Search results for: students participation.

Authors: Jochen Nelles, Susanne Kohns, Julia Spies, Friederike Schmitz-Buhl, Roland Thietje, Christopher Brandl, Alexander Mertens, Christopher M. Schlick

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Industrial robots as part of highly automated manufacturing are recently developed to cooperative (light-weight) robots. This offers the opportunity of using them as assistance robots and to improve the participation in professional life of disabled or handicapped people such as tetraplegics. Robots under development are located within a cooperation area together with the working person at the same workplace. This cooperation area is an area where the robot and the working person can perform tasks at the same time. Thus, working people and robots are operating in the immediate proximity. Considering the physical restrictions and the limited mobility of tetraplegics, a hands-free robot control could be an appropriate approach for a cooperative assistance robot. To meet these requirements, the research project MeRoSy (human-robot synergy) develops methods for cooperative assistance robots based on the measurement of head movements of the working person. One research objective is to improve the participation in professional life of people with disabilities and, in particular, mobility impaired persons (e.g. wheelchair users or tetraplegics), whose participation in a self-determined working life is denied. This raises the research question, how a human-robot cooperation workplace can be designed for hands-free robot control. Here, the example of a library scenario is demonstrated. In this paper, an empirical study that focuses on the impact of head movement related stress is presented. 12 test subjects with tetraplegia participated in the study. Tetraplegia also known as quadriplegia is the worst type of spinal cord injury. In the experiment, three various basic head movements were examined. Data of the head posture were collected by a motion capture system; muscle activity was measured via surface electromyography and the subjective mental stress was assessed via a mental effort questionnaire. The muscle activity was measured for the sternocleidomastoid (SCM), the upper trapezius (UT) or trapezius pars descendens, and the splenius capitis (SPL) muscle. For this purpose, six non-invasive surface electromyography sensors were mounted on the head and neck area. An analysis of variance shows differentiated muscular strains depending on the type of head movement. Systematically investigating the influence of different basic head movements on the resulting strain is an important issue to relate the research results to other scenarios. At the end of this paper, a conclusion will be drawn and an outlook of future work will be presented.

Keywords: Assistance robot, human-robot-interaction, motion capture, stress-strain-concept, surface electromyography, tetraplegia.

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Authors: Vinti Davar

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Background: Worldwide, at least 2.8 million people die each year as a result of being overweight or obese, and 35.8 million (2.3%) of global DALYs are caused by overweight or obesity. Obesity is acknowledged as one of the burning public health problems reducing life expectancy and quality of life. The body composition analysis of the university population is essential in assessing the nutritional status, as well as the risk of developing diseases associated with abnormal body fat content so as to make nutritional recommendations. Objectives: The main aim was to determine the prevalence of obesity and overweight in University students using Anthropometric analysis and BIA methods. Material and Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 283 university students participated. The body composition analysis was undertaken by using mainly: i) Anthropometric Measurement: Height, Weight, BMI, waist circumference, hip circumference and skin fold thickness, ii) Bio-electrical impedance was used for analysis of body fat mass, fat percent and visceral fat which was measured by Tanita SC-330P Professional Body Composition Analyzer. The data so collected were compiled in MS Excel and analyzed for males and females using SPSS 16. Results and Discussion: The mean age of the male (n= 153) studied subjects was 25.37 ±2.39 years and females (n=130) was 22.53 ±2.31. The data of BIA revealed very high mean fat per cent of the female subjects i.e. 30.3±6.5 per cent whereas mean fat per cent of the male subjects was 15.60±6.02 per cent indicating a normal body fat range. The findings showed high visceral fat of both males (12.92±3.02) and females (16.86±4.98). BMI, BF% and WHR were higher among females, and BMI was higher among males. The most evident correlation was verified between BF% and WHR for female students (r=0.902; p<0.001). The correlation of BFM and BF% with thickness of triceps, sub scapular and abdominal skin folds and BMI was significant (P<0.001). Conclusion: The studied data made it obvious that there is a need to initiate lifestyle changing strategies especially for adult females and encourage them to improve their dietary intake to prevent incidence of noncommunicable diseases due to obesity and high fat percentage.

Keywords: Anthropometry, bioelectrical impedance, body fat percentage, obesity.

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Authors: Chrysoula Karathanasi, Senad Karavdic, Angela Odero, Michèle Baumann

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It is not only the economic determinants that impact on life conditions, but maintaining a good level of life satisfaction (LS) may also be an important challenge currently. In Luxembourg, university students receive financial aid from the government. They are then registered at the Centre for Documentation and Information on Higher Education (CEDIES). Luxembourg is built on migration with almost half its population consisting of foreigners. It is upon this basis that our research aims to analyze the associations with mental health factors (health satisfaction, psychological quality of life, worry), perceived financial situation, career attitudes (adaptability, optimism, knowledge, planning) and LS, for non-Luxembourgish and native postgraduate students. Between 2012 and 2013, postgraduates registered at CEDIES were contacted by post and asked to participate in an online survey with either the option of English or French. The study population comprised of 644 respondents. Our statistical analysis excluded: those born abroad who had Luxembourgish citizenship, or those born in Luxembourg who did not have citizenship. Two groups were formed one consisting 147 non-Luxembourgish and the other 284 natives. A single item measured LS (1=not at all satisfied to 10=very satisfied). Bivariate tests, correlations and multiple linear regression models were used in which only significant relationships (p<0.05) were integrated. Among the two groups no differences were found between LS indicators (7.8/10 non-Luxembourgish; 8.0/10 natives) as both were higher than the European indicator of 7.2/10 (for 25-34 years). In the case of non-Luxembourgish students, they were older than natives (29.3 years vs. 26.3 years) perceived their financial situation as more difficult, and a higher percentage of their parents had an education level higher than a Bachelor's degree (father 59.2% vs 44.6% for natives; mother 51.4% vs 33.7% for natives). In addition, the father’s education was related to the LS of postgraduates and the higher was the score, the greater was the contribution to LS. Whereas for native students, when their scores of health satisfaction and career optimism were higher, their LS’ score was higher. For both groups their LS was linked to mental health-related factors, perception of their financial situation, career optimism, adaptability and planning. The higher the psychological quality of life score was, the greater the LS of postgraduates’ was. Good health and positive attitudes related to the job market enhanced their LS indicator.

Keywords: Career attitudes, fathers’ education level, life satisfaction, mental health.

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Authors: Eduardo N. Velloso, Fernando M. N. Dantas, Luciano S. Barros

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A common complaint from power system analysis students lies in the overly complex tools they need to learn and use just to simulate very basic systems or just to check the answers to power system calculations. The most basic power system studies are power-flow solutions and short-circuit calculations. This paper presents a simple tool with an intuitive interface to perform both these studies and assess its performance in comparison with existent commercial solutions. With this in mind, Elegant is a pure Python software tool for learning power system analysis developed for undergraduate and graduate students. It solves the power-flow problem by iterative numerical methods and calculates bolted short-circuit fault currents by modeling the network in the domain of symmetrical components. Elegant can be used with a user-friendly Graphical User Interface (GUI) and automatically generates human-readable reports of the simulation results. The tool is exemplified using a typical Brazilian regional system with 18 buses. This study performs a comparative experiment with 1 undergraduate and 4 graduate students who attempted the same problem using both Elegant and a commercial tool. It was found that Elegant significantly reduces the time and labor involved in basic power system simulations while still providing some insights into real power system designs.

Keywords: Free- and open-source software, power-flow, power system analysis, Python, short-circuit.

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Authors: Javadi Alimohammad, Javadi Maryam, Feizi Fereidoon

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A review of the literature found that Domestic violence and child maltreatment co-occur in many families, the purpose of this study attempts to emphasize the factors relating to intra-family relationships (order point of view) on violence against the children, For this purpose a survey technique on the sample size amounted 200 students of governmental guidance schools of city of Gilanegharb in country of Iran were considered. For measurement of violence against the children (VAC) the CTS scaled has been used .The results showed that children have experienced the violence more than once during the last year. degree of order in family is high. Explanation result indicated that the order variables in family including collective thinking, empathy, communal co-circumstance have significant effects on VAC.

Keywords: Violence, domestic violence, violence against children, order, guidance school, family, children.

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Authors: I. Derek Kaka’an, P. Smolianov, D. Koh Choon Lian, S. Dion, C. Schoen, J. Norberg

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This study was designed to examine mass participation and elite football performance in Nigeria with reference to advance international football management practices. Over 200 sources of literature on sport delivery systems were analyzed to construct a globally applicable model of elite football integrated with mass participation, comprising of the following three levels: macro- (socio-economic, cultural, legislative, and organizational), meso- (infrastructures, personnel, and services enabling sport programs) and micro-level (operations, processes, and methodologies for development of individual athletes). The model has received scholarly validation and showed to be a framework for program analysis that is not culturally bound. The Smolianov and Zakus model has been employed for further understanding of sport systems such as US soccer, US Rugby, swimming, tennis, and volleyball as well as Russian and Dutch swimming. A questionnaire was developed using the above-mentioned model. Survey questions were validated by 12 experts including academicians, executives from sport governing bodies, football coaches, and administrators. To identify best practices and determine areas for improvement of football in Nigeria, 120 coaches completed the questionnaire. Useful exemplars and possible improvements were further identified through semi-structured discussions with 10 Nigerian football administrators and experts. Finally, content analysis of Nigeria Football Federation’s website and organizational documentation was conducted. This paper focuses on the meso-level of Nigerian football delivery, particularly infrastructures, personnel, and services enabling sport programs. This includes training centers, competition systems, and intellectual services. Results identified remarkable achievements coupled with great potential to further develop football in different types of public and private organizations in Nigeria. These include: assimilating football competitions with other cultural and educational activities, providing favorable conditions for employees of all possible organizations to partake and help in managing football programs and events, providing football coaching integrated with counseling for prevention of antisocial conduct, and improving cooperation between football programs and organizations for peace-making and advancement of international relations, tourism, and socio-economic development. Accurate reporting of the sports programs from the media should be encouraged through staff training for better awareness of various events. The systematic integration of these meso-level practices into the balanced development of mass and high-performance football will contribute to international sport success as well as national health, education, and social harmony.

Keywords: Football, high performance, mass participation, Nigeria, sport development.

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Authors: Ayse Okvuran

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Creative drama which interconnects with the concepts of play, theatre, animation and role playing is a field which can only be learnt and expressed through experiencing. This study about assessment of the drama teaching in preschools by children was conducted in 3 preschools in Ankara with participation of 12 children of 6 ages who had taken drama learning courses. Qualitative research approach and semi-structured interviewing technique were employed. The results of the study indicated that all of 12 children defined drama as a game and entertainment.

Keywords: Creative drama, preschoolers, drama courses

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Authors: Mohammad H. Taheri, David J. Brown, Nasser Sherkat

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Engagement is one of the most important factors in determining successful outcomes and deep learning in students. Existing approaches to detect student engagement involve periodic human observations that are subject to inter-rater reliability. Our solution uses real-time multimodal multisensor data labeled by objective performance outcomes to infer the engagement of students. The study involves four students with a combined diagnosis of cerebral palsy and a learning disability who took part in a 3-month trial over 59 sessions. Multimodal multisensor data were collected while they participated in a continuous performance test. Eye gaze, electroencephalogram, body pose, and interaction data were used to create a model of student engagement through objective labeling from the continuous performance test outcomes. In order to achieve this, a type of continuous performance test is introduced, the Seek-X type. Nine features were extracted including high-level handpicked compound features. Using leave-one-out cross-validation, a series of different machine learning approaches were evaluated. Overall, the random forest classification approach achieved the best classification results. Using random forest, 93.3% classification for engagement and 42.9% accuracy for disengagement were achieved. We compared these results to outcomes from different models: AdaBoost, decision tree, k-Nearest Neighbor, naïve Bayes, neural network, and support vector machine. We showed that using a multisensor approach achieved higher accuracy than using features from any reduced set of sensors. We found that using high-level handpicked features can improve the classification accuracy in every sensor mode. Our approach is robust to both sensor fallout and occlusions. The single most important sensor feature to the classification of engagement and distraction was shown to be eye gaze. It has been shown that we can accurately predict the level of engagement of students with learning disabilities in a real-time approach that is not subject to inter-rater reliability, human observation or reliant on a single mode of sensor input. This will help teachers design interventions for a heterogeneous group of students, where teachers cannot possibly attend to each of their individual needs. Our approach can be used to identify those with the greatest learning challenges so that all students are supported to reach their full potential.

Keywords: Affective computing in education, affect detection, continuous performance test, engagement, flow, HCI, interaction, learning disabilities, machine learning, multimodal, multisensor, physiological sensors, Signal Detection Theory, student engagement.

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Authors: M. Rodionov, Z. Dedovets

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The article describes the theoretical concept of teaching secondary school students proof demonstration skills in mathematics. It describes in detail different levels of mastery of the concept of proof-which correspond to Piaget’s idea of there being three distinct and progressively more complex stages in the development of human reflection. Lessons for each level contain a specific combination of the visual-figurative components and deductive reasoning. It is vital at the transition point between levels to carefully and rigorously recalibrate teaching to reflect the development of more complex reflective understanding. This can apply even within the same age range, since students will develop at different speeds and to different potential. The authors argue that this requires an aware and adaptive approach to lessons to reflect this complexity and variation. The authors also contend that effective teaching which enables students to properly understand the implementation of proof arguments must develop specific competences. These are: understanding of the importance of completeness and generality in making a valid argument; being task focused; having an internalised locus of control and being flexible in approach and evaluation. These criteria must be correlated with the systematic application of corresponding methodologies which are best likely to achieve success. The particular pedagogical decisions which are made to deliver this objective are illustrated by concrete examples from the existing secondary school mathematics courses. The proposed theoretical concept formed the basis of the development of methodological materials which have been tested in 47 secondary schools.

Keywords: Education, teaching of mathematics, proof, deductive reasoning, secondary school.

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Authors: Christine K. Fulmer

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Social work education is competency based in nature. There is an expectation that graduates of social work programs throughout the world are to be prepared to practice at a level of competence, which is beneficial to both the well-being of individuals and community. Experiential learning is one way to prepare students for competent practice. The use of Problem-Based Learning (PBL) is a form experiential education that has been successful in a number of disciplines to bridge the gap between the theoretical concepts in the classroom to the real world. PBL aligns with the constructivist theoretical approach to learning, which emphasizes the integration of new knowledge with the beliefs students already hold. In addition, the basic tenants of PBL correspond well with the practice behaviors associated with social work practice including multi-disciplinary collaboration and critical thinking. This paper makes an argument for utilizing PBL in social work education.

Keywords: Constructivist theoretical approach, experiential learning, pedagogy, problem-based learning, social work education.

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Authors: Benjamin Osei Tutu, Rita Asante, Emefa Atsu

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Background: An outbreak of gastroenteritis occurred in December 2019 after students of a Senior High School in Accra were served with kenkey and fish during their dinner. An investigation was conducted to characterize the affected people, the source of contamination, the etiologic food and agent. Methods: An epidemiological study was conducted with cases selected from the student population who were ill. Controls were selected from among students who also ate from the school canteen during dinner but were not ill. Food history of each case and control was taken to assess their exposure status. Epi Info 7 was used to analyze the data obtained from the outbreak. Attack rates and odds ratios were calculated to determine the risk of foodborne infection for each of the foods consumed by the population. The source of contamination of the foods was ascertained by conducting an environmental risk assessment at the school. Results: Data were obtained from 126 students, out of which 57 (45.2%) were cases and 69 (54.8%) were controls. The cases presented with symptoms such as diarrhea (85.96%), abdominal cramps (66.67%), vomiting (50.88%), headache (21.05%), fever (17.86%) and nausea (3.51%). The peak incubation period was 18 hours with a minimum and maximum incubation periods of 6 and 50 hours respectively. From the incubation period, duration of illness and the symptoms, non-typhoidal salmonellosis was suspected. Multivariate analysis indicated that the illness was associated with the consumption of the fried fish served, however this was statistically insignificant (AOR 3.1.00, P = 0.159). No stool, blood or food samples were available for organism isolation and confirmation of suspected etiologic agent. The environmental risk assessment indicated poor hand washing practices on the part of both the food handlers and students. Conclusion: The outbreak could probably be due to the consumption of the fried fish that might have been contaminated with Salmonella sp. as a result of poor hand washing practices in the school.

Keywords: Case control study, food poisoning, handwashing, Salmonella, school.

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Authors: Yingying Ding

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This study presents a methodology of specialized translation with the objective of helping teachers to improve the strategies in teaching translation. In order to allow students to acquire skills to translate specialized texts, they need to become familiar with the semantic and syntactic features of source texts and target texts. The aim of our study is to use a corpus-based approach in the teaching of specialized translation between Chinese and Italian. This study proposes to construct a specialized Chinese - Italian comparable corpus that consists of 50 economic contracts from the domain of food. With the help of AntConc, we propose to compile a comparable corpus in for translation teaching purposes. This paper attempts to provide insight into how teachers could benefit from comparable corpus in the teaching of specialized translation from Italian into Chinese and through some examples of passive sentences how students could learn to apply different strategies for translating appropriately the voice.

Keywords: Corpus-based approach, translation teaching, specialized translation.

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Authors: Joanna Peksa, Faith Dillon-Lee

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Current developments in the Western economies have turned some universities into corporate institutions driven by practices of production and commodity. Academia is increasingly becoming integrated into national economies as a result of students paying fees and is consequently using business practices in student retention and engagement. With these changes, pedagogy status as a priority within the institution has been changing in light of these new demands. New strategies have blurred the boundaries that separate a student from a client. This led to a change of the dynamic, disrupting the traditional idea of the knowledge market, and emphasizing the corporate aspect of universities. In some cases, where students are seen primarily as a customer, the purpose of academia is no longer to educate but sell a commodity and retain fee-paying students. This paper considers opposing viewpoints on the commodification of higher education, reflecting on the reality of maintaining a pedagogic grounding in an increasingly commercialized sector. By analysing a case study of the Student Success Festival, an event that involved academic and marketing teams, the differences are considered between the respective visions of the pedagogic arm of the university and the corporate. This study argues that the initial concept of the event, based on the principles of gamification, independent learning, and cognitive criticality, was more clearly linked to a grounded pedagogic approach. However, when liaising with the marketing team in a crucial step in the creative process, it became apparent that these principles were not considered a priority in terms of their remit. While the study acknowledges in the power of pedagogy, the findings show that a pact of concord is necessary between different stakeholders in order for students to benefit fully from their learning experience. Nevertheless, while issues of power prevail and whenever power is unevenly distributed, reaching a consensus becomes increasingly challenging and further research should closely monitor the developments in pedagogy in the UK higher education.

Keywords: Economic pressure, commodification, pedagogy, gamification, public service, marketization.

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Authors: Cory A. Bennett

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Teaching and learning through the use of discourse support students’ conceptual understanding by attending to key concepts and relationships. One discourse structure used in primary classrooms is number talks wherein students mentally calculate, discuss, and reason about the appropriateness and efficiency of their strategies. In the secondary mathematics classroom, the mathematics understudy does not often lend itself to mental calculations yet learning to reason, and articulate reasoning, is central to learning mathematics. This qualitative case study discusses how one secondary school in the Middle East adapted the number talk protocol for secondary mathematics classrooms. Several challenges in implementing ‘reasoning talks’ became apparent including shifting current discourse protocols and practices to a more student-centric model, accurately recording and probing student thinking, and specifically attending to reasoning rather than computations.

Keywords: Discourse, reasoning, secondary mathematics, teacher development.

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Authors: Elke Mackensen

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Systems Engineering plays a key role during industrial product development of complex technical systems. The need for systems engineers in industry is growing. But there is a gap between the industrial need and the academic education. Normally the academic education is focused on the domain specific design, implementation and testing of technical systems. Necessary systems engineering expertise like knowledge about requirements analysis, product cost estimation, management or social skills are poorly taught. Thus there is the need of new academic concepts for teaching systems engineering skills. This paper presents a project-orientated training concept to prepare students from different technical degree programs for systems engineering activities. The training concept has been initially implemented and applied in the industrial engineering master program of the University of Applied Sciences Offenburg.

Keywords: Educational systems engineering training, requirements analysis, system modelling, SysML.

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Authors: Fauzy M. Wan, Reem S.A. Baragash

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This study examined the effects of two dynamic visualizations on 60 Malaysian primary school student-s performance (time on task), retention and transference. The independent variables in this study were the two dynamic visualizations, the video and the animated instructions. The dependent variables were the gain score of performance, retention and transference. The results showed that the students in the animation group significantly outperformed the students in the video group in retention. There were no significant differences in terms of gain scores in the performance and transference among the animation and the video groups, although the scores were slightly higher in the animation group compared to the video group. The conclusion of this study is that the animation visualization is superior compared to the video in the retention for a procedural task.

Keywords: Dynamic visualization, Procedural Task, Retention, Transference

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Authors: Neelam Vats, Madhvi Pathak Pillai, Rajender Lal, Indu Dabas

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The pressure of scoring higher marks to be able to get admission in a higher ranked institution has become a social stigma for school students. It leads to various social and academic pressures on them, causing psychological anxiety. This undue stress on students sometimes may even steer to aggressive behavior or suicidal tendencies. Human mind is always surrounded by the some desires, emotions and passions, which usually disturbs our mental peace. In such a scenario, we look for a solution that helps in removing all the obstacles of mind and make us mentally peaceful and strong enough to be able to deal with all kind of pressure. Preksha meditation is one such technique which aims at bringing the positive changes for overall transformation of personality. Hence, the present study was undertaken to assess the impact of Preksha Meditation on the academic anxiety on female teenagers. The study was conducted on 120 high school students from the capital city of India. All students were in the age group of 13-15 years. They also belonged to similar social as well as economic status. The sample was equally divided into two groups i.e. experimental group (N = 60) and control group (N = 60). Subjects of the experimental group were given the intervention of Preksha Meditation practice by the trained instructor for one hour per day, six days a week, for three months for the first experimental stage and another three months for the second experimental stage. The subjects of the control group were not assigned any specific type of activity rather they continued doing their normal official activities as usual. The Academic Anxiety Scale was used to collect data during multi-level stages i.e. pre-experimental stage, post-experimental stage phase-I, and post-experimental stage phase-II. The data were statistically analyzed by computing the two-tailed-‘t’ test for inter group comparison and Sandler’s ‘A’ test with alpha = or p < 0.05 for intra-group comparisons. The study concluded that the practice for longer duration of Preksha Meditation practice brings about very significant and beneficial changes in the pattern of academic anxiety.

Keywords: Academic anxiety, academic pressure, Preksha, meditation.

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Authors: Natalia Podkhodova, Olga Sheremeteva, Mariia Soldaeva

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Creating favourable conditions for students’ comprehension of mathematical content is one of the primary problems in teaching mathematics in secondary school. The fact of comprehension includes the ability to build a working situational model and thus becomes an important means of solving mathematical problems. This paper describes a holistic approach to teaching mathematics designed to address the primary challenges of such teaching; specifically, the challenge of students’ comprehension. Essentially, this approach consists of (1) establishing links between the attributes of the notion: the sense, the meaning, and the term; (2) taking into account the components of student’s subjective experience—value-based emotions, contextual, procedural and communicative—during the educational process; (3) linking together different ways to present mathematical information; (4) identifying and leveraging the relationships between real, perceptual and conceptual (scientific) mathematical spaces by applying real-life situational modelling. The article describes approaches to the practical use of these foundational concepts. Identifying how proposed methods and techniques influence understanding of material used in teaching mathematics was the primary goal. The study included an experiment in which 256 secondary school students took part: 142 in the study group and 114 in the control group. All students in these groups had similar levels of achievement in math and studied math under the same curriculum. In the course of the experiment, comprehension of two topics — “Derivative” and “Trigonometric functions”—was evaluated. Control group participants were taught using traditional methods. Students in the study group were taught using the holistic method: under teacher’s guidance, they carried out assignments designed to establish linkages between notion’s characteristics, to convert information from one mode of presentation to another, as well as assignments that required the ability to operate with all modes of presentation. Identification, accounting for and transformation of subjective experience were associated with methods of stimulating the emotional value component of the studied mathematical content (discussions of lesson titles, assignments aimed to create study dominants, performing theme-related physical exercise ...) The use of techniques that forms inter-subject notions based on linkages between, perceptual real and mathematical conceptual spaces proved to be of special interest to the students. Results of the experiment were analysed by presenting students in each of the groups with a final test in each of the studied topics. The test included assignments that required building real situational models. Statistical analysis was used to aggregate test results. Pierson criterion x2 was used to reveal statistics significance of results (pass-fail the modelling test). Significant difference of results was revealed (p < 0.001), which allowed to conclude that students in the study group showed better comprehension of mathematical information than those in the control group. The total number of completed assignments of each student was analysed as well, with average results calculated for each group. Statistical significance of result differences against the quantitative criterion (number of completed assignments) was determined using Student’s t-test, which showed that students in the study group completed significantly more assignments than those in the control group (p = 0.0001). Authors thus come to the conclusion that suggested increase in the level of comprehension of study material took place as a result of applying implemented methods and techniques.

Keywords: Comprehension of mathematical content, holistic approach to teaching mathematics in secondary school, subjective experience, technology of the formation of inter-subject notions.

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Authors: Nhon Van Do, Nam Hoai Le, Vien Chan Luong

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The Model for Knowledge Base of Computational Objects (KBCO model) has been successfully applied to represent the knowledge of human like Plane Geometry, Physical, Calculus. However, the original model cannot easyly apply in inorganic chemistry field because of the knowledge specific problems. So, the aim of this article is to introduce how we extend the Computional Object (Com-Object) in KBCO model, kinds of fact, problems model, and inference algorithms to develop a program for solving problems in inorganic chemistry. Our purpose is to develop the application that can help students in their study inorganic chemistry at schools. This application was built successful by using Maple, C# and WPF technology. It can solve automatically problems and give human readable solution agree with those writting by students and teachers.

Keywords: artificial intelligence, automated problem solving, knowledge base system, knowledge representation, reasoning strategy, education software/educational applications.

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Authors: Nima Babazadeh Gashti, Nazanin Pilevari

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Increase in using internet makes some problems that one of them is "internet anxiety". Internet anxiety is a type of anxious that people may feel during surfing internet or using internet for their educational purpose, blogging or streaming to digital libraries. The goal of this study is evaluating of internet anxiety among the management students. In this research Ealy's internet anxiety questionnaire, consists of positive and negative items, is completed by 310 participants. According to the findings, about 64.7% of them were equal or below to mean anxiety score (50). The distribution of internet anxiety scores was normal and there was no meaningful difference between men-s and women's anxiety level in this sample. Results also showed that there is no meaningful difference of internet anxiety level between different fields of study in Management. This evaluation will help managers to perform gap analysis between the existent level and the desired one. Future work would be providing techniques for abating human anxiety while using internet via human computer interaction techniques.

Keywords: Internet, anxiety, research process, internet identification, human computer interaction.

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Authors: G.S. Abdiraiymova, D.K. Burkhanova, G.A. Kenzhakimova

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Education in the modern world provides the socioeconomic progress of society. In today's society, where the presence of large middle class ensures its stability and is a symbol of resolution of hidden economic problems, education is an integral part of formation and reproduction of the middle class. This article presents part of results of the sociological study conducted under the project "Kazakhstan model of education: international experience and national traditions" supported by the Foundation of the First President of Republic of Kazakhstan - Leader of the Nation to determine the ratio of students to the transformations of the educational system. The authors conclude that the Kazakhstani system of education, passing through the transformation processes, improving the quality of educational programs and trying to correspond to the international standards, not yet in full range, but begins to perform important functions in the formation of the middle class.

Keywords: Higher education, middle class, reforms, students, transformation processes.

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Authors: Badr Hssina, Belaid Bouikhalene, Abdelkrim Merbouha

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This article presents our prototype MASET (Multi Agents System for E-Tutoring Learners engaged in online collaborative work). MASET that we propose is a system which basically aims to help tutors in monitoring the collaborative work of students and their various interactions. The evaluation of such interactions by the tutor is based on the results provided by the automatic analysis of the interaction indicators. This system is predicated upon the middleware JADE (Java Agent Development Framework) and e-learning Moodle platform. The MASET environment is modeled by AUML which allows structuring the different interactions between agents for the fulfillment and performance of online collaborative work. This multi-agent system has been the subject of a practical experimentation based on the interactions data between Master Computer Engineering and System students.

Keywords: AUML, Collaborative work, E-learning, E-tutoring, JADE, Moodle, SMA, Web Agent.

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Authors: Elizabeth M. Hodge, Sharon K. Collins, Eric Kisling

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Virtual environments are a hot topic in academia and more importantly in courses offered via distance education. Today-s gaming generation view virtual worlds as strong social and interactive mediums for communicating and socializing. And while institutions of higher education are challenged with increasing enrollment while balancing budget cuts, offering effective courses via distance education become a valid option. Educators can utilize virtual worlds to offer students an enhanced learning environment which has the power to alleviate feelings of isolation through the promotion of communication, interaction, collaboration, teamwork, feedback, engagement and constructivists learning activities. This paper focuses on the use of virtual environments to facilitate interaction in distance education courses so as to produce positive learning outcomes for students. Furthermore, the instructional strategies were reviewed and discussed for use in virtual worlds to enhance learning within a social context.

Keywords: Virtual Environments, Second Life, Instructional Strategies and Technology

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Authors: M. T. Becerra, F. Martín, P. Gutiérrez, S. Cubo, E. Iglesias, A. A. Sáenz del Castillo, P. Cañamero

Abstract:

The consolidation of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) in universities has led to significant changes in student training. This paper, part of a Teaching Innovation Project, starts from new training requirements that are fit within Undergraduate Thesis Project, a subject that culminate student learning. Undergraduate Thesis Project is current assessment system that weigh the student acquired training in university education. Students should develop a range of cross curricular competences such as public presentation of ideas, problems and solutions both orally and writing in Undergraduate Thesis Project. Specifically, we intend with our innovation proposal to provide resources that enable university students from Teacher Degree in Education Faculty of University of Extremadura (Spain) to develop the cross curricular competence of public speaking.

Keywords: Interaction, Public Speaking, Student, University.

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Authors: What Factors Contributed to the Adaptation Gap during School Transition in Japan?

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The present study was aimed to examine the structure of children’s adaptation during school transition and to identify a commonality and dissimilarity at the elementary and junior high school. 1,983 students in the 6th grade and 2,051 students in the 7th grade were extracted by stratified two-stage random sampling and completed the ASSESS that evaluated the school adaptation from the view point of ‘general satisfaction’, ‘teachers’ support’, ‘friends’ support’, ‘anti-bullying relationship’, ‘prosocial skills’, and ‘academic adaptation’. The 7th graders tend to be worse adaptation than the 6th graders. A structural equation modeling showed the goodness of fit for each grades. Both models were very similar but the 7th graders’ model showed a lower coefficient at the pass from ‘teachers’ support’ to ‘friends’ support’. The role of ‘teachers’ support’ was decreased to keep a good relation in junior high school. We also discussed how we provide a continuous assistance for prevention of the 7th graders’ gap.

Keywords: School transition, social support, psychological adaptation, K-12.

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Authors: Premvadee Na Nakornpanom

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Code- mixing in spontaneous speech has been widely discussed, but not in virtual situations; especially in context of the third language learning students. Thus, this study is an attempt to explore the linguistic characteristics of the mixing of Japanese, English and Thai in a mobile Line chat room by students with their background of English as L2, Japanese as L3 and Thai as mother tongue. The result found that insertion of Thai content words is a very common linguistic phenomenon embedded with the other two languages in the sentences. As chatting is to be ‘relational’ or ‘interactional’, it affected the style of lexical choices to be speech-like, more personal and emotionally-related. A personal pronoun in Japanese is often mixed into the sentences. The Japanese sentence-final question particle か “ka” was added to the end of the sentence based on Thai grammar rules. Some unique characteristics were created while chatting.

Keywords: Code-mixing, Japanese, English, Thai, Line chat.

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Authors: Inna R. Edara, Haw-Lin Wu

Abstract:

Positive psychology investigates human strengths and virtues and promotes well-being. Relying on this assumption, positive interventions have been continuously designed to build pleasure and happiness, joy and contentment, engagement and meaning, hope and optimism, satisfaction and gratitude, spirituality, and various other positive measures of well-being. In line with this model of positive psychology and interventions, this study investigated certain measures of well-being in a group of 45 students enrolled in an 18-week positive psychology course and simultaneously engaged in service-oriented interventions that they chose for themselves based on the course content and individual interests. Students’ well-being was measured at the beginning and end of the course. The well-being indicators included positive automatic thoughts, optimism and hope, satisfaction with life, and spirituality. A paired-samples t-test conducted to evaluate the impact of class content and service-oriented interventions on students’ scores of well-being indicators indicated statistically significant increase from pre-class to post-class scores. There were also significant gender differences in post-course well-being scores, with females having higher levels of well-being than males. A two-way between groups analysis of variance indicated a significant interaction effect of age by gender on the post-course well-being scores, with females in the age group of 56-65 having the highest scores of well-being in comparison to the males in the same age group. Regression analyses indicated that positive automatic thought significantly predicted hope and satisfaction with life in the pre-course analysis. In the post-course regression analysis, spiritual transcendence made a significant contribution to optimism, and positive automatic thought made a significant contribution to both hope and satisfaction with life. Finally, a significant test between pre-course and post-course regression coefficients indicated that the regression coefficients at pre-course were significantly different from post-course coefficients, suggesting that the positive psychology course and the interventions were helpful in raising the levels of well-being. The overall results suggest a substantial increase in the participants’ well-being scores after engaging in the positive-oriented interventions, implying a need for designing more positive interventions in education to promote well-being.  

Keywords: Hope, optimism, positive automatic thoughts, satisfaction with life, spirituality, well-being.

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Authors: Peter Clutterbuck, Terry Rowlands, Owen Seamons

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In this paper we describe one critical research program within a complex, ongoing multi-year project (2010 to 2014 inclusive) with the overall goal to improve the learning outcomes for first year undergraduate commerce/business students within an Information Systems (IS) subject with very large enrolment. The single research program described in this paper is the analysis of student attitudes and decision making in relation to the availability of formative assessment feedback via Web-based real time conferencing and document exchange software (Adobe Connect). The formative assessment feedback between teaching staff and students is in respect of an authentic problem-based, team-completed assignment. The analysis of student attitudes and decision making is investigated via both qualitative (firstly) and quantitative (secondly) application of the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) with a two statistically-significant and separate trial samples of the enrolled students. The initial qualitative TPB investigation revealed that perceived self-efficacy, improved time-management, and lecturer-student relationship building were the major factors in shaping an overall favorable student attitude to online feedback, whilst some students expressed valid concerns with perceived control limitations identified within the online feedback protocols. The subsequent quantitative TPB investigation then confirmed that attitude towards usage, subjective norms surrounding usage, and perceived behavioral control of usage were all significant in shaping student intention to use the online feedback protocol, with these three variables explaining 63 percent of the variance in the behavioral intention to use the online feedback protocol. The identification in this research of perceived behavioral control as a significant determinant in student usage of a specific technology component within a virtual learning environment (VLE) suggests that VLEs could now be viewed not as a single, atomic entity, but as a spectrum of technology offerings ranging from the mature and simple (e.g., email, Web downloads) to the cutting-edge and challenging (e.g., Web conferencing and real-time document exchange). That is, that all VLEs should not be considered the same. The results of this research suggest that tertiary students have the technological sophistication to assess a VLE in this more selective manner.

Keywords: Formative assessment feedback, virtual learning environment, theory of planned behavior, perceived behavioral control.

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Authors: Yi-Chun Chang, Jian-Wei Li

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Web-based cooperative learning focuses on (1) the interaction and the collaboration of community members, and (2) the sharing and the distribution of knowledge and expertise by network technology to enhance learning performance. Numerous research literatures related to web-based cooperative learning have demonstrated that cooperative scripts have a positive impact to specify, sequence, and assign cooperative learning activities. Besides, literatures have indicated that role-play in web-based cooperative learning environments enhances two or more students to work together toward the completion of a common goal. Since students generally do not know each other and they lack the face-to-face contact that is necessary for the negotiation of assigning group roles in web-based cooperative learning environments, this paper intends to further extend the application of genetic algorithm (GA) and propose a GA-based algorithm to tackle the problem of role assignment in web-based cooperative learning environments, which not only saves communication costs but also reduces conflict between group members in negotiating role assignments.

Keywords: genetic algorithm (GA), role assignment, role-play; web-based cooperative learning.

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Authors: Etsuo Morishita

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This paper presents the project and experiment-based fluid dynamics education in Meisei University, a private institution in Tokyo, Japan. We pay attention not only to the basic engineering courses but also to the practical aspect of engineering experience. So, we prepare courses called the Projects from I to VI. The Projects I and II are designed for the first year, III and IV are designated for the second year, V and VI are prepared for the third year, respectively. Each supervisor is responsible for two of these projects every year. When students take the Project V and VI at the third year, we automatically assume that these students will join the lab of the project for the graduation thesis. We would like to show our experience in the Project I in the summer term, 2016. In this project, we introduce a traction flight vehicle called Cat Flyer. This is a kind of a kite towed by a car for example. This is very similar to parasailing, but flight is possible even on the roads. Experiments in mechanical engineering education are also very important, and we would like to explain our course on centrifugal pump, venture, and orifice. Although these are described in detail in the text books of fluid dynamics, it is still crucial to have practical experiments as a student.

Keywords: Aerodynamics, experiment, fluid dynamics, project.

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