ETR&D

The orientation programs in most of the schools do not mitigate the diverse necessities of students. In addition, the instability of the labor market and the complexity of life have a great impact on young people’s career choices. Faced with these concerns, high school students get confused when choosing a college major. Furthermore, the explosion of data on the Internet has caused most of the Internet users to make possible unsuitable decisions when browsing the Web, due to their inability to handle such large amounts of data. In this paper, the Case-based reasoning, and Ontology-based Hybrid Recommender System (COHRS) is proposed to assist high school students deciding the appropriate university/college, university major and career domain that best fit their preferences. COHRS uniquely combines case-based reasoning, collaborative filtering, knowledge base and ontology to explore the top N recommendations based on their fields of interest. The system has been evaluated on Lebanese students through a real-life dataset collected from different Lebanese cities. The first tests carried out on 60 high school students in Beirut city showed an average satisfaction level of 91.7% of the recommended results from the proposed system and 93.3% of them found the system very useful. The proposed system achieved an average accuracy level of 98% and 95% to retrieve the most similar cases and to extract appropriate recommendations respectively, which provides a very insightful capability to guide high school students in their future directions.

For several decades, digital formative assessment tools and platforms have been promoted as promising for supporting adaptive teaching. For learning goals such as procedural fluency, this promise has been held across a range of subject-matter topics. For conceptual learning goals, however, the available digital formative assessment tools are much less widespread, and the research needed to develop them still seems to be underestimated. This paper reports on the design process of the Mastering Math Online-Check to illustrate approaches to a research-based design of targeted digital formative assessment tools that (a) are relevant, (b) are valid, and (c) provide in-depth, informative insights into students’ understanding of subject-matter concepts (in this case, basic arithmetic concepts such as the meaning of multiplication and division). The described research needs and the considerations about research-informed designs refer to improving the depth of insights into students’ understanding and their explanations of meanings. This conceptual (rather than empirical) paper discusses pivotal questions that must be addressed to fully leverage technological advances for the assessment of deep conceptual understanding, not only for mathematical concepts but also for other abstract concepts that rely on explanations and visual representations for the assessment of their understanding.

Augmented reality (AR) technology has risen as a promising instrument for enriching educational encounters across diverse learning environments. In the realm of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) instruction, AR applications have shown potential in improving vocabulary learning and retention among students. This research investigates the effect of the ARLOOPA augmented reality app on the countable and uncountable vocabulary learning and retention of EFL students at a high school level within the context of flipped instruction. The study focused on a cohort of 30 female EFL students, who were chosen based on their results in the Oxford Quick Placement Test. Prior to the intervention, a countable and uncountable vocabulary pretest was administered to assess the students' initial proficiency. Both the flipped online and flipped face-to-face groups received countable and uncountable vocabulary instruction using ARLOOPA augmented reality app. However, the flipped online group accessed the instructional materials through online platforms, while the flipped face-to-face group received them in traditional classroom settings. Following 12 sessions of the treatment, a follow-up assessment was carried out to evaluate the effects of the AR app on the students' countable and uncountable vocabulary proficiency. Additionally, a delayed vocabulary test was administered two weeks after the post-test to assess the participants' retention of the newly acquired countable and uncountable vocabulary. Analysis of the data indicated that the online flipped group performed better than the face-to-face flipped group. The findings suggest that the online instruction, coupled with the interactive and immersive nature of ARLOOPA, contributed to the enhanced countable and uncountable vocabulary learning outcomes in the flipped online group. These results underscore the potential of AR technology and flipped instruction in EFL classrooms, especially when delivered through online platforms, to create more engaging and effective learning environments.

To investigate the potential of GPT-4.0 feedback to substitute teacher feedback in flipped classrooms, we conducted research that GPT-4.0 and a course teacher provided cognitive, praise, and mitigating feedback weekly via a course discussion platform, respectively. At the end of each topic, 89 third-year university students majoring in Educational Technology completed a self-regulated learning questionnaire, learning satisfaction questionnaire, and learning performance test without knowledge of the feedback provider’s identity. The results indicate no significant difference between GPT-4.0 and teacher feedback in promoting students’ self-regulated learning skills in the context of cognitive feedback. However, students generally expressed higher satisfaction with traditional teacher feedback, and those receiving teacher feedback outperformed those receiving GPT-4.0 feedback. The findings suggest that while GPT-4.0 provides cognitive feedback efficiently, its effectiveness in praising and mitigating feedback is limited compared to real teachers. This study reveals the potential and limitations of GPT-4.0 as a supplementary, rather than a substitute, teaching tool in the flipped classroom.

Oral practice is challenging for foreign language education, and Corrective Feedback (CF) is often used to point out learners’ pronunciation errors and to help them improve their oral skills in foreign language courses. CF is generally considered as a necessary condition for foreign language acquisition, and “reflection” and “correction” are imperative stages to realize the process from “input” to “output” to improve accuracy and deepen reflection on foreign language learning. In conventional courses, teachers have often used peer assessment (PA) to ask students to comment on each other’s performance during exercises so as to promote reflection. However, due to students’ varied levels of proficiency, correction from the teacher during PA activities is needed. Since a ratio of one teacher to many students is very common in most courses, it is almost impossible to provide immediate and detailed feedback for individual students during pronunciation practice. With the development of artificial intelligence, Automated Corrective Feedback (ACF) can provide more personalized, precise, and timely feedback for individual learners. Therefore, a quasi-experimental research design was conducted to explore if the ACF-based peer assessment (ACF-PA) approach would have a positive effect in a foreign language pronunciation course. The participants were 66 college students who were divided into an experimental group with the ACF-PA approach (N = 31) and a control group with the Conventional Peer Assessment (C-PA) approach (N = 35). The results indicated that when ACF-PA was adopted, it was helpful for improving students’ learning performance, intrinsic motivation, and self-regulated learning conceptions when learning French pronunciation. Additionally, discussion on students’ learning experience and their perceptions is also provided.

Recently scientists have underscored a significant mismatch between the latest theoretical Computational Thinking conceptualizations as an upcoming literacy that goes beyond computer science, and its operationalizations in current empirical research and designs, which are limited to coding-centred and domain-specific tools and approaches. To achieve an integrated computational literacy CT research must study new approaches that from the one side utilize multiple computational tools beyond traditional programming, such as databases and modelling tools, and from the other side employ CT for dealing with both the scientific and the societal aspects of real-world problems. To this end, this article explores the development of 16 middle school students’ computational thinking practices as they collaboratively play and modify the socio-scientific simulation game “CT-Chef” with three interconnected affordances, i.e., map design, data editing and block-based programming, in “ChoiCo” environment. The in-depth thematic analysis of students’ interactions throughout the activities, revealed new, system and data related, dimensions of known CT practices that have not yet been explored or detected in traditional programming-centred approaches. Moreover, the results showed that the progressive transition of student roles from players to designers enabled the development of abstract reasoning about the simulation game system. Finally, as designers of the socio-scientific game content, students questioned, discussed and modified the subjective societal values and possible biases behind the simulation. Based on the findings, the article discusses a framework of three axes, i.e., computational tools, engagement process and content, for utilizing CT in socio-scientific contexts.

Integrating Mixed Reality (MR) into nursing education and professional practice has recently captured significant interest as a transformative approach. This paper presents a comprehensive exploration and practical insights into designing and implementing an advanced MR training platform to provide nursing students with immersive experiences across various patient care scenarios. Further enhancing the platform’s utility is the incorporation of a unique conversational artificial intelligence (AI) module. This innovation breathes life into digital patients, enabling dynamic and realistic interactions that challenge nursing students to develop clinical reasoning skills in a controlled yet flexible MR environment. The AI’s capacity to understand and contextually react to the learner’s' verbal and behavioral inputs simulates authentic patient interactions. A total of 7 nursing students and 3 nursing faculty engaged in the pilot study, which served as a proving ground for the MR training system’s effectiveness. The study involved in-depth analysis, employing performance metrics, and evaluating situational awareness alongside cognitive workload using NASA Task Load Index (TLX) and learner’s thought verbalizations. The primary objective was to create a system that enhances nursing students' competencies and readiness for clinical healthcare practice. This system can potentially elevate the preparedness of new graduate nurses by providing a rich, interactive learning environment that mirrors the complexity of real-life clinical settings.

Science education aims to enhance students’ scientific knowledge and inquiry ability. In recent years, due to the advancements of computer and network technology, as well as the considerations of safety and cost, virtual reality (VR) has been gradually applied in scientific inquiry activities. When implementing inquiry-based learning in the past, students were usually guided to complete tasks by following the steps of observation, identification and summary. However, scholars have pointed out that observation, data collection and summary are not sufficient to promote students’ reflection and scientific knowledge construction. Analogy is an effective strategy to guide students to integrate old and new knowledge, to think from multiple perspectives, and to construct knowledge through inferences and examples. As a result, the present study proposed an analogy-based VR learning approach with the observation-identification-analogy (OIA) strategy to guide students to engage in analogy learning while collecting and organizing information in the VR scientific inquiry activity. In order to explore the effects of this learning approach, the present study employed a quasi-experimental design and recruited two classes of seventh graders in a junior high school in northern Taiwan as the participants. One class was the experimental group adopting the analogy-based VR learning approach, while the other class was the control group adopting the conventional VR learning approach. The results showed that the experimental group had significantly better learning achievement, self-efficacy, and reflection ability than the control group.

Developing digital materials for learning purposes, or e-learning materials, is not as straightforward as it may seem. The traditional approach is multimedia instruction, the presentation of both pictures and words in an e-learning format to foster learning. However, multimedia instruction, to develop meaningful learning, needs to support the active processing of the learner who engages with those materials. The Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning (CTML) informs the development of effective multimedia e-learning materials. However, given the dearth of CTML studies directed at students of diverse and underrepresented populations, such as d/Deaf and hard-of-hearing students (DHH), it is unclear as to the extent that CTML principles may inform effective multimedia instruction for this group. We conducted a mixed methods study in which we recruited DHH students to view an asynchronous, online multimedia tutorial covering a general chemistry concept and complete a brief questionnaire that inquired about their e-learning perspectives. Students characterized their use of the tutorial’s features as broadly serving three different functions and suggested additional improvements to the tutorial. Within the context of both these self-described behaviors and feedback, findings suggest the CTML principle of segmenting may have strong applicability for the e-learning needs of this student population while the principle of redundancy likely conflicts with those needs. Additional feedback more broadly focused on the tutorial’s formatting and visuals suggests other CTML principles may be important to consider for multimedia designed for DHH students.

Computational thinking (CT) is a core skill for students in the digital age, which refers to the use of fundamental concepts of computer science to analyze and solve real-world problems. However, it is a challenging task to accurately measure the CT levels of the students. The goal of this study is to explore a new CT assessment paradigm that combines a data-driven approach with evidence-based reasoning, and to verify the reliability and validity of this paradigm through an empirical study. Specifically, we examined middle school students’ CT by adopting an Evidence-Centered Design (ECD) approach. We first developed a CT evaluation framework based on ECD which included student, task, and evidence models. We then created several simulation-based tasks to gather evidence of CT levels; with these tasks, we extracted the observable variables in ECD model from clickstream data during the students’ answer process. Finally, a Bayesian network model was used for CT level prediction. Findings suggest that students’ clickstream data provide fine-grained, time-variant information on their interactions with tasks, thus promising more objective and richer insight into the performances of students with different CT levels. This study provides a paradigm reference for future CT measurement studies and proposes ideas for using process data in teaching to promote students’ CT development.

This paper reports on a study aiming at examining whether online argumentation enhance the teacher candidates’ scientific habits of mind (SHOM). The study was carried out as a pre-experimental design including pre and post-test. Scientific Habits of Mind scale, interviews and written arguments were used as data collection tools. Google Classroom, sentence openers, prompt questions and videos were used to facilitate the online argumentation process. Five different SSIs were given as discussion and argumentation tasks for the participants who worked in online groups. The results indicated that, the SHOM scores of the teacher candidates were slightly decreased while the argumentation skills were significantly increased. In addition, there was a medium, positive correlation between the levels of scientific habits of mind and levels of argumentation skills. Participants’ perspectives also showed the contributions of virtual argumentation strategy implemented in this study. Sentence openers, prompt questions, videos and feedback were the prominent factors shaped the online argumentation process. We believe that the findings of this study would assist in future design and implementation of online tools for enhancing argumentation.

Problem-posing has been regarded as a potential method to engage students in deeper thinking; however, without sufficient supports, most students could encounter difficulties in posing quality problems. In this study, a concept mapping-based online cooperative problem-posing (CM-OCPP) approach is proposed to guide students to complete problem-posing tasks in online collaborative learning contexts. To verify the effectiveness of the proposed approach, a quasi-experiment was conducted in a natural science class at a junior high school with two classes of seventh graders. Among them, one class with 29 students was assigned as the experimental group conducting the CM-OCPP approach; the other class with 29 students was the control group conducting the conventional online cooperative problem-posing (C-OCPP) approach. The research findings showed that the CM-OCPP group had better learning achievement, problem-solving skills, and problem-posing quality in terms of topic relevance and depth of questions than the C-OCPP group. The interactive pattern analysis results further showed that, with the guidance of the CM-OCPP approach, the students engaged more in knowledge sharing, discussion, knowledge co-construction, and diverse thinking.

In science education, the abstraction and complexity of scientific concepts are usually stumbling blocks that prevent students from learning science. Recently, augmented reality (AR) has offered transformative potential to support scientific concept learning by visualizing scientific phenomena and enhancing students' experiences. However, the lack of appropriate pedagogical scaffolds might not ensure effective learning in the AR learning environment (ARLE). In this study, we developed an AR-based learning tool (PeachBlossom) to support students' scientific concept learning and integrated the concept map strategy into AR learning activities. We conducted a quasi-experiment to examine the educational effectiveness of the concept map strategy on students' mental models and cognitive load in an ARLE. Eighty-five seventh graders (aged 12–14) from Central China were assigned into two groups (AR and AR with a concept map [ARCM]). The results showed that when considering students' prior mental models, the positive effect of the concept map strategy was found only in students with low and medium levels of prior mental models. In addition, the concept map strategy reduced students' mental effort but did not significantly affect students' mental load. This study emphasises the importance of considering students' prior mental models when implementing the concept map strategy in ARLEs.

Conversational agents have been designed to improve instruction quality and support student learning. In addition to their instructional use, they can be incorporated into assessment—conversation-based assessment (CBA). This study primarily introduces a CBA with selected-response and constructed-response tests as a formative assessment tool for higher education students, while also reporting student attitudes. CBA was designed using Rasa and deployed to Google Chat for students in two sections of an undergraduate-level course to use. Results show that CBA with both formats produces high standard performance measures and confidence scores for each student response. Most students reported positive attitudes toward CBA via the survey. Overall, accurate dialogue moves within CBA underscore its effectiveness in measuring higher education students’ knowledge and skill, while positive student attitudes toward CBA indicate the promise of conversational agents to enhance student assessment experiences by providing a more interactive assessment environment.

In the context of process-oriented writing instruction, the significance of engaging students in draft revision is widely acknowledged (McGarrell and Verbeem, ELT Journal 61:228–236, 2007). Nevertheless, L2 learners often exhibit limited motivation for writing, leading to inadequate revision efforts. This quasi-experimental study investigates the use and efficacy of technology-enhanced peer feedback workshops (PFWs) in comparison to traditional teacher oral feedback (TOF) in promoting student motivation for draft revision and revision quality. Over a 10-week academic English course, 18 EFL business freshmen received TOF for 3 writing tasks while they participated in PFWs facilitated by PeerMark for another 3 writing tasks in the first and second halves of the term respectively. Analysis of survey responses, interviews, peer feedback, students’ written works, and the teacher’s field notes reveals that PeerMark-based PFWs were well-received by students and had a positive impact on their motivation for draft revision and revision quality. Implications for pedagogical practices are discussed.

This paper explores the potential of new, technology enriched teaching simulations (Simulations) to support learning. Using the principles of evidence-centered design (ECD; Mislevy et al., Measurement: Interdisciplinary Research and Perspectives. 1:3–62, 2003), we provide a roadmap for the design of: (a) simulation-based assessments (SBAs) and (b) instruction-focused Simulations, and argue that the ECD framework can foster coherence between an instructional simulation and the larger educational efforts it is designed to support. This approach also helps ensure that Simulations target intended cognitions that might not otherwise be developed. Using teacher preparation as an example, we discuss how Simulations can be used to create focused approximations of practice opportunities that are tightly controlled and that target difficult to capture aspects of teaching, including responsiveness to student ideas through teacher noticing. Using our own work developing Simulations to foster teacher noticing skills, the paper outlines the stages of an ECD approach to Simulation design and also the role of various stakeholders in development processes. We conclude by highlighting the affordances of incorporating Simulations into educational efforts, both as instructional and assessment tools, and identify areas in need of further study.

Gesture recognition can create an interactive environment in which to train children to control their thoughts, gestures, and body postures when performing learning activities. This study integrated gesture recognition and a memory strategy to develop a physical learning activity for preschoolers to improve their English learning performance, motor skills (namely, stability and movement), and executive functions (namely, working memory). The study selected 67 kindergarten level 3 preschoolers. They were divided into either the experimental group (gesture recognition with memory strategy) or the control group (traditional activity learning with memory strategy). The experiment was conducted over a period of six stages for a total duration of 360 min. The results showed that the participants who used gesture recognition with the memory strategy demonstrated better learning performance, motor skills, and executive functions, and the statistics showed a significant deviation between the two approaches. With gesture recognition, the instructor enhanced the learning process of the children’s physical motions and cognitive knowledge by strengthening the connection between life experiences and specific tasks, and the children’s executive functions also improved. The research contribution of this study is a pedagogy manuscript for teachers who want to create a physical activity with gesture technology for preschoolers.

The current monument guide teaching has proven to have many challenges, as the learning effectiveness may be reduced by external interference in the real guide activities, and online approaches may cause the problem of insufficient interaction. This study integrated role-playing and multi-dimensional scaffolding theories to develop a remote scaffolding-based educational game that involved a role-playing mechanism, in which guides and learners play the roles of historical characters and participate in historical events in an authentic game environment, with the aim of improving the problems of existing monument teaching and of enhancing the motivation to visit. The results showed that this learning model has advantages in flow and motivation compared to the traditional online guide. It was demonstrated that the multi-dimensional scaffolding formed by the guides, the game environment, and the peers could keep the learners quite engaged in the game, while the dynamic scaffolding of the guides could also be effective and even keep the learners interested in the monument after the activity.

Self-regulated learning (SRL) is an approach to learning which aims to improve learners' learning outcomes. In the SRL cycle, the quality of students' reflections is a critical factor in SRL performance that can improve learning outcomes. The feedback provided by teachers often has a significant impact on the quality of students' reflections. However, research has shown that teachers are often confronted with many students and so are unable to give individual feedback. To address this problem, this study proposed chatbot-assisted SRL, which provides personal and immediate feedback during the SRL process to promote the quality of students' reflection. This study applied this approach in the "Website Design" unit of an Introduction to Multimedia course. Two classes of second-year university students were the participants. One class with 23 students was the experimental group using the chatbot-assisted SRL mode, whereas the other class with 24 students was the control group using the conventional SRL mode. The experiment results showed that the proposed approach improved the students' performance, motivation, SRL, reflection, and meta-cognition tendency more than the conventional SRL approach.

Engagement in digital reading assessments has been underexplored in spite of its importance for assessment and instructional design. In this study, we used different engagement indicators in two ePIRLS tasks (n1 = 14,324, n2 = 15,026) to identify engagement profiles, and interpreted them using the three-dimensional model of engagement: affective, behavioral, and cognitive. In both tasks, we found profiles representing high, moderate, and low levels of engagement, as well as profiles with high behavioral-cognitive engagement but low affective engagement, high cognitive engagement, and high behavioral but low cognitive engagement. The students who took both tasks (n3 = 2658) were likely to be grouped into similar profiles in both of them, demonstrating the profiles’ stability and generalizability. These profiles significantly predicted students’ performance, self-efficacy, and reading engagement outside of school (all p < .001), with especially strong effects on performance (η12 = .22, η22 = .17). While most groups’ performance was as expected, high behavioral-cognitive and low affective engagement students had the lowest reading engagement outside of school. This study reveals the unique reading engagement patterns that readers exhibit in digital contexts, contributing to the literature on reading engagement. From the perspective of large-scale assessments, the study demonstrates the complex relationship between different forms of engagement and performance, suggesting that response time alone might not be enough to identify disengaged participants.