Group work is an essential aspect of our personal, educational and professional development, yet it is not a common method of assessment in Politics and International Relations departments at British Universities. This study explores how instructors can effectively engage students in assessed group work to help them develop an appropriate mix of skills by focusing on collaborative learning and scaffolding. It draws on primary sources collected from a final year Politics and International Relations module at a top-ranking British University. Group work assessment is discussed in relation to three points of comparison: cooperative and collaborative learning, formative and summative assessment, and individual and group achievement rates.The key findings suggest that a) students have the ability to learn collaboratively with minimum "scaffolding" in place and prefer being empowered to self-manage their respective groups and arising problems and b) formative group assignments and intermediary feedback are perceived by students as key in supporting group performance. The findings and proposed recommendations provide a guide for educators interested in diversifying their assessment methods and supporting students' development.
China and Japan continue to partly live in the shadow of World War II (WWII) with recurrent expressions of anti-Japanese nationalism in China periodically ebbing bilateral relations. How does the Chinese government manage anti-Japan public manifestations of nationalism and what factors explain it? The government has to walk a fine line by managing the nationalism it has bred without undermining its own rule and considering elite divisions, heightened public nationalism, and the developments in its external environment. Six case studies from the Hu-Wen era provide a comprehensive understanding of what pertains to Chinese nationalism, the means used to express it, and more importantly the way the government chose to tackle them. While nationalism can be a mean of garnering legitimacy and exercising pressure on Japan to bend to its wishes, the Chinese government is embarked on the sinuous task of preventing an escalation beyond its control at both the domestic and international levels.
The programme examines how just transitions whilst tackling climate change and biodiversity is key to supporting inclusive economies and societies in the future. Through the programme, the Academy awarded funding to nine research projects exploring the actions required in sectors and industries globally across supply and value chains, with a focus on key economic emitters or areas of society that will help 'The Energy of Freedom'? 'The Energy of Freedom'? 8 Ursula Von der Leyen, (2021). State of the Union 2021, 15 September 2021, available at https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/ detail/en/SPEECH_21_4701. 9 Roland Busch (2021). "Siemens-Chef warnt Baerbock vor "konfrontativer Außenpolitik" gegenüber China", Handelsblatt, 30 December 2021.
Why and how has China covered the Black Lives Matter (BLM), a movement with emerging themes closely related to its domestic issues? To what extent does the Chinese media build a unified discourse on sensitive themes that underpin the BLM? These are important questions given China's complicated history with ethnicity, race, and protests. This article argues that Chinese media uses BLM as a multi-faceted propaganda tool to foster cohesion at ideological level. NVivo-powered coding and thematic media analysis show that mainstream media, including official, semi-official and commercial media, and we-media do not present a uniform discourse on BLM. While they generally converge on criticism towards “protests” and “police” action, they display a nuanced “anti-US” and “Greater China” discourse. Moreover, the BLM coverage is used to undermine the US and strengthen by comparison the party-state's legitimacy. In the absence of a reflective discussion on race, racist undertones emerge in Chinese we-media.
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