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Taking Control of Your Health & Well-Being

admin — Tue, 13 Jun 2023 12:34:42 +0000

Do you ever wonder why, in spite of all your good intentions, you just cannot seem to take control over your health and wellness the way you really want to? The answer to that question can be found in the words of Albert Einstein, who reminded us “you cannot correct a problem with the same thinking that created it”. In other words, you cannot change old behaviors without new information.

The Institute of Medicine recently published a study that indicates ninety million Americans are “health illiterate”, which means we do not know how to interpret or use health information to control or improve our health, or prevent chronic disease. Data compiled previously identified, “lack of information as the number one root cause of death”. Understanding that there exists a cause and effect relationship between what we know and how we behave, we need a model of integrating this important information to change the behaviors that lead to chronic disease. According to a 7-year, 1996, Harvard Medical School study, approximately 70% of all cancers are preventable through lifestyle changes. Furthermore, our diseases and conditions are primarily a result of stress, food, environment, attitude, emotions or beliefs that keep us in behaviors that lead to illness. Which invites the question, are we consciously choosing to be unhealthy, or do we just not understand sufficiently the relationship between what we think, how we behave, what we put into our bodies and how we keep ourselves well or make ourselves sick?

In a world exploding with health information, especially on the internet, we are caught in the dilemma of having abundant amounts of information, without a context through which we can understand and utilize this information in a way that is appropriate for our own unique personal health needs. There is, however, good news – making its way into the mainstream of health care is an integrated model of health information and education that provides a “whole picture of health” perspective, allowing each of us to discern and create our own unique approach to taking charge of our health and well-being. Whole Health Education, developed over the past 28 years, in cooperation with Boston physicians, nurses and educators, is an approach to understanding the cause and effect our behaviors and choices have on our state of health. Demystifying the five major factors that influence how sick or well we become, Whole Health Education provides a perspective on human anatomy and physiology, bio-chemistry, psycho-social, environmental and spiritual aspects which allows for an authentic understanding of what we need know to resolve chronic health problems or to stay healthy. Integrating evidence-based information with the wisdom of various spiritual teachings and a whole-person overview of behavioral options, Whole Health Education offers each of us a tool for personal health management by providing personalized health information that explains the physical, emotional, nutritional, environmental and spiritual aspects of a health concern.

For example, Mature Onset Diabetes affects approximately 18.2 million Americans and is the leading health concern in our culture today. As all chronic conditions are, Mature Onset Diabetes is a multi-dimensional disease state and the unique Whole Health perspective, can facilitate the restoration of health for those with chronic diseases such as diabetes.

Physical/Structural

What happens on a physical and structural level with Mature Onset Diabetes? The specialized beta cells of the pancreas, which produce insulin, become incapable of producing adequate amounts of the critically necessary secretion. This happens over a period of years and can begin in our bodies, over time, by eating large amounts of insulin-provoking foods. These insulin provocateurs, which are sugars and starches in the form of complex carbohydrates, require the pancreas to produce more insulin so that the sugars can be carried over the cell membranes to all parts of the body. Serious disturbances occur when we do not have enough insulin to carry the sugar over the cell membranes. Insulin hooks onto the sugar molecule and acts like a lock and key mechanism to bring that sugar into the cell which is then used in the energy cycle of cell metabolism. The nervous system, brain and the lungs cannot function without the proper metabolism of sugars.

Emotional/Social

Just as diabetes is a lack of nourishment on a chemical/nutritional level, so is it a lack of emotional nourishment on an emotional/mental level. It relates to the “feel good” nourishment component of your body. What do we know about carbohydrates and serotonin? Carbohydrates provoke the production of serotonin. Serotonin is a neuro-transmitter that produces a feeling of well-being. There is a direct relationship between what our body is doing chemically and how we feel emotionally. When we crave or build our diet around carbohydrates, this can be a way of “self-medicating” our emotional needs by eating carbohydrates to provoke insulin production.

Sugar problems can affect us emotionally. Let’s say you have a pancreas that is not working properly. What can happen somatic/psychically from the pancreas to the brain? If we are feeling the ups and downs of hypoglycemia, and its biochemical/neurological symptoms, it may undermine our sense of security, self esteem, and produce anxiety and fear.

What is the emotional component of diabetes and the pancreas? Often, it can be a poor sense of self-esteem and a fear of not being “good enough” or not belonging. These feelings, medicated by the serotonin foods, can lead us to not look deeply enough into what is causing our health concerns and allow the feeling/feeding cycle to continue.

Chemical/Nutritional

On the nutritional side, the treatment for people with Mature Onset Diabetes is to decrease the stress on the pancreas by making changes in their diet — decrease starches and sugars and decrease calories. Eat less, eat right. What kind of a diet would be best for preventing Mature Onset Diabetes? Vegetables, vegetables, and vegetables combined with lean proteins such as fish, chicken, water, a little fruit and a little fat. In a hypoglycemic situation, it is wise not to eat grain or sugar, but sprouted grain bread, and other substitutes can be healthy and satisfying.

Because hormones are chemicals, diabetes and hypoglycemia are both hormonal-based problems. What we know about the hormone system is that it works as a balanced interdependent system. Diabetes is an endocrine-related, systemic problem. With a systemic problem like diabetes, you have a body system problem–you do not just have a condition by itself. It is known that the pancreas is related, through hormone interaction, to the adrenals, and the adrenals are in turn related to the reproductive system. It is known that these glands are related through hormone interactions to the pituitary and the pituitary is related to the thyroid gland, the thyroid is related to the thymus, and the thymus is related to the immune system.

Environmental/Internal & External

The environment that we work in, live in, walk through, live near — how does that environment have an impact on the way that we feel and the way we feel about ourselves?

How do we learn to trust in the order of the universe? By behaviors that come from trusting the order inside ourselves. We do this by setting boundaries — codes of conduct of how we are going to behave, eat, work exercise and live. If we don’t violate our own boundaries, we are less likely to let anybody else violate our boundaries. We have to start with ourselves. Our experience of victimization can begin with our own self-victimizing behavior.

Spiritual/World View

A Hindu Vendata truth is that “the whole world is one family”. It is said that there is only one disease, the disease of separateness, separating oneself from the awareness that we are one living organism. Competition creates isolation. The spiritual challenge presented by hypoglycemia and diabetes appears to be involved with over- or under-valuing the self: judgment of self and then others. Where are we in the process of getting to the truth that we are all equally important? The drama created by a one-up or one-down dynamic that we may allow to be part of our experience can lead to psychophysiology and the behavioral issues which can contribute to and create Mature Onset Diabetes.

Whole Health Education can transform our experience of taking care of ourselves. It can provide an understanding of our health concerns and conditions from this multi-dimensional perspective that makes sense in a way we can utilize the information directly and in a meaningful way. In addition, having the information provided in a mindful, respectful way that invites each of us to discern what we know about our health and condition, how to choose to resolve the problem and what kind of care we choose to have, allows each of us to experience whole-person health care through whole health information. Then, WE become the center of our health and healing process, rather than the doctors or practitioners we go to for guidance.

There is an excessive amount of traffic coming from your Region.

admin — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 05:53:56 +0000

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Top 03 Free Digital Medias for Education in Pakistan

admin — Tue, 06 Jun 2023 09:22:38 +0000

When one listen about YouTube in developing countries, its perception take him to kingdom of entertainment. It’s quite natural for someone to think about YouTube as gigantic source for watch free entertaining videos. During my parents-teacher meeting conducted for the students of higher secondary classes, when I told them about the use of YouTube as an educational source for their children. All of them were astonished.

I belong to Pakistan and I have been working as a computer teacher in a college since last 14 years. Like other developing countries we, majority of us, are far behind in the race of use of information technology in our children’s education. Mostly parents, due to lack of awareness, keep their children away from using internet in the classes of schools and early college. Although we have some dazzling stars children in the field of Computer and technology. Late Arfa Karim (Computer Scientist), Syed Sumail Hassan (Pakistani eGamer) and Rafay Baloch (ethical hacker) are few of them. Their parents pumped up their children and didn’t abide them to use digital media as a source for their education and positively they delivered he bestest services. Hence by giving awareness to the teachers, parents and students about the use of digital technologies in the learning process may increase their performance and bring many more starry performances as well.

1. YouTube as educational Source

As discussed in the starting, YouTube is not more than a collection of mixed quality of videos depicting the latest internet craze, painful-looking accident, music videos and entertainment videos. This is truly a misconception and underestimation of this real potential of YouTube that I consider is best, free and cheapest source of education. From how-to instructional videos to TED talks videos from experts, YouTube is the most significant educational source this time for Pakistan and other developing countries.

The raw statistics about videos being watched on YouTube are astonishing. With over 100 hours of content being uploaded every minute, peoples of in 61 countries around the world approaching and more than 10 billion hours are being watched per month. The statistics about educational videos are so healthy that more than 400 millions of people around the world are shaping up to be a new educational course. A growing number of free educational channels like thenewboston and theITeducation are providing anyone, anywhere, access to a huge collection of almost any topic videos that one can need in education. This is a lucky and happy news for the people in developed and especially developing countries as the peoples of developing countries like Pakistan perhaps could not have sufficient budgets.

Schools and universities are integrating free video platforms like YouTube into their classrooms. Sessions are produced either by content developers or by the teacher/lecturer themselves, using a webcam and some easily learnable software, and uploaded to YouTube. The link is then embedded in the course website where the students can watch it on demand. These videos can be public or private.

2. Educational mobile Apps

Mobile are now evolved to smartphones and has become the part of daily life of parents, teachers and students today. This new technology might also be used as an education tool using modern, simple and versatile educational apps. Mobile apps like Edmodo, Khan Academy are providing collaborative, interactive and planned learning possible on figure tips. These advanced gadgets are being used in classrooms to integrate the books, tests and quizzes. It motivates students about the ‘Learning Study’ from vocabulary learning to literacy skills and build on comprehensive knowledge. Worldwide researcher has found that younger people are utilizing smart-phones with emphasis on iPhone, iTouch apps and widely contributed through iBook Textbook. This has boosted the skills of scientific inquiry with content development and active and productive learning. It has rightly been termed as ‘Learning with Technology’ that has produced excitement for learning with an increased sense of self-confidence, pride in their abilities and hope for a spectacular future.

3. Virtual University TVs

Educational technology is the application of scientific knowledge about learning and conditions of learning to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of teaching and training. TV is one the most commonly used device for educational technology. It plays important role in making learning-teaching process interesting, objective and scientific. It brings appreciable change in behaviors of pupils and teachers. In Pakistan, the world’s first virtual university was established in 2000. Virtual University of Pakistan launched its own four TV channels. All lectures of different subjects are broadcasted on these channels that are telecasted by Cable TV network all across the county. It is mandatory by Govt. of the Pakistan for every cable TV operator to broadcast these channels. All the devices are provided to these operators free of cost. But unfortunately, students are not using this facility. All lectures are recorded by PhD professors which are free on air to watch for everyone on free of charge. Parents, students and teachers must tell their students to take help from these TV channels.

Two Tier Education System For Higher Technical Education in India

admin — Tue, 06 Jun 2023 07:11:19 +0000

Introduction

With ever increasing use of technology and the internet in India and ever growing demand and need for expanding the coverage of Higher Technical Education there is a wide scope of introducing technology in the way the Higher Technical Education is imparted in India. In today’s environment mostly the methods employed are labor intensive, limited to class room interaction, access to which is not available to students in the event of they missing out the classes due to certain reasons. In addition there are difficulties in explaining and demonstrating the complex subjects involving three dimensional figures/models. More over it is an accepted fact that it is difficult for the students to concentrate on a subject in a typical classroom environment for more than about 20 minutes. The best of students have often been found to be losing concentration after about 20 minutes of classroom teaching which mostly becomes monotonous in traditional class where teacher mostly resorts to one way transmission without initiating interactive discussion. Though interactive sessions offer little improvement but it is not always possible to initiate the interaction till the time the students have developed certain level of understanding of basic concepts and fully understand the prerequisite required for a typical course.

Background

In order to improve teaching learning process it is important that we go beyond the boundaries of classroom and fixed timetable limits. The teaching material must be delivered to the student at a time, pace and place which provides best learning environment for him. This may have lot of variation depending on individual students needs. The EDUSAT program launched at the initiative of the government has also not achieved the desired success though large numbers of terminals have been established all over India and best of Professors are delivering lectures in real time environment. The root cause of failure can be attributed to the fact that it is still not getting out of a typical class room environment. Though virtual classrooms have been created but still it is limited to formalities of a classroom.

Use of technology in improving the teaching learning process normally termed as Educational Technology – also known variously as e-learning, instructional technology and learning technology – is the use of technology to support the enhancement of learning process. It impacts upon the learning process, e.g. in delivering learning materials, facilitating communication and providing assessment and feedback. This technology can effectively be used to enhance and supplement the classroom teaching wherein the material is once again made available to the student at a time, pace and place that is best suitable for his needs. It will fill in the blanks which he must have drawn while he was in the classroom and could not clarify his concepts due to certain reasons. More ever certain other things like tutorials, tests, assignments etc can also handled effectively on line thereby saving the valuable time of the competent faculty members which can be used for other more useful activities.

Course management systems (CMSs), which are online systems, were designed and developed to support classroom learning in academic settings, such as universities and other Educational Institutes. CMSs provide instructors with the ability to perform the following tasks:

• Place course materials online. Most CMSs provide pre-programmed buttons for the course syllabus, course schedule, and course materials linked to specific lessons, such as copies of readings and PowerPoint slides from lectures.

• Track student progress through assessment features, which enable instructors to give quizzes and tests online, and an online grade book, where instructors can post student grades.

• Discussion board, where instructors and students can discuss readings and continue class discussions between formal class sessions.

• Other communications tools, which let instructors send announcements to classes and communicate individually with students.

• Lock box for students, where students can store class materials in a safe place-either a presentation to give later in class or backing up class assignments in a safe place.

• Course statistics, which provide information on the use of the course site, including who used the course site and when.

• Examples of CMSs include the commercial products Blackboard and WebCT, and the open source system like Moodle.

Motivation

With ever increasing need for automation in the education system and the Government having decided to go for decentralization in Higher Technical Education in a big way there has been mushrooming growth of Engineering Institutions all over India. Good faculty members with thorough understanding of basic through advanced topics are difficult to find. With the current system of the faculty resources being utilized only for the benefit of the students enrolled with the Institute/University employing the concerned faculty, the scarce resources are not being utilized optimally. With the current developments and availability of Information Technology tools it may be possible to share the rich experiences of the distinguished faculty resources of certain key institutions in a typical University by other inexperienced faculty members of the same university engaged in teaching similar or same subjects.

The basic idea will be to introduce two tier system in the higher technical education. The first tier will involve a continuous and consistent effort made to train and educate the fresh and inexperienced faculty members by using real time interaction with a group of experienced faculty members located at a center of excellence. This will involve creation of a “Nodal Center of Excellence” for each of the course being offered by the university. Such nodal center will design and develop a course by using the best suitable and simple to operate tools available in course management systems to perfection. This course will compulsorily be subscribed to by all faculty members engaged in teaching same course all throughout the University. They can share the expertise available at the nodal center and also clarify the intricacies of the subjects on a day to day basis as the course advances in the semester.

The second tier of the system will involve Individual teachers who are already subscribed to the first tier discussed above. Such teachers will run their own course management systems for the benefit of the students attending their lectures.

In this manner all the center of excellence established everywhere can be shared by all the institutes affiliated to the university and also the university campus colleges. This will result in:-

• Uniformity in the coverage of the syllabus and its standardization.

• Discovering the shortcoming of the syllabus and a common platform for discussing the same for future revision.

• Clarification of the basic through advanced concepts through the chatting/tools offered by concerned selected service of the CMS.

• Standardization and sharing of the grading and assessment of the students without significant variation form teacher to teacher.

• Moderation of the grading centrally.

• Readily available standardized course material which can be developed by networking of teachers sharing same subject in the university but at different institutions.

• Standardization of reference books and the topics to be covered.

• Standardization of the depth of individual topics to be covered for each subject.

• Typical standardization of question bank.

• Development of reference standard study material at the center of excellence which can be shared by all other institutions.

• Automation of tutorial submission, FAQ answers, question paper generation, and response to earlier similar question asked.
• Provision of authenticated links to related and useful material for further higher study for research.

The System can be Implemented in these steps:

Conceive, design and develop a two tier education system based on nodal concept of center of excellence in Engineering Education (Higher technical education) typical to Indian Universities by selecting the best suitable tools offered by Course Management Systems (CMS) available and demonstrate the viability of the concept.

(1) Step one:

(a) Identify the essential and desirable features which should be offered by the nodal center of excellence, in typical Indian University environment, to make it effective in sharing and updating its resources.

(b) Carry out comparative study of the available course management systems world wide and selecting the best suitable system for this purpose.

(2) Step Two: Developing a comprehensive module in selected course which should preferably support following features:-

(a) Learning Tools

• Book marking

• Student Area

• Library and Information Access

• Annotation

• Glossary

• Course Index/Search Engine

• Learning Exemplars/Guidance

• Access to Grades

• Student Guide

• Self-Assessment Exercises

• Study Skill Building

• Student Web Pages

(b) Collaboration Tools

• Discussion Options

• File Sharing

• Work Group Areas

(c)Faculty Tools

• Course Planning, Design, Templates

• Automated Glossary

• Automated Course TOC/Index/Search Engine

• File Management

• Instructor Guide/Course Exemplars

• Web Search Tools

• Multimedia Capability

(d)Course Management

• Course Pages

• Student Management

• Automatic student assignment reminders (currently none of the CMS offer this currently)

• Course Archive/Backup/Replication

• Course Revision

• Online Help/FAQs

• Administration Tools

• Automated Registration

• Security

• Student Transcript

(3) Step Three: Implementing the nodal concept of center of excellence in real time and initiate the process for demonstration purposes.

Milestones completed

Nodal concept has widely been applied in service, telecommunication and repair & maintenance industry wherein certain nodal centers are created with all the facilities and expertise available at easily accessible place which can be accessed by the prospective customers. In telecommunications wherein certain communication nodes are created and users can hook on to these nodes for getting the desired services. In education system the concept has widely been applied in various admission management systems and placement services.

The concept of creating the Nodal center of excellence has been experimented in India by EDUSAT which is based on real time lectures in virtual classroom environment. However it has not invoked much enthusiasm. The root cause for this can be attributed to the fact that the lecture tends to be monologue and is not at a place, pace and time as may be required by the perspective learner. More over it lacks personal contact between the teacher and the students. The proposed two tier system of education involving nodal concept is intended to supplement the classroom teaching. It will be designed to optimize the contact time between the teacher and students in a way that the most important tings are attended to during the contact period and things of lesser importance can be attended to by the course management system like tutorials, class tests, assignments etc.

This concept can be related to the service industry where in a nodal point, which can be termed as centre of excellence, is established which caters to the training needs of service engineers who are placed all over the operational areas. These service engineers in turn provide service to the customers. In case they find they are not able to address the problem they consult the nodal point for further advice. Almost same concept is applied in case of maintenance support provided by most of the companies for maintenance cover provided to their customers.

The defense forces are known to have been using multi tier system for their training, maintenance and repair needs, though their system is not automated but the nodal concept is well established. In the proposed system we intend to use the two tier system with automation by using Course Management Systems.