A Comparison of Assessment Book Authors’ and Educators’ Perspectives on Ethics Issues in Assessment: A Review Study

Assessment book authors’ perspectives on ethical assessment practices are not necessarily consistent with those of educators. This study’s purpose was to explore similarities and differences between the two perspectives. Researchers presented scenarios of classroom assessment practices to gain insights into educators’ perspectives on ethical issues. Fourteen scenarios that were common across three empirical research articles were selected. Educators had similar opinions on a scenario if 70% or more respondents selected “ethical” or “unethical” on one item. Twenty-five assessment-related books were reviewed to present the authors’ views on the ethicality of classroom assessment practices. The results showed that assessment book authors and educators held similar views on five of the 14 scenarios. Findings might inform the professional development of in-service teachers and the training of pre-service teachers. The results can inform assessment book authors in the future development to address ethics issues in assessment and practitioners in educational technology to consider ethical issues in the process of designing assessment tasks.

Student Evaluations of Instructor Email Response Speed as Chronemic Expectancy Violations

Instructional communication researchers have begun exploring the effects of instructor email response speed on student evaluations of their instructor. To date, researchers have concluded that faster response times result in more favorable evaluations. To extend this line of research, this experiment explores student evaluations of instructor response speed through the lens of expectancy violations theory, arguing that eliciting positive evaluations is not just about responding quickly, but rather, responding more quickly than students expect. Results indicated that positive violations of instructor email response speed are evaluated more favorably than negative chronemic violations in terms of instructor credibility and relational closeness. These findings contribute practical implications for instructors inundated with email exchanges with students and offer theoretical nuance to the study of chronemics in instructor-student email communication.

Examining Trajectories of Elementary Students’ Computational Thinking Development Through Collaborative Problem-Solving Process in a STEM-Integrated Robotics Program

Developing K-12 students’ computational thinking (CT) skills is essential. Building on the existing literature that has emphasized programming skill development, this study expands the focus to examine students’ use of underlying CT cognitive skills during collaborative problem-solving processes. A case study approach was employed to examine video data of 5th graders engaging in an integrated-STEM robotics curriculum. The findings reveal that students applied algorithmic thinking most frequently and prediction the least. They recorded most debugging behaviors initially in the problem-solving process, but after accumulating more experiences their uses of other CT skills, including algorithmic thinking, pattern recognition, and prediction, increased. Implications for developing young learners’ CT skills to solve real-world problems are discussed.

Multiple-role perspective on assessing teaching ability: reframing TVET teachers’ competency in the information age

In the information age, technology has changed people's lives as well as working and learning styles. The teaching competency of vocational teachers’ is facing new challenges. Based on the modernization of vocational education, "Internet + Vocational Education", and "reform of teachers, teaching materials and teaching methods", the study intends to enrich the research on vocational teachers’ teaching competency theoretically by establishing the framework, criteria and assessing instrument. In practice, the study aims to provide benchmarks and tools for the diagnosis and assessment of vocational teachers’ teaching competency. Furthermore, the study wishes to provide guidelines for vocational teachers' professional development and improve the quality of the ICT teaching practice.

Parents’ Voices: Virtual Classroom Bridging Homeschooling to Public Schools

This research examined to what extent homeschooling parents believed that virtual classrooms have bridged the home and public-schooling systems via a case study. Data were drawn from an online survey as well as Skype and personal interviews with ten participants who were parents of home-schooled children with an understanding of the virtual learning process. Participants reported both benefits and challenges of virtual homeschooling from parents’ perspectives. Discussion and implications to educational practitioners are included.

Analysis of the cores of these Improvements of Online Teaching System and Model－Based on the Evaluation and Feedback on the Online Teaching Model and Teaching Platform

In recent years, MOOC, SPOC and other online teaching modes have attracted widespread attention. Online teaching platforms such as Tencent Classroom and MOOC of Chinese universities have emerged in an endless stream. During the 2020 outbreak of COVID-19, schools at all levels actively engaged in online teaching. The problems and challenges faced in the course of this teaching process will push the research hotspots of modern educational technology to construct the online teaching model that meets the needs of colleges and universities in the context of "Internet + Education". This study collected the evaluation and feedback of college students from different universities and different majors on online teaching mode and teaching platform, conducted a quantitative study of SPSS samples, and analyzed the influence of learners' and teachers' participation on online teaching effect. Results show that: there is a positive correlation between learners' attitude towards online teaching and the effect of online teaching, and between learners' participation and the effect of online teaching. There is also a positive correlation between teacher’s participation and effect of online teaching. There is no clear correlation between learners' use of equipment and online teaching effectiveness. Through the interview, learners reported low self-evaluation in online learning, and there are some problems in the teaching process, such as lack of teaching experience, poor platform interaction ability, and low supervision ability of managers. This study argues that in the development of online teaching, learners' and platform users' sense of experience and teachers' participation should be further improved and perfected.

Stimulus of Specialization on Postgraduate Students’ Application of Mobile Technologies for Learning

Most students could be adopting the mobile technologies available but may not be for learning purposes. This study investigated the postgraduate students’ application of mobile technologies for learning and examined the differences in the application of mobile technologies by postgraduate students based on their area of specialization. The study was a quantitative research design. The population comprised all postgraduates’ students in Nigeria out of which 750 of them were purposively sampled across eleven universities based on accessibility. The data for the study was gathered using a Researchers-developed questionnaire. Statistical form of Mean was used to answer the research questions while Kruskal Wallis H-Test was used to test the hypothesis. A coefficient reliability of 0.87 was obtained on the instrument. The finding among others were that, postgraduate students in the information and communication specialization apply mobile technologies for their learning and research more than other postgraduate students’ counterparts; and there was significant difference among postgraduate student’ utilization of mobile technologies for learning and research purposes based on specialization. The study concluded that, the thoughtful utilization of mobile technologies by postgraduates could be of enormous benefit towards their learning within and outside the classroom settings and also facilitate their research knowledge, training and skills. It was however recommended among others that most of the course lectures by postgraduate students as well as their research should be embedded in mobile technologies.

Methods to Analyze Likert-Type Data in Educational Technology Research

Likert-type items are commonly used in education and related fields to measure attitudes and opinions. Yet there is no consensus on how to analyze data collected from these items. In this paper, we first synthesized literature on strategies for analyzing Likert-type data and provided computing tools for these strategies. Secondly, to examine the use and analysis of Likert-type data in the field of educational technology, we reviewed 424 articles that were published in the journal Educational Technology Research and Development between 2016 and 2020. Our review showed that about 50% of the articles reported Likert-type data. A total of 139 articles used Likert-type data as a dependent variable, among which 86% employed parametric methods to analyze the data. In addition, less than 1% of the 139 articles used an ordered probit/ logit model, transformation, or strategy for rescaling Likert-type data to interval data to perform statistical analysis. Finally, to empower educational technology researchers to handle Likert-type data effectively, we concluded the paper with our suggestions and insight regarding alternative strategies and methods.

Exploring Chinese students’ learning experience in CIC MOOC 2.0– A study with Chinese online communities

This research explores Chinese students’ learning experience in the Creativity, Innovation, and Change (CIC) Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) 2.0 from the cultural, language, and communication perspectives. The CIC MOOC was the first course offered in both English and Chinese in Coursera. Data in this study were collected via online survey, interviews, QQ chat logs, and discussion threads in Guokr platform. Content analysis was performed to identify key themes from the collected data. Findings reveal that differences exist in Eastern and Western societies regarding power distance, individualism versus collectivism, and masculinity versus femininity. Communication patterns also vary in QQ and Guokr online communities. In addition, Chinese students reported that translation helped them understand the course topics better, and the online interest group motivated them to participate in course activities and complete the course. The conclusions shed light on the design of future MOOCs, advocating for translating course content into different languages and building small online communities to meet learners’ needs and improve their learning experiences.

Online Learning in Vocational Education of China during COVID-19: Achievements, Challenges, and Future Developments

COVID-19 has challenged education systems globally. Traditional teaching and learning activities of more than 1,300 vocational colleges and nearly 11,000 vocational high schools in China have had to be paused and transformed into an online mode. A study had been conducted to trace the unprecedented change which would provide reflections on policies and practical experience worthy of reference for the follow-up development of online vocational education in China and other countries in the world. The study used two methods to collect data: (1) delivering questionnaires to 767 schools, 17009 teachers, 270,732 students, and (2) gathering 110 institute cases from 21 provinces and 170 curriculum cases from 14 provinces. The result showed that vocational institutions coped with the pandemic’s outbreak through online learning and achieved the overall goal of “Not Going to School but Classes still Ongoing.” Further, vocational institutions have faced problems and challenges of online learning in practice training and internship, organization, and technical environment. The development of vocational education in the information era requires thinking about the system-driven reform path and online learning strategy and putting it into action.