Database Management Course Research Articles

Students’ Achievement in a Flipped Database Management Course: The Impact of Flow Theory Gamification Elements

Aim/Purpose: The study aimed to investigate the effect of using the gamified flipped classroom instructional method on the students’ overall achievement compared to the traditional non-gamified, non-gamified flipped classroom, and traditional gamified instructional methods. Background: Flipped classroom is helpful to address limited class time, implement different pedagogies, and help students better attain their learning outcomes and improve their academic achievement. Motivating and encouraging students to perform or complete flipped learning activities is a challenging issue affecting the success of the flipped classroom. This research posits that gamification presents a promising solution, and adding gamification to the flipped classroom is important for its success. However, little is known about the effects of integrating gamification into flipped learning without sufficient results to generalize. Pedagogical designs with appropriate theoretical foundations should be added to the literature on flipped learning and gamification. This research proposes a learning model that combines gamification within flipped classroom via quizzes online platform with the main flow theory requirements. The purpose of this combination is to motivate and engage learners in flipped classroom activities. Methodology: The data were collected from 101 undergraduate students in a database management course at Al al-Bayt University in Jordan. The students were assigned to four different instructional methods according to their preferences (traditional non-gamified, non-gamified flipped, traditional gamified, and gamified flipped classroom). A study with a quasi-experimental factorial design was carried out using midterm and final exam instruments to assess the students’ overall achievement. Two-way factorial ANOVA was employed to examine the main effect of the instructional method, student gender, and the interaction effect on students’ overall achievement. Bonferroni’s multiple comparisons test was carried out to compare and determine which instructional method had the main effect and achieved the best grades among test groups. Contribution: The current study proposed a gamified flipped learning model guided by the theoretical foundations of flow theory. This study offers a novel contribution to the literature by illustrating the importance of employing gamification in the flipped classroom and how the gamified flipped instructional method affects student achievement, especially when appropriate gamification design and careful game element selection. The effects reported by this study provide empirical evidence and valuable insights for researchers, practitioners, and educators about the issues of gamified flipped classroom and guide instructional designers to apply appropriate game elements. Findings: The findings showed that the gamified flipped group outperformed the other three groups and significantly improved students’ overall achievement with a large effect size. Employing gamification within the flipped classroom instructional method improved 23.9% of the total variance in the students’ achievement through increasing their motivation to complete flipped classroom activities. It has also been found that the non-gamified flipped group outperformed both the traditional non-gamified and the traditional gamified groups. Students’ gender was also not a significant factor regarding male and female achievement in using gamified flipped classroom. Recommendations for Practitioners: This study recommends that instructors who utilize flipped classroom should combine other new technologies within in-class activities, such as gamification, instead of traditional discussion in classroom meetings. Thus, the in-class activities become more attractive, increasing their students’ motivation. Recommendation for Researchers: Researchers need to understand the factors enhancing the flipped learning activities and the ways of designing and implementing gamification elements to develop new learning models. Impact on Society: Gamified flipped learning can help students improve their achievement and help instructors perform in-class instructional activities, leading to more effective and efficient higher education. Appropriate design and use of gamification elements within flipped learning can promote and encourage the use of such a model. Future Research: Additional research should be conducted to explore and measure students’ motivation, engagement, and in-class collaboration due to the gamified flipped classroom instructional model. Further experimental studies on other courses in different environmental variables are also recommended.

Implementing Team-Based Learning: Findings From a Database Class

Aim/Purpose: The complexity of today’s organizational databases highlights the importance of hard technical skills as well as soft skills including teamwork, communication, and problem-solving. Therefore, when teaching students about databases it follows that using a team approach would be useful. Background: Team-based learning (TBL) has been developed and tested as an instructional strategy that leverages learning in small groups in order to achieve increased overall effectiveness. This research studies the impact of utilizing team-based learning strategies in an undergraduate Database Management course in order to determine if the methodology is effective for student learning related to database technology concepts in addition to student preparation for working in database teams. Methodology: In this study, a team-based learning strategy is implemented in an undergraduate Database Management course over the course of two semesters. Students were assessed both individually and in teams in order to see if students were able to effectively learn and apply course concepts on their own and in collaboration with their team. Quantitative and qualitative data was collected and analyzed in order to determine if the team approach improved learning effectiveness and allowed for soft skills development. The results from this study are compared to previous semesters when team-based learning was not adopted. Additionally, student perceptions and feedback are captured. Contribution: This research contributes to the literature on database education and team-based learning and presents a team-based learning process for faculty looking to adopt this methodology in their database courses. This research contributes by showing how the collaborative assessment aspect of team-based learning can provide a solution for the conceptual and collaborative needs of database education. Findings: Findings related to student learning and perceptions are presented illustrating that team-based learning can lead to improvements in performance and provides a solution for the conceptual and collaborative needs of database education. Specifically, the findings do show that team scores were significantly higher than individual scores when completing class assessments. Student perceptions of both their team members and the team-based learning process were overall positive with a notable difference related to the perception of team preparedness based on gender. Recommendations for Practitioners: Educational implications highlight the challenges of team-based learning for assessment (e.g., gender differences in perceptions of team preparedness), as well as the benefits (e.g., development of soft skills including teamwork and communication). Recommendation for Researchers: This study provides research implications supporting the study of team assessment techniques for learning and engagement in the context of database education. Impact on Society: Faculty looking to develop student skills in relation to database concepts and application as well as in relation to teamwork and communication may find value in this approach, ultimately benefiting students, employers, and society. Future Research: Future research may examine the methodology from this study in different contexts as well as explore different strategies for group assignments, room layout, and the impact of an online environment.

Choosing Appropriate Retrieval based Learning Elements among Students in Java Programming Course

Effective learning needs consistent and relevant strategies to help students process and maintain new information. This importance is influenced by researchers’ objectives to help students who are able to retain memory in learning, and manage to master learning well. Encoding, learning condition and learning practice are the important elements in Retrieval Based Learning (RBL) strategies. This research aims to decide suitable RBL strategies for students who join Java Programming course at vocational institutions. Research sample consists of 72 DVM students in their first semester for the Data and Web Application Database Management course in four different vocational institutions. Research data were obtained using questionnaire and analysed using the Statistical Package of the Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 22.0. The questionnaire was divided into four sections, encoding, learning condition, retrieval practice and suitable materials to be used in learning. Results from the descriptive analysis showed that the use of encoding through acoustic, visual semantic and elaborative methods has become students’ choices in program learning, while the appropriate learning condition by students with the highest mean value of 4.0694 is through repetitive practices or individual tests to improve memory in learning. The three retrieval practices which are free recall, serial recall and cue recall, receive the highest interpretation other than using hardcopy materials and computer application in learning. Students’ learning approaches were different depending on suitability and comfort. Thus, educators should realize this and the effort of adapting learning between students’ choices and Java Programming course which could create an effective learning environment for all students. The results of the study are hoped to provide important knowledge in improving program learning, generally, and at vocational institutions, specifically, for computer programming courses.

Open Social Student Modeling for Personalized Learning

Open student modeling (OSM) is an approach to technology-based learning, which makes student models available to the learners for exploration. OSM is known for its ability to increase student engagement, motivation, and knowledge reflection. A recent extension of OSM known as open social student modeling (OSSM) complements cognitive aspects of OSM with social aspects by allowing students to explore models of peer students and/or an aggregated class model. In this paper, we introduce an OSSM interface, MasteryGrids, and report the results of a large-scale classroom study, which explored the impact of the social dimension of OSSM. Students in a database management course accessed nonrequired learning materials (examples and problems) via the MasteryGrids interface using either OSM or OSSM. The results revealed that OSSM-enhanced learning, especially for students with lower prior knowledge, compared with OSM. It also enhanced user attitude and engagement. Amount of student usage, efficiency of student usage, and student attitude varied depending on the combination of interface condition (OSM/OSSM), gender, and student social comparison orientation.

Semi-Virtual Knowledge Engineering: Development of Semi-Virtual Knowledge Learning Process to Improve the Semi-Virtual Individual learning

The study introduce a semi-virtual learning process to improve the team learning abilities. The learning goals are achieved by combining both virtual and face-to-face interactions (activities). The semi-virtual learning process facilitates the team to develop and complete the project by sharing and transferring their knowledge (skills) between each other. The research study explores implementation of a semi-virtual learning practice in semi-virtual teams to assure that each member of the team has hands-on-training on the creation and development of the database application. The sample of the study is students registered in advance database management course offered by the School of Management, University of California, Riverside. The hypothetical application they developed was for the service department of the car dealer. Each member activities were monitored by introducing a project session during a class time in which they interact with each other and with the instructor to discuss their project deliverables, issues, and software and hardware limitations. The results show that learning is more effective between semi virtual teams; and the team size plays a major role in individual learning process as their social interactions both face to face and virtual (email) were personal (limited space diversity) and professional (category identification). They were able to transfer their expertise to other member on one on one basis. Each one of them was involved in the development and implementation stages though their roles and deliverables were distributed. The final project presentation covered the development, implementation and execution of application and provided positive and successful learning outcome in semi-virtual environment.

Promoting Students’ Understanding of SQL in a Database Management Course: A Learning Cycle Approach

AbstractSQL (Structured Query Language) is an important topic that can help students understand database management concepts because this language can be applied to solve problems, manipulate data, and extract meaningful information. One often finds teaching and learning of SQL difficult because of the abstraction of conditions, hard-to-understand queries and ill-defined errors. In traditional classes, the teachers describe each command, followed by an example from a textbook, while students remain passive. In this study, an SQL learning unit based on the learning cycle approach was developed to promote undergraduate students’ understanding. For each command, the students started by exploring a statement and were asked to predict and verify its outcome using Microsoft Office Access. Next, the command syntax was explained and the errors were discussed. Finally, the students performed their own task in couple or individually. Results from this study revealed that the proposed learning unit based on the learning cycle approach could help students to improve their understanding of SQL in a Database Management course. This research study provided a useful guideline for further the development of the learning unit.

A Tools-Based Approach to Teaching Data Mining Methods

Introduction Data mining is the process of discovering useful and previously unknown information and relationships in large data sets (Campos, Stengard, & Milenova, 2005; Tan, Steinbach, & Kumar, 2006). Accordingly, data mining is the purposeful use of information technology to implement algorithms from machine learning, statistics, and artificial intelligence to analyze large data sets for the purpose of decision support. The field of data mining grew out of limitations in standard data analysis techniques (Tan et al., 2006). Advancements in machine learning, pattern recognition, and artificial intelligence algorithms coupled with computing trends (CPU power, massive storage devices, high-speed connectivity, and software academic initiatives from companies like Microsoft, Oracle, and IBM) enabled universities to bring data mining courses into their curricula (Jafar, Anderson, & Abdullat, 2008b). Accordingly, Computer Science and Information Systems programs have been aggressively introducing data mining courses into their curricula (Goharian, Grossman, & Raju, 2004; Jafar, Anderson, & Abdullat 2008a; Lenox & Cuff, 2002; Saquer, 2007). Computer Science programs focus on the deep understanding of the mathematical aspects of data mining algorithms and their efficient implementation. They require advanced programming and data structures as prerequisites for their courses (Goharian et al., 2004; Musicant, 2006; Rahal, 2008). Information Systems programs on the other hand, focus on the data analysis and business intelligence aspects of data mining. Students learn the theory of data mining algorithms and their applications. Then they use tools that implement the algorithms to build mining models to analyze data for the purpose of decision support. Accordingly, a first course in programming, a database management course, and a statistical data analysis course suffice as prerequisites. For Information Systems programs, a data centric, algorithm understanding and process-automation approach to data mining similar to Jafar et al. (2008a) and Campos et al. (2005) is more appropriate. A data mining course in an Information Systems program has an (1) analytical component, (2) a tools-based, hands-on component ,and (3) a rich collection of data sets. (1) The analytical component covers the theory and practice of the lifecycle of a data mining analysis project, elementary data analysis, market basket analysis, classification and prediction (decision trees, neural networks, naive Bayes, logistic regression, etc.), cluster analysis and category detection, testing and validation of mining models, and finally the application of mining models for decision support and prediction. Textbooks from Han and Kamber (2006) and Tan et al. (2006) provide a comprehensive coverage of the terminology, theory, and algorithms of data mining. (2) The hands-on component requires the use of tools to build projects based on the algorithms learned in the analytical component. We chose Microsoft Excel with its data mining add-in(s) as the front-end and Microsoft's Cloud Computing and SQL Server 2008 data mining computing engines as the back-end. Microsoft Excel is ubiquitous. It is a natural front-end for elementary data analysis and presentation of data. Its data mining add-in(s) are available as a free download. The add-in(s) are automatically configured to send data to Microsoft's Cloud Computing engine server. The server performs the necessary analysis and receives analysis results back into Excel to present them in tabulated and chart formats. Using wizards, the add-in(s) are easily configured to connect to a SQL Server 2008 running analysis services to send data and receive analysis results back into Excel for presentation. The add-in(s) provide a rich wizard-based, uniform graphical user interface to manage the data, the data mining models, the configurations, and the pre and post view of data and mining models. …

A framework for the computerized assessment of university student essays

This paper presents an approach for automatic grading of essays. Student essays are compared against a model or key essay provided by the teacher. The similarity between a student essay and the model essay is measured by the cosine of their contained angle in an n-dimensional semantic space. The model essay is preprocessed by removing stopwords, extracting keywords, assigning weights to keywords to reflect their importance and finally by linking every keyword to a subject-oriented synonym list. The student essay, by comparison, is preprocessed by removing stopwords and then by extracting keywords. The keywords extracted from the model essay and the keywords extracted from students essays together with weights provided by teacher are used to build feature vectors for teacher and students essays. The obtained grade depends on the similarity between these vectors (calculated by using the cosine formula). A simulator was implemented to test the viability of the proposed approach. It was fed with student essays (at the university level) gathered from database management course over three semesters. The results were very encouraging and the agreement between the auto-grader and human grader was as good as the agreement between human graders.

Restructuring an Undergraduate Database Management Course for Business Students

An international association advancing the multidisciplinary study of informing systems. Founded in 1998, the Informing Science Institute (ISI) is a global community of academics shaping the future of informing science.

A cooperative learning approach to database group projects: integrating theory and practice

This paper describes the use of cooperative learning concepts in support of an introductory database management course that emphasizes the theoretical and practical aspects of database application development. The database practice is realized through the use of cooperative group projects. The course project is divided into three main phases, involving requirements analysis and conceptual design, relational database mapping and prototyping, and database system implementation using Microsoft Access/sup TM/. Students are required to actively participate in each phase, with students assuming different roles in each phase to allow them to experience different leadership responsibilities. This paper also describes a cooperative learning approach to integrating the practical use of a database product into the theoretical curriculum of a database management course. The paper concludes with a detailed evaluation of the group projects effect on the student's performance in the class.

Learning Information Engineering Subjects Through the Internet

In the first semester of 1997, once again, we taught our introductory Database Management (CS230) course to around 350 students on our two main campuses. On this occasion, we used the e-mail, NewsGroups, Telnet and the World Wide Web capabilities extensively to support access to teaching and learning materials, for promulgation and submission of assignments and for staff-staff-student-student communication. In this context, students encountered challenging difficulties arising out of what might be described as ‘problems with socio-technical systems’. This paper describes the several elements of the teaching programme the curriculum elements, the teaching staff and the technology intended to support each of these. With most of these elements, we encountered a number of ‘small’ problems. Taken in conjunction, these several difficulties presented students with considerable impediments to successful learning in this subject. The paper concludes with observations concerning conditions which must be in place for Internet-augmented teaching and learning to be successful and enjoyable and reports some performance data which indicate a positive—although not strong—benefit from the use of the WebTests upon the final examination results. We include a ‘pre-fiight checklist’ for each element in the programme and each linkage between them. The prediction is that the need for checklists of this kind will increase as we increase the number and remoteness of links in the teaching chain, the number and experience of sources of communication contained in those links and increasingly challenge the technical reliability of the linkages, and as each of those multi-faceted links is subject to rapid evolution.

Learning Information Engineering Subjects Through the Internet

Abstract In the first semester of 1997, once again, we taught our introductory Database Management (CS230) course to around 350 students on our two main campuses. On this occasion, we used the e-mail, NewsGroups, Telnet and the World Wide Web capabilities extensively to support access to teaching and learning materials, for promulgation and submission of assignments and for staff-staff-student-student communication. In this context, students encountered challenging difficulties arising out of what might be described as ‘problems with socio-technical systems’. This paper describes the several elements of the teaching programme the curriculum elements, the teaching staff and the technology intended to support each of these. With most of these elements, we encountered a number of ‘small’ problems. Taken in conjunction, these several difficulties presented students with considerable impediments to successful learning in this subject. The paper concludes with observations concerning conditions which must be in place for Internet-augmented teaching and learning to be successful and enjoyable and reports some performance data which indicate a positive—although not strong—benefit from the use of the WebTests upon the final examination results. We include a ‘pre-fiight checklist’ for each element in the programme and each linkage between them. The prediction is that the need for checklists of this kind will increase as we increase the number and remoteness of links in the teaching chain, the number and experience of sources of communication contained in those links and increasingly challenge the technical reliability of the linkages, and as each of those multi-faceted links is subject to rapid evolution.

A cooperative learning approach to database group projects: integrating theory and practice

This paper describes the use of cooperative learning concepts in support of an introductory database management course that emphasizes the theoretical and practical aspects of database application development. The database practice is realized through the use of cooperative group projects. The course project is divided into three main phases, involving requirements analysis and conceptual design, relational database mapping and prototyping, and database system implementation using Microsoft Access/sup TM/. Students are required to actively participate in each phase, with students assuming different roles in each phase to allow them to experience different leadership responsibilities. This paper also describes a cooperative learning approach to integrating the practical use of a database product into the theoretical curriculum of a database management course. The paper concludes with a detailed evaluation of the group projects effect on the student's performance in the class.

Integrating the practical use of a database product into a theoretical curriculum

Integrating the practical use of a database product into the theoretical curriculum of a database management course is a challenge. The approach described minimizes the amount of class time that is allocated to teaching students the use of a database product, while providing guidance to the students in the use of the tool. Introduction of the database product is accomplished through cooperative learning, where students help each other learn the intricacies of the system. To facilitate this process, the students are provided with a complete database implementation example. Using this example, students gradually advance from a tutorial exercise, to a step-by-step extension of the example, and finally to more difficult extensions. These self-paced assignments provide a solid foundation for the students' knowledge in the implementation of their own cooperative group project.

Database theory in practice

This paper describes the use of cooperative group learning concepts in support of an undergraduate database management course that emphasizes the theoretical and practical aspects of database application development. The course project is divided into three main phases, involving requirements analysis and conceptual design, relational database mapping and prototyping, and database system implementation using Microsoft Access. The project deliverables are designed so that students not only develop a database implementation, but also evaluate their design in terms of functional dependencies, normal forms, the lossless join property, and the dependency preservation property, thus establishing the need for sound database design principles. Students are required to actively participate in each phase, with students assuming different roles in each phase to allow them to experience different leadership responsibilities. As part of the grading process, students evaluate their own performance as well as the performance of others in the group. This paper describes our experience with the structure and administration of cooperative groups and provides a discussion of the lessons we have learned, including initial observations of the effectiveness of the approach.