Self-Directed Learning, A Guide for Learners and Teachers

Urban heat island and thermal comfort conditions at micro-climate scale in a tropical planned city

UNITED NATIONS HUMAN SETTLEMENTS PROGRAMME  The effects of urbanization and climate change are converging in dangerous ways that seriously threaten the world’s environmental, economic and social stability. Cities and Climate Change: Global Report on Human Settlements 2011 seeks to improve knowledge, among governments and all those interested in urban development and in climate change, on the contribution of cities to climate change, the impacts of climate change on cities, and how cities...

Cities and climate change: Global report on human settlements 2011

The electricity consumption growth in Iran requires a rapid development of power plant construction. Like many other countries, most of the power plants in Iran are using fossil fuel. In the past decade, thermal power plants generated about 94% of electricity and about 6% was generated by renewable sources such as hydro-power. This study is to show a clear view of 42 years an evolutionary trend of Iran's electricity generation industry. The capacity of power generation installed and electricity generation from the years 1967 to 2008 has been gathered. The total pollutant emissions and emission per unit electricity generation for each type of power plants have also been calculated using emission factors and the pattern of electricity generation and emission has been presented. The results shown that encouraging of using renewable energy sources and increasing the contribution of the combined cycle as a best type of thermal power plants and use more natural gas is recommended to reduce emission.

A review on the pattern of electricity generation and emission in Iran from 1967 to 2008

Background Nature play is growing in popularity as children’s play spaces are transforming from traditional playgrounds into more nature-based play spaces with considerable financial and resource investment from government bodies. This has resulted in the re-development of children’s play spaces to incorporate more natural elements such as trees, plants and rocks. Despite this, it is unclear whether there is empirical evidence to support claims that play in nature is beneficial for child health and development. Aim To conduct a systematic review examining the impacts of nature play on the health and developmental outcomes of children aged 2–12 years. Methods Seven electronic databases were searched (MEDLINE, ERIC, Embase, PsycINFO, The Cochrane Library, The Joanna Briggs Institute and Emcare) from inception to July/August 2018 (search updated July/August 2019). The Inclusion criteria were children aged 2–12 years with no health/developmental conditions. The exposure/intervention of interest was unstructured, free play in nature. Critical appraisal of included studies was conducted using the McMaster Critical Appraisal Tool. Descriptive synthesis was then undertaken using the NHMRC FORM Framework. Results Out of 2927 articles identified, 16 studies met the inclusion criteria. The nature play exposure/intervention was heterogeneously described, and a plethora of outcome measures were used. Nature play had consistent positive impacts on physical activity outcomes and cognitive play behaviours (imaginative and dramatic play). However, there remain some concerns regarding the quality of the evidence base, heterogeneity in intervention description and parameters in the outcome measures used. Conclusions While the positive impacts of nature play were encouraging in terms of physical activity and cognitive development, nature play stakeholders should focus on producing a universal definition for nature play, the development of standardised outcome measures and the conduct of robust research designs. Implications of these findings suggest the need for the development of standardised guidelines to inform practice and policy in the design of children’s play spaces in different contexts.

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The impacts of unstructured nature play on health in early childhood development: A systematic review.

Developing Conducive Sustainable Outdoor Learning: The Impact of Natural environment on Learning, Social and Emotional Intelligence☆

Sustainability is a critical issue nowadays to ensure human’s continuity in these world. As the centre of research and knowledge, many universities worldwide have made the sustainability as a goal in developing their campus. This is because the physical development planning of the campus is an effective tool to create a sustainable campus. The objective of the research is to study the effectiveness of the physical development planning of research universities campus in Malaysia in creating a sustainable campus by referred to the physical elements in campus development planning. The scope of this research is limited to the physical planning of the campus.  There are four research universities has been chosen as the subjects namely Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Universiti Malaya (UM) and Universiti Putra Malaysia. Research methods used consisted of questionnaire, behavioural observation and visual study. A total of 400 respondents were chosen to ensure the success of the questionnaire and the total divided equally on each campus. Next, data obtained was statistically analyzed and compared between each campus. The results obtained by questionnaire then referred to the findings obtained from other techniques to get a detailed explanation. The research found that there are some weaknesses in the physical development planning of the campus that studied, especially in term of accessibility. In addition, the findings also indicate that the campus that planned as a compact campus lead a minor sustainability issue compared to the wide and dispersed campuses. Thus, the compact campus can lead to achieve the sustainability.

/pdf/toward-a-sustainable-campus-comparison-of-the-physical-39r78kgukb.pdf

Toward a Sustainable Campus: Comparison of the Physical Development Planning of Research University Campuses in Malaysia

In the attempt to reshape the future landscape of the construction industry in Malaysia, there is a need to address the increasing concern of ethical issues prevailing in the industry. The way forward is to improve ethics in the industry and it should start from the way we educate the construction professionals. This paper discusses the research on the significance of ethics education and training for construction professionals. It underlines construction professionals’ perceptions on ethics education and training as a way to improve ethics in the Malaysian construction industry. A questionnaire survey was conducted with construction professionals made up of architects, quantity surveyors and engineers from Malaysian main construction industry players that are the clients, contractors and consultants involved with the design, project management and construction of projects in Malaysia. Results from the survey show that ethics and moral education at elementary school; ethics education for undergraduate levels of construction and engineering programs at colleges/universities; and, professional institutions’ responsibility to endorse the ethics substance by conducting Continuing Professional Development (CPD) ethics training for their members, are significant to form the nucleus of the construction professionals’ ethical setting to improve ethics in industry. Further research may focus on ethics education specifically in designing appropriate ethics curricula for undergraduate construction and engineering programs in Malaysia.

/pdf/ethics-education-and-training-for-construction-professionals-47lrlq4ldc.pdf

Ethics Education and Training for Construction Professionals in Malaysia

The architectural curriculum has been based on the design studio model which focuses on learning by doing and all processes and procedures of problem solving are transmitting trough lectures and critique sessions The current model in studios is based on ancient model In some cases the traditional design studio in a school of architecture consists of a teacher telling students what to do and student doing what they are toldThis traditional model must be redefined and be made clearer in order to improve both learning and teaching methods This paper tries to analyze studio types and implemented methods of critique in order to find their weak and strength points and also to identify procedures and tools that can be used to support the studio based pedagogy in architecture Key-Words: critique (crit); design studio; Architecture; assessment tool; evaluation

http://www.wseas.us/e-library/conferences/2010/TimisoaraP/EELA/EELA-58.pdf

Ismar Minang Satotoy Usman

Papers

Developing Conducive Sustainable Outdoor Learning: The Impact of Natural environment on Learning, Social and Emotional Intelligence☆

Toward a Sustainable Campus: Comparison of the Physical Development Planning of Research University Campuses in Malaysia

Ethics Education and Training for Construction Professionals in Malaysia

Redefining critique methods as an assessment tools in architecture design studio

Physical and transportation elements of traditional street in Malaysia