Month: January 2025
Natural Hazards
Abstract
Natural hazards include many geophysical and biological phenomenon that have negative effects on humans. In many cases, natural hazards can be predicted based on meteorological, oceanographic, and geological patterns or physical characteristics. Hazards include extreme rainfall from storms, erosion from waves, and ash from volcanic activity. Owing to the potential of combined factors with varying temporal and spatial scales, sharing expertise among scientists and engineers is especially necessary. Resilient approaches require collaboration among multiple agencies, industry and the community. Effective collaboration includes coordination across geographic regions, levels of authority and sectors of society to ensure that partners understand the impacts of environmental factors on their plans and operations. Resilient approaches preserve, not destroy, barriers against waves and storm surge such as coral reefs, dune systems, mangrove forests, and salt marshes.
Enhancing Cross-Cultural Teaching and Learning: An Instructor’s View on Africanization
Abstract
Research has indicated that learners who receive education in a context they can relate to are more successful in acquiring knowledge and skills. For this reason, educators in Africa often explore the concept of Africanization as part of cross-cultural teaching and learning efforts. Africanization includes local and indigenous cultural considerations to instill African culture and identity in teaching and learning environments. This qualitative study investigates the perceptions of academic staff, focusing on the effectiveness of using an African case study to explain important theoretical constructs in an undergraduate Business Analysis and a Human-Computer Interaction course at a higher-educational institution. Thematic analysis performed on the results of in-depth semi-structured interviews involving academic instructors reveals seven main themes, with the theme on the relevance and interpretation of practical examples occurring most frequently. The findings suggest that the Africanization of content, using local and Afrocentric examples, can assist learners in acquiring relevant knowledge and skills and be useful in cross-cultural teaching and learning, as learners can relate the theory to their local context. However, the concept should be presented to learners before introducing new academic content.