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Muddiest point and minute paper have been popular techniques to obtain feedback from students. However, focusing on the muddiest point too often can be discouraging for both students and instructors; in minute paper, students may often have off-topic comments. Here a cross and modified technique, the 'traffic light' card is introduced, to overcome the drawbacks in muddiest point and minute paper. About 2 minutes before the end of lecture, students "traffic light" the given topics on a notecard, in which their understanding is high (green), partial (yellow), or low (red). The results are used by the instructors to give appropriate review in the next lecture and help students gain better understanding in the content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inequality in students' degree outcomes has been a concern for the higher education sector and the UK government for more than a decade. Since its inception in 2018, the Office for Students in England has prioritised the need for evidence of causality through requiring institutions to evaluate the effectiveness of their initiatives as set out in Access and Participation Plans. This policy development responds to several reports which identify a dearth of evidence-based interventions and scant knowledge of 'what works'. This paper traces the interplay between policy and research, focusing on the assumptions they make about causality. It concludes that unwarranted positions are taken in both spheres of practice, making progress unlikely. A conception of causality situated in extant formal theory on evidential pluralism and that draws on current practices would help us address inequality more effectively. Alternative framings of the problem of inequality in students' degree outcomes is offered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the development and randomised control trial (RCT) of a dialogic teaching intervention designed to maximise the power of classroom talk to enhance students’ engagement and learning. Building on the author’s earlier work, the intervention’s pedagogical strand instantiates dialogic teaching not as a single, circumscribed ‘method’ but as an interlocking set of permissive repertoires through which, steered by principles of procedure, teachers energise their own and their students’ talk. The repertoires are directed both to teaching’s improvement and to its larger epistemological, cultural and civic purposes. Its professional strand entailed teacher induction and training followed by a cyclic programme of planning, target-setting and review using mentoring and video/audio analysis. Supported by the UK Education Endowment Foundation it was piloted in London and trialled in three other UK cities with combined intervention/control cohorts of nearly 5000 year 5 (4th grade) students and 208 teachers. The independent evaluation calculated that after 20 weeks students in the intervention group were two months ahead of their control group peers in English, mathematics and science tests; while coded video data showed that the changes in both teacher and student talk were striking and in the direction intended. The RCT methodology affords limited explanatory purchase but insights are available from other studies. These, together with contingent questions and future possibilities, are discussed in the paper’s conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is currently much interest in the interconnections between research and teaching in Higher Education. This relationship is usually termed 'the research/teaching nexus' (RTN). However, within this wide body of literature, there has been little attempt to explore the emergent experiences of students across the entire length of their degree programme. Drawing on the results of a three-year qualitative study that followed 40 students through their whole student lifecycle, this paper explores how undergraduates in an English university experienced the RTN, how those experiences developed over time, and how these changes can be variously enabled or constrained. Situating the findings in the context of the 'post-truth' society and the uncertainty of employment futures, the paper highlights how the nexus can also often serve to exclude students as much as it includes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research-based learning in taught courses develops the skills needed to judge knowledge sources and think critically in a post-truth world. In viewing research skills as threshold concepts, the paper argues that transforming a student cannot be a one-off event. Research capacity must build over a programme and this requires coherent research skill development and assessment that is progressive (ipsative). A study of five programmes each with a different design of research 'throughline' showed that such integrated research-based learning generates three challenges. Firstly, conceptualising the research skills and progression is not easy. Secondly, the accumulation and enrichment of research skills is not readily visible to students. Finally, providing a clear support system across the programme is not straightforward. The paper concludes that these challenges need to be addressed if the potential of research-based education to enable future citizens to interrogate populist claims and reject misinformation is to be realised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we explore first-year undergraduate students’ experiences and perceptions regarding the use of exemplars, with reference to the development of student self-regulation. The study was carried out at a tertiary education institution in New Zealand where the second author was a lecturer. This author used exemplars with two classes of first-year students enrolled in a core introductory paper taught as part of the students' undergraduate business studies degree. Data were gathered through three complementary approaches: students’ responses to a short anonymous survey at the end of each of the four sessions where exemplars were used, written notes in the teacher’s Teaching journal and semi-structured interviews with student volunteers. When strategically employed as part of the teaching design, it was found that exemplars have the capacity to motivate, enhance students’ self-efficacy, promote understanding of task requirements, expand knowledge, understanding and skills in relation to the structure of academic tasks, support and advance subject knowledge, and develop evaluative and productive knowledge and expertise. We concluded the use of exemplars with these students demonstrated their potential as tools for the promotion of student self-efficacy, self-monitoring and to a lesser extent, self-regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: This study explores the English literacy practices of students in Ghana, in particular their time spent on reading, the availability of reading resources and their use in the curriculum, and the importance of reading from the perspectives of students and lecturers. Methods: Student diaries (6,364 reported hours) and interviews (12 students/ 14 lecturers) were used for data collection. Results: Students spend many hours on academic work, but little time on processing academic texts. Their low reading proficiency is maintained at university due to the following factors: little time spent on reading, the type of reading students engage in, institutional values and poor resources. Conclusion: Universal mechanisms that determine literacy practices from the more affluent Western world are prevalent in Ghana. These mechanisms, in combination with contextual factors, especially poor resources and low reading levels, make the Ghana case distinct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally competent people have the knowledge, skills, and dispositions to understand and to find lasting solutions to global issues and problems using multiples perspectives. They understand interdependence and interconnectedness of the global systems, cultures and communicate effectively with different people around the world. The purpose of this paper is to discuss how an international online learning experience enhances our awareness of different perspectives and cultural diversity, the challenges facing humanity and the world, and our role as globally competent citizens. In particular, this paper discusses the design and implementation of an international online learning experience to promote global learning between two higher education students in the United States and Mexico. The paper uses global competency as the pedagogical framework for teaching and promoting global learning within the context of global competency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the changing context of universities, organisational structures for teaching and research problematise academic roles. This paper draws on a critical realist analysis of surveys and interviews with academics from universities in England and Australia. It identifies important academic work, not captured simply in descriptions of teaching or research. It shows that many academics, who are not research high flyers nor award-winning teachers, carry out this essential work which contributes to the effective functioning of their universities. That work is referred to as academic artisanal work and the people who do it as academic artisans. Characteristics and examples of academic artisans are presented, and the nature of artisanal work is explored. Implications for higher education management and for future studies are discussed. The paper points to an urgent need to better understand the complex nature of academic work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper emanates from a case study which focussed on 15 Managerial Accounting and Financial Management (MAFM) students’enjoymentof learning MAFM in an 18-week Writing Intensive Tutorial (WIT) programme. Interactive Qualitative Analysis (IQA) was used for the research design and as a data analysis tool. Following IQA protocols participants articulate their experiences of the programme and develop emergent categories of meaning, or affinities, and the relationship between the affinities. Of the nine affinities that were confirmed as describing students’ experiences of learning in the WIT programme, this paper reports on the students’ experiences of one of these affinities,enjoyment.Participants said that they found the WIT programme enjoyable which made learning fun. MAFM tutorials were no longer perceived as dull and boring, but rather exciting and enjoyable. The awareness that higher education can be a fun learning environment impacted positively on students’ experiences of learning MAFM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia has been very successful in recruiting international students. The Australian government regularly reports students' high levels of satisfaction with their educational experiences; however, there is also evidence of some dissatisfaction with regard to social and educational experiences. This paper explores the extent to which universities are meeting the social and educational needs of international students by analysing their experiences through the two dominate rationales in international education, namely neoliberal and cosmopolitan rationales. It discusses findings from a project examining the perceptions and experiences of international students at a large metropolitan Australian university. The study was conducted in two phases: an online questionnaire, followed by focus group interviews. The findings indicate that while international students might rate their overall satisfaction as high on questionnaires, deeper analysis through focus groups highlights the lack of social integration and belongingness that international students perceive. These results challenge universities to innovate their practices in order to develop and integrate cosmopolitan experiences that not only may benefit students but also assist in sustaining the neoliberal rationale of the sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the interplay of control and trust in a cross-national and cross-cultural professional development course. It examines the differing expectations of the overseas high-ranked education officials who were the students and of the course teachers, particularly in terms of: approaches to control of content and of interpersonal interactions; the cultural contexts in which the attitudes were shaped; the effect of the participants' professional roles, particularly of their perceptions of accountability and power; the complex, continuing and yet shifting, interplays of control and trust and the ways these interplays impacted learning within the course. It proposes the concept of operational trust as a way to consider the relationship that developed. While the situation examined is situated within a particular context and reflective of the participants involved and therefore non-iterative, the discussion highlights patterns of interaction and gives rise to tentative theorisations with implications for other cross-cultural or cross-national teacher development projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The practical experience of implementing the technologies of forming engineering thinking of students of higher educational institutions is given in the paper. The formation of engineering thinking through the competence approach is possible due to the study not only of the theoretical lecture course but also the solution of practical problems with the introduction of interactive teaching methods. Studies have shown that the use of various techniques in the educational process has markedly increased the perception of the theoretical material by the students, and, importantly, the interest in a discipline and the need for acquiring, preserving, multiplying knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Patterns of participation in higher education (HE) in the UK, as elsewhere, have been marked by social inequalities for decades. UK Governments have responded with a plethora of policies and agendas aimed at addressing this broad social issue. However, little is known about how higher education institutions (HEIs) interpret and 'enact' these policies in relation to institution-specific contexts. Drawing on concepts from policy sociology this paper examines how HEIs in one nation state, Wales, enact its Government's policy on 'widening access' to higher education. Interviews with a range of 'policy actors' along with analyses of institutional 'widening access' policy documents, reveal divergences between HEIs in how this policy agenda is interpreted and delivered. These differences reflect institution-specific contexts - not least their internal politics and assumptions about the type of students they admit, but also their interests and priorities in relation to their positions within a global, marketised, HE system. The implications of this for the reproduction of university hierarchies in the UK, as well as social inequalities more generally are brought to the fore. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Foucault's thoughts were first introduced to China in the early 1980s. Initially, they were only discussed in the small circle of the Peking University Philosophy Department and did not impact the larger Chinese academic community. However, with the opening up of China to foreign thought, especially the introduction of postmodernism, Foucault's thought have gradually gained influence across several different disciplines in China, including political science, sociology, and pedagogy. Foucault's criticism of school education, his perspective on panoramic surveillance, and his opinions on disciplining society and the technology of micro-power have had a great impact on the Chinese education community. Since dissertations and theses written by graduate students have the obvious advantage of being systematic, complete, and reflective, scholars research these dissertations to try and figure out how Chinese scholars think about/use/reference Foucault's thoughts. The research method used in this paper is text analysis; quantitative and qualitative methods are used to analyze a collection of dissertations and theses. The results of this research show that the first dissertation on one of Foucault's theories in China appears in 2002. According to further quantitative analysis, the number of dissertations on Foucault's theories has not steadily increased, rather it has increased in two separate phases. According to a qualitative analysis, the research topics are diverse and wide-ranging, and there are also significant qualitative differences between the doctoral dissertations and master's theses. Foucault's thoughts have theoretical and methodological implications in terms of analyzing discipline in school education, and they serve as an indispensable resource for studying power dynamics in school life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Foreign Language (FL) section of Spanish University Entrance Examination (EFL-PAU) has had few revisions over the last twenty years. The Spanish government has substituted the old EFL-PAU University Entrance Examination by a high stakes Baccalaureate Final Evaluation. However, further changes are expected in the coming years. Among the most important ones for the Foreign Language Section is a deep and necessary revision with the inclusion of new types of tasks. To try and inform the decisions made for the new Baccalaureate Final Evaluation, this article reports on the quantitative and qualitative analyses conducted thanks to a pilot oral test carried out with 772 recorded candidate performances. Three main goals were established for this research: 1) to find out the most important variables which characterize foreign language learning in secondary school in Spain; 2) to find out if there is any correlation between the oral competence of students at the end of their non-compulsory secondary education (as obtained from the pilot study) and the marks students obtain in the University Entrance Examination (which does not include the oral skill); and 3) to find out any aspects related to EFL teaching and learning which may potentially enhance oral performance. The results of this paper provide rich information on the students' foreign language learning context, the strong correlation between the written and oral competences and the need to pay attention to three variables which foster the development of oral foreign language in secondary school classrooms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasing evidence supports the use of small group instruction to enhance student learning in undergraduate mathematics. However, effectively enacting such learning methods requires instructors to develop new skills as educators. This paper provides a practical guide for group work in undergraduate mathematics, describing key aspects of group work through the lenses of forming, norming, storming, and performing. I provide vignettes from my own teaching for reference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the role played by a student-organized research conference in the age of research-led teaching and active learning. Drawing on our experiences of organizing two departmental conferences in Geography in March 2016 and March 2017, we begin to outline how institutional support and funding for student-led “Changemakers” projects can not only introduce students to specific aspects of research (in the case of our conference, to disseminating and communicating research findings), but also encourage collaboration and mutual support outside of formal staff-student hierarchies of teaching, learning and marking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The student evaluation of teaching process is generally thought to produce reliable results. The consistency is found within class and instructor averages, while a considerable amount of inconsistency exists with individual student responses. This paper reviews these issues along with a detailed examination of common measures of reliability that are utilised with the instruments. While inter-item consistency of the evaluations has been shown to be high, the agreement between students was shown to be no better than what would be expected by chance, indicating that students do not agree on what they are being asked to evaluate. The reliability measures generated by the student evaluations of teaching are an insufficient foundation for establishing validity. Further, the pattern of reliability indicates that the instruments are generally providing information about students, not instructors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blind Drawing is an exercise based in phenomenological and experiential pedagogy that I teach to students in architecture design studios. The exercise is to draw blindfolded with charcoal and dry pastel on large sheets of paper using a guided conversation to evoke sensory experiences and abstract thought. It is a transformative exercise that changes students' perceptions of drawing, image-making, representation of concepts, and offers a performative alternative to architecture design Studio. Handdrawing, for architects, is an essential skill which is rapidly being lost to a 'perfected' digitised practice. By removing outward-looking visual connections turns the students' attention to inward perception and the imagination. These poetic drawings are embodied energy drawn out from the subconscious. This style of blind drawing is a disruption of perfectionism and establishes a physical approach for the design Studio by breaking through the fear of mark making and the intellectual self-criticality of 'getting it right'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we investigate university lecturers’ experiences of and reflections on the development of their pedagogical competency during a 9-month university pedagogical course. The effects of long-term university pedagogical training are considered through experienced pedagogical competency by analysing university lecturers’ evaluations of and reflections on their pedagogical competence areas during the course. Data was gathered from 31 participants using a self-evaluation questionnaire and reflective writings, and analysed using a mixed-methods approach. The results show that the participants experienced significant development in their pedagogical competency. However, it became evident that the concept and practice of reflection is not clear, especially in different disciplines. In addition to the number of credits of the training, the design, and the long timeframe of the pedagogical training, the context in which the training is put into practice, as well as the social aspect of reflection, need to be taken into consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Informed by Martin Buber's notions of I-It and I-Thou relationships, this paper examines the problematic and contested issues of emancipation and empowerment in schooling. Specifically, it explores what happens when teachers and students collaborate when observing lessons and commenting on teaching practice in the imagined space of the self-improving school system. Within this space, it examines the challenges and complexities of establishing I-Thou teacher- student relationships, and the potential for creative dissonance in such situations. Finally, it explores the idea that the self-improving school could become a place where teachers and students create a space for mutual dialogue about collaborative research in the classroom - in other words, a place where classroom practice is democratically 'top-down' teacher-led and 'bottom-up' student-informed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the contributions of the praxeological approach to the development of civic competences and civic education, based on an incipient and incident mechanism on pedagogical practice, shaped in higher education and developed in children's classrooms. This pedagogical strategy is highly linked to the recognition of social needs in a non-conventional way that encourages the inclusion, innovation and the development of social competences. The methodology of this investigation is to involve different sectors of society for the reconstruction of democratized and inclusion-oriented spaces, based on the reflection and discussion of a civic education thought from and for the child population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Flipped classroom is a relatively new model in education that primarily focuses on learner-centered instructions. In other words, the model allows both management and teachers to build a more active and dynamic learning environment on the campus. The current paper tries to document the implementation of the flipped classroom model in two big data courses. Here, the course contents have been curated from a couple of websites with different contents including videos and short books as well as reports. The mixed-method approach was applied while analyzing the student perceptions in demographically two different groups. It was found that students of both groups responded positively to the flipped classroom, with each focusing on their specific goals. Consequently, the first group focused on the academic achievement whereas the second group with managerial jobs focused on solving problems in their workplaces. Students of both groups, although preferred TED talks and documentaries, they were opposed to university-like videos and O'Reilly short books and reports. Meanwhile, the use of English language contents turned out to be both a challenge and an opportunity for students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The considerable impact of problem-based learning (PBL) on academic achievement of students in medical education has prompted the K-12 community to start implementing this non-traditional, student-centered, and inquiry-driven teaching approach in its classrooms. This paper examines the current reported evidence of PBL effectiveness in secondary education. To our knowledge, there has been no systematic review of the literature that evaluates the impact of PBL on student academic achievement in high school education. Based on the exhaustive review of the current literature it is not possible to claim with a high degree of confidence that PBL is indeed more effective in increasing student content knowledge. While it is evident from the results of the reviewed studies that PBL positively influences student academic achievement, there are several reasons that prevent the generalization of these findings to a wider, secondary education population. The current reported literature lacks sufficient, rigorous evidence that supports superiority of PBL over traditional methods of instruction. However, it needs to be remembered that PBL fosters not only development of content knowledge, but also a wide range of skills, such as communication and collaboration skills, decision-making, problem-solving, critical-thinking, and self-directed learning. Keeping in mind that these skills are highly valued in secondary education, the inefficiency of traditional methods to aid in development and strengthening of these particular student abilities was the main reason to start considering and adopting various instructional approaches, including PBL. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The teacher academic performance evaluation is a way of increasing the quality of teaching at the university and an important source to carry out this process is the student's criteria. The aim of this paper was to analyze the evaluation of the academic competencyof a teacher, using the student's perceptions, through a Research Methodology course that was thought as a part of the mastership in Spanish language and literature teaching taking place at Artemisa University, Cuba. To do so, a survey based on the academic competency indicators was used. The software “Coharentia" made possible to process the results of the survey. According to the student's perceptions, the teacher was evaluated as competent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the field of civil engineering evolves to address twenty-first century challenges, the demand for creative and innovative thinking rises. Engineering institutions around the nation have begun to integrate sustainability into the curriculum. Topics such as innovation and entrepreneurship are highly correlated with sustainability goals; however, many times they are viewed as market or management-driven principles. The Kern Entrepreneurship Education Network (KEEN) Program was established to transform the U.S. workforce through equipping graduate engineers with an entrepreneurial mindset. This program is based on KEEN student outcomes (KSOs), which can be incorporated into department level, as well as course level, curricula. This paper focuses on the integration of KSOs into a senior civil engineering capstone course through two course activities over two years. KEEN rubrics are used to assess student achievement of the KSOs focused on innovative thinking and productive collaboration. The assessment results indicate that there are existing strengths as well as future opportunities to enhance student performance of innovative thinking and open-ended problem solving--skills that are essential to promoting sustainable design and development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]