Authentic Contexts Research Articles

Classification of Features across Five CURE Networks Reveals Opportunities to Improve Course Design, Instruction, and Equity.

Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) are tools used to introduce students to authentic participation in science. Several specific CUREs have been shown to benefit students' interest and retention in the biological sciences. Nevertheless, CUREs vary greatly in terms of their context, methodology, and degree of research authenticity, so different types of CUREs may differently influence student outcomes. This programmatic diversity poses a challenge to educators who want to better understand which course components and features are reliably present in a CURE curriculum. To address these issues, we identified, catalogued, and classified 112 potential features of CUREs across the biosciences. To develop the list, we interviewed instructors experienced with teaching individual and large networked CUREs across a diversity of the biological disciplines, including: Squirrel-Net (field-based animal behavior), SEA-PHAGES (wet lab microbiology and computational microbiology), Tiny Earth (environmental and wet lab microbiology), PARE (environmental microbiology), and the Genomics Education Partnership (eukaryotic computational biology). Twenty-five interviewees contributed expert content in terms of CURE features and classification of those items into an organized list. The resulting list's categories encompasses student experiences with the following: (i) the scientific process; (ii) technical aspects of science; (iii) the professional development associated with research; and (iv) building scientific identity. The most striking insight was that CUREs vary widely in terms of which features they contain, since different CUREs will by necessity have different approaches to science and student involvement. We also identified several features commonly thought to be crucial to CUREs yet have ambiguous definitions. This ambiguity can potentially confound efforts to make CUREs research-authentic and aligned with the central goals of science. We disambiguate these terms and represent their varied meanings throughout the classification. We also provide instructor-friendly supplementary worksheets along with considerations for instructors interested in expanding their CURE course design, instruction, and equity.

Addressing Emotions and Beliefs for Vulnerable Jobseekers with Virtual Reality

Virtual reality (VR) technologies have been shown to impact the affective and motivational dimensions of learning, for example increasing learners’ enjoyment, confidence, and self-efficacy beliefs. While VR is increasingly being used for workforce development, research on these dimensions of learning in authentic workforce development contexts remains thin. This mixed-method case study addressed the need for more research on VR’s affordances for engaging affective dimensions of learning. We investigated the impact of a job interview VR simulation on the emotions, confidence, and self-efficacy beliefs of jobseekers who have been impacted by the criminal justice system. By observing the implementation of this application in an authentic workforce development context, we also addressed questions about how VR use and facilitation vary among participants. We find compelling evidence that a VR job interview simulation tailored to the experiences of people impacted by the criminal justice system can alleviate some of the emotional toll the job search takes on this vulnerable population, but we did not find evidence of changes in their self-efficacy beliefs. We discuss ways participants described the simulation as authentic practice, and how its facilitation and use varied, emphasizing the importance of VR design as a tool within a broader instructional context.

Investigation of Facilitating English Speaking of Elementary School Students in Authentic Contexts with UEnglish

Despite the importance of English in various aspects of life, students learning English as a foreign language often lack sufficient opportunities to practice speaking in their daily lives. To address these issues, this study proposes an innovative mobile app called Ubiquitous English (UEnglish) that facilitates English speaking learning in authentic contexts anytime and anywhere. Leveraging advanced technologies, UEnglish incorporates automatic speech recognition (ASR), cloud machine translation (MT), and text-to-speech (TTS) functionalities. The primary aim of this study is to assess the impact of UEnglish on students’ English speaking ability, specifically focusing on the quality and quantity of their spoken English when describing comic pictures and authentic pictures. To investigate the learning behaviors and the influence on English speaking learning achievement in this study, 56 fifth-grade students were employed, including 28 students in an experimental group (EG) using UEnglish and 28 students in a control group (CG) with a paper-based teaching method. The results indicated that, after the experiment, EG outperformed CG and EG had significant differences in the quality and quantity of English speaking in the context of describing comic pictures and authentic pictures. Students’ learning portfolios revealed that EG students not only could use more English words and more complex sentences to express their thoughts but also easily applied what they learned when encountering similar contexts. Our findings suggested that authentic contextual English learning with UEnglish was helpful for students to practice speaking English related to their surroundings.

Investigation of Learning Experiences of Primary School Students with Mathematics Learning Disability with Authentic Activities

This study aimed to examine the primary school children learning experiences with mathematics learning difficulties in authentic contexts. Eight primary school students with mathematics difficulties participated in the research as multiple case studies. Research data were obtained with three different data collection methods. These were determined as semi-structured interviews (before and after observation), in-class observation and document review. At the end, as the result of the data collection process, which lasted for a total of five months, the students’ opinions showed that; Mathematics teaching supported by authentic activities brought along features such as familiar problems, well-defined tasks, cognitive support, authentic assessment and reflection. In addition, it was seen from the student data who participated in all of the authentic tasks that; Students who participated in authentic tasks with their peers, teachers, or parents had higher completion rates.

Improving EFL Teaching in Chinese Universities: Perceptions of Teachers with Oversea Experience

This study aimed to investigate the perceptions of English teachers regarding the adverse effects of teaching English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in China, as well as their proposals for improving EFL instruction in the country. By exploring the views of experienced English teachers, this study provides valuable insights into how English as a Foreign Language pedagogy can be improved in China and other countries. The main research question is about the adverse effects of teaching English as a Foreign Language in Chinese higher education and the ways to improve its instruction. A thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews was conducted on a sample of 20 English teachers who possessed substantial experience teaching in Chinese higher education institutions. The participants’ teaching experience ranged from 3-20 years (SD = 5.3). The analysis involved the establishment of concordant codes and sub-codes, with the aid of two researchers and an external expert, to ensure the reliability and validity of the results. The findings showed that the teachers attributed English as a Foreign Language learners’ English deficiencies to the English teaching curriculum, self-directed learning, and the education system. Finally, the teachers suggested that self-directed learning skills and self-regulation were crucial for effectively applying language in authentic contexts. These findings have implications beyond China and are expected to enhance English pedagogy in other English as a Foreign Language countries. Thus, this research may contribute to improving the effectiveness of English teaching in China and other countries by providing a deeper understanding of the challenges and potential solutions associated with English as a Foreign Language instruction.

Enhancing Self-Directed Learning Readiness in Entrepreneurship Education

Worldwide entrepreneurship education (EE) is gaining popularity as an employability skill to prepare learners for a future of adaptability and lifelong learning. Its scholarship, however, is concerned that we have lost sight of what works, why, and how in EE. This is especially true for such novel learning objectives as preparation for lifelong learning. This quasi-experimental, mixed methods research sought answers to the question: of how EE pedagogy influences students’ self-directed learning readiness (SDLR). Statistically significant relations were found, especially between self-efficacy and SDLR. The impact of EE was found to be highly significant, which was explained by the effect of a stage-wise, mixed pedagogy approach to teaching/learning. Enhancement of self-efficacy and motivation for self-directed learning was found to benefit from a continuous cyclical teaching-learning process combining passive, participative and self-steered learning within and throughout each step of the learning process, in simulated and authentic learning contexts.

Representational-mapping strategies improve learning from an online statistics textbook.

Using multiple representations is an important part of learning and problem-solving in science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields. For students to acquire flexible knowledge of representations, they must attend to the structural information within each representation and practice making relational connections between representations. Most studies so far have only attempted to help students connect between multiple representations in the lab or short-term classroom interventions, with the intervention largely separated from students' authentic learning. The present study developed a representation-mapping intervention designed to help students interpret, coordinate, and eventually translate across multiple representations. We integrated the intervention into an online textbook being used in a college course, allowing us to study its impact in a real course over an extended period of time. The findings of this study support the efficacy of the representation-mapping intervention for facilitating learning and shed light on how to implement and refine such interventions in authentic learning contexts. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Preparing preservice teachers for working with students with intellectual disability: evaluating the impact of supplementary fieldwork experiences

ABSTRACT In this paper, the utility of instruments for evaluating how well preservice teachers are being prepared for teaching students with intellectual disability in inclusive classrooms are explored. This included an investigation using an instrument to assess the attitudes of first-year preservice teachers (PSTs) toward individuals with intellectual disability (n = 96) and to measure changes in PSTs’ attitudes after participating in a supplementary fieldwork experience that involved tutoring young adults with intellectual disability (n = 39). Results revealed that PSTs held generally positive attitudes, particularly those who had previous experience with people with intellectual disability. Involvement in the tutoring programme contributed further to promoting productive attitudes among PSTs by decreasing levels of discomfort when interacting with people with intellectual disability, but counterintuitively tempered their endorsement of inclusion in schools. While more opportunities for PSTs to work alongside students with intellectual disability in authentic contexts are needed to prepare them for the reality of being inclusive educators, our findings suggest that the current ways these opportunities are designed and assessed need further investigation.

ChemVLab+: Integrating Next Generation Science Standards Practices with Chemistry

The Next Generation Science Standards encourage students to develop the reasoning and practice skills of scientists. Rather than promoting rote memorization, teachers engage students with real-world phenomena and prompt students to think critically. ChemVLab+ is a series of freely available, online modules that require students to reason like chemists by integrating core concepts with investigations in authentic contexts. Each activity reflects four key design principles as well as a novel framework for developing chemical reasoning specific to the practice of designing and interpreting experiments. The current paper describes the development and testing of the ChemVLab+ modules. A within-teacher randomized control trial study (treatment = 15 class sections with 371 students; control 14 class sections with 332 students) found that students using the ChemVLab+ modules outperformed students completing a set of active control modules that offered a more traditional instructional approach and problem-solving opportunities. ChemVLab+ students scored higher than their active control peers on 7 of 8 module quizzes and performed particularly well on open-ended response items that were focused on chemical reasoning for experiments. Analyses of demographic effects also revealed a positive interaction between BIPOC students and the ChemVlab+ intervention.

Causal reasoning with causal graphs in educational technology research

AbstractResearchers tasked with understanding the effects of educational technology innovations face the challenge of providing evidence of causality. Given the complexities of studying learning in authentic contexts interwoven with technological affordances, conducting tightly-controlled randomized experiments is not always feasible nor desirable. Today, a set of tools is available that can help researchers reason about cause-and-effect, irrespective of the particular research design or approach. This theoretical paper introduces such a tool, a simple graphical formalism that can be used to reason about potential sources of bias. We further explain how causal graphs differ from structural equation models and highlight the value of explicit causal inference. The final section shows how causal graphs can be used in several stages of the research process, whether researchers plan to conduct observational or experimental research.

Design and Application of Intelligent Classroom for English Language and Literature Based on Artificial Intelligence Technology

ABSTRACT The phenomenon of economic globalization has led to a greater intermingling of economy and culture, which has brought about new demands for innovative talent cultivation in universities. To meet these demands, universities need to cultivate more students with high language ability who are capable of communicating and exchanging ideas between different cultures. This requires universities to innovate their language cultivation programs and improve students’ language ability and cultural literacy. The cultivation of international language ability, particularly in English language and literature, plays a vital role in enhancing students’ comprehensive language literacy. However, traditional teaching methods have been found to be less effective in achieving desired learning outcomes. As such, there is a need to adopt more innovative teaching methods that stimulate students’ interest in learning and facilitate their experience of English language and literature in authentic cultural contexts. One promising approach to achieve these objectives is through the integration of smart classroom teaching and artificial intelligence (AI) technology. This approach offers a range of benefits, including personalized learning experiences, real-time feedback, and interactive engagement. Furthermore, the application of AI technology can assist teachers in guiding students to experience the cultural background of English language and literature in English situations, helping students to exercise their English language application skills. This paper proposes a method and application assessment for designing a smart classroom for English language and literature based on AI technology. The primary aim of this approach is to help students become familiar with the English context and cultural background, thereby improving their overall language proficiency. The proposed approach seeks to facilitate a more engaging and effective learning experience for students, allowing them to develop their language skills and cultural literacy in a meaningful and impactful way.

Oh Deer … Practicing Scientific Inquiry and Data Literacy through an Authentic Gazelle Data Set

Large data sets invite students to engage in scientific practices such as question asking, identifying correlations, using visualizations, and practicing data literacy in an authentic context. However, authentic data sets are rarely introduced in the biology classroom. We prepared an online inquiry activity based on authentic gross characteristics of a gazelle data set. These included gazelle’s weight, location (longitude and latitude), collection date, and measured lengths of body parts. In constructing the activity, we considered the following design principles: use of high-quality authentic data, choice of a wide data set to allow multiple research questions, and exposure of the participants to basic data science tools. The activity starts with an introduction to data sets and guided data analysis, and it ends with independent research of a large gazelle data set. The activity was experienced by 121 teachers and was found to promote higher-order research questions. Before the activity, most of the teachers’ questions focused on gazelle properties—first-order questions, according to Dillon’s (1984) classification of research questions. Following the activity, most questions belonged to the comparison and contingencies categories (second- and third-order questions, respectively). Thus, this activity might serve to expand the biology teacher’s toolbox in teaching inquiry and data literacy.

A virtual reality-based collaborative argument mapping approach in the EFL classroom

ABSTRACT In language learning, it is important to foster students’ computational thinking and improve their skills of building arguments and dialectical structure, teamwork, and decision accuracy. This is especially so in English language courses which aim to promote students’ cultural learning interest, creative thinking, and oral presentation. Collaborative argument mapping is an appropriate strategy to elicit those objectives. However, in the emergency distance learning (EDL) context, when online instruction lacks real-world learning and face-to-face interaction, it is challenging to teach units on cultural issues in authentic contexts. Therefore, in this study, the virtual reality-based collaborative argument mapping approach was developed to address this problem. A quasi-experiment was designed with a total of 45 EFL (English as a Foreign Language) students. The experimental result showed that the virtual reality-based collaborative argument mapping approach (VR-CAM) improved the students’ English oral presentation more than did the non-virtual reality-based collaborative argument mapping approach (non-VR-CAM). Although the VR-CAM group scored higher than the non-VR-CAM group on cultural learning interest, the two groups did not significantly differ. Furthermore, in the computational and creative thinking aspects, students who learned with VR-CAM performed significantly better than those who learned with non-VR-CAM over time.

Practical Research on Corpus-based Translation Teaching Modes of College English

Based on the practical research of a corpus-based translation teaching, this article discusses the importance of translation teaching in college English. While traditional translation teaching has been criticized for its focus on English culture only and outdated teaching methods, corpus-based translation teaching would meet the demand, which utilizes technology to provide authentic language input and improve translation competence. The benefits of corpus-based teaching include exposure to authentic language input and cultural context, while the challenges include the need for specialized training and balancing the use of corpora with other teaching methods. To prepare for the future, translation educators should emphasize technology skills and incorporate real-world translation examples and scenarios.

Participatory Inquiries That Promote Consideration of Socio-Scientific Issues Related to Sustainability within Three Different Contexts: Agriculture, Botany and Palaeontology

The involvement of students in dramatised inquiries, through participatory activity, offers opportunities to act in-role as scientists. The inquiries can ‘set-the-scene’, provide context and challenges for students to consider possibilities within and beyond everyday life. This approach can engage students in thinking about sustainability and developing citizenship competencies, such as thinking scientifically and critiquing ideas, interrogating evidence and assessing the validity of information, as well as decision making and problem solving. In this paper, adopting stories from the history of science is shown to provide rich, authentic contexts that engage students imaginatively and collaboratively in addressing past, present and future socio-scientific issues. To demonstrate how the approach can be adapted we drew on the work of three scientists: an agriculturalist; a botanist and a palaeontologist. Their scientific work informed the learning activities of several primary science lessons (with students aged 9–10). The agricultural activities were informed by the work of George Washington Carver and were related to improving soil quality through crop rotation as well as thinking about the diversity of food and other products that can be produced from plants. The botanically informed activities promoted understanding about processes linked to maintaining species diversity. These drew on the work of Marianne North, a Victorian botanical artist, noted for her detailed plant observations. The final socio-scientific context was related to the work of Mary Anning, a pioneering 19th century palaeontologist, who made significant fossil discoveries that contributed to the understanding of geology and evolution. Interactive and participatory activities, informed by the lives and work of these scientists, were designed to engage students in socio-scientific inquiry-based learning through a drama-based pedagogy. These dramatised inquiries promoted the development of scientific citizenship competencies. Scrutiny of data collected through multiple methods suggested that, by extending opportunities for learners to participate in these dramatised lessons, understanding sustainability became more salient for the students. Outcomes suggest several distinctive affordances offered by dramatisation when supporting understanding about sustainability and the development of scientific citizenship.

Investigating the impact of context-awareness smart learning mechanism on EFL conversation learning

ABSTRACT Drama learning is helpful for English speaking, however, few studies provided students with opportunities to practice drama conversations individually. This study proposed a Context-Awareness Smart Learning Mechanism (CASLM) and integrated into SmartVpen that consisted of context-aware learning content, context-aware input assistance, oral recognition feedback, peer cooperative learning, and smart conversation robot. The participants were 68 eighth grade-students divided into three groups: an experimental group (EG) who used SmartVpen, a control group 1 (CG1) who used typical camera and voice recorder, and a control group 2 (CG2) who used papers and pencils. The results showed the EG outperformed the other groups concerning oral and conversational skills, which indicated the use of SmartVpen had significant effects in both English oral speaking and conversational skills. Additionally, the number of time to complete conversation practices can predict students’ oral performance by 30%. Furthermore, the results also showed the EG tend to practice drama conversations more frequently than the CG1, which demonstrated practicing English drama conversations using SmartVpen can effectively improve students’ learning motivation. Thus, we suggested English conversations practice activities should be conducted in authentic context with SmartVpen to support students’ speaking and facilitate them to apply what they learned in real-life situations.

Examining middle school students’ attitudes toward computing after participating in a physical computing unit

ABSTRACT Providing greater access to computer science (CS) education for K-12 students in the United States (U.S.) has increased interest in integrating CS concepts within authentic science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) contexts. Physical computing is one method that has demonstrated promising results in other countries (e.g. England) and has been receiving growing attention in the U.S., yet there remains limited research on physical computing within the U.S. Therefore, this study utilized a modified version of the Computing Attitude Questionnaire (Yadav, A., Mayfield, C., Zhou, N., Hambrusch, S., & Korb, J. T. (2014). Computational thinking in elementary and secondary teacher education. ACM Transactions on Computing Education, 14(1), 1–16) to examine changes in 71 middle school students’ attitudes toward computing after participating in a four-week physical computing unit. Students reported significant gains in all five computing attitude constructs (definition, comfort, interest, classroom applications, and career/future use). Further analyses revealed male students had significantly greater gains than females in the career/future use construct, and there were no significant differences when controlling for completion of prior engineering design coursework (PEDC). Additionally, while the majority (77%) of students indicated they preferred physical computing over screen-based experiences for future computing lessons, analyses found gender and PEDC were not significant predictors of students’ preference for learning computing concepts. This study provides implications for improving computer science instruction within authentic STEM contexts.

Specificity, Authenticity, and Inseparability: Assessing Integrated Oral Skills for Pilots and Air Traffic Controllers

Because the stakes are so high when assessing the oral language skills of pilots and air traffic controllers, they deserve to be tested in the use of the most specific language features of aviation English and in the most authentic context of their professions. In this talk I will discuss the problem of defining language specificity for professional purposes, the problem of reproducing authentic contexts in assessments, and the problem of the inseparability of language knowledge and professional background knowledge. In terms of specificity, I will talk about “Codes of Relevance,” which relate language use to specific professional contexts. The notion of authenticity is paramount since, unless pilot and ATC test takers can relate to the professional context in a realistic manner, then the judgments we make concerning their language abilities may not be valid. Finally, I will discuss the consequences of the notion that language knowledge and professional background knowledge are theoretically and practically inseparable.

Satan Shoes or Satan Speech? Balancing Trademark and First Amendment Rights in the Altered Authentic Goods Context

Satan Shoes or Satan Speech? Balancing Trademark and First Amendment Rights in the Altered Authentic Goods Context

Effectiveness of Virtual Reality on Chinese as a second language vocabulary learning: perceptions from international students

This study explores the effectiveness of Virtual Reality (VR) in Chinese as a second language (CSL) vocabulary learning from the international students’ perspective. A new theoretical framework of VR-based vocabulary learning was designed and verified to serve the investigation. A total of 30 international students learning CSL in a Chinese university participated in the study. Data were collected through vocabulary tests, a VR-based vocabulary learning questionnaire, and semi-structured interviews. Findings indicate that the VR approach can effectively facilitate students’ vocabulary learning and retention, as well as a positive learning experience. VR provides an authentic and repetition-enabled learning context. In an immersive environment, a higher rate of engagement in interactions and multimodal, immediate, and learner-friendly scaffolding benefit students’ VR-based vocabulary learning. Results also indicate that VR can motivate students to be actively involved in learning and build their language skills despite some challenges. Investigation of a wider range of learners with different backgrounds and language levels, and the differences between VR-based learning and traditional learning is recommended for future research. Additionally, CSL teachers’ perceptions are worthy of consideration.