Bøger af Michelle Blum

The text introduces engineering to first-year undergraduate students using Inquiry-Based Learning (IBL). It draws on several different inquiry-based instruction types such as confirmation inquiry, structured inquiry, guided inquiry, and open inquiry, and all of their common elements. Professor Blum¿s approach emphasizes the student¿s role in the learning process, empowering them in the classroom to explore the material, ask questions, and share ideas, instead of the instructor lecturing to passive learners about what they need to know. Beginning with a preface to IBL, the book is organized into three parts, each consisting of four to ten chapters. Each chapter has a dedicated topic where an initial few paragraphs of introductory or fundamental material are provided. This is followed by a series of focused questions that guide the students¿ learning about the concept(s) being taught. Featuring multiple inquiry-based strategies, each most appropriate to the topic, An Inquiry-Based Approach to Introduction to Engineering stands as an easy to use textbook that quickly allows students to actively engage with the content during every class period.

Essay from the year 2019 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: 13, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, language: English, abstract: In this small-scope study, a number of hesitation markers of Chinese learners of English were investigated. While other learner groups, such as French learners of English, have been investigated quite thoroughly, Chinese learners have as of yet not had much time in the spotlight. The research question is as follows: "How do Chinese learners of English use hesitation markers?" When thinking about language and what constitutes it, hesitation markers may not be the first thing that comes to mind. Other linguistic factors, such as intensifiers (for example, 'very', 'really' which strengthen the meaning of a message), backchannels ('uh-huh' and other such words used in order to maintain a conversation), and errors (for example, the usage of 'false friends' or other mistakes made by the speaker) may seem a more important topic to investigate. In fact, "hesitation markers are often not admitted within the bounds of lexis and grammar - in authoritative reference works they can be summarily dismissed or all but ignored". However, hesitation markers are in fact quite interesting to study, and what makes them so important is the correlation they have with fluency. Fluency is often named as the aim of a learner of any language - to appear as secure in a language as a native speaker. In general, it can be said that the more fluent a speaker is, the less hesitation they use since many linguistic insecurities fall away with more practice. No matter the specific speaker situation, hesitation markers play a big role in everyday conversations, and all of these factors constitute what makes them worth investigating.

Project Report from the year 2019 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, language: English, abstract: The phenomenon under investigation was the dative alternation, i.e. the factors influencing the choice between the NP/noun phrase dative ("I give him the book") and the PP/prepositional phrase dative ("I give the book to him"). It is generally assumed, that factors holding an influence over the dative choice are, among others, the syntactic complexity/length of the indirect object and the verbs used. In order to find out which factor is more influential in the choice, both factors were considered in the study. Some verbs, like give, promise, lend and mail, have a tendency towards the usage with the NP dative - that means that they would not be used with the PP dative, and this would thus mean that the NP dative would be used more often when these verbs occur - if the verb choice influences the dative form more than the syntactic complexity, that is.

Essay from the year 2018 in the subject Communications - Journalism, Journalism Professions, grade: 13, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, language: English, abstract: This paper explores how a German and an English news website, Spiegel online and BBC online, respectively, present some of the actual people behind the term 'refugee': A Syrian family of seven and a lone Syrian man. Both have faced hardships, both have a similar cultural background and both want nothing more than to integrate into German society and "become German". In 2015, the already tense situation in many Arab countries, chief among them Syria, escalated. While many Syrians had already sought asylum in neighboring states such as Turkey and Jordan since 2011, when the Syrian Civil War first led people to flee their country, the vast refugee population in the neighboring countries eventually forced many to go elsewhere. At first, the refugees¿ predicament seemed solved: Many Europeans had a "Refugees Welcome" mentality, welcoming the new arrivals with open arms and hearts.This changed, however, with more and more people coming to the country and politicians seemingly at a loss on how to organize the situation. The circumstances for the new society members became difficult. They were disliked by many for the sheer fact that they were part of a different culture. A majority of the refugees lived in crowded refugee camps, bored out of their minds, often not allowed to work, out of money since having spent the last of it on the way to Germany. The media also could not decide how to portray refugees: Were they victims, perpetrators? As Chouliaraki put it, the news on the topic of refugees has been "a constant struggle of shifts and turns over the narration of refugees in news journalism".

Master's Thesis from the year 2020 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: 1,7, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, language: English, abstract: This thesis will analyze the usage of intensification in three varieties of English, namely British English, Indian English and Sri Lankan English. These varieties were chosen due to their shared colonial past. It will be exciting to see similarities and differences between them, and to ascertain if their colonial past has left a linguistic imprint on them. After this introduction, the theory section will explain the most important topics concerning this thesis, namely Sri Lankan English, Indian English and British English and, naturally, intensifiers. The Schneider Dynamic Model and Kachrüs Three Circle Model will also be explained briefly, since both are vital for research connected to colonialism. The methodology and data section will explain the process of data extraction and the methods used for data analysis along with research questions and hypotheses. The results will be explained in the results section. After that, the discussion of results will talk about the results and their meaning more thoroughly, and research questions as well as hypotheses will be revisited.Intensifiers have been used ever since language has been documented, and yet, with the amount of research done on the subject, are hardly taken seriously as an insight into language. Why is that? Do intensifiers really mean little, change little? Are they actually worth investigating, or are they just filler words, just meant to underline the importance of other words? Why research something that holds no meaning of its own? And, lastly, the most important question of all: What are intensifiers, and why do we use them?