Improving Dimensional Change Card Sort Performance of Preschoolers With Developmental Language Disorder: Effects of Two Task Variations

Purpose This research note addresses whether task administration variations can improve Dimensional Change Card Sort (DCCS) performance in preschoolers with developmental language disorder (DLD). Method Participants included preschoolers with DLD who failed the standard DCCS, which is characterized by inability to switch from one card sorting rule to a new rule. After an approximately 2.5-month delay, participants were retested on the DCCS in one of three conditions: repeating standard administration, participants labeling relevant card dimensions, or briefly removing target cards before the switch. Results Children in both the labeling and target removal conditions scored significantly higher on the second administration relative to the first. However, comparing across conditions, participants in the target removal condition scored higher on the second DCCS compared to participants in the standard and labeling conditions, which did not differ from each other. Conclusions DCCS performance of preschoolers with DLD can be improved by changing task administration. The most effective change is increasing the salience of the switch to the new sorting rule, as opposed to directing children's attention via their own labeling behavior.

Application of System Engineering to Project Management

Task administration is the procedure through which work is instated, arranged, executed, and controlled by a group to accomplish an objective. Since project management activities are different from normal business activities that are conducted every day, project management calls for special technical and management skills amongst team members. The successful completion of a project depends largely on systems engineering and the management of various programs. Systems engineering refers to an interdisciplinary approach that facilitates the realization and success of complex systems. The purpose of system engineering is to, therefore, influence the whole system through various cohesive subsystems. The principles of system engineering are synonymous with most characteristics of project management. System engineering is, therefore, applicable to advance project management. This paper looks at the application of system engineering to project management.

Effects of Task Conditions and Administrations on Changes in State Motivation

<p><em>Many traditional motivation studies have argued that trait motivation strongly controls state motivation. This study, however, focuses more on state motivation and attempts to suggest a bottom-up approach whereby stimulating state motivation through the use of tasks has a potential to positively influence trait motivation. As few studies have argued the task administration and condition in relation to changes in state variables, this study deals mainly with task conditions (i.e., closed vs. open tasks) and task administration (i.e., individual vs. pair tasks) with special attention to changes in state motivation, perceived competence, and anxiety. Four sets of narrative writing tasks were designed: individual-closed, individual-open, pair-closed, and pair-open. Before and after each task, students were asked to answer questionnaires measuring the previously mentioned three state variables. The results indicate that (a) learners’ motivation, competence, and anxiety were more likely to positively change in pair tasks, (b) before the tasks, individual-tasks were considered more attractive than pair-tasks, and (c) after the tasks, however, learners felt more competent performing pair-tasks than individual-tasks. Based on these results, this study suggests that pair tasks positively influence learners’ state variables.</em></p>

Judgment and Interpretation Tasks in Second Language Research

This article provides an overview of recent studies in second language acquisition that use tasks that elicit learners' judgments about the grammaticality of language or learners' interpretation of language. We discuss acceptability judgment tasks, preference tasks, truth-value judgment tasks, and other types of interpretation tasks. For each task type, recent studies that use that task are briefly summarized, with a focus on advantages and disadvantages of the methodology in relation to the study's objectives. A variety of topics related to task administration are covered, including (but not limited to) different types of rating scales; presentation of target sentences in isolation versus in the context of other sentences, stories, and/or pictures; visual versus auditory modality of presentation; and timed versus untimed tasks.