Search

This study tested the influence of instructional elements within an online Open Educational Resource (OER) focused on information literacy (IL) on outcome measures of IL achievement, learner satisfaction and IL self-efficacy among undergraduate students. An online OER was designed to address the domains of access, evaluation and communication of IL guided by the notion of instructional scaffolding and self-regulated learning. Participants were randomly placed into one of six different OER conditions: (a) full version with all instructional elements, (b) lean version, (c) version without tooltip text, (d) version without embedded practice questions, (e) version without learning objectives and (f) version without summaries. There were no significant differences found across the six conditions on the dependent measures. Participants averaged 58% for IL achievement, performing slightly better in the domain of access versus evaluate and communicate. Limitations include a controlled laboratory setting where participants were not necessarily motivated to complete the study tasks at a high level of achievement. Future research can explore more ecologically valid environments where learners might be more motivated, along with more rigorous intervention and assessment construction. This paper includes implications for educators and researchers to explore the established and innovative instructional elements that are natural affordances of an online OER in IL. This paper presents innovative IL instruction that does not require instructor or learner training and evaluates its effectiveness using a sound, replicable methodological approach to isolate the effects of the individual instructional elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper outlines a creative Wikipedia-based project developed by the University of Kansas (KU) Libraries and the KU Biology Department. Inspired by the tenets of open pedagogy, the purpose of this project is to use Wikipedia as a way for students to learn about the scholarly peer review process while also producing material that can be shared and used by the world outside the classroom. The paper is divided into three sections, with the first summarizing pertinent related literature related to the paper's topic. From here, the paper describes the proposed assignment, detailing a process wherein students write new articles for the encyclopedia which are then anonymously peer reviewed by other students in the class; when articles are deemed acceptable, they are published via Wikipedia. The parallels between this project and academic peer review are emphasized throughout. The paper closes by discussing the importance of this project, arguing that it fills a known scholarly need, actively produces knowledge, furthers the aims of the open access movement, and furthers scientific outreach initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessment of higher education is a multifaceted and multidimensional concept. Therefore this paper focuses on assessment of preferences by business university students. The aim of this paper is to identify preferable course of study and benefits of business higher education in case private business university. The paper shows how students perceive and evaluate study support by modern information and communication technologies and identifies most important areas of their preferences during studies. The results are based on a quantitative survey by questionnaire data collection from all students of surveyed Business University. Descriptive statistics, correlation analyisis, analysis of differences and factor analysis was conducted to find responses from students regarding their perception of the educational process. The analysis found groups of variables with significant appearance of students’ main preferences. The results show orientation of students on benefits of university education mostly in career development (p = 0.000). Prefered curiculum of graduates most importantly contains independent work, significant position at job market and self management. In the area of study support students mostly prefer flexibility and availability of study texts and materials online using mobile applications (Cramer’s V = 0.314, p = 0.013). Other significant group of students focus on expert teachers and knowledge and online / mobile consultaions. The results may help to set up students’ support in order to address current students’ needs and expectations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of the paper is to presents the results of a focus group with students in veterinary medicine, asked about their preferred delivery methods. The research is a preliminary one in a longer series of studies dedicated to the design and implementation of a problem-based learning methodology for the students. The materials used consisted in a series of questions that were submitted for debate during a focus group organised with 12 students in veterinary medicine. The method used was the focus group. The degree of novelty of the paper is high. Results show that students in veterinary medicine have already used problem-based learning without even knowing it. The research limitations consist in the fact that the authors organised the focus group on a small sample of students. The usefulness of the paper consists in the fact that it will help other academics see better through the eyes of their students and try to meet their expectations. The originality of the paper is real: there has been no such research in Romanian higher education in veterinary medicine. The importance of the paper resides in its disclosure of facts and feelings unknown to both the authors of the paper and readers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents a narrative on the state of the question about the teaching and assessment of generic soft skills through Virtual Environments (VEs) in universities, based on consultation of scientific journals in electronic and printed format published between 2000 and 2014, as well as research projects focused on the development of generic skills through VEs. The paper summarises the theoretical and empirical contributions as a way of providing a greater insight into a line of research that began barely a decade ago. Soft skills related to student training, when combined with specific skills, enable better performance in personal, academic, social and organisational settings. This premise implies the need to consider the development of new methodologies for teaching, learning and assessment of soft skills. Results include the value of soft skills in training university students, as well as the development of innovative projects focused on the provision of teaching and assessment procedures that are feasible and effective for the achievement of soft skills assessment in VEs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to sustain or improve a position, higher education institutions have to realize that service quality is a critical condition for survival and growth in the education market. Therefore, the purpose of the research presented in this paper is to emphasize quality as a source of competitive advantage of higher education institutions, as well as to identify opportunities for improving service quality. The main objective of the research is to evaluate whether service quality determines students‟ satisfaction. The data provided by empirical research, conducted at universities in Serbia, have been subject to model that is usually used for service quality assessment and evaluation (SERVQUAL model). This model is valuable, but certainly not sufficient for creating an improvement map. Therefore, for identification of improvement priorities, in addition to SERVQUAL model, AHP method, pared t-test, ANOVA and regression analysis have been used. The results of the analysis indicate a gap between service quality that students expect and perceive. In addition, based on quantitative analysis, priorities for improvement of service quality are identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The OTIL is a new information literacy (IL) test, designed to be flexible and adjustable for use across a variety of contexts where IL is important. This paper discusses the development and face validation of OTIL and a Higher Education (HE) add-on that can be used to make the test HE specific. OTIL was developed in line with the new CILIP (2018) definition. It is comprised of a core set of general IL questions which can be combined with context-specific add-on question sets. Categories of IL form a template that can be used for additional question creation. Additionally, we have developed add-on questions for HE which do not contain in-built specificities to domain, region or institution in order to permit for IL research across different universities. The OTIL is designed for longitudinal research, with three different test versions available. The categories, general questions, and HE questions have been face validity tested with a panel of experts. The expert panel found the OTIL to be relevant and to accurately represent what is meant by IL. Feedback from the panel was used to refine and improve the test questions. The OTIL aims to be adaptable to different information contexts, in recognition of the diverse ways in which IL can be expressed. We encourage researchers in IL to use the OTIL and create add-on question sets for their different information settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of the research reported in this paper is to design and systematically assess the effectiveness of a collaborative contextaware mobile augmented reality tool (CAM-ART) in construction and civil engineering curriculum. To achieve this goal, an augmented reality (AR)-based information delivery tool, CAM-ART, was implemented in classroom-scale experiments to enhance traditional lecture- based instruction and information delivery methods. In the research reported in this paper, the contents of an ordinary textbook were enhanced using computer-generated three-dimensional (3D) objects and other virtual multimedia (e.g., sound, video, and graphs), and delivered to students through an AR application running on their smartphones or tablet computers. The sample consisted of construction and civil engineering students, who were randomly assigned to Group A (control group) and Group B (test group). The designed learning tool was tested in a collaborative and interactive environment, preperformance and postperformance data was collected, and student perception of using the AR-based tool was elicited through a feedback questionnaire. Data analysis showed that CAM-ART had a measurable and positive impact on students' learning both in short-term and long-term. Moreover, results of the feedback questionnaire indicated that students found CAM-ART to be an interesting, helpful, and motivational approach in the classroom that helped them gain more in-depth and long-lasting knowledge beyond what is normally expected from traditional lecture-based teaching methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many universities have started to measure sustainability, and many tools have been developed to assist them in this process. For universities at an early stage of sustainability implementation, choosing a tool that fits their specific context is an important step in their assessment process. The goal of this paper is to introduce an Adaptable Model for Assessing Sustainability into higher education institutions that enable the assessment of sustainability within different implementation stages and data availability scenarios. The model's design was based on previous experiences in the field of sustainability in higher education, and takes into account international declarations and other assessment models. The result is a model based on a four tiered hierarchy, with three main criteria: institutional commitment, example setting, and advancing sustainability. In order to establish the weight assigned to each tier of the proposed hierarchy, the analytic hierarchy process was applied. The results of this process showed a preference for institutional commitment and example setting/leadership criteria, with weights of 36.1% and 38.2% respectively, and less preference for the advancing sustainability criterion, with a weight of 25.7% . The resulting model enables the assessment of sustainability within different contexts while maintaining a universal methodological approach; this allows for comparison within a cluster of institutions with similar contexts. The assessment model could be used to improve other assessment tools by following the same process used to build the model, facilitating the participation of stakeholders and experts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to discuss some of the challenges and possibilities that librarians may face when engaging in faculty-library collaboration. The main objective is to present findings from two case studies of embedded librarianship at Gjøvik University College (GUC) and to compare these findings with results from a literature review. The literature review is concentrated around collaboration challenges, a possible role-expansion for librarians, team-teaching and assessment of information skills courses. Another objective is to present two pedagogical approaches that are in use at GUC; the tutor approach and the team-teaching approach. Findings from the case studies suggest that faculty staff were impressed with the librarian's knowledge and they quickly became comfortable with team-teaching and/or leaving the librarian in charge of the students. However there were concerns from both the teacher and librarian about the time-consuming nature of collaborative work. This paper contributes to the literature through a literature review, two case studies and teaching approaches that highlight factors leading to success when collaborating with faculty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports a comparison of results obtained by using different e-learning strategies for teaching a biogas topic in two courses of the chemical engineering degree at the University of Granada. Particularly, four different asynchronous e-learning activities were carefully chosen: (1) noninteractive videos and audio files; (2) reading papers and discussion; (3) virtual tour of recommended websites of entities/associations/organizations working in the biogas sector; (4) PowerPoint slides and class notes. Students evaluated their satisfaction level (assessment) and teachers gave scores for evaluation exams (scores). We discuss the results from a quantitative point of view to suggest recommendations for improving e-learning implementations in education for sustainable energy. For dependent variables, reached scores and satisfaction assessment, we find the differences between means for students in two different academic years are no significant. In addition, there are no significant differences between means depending on the type of course. Significant differences appear for scores and satisfaction assessment between different activities. Finally, we deeply analyze the relationship between score and satisfaction assessment. The results show a positive correlation between assessment of e-learning activities and the score level reached by students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the end of 2012 a short course, the Certificate of Information Literacy, was registered by the Cape Peninsula University of Technology Libraries and was first introduced in 2013. The course consisted of five modules and a summative assessment. The assessment, accessed via the Learning Management System, comprised 100 multiple-choice questions of which students received a randomly selected fifty to answer in ninety minutes. This article reports on the effectiveness and validity of the online assessment for the Certificate of Information Literacy: whether the assessment instrument accurately measures the information literacy skills of the students and whether the test can be considered valid and reliable. There are two parts to the study, but this paper focuses on the first part which is an item analysis on the assessment data of the students who completed the test in 2013. The results highlight weaknesses and problematic areas in the test. The second part of the study will focus on comparing the results students received in the test with the results of a subject-specific essay assignment to measure the level of application of their information literacy skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The assessment of knowledge and skills acquired by the student at each academic stage is crucial for every educational process. This paper proposes and tests an approach based on a structured assessment test for mathematical competencies in higher education and methods for statistical evaluation of the test. A case study is presented for the assessment of knowledge and skills for solving linear algebra and analytic geometry problems by first-year university students. The test includes three main parts—a multiple-choice test with four selectable answers, a solution of two problems with and without the use of specialized mathematical software, and a survey with four questions for each problem. The processing of data is performed mainly by the classification and regression tree (CART) method. Comparative analysis, cross-tables, and reliability statistics were also used. Regression tree models are built to assess the achievements of students and classification tree models for competency assessment on a three-categorical scale. The influence of 31 variables and groups of them on the assessment of achievements and grading of competencies is determined. Regression models show over 94% fit with data and classification ones—up to 92% correct classifications. The models can be used to predict students' grades and assess their mathematical competency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability in higher education aims to educate learners, as both citizens and future professionals , to build capacity to bring about a more sustainable future. As such, sustainability education can be seen as part of enabling work-ready graduates. Many universities, globally, have begun to embed sustainability capabilities into their degree programs. However, there is a gap in existing methods for assessing graduate application of the associated learning outcomes, post degree-completion. The Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) has been suggested and applied in the development of an assessment tool to address this limitation. The TPB considers human behaviour is influenced by a number of factors, the measurement of which allows one to understand the likelihood of a person executing a particular behaviour. This paper presents an overview and explanation of how TPB could be applied to graduate sustainability capability assessment, thereby, offering insight into how graduate learning is applied in professional settings. • TPB is a valid theoretical foundation to assess graduate sustainability attributes. • Graduate attribute assessment beyond self-assessment is achieved. • Insight into the professional application of sustainability graduate learning. • TPB has the potential to provide graduate data to inform curriculum renewal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]