Search results for: sports school students

Authors: Vilma Zydziunaite, Gitana Balezentiene, Vilma Zydziunaite

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Teaching is one of most responsible profession, and it is not only a job of an artisan. This profes-sion needs a developed ability to identify oneself with the chosen teaching profession. Research questions: How teachers characterize their authentic individual professional identity? What factors teachers exclude, which support and limit the professional identity? Aim was to develop the grounded theory (GT) about teacher’s professional identity (TPI). Research methodology is based on Charmaz GT version. Data were collected via semi-structured interviews with the he sample of 12 teachers. Findings. 15 extracted categories revealed that the core of TPI is teacher’s professional calling. Premises of TPI are family support, motives for choos-ing teacher’s profession, teacher’s didactic competence. Context of TPI consists of teacher compli-ance with the profession, purposeful preparation for pedagogical studies, professional growth. The strategy of TPI is based on teacher relationship with school community strengthening. The profes-sional frustration limits the TPI. TPI outcome includes teacher recognition, authority; professional mastership, professionalism, professional satisfaction. Dimensions of TPI GT the past (reaching teacher’s profession), present (teacher’s commitment to professional activity) and future (teacher’s profession reconsideration). Conclusions. The substantive GT describes professional identity as complex, changing and life-long process, which develops together with teacher’s personal identity and is connected to professional activity. The professional decision "to be a teacher" is determined by the interaction of internal (professional vocation, personal characteristics, values, self-image, talents, abilities) and external (family, friends, school community, labor market, working condi-tions) factors. The dimensions of the TPI development includes: the past (the pursuit of the teaching profession), the present (the teacher's commitment to professional activity) and the future (the revi-sion of the teaching profession). A significant connection emerged - as the teacher's professional commitment strengthens (creating a self-image, growing the teacher's professional experience, recognition, professionalism, mastery, satisfaction with pedagogical activity), the dimension of re-thinking the teacher's profession weakens. This proves that professional identity occupies an im-portant place in a teacher's life and it affects his professional success and job satisfaction. Teachers singled out the main factors supporting a teacher's professional identity: their own self-image per-ception, professional vocation, positive personal qualities, internal motivation, teacher recognition, confidence in choosing a teaching profession, job satisfaction, professional knowledge, professional growth, good relations with the school community, pleasant experiences, quality education process, excellent student achievements.

Keywords: grounded theory, teacher professional identity, semi-structured interview, school, students, school community, family

Procedia PDF Downloads 74

Authors: Faride Hashemiannejad, Shima Oloomi

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Imagination is one of the important elements of creative thinking which as a skill needs attention by the educational system. Although most students learn reading, writing, and arithmetic skills well, they lack high level thinking skills like creative thinking. Therefore, in the information age and in the beginning of entry to knowledge-based society, the educational system needs to think over its goals and mission, and concentrate on creativity-based curriculum. From among curriculum elements-goals, content, method and evaluation “method” is a major domain whose reform can pave the way for fostering imagination and creativity. The purpose of this study was examining the relationship between creativity development and curriculum. Research questions were: (1) is there a relationship between the cognitive-emotional structure of the classroom and creativity development? (2) Is there a relationship between the environmental-social structure of the classroom and creativity development? (3) Is there a relationship between the thinking structure of the classroom and creativity development? (4) Is there a relationship between the physical structure of the classroom and creativity development? (5) Is there a relationship between the instructional structure of the classroom and creativity development? Method: This research is a applied research and the research method is Correlational research. Participants: The total number of participants in this study included 894 students from High school through 11th grade from seven schools of seven zones in Mashad city. Sampling Plan: Sampling was selected based on Random Multi State. Measurement: The dependent measure in this study was: (a) the Test of Creative Thinking, (b) The researcher-made questionnaire includes five fragments, cognitive, emotional structure, environmental social structure, thinking structure, physical structure, and instructional structure. The Results Show: There was significant relationship between the cognitive-emotional structure of the classroom and student’s creativity development (sig=0.139). There was significant relationship between the environmental-social structure of the classroom and student’s creativity development (sig=0.006). There was significant relationship between the thinking structure of the classroom and student’s creativity development (sig=0.004). There was not significant relationship between the physical structure of the classroom and student’s creativity development (sig=0.215). There was significant relationship between the instructional structure of the classroom and student’s creativity development (sig=0.003). These findings denote if students feel secure, calm and confident, they can experience creative learning. Also the quality of coping with students’ questions, imaginations and risks can influence on their creativity development.

Keywords: imagination, creativity, curriculum, bioinformatics, biomedicine

Procedia PDF Downloads 480

Authors: Erva Kaygun

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The purpose of this research is to investigate the effects of positive psychology interventions on college students' positive-negative emotions, coronavirus anxiety, and career stress. 4 groups of college students are compared in terms of the level of exposure to PP constructs ( Non-Psychology, Psychology, Positive Psychology Course, and Positive Psychology Boot Camp). In this research, Pearson Correlation, independent t-tests, ANOVA, and Post-Hoc tests are conducted. Without being significant, the groups exposed to PP constructs showed higher positive emotions and total PERMA scores, whereas negative emotions, career stress, and coronavirus stress remained similar. It is crucial to indicate that career stress is higher among all psychology students when compared to non-psychology students. The results showed that the highest exposure group (PP Boot Camp) showed no difference in negative emotions, whereas higher PERMA scores and positive emotion scores were on the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) scale.

Keywords: positive psychology, college students, well being, anxiety

Procedia PDF Downloads 192

Authors: Yi Ding

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With the upsurge of Chinese international students in American higher education, serious academic problems Chinese international students are suffering from are also striking. While most practices and research in higher education focus on the role of professors, writing centers, and tutoring centers to help international students succeed in college, this research study focuses on a more fundamental skill that is neglected in most conversations: information literacy, which is usually addressed by academic librarians. Transitioning from an East-Asian, developing educational system that values authority, set knowledge more than independent thinking, scholarly conversation, Chinese international students need support from academic librarians to acquire information literacy, which is crucial to understand expectations of a Western academic setting and thus to succeed in college. This research study illustrates how academic librarians can play an integral role in helping Chinese international students acclimate to the expectations of American higher education by teaching information literacy as academic literacy unique to the Western academic setting. Six keys of information literacy put forward by Association of College and Research Libraries, which are 'Authority Is Constructed and Contextual', 'Information Creation as a Process', 'Information Has Value', 'Research as Inquiry', 'Scholarship as Conversation', and 'Searching as Strategic Exploration', are analyzed through the lens of Chinese educational system and students’ backgrounds. Based on the analysis as well as results from surveys and interviews among academic librarians, professors, and international students, this research further examines current practices from a wide range of academic libraries and finally, provides evidence-based recommendations for academic librarians to use information literacy instruction to help Chinese international students succeed in American higher education.

Keywords: academic librarians, Chinese international students, information literacy, student success

Procedia PDF Downloads 243

Authors: Daniel Ecler

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The aim of this paper was to find out how Chinese university students perceive distance learning compared to full-time teaching, to reveal its advantages and disadvantages, and to try to find what elements could be implemented in regular full-time teaching in order to make it more effective. Recent events have shown that online teaching has a significant role to play in the field of education and needs to be given increased attention and scrutiny. For this purpose, a research survey was conducted using semi-structured questionnaires, which aimed to determine the attitudes of Chinese university students to the phenomenon of distance learning. The results of this survey revealed that most students prefer distance learning to full-time teaching, mainly because it gives them more freedom to participate in teaching, regardless of the environment in which they are currently located. In conclusion, it is necessary to mention that the possibility to participate virtually in teaching from anywhere is a huge advantage that could become part of regular teaching in the future. However, further research into this issue will be necessary.

Keywords: distance learning, full-time teaching, Chinese college students, cultural background

Procedia PDF Downloads 176

Authors: G. S. Androulakis, G. Deli, M. Kaisari, N. Mihos

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Teaching practices at the university level have changed and developed during the last decade. Implementation of inverted classroom method in secondary education consists of a well-formed basis for academic teachers. On the other hand, distance learning is a well-known field in education research and widespread as a method of teaching. Nonetheless, the new pandemic found many Universities all over the world unprepared, which made adaptations to new methods of teaching a necessity. In this paper, we analyze a model of an inverted university classroom in a distance learning context. Thus, the main purpose of our research is to investigate students’ difficulties as they transit to a new style of teaching and explore their learning development during a semester totally different from others. Our teaching experiment took place at the Business Administration department of the University of Patras, in the context of two courses: Calculus, a course aimed at first-year students, and Statistics, a course aimed at second-year students. Second-year students had the opportunity to attend courses in the university classroom. First-year students started their semester with distance learning. Using a comparative study of these two groups, we explored significant differences in students’ learning procedures. Focused group interviews, written tests, analyses of students’ dialogues were used in a mixed quantity and quality research. Our analysis reveals students’ skills, capabilities but also a difficulty in following, non-traditional style of teaching. The inverted classroom model, according to our findings, offers benefits in the educational procedure, even in a distance learning environment.

Keywords: distance learning, higher education, inverted classroom, mathematics teaching

Procedia PDF Downloads 133

Authors: Nurul Azmawati Mohamed, Zarini Ismail, Shalinawati Ramli, Nurul Hayati Chamhuri, Nur Syahrina Rahim, K. Omar

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Choosing a career is one of the most important decisions in our life. A right career leads a person to grow with that career and achieve success through the decision. Thus, career suitability assessment is important to help individuals to understand how a variety of personal attributes can impact their potential success and satisfaction with different career options and work environments. Some career needs specific personality trait that relates to attributes of job requirements and commitments. For medicine, being caring, approachable, inquisitive, able to listen and understand patients’ pain, anxiety and sorrow are important. The aim of this study was to evaluate the career suitability of pre-clinical students. This was a cross sectional study conducted among pre-clinical medical students in Universiti Sains Islam Malaysia. 'Sidek Career Interest Inventory’ was used to assess the students’ suitability for the course. This instrument had been validated locally to suit the local social and cultural context. It assessed the students’ personality trait based on Holland’s theory and their interests. For students to pursue in the medical course, two main personality trait are believed to be essential namely investigative and social trait personalities. Some of the characteristics of investigative trait are analytical, rational, intellectual and curious, while the characteristics of social trait personality include empathy, friendly, understanding and accommodating. The score for each personality trait were categorized as low (0-3.99), moderate (4-6.99) and high (7-10). A total of 81 pre-clinical medical students were included in this study. About two third (93.8%) of them were female and all of them are from 20 to 21 of age. Approximately, half of the students (47.5%) scored high and another 46.3% scored moderate for investigative trait. For social trait, only 13.8% scored high while 31.3% scored moderate. Only 12.5% (10) students had high scores for both investigative and social traits. Most of the pre-clinical medical students scored high in the investigative sections, however their social values were inadequate (low scores). For them to become good medical doctors, they should be good in both investigative and social skills to enhance their suitability for this career. Therefore, there is a need to nurture these medical students with appropriate social values and soft skills.

Keywords: career suitability, career interest, medical students, personality trait

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Authors: Wafa Labib

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Teaching methods include lectures, workshops and tutorials for the presentation and discussion of ideas have become out of date; were developed outside the discipline of architecture from the college of engineering and do not satisfy the architectural students’ needs and causes them many difficulties in integrating structure into their design. In an attempt to improve structure teaching methods, this paper focused upon proposing a supportive teaching/learning tool using multi-media applications which seeks to better meet the architecture student’s needs and capabilities and improve the understanding and application of basic and intermediate structural engineering and technology principles. Before introducing the use of multi-media as a supportive teaching tool, a questionnaire was distributed to third year students of a structural design course who were selected as a sample to be surveyed forming a sample of 90 cases. The primary aim of the questionnaire was to identify the students’ learning style and to investigate whether the selected method of teaching could make the teaching and learning process more efficient. Students’ reaction on the use of this method was measured using three key elements indicating that this method is an appropriate teaching method for the nature of the students and the course as well.

Keywords: teaching method, architecture, learning style, multi-media

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Authors: Amah Nnachi Lofty, Oyefeso Olufemi, Ibiam Udu Ama

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New and more powerful communications technologies continue to emerge at a rapid pace and their uses in education are widespread and the impact remarkable in the developing societies. This study investigates Mobile Collaboration Learning Technique (MCLT) on learners’ outcome among students in tertiary institutions of developing nations (a case of Nigeria students). It examines the significance of retention achievement scores of students taught using mobile collaboration and conventional method. The sample consisted of 120 students using Stratified random sampling method. Three research questions and hypotheses were formulated, and tested at a 0.05 level of significance. A student achievement test (SAT) was made of 40 items of multiple-choice objective type, developed and validated for data collection by professionals. The SAT was administered to students as pre-test and post-test. The data were analyzed using t-test statistic to test the hypotheses. The result indicated that students taught using MCLT performed significantly better than their counterparts using the conventional method of instruction. Also, there was no significant difference in the post-test performance scores of male and female students taught using MCLT. Based on the findings, the following recommendations was made that: Mobile collaboration system be encouraged in the institutions to boost knowledge sharing among learners, workshop and trainings should be organized to train teachers on the use of this technique and that schools and government should formulate policies and procedures towards responsible use of MCLT.

Keywords: education, communication, learning, mobile collaboration, technology

Procedia PDF Downloads 221

Authors: Amina Babou

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Gender and language is a moot and miscellaneous arena in the sphere of sociolinguistics, which has been proliferated so widely and rapidly in recent years. The dawn of research on gender and foreign language education was against the feminist researchers who allowed space for the bustling concourse of voices and perspectives in the arena of gender and language differences, in the early to the mid-1970. The objective of this scrutiny is to explore to what extent teaching gender and language in the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classroom plays a pivotal role in learning language information and skills. And the gist of this paper is to investigate how EFL students in Algeria conflate their gender identities with the linguistic practices and scholastic expertise. To grapple with the full range of issues about the EFL students’ awareness about the negotiation of meanings in the classroom, we opt for observing, interviewing, and questioning later to check using ‘how-do-you do’ procedure. The analysis of the EFL classroom discourse, from five Algerian universities, reveals that speaking strategies such as the manners students make an abrupt topic shifts, respond spontaneously to the teacher, ask more questions, interrupt others to seize control of conversations and monopolize the speaking floor through denying what others have said, do not sit very lightly on 80.4% of female students’ shoulders. The data indicate that female students display the assertive style as a strategy of learning to subvert the norms of femininity, especially in the speaking module.

Keywords: gender identities, EFL students, classroom discourse, linguistics

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Authors: Nidhi Gadura

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Given the increase in the number of students and administrators asking for online courses the author developed two partially online courses. One was a biology majors at genetics course while the other was a non-majors at biology course. The student body at Queensborough Community College is generally underprepared and has work and family obligations. As an educator, one has to be mindful about changing the pedagogical approach, therefore, special care was taken when designing the course material. Despite the initial concerns, both of these partially online courses were received really well by students. Lessons learnt were that student engagement is the key to success in an online course. Good practices to run a successful online course for underprepared students are discussed in this paper. Also discussed are the lessons learnt for making the eLearning environment better for all the students in the class, overachievers and underachievers alike.

Keywords: partially online course, pedagogy, student engagement, community college

Procedia PDF Downloads 395

Authors: Rose Mutuota

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Western knowledge have influenced the Kenyan education system through colonisation and policies borrowed from the global North. Researchers argue that studies of education and systems based on Northernframeworks ignore the lived experiences of the global South. The history of colonization is one such example. In light of this, there is a need for schools to consider the lived experience of the Kenyan child and integrate Indigenous knowledge in the education system. The study reported here explored the possibility of creating a blended/hybrid curriculum that values Indigenous knowledge and practices but also selectively use side as from the global North. Acasestudyformat was employed. Teachers and principals in four schools were interviewed. The findings indicated that teachers and students brought indigenous knowledge to the classroom but were limited in their use by existing educational policies.AnotherfindingwasthatpoliciesborrowedfromtheglobalNorthdid not suit the context in the Southincountries with a history of colonization. There was the need for policymakers to ensure the policies borrowed from the North suit the Kenyan context. The recommendations included the deliberate and mandated use of indigenous knowledge in classrooms including indigenous languages for instruction, the use of locally available assets to support students with disabilities in mainstream classrooms, and the use of a hybrid curriculum that privileges indigenous knowledge over Westernknowledgesintheschoolcurriculum.

Keywords: global North, global South, inclusive educate indigenous knowledges

Procedia PDF Downloads 202

Authors: Faihan Alotaibi

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This study explores Saudi teachers’ perceptions of the efficacy of social stories in the development of social skills in students with autism in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in two phases. Data were collected in sequential quantitative and qualitative phases. Participants in this study were 100 teachers in the quantitative phase and 15 teachers were interviewed. In this poster, the researcher will present the data result in the qualitative second phase in which an understanding of teachers’ experiences was deepened by conducting semi-structured interviews with a purposeful sample of fifteen teachers of diverse experience, covering six initial themes: the social story concept, sources of social stories, the effectiveness of social stories in improving social skills in students with autism, barriers to using social stories for students with autism, cultural consideration and context of social stories, and factors which contribute to the best use of social stories to developing of social skills for students with autism.

Keywords: autism, social storyteachers’ perceptions, intervention, social skills

Procedia PDF Downloads 382

Authors: Lucy Lugo Mawang

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Educational Psychologists have highlighted the significance of creativity in education. Likewise, a fundamental objective of music education concern the development of students’ musical creativity potential. The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between motivation strategies and musical creativity, and establish the prediction equation of musical creativity. The study used purposive sampling and census to select 201 fourth-form music students (139 females/ 62 males), mainly from public secondary schools in Kenya. The mean age of participants was 17.24 years (SD = .78). Framed upon self- determination theory and the dichotomous model of achievement motivation, the study adopted an ex post facto research design. A self-report measure, the Achievement Goal Questionnaire-Revised (AGQ-R) was used in data collection for the independent variable. Musical creativity was based on a creative music composition task and measured by the Consensual Musical Creativity Assessment Scale (CMCAS). Data collected in two separate sessions within an interval of one month. The questionnaire was administered in the first session, lasting approximately 20 minutes. The second session was for notation of participants’ creative composition. The results indicated a positive correlation r(199) = .39, p ˂ .01 between musical creativity and intrinsic music motivation. Conversely, negative correlation r(199) = -.19, p < .01 was observed between musical creativity and extrinsic music motivation. The equation for predicting musical creativity from music motivation strategies was significant F(2, 198) = 20.8, p < .01, with R2 = .17. Motivation strategies accounted for approximately (17%) of the variance in participants’ musical creativity. Intrinsic music motivation had the highest significant predictive value (β = .38, p ˂ .01) on musical creativity. In the exploratory analysis, a significant mean difference t(118) = 4.59, p ˂ .01 in musical creativity for intrinsic and extrinsic music motivation was observed in favour of intrinsically motivated participants. Further, a significant gender difference t(93.47) = 4.31, p ˂ .01 in musical creativity was observed, with male participants scoring higher than females. However, there was no significant difference in participants’ musical creativity based on age. The study recommended that music educators should strive to enhance intrinsic music motivation among students. Specifically, schools should create conducive environments and have interventions for the development of intrinsic music motivation since it is the most facilitative motivation strategy in predicting musical creativity.

Keywords: extrinsic music motivation, intrinsic music motivation, musical creativity, music composition

Procedia PDF Downloads 154

Authors: Ahmad A. Kader

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In the principles of Microeconomics course taught during the Fall Semester 2019, 158out of 179 students participated in the completion of two questionnaires and a survey describing their demographic and academic profiles. The two questionnaires include the 29 items of the Rotter Locus of Control Scale and the 52 items of the Schraw andDennisonMetacognitive Awareness Scale. The 52 items consist of 17 items describing knowledge of cognition and 37 items describing the regulation of cognition. The paper is intended to show the combined influence of locus of control, metacognitive knowledge, and metacognitive regulation on student performance. The survey covers variables that have been tested and recognized in economic education literature, which include GPA, gender, age, course level, race, student classification, whether the course was required or elective, employments, whether a high school economic course was taken, and attendance. Regression results show that of the economic education variables, GPA, classification, whether the course was required or elective, and attendance are the only significant variables in their influence on student grade. Of the educational psychology variables, the regression results show that the locus of control variable has a negative and significant effect, while the metacognitive knowledge variable has a positive and significant effect on student grade. Also, the adjusted R square value increased markedly with the addition of the locus of control, metacognitive knowledge, and metacognitive regulation variables to the regression equation. The t test results also show that students who are internally oriented and are high on the metacognitive knowledge scale significantly outperform students who are externally oriented and are low on the metacognitive knowledge scale. The implication of these results for educators is discussed in the paper.

Keywords: locus of control, metacognitive knowledge, metacognitive regulation, student performance, economic education

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Authors: Subramaniam Chandran, A. Geetha

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This paper addresses three issues: how to prepare instructional design for imparting English language skill from inter-disciplinary self-learning material; how the disadvantaged students are benefited from such kind of language skill imparted through m-learning; and how do the m-learners perform better than the other learners. This paper examines these issues through an experimental study conducted among the distance learners enrolled in preparatory program for bachelor’s degree. This program is designed for the disadvantage learners especially for the school drop-outs to qualify to pursue graduate program through distant education. It also explains how mobile learning helps them to enhance their capacity in learning despite their rural background and other disadvantages. In India nearly half of the students enrolled in schools do not complete their study. The pursuance of higher education is very low when compared with developed countries. This study finds a significant increase in their learning capacity and mobile learning seems to be a viable alternative where conventional system could not reach the disadvantaged learners. Improving the English language skill is one of the reasons for such kind of performance. Exercises framed from the relevant self-learning material for enhancing English language skill not only improves language skill but also widens the subject-knowledge. This paper explains these issues out of the study conducted among the disadvantaged learners.

Keywords: English language skill, disadvantaged learners, distance education, m-learning

Procedia PDF Downloads 666

Authors: Shankaran Sitarama

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Teamwork is an extremely effective pedagogical tool in engineering education. New Product Development (NPD) has been an effective strategy of companies to streamline and bring innovative products and solutions to customers. Thus, Engineering curriculum in many schools, some collaboratively with business schools, have brought NPD into the curriculum at the graduate level. Teamwork is invariably used during instruction, where students work in teams to come up with new products and solutions. There is a significant emphasis of grade on the semester long teamwork for it to be taken seriously by students. As the students work in teams and go through this process to develop the new product prototypes, their effectiveness and learning to a great extent depends on how they function as a team and go through the creative process, come together, and work towards the common goal. A core attribute of a successful NPD team is their creativity and innovation. The team needs to be creative as a group, generating a breadth of ideas and innovative solutions that solve or address the problem they are targeting and meet the user’s needs. They also need to be very efficient in their teamwork as they work through the various stages of the development of these ideas resulting in a POC (proof-of-concept) implementation or a prototype of the product. The simultaneous requirement of teams to be creative and at the same time also converge and work together imposes different types of tensions in their team interactions. These ideational tensions / conflicts and sometimes relational tensions / conflicts are inevitable. Effective teams will have to deal with the Team dynamics and manage it to be resilient enough and yet be creative. This research paper provides a computational analysis of the teams’ communication that is reflective of the team dynamics, and through a superimposition of latent semantic analysis with social network analysis, provides a computational methodology of arriving at patterns of visual interaction. These team interaction patterns have clear correlations to the team dynamics and provide insights into the functioning and thus the effectiveness of the teams. 23 student NPD teams over 2 years of a course on Managing NPD that has a blend of engineering and business school students is considered, and the results are presented. It is also correlated with the teams’ detailed and tailored individual and group feedback and self-reflection and evaluation questionnaire.

Keywords: team dynamics, social network analysis, team interaction patterns, new product development teamwork, NPD teams

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Authors: Margaret Nohilly, Fionnuala Tynan

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Wellbeing in not only a national priority in Ireland but in the international context. A review of the literature highlights the consistent efforts of researchers to define the concept of wellbeing. This study sought to explore the understating of Wellbeing in Irish primary schools. National Wellbeing Guidelines in the Irish context frame the concept of wellbeing through a mental health paradigm, which is but one aspect of wellbeing. This exploratory research sought the views of Irish primary school teachers on their understanding of the concept of wellbeing and the practical application of strategies to promote wellbeing both in the classroom and across the school. Teacher participants from four counties in the West of Ireland were invited to participate in focus group discussion and workshops through the Education Centre Network. The purpose of this process was twofold; firstly to explore teachers’ understanding of wellbeing in the primary school context and, secondly, for teachers to be co-creators in the development of practical strategies for classroom and whole school implementation. The voice of the teacher participants was central to the research design. The findings of this study indicate that the definition of wellbeing in the Irish context is too abstract a definition for teachers and the focus on mental health dominates the discourse in relation to wellbeing. Few teachers felt that they were addressing wellbeing adequately in their classrooms and across the school. The findings from the focus groups highlighted that while teachers are incorporating a range of wellbeing strategies including mindfulness and positive psychology, there is a clear disconnect between the national definition and the implementation of national curricula which causes them concern. The teacher participants requested further practical strategies to promote wellbeing at whole school and classroom level within the framework of the Irish Primary School Curriculum and enable them to become professionally confident in developing a culture of wellbeing. In conclusion, considering wellbeing is a national priority in Ireland, this research promoted the timely discussion the wellbeing guidelines and the development of a conceptual framework to define wellbeing in concrete terms for practitioners. The centrality of teacher voices ensured the strategies proposed by this research is both practical and effective. The findings of this research have prompted the development of a national resource which will support the implementation of wellbeing in the primary school at both national and international level.

Keywords: definition, wellbeing, strategies, curriculum

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Authors: M. Touhidul Islam Sarker, Mohammod Abul Kashem

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The purpose of this paper is to improve the e-learning system and digitize the learning method in the educational sector. The learner will login into e-learning platform and easily access the digital content, the content can be downloaded and take an assessment for evaluation. Learner can get access to these digital resources by using tablet, computer, and smart phone also. E-learning system can be defined as teaching and learning with the help of multimedia technologies and the internet by access to digital content. E-learning replacing the traditional education system through information and communication technology-based learning. This paper has designed and implemented integrated e-learning system architecture with University Management System. Moodle (Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment) is the best e-learning system, but the problem of Moodle has no school or university management system. In this research, we have not considered the school’s student because they are out of internet facilities. That’s why we considered the university students because they have the internet access and used technologies. The University Management System has different types of activities such as student registration, account management, teacher information, semester registration, staff information, etc. If we integrated these types of activity or module with Moodle, then we can overcome the problem of Moodle, and it will enhance the e-learning system architecture which makes effective use of technology. This architecture will give the learner to easily access the resources of e-learning platform anytime or anywhere which digitizes the learning method.

Keywords: database, e-learning, LMS, Moodle

Procedia PDF Downloads 188

Authors: Seyyed Farzad Motevalli-Haghi, Javad Rafinejad, Mahboobeh Hosseni, Jamshid Yazdani-Charati, Behzad Parsi

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Background and purpose: Pediculosis is a worldwide public health concern. This descriptive study was performed on primary-school-aged children to determine the prevalence of pediculosis and its risk factors in Mazandaran Province, Iran, on basis of geographic information system (GIS). Materials and methods: A random sampling method was used to select 45237 school-aged children from Sari to Ramsar cities during September 2012 to June 2013. Data were collected from the selected schools by five trained nursing inspectors. A detailed questionnaire was filled for each child prior to hair examination following which examination was carried out to detect head lice as well as eggs/nits. Data were analyzed chi-square test. Finally, the GIS map was obtained in province informational chart. Results: 823 primary-school children (of 45237) were infected with lice in Mazandaran Province. The mean infection prevalence was 1.4% in cities 5.64% in rural area from Sari to Ramsar. There were significant relationships between pediculosis and some factors (P<0.05). GIS map revealed that the contamination was less in west than in east and central regions. Conclusion: Increasing awareness and training of teachers and parents, as well as improving standards of personal health can significantly reduce the prevalence of pediculosis.

Keywords: pediculosis capitis, primary school children, epidemiology, geographic information system (GIS), Mazandaran, Iran

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Authors: Mick Jackowski

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In terms of popularity in the United States, horse racing has been in a steady state of decline since the 1970s. This trend can be attributed to deterioration in the prestige of the sport, due to a shift in cultural values around the treatment of horses, as well as the growing interest of other sports and gambling options. Despite this drift, horse racing still commands a significant piece of the sport landscape through specific events like the Triple Crown and the Breeders Cup. The 2024 Kentucky Derby enjoyed it largest peak television audience (20.1 million) ever. It is because of this still significant attraction to thoroughbred racing that hope exists, not only for the survivability of one of the oldest organized sports in North America, but also for its future growth. But the spectacle that makes select races very popular must be expanded to tracks around the country on a regular basis. The first step is to create a centralized governing body that regulates operation of all races at all tracks in the country, instead of the state-by-state government fiefdoms that currently oversee operations in each jurisdiction. One league office, if you will, can also better coordinate marketing efforts to promote races. These promotions, though, must be targeted to specific audiences, focusing on the strengths that horse racing has in relation to other recreational activities. The industry should utilize a multi-segment strategy that targets the following four groups: Families, Young Adults, Fashion-Conscious, and Sports Bettors. Beyond the traditional marketing mix, the most vital means of establishing and maintaining relationships with each of these consumer segments is through community building.

Keywords: community building, horse racing, sport marketing, thoroughbreds

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Authors: Marlone D. Severo

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A pre- and post-test quasi-experimental design was used to test the intervention of Trachtenberg Speed Math on the mathematical competency of sixty (60) matched-paired students with a poor performing grade in Mathematics from one of the biggest public national high school at the South of Metro Manila. Both control and experimental group were administered with the Attitude Towards Mathematics Inventory (ATMI) before the pretest were given and both group showed high dislike for Mathematics. Pretest showed a 53 percent accuracy for the control group and 51 percent for the experimental group using a 15-item long multiplication test without any aid of a computing device. The experimental group were taught how to use the Trachtenberg number-keys and techniques in multiplication between October 2014 to March 2015. Post-test showed an improvement in the experimental group with 96 percent accuracy for the control group and a dismal 57 percent for the control group in long-multiplication. Post-test ATMI were administered. The control group showed a great dislike towards Mathematics, while the experimental group showed a positive attitude towards the subject.

Keywords: attitude towards mathematics, mathematical competency, number-keys, trachtenberg speed math

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Authors: Zorana Jurinjak, Christos Alexopoulos

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The aim of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of using a medical bilingual dictionary in teaching English in a vocational college. More precisely, to what extent the use of bilingual medical dictionary in relation to the use of Standard English bilingual dictionaries influences the results on tests, and thus the acquisition of better competence of students mastering the subject terminology. Secondary interest in this paper would be to raise awareness among students and teachers about the advantages of dictionary use. The experiment was conducted at College of Applied Health Sciences in Ćuprija on a sample of 90 students. The respondents translated three medical texts with 42 target terms. Statistical analyses of the data obtained show that the differences in average time and correct answers favor the students who used medical dictionary.

Keywords: bilingual medical dictionary, standard english bilingual dictionary, medical terminology, EOS, ESP

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Authors: Sung Un Kim, Ivana Martinović, Snježana Stanarević Katavić

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As more and more youth use mobile devices, such as tablets and smartphones, for information seeking in their everyday lives, the purpose of this study is to understand the behaviors of youth seeking health information on mobile devices. The specific objective of this study is to examine 1) for what health issues youth use mobile devices, 2) for what reasons youth use mobile devices to obtain health information, 3) in what ways youth use mobile devices for health information, and 4) the features of health applications that youth find useful. The researchers devised a questionnaire for this study. Four hundred eight students from two high schools, located in Osijek, Croatia, participated by answering the questionnaire (281 girls and 127 boys). The collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and content analysis. The results show that among all participants, about 85 percent (n = 344) reported having used mobile devices for health information. The most frequent health topic for which they had been using mobile devices is physical activity (n = 273), followed by eating issues and nutrition (n = 224), mental health (n = 160), sexual health (n = 157), alcohol, drugs, and tobacco (n = 125), safety (n = 96) and particular diseases (n = 62). They use mobile devices to obtain health information due to the ease of use (n = 342), the ease of sharing health information (n = 281), portability (n = 215), timeliness (n = 162), and the ease of tracking/recording/monitoring health status (n = 147). Of those who have used mobile devices for health information, three-quarters (n = 261) use mobile devices to search health information, while 32.8% (n =113) use applications and 31.7% (n =109) browse information. Those who have used applications for health information (n = 113) consider the alert feature (n=107) as the most useful, followed by the tracking/recording/monitoring feature (n =92), the customized information feature (n = 86), the video feature (n = 58), and the sharing feature (n =39). It is notable that although health applications have been actively developed and studied, a majority of the participants search for or browse information on mobile devices, instead of using applications. The researchers will discuss reasons that some of them did not use mobile devices to obtain health information, students’ concerns about using health applications, and features that they wish to have in health applications.

Keywords: Croatia, health information, information seeking behaviors, mobile devices, youth

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Authors: Sanaa Abouras

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This research investigates the attitude of Egyptian Nubian University students towards the Arabic and the two Nubian languages, Nobiin, and Kenuzi-Dongola. The Nubian languages are called by Egyptian Nubians, Fadijja/Fadicca and Kenzi, respectively. Nubians are people who live in the Nubia area which lies between Egypt’s southern borders with the northern part of Sudan. Nubia is divided into two parts - one under the Egyptian regime, and the other under the Sudanese regime. The number of participants used in the study was forty - half male and half female. Twenty of these participants live in the Nubian region and are enrolled at the South Valley University in Aswan, Egypt. This number was compared with an additional twenty Egyptian-Nubian university students who live outside the Nubian region and attend various Egyptian universities located in Alexandria and Cairo. The hypothesis of this study is that Egyptian Nubian University students tend to have positive attitudes toward Arabic and also the Nubian languages. This research is a qualitative and partially quantitative one. Observations, questionnaires, and interviews were used to collect data in order to explore the following: (1) the language students prefer to speak at home and in public and if language preferences are gender-related, (2) the factors that influence the Egyptian Nubian university students' attitudes towards Arabic and Nubian languages, and (3) a look at the future of these ethnic Nubian languages. Results that answered the main question on the attitude of Egyptian Nubian University students toward Arabic and Nubian languages revealed that students who live inside and outside the Nubian region tend to have positive attitudes towards both the Arabic and the Nubian languages.

Keywords: language attitude, minority, Arabic language, Nubian Language

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Authors: Sehrish Khan

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The present study investigated the attitude of university students towards semester system and teachers with a specific objective of finding problems faced by students in semester system. 10 focus group discussions were conducted among students in five Universities of Hazara Division of KPK regarding their knowledge and attitudes about semester system and problems they faced due to this system and teacher’s attitude. The key findings were the problems like favoritism, gender biased ness, racial biased ness, biased ness in marking, relative marking, harassment, using students for personal tasks and authoritarian attitude from teachers’ side and the heavy tasks in less time which are causing stress among students. It was recommended that proper training and monitoring system should be maintained for evaluation of teachers to minimize the corruption in this sacred profession and maximize the optimal functioning. The information gathered in this research can be used to develop training modules for University teachers.

Keywords: university teachers, favoritism, biasedness, harassment

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Authors: Paul Lam, Kevin Wong, Chi Him Chan

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Constant practicing and accurate, immediate feedback are the keys to improving students’ speaking skills. However, traditional oral examination often fails to provide such opportunities to students. The traditional, face-to-face oral assessment is often time consuming – attending the oral needs of one student often leads to the negligence of others. Hence, teachers can only provide limited opportunities and feedback to students. Moreover, students’ incentive to practice is also reduced by their anxiety and shyness in speaking the new language. A mobile app was developed to use artificial intelligence (AI) to provide immediate feedback to students’ speaking performance as an attempt to solve the above-mentioned problems. Firstly, it was thought that online exercises would greatly increase the learning opportunities of students as they can now practice more without the needs of teachers’ presence. Secondly, the automatic feedback provided by the AI would enhance students’ motivation to practice as there is an instant evaluation of their performance. Lastly, students should feel less anxious and shy compared to directly practicing oral in front of teachers. Technically, the program made use of speech-to-text functions to generate feedback to students. To be specific, the software analyzes students’ oral input through certain speech-to-text AI engine and then cleans up the results further to the point that can be compared with the targeted text. The mobile app has invited English teachers for the pilot use and asked for their feedback. Preliminary trials indicated that the approach has limitations. Many of the users’ pronunciation were automatically corrected by the speech recognition function as wise guessing is already integrated into many of such systems. Nevertheless, teachers have confidence that the app can be further improved for accuracy. It has the potential to significantly improve oral drilling by giving students more chances to practice. Moreover, they believe that the success of this mobile app confirms the potential to extend the AI-assisted assessment to other language skills, such as writing, reading, and listening.

Keywords: artificial Intelligence, mobile learning, oral assessment, oral practice, speech-to-text function

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Authors: Catherine Cheetam, Alan Harper, Melody Elliott, Mika Ito

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This paper describes a pilot study conducted with English as a foreign language (EFL) students at a private university in Japan who used graded readers and the MReader website in class or independently to enhance their English reading skills. Each semester students who read 100,000 words with MReader quizzes passed enter into the ‘MReader Challenge,’ a reading contest that recognizes students for their achievement. The study focused specifically on the attitudes of thirty-six EFL students who successfully completed the Challenge in the 2015 spring semester using graded readers and MReader, and their motivation to continue using English in the future. The attitudes of these students were measured using their responses to statements on a Likert scaled survey. Follow-up semi-structured interviews were conducted with eleven students to gain additional insight into their opinions. The results from this study suggest that reading graded readers in general promoted intrinsic motivation among a majority of the participants. This study is preliminary and needs to be expanded and continued to assess the lasting impact of the extensive reading program. Limitations and future directions of the study are also summarized and discussed.

Keywords: attitudes, extensive, intrinsic, methodolgies, motivation, reading

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Authors: Chyong-Ru Liu, Wen-Shiung Huang, Wan-Ching Tang, Shan-Pei Chen

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Two of the biggest challenges companies involved in sports and exercise information services face are how to strengthen participation in virtual sports/exercise communities and how to increase the ongoing participatoriness of those communities. In the past, relatively little research has explored mechanisms for strengthening alignment practice and community response from the perspective of self-construal, and as such this study seeks to explore the self-construal of virtual sports/exercise communities, the role it plays in the emotional commitment of forming communities, and the factor that can strengthen alignment practice. Moreover, which factor of the emotional commitment of forming virtual communities have the effect of strengthening interference in the process of transforming customer citizenship behaviors? This study collected 625 responses from the two leading websites in terms of fan numbers in the provision of information on road race and marathon events in Taiwan, with model testing conducted through linear structural equation modelling and the bootstrapping technique to test the proposed hypotheses. The results proved independent construal had a stronger positive direct effect on affective commitment to fellow customers than did interdependent construal, and the influences of affective commitment to fellow customers in enhancing customer citizenship behavior. Public self-consciousness moderates the relationships among independent self-construal and interdependent self-construal on effective commitment to fellow customers. Perceived playfulness moderates the relationships between effective commitment to fellow customers and customer citizenship behavior. The findings of this study provide significant insights for the researchers and related organizations. From the theoretical perspective, this is empirical research that investigated the self-construal theory and responses (i.e., affective commitment to fellow customers, customer citizenship behavior) in virtual sports/exercise communities. We further explore how to govern virtual sports/exercise community participants’ heterogeneity through public self-consciousness mechanism to align participants’ affective commitment. Moreover, perceived playfulness has the effect of strengthening effective commitment to fellow customers with customer citizenship behaviors. The results of this study can provide a foundation for the construction of future theories and can be provided to related organizations for reference in their planning of virtual communities.

Keywords: self-construal theory, public self-consciousness, affective commitment, customer citizenship behavior

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Authors: Yelda Kağnıcı, Seçil Seymenler, Bahar Baran, Erol Esen, Barışcan Öztürk, Ender Siyez, Diğdem M. Siyez

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Infertility is the inability to reproduce after twelve months or longer unprotected sexual relationship. Although infertility is not a life threatening illness, it is considered as a serious problem for both the individual and the society. At this point, the importance of examining attitudes towards infertility is critical. Negative attitudes towards infertility may postpone individuals’ help seeking behaviors. The aim of this study is to investigate university students’ attitudes towards infertility in terms of socio-demographic variables (gender, age, taking sexual health education, existence of an infertile individual in the social network, plans about having child and behaviors about health). The sample of the study was 9693 university students attending to 21 universities in Turkey. Of the 9693 students, % 51.6 (n = 5002) were female, % 48.4 (n = 4691) were male. The data was collected by Attitudes toward Infertility Scale developed by researchers and Personal Information Form. In data analysis first frequencies were calculated, then in order to test whether there were significant differences in attitudes towards infertility scores of university students in terms of socio-demographic variables, one way ANOVA was conducted. According to the results, it was found that female students, students who had sexual health education, who have sexual relationship experience, who have an infertile individual in their social networks, who have child plans, who have high caffeine usage and who use alcohol regularly have more positive attitudes towards infertility. On the other hand, attitudes towards infidelity did not show significant differences in terms of age and cigarette usage. When the results of the study were evaluated in general, it was seen that university students’ attitudes towards infertility were negative. The attitudes of students who have high caffeine and alcohols usage were high. It can be considered that these students are aware that their social habits are risky. Female students’ positive attitudes might be explained by their gender role. The results point out that in order to decrease university students’ negative attitudes towards infertility, there is a necessity to develop preventive programs in universities.

Keywords: infertility, attitudes, sex, university students

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