Individual Differences in Perceptions of Social Presence: Exploring the Role of Personality in Online Distance Learning

Social presence is a central concept relating to interpersonal aspects in online distance learning. However, the conditions and determinants of its emergence are not yet fully understood. As a construct rooted in social psychology, the potential of individual differences predicting perceptions of social presence has been largely neglected, thus, constituting a gap in our understanding. In a sample of 201 online distance education students, the merits of a trait-level view of social presence were investigated. To this end, personality was assessed using the Big Five personality inventory, exploring both a dimensional and a typological approach. Results suggest that specific personality typologies may be more prone to perceptions of social presence, thus calling for an extension of our theoretical modeling of the construct.

STEAM Practices to Explore Ancient Architectures Using Augmented Reality and 3D Printing with GeoGebra

In this study, we develop mathematical educational practices for students to explore ancient buildings using GeoGebra, Augmented Reality and 3D printing. It is an interdisciplinary approach, intertwining history, culture, mathematics, and engineering. For example, the 3D modelling of Cheomseongdae in Korea and the Temple of Dendera in Egypt can enable students to practice a multimodal set of traditional and innovative learning approaches. Students might use their mathematical knowledge to reflect on architectural and cultural history in a modeling task.

Interactive Mind Map: A Model for Pedagogical Resource

This paper presents an extension of the mind map pedagogical tool, a conception in which the mind map becomes interactive and dynamic. We took advantage of all the mind map’s learning potential and benefits, and we add new ones when we propose the interactive mind map tool. We develop a model in which the teacher would have an authoring tool for creating a mind map with its elements, relationships, and interactive content related to each map element. The proposed tool is rich media, as it incorporates different types of media, allowing it to reach students with different learning profiles and needs. Furthermore, the technological aspect brings the school closer to the student’s reality.

Designing Combinations of Physical and Digital Manipulatives to Develop Students’ Visualisation

This paper focuses on two main objectives. The first, to describe and characterise instrumental approach involving artefact and instrument differentiation, instrumental genesis and orchestration along with the instrument-mediated activity model. The second, to present and discuss one of five cube cross-section lessons designed and carried out in our mixed methods research project. Altogether, a paper workbook, dynamic applets and 3D prints form a five-set toolkit, each corresponding to one of the five designed lessons. The main research idea was to explore how digital and physical manipulatives could be integrated into solid geometry lessons to support the development of students’ visualisation. In this paper, Lesson 2 will be described in detail, which, like the others, has been particularly influenced by the instrumental approach. Its individual attributes will be depicted according to the personally adapted activity model.

Pedagogy, Didactics, or Subject Matter? Exploring Pre-service Teachers’ Interest Profiles

Interest has been considered an important determinant of teacher quality. However, research into teacher interest, and more specifically, pre-service teachers’ interest is limited. Hence, the current study tackled the current gaps in pre-service teachers’ interest and aimed to explore pre-service teachers’ interest profiles based on the multidimensional framework of teacher interest. A total of 225 pre-service teachers, enrolled in various initial teacher education programs of two universities in Germany, participated voluntarily in the study. The results revealed two distinct pre-service teachers’ profiles based on the three teacher interest factors. Interestingly, the two profiles did not significantly differ in their subject interest levels, but did vary in their didactic and educational interest. In addition, the findings also revealed gender and school track differences in pre-service teachers’ interests and profiles. Consequences for future research and teacher education are discussed in detail.

Educational Robotics: Building and Applying an App-controlled Car to Study Newton’s Laws

The use of technology – including mobile phones – in classrooms is a growing and promising trend, but it still needs research on ways to integrate it in classrooms and on its impacts. We propose a low cost educational product where students assemble an Arduino car remotely controlled through a mobile app and use it to study Newton’s third law, of action-reaction forces. The teacher used an inquiry-based approach to prompt students to test towing capacity of the car. Students connected the car to different weights and used a structure of pulleys to investigate the behaviour of fixed and movable pulleys, as well as the forces involved. The goal of the activity is to motivate students to study physics and to facilitate learning. This article describes a pilot implementation of the educational product in a secondary school of Brazil. We used a qualitative approach to evaluate the implementation. Students answered a survey before and after the activities. They also delivered a report and answered questions about the physics involved. The teacher recorded his observations. The product and the strategy showed great potential: these students were more motivated and engaged in the classes and were able to learn the main concepts involved.

Individual Creativity and Career Choices of Pre-teens in the Context of a Math-Art Learning Event

A sample of 392 students (aged 12-13 years, M± SD: 12. 52% girls) completed a learning module integrating informal hands-on mathematics and arts activity (extending STEM to STEAM). Within a 140 minute workshop period participants worked with commercially available ‘4Dframe’ Math and STEAM learning toolkits to design and create original, personal and individual geometrical structures. Two science pedagogues acted as tutors supervising the process and intervened only when needed. A pre-/post-test design monitored individual creativity, relative autonomy, and career choice preference. Path analysis elaborated the role of creativity (measured with two subscales: act and flow), and it showed that post-act, post-flow as well as relative autonomy are valuable predictors of career choices. Similarly, pre-creativity scores were shown to significantly predict the related post-scores: act and flow. As a consequence, our STEAM module was shown to trigger both the creativity level and the career choice preferences. Conclusions for appropriate educational settings to foster STEAM environments are discussed.

When is the Best Time to Learn? – Evidence from an Introductory Statistics Course

We analyze learning data of an e-assessment platform for an introductory mathematical statistics course, more specifically the time of the day when students learn and the time they spend with exercises. We propose statistical models to predict students’ success and to describe their behavior with a special focus on the following aspects. First, we find that learning during daytime and not at nighttime is a relevant variable for predicting success in final exams. Second, we observe that good and very good students tend to learn in the afternoon, while some students who failed our course were more likely to study at night but not successfully so. Third, we discuss the average time spent on exercises. Regarding this, students who participated in an exam spent more time doing exercises than students who dropped the course before.

Instructor Presence in a Virtual Classroom

Synchronous online learning platforms have been used actively during the COVID-19 period. They have opened possibilities for online learning and interaction, but have also posed new challenges for instructors. This article provides insights into one teacher’s interactions and examines how the instructor presence is expressed in the teachers’ activities in virtual classrooms in higher education. Instructor presence is investigated using the social and teaching presence indicators of the community of inquiry (CoI) framework. Twelve hours of interactions across six online classes were recorded, transcribed, and analysed using content analysis. The findings suggest that indicators of teaching presence dominate interactions in a virtual classroom, but it often involves co-occurrences of indicators of social presence. The typical features of instructor presence included addressing students by name, encouraging them, expressing gratitude for and acknowledging their contributions, describing actions on the dashboard, clarifying and summarising content, and responding to technical concerns. These findings may suggest holistic and pedagogical ways to understand and develop synchronous online interactions and teaching and learning practices. They also have implications for the skills instructors need in virtual classrooms.

Mathematics Teachers’ TPACK Development Based on an Online Course with Geogebra

This paper aims to discuss the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) development by mathematics teachers (preservice and inservice) that participated in an online course for developing educational apps and puzzles with GeoGebra. Theoretical foundations are based on the authors Punya Mishra, Matthew J. Koehler et al, regarding TPACK framework and Margaret Niess et al regarding the development of TPACK by mathematics teachers. The research method is qualitative, and to analyze the thoughts and ideas discussed by the participants, we used the Discursive Textual Analysis. In this regard, three representative categories were used to build the following metatexts: instructional approaches, classroom environment management and teacher’s professional development. Through the Discursive Textual Analysis, it was possible to understand the participants concerns in creating different instructional approaches using Information and Communication Technologies, once they realized that dealing with digital natives requires pedagogical innovations, supported by new technologies, and new ways to configure and manage classroom environments permeated by digital resources.