize their wants. It has been proven in countless studies that a good display of the products makes the customers more inclined to buy the products. This means that a layout can make or break a sale hence needs attention from the upper management (Waters, 2011). CONCLUSION IKEA has a great future ahead. It needs to take an aggressive role in this market because its sales are now stagnant and costs are on a rise. It has used the best method for inventory management along with supply chain management it can further expand its dominance over the other furniture retailers by becoming a public company instead of staying private and add additional funds to its disposal. The has been orthodox and conservative in its approach to management so far but it needs to change its policies into being more innovative not only in the products it makes but also in the strategies it follows. The company has great potential and a business plan that matches no other organization in the world. It size and its success by far have been commendable. It company also needs to change into being more web based which would reduce the cost of transportation and logistics. It has a lot of potential and a goodwill that precedes every country it decides to open a store in, however marketing is also an important feature IKEA needs to look into. Its current marketing strategies were effective in an expanding economy where people where ready to spend however in this current recession the only way IKEA can make more sales is through advertising its fundamental business objective; low cost. It needs to cash into the recession and increase sales by lowering prices and making its products quality checked. IKEA also has a lot of improvement to do in the customer care area where it is lacking behind due to its policy to lower costs. The organization needs to train its employee so that they are more efficient and better equipped to make a sale. To conclude I would like to add that IKEA has great potential not only in its existing countries but other countries where it does not have any stores. It needs to tap into the sales before some other organization does.