Digital Transformation of Education Toward Successful Internships: A Methodology Developed Over Seven Years and Tested During COVID-19

Contribution: This article provides a teaching methodology which combines project-based learning, self-regulated learning (SRL), and design projects (DPs) to improve the preparedness of students for computing science-related internships. The methodology is supported by the implementation of the educational technology that transforms the way teaching and learning is transformed to benefit on-campus and off-campus students equitably, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Background: Success in the workspace is governed by the ability of an individual to learn on-the-job and independently. Online learning has led to a shift from instructor-led learning to SRL. This requires individuals to discipline themselves, and be in control of their learning and education. Outcome: The success of internships is improved with skills learnt in class through hands-on real-world projects. Both on/off-campus students gain equitable relevant experience. The teaching methodology developed over several years combines project-based learning, SRL, and DPs. Application Design: The methodology was applied using a flipped classroom approach. The educational technology was used to enhance SRL before in-class learning. This way, in-class rote learning was replaced with hands-on projects. Exam assessments were replaced with DPs where soft skills and technical skills are applied. Findings: The effectiveness of the developed methodology is measured through quantitative and qualitative evaluation tools. The evaluation demonstrates that combining well-designed education technology for SRL, with in-class project-based learning and DPs, can improve students' chances in getting high-impact internships.

General Characteristics of the Assisted E-Learning System in Computer Sciences

Taking into consideration all the restrictions applied worldwide due to the Covid-19 pandemic in the recent couple of years, it is completely understandable why the educational system as well had to adapt and move all its activities online. Even though this kind of approach has turned out to have many advantages, there are certainly still things that could be improved and explored. The main objective of this paper is to highlight the importance and benefits of online learning tools which could assist students during their educational process, even under normal circumstances. Hence, we will analyse the characteristics of the current eLearning applications and what each one proposes for the automation of computer-assisted learning using the computer science field. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

USING ZOOM MEETING PLATFORM AS A SYNCHRONOUS ONLINE LEARNING TOOL IN EFL CLASSROOM AT INDONESIA TERTIARY LEVEL: A LITERATURE REVIEW

The outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic affects educational system around the world. Online learning is no longer an option, but a compulsory during this pandemic. This paper is to identify how far synchronous online learning in English as foreign language learning at higher education implemented. This study focuses on the use of Zoom meeting platform as technological devices that supports synchronous online learning as well as identifying the students' perception and challenges faced by both lecturers and students in Indonesia. This study applies systemic literature review (SLR) approach by collecting research articles from Google Scholar indexed database. There are twenty-seven articles published in 2020-2022 that meet the criteria which are reviewed. This paper results the voices from students related to the advantages and disadvantages during using using Zoom Meeting platform in EFL classroom as well as the challenges faced by both lecturers and students. The result of this paper can provide insight toward the use of Zoom Meeting platform as technological devices that can be adopted as synchronous teaching tool during social distancing. However, the Zoom user should consider the availability of stable internet connection and teachers' and students' readiness. © 2022 Proceedings of the 19th International Conference on Cognition and Exploratory Learning in the Digital Age, CELDA 2022. All rights reserved.

Experience Report on Using WeBWorK in Teaching Discrete Mathematics

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, most university classes were moved to online instruction. This greatly stimulated the need for online learning tools. WeBWorK is an open source online homework system, which has been used extensively in a variety of subjects. However, it has not been widely adopted by the Computer Science education community. In this paper, we discuss our experience using WeBWorK in teaching two large online sections of discrete mathematics. Emphasis is given to how we created randomized and auto-graded problems for many topics. In addition, we summarize student performance and feedback. We conclude with our reflections on using WeBWorK and propose future work for exploring its adaptive learning features. © 2023 ACM.

Digital Transformation of Education Toward Successful Internships: A Methodology Developed Over Seven Years and Tested During COVID-19

Contribution: This article provides a teaching methodology which combines project-based learning, self-regulated learning (SRL), and design projects (DPs) to improve the preparedness of students for computing science-related internships. The methodology is supported by the implementation of the educational technology that transforms the way teaching and learning is transformed to benefit on-campus and off-campus students equitably, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Background: Success in the workspace is governed by the ability of an individual to learn on-the-job and independently. Online learning has led to a shift from instructor-led learning to SRL. This requires individuals to discipline themselves, and be in control of their learning and education. Outcome: The success of internships is improved with skills learnt in class through hands-on real-world projects. Both on/off-campus students gain equitable relevant experience. The teaching methodology developed over several years combines project-based learning, SRL, and DPs. Application Design: The methodology was applied using a flipped classroom approach. The educational technology was used to enhance SRL before in-class learning. This way, in-class rote learning was replaced with hands-on projects. Exam assessments were replaced with DPs where soft skills and technical skills are applied. Findings: The effectiveness of the developed methodology is measured through quantitative and qualitative evaluation tools. The evaluation demonstrates that combining well-designed education technology for SRL, with in-class project-based learning and DPs, can improve students' chances in getting high-impact internships.

The Measurement Analysis of University Support, Online Learning Tools, and Technical Support on Online Learning Satisfaction during COVID-19 Pandemic

This study aims to understand the factors that provide student satisfaction in online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The unit of analysis of this research involved 581 student respondents who had done online learning. This study uses a quantitative approach with SEM-PLS analysis to answer the three research hypotheses. The factor studied is the relationship between University Support, Online Learning Tools, Technical Support, and Student Satisfaction. The results of the analysis state that all items are valid and reliable with the indicated values of loading factor (LF), Average Variance Extracted (AVE), composite reliability (CR), and Cronbach's alpha (CA) > 0.5. Meanwhile, the value of R2 = 0.545, which means the model is quite representative. The results of the analysis of all hypotheses showed a positive and significant impact on Student Satisfaction. These results indicate that online learning activities during the COVID-19 pandemic really need university support and online learning tools that are well available from devices that can be used by students and teachers and technical support that is ready to solve all problems. © 2022 IEEE.

How Engaged is Your Student? A Review of Online Learning Tools

The Covid-19 widespread has given a modern measurement where learning can still be carried out without understudies' assembly their teaches face-to-face. However, an issue that need special attention is student's engagement during online teaching and learning process. The objective of this review is to inspect online learning tools that have been used in various high-level institutions or even in schools. In addition, the purpose of this review is to give instructors some suggestions of online learning tools that can be applied to help students engage with their learning. The study also offers some definition term on online learning, online learning resources, platforms, and tools being applied by researchers in various fields that suits the online learning environment. © 2022 IEEE.

Online Learning During Covid-19 in a Making Centered Engineering Community

Throughout the decade, but especially over the past and a half, there has been an increase in the integration and use of online learning tools in education. Spring 2020, with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, students and professors had to quickly adapt to online learning and teaching. This study investigates the impacts that this rapid transition to online learning on the students in an undergraduate making-centered and design-focused engineering program. Focus group interviews were conducted during the pandemic with four different undergraduate cohorts in the academic program. Results demonstrate how the disruption to in-person learning impacted community, collaboration, and learning. Qualitative data analyses highlight similarities and differences in experiences across cohorts. Based on the responses, an understanding of how students adapted to this shift to online learning is revealed. This study provides themes and patterns for student adaptations and learning experiences in an undergraduate engineering program. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2022.

Assessing Student Participation and Engagement Using Discord

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of understanding the effectiveness of online learning tools, especially for the socio-cultural aspects of education. In online classes, we observed that students had low participation in online discussions with peers or instructors. Recognizing the importance of having a platform that supports digital collaboration, academic content delivery, and social interactions between students in a class, we utilized a platform popular with students, Discord, in two large undergraduate Computer Science classes at a mid-sized university. We evaluated their experiences and perceptions using a survey at the beginning and end of the quarter. Eighty-seven percent of participants who used the class Discord stated that using a digital collaboration platform like Discord to supplement classroom online interaction enhanced their sense of belonging in the class. Drawbacks were non-class relevant chatter, questions being lost in the shuffle, and academic honesty. We hope this work will assist educators to bridge the gap between the in-person and online classrooms by leveraging digital communication platforms which facilitate a space for student socialization. © 2022 IEEE.

Implementation of a Mathematics Formative Assessment Online Tool Before and During Remote Learning

ASSISTments is a free online learning tool for improving students’ mathematics achievement by providing immediate feedback and hints to students, detailed information on how students performed to teachers, and instructional suggestions for teachers to use. Researchers at the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation conducted an intrinsic, longitudinal multiple-case study of 7th-grade mathematics teachers’ implementation of ASSISTments and its impact on their instruction before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study examined teachers’ use of ASSISTments in three instructional contexts: in- person only, remote only, and both in-person and remote. Our findings indicate that teachers in all contexts changed their instructional practices for homework review and for determining whether their students had understood lessons. Teachers used the ASSISTments auto-generated reports to focus their homework reviews, based on their students’ performance, and to provide instructional interventions and/or re-teaching. They also used the instructional suggestions provided by the ASSISTments platform to plan lessons to re-teach concepts or to review prior instruction with their students. © 2022, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

TEACHING INFORMATION SYSTEMS STUDENTS TO WRITE A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW BEFORE AND DURING COVID-19

Fourth year Information Systems (IS) students are expected to write a research paper on a selected IS topic. At the University of Pretoria in South Africa, a number of challenges were faced towards reaching this goal: many students have poor research and academic writing skills;the supervision load grows significantly as student numbers increase annually;and students' final research papers are rarely publishable. Some of these problems were solved by changing the module's objective to writing a systematic literature review (SLR). This paper describes how the curriculum of the module was adjusted to reach the objective and how the transition to fully remote teaching during the pandemic was managed. Blackboard Collaborate was used for synchronous online teaching and student engagement was facilitated by online learning tools, which include Jamboard. Both students and lecturers generally experienced the changes as positive. Recorded lectures are considered valuable as it enables flexible learning, and online learning tools were successfully utilised to make lectures more interactive. © Proceedings of the 2021 AIS SIGED International Conference on Information Systems Education and Research.

Technology Acceptance Before and After Covid Pandemic

The purpose of this study is to investigate factors that influence learners’ intention towards accepting online learning tools before and after Covid pandemic in different learning environments. A total of 350 sample collected prior to Covid pandemic in Malaysia whereas 627 sample collected at post Covid pandemic in China. UTAUT model and TAM served as the frameworks whereas PLS-SEM was used for data analysis. The findings disclosed that both Performance Expectancy and Effort Expectancy have positive relationship with students’ Behavioral Intention of accepting online learning tools in the Malaysia’s study before Covid pandemic under the blended learning environment. However, the effect size (f2) of Performance Expectancy is small (f2 = 0.020), and Effort Expectancy has no effect (f2 = 0.015) in predicting Behavioral Intention in adopting online learning tools. While comparing to another similar study conducted in China after covid pandemic in the mobile learning environment, Performance Expectancy (perceived usefulness) has large effect size (f2 = 0.403), and Effort Expectancy (ease of use) has medium effect size (f2 = 0.241) on students’ adoption of online learning technologies. By comparing results of the two studies, the effect size of Performance Expectancy increased from small to large effect, while Effort Expectancy increased from no effect to medium effect. This shows that the widespread of Covid pandemic has impacted the learning approaches in education institutions likewise the perception of students towards technology acceptance. Importance-performance matrix analysis was used as a post-hoc procedure to measure the importance and performance of the exogenous constructs for both studies. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Challenges and Opportunities of Online Learning Implementation During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Lecturers’ Perspective

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the way learning is conducted in several countries. Face-to-face interaction has been prohibited to help prevent the spread of the virus even further. This situation has necessitated the transition from face-to-face to long distance learning. Lecturers' participation in using e-Learning platforms is one of the main factors that has influenced the transition. However, lecturers have faced many challenges during the transition period. Those challenges must be identified so that institutions can provide the support lecturers need. This study aims to identify the challenges and opportunities that come from online learning based on the lecturer’s perspective. A systematic literature review (SLR) is used to identify challenges and opportunities of online learning from previous studies. The findings of the current study show three major themes related to these challenges: individual, institutional, and technological. Furthermore, it finds that online learning provides opportunities to explore new ways of teaching and using technology for learning purposes, such as utilizing online learning tools for course assignments or quizzes. © 2021 IEEE

Digital platforms & online teaching-learning: Hobson’s choice in times of Covid-19

Covid 19 has forced the entire world into an abyss of vulnerability. Almost every aspect of human life has been extremely affected. Among the important ones is Education. More than 1.57 billion learners across the globe have been affected by the closure of universities and schools, as per UNESCO. This is an unprecedented and precarious situation. Education, all over the world has faced the brunt and governments are grappling with this pandemic. In this situation, the onus of responsibility is on teachers, academicians to try and provide crucial support to help continuation of the teaching-learning process. Although universities, colleges, schools have moved very quickly to online mode of education but still more effective measures have to be taken to help students with their education. There is still more to be done and can be made possible by utilizing online services, OERs (open educational resources), online media, digital media, software, etc. The online available tools can be effectively put to use to create and share learning modules with students. Many reputed world organizations have made their online platforms available so that education does not fall a victim to this pandemic. These tools are easily available on the Internet and are accessible anytime anywhere on several devices. The paper attempts to analyze the effect of Covid-19 on education and review and discuss different online platforms, which could be explored more operatively to benefit the student community in the current situation. Also, analyze various weaknesses and disadvantages of this type of teaching-learning. © 2021