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Over the last decade, policy makers have urged universities to innovate their teaching methodologies. Although educational research has shown that active methods lead to improvements in learners' performance more than traditional lectures in small classes, some factors impede active methods from spreading in large size classes. In this paper we aim at fostering these methodological innovations by showing the effectiveness of an integrated teaching methodology that employs peer learning, technology, and traditional lectures in large size classes. In the academic years 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 a quasi-experiment involved more than 600 engineering students per year attending an introductory physics course at Politecnico di Milano. These learners were assigned to two sections and their outcomes in a pre-test and a post-test were analyzed through descriptive and inferential statistics. The learning results of the experimental group were always better than the outcomes of the control group, regardless of the difficulty of the physics topics addressed. Furthermore, a very low threshold for the exposure to peer learning has been highlighted in order for it to be effective. These promising results may thus foster ongoing changes in university policy towards the renewal of the teaching methodology.

As the debate on data in the society and in education grows the attention on data-trace as 'primary material' for governance, educational quality and innovation falls under the spotlights. In this context, HEIs have been put under pressure to adopt quantitative metrics and evaluation approaches enhancing the massive collection of trace data. Nonetheless, each university overall, and the academics specifically, might respond differently to this context of innovation. The present article aims to explore data practices in two higher education institutions. Two relevant areas for the imaginaries related to data and quantification were explored: (a) evaluation of quality in teaching and learning; (b) data to support assessment. The study is based on a survey distributed to the whole university teaching staff of two institutions. Descriptive and inferential statistics comparing multivariate sample means (MANOVA) were applied to 601 responses collected. The results indicated the prevalence of institutionally consolidated data practices relative to quality teaching evaluation, with fragmentation and isolation in some emerging data practices connected to decision-making and teaching and learning. Moreover, each of the universities revealed distinct institutional profiles which could be put in connection with the organisational culture. The results are discussed in light of the potential strategies at the institutional level, particularly regarding faculty development as means to build a visible, contextualised data culture.

This paper presents an exploratory study to examine the practices of outstanding primary school teachers in their professional development for ICT integration in teaching and learning, as a means of understanding how their learning ecologies develop and function. Outstanding teachers in the context of this study are teachers who innovate pedagogically and who are influential in the community, having successfully developed their learning ecology. Using a qualitative approach, we explore the concept of learning ecologies as a driver for innovation in the professional development of teachers, using a carefully selected sample of nine outstanding teachers. Drawing from in-depth interviews, specific coding and NVIVO analysis, our results show that these teachers develop organized systems for activities, relationships and resource usage and production, which can be characterized as the components of their professional learning ecology, to continuously keep up to date. We also identified some characteristics of teachers that perform outstandingly and factors that potentially facilitate or hinder their learning ecology development. Further research in the field will enable an improved understanding of the professional learning ecologies of school teachers and support future interventions and recommendations for professional development through the cultivation of emerging professional learning ecologies.

Instructor-student interaction and regular feedback are seen as teaching strategies designed to support effective learning. These days, there is increasing reliance on technology to support this in the classroom; one such technology is a student response system or its more recent development of this, that is, a game-based one. This study investigates the potential of using game-based student response systems for formative assessment through the analysis of learning outcomes and students' perceptions of the gamified experience in terms of engagement and pleasantness. A quasi-experiment was conducted within an undergraduate course on educational technologies, involving about 400 students. Learning improvements were measured through a pre- and posttest, and students' perceptions were elicited through a questionnaire. Data analysis showed a high level of student satisfaction and an overall improvement of learning outcomes due to the use of game-based student response systems. However, differences in terms of effectiveness were found according to the nature of the topics dealt with in the course, that is, whether or not they were used in the development of theoretical knowledge rather than the use of that knowledge in a more practical context.

As algorithmic decision-making and data collection become pervasive in higher education, how can educators make sense of the systems that shape life and learning in the twenty-first century? This paper outlines a systematic literature review that investigated gaps in the current framing of data and faculty development, and explores how these gaps prevent the formulation of potential pathways and principles for fostering educators' data literacy. The analysis of 137 papers through classification by relevant categories and key word mapping shows that there is little attention on higher education teachers. It also makes clear that most approaches to educators' data literacy address management and technical abilities, with less emphasis on critical, ethical and personal approaches to datafication in education. The authors conceptualize this situation as a 'complicated' approach to data literacy in the academic profession, as opposed to a complex vision which would bundle management and technical skills together with a critical, systemic approach to professional learning and data.

This article presents a systematic review of the literature on Digital Scholarship, aimed at better understanding the collocation of this research area at the crossroad of several disciplines and strands of research. The authors analysed 45 articles in order to draw a picture of research in this area. In the first phase, the articles were classified, and relevant quantitative and qualitative data were analysed. Results showed that three clear strands of research do exist: Digital Libraries, Networked Scholarship and Digital Humanities. Moreover, researchers involved in this research area tackle the problems related to technological uptake in the scholar's profession from different points of view, and define the field in different often complementary ways, thus generating the perception of a research area still in need of a unifying vision. In the second phase, authors searched for evidence of the disciplinary contributions and interdisciplinary cohesion of research carried out in this area through the use of bibliometric maps. Results suggest that the area of Digital Scholarship, still in its infancy, is advancing in a rather fragmented way, shaping itself around the above-mentioned strands, each with its own research agenda. However, results from the cross-citation analysis suggest that the Networked Scholarship strand is more cohesive than the others in terms of cross-citations.

In this paper, we reflect on how Design for Learning can create the basis for a culture of educational quality. We explore the process of Design for Learning within a blended, undergraduate university course through a teacher-led inquiry approach, aiming at showing the connections between the process of Design for Learning and academic staff/student reflections on educational quality. As emerges from the evidence collected, "forward-oriented design"--which is Design for Learning as iterative and participatory practice--supports meta-learning on the practices and values of educational quality. We introduce in depth the two main constructs adopted in our work--Design for Learning and educational quality--in order to understand the ongoing debate in these two separate (but convergent) areas of research. The four phases (design for configuration, design for orchestration, design for reflection and design for redesign) show the impact of design on educational quality reflections and practices. Alongside the process of Design for Learning, the data are collected and analysed adopting different methods that enable the researchers to better understand the diverse perspectives of staff and students. We conclude that Design for Learning can be deemed a "mediational" instrument to explore methods of transforming "existing educational situations into desired situations," linking the vision of educational quality with concrete practices of the teacher and students' daily activities.

Copyright of Form@re is the property of Firenze University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Italian Journal of Educational Technology is the property of Firenze University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

As the debate on data in the society and in education grows the attention on data‐trace as 'primary material' for governance, educational quality and innovation falls under the spotlights. In this context, HEIs have been put under pressure to adopt quantitative metrics and evaluation approaches enhancing the massive collection of trace data. Nonetheless, each university overall, and the academics specifically, might respond differently to this context of innovation. The present article aims to explore data practices in two higher education institutions. Two relevant areas for the imaginaries related to data and quantification were explored: (a) evaluation of quality in teaching and learning; (b) data to support assessment. The study is based on a survey distributed to the whole university teaching staff of two institutions. Descriptive and inferential statistics comparing multivariate sample means (MANOVA) were applied to 601 responses collected. The results indicated the prevalence of institutionally consolidated data practices relative to quality teaching evaluation, with fragmentation and isolation in some emerging data practices connected to decision‐making and teaching and learning. Moreover, each of the universities revealed distinct institutional profiles which could be put in connection with the organisational culture. The results are discussed in light of the potential strategies at the institutional level, particularly regarding faculty development as means to build a visible, contextualised data culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Open research data (ORD) have been considered a driver of scientific transparency. However, data friction, as the phenomenon of data underutilisation for several causes, has also been pointed out. A factor often called into question for ORD low usage is the quality of the ORD and associated metadata. This work aims to illustrate the use of ORD, published by the Figshare scientific repository, concerning their scientific discipline, their type and compared with the quality of their metadata. Considering all the Figshare resources and carrying out a programmatic quality assessment of their metadata, our analysis highlighted two aspects. First, irrespective of the scientific domain considered, most ORD are under-used, but with exceptional cases which concentrate most researchers' attention. Second, there was no evidence that the use of ORD is associated with good metadata publishing practices. These two findings opened to a reflection about the potential causes of such data friction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work introduces educators' reactions from their professional practice to the injustice generated by the practices and narratives of datafication. A reflective and interpretive work approach based on the principles of hermeneutics is presented, implemented within a series of workshops (12) with the participation of 298 educators. From the interpretive synthesis it is observed that: A) although educators are developing forms of sensibility and attention to the problem of datafication, they feel that their degrees of freedom are limited. In a subordinate way to the first effect, it appears that B) in some cases, they abandon themselves to suffer the problems of datafication passively; C) in others, they wield their technical and technological skills to "hack the algorithm". In any of these situations, the need arises to organise the educational work beyond technological competence, to promote counter-hegemonic antagonisms as a way to build new contexts of data justice, and therefore, social justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Instructor–student interaction and regular feedback are seen as teaching strategies designed to support effective learning. These days, there is increasing reliance on technology to support this in the classroom; one such technology is a student response system or its more recent development of this, that is, a game-based one. This study investigates the potential of using game-based student response systems for formative assessment through the analysis of learning outcomes and students' perceptions of the gamified experience in terms of engagement and pleasantness. A quasi-experiment was conducted within an undergraduate course on educational technologies, involving about 400 students. Learning improvements were measured through a pre- and posttest, and students' perceptions were elicited through a questionnaire. Data analysis showed a high level of student satisfaction and an overall improvement of learning outcomes due to the use of game-based student response systems. However, differences in terms of effectiveness were found according to the nature of the topics dealt with in the course, that is, whether or not they were used in the development of theoretical knowledge rather than the use of that knowledge in a more practical context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Interamericana de Investigación, Educación y Pedagogía - RIIEP is the property of Universidad Santo Tomas and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Form@re is the property of Firenze University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Form@re is the property of Firenze University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)