ABSTRACT
Content-heavy lectures and traditional summative assessment practices have long been employed in higher education classrooms. Opposed to this approach, two instructors teaching an introductory content-rich course to undergraduate students in a teacher education program experimented with existing educational theories to prioritize experiential, reflective learning grounded in formative assessment practice. Through experimentation, collaboration, and reflection, an emerging course design framework was established. The innovative teaching solution framework combined backward design, Kolb's model for experiential learning, and imaginative education (IE) theory to create a community of learners where enduring understanding is the outcome. When COVID-19 forced classes to remote learning environments, the true fidelity of the framework emerged through instructor self-assessment and student feedback. This emergent Imaginative Course Design Framework allows educators to structure their courses as engaging, meaningful, and lasting learning experiences that support students in depth of understanding. The authors share concrete examples of performance tasks from their education course to demonstrate how the emergent Imaginative Course Design Framework connects to theory and creates the conditions for rich, inspired learning. © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
To stop the spread of the COVID-19 virus, educational institutions abruptly switched from in-person to online, remote mode of teaching without giving educators the necessary tools and training. In this paper, we focus on the Software Engineering Education & Training (SEET) courses at the university levels and address questions like: What tools and techniques did they adapt to handle the modality transition challenges? What lessons they learned and what would they do differently the next time? What are the students' perspective on these, etc.? We interviewed 16 SEET educators from different countries around the world;followed by surveys of more than 300 educator and student participants. Our empirical study found some common themes of challenges, as well as suggestions on tools and techniques to overcome them. © 2022 IEEE Computer Society. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
The 4th Industrial Revolution is causing profound and accelerated changes to work, bringing new opportunities and challenges as new technologies impact practically all occupations. The transformations in the labor market were accelerated even more due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the scenario where old careers cease to exist, and new occupations are being created, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) need to be prepared to educate professionals capable of getting and keeping qualified jobs. To do so, HEIs need tools to evaluate their undergraduate courses in the face of the changing demands of the labor market. We propose a novel approach to employability from the perspective of HEIs, creating a framework- called Higher Education Courses Employability (HECE). The framework can help HEI decision-makers to make decisions based on employability data. The framework allows for mitigating the reported gap between the theory taught in HEIs and the labor market demands. We evaluated the HECE framework as useful and relevant by HEI decision-makers and Employability experts from Brazil, a continental country with great social differences between and within its regions, and where the unemployment and underemployment rates demonstrate the mismatch between the labor market demands and the undergraduate course's curricula. The applicability of HECE in different Brazillian regions provides evidence that we can apply the framework in most contexts. This study provides tools to facilitate the implementation of the framework by HEIs. The evaluators reported the innovative nature of the approach of this research. © 2013 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
CONTEXT Video usage in higher education has increased markedly over many years, but ongoing disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic have accelerated this trend. Consequently, a growing number of educators are grappling with how to best approach video production. Although a range of factors such as video quality, video length, and the presenters' style are known to influence student engagement with videos, more research is needed to understand the extent to which these factors impact, particularly in higher education. This can support educators producing video content that prioritises those aspects which are most critical. PURPOSE This research seeks to understand what factors are most influential on students' decisions to engage versus disengage with video resources in the higher education context. This aims to develop a series of recommendations for educators to focus on when producing videos for inclusion in higher engineering education courses. APPROACH This research considers two mechanical engineering courses taught at different Australian universities. These courses used videos as the primary delivery mode during Semester 2 (July to November) of 2020. Approximately half of each course explicitly applied production recommendations of a highly influential study. Students were surveyed at the end of the semester about their engagement preferences. OUTCOMES The quality of the presenter's explanations and their enthusiasm in delivery were the most important factors influencing engagement, while seeing the presenter was least important. Video length and quality were more likely to cause disengagement when poor, than drive engagement when done well. CONCLUSIONS Characteristics of the presenter's delivery (that is the quality of their explanations and their enthusiasm) are more influential in producing engaging video content than technological choices relating to the video capture and length. Therefore, educators should seek to prioritise the quality of their explanations and their stage presence, before working to improve the video/audio capture quality and reducing video durations. Including the face of the instructor in educational videos has little impact on students' usage decisions. Copyright © J. Khanna and A. Bigham, 2021.
ABSTRACT
The pandemic of COVID-19 forced all countries to establish quarantine protocols. Educational institutions around the world have had to adapt to some form of remote learning. In the study presented here, all students at a higher education institution specializing in business courses in São Paulo/Brazil were moved to the synchronous remote teaching modality. This movement generated several impacts on the assessment process, particularly on final averages and passed rates and attendance. These impacts were uneven depending on the type of content of each subject. This study used databases of grades and absences, as well as interviews with professors and course coordinators. This article seeks to integrate with other national studies on the impact of the pandemic on education, bringing quantitative data, taking as an example a Brazilian higher education institution. © 2021 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
The COVID-19 pandemic broke out in December 2019 and began to spread globally in 2020. The final analysis of 124, 564 valid observations pointed out that before and after the COVID-19, online education courses had an abso-lute increase in the total purchase amount or total purchase amount. Because of the control of COVID-19 in Taiwan, there is no significant difference between the validity and the time point of the purchase amount and the use of the course. The geographic location is defined by the digital development level of the administrative area, and the higher the digital development of the administrative area, the better the amount of courses purchased and the use of courses, compared with other types of courses, the life category has more purchase amount and course use time;the education level of course users has a considerable degree of positive influence on the purchase amount and course using. © 2021, Tamkang University. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
In the COVID-19 era, hybrid classes have become the norm. Even though online classes have been there for a while, a proper design of the engineering education courses to motivate the students to learn the material, keeping students' attention span and excitement level intact has been a challenge for the instructors. To overcome this challenge and design a generic course structure that can be used for engineering as well as science courses, this research has produced the design of the course structure in the most convenient form. The present study of the hybrid course design structure will help in increasing the student attention span as well as help in motivating the students and keeping their excitement about the course content at high levels throughout the semester. To achieve this feat for a variety of engineering courses, the course structure was designed and implemented at Texas A&M University, and implemented and evaluated at Saint Ambrose University in form of student surveys. At Texas A&M University, courses of Thermodynamics, Fluid Mechanics and Strength of Materials were used to design the hybrid course structure. The course structure uses class lecture broken down into lecture, group problem-solving activity including breakout rooms on Zoom, a relevant video for a “hook” to show the concept with practical application and a one-minute paper in the end to answer any questions. At Saint Ambrose University, the Electronics course is designed as a flipped classroom hybrid course broken into modules. Students have pre- and post-class material to engage in where they earn engagement or participation credits. The setup is very flexible, responsive to students, and easily switches to an online format if required. Before class, students begin engaging with the material by posting notes from reading, watching video lectures covering class content normally provided during class time, and reading quizzes. During class, students actively engage with the material through various activities such as worksheets and practice problems. After class, students can assess themselves with practice problems. Electronics also incorporates hybrid labs that aid students' understanding of the course material. All this prepares students for instructor assessment through quizzes, exams, or other activities like a topic presentation. Both of these course structure designs are compatible with Face-To-Face instruction as well. These case studies will give the required insight into the teaching effectiveness of the designed structure used during the semester. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2021
ABSTRACT
Over the years, the number of students who enroll in face-to-face learning typically outnumber those who enroll in online learning, and that most students prefer face-to-face instruction is not new or unknown. Then came the pandemic, and for the first time in our lifetime, the pandemic has posed a unique situation where more students are enrolled in online learning than face-to-face learning. Having the largest population of students to ever enroll in an online learning environment is an opportunity to revisit and learn about students' learning preferences, which could lead educators to find new opportunities to enhance learning in both face-to-face and online environments. This research reports on issues related to the rapid implementation of online or otherwise remote learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The research addressed creative solutions to moving coursework to a virtual or online learning format. This research follows a qualitative research method. The research examined students' perceptions of online course delivery for two construction-related courses, methods and supervision, and cost estimating, which are traditionally face-to-face and were shifted online due to COVID-19. The instructor, course delivery formats were consistent between the two courses, but the course content for both courses was different. The research findings show that the students perceived the online course delivery format as effective, yet most students prefer a face-to-face learning environment. Also, the research findings show that an effective online course must provide for and support an interactive and engaging learning environment. The research recommends the use of a synchronous online method, with regular class meetings, provision for breakout groups, and most of all, that educators make themselves available to quickly help students resolve any course-related issues students may run into online. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2021
ABSTRACT
A flexible learning defensive security course was developed using the HyFlex delivery model which was initially developed at San Francisco State University. This paper discusses how a limited-flexibility model was transformed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and how the course was changed from having a single path to offering a HyFlex Options Menu where students select between several options for each area of the class. The overall outline and instructional design of the course are presented. The implementation of each of the HyFlex options is presented and the logistics of the overall course are reviewed. The challenges that were faced during course development and while offering the course, and how these were responded to, are discussed. Challenges with the rapid implementation of the HyFlex-based delivery model amidst the pandemic are reviewed. Additionally, differences between the San Francisco State University HyFlex model and the HyFlex-based model used in the course are discussed. Finally, plans for future offerings of this course are reviewed. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2021
ABSTRACT
Public health emergencies provide an opportunity for the application of information technology in life education courses in universities. Information technologies such as 5G technology, cloud technology, virtual reality technology and big data technology have all been applied to the process of life education in universities. Information technology helps to maintain the life safety of teachers and students in colleges and universities, and plays a positive role in improving the quality of life education in colleges and universities. Information technology can protect the physical and mental safety of college students, meet the needs of different college students for life education, and help them to form a correct value of life. © 2021 ACM.