An Expert System in Education

The computer provides one means of facilitating educational diagnosis within the regular school environment. An expert system could be developed to guide the classroom teacher and/or resource person through the various stages of diagnosing learning disabilities from the initial screening to a prescription. At each step the expert system would analyze the available data and suggest an appropriate next step. It could request information regarding the child’s developmental history or academic skills. The administration of a particular standardized test may be advised, or it might recommend further assessment of a skill or ability not within its domain of expertise. This might include consultation with a specialist or a reference to an outside agency.

The teacher or diagnostician would perform the required task, such as obtaining the requested data, or administering the appropriate test, and would supply this information to the system. After this new data had been assimilated and analysed, the system would propose the next step, and so on. Eventually, the system would provide a summary of its diagnostic findings along wit a prescription, including appropriate remedial activities and instructional techniques.

Grammar Review

I. Give Russian equivalents:

1. What is done cannot be undone. 2. I would here refer to what I have already said about these substances. 3. This article will review what has been achieved in this field since 1951. 4. From what has been said one concludes that the results obtained depend principally on the technique employed. 5. What we want to stress is indivisibility and complexity of the environment. 6. In what may seem too precise a form, the answer is as follows. 7. What follows is extremely significant in its bearing on the problem of the relationship of physics with other sciences. 8. Much of what we do in space, much of what is expected of us strains our technology to the breaking point. 9. In this article Dyson states what may be considered three rules of managing a research laboratory. 10. What goes into a system must eventually come out.

II. Give English equivalents:

1. Мне трудно об этом спорить.
2. Им важно подкрепить теорию дополнительными данными.
3. Физикам важно поддерживать контакт с биологами.
4. Ребенку необходимо учиться на собственном опыте.
5. Нам часто трудно угадать, каким будет будущее.
6. Естественно, что на такой анализ затрачивается около года.
7. Необходима, чтобы реакция была ускорена.
8. Чтобы две молекулы вступили в реакцию, они должны столкнуться.

III. Translate the sentences:

1. A fool may ask more questions than a wise man can answer.
2. He that cannot obey cannot command.
3. However complex the work we must do it on time.
4. You cannot fool all people all the time.
5. You may take a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink.
6. A man without a smiling face must not open a shop.

Phrasal Verbs

BREAK

Break away вырваться, оторвать. убежать

Break back внезапно повернуть назад

Break down сломаться, сорваться, разбить (по пунктам)

Break forth вырваться, пробить себе путь

Break in (to) вломиться, вмешаться

Break off вломиться, прервать, расторгнуть

Break out вырваться, разразиться, вспыхнуть

Break through пробиться, сделать открытие

Break up прерваться, разогнать, разбить, разойтись

Break with порвать с

Think about the sentences of your own using the verbs.

Unit 5

Read and translate the text:

Text

When Index

In dealing with people, we must remember that although their names do not change, they may act differently with the passing of time. Susie (1994) may have had many habits that made people call her selfish. Susie (today) may not have those habits. You cannot simply meet Susie (1994) and decide she is selfish, then for the rest of your life assume that’s the way she is because that’s the way she was. Susie may have changes (and, of course, Susie may not have changed). The point is, again, to survey the Susie-territory before you hang a 1994 label on her today.

If we want to react to people as they are (rather than to people as they were), we must recognize the process factor in knowledge. We must remember with Whitehead that “Knowledge keeps no better than fish”.

All of us make missteps. All of us have done mean, selfish, illegal, unworthy and terrible things. If people get impressions of us at such unfortunate times, and then set them in concrete in their minds and refuse to reevaluate us at later times, then we are sunk. When that happens, a person may feel there is no need to try to act better or improve himself. He may feel that his reputation is establishes, and no matter how he changes, it will help him because people are not open-minded enough to revise their opinion. You can see what unhappiness poor thinking habits can cause. Clear thinking demands that we use the when index to attune ourselves to the possibilities of change.

Grammar Review

I. Translate into Russian:

1. The valves help to maintain the pressure necessary for circulation. 2. The purpose of the book is to inform the practicing users. 3. This new publication aims to provide a practical guide for specialists 4. To obtain as well as to interpret terms is of importance to linguists. 5. It is important to consider the clinical aspects of the cases under discussion. 6. To prevent diseases is our major task. 7. The aim of the book is to be a guide for students. 8. Every effort has been made to provide up-to-date information.

III. Give English equivalents:

1. Эта работа предназначена для тех, кто работает в области биологии. 2. Данные были включены в статью, чтобы помочь читателю в дальнейших исследованиях. 3. Цель нашего исследования – понять причины этих неудач. 4. Вопрос, на который надо ответить, сложный. 5. Институт был создан, чтобы улучшить исследования в данной области. 6. Данные, которые будут опубликованы в нашей статье, были получены в нашей лаборатории.

Unit 6

Read and translate the text:

Text

Reading

Reading to oneself is a modern activity which was almost unknown to the scholars of the classical and medieval worlds, while during the fifteenth century the term “reading” undoubtedly meant reading aloud. Only during the nineteenth century did silent reading become commonplace.

One should be wary, however, of assuming that silent reading came about simply because reading aloud is a distraction to others. Examination of factors related t the historical development of silent reading reveals that it became the usual mode of reading for most adult reading tasks mainly because tasks themselves changes in character.

The last century saw a steady gradual increase in literacy, and thus in the number of readers. As readers increased, so the number of potential listeners declined, and thus there was some reduction in the need to read aloud. As reading for the benefit of listeners grew less common, so came the flourishing of reading as a private activity in such public places as libraries, railway carriages and offices, where reading aloud would cause distraction to other readers.

Towards the end of the century there was still considerable argument over whether books should be used for information or treated respectfully, and over whether the reading of material such as newspapers was in some way mentally weakening. Indeed this argument remains with us still in education. However, whatever its virtues, the old shared literacy culture had gone and was replaced by the printed mass media on the one hand and by books and periodicals for a specialist readership on the other.

By the end of the century students were being recommended to adopt attitudes to books and to use skills in reading them which were inappropriate, if not impossible, for the oral reader. The social, cultural and technological changes in the century had greatly altered what the term “reading” implied.

Grammar Review

I. Remember the follow-expressions:

It follows

As follows

As following

Follow-up

Follow-up study

II. Give Russian equivalents of the sentences:

1. The paper was followed by a series of reports. 2. The operated children were followed to age of 7 to 8. 3. Control subjects followed the same visit protocol as the experimental groups. 4. A typical experiment was carried out as follows. 5. The treatment of virus diseases is followed by the development of new drugs. 6. Each paper is followed by an extensive bibliography. 7. All of them are aware of the fact. It follows that additional requirements are not necessary.

“Translator’s false friends”