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The objectives of the present study are to investigate both the history of the collection of scientific instruments from the Maraslean Teaching Center (MTC) and the potential for the collection's use in STEM education programs. Although MTC went by a number of different names during its long history, its institutional goal remained the same: training the Greek state's primary school teachers-to-be. To so do, it was necessary to assemble a collection of scientific instruments. The first objective of the paper is to present in detail the gradual enlargement of the collection from the last quarter of the 19th century through to the 1930s, along with the way the instruments were used in science lessons and the central role MTC played in relation to other regional teaching schools in Greece in terms of the distribution, administration, repair and maintenance of the equipment. The second objective is to investigate the role the historical scientific instruments can play not only in the history of science, but also in contemporary science teaching. The findings reveal that the history of laboratory physics education in MTC along with the corresponding collection of the historical scientific instruments can be a fertile ground for implementing STEM education programs. Finally, the findings imply the broader integration of STEM education and history of science in order to promote cultural and procedural aspects of science in student teachers and beyond. Such integration gives rise to broader research on introducing STEM education to cultural embedded environments, such as museums and historically important schools and laboratories, such as MTC.

Higher education informatization (HEI) is an interdisciplinary field that examines the use and integration of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in higher education. This paper provides a bibliometric and visual analysis of the research trends, patterns, and topics in this field. Using the Web of Science database, the authors selected and analyzed 199 SCI and SSCI papers on HEI published from 2000 to 2023 by VOSviewer and CiteSpace software. The results indicate that the publication volume of HEI research has grown significantly in recent years. The author network shows the collaboration and contribution of different researchers and institutions, while the journal network reveals the multidisciplinary nature and scope of the field. The keyword network and the burst keyword analysis identify the main research themes and the emerging hot topics in HEI. The co-citation network of sources illustrates the theoretical and methodological foundations and influences of the field. The paper concludes with some implications and suggestions for future HEI research.

Lately, there has been a rising trend towards integrating sustainability issues and implementing sustainable development (SD) goals into higher education, especially in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) field. This paper presents the challenges of the introduction of education for sustainability in higher education institutions, analyzes how these challenges could be addressed, and records the essential principles that can guide the incorporation of SD education in higher education. At the same time, this paper advocates the concept of sustainability integration into undergraduate ICT curricula and provides indications for developing ICT curricula that integrate sustainability issues. This paper also examines the contribution of education to the environmental awareness of the students at a Greek University while it captures their perceptions regarding the necessity for the inclusion of sustainability in the ICT curricula. The results are based on the processing of two questionnaires (pre-test and post-test data) distributed during two lectures regarding sustainability at a two-week interval. The findings of the study prove that the direct effect of the educational intervention on the intention of the students to engage in sustainability is significant. Furthermore, it is observed that students show a positive attitude towards integrating sustainability issues into their ICT education. In addition, although students had a deficient level of understanding of the concept of SD goals before the intervention, they showed a significant increment in their previous knowledge regarding sustainability and the environmental impact of ICT studies. The research also reveals that the students are not satisfied with the engagement of the university towards sustainability, and they propose various awareness activities to support their engagement with sustainability issues in an inclusive manner.

In this paper, we draw on our recent research to inspect again some of the theoretical perspectives we have been using to analyze data and to characterize teaching-learning in university settings. We focus particularly, within a sociocultural perspective on Activity Theory and the construct the "Teaching Triad," seeking to embed the Triad within an Activity Theory perspective. To achieve this, we relate the Teaching Triad with aspects of the sociocultural setting both in and beyond direct interactions in face-to-face teaching. While this is mainly a theoretical paper, an example is taken from observations of teaching in university lectures in a Greek university to show how these theoretical perspectives have provided insights to the institutional and cultural complexities involved and in what ways the Triad construct has evolved.

In this paper we explore the difficulties undergraduates from Greek Higher Educational Institutions faced during the transition to online learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. By analyzing qualitative data from an online survey (N = 2093), we were able to identify the barriers undergraduates encountered during this transition and make inferences about the quality of the way online learning was implemented. The most frequently reported barriers include problems that undergraduates perceived as being caused by their lecturers, internet connection issues during an online lecture and the perceived limited social interactions that synchronous environments can afford. The paper argues that the way online learning was implemented by Greek Higher Educational Institutions did not result a meaningful learning experience for undergraduates. Our results are relevant to universities that are either forced in implementing emergency online protocols or wish to support their undergraduates' learning experience.

Relying upon the heuristic presuppositions of behavioral economics, this study seeks to offer an expanded analysis of the public mission mandate of the Greek higher education sector. The examination outlines and parses qualitative evidence issued from the Greek Ministry of Education, and in particular from the hitherto untranslated document "A Strategy for Higher Education in Greece: 2016-2020," in conjunction with a growing body of scholarship on the challenges of cultivating public trust in the Greek social landscape. The discussion negotiates the position of the Greek higher education system as a system of sustainable social prosperity and argues that its operational conditions of financial scarcity may entail broader and inadvertent ramifications, namely, the depletion of cognitive resources and the propagation of narrow mental frames in the pursuit of a public mission.

The study aims to understand the foremost challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study adopts the PRISMA approach to screening the selection of journal articles and review papers according to the research aims and the inclusion criteria. The journal articles and review papers were extracted and stored in Microsoft Excel and Google Scholar, Academic. Microsoft, Semantic Scholar, Elsevier, and Emerald Insight databases searched relevant documents using formulated keywords. A statistical technique was applied using the M.S. Excel analysis tool (PivotTable and an independent t-Test) to analyze data and determine the differences between teachers and students. The review revealed the evidence that the majority of the studies were primarily focused on the individual developing countries and results from other developing countries were not considered. In addition, the foremost challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic were inadequate skills and training, inadequate Internet/Infrastructure, lack of supporting resources and lack of online student engagement and feedback. Finally, the independent t-test reveals there is no statistically significant difference in challenges in the transition to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. Both teachers and students encounter similar challenges. The systematic review raised concerns that higher learning needs to effectively implement long term strategies and support teachers and students in getting into online teaching and learning.

The rich repertoire of online practices adopted by educators during the COVID-19 pandemic opened up new perspectives for educational research to consider e-learning post-pandemic. Focusing on teacher education, it is worth considering the practices adopted to inform the development of future curricula that cultivate teaching competencies for e-learning. This paper examines microteaching, a well-established practice realised in teacher education as a learning-to-teach experience. As was the case with other teacher education practices, the forced online transition heavily compromised the vividness of microteaching -a technique inherently connected to face-to-face interaction-. On the other hand, this online relocation can be an opportunity to capitalise on online microteaching as a fulfilling e-learning experience in teacher education. The paper has two parts. In the first part, we conceptualise the potential of microteaching while applying Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL). The second part reports our experience relocating online a mature technology-enhanced microteaching practice (successfully implemented in face-to-face settings for seven years) due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Our research design utilises two implementations of microteaching practice. One was conducted in a typical face-to-face context pre-pandemic, and another was conducted in an online context during a lockdown imposed by the pandemic. On a first level, collecting qualitative data from both contexts allowed us to observe common TEL-related challenges. On a second level, we focused on identifying challenges distinct at the online context to infer and highlight the implications of the online relocation. These implications relate to (i) the organisational changes, as experienced from the instructor's perspective, (ii) the technologies adopted for applying TEL, and (iii) the challenges that pre-service teachers (PSTs) face in the online environment. Our findings extend the previous research scope on face-to-face microteaching practice. New challenges of relocating technology-enhanced microteaching online include technical difficulties in handling technologies and reduced participation in whole-class discussions. However, challenges that remain relatively unaffected concerning the typical face-to-face practice are (i) the PSTs immersion in the roleplaying character of microteaching, (ii) the misconceptions on the principles and methods of teaching techniques roleplayed, (iii) the adoption of digital tools for applying TEL, (iv) the selection of suitable digital tools, and (v) the burden of time limitation. In conclusion, we argue that these insights reveal an unexplored potential for technology-enhanced microteaching in an online context. We discuss how the implications of shifting microteaching practise online may model future microteaching implementations in teacher education post-pandemic. We support that online microteaching, apart from providing an alternative method when circumstances impose it, should be integrated within the typical teacher education curriculum to cultivate teaching competencies for e-learning.

The paper studies the establishment of work experience programs in the context of the Greek Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and connects it with the attempts to include Work-Based Learning (WBL) in the education system on a large scale. Emerging challenges caused by two significant recent changes in the Greek Higher Education landscape set the aim of this study. The integration of Technological Education Institutions in Higher Education Institutions and a significant financial change initiated by the new law which transfers the cost of compensation for traineeships to host institutions and not to Operational Programs. The paper presents the current state of the art in the Greek Higher Education and provides a detailed analysis of the existing barriers. The particular study acquires special interest in light of the intensification of the efforts made all over the world aiming to improve the organization and implementation of such interventions. Work experience programs offered by HEIs are required to be better adjusted to the special educational and labor market characteristics of each country and to become more effective. In Greece, the educational and the labor market policy framework recognizes the significant contribution of WBL in general and of traineeships in particular to the development of the appropriate professional knowledge and competences by higher education students. At the same time, traineeships can operate as a communication channel between educational institutions, businesses and social partners, which facilitates their multifaceted information exchanges. Considering, however, the operational autonomy that has been granted to HEIs in Greece, each University develops its own strategy as regards the connection between higher education studies and the labor market. The research presented in the paper constitutes a quantitative analysis of all the types of traineeships implemented by the Greek HEIs with special reference to certain axes, the optional or mandatory character of WBL, the awarded ECTS, similarities of WBL within the same scientific field in different HEIs, the possibility to undergo a WBL placement abroad.

This paper examines the quality evaluations of the Greek Universities highlighting those which offer a full-fledged study program of primary education. There are eight principles-criteria according to which each university is evaluated. For each principle, scores may range from 1 (noncompliance with the principle) to 4 (fully compliance). I present and compare results of the Greek university evaluations completed by the Hellenic Quality Assurance and Accreditation Agency (HQA). Surprisingly, no university has been graded as non-compliant in any of the eight principles-criteria. These evaluations are performed by an alleged "external" and "independent" committee. For all practical purposes, they are, nevertheless, based on subjective and biased opinions of academics affiliated with international universities with links to Greece and its universities. Independent and evidence-based evaluations paint a different picture. Universities which get perfect scores in the quality evaluation processes perform badly in the pertinent international ranking systems. As a case study, their primary education departments have lower research performance with high variability between faculty members and departments. Given that one criterion of evaluating quality is research, then not all Greek universities can be evaluated as highly performing research institutions, either in absolute or relevant terms. This criterion of quality is not satisfied by the primary education departments of Greek universities. According to this evidence, using the HQA as an agency to assess and accredit quality is useless. It should be abolished. A new system should be based on objective criteria such as independent teaching evaluations and research performance. These do not require any committee to evaluate performance and can be constructed on evidence-based policy. The latter relies solely on rigorously established objective facts.

This paper aims to investigate how digital tools, such as blogs, could be used by drama teachers, already qualified on a Drama teaching postgraduate study course, in teaching Theatre/Drama Education in schools in Greece, and to record the ways in which they could interact through blogging with their students and similarly ways in which their students could interact between themselves. In order to attain this, a small-scale case study was planned and developed, with an interdisciplinary approach. Drama teachers and their students were asked to build and develop their blogs concerning drama and theatre education and then use them in Theatre/Drama lessons. After applying this with their students for some time, drama teachers were asked to express their personal views and perceptions. Their responses showed in general a positive attitude towards the integration and use of blogs in teaching Theatre/Drama courses in schools, because they appear to increase the interactivity between teachers and their students and to provide them both with opportunities to further develop their dramatic and digital skills either within or outside a school environment.

Long-term energy supply constitutes a pressing global issue. As a renewable energy resource, bioenergy can play a significant role in energy sustainability. The present study aimed to investigate the attitudes and perceptions of bioenergy amongst 412 Greek preservice primary teachers utilising a specific tool, the IBPAMS. Results confirmed the factorial validity and reliability of the Greek version of the IBPAMS. It also demonstrated that the energy and bioenergy-related knowledge of preservice teachers is moderate and poor respectively, while critical perceptions are held over the sustainability of forest-based bioenergy production. Overall preservice teacher attitudes toward bioenergy are positive. Statistical analyses showed that gender influenced the responses of the motivational and critical aspects of the IBPAMS-GR. The paper's findings have important implications for teacher preparation programs.

Although concepts such as research without borders have become more commonplace in recent decades, few studies have investigated the capabilities that global researchers require to cross both cultural and disciplinary borders. This paper explores global capabilities along with strategies and spaces that may facilitate academic researchers' acquisition and development of global research competence. The study's dataset comprises responses of 26 participants across 15 countries -- all of whom are members of a specific comparative education society -- who contributed their views via e-questionnaire. Findings indicate that research capacity building is a dynamic process and global competence calls for complex skills and conscious attitudes. Commitment to expand scientific curiosity beyond one's own culture and academic discipline appears to be a main criterion in achieving global competence. Results of this study are not meant to be prescriptive but rather exploratory and informative for a broad group of academic stakeholders.

Peer tutoring has been implemented for two academic years (2017-18 and 2018-19) to a course and the internship of a postgraduate program of the Department of Education Sciences in Early Childhood of the Democritus University of Thrace. Until now fourteen students (eight students and six tutors) have been involved to the method. The purpose of this qualitative study is to research the students' difficulties that were faced with the peer tutoring method and the difficulties of the tutors in applying it, as well as the ways in which they were dealt with. Therefore, this research helps to highlight the importance of this method for the academic development of undergraduate and postgraduate students of the particular University Department and helps to collect data that could support the further development of the method itself in the Department. [Paper presented at the ERPA International Congresses on Education (April 10-12, 2020).]

Purpose: There is a widely held belief that sustainable development (SD) policies are essential for universities to successfully engage in matters related to sustainability, and are an indicator of the extent to which they are active in this field. This paper aims to examine the evidence which currently exists to support this assumption. It surveys a sample of universities in Brazil, Germany, Greece, Portugal, South Africa and the UK and the USA to ascertain the extent to which universities that are active in the field of sustainable development have formal policies on sustainable development, and whether such policies are a pre-condition for successful sustainability efforts. Design/methodology/approach: The study involved 35 universities in seven countries (five universities respectively). A mixed-methods approach has been used, ranging from document analysis, website analysis, questionnaires and interviewing. Findings: Although only 60 per cent of the sampled universities had a policy that specifically addressed SD, this cannot be regarded as an indicator that the remaining 40 per cent are not engaged with substantial actions that address SD. Indeed, all of the universities in the sample, regardless of the existence of a SD formal policy, demonstrated engagement with environmental sustainability policies or procedures in some form or another. This research has been limited by the availability and ability to procure information from the sampled universities. Despite this, it is one of the largest research efforts of this kind ever performed. Research limitations/implications: This research has been limited by the availability and ability to procure information from the sampled universities. Practical implications: The findings provide some valuable insights into the connections between SD policies on the one hand and the practice of sustainable development in higher education institutions on the other. Social implications: Universities with SD policies can contribute to models of economic growth consistent with sustainable development. Originality/value: The study is the one of the largest research efforts of this kind ever performed.

This paper aims at highlighting and interpreting current empirical facets of the Greek educational pathogeny through a sociological approach. Especially, the paper tries to investigate the relationship between education and employment in modern Greece based on the annual statistical report of KANEP/GSEE, choosing both selected facets and sociologically interpreted issues such as public and private expenditure, trends on specialties, outcomes of initial training teacher's profile etc. According to this data, the main political challenge is based on both the decrease of public expenditure and the maintenance of significantly high levels of household expenditure. Additionally, current trends, such as «brain drain» or migration of highly educated people, prove that Greek public universities' learning outcomes remain competitive and effective through the framework of a global labour market, notwithstanding the harsh critique blaming them for «statism» and mismatching with the labour needs.

The smooth transition of young people to the labor market and their competency in successfully planning and developing their careers constitute key aims of all modern education systems. The implementation of work placements plays an important role in the realization of these aims by enhancing the communication between the education providers and the world of work, and by contributing to the development of professionally oriented competences by young learners. The paper focuses on traineeships, a particular type of work placement, which is implemented by post-secondary education institutions in Greece. A traineeship includes a variety of training processes with clear objectives and predetermined assessment strategies, which help trainees to gain professional skills and experience through an experiential process. Its ability to exercise a strong influence on the professional prospects of young people led many education institutions to integrate traineeship opportunities in their study program either as a compulsory component or as a non-mandatory option. The paper analyses the traineeship component of the study programs of three post-secondary education institutions in Greece, i.e. Institutes of Vocational Training (IVTs), Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and Technological Educational Institutes (TEIs). More analytically, the paper investigates the legislative provisions concerning the organization and implementation of student traineeships, and records the evolution of the particular learning option over the years. In addition, it attempts to identify indications of interaction between post-secondary education institutions as regards the organization and the particular features of student traineeship schemes, which may imply the development of mutual learning. The paper concludes by articulating some remarks regarding the implementation of traineeships in Greek post-secondary institutions and the improvement of their organizational and operational characteristics.

Geographical Information Systems (GISs) in architecture were initially limited to regional and urban development applications. Over recent years its potential has been recognized and its use has evolved to address urban planning and architectural heritage management subjects. Nevertheless, evidence shows that its use in architecture teaching is scarce and uneven. Directive 2007/2/EC, establishing the infrastructure for spatial information in the European Community (EU), is, in this way, an opportunity to develop a greater knowledge and application of GIS in the framework of higher education. In architecture, this can be achieved by problem solving based on real case scenarios, which can benefit from GIS-based techniques and analysis capabilities. In this paper, the authors aim to present a review of the use of GIS in teaching and research in architecture to assess its level in different European programmes. Experiences from three European universities (University of Seville, Spain, University of Beira Interior, Portugal, and Technical University of Crete, Greece), which are among the few in their respective countries that promote the inclusion of GIS in architectural education, particularly in the fields of urban and regional planning and architectural heritage, are compared and framed within the European scenario. The paper concludes with a reflection on the three universities' practice compared to the leading European architecture programmes listed in the main international university rankings. Main trends of future evolution on the use of GIS in architecture teaching are also presented.

This study aims to identify the literacy skills of individuals whose highest level of education was in the field 'teacher training and educational sciences'. The study sample comprised 10,618 individuals in the field of teacher training and educational sciences, selected from 31 countries (participating in the International Adult Skills Assessment Programme during the 2014-2015 survey) using a multi-stage sampling method. The study employed multi-level latent class analysis and three-step analysis in order to determine both the number of multi-level latent classes of educators' literacy scores as well as the selected independent variables' success in predicting those latent classes. The analysis revealed that educators in Germany constituted the group with the highest literacy skills while educators from Singapore comprised the group with the lowest literacy skills. [This study was presented at the 9th International Congress of Educational Research. Ordu University, Ordu, Turkey.]

This work analyses students' failure in the 2019 Nationwide Chemistry Examination in Greece, which concerns secondary education graduates, competing for admission to higher education Greek institutions. The distinction of thinking skills into higher and lower order (HOTS and LOTS) is used as a theoretical tool for this analysis. The examination included several questions that contained HOTS elements that had been unusual in previous examinations. This led to a decrease in overall student performance but better discrimination between outstanding and good students. Based on two samples of examination papers, corresponding to very similar subsets of the student population, the 2018 and 2019 examinations are compared, and the individual 2019 questions are evaluated. It was found that section B of the 2019 examination paper (which included contexts unfamiliar to the students, and for which, a large effect size between 2018 and 2019 was calculated) may have caused the large drop. An important link is established between the 2019 low performance and the HOTS and LOTS features of the questions, and the role or non-role of algorithmic calculations is examined. In addition, the critical opinions of chemistry teachers are provided, with a consensus emerging in favour of connecting chemistry with everyday life.

This paper reports a study of prospective teachers' views about Europe, and European and national identity, in Greece and Portugal. The paper analyses written responses to a closed multiple-choice questionnaire provided by 33 Greek and 35 Portuguese prospective teachers following courses in Ioannina and Braga universities in early 2018. First, students were asked to answer 15 closed questions related to their perceptions of national, European and other identities. More specifically they were asked to choose among different associations of Europe and different levels of how their country is integrated into Europe. Also, they were asked to choose their preferred 'identification with particular identities' (Villaverde Cabral and Machado Pais, 1998) and to articulate their notions of citizenship by commenting on different criteria for the naturalization of immigrants. Finally, they were asked to predict the future of the European Union by answering an open question. Data analysis focused on the 2018 data and on comparisons with existing data sets, collected in Greece and Portugal since 1994, relating to perceptions of national and European identity and to notions of citizenship. The authors expected to find change over time in data on attitudes in the two countries, reflecting the impacts of the recent economic crisis in both Portugal and Greece and the refugee crisis, particularly in Greece. Portuguese participants were found to manifest a more positive perspective on Portuguese-European integration than had been the case in earlier data sets, while at the same time wishing to preserve some specific aspects of national identity. The Greek students were found generally to be consistent with their pro-European viewpoints, but at the same time there seems to have been an increasing distrust of the European Union after the experience of the 2010-18 economic crisis -- indications of which were apparent in some earlier findings.

The digital trails that students leave behind on e-learning environments have attracted considerable attention in the past decade. Typically, some of these traces involve the production of different kinds of texts. While students routinely produce a bulk of texts in online learning settings, the potential of such linguistic features has not been systematically explored. This paper introduces a novel approach that involves using student-generated texts for predicting performance after viewing short video lectures. Forty-two undergraduates viewed six video lectures and were asked to write short summaries for each one. Five combinations of features that were extracted from these summaries were used to train eight machine learning classifiers. The findings indicated that the raw text feature set achieved higher average classification accuracy in two video lectures, while the combined feature set whose dimensionality had been reduced resulted in higher classification accuracy in two other video lectures. The findings also indicated that the Gradient Boost, AdaBoost and Random Forest classifiers achieved high average performance in half of the video lectures. The study findings suggest that student-produced texts are a very promising source of features for predicting student performance when learning from short video lectures.

In this paper, we present parts of an online qualitative research project which lasted a whole semester about the understanding of real numbers by sixty first-year Greek mathematics undergraduate students during the COVID-19 pandemic. We focus on the distinction between rational and irrational numbers and their location on the number line using straightedge and compass. The results, came of questionnaires, focused interviews and tasks, disclosed some gaps regarding real numbers that the students had from school and revealed confusion between irrational numbers and their decimal approximation. The results also led us to group students' conceptions of rational and irrational numbers into five categories related to the number and pattern of decimal digits. Teaching practices and perspectives as well as the, negative, impact of the pandemic on teaching and learning mathematics are discussed.

This paper investigates the viewpoints and perspectives of 179 undergraduate students engaged in a co-creation project regarding their anticipated progress, exploring, simultaneously, the affecting factors. The students attended the physics course in the Department of Industrial Design and Production Engineering at the University of West Attica, Greece. The investigation is implemented through a questionnaire that appraises the students' co-creation expectations in association with collected demographic data via twenty-two close-ended questions (Q1-Q22). Several statistical data sets are presented, including descriptive and correlation statistics and principal component and exploratory factor analyses. The majority of the replies are provided by male participants in their first year of study, with an average age of between 18 and 19. The correlation coefficient between the questions ranges from -0.04 to 0.73, with the maximum occurring between the questions Q19 and Q20. Factor analysis justified by KMO (0.862) and Bartlett's sphericity (1749.843, p= 0.000) tests indicates five principal components within the following factors determining the undergraduate co-creation activities: responsible behaviour, feedback, helping, tolerance, and personal interaction. The above findings may contribute to the implementation of students' co-creation as they are valuable tools for the design and pre-requisites for a successful implementation.

Design Thinking (DT) is not merely a well-known design methodology but also an entire mindset towards solving complex societal problems in an innovative way. Its popularity in diverse disciplines beyond design, is due to its relation with the development of key 21st-century skills, such as creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication. Teaching the DT mindset has always required methods different from the traditional, one-way, mainly teacher-led approaches in which students play a more passive role in the learning process. Such creative methods include constructivist teaching practices, such as learning-by-doing and learning-by-making. Game modding, which is defined as the modification of existing games, is also seen as a constructivist teaching approach since in this way students learn by designing a game. The experience is argued to increase the engagement and interaction of players with the game, and combine the roles of player and designer. However, using game modding to teach the DT mindset remains poorly researched. This paper discusses the outcomes of a pilot study developed in the scope of the in-progress Erasmus+ KA2 project 'T-CREPE' (Textile Engineering for Co-Creation Paradigms in Education). This study investigates the influence of game modding on students' adoption of the DT mindset through the use of an online learning platform that enables a game modding experience. This platform includes games that students can play, modify, and/or design their own in the process of developing a project. Students (n = 240) and teachers (n = 9) from three higher education institutions in Belgium and Greece participated in this study. The quantitative and qualitative data collected has provided information on their experiences of game modding while cultivating a DT mindset. The findings of the study indicate that game modding enables students to practise critical questioning, constructionism and co-creation, which are core elements of the DT mindset.

The present generation of young people who nowadays attend higher education curricula are accustomed to receiving information and knowledge through audiovisual material. Creating a digital story can assist students to learn more on the subject they study as well as to help them overcome obstacles that hinder the presentation of their gained knowledge. The aim of this paper was to examine the use of audiovisual tools in the educational procedure of sport journalism higher education courses. Thirty-eight students in the School of Journalism at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki were asked to present a team sport in a video form. Following the general instructions from the teachers they were able to use any kind of equipment and software they chose to create the audiovisual production. Upon the completion of the projects and based on an embedded mixed research design they were asked to answer a short questionnaire and afterwards to participate in two focus group discussions. The results revealed that the employment of technological tools to create, present, and furthermore express themselves was warmly accepted and the participants stated that it provided a vivid educational environment, which besides enhancing the process of teaching, contributed to the acquisition of skills and their right utilization.

Nowadays, the improvement of digital learning with Artificial Intelligence has attracted a lot of research, as it provides solutions for individualized education styles which are independent of place and time. This is particularly the case for computer science, as a tutoring domain, which is rapidly growing and changing and as such, learners need frequent update courses. In this paper, we present a thorough evaluation of a fuzzy-based intelligent tutoring system (ITS), that teaches computer programming. The evaluation concerns multiple aspects of the ITS. The evaluation criteria are: (i) context, (ii) effectiveness, (iii) efficiency, (iv) accuracy, (v) usability and satisfaction, and (vi) engagement and motivation. In the evaluation process students of an undergraduate program in Informatics of the University of Piraeus in Greece participated. The evaluation method that was used included questionnaires, analysis of log files and experiments. Also, t-tests were conducted to certify the validity of the evaluation results. Indeed, the evaluation results are very positive and show that the incorporated fuzzy mechanism to the presented ITS enhances the system with Artificial Intelligence and through this, it increases the learners' satisfaction and new knowledge learning and mastering, improves the recommendation accuracy of the system, the efficacy of interactions, and contributes positively to the learners' engagement in the learning process.

This paper presents the findings of a comparative study carried out in 2018, which aimed to explore and compare teacher educators' perceptions of initial teacher education (ITE) programmes in Jamaica, Greece and Nigeria. This study endeavoured to add intercultural perspectives to the study of ITE and to underlie the idea that ITE has become increasingly bound up in the processes of neo-liberalism and globalisation. A comparative research design was used to investigate the similarities and differences in ITE programmes available in these three countries. Specifically, this was a quantitative survey study, and the participants (n = 135) were teacher educators who were purposefully selected. Based on what the findings revealed, it is argued that, while features of national culture, tradition and institutional politics have a significant role to play in the detail of the approaches taken in ITE programmes, there is nevertheless evidence of significant convergence between the three countries in terms of the type, modality and duration of ITE, as well as the current issues facing ITE programmes and the areas that need improvement. This, it is suggested, reflects trends associated with neo-liberal 'globalisation'.

The aim of this study was to determine the examination of the researches about the use of technology by fine arts teachers. The study was conducted according to the content and citation analysis model. In this context, Web of Science (WOS) Core Collection indexes were included. In the document scanning in the WOS environment, the keywords 'Fine arts', 'Teachers' and 'Technology' were searched. In total, 169 documents were examined and analysed one by one. They were analysed according to year, document type, WOS content category, country, source title, organisation and citation, authors, publication language and categories. As a result of this research, the first study was conducted in 2004, while the most studies were conducted in 2016. It was concluded that the published studies had the most Proceedings papers as the document type. The area where the studies of fine arts teachers on the use of technology are mostly carried out is Education Educational Research, according to the Web of Science content category. The most researched title in the distribution according to the Source Title field is 'International Multidisciplinary Scientific Conferences on Social Sciences and Arts.' The university with the most studies is Kazan Federal University. The 19 authors who conducted the studies have a large number of studies in this field. It was concluded that other authors had only one study in the field. Again, when we look at the distribution of the countries and documents according to the language of writing, the country with the most studies is China and the language of the documents is English. The area continues to evolve.

Mathematics is a constituent of the education of Engineering students. This paper reports on a study investigating the attitudes and perceptions towards mathematics of first year Engineering students. The sample consisted of 145 freshmen (80 men and 65 women) from one Greek university, derived from three Engineering departments (Mechanical, Electrical and Civil). A two-part questionnaire with satisfactory reliability in each part was completed by the participants. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics, correlations and exploratory factor analysis. The data analysis led to nine factors which shape and mediate students' mathematical attitudes and perceptions. These factors are: Anxiety, Confidence, Learning goals, Theory of intelligence, Persistence, Approach, Learning strategies, Prior experience and General issues. Demographic variables (sex, age, learning disability and choice of study) are found to have an effect on students' attitudes and perceptions. The findings of this study need to be viewed in relation to the redesign of the Engineering Mathematics curriculum to teach effectively all students and raise their mathematical confidence and motivation.

The introduction of the computer into the educational process is a fact. The educational use of new technologies creates a new, more appealing and enjoyable learning environment. The introduction of new technologies into school differentiates the role of the professor by giving him/her a guiding character in a process of experiential approach to knowledge. In the present paper a proposal for the teaching of the chemistry module "Simple Colloids" is presented, with the contribution of video recorded educational experiments. Complete experiments on the subject of "Simple Colloids" and their properties are presented, aiming at familiarizing students with this theory

Students, as digital natives, are fascinated by social media as they use it in their everyday lives. However, not only opportunities but also challenges for education have arisen with the new bottom-up approach of using social media for educational purposes. In order to investigate different aspects of social media adoption and use in higher educational learning environments, a longitudinal study starting in 2010 was conducted. This paper summarizes and analyzes our findings based on several studies with quantitative and qualitative data collected and presented in 16 different articles throughout the last decade. Based on our results, we reached the conclusion that when there is proper infrastructure, appropriate strategies are applied, security and privacy are of high priority and teachers become accustomed to using modern technologies, social media can be used as an effective educational tool which improves the overall educational process and learning outcomes. Specifically, by using social media in a creative and student-centered manner in educational settings, students' engagement, motivation, interactivity, soft skills, communication and collaboration are promoted and improved. Finally, social media can be used as a means to help create virtual communities in which students will be able to exchange ideas, opinions and knowledge in both academic and extracurricular environments, mature and flourish. The aim of this ongoing longitudinal study is to enhance teachers' comprehension of social media and its use as an educational tool to create interactive learning environments for students of various disciplines in geographically and culturally distributed environments.

The paper describes the design and implementation of a virtual lab for on-line lab training on optical communications, part of the 'Optical Communications' course offered at the Dept. of Electrical & Electronic Engineering Educators, School of Pedagogical & Technological Education (ASPETE), Athens, Greece. The virtual lab is based on the OptiSystem 16 software tool while the on-line component was implemented by using the MS-Teams tool of MS-Office. The lab includes a synchronous and an asynchronous part. Since the virtual lab was offered for the first time, students' response was evaluated on the basis of the submitted lab reports to allow for proper corrective actions during the subsequent academic year. Results were encouraging in that 79% of the students achieved a passing grade, however, 60% of students either failed or attained a low passing grade, which leaves room for improvement. Further analysis revealed a lack of a proper background in mathematics, physics and essential signal quantities. Future actions will include an investigation of the optimum combination between the physical and the simulation lab, development of short notes and multiple-choice questions, a closer association between the lab work and relevant small tasks/projects and a more systematic feedback process.

Online courses have become an increasingly attractive format for delivering teacher training. However, the low retention rates are a critical and still unsolved issue. This paper presents the results of a randomized controlled trial aimed at testing the impact of a personalized support model on teachers' retention in online training courses. The support consisted of a package of nine messages triggered by teachers' characteristics and their specific (in)actions on the course platform. The study involved 3,777 lower-secondary education professional and student teachers from nine European Union Member States and Turkey, who were invited to participate in four new online courses in school year 2018/2019. The experimental estimates show that the offered support increased course completion by 10 percentage points among professional teachers in EU Member States, while it had no effects among student teachers nor in Turkey. Implications for online teacher training providers--such as the importance of reaching out to participants with poor online training experience and who do not start the courses in time--are discussed.