Teaching Purposes Research Articles

Using Technology and Proofs Without Words in Teaching Mathematical Reasoning to Pre-Service and In-Service Geometry Teachers

With the ever-evolving implementation of technology in the teaching and learning of geometry, the task of designing and/or finding suitable questions or problems that can facilitate and promote mathematical reasoning and accurately assess students' understanding of the subject matter can be a challenge. It is the aim of this article to share the findings of an experimental study on the use of GeoGebra graphing technology as an ITC tool coupled with proofs without words in our teacher training geometry classes. The problems used for our experimental study may not appear to be rigorous and challenging in terms of mathematical contents but are perfect tools for pedagogical purposes. It is hoped that the ideas presented in this article can motivate future experiments and studies in this direction in the teaching and learning of geometry.

“Over 800 data points”: how coaches and athletes collectively navigate data-rich learning encounters

PurposeThe datafication of teaching and learning settings continues to be of broad interest to the learning sciences. In response, this study aims to explore a non-traditional learning setting, specifically two Golf Teaching and Research Programs, to investigate how athletes and coaches capture, analyze and use performance data to improve their practice. Athletic settings are well known for spurring the proliferation of personal data about performance across a range of contexts and ability levels. In these contexts, interest in athletes’ experiences with data has often been overshadowed by a focus on the technologies capturing the data and their capabilities.Design/methodology/approachThis ethnographic research focuses on the data-rich experiences of golf coaches and students during two pedagogical encounters. Using Balka and Star’s (2015) concept of shadow bodies, this article explores how golfing bodies can become infused with data, creating partial representations of a lived experience that can be augmented and manipulated for pedagogical purposes, depending on the context and the individuals involved.FindingsInteraction analysis helps the authors to examine the embodied and interactional nature of coach-golfer pedagogical encounters across two sites, a local Professional Golf Association golf course and a Swing Analysis Lab. The authors also split these encounters into two episodes to identify how coaches and golfers use partial representations of their bodies to analyze performance and interpret data.Originality/valueThis research suggests that as data-driven practices continue to engulf athletic settings, and teaching and learning settings broadly, emphasis needs to be placed on ensuring that athletes (learners) – from the most recreational to elite users – have an embodied understanding of their performance to improve their ability. Furthermore, this article raises questions about what data gets shared between instructors and athletes and how that data is used.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER’S INTERPERSONAL SKILLS IN IN-SERVICE TEACHER POFESSIONAL PROGRAM

Innovative English instruction practices require knowledge and skills of teaching appropriately as an English teacher. This study aims to explain the development of English language teachers’ interpersonal skills in an in-service teacher professional program at one of the universities in Surabaya through lecturing/tutorials, seminars/workshops, and English instruction practices. Experienced English teachers need interpersonal skills to develop interactive communication with learners. Studies of interpersonal skills discussed pedagogical competence. This study focuses on interpersonal skills in pedagogical and professional competencies. However, this study focuses on developing English language teachers’ interpersonal skills in innovative English instruction development and practices in class. So, this study implements the qualitative method to find out the story of English language teachers’ interpersonal skills in innovative English instruction development and practices in class. The participants are English teachers in an in-service teacher professional program, investigated using an online observation to describe the development of English language teachers’ interpersonal skills at innovative English instruction practices. The results show that developing English language teachers’ interpersonal skills, communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creation can increase students’ academic engagement to achieve innovative English instruction. Therefore, English teachers' capacity, capability, and innovative instructional practices can increase teachers’ knowledge, skills, and character, so they become professional English teachers. Finally, the conclusion is that developing English language teachers’ interpersonal skills can increase students’ academic engagement to achieve innovative English instruction purposes.

Sadeghi Karim and Ghaderi Farah (Eds): THEORY AND PRACTICE IN SECOND LANGUAGE TEACHER IDENTITY: RESEARCHING, THEORISING AND ENACTING

Given the prominence of second language (L2) identity in applied linguistics and bilingual education today, the publication of Theory and Practice in Second Language Teacher Identity: Researching, Theorising, and Enacting is a timely reminder that this dynamic concept can be changed and developed subject to sociocultural situations and pedagogical challenges. One of the few books to concentrate on both theoretical and practical issues of teacher identity in L2 contexts, it reviews systematically how teacher identity is currently conceptualized and researched, reports empirical studies conducted on L2 teacher identity in various settings with diversified instructional purposes, and reflects on the implications critical to applied linguistics and L2 teacher education. This edited volume addresses a multiplicity of constructs involved in identity (emotions, commitment, agency, investment, etc.) and uses a host of methodologies such as conversation analysis, narrative inquiry, journal writing, visual representations, and (auto)biographical accounts to explore key aspects of L2 teacher identity. The data collected and coded capture both the internal and external influences on the trajectories in L2 teachers’ professional growth. The themes it highlights are essential for the enhancement and enrichment of L2 teacher identity. As such, it can help policy-makers to refine L2 teacher education programs, and point to future directions for teacher identity research.

Students’ perception of WhatsApp usage as an additional learning aid at a Dental College in Pakistan

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE: Technological advancements have transformed society into a global entity; medical education is no exception. Innumerable social media platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Edmodo encourage collaborative learning, improved communication, and knowledge-sharing. The current study aims to assess students' perception of WhatsApp as an additional educational and learning aid for communication purposes, sharing of learning materials, and as a discussion forum.
 METHODOLOGY: This cross-sectional study was carried out from July 2021 to December 2021 at Faryal Dental College, Sheikhupura, Pakistan. A standardized questionnaire was prepared and circulated amongst students of 1st Year BDS to Final Year BDS. Responses were analyzed using SPSS Version 20.
 RESULTS: The study comprised 150 participants; the majority, i.e., 62% (n=93), were females, and 38% (n=57) were males. Learning through WhatsApp was found to be useful by 90% of students. An association (p≤0.02) was found among both genders regarding the usefulness of WhatsApp as an additional learning aid.
 CONCLUSION: These days, social media is a dominant mechanism used for communal exchanges and is also utilized as an additional aid for teaching and learning purposes. Incorporating social media with conventional class teaching in medical education has evident advantages.

OLINDA/EXM 2-The Next-generation Personal Computer Software for Internal Dose Assessment in Nuclear Medicine.

The OLINDA/EXM version 2.0 personal computer code was created as an upgrade to the widely used OLINDA/EXM 1.0 and 1.1 codes. This paper documents the upgrades that were implemented. New decay data and anthropomorphic and biokinetic models were implemented in the software, and the software alpha and beta tested. Agreement of doses between the OLINDA/EXM codes 1 and 2 was very good. Use of the new anthropomorphic and biokinetic models results in understandable differences between the codes. Previous models were retained in the new code, and those results were identical to those in the previous code. OLINDA/EXM 2.0 represents an upgrade from version 1, with new modeling data recommended by the international community. It standardizes internal dose calculations for dose assessments in clinical trials with radiopharmaceuticals, theoretical calculations for existing pharmaceuticals, teaching, and other purposes.

The Role of Social Media in Communication and Learning at the Time of COVID-19 Lockdown-An Online Survey.

This study aimed to assess orthodontic postgraduate students' use of social media during the COVID-19 lockdown. Ninety-four postgraduate students (67 master's students and 27 doctoral students) were enrolled in the study and asked to fill in an online questionnaire by answering questions regarding their use of social media during the COVID-19 lockdown. The frequency distributions and percentages were calculated using SPSS software. The results showed that 99% of the students used social media. The most frequently used type of social media was Facebook, 94%, followed by YouTube, 78%, and Instagram, 65%, while Twitter and Linkedin were used less, and no one used Blogger. About 63% of the students used elements of social media to learn more about orthodontics staging, biomechanics, and various approaches in managing orthodontic cases. About 56% of students tried uploading and downloading scientific papers, lectures, movies, presentations, and e-books from social media, while communication with professionals and searches about orthodontic products were reported in 47% of students' responses. On the other hand, 43% of the responses favored sharing orthodontic information and posts for teaching and discussion purposes. Generally, social media plays leading roles in the communication with, learning of, sharing of information with, and supervision of patients from a far during the COVID-19 lockdown.

A systematic review of research on teachers’ guides

This article presents the results of a systematic review of research on teachers’ guides. A teachers’ guide is defined as text directed at the teacher guiding the use of a didactic learning material, i.e. learning resources made for purposes of teaching and learning. The review is conducted to identify the main research areas in international research about teachers’ guides, and what the research can tell us about the various aspects of teachers’ guides. We included methodically diverse research published 1990-2020 focusing on primary school and lower secondary school. 43 studies were included. We inductively identified six themes that stood out when reading across the included articles: The historical development of teachers’ guides, analytical approaches to teachers’ guides, research on teachers’ use of teacher guides, teachers’ interpretation or engagement with teachers’ guides, and what teachers’ guides should provide according to teachers and researchers respectively. 

ELT coursebooks for primary school learners

Abstract This article reports on the findings of a comparative study on songs in four English coursebook series for primary school learners, with two published in China and another two in the UK. Detailed analysis focuses on the number, the coverage, the teaching purposes, and the instructional arrangements of songs. The findings show that although the total number of songs in coursebooks from China outnumbers that from the UK, no correlation exists between learners’ grade levels and the number of songs in each fascicle. The study further demonstrates that the purposes of songs in all four series are mainly to arouse learners’ interest, to improve pronunciation, and to enhance vocabulary and sentence structure understanding, revealing a lack of due attention to fostering learners’ intercultural awareness. Regarding the pedagogical approach and other instructional arrangements, British coursebooks feature a more diversified approach, highlighting the integration of learners’ physical, psychological and cognitive development, whereas Chinese coursebooks concentrate on providing simplistic and unified instructions which may pose a challenge for novice teachers but an opportunity for experienced teachers. Based on the findings, recommendations are offered to future coursebook writers.

Don du corps à la science

In France, between 2,500 and 3,000 people donate their bodies to science each year after their death; they contribute therefore to the teaching of anatomy, to research and to the learning and improvement of surgical practices. The decision to donate must be made during the donor's lifetime and consent must be expressed in writing to one of the 27 donation centers throughout the country. Following the scandal of the Parisian center of the Saints Pères, which revealed a lack of respect for bodies and fundamental ethical principles, the decree of April 27, 2022 concerning the donation of bodies for teaching and research purposes, which is part of the new bioethic laws, was eagerly awaited to clarify certain practices. However, this decree raises new questions because many of the rules it proposes do not appear to be relevant to the values of donation and the functioning of donation centers. The new modes of regulation proposed by the decree generate questions among donors and professionals in the field with a risk of poor regulation, detrimental to all with regard to major ethical issues. If the public authorities do not commit themselves to a regulation that is better adapted to the field, if the ethical stakes are not better clarified and if the universities do not have the means to implement these new organizations, the perpetuation of body donation and of donation centers could become challenging.

A prediction model of speech transmission index based on reverberation time in non-native linguistic context

High speech intelligibility is an essential requirement for classrooms, especially in relation to non-native students. Speech transmission index (STI) was proved as the most relevant acoustic parameter to assess speech intelligibility. In this paper, twenty-seven classrooms for non-native teaching purposes were selected for investigation. Physical acoustic measurements were conducted in these classrooms and numerical simulation verification was determined by ODEON version 16. The relationships between STI values and RT values were fitted based on non-linear curve fitting regression models. In this paper, three primary forms of non-linear curve fitting regression models were employed for predicting curves. A logarithmic function was selected as the basic regression equation to describe the effects of RT values on STI values. The results showed that STI values increase with the decrease of RT values for all age groups. From the verified results, it was possible to propose the predictive equation that presents the best accuracy in predicting the experimental data for non-native teaching purposes. The impact of different age groups and linguistic environment on STI were discussed. The prediction model is expected to estimate STI values by using RT values during the early design stage in a non-native linguistic context.

A Teaching Model of Cultural and Creative Design Based on the Philosophy of the Book of Changes

In essence, cultural and creative design features humanity and culture. The process of how to transform culture into creativity is an essential subject of design education, which, in turn, calls for a new design teaching system. In regard to combining traditional Chinese thinking with modern design experience, the question of how to apply traditional Chinese thinking to design concepts, methods, and education is systematically explored in this research. Firstly, the question of how to transform the philosophy of “Tao, Vessel, Change and Comprehensiveness” in the Book of Changes into “design thinking” in order to establish the learning process of creative design with added value—as well as to set up the teaching model of cultural and creative design under “Tao, Vessel, Change and Comprehensiveness”—is discussed. After this, two cases of the Aboriginal Harvest Festival’s cultural creativity “Dancing Together” candlestick and the animation, cultural, and creative design of the “Wind Lion God” are used in order to examine the effectiveness of the specific design and to verify the feasibility of this teaching model in the development and application of cultural and creative products. The results demonstrate the feasibility of this teaching model, which provides a new systematic approach for the purposes of teaching and practice in the field of cultural and creative design.

Mediatisation, digital spaces and live performance: Understanding Indian stand-up comedy and evolving performance landscapes

This paper is a reflection on the points of convergence between live performance and the media within Indian stand-up comedy. Traditionally, live performance has been seen in opposition to the media. While the former is defined by spatial and temporal co-presence of the audience and spectators, the latter has neither (Auslander, 2012). While stand-up comedy is primarily live, digital and mass media are used extensively by comedians to build a professional reputation for themselves through their presence and participation on social media. However, after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, much of performance art – including stand-up comedy – has moved online. That is, comedians are experimenting with the online media: Zoom, Instagram Live, Facebook Live and so on, to put up live performances that would otherwise have been performed within a comedy club or café. This paper derives its theoretical basis from Philip Auslander’s postulation of liveness in a mediatised culture and digital liveness which ‘results from our conscious act of grasping virtual entities as live in response to the claims [technology makes] on us’ (2012: 13). The paper attempts a theoretical reflection on how to ‘read’ a stand-up comedy performance for pedagogical purposes in these different contexts as the idea of liveness, mediatisation and our experience of the live evolves with time and context.

Linking scores from two written receptive English academic vocabulary tests—The VLT-Ac and the AVT

The academic section of the Vocabulary Levels Test (VLT-Ac) and the Academic Vocabulary Test (AVT) both assess meaning-recognition knowledge of written receptive academic vocabulary, deemed central for engagement in academic activities. Depending on the purpose and context of the testing, either of the tests can be appropriate, but for research and pedagogical purposes, it is important to be able to compare scores achieved on the two tests between administrations and within similar contexts. Based on a sample of 385 upper secondary school students in university-preparatory programs (independent CEFR B2-level users of English), this study presents a comparison model by linking the VLT-Ac and the AVT using concurrent calibration procedures in Item Response Theory. The key outcome of the study is a score comparison table providing a means for approximate score comparisons. Additionally, the study showcases a viable and valid method of comparing vocabulary scores from an older test with those from a newer one.

How students perceive the teacher’s use of humour and how it enhances learning in the classroom

Recently, scholarship on humour in teaching and learning has focused on the use of instructional humour. Past studies have reported that instructional humour is best used as a pedagogical tool for teaching and learning purposes. Nevertheless, how students perceive instructional humour and how humour enhances learning in the classroom is still not clear. This exploratory study aims to gain further understanding of students’ interpretation of teachers’ use of humour in relation to teaching and learning in a higher education context. In particular, it aims to explore the perspectives of students as to how the use of humour in the classroom enhances their learning. Data were collected from one-to-one in-depth interviews with 10 undergraduate students who were learning with award-winning teachers at a research-intensive university in New Zealand. Students explained a variety of ways in which humour enabled their process of learning. These included helping them to concentrate, remember and understand learning content by connecting humour to content. Additionally, a sense of rapport and positive attitude towards learning and the teacher were indicated as contributing to the learning environment. Our findings indicate that students considered instructional humour a tool that enhanced their learning cognitively and emotionally.

Educational Gradient in Occupational Attainment: Does the Stratification of Education Systems Really Matter?

Education is one of the most important determinants of occupational attainment, and country-comparative scholars have increasingly focused their attention on the stratification of education systems, that is, the extent to which students are differentiated into different groups for instructional purposes. This article introduces a new microlevel risk ignored by previous theories, that is, the risk of productivity loss. I argue that the criterion guiding the first selection into different schools or curricula within a school reduces skill heterogeneity and employers’ risk of productivity loss, strengthening the link between education and occupation. Data of the European Social Survey are complemented with new indicators of education systems’ characteristics coming from an expert survey that involved more than 200 experts in 34 OECD countries. Findings show that as the first selection is increasingly based on students’ ability, the educational gradient in occupational attainment increases for those respondents who achieved an academic upper-secondary degree.

An Exploration of "Smart Classroom" for College English Teaching with SPOC Platforms

Chinese higher education is greatly impacted by the development of ICT (Information Communications Technology) and new modes of EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teaching have emerged and been implemented under contexts of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) and SPOCs (Small Private Online Courses). This requires education practitioners to further clarify their purposes of teaching, make detailed plans for the innovation accordingly, and furthermore, build the new model of EFL teaching with the support of feasible platforms. The study introduced the application of the "Smart Classroom" in College English teaching and the five steps to put it into practice. Through the exploratory research, it is found that the "Smart Classroom" combined with the support of SPOC multi-platforms is realistic and feasible in college English classrooms, which indicates the advantages of the new mode in promoting the motivation of the students and enhancing learning effects. Thus, the new mode of teaching with "Smart Classroom" has potentials to be furthermore applied and explored in the college English teaching process.

Enseñando a Sentir. Repertorios éticos en la ficción infantil. [Teaching How to Feel. Ethical Repertoires in Children’s Fiction.] by Macarena García González

Enseñando a Sentir. Repertorios éticos en la ficción infantil. [Teaching How to Feel. Ethical Repertoires in Children’s Fiction.] by Macarena García González Agustina Palenque ENSEÑANDO A SENTIR. Repertorios éticos en la ficción infantil. [TEACHING HOW TO FEEL. Ethical Repertoires in Children’s Fiction.] By Macarena García González.1 Ediciones / Metales Pesados, 2021, 182 pages. ISBN: 978-956-6048-46-6 ________ Teaching How to Feel: Ethical Repertoires in Children’s Fiction (2021) is a book that challenges. It challenges the premise of children’s literature as “useful” to teach about emotions as it challenges adults’ hopes for literature as a way to raise more empathetic people (9). Macarena García González approaches the widely spread discourses about emotions from an innovative perspective. In her work, emotions are analyzed as part of social relationships instead of individual responses that need to be understood and managed. Moving beyond the discussion between aesthetic or pedagogical purposes in the field, she proposes a rather original angle: “We return again and again to the question of the uses of fiction to think about the emotional and affective dimensions that are also ethical and political”(24).2 The book is structured into eight chapters that focus on the emotional dimension of texts for children from different points of view. Some of these offer critical analyses of literary texts, and others share research experiences of reading responses with children. “The Rise of Picture Books and Socio-Emotional Education” reflects on the growing production of picturebooks and the agendas of socio-emotional education for early childhood in public discourses. The author dialogues with the contributions of sociology of emotions to reflect on a specific trend of picturebooks. She observes that these narratives may work as accomplices of a pedagogy of emotions that tends to “discipline” feelings in the pursuit of a certain idea of happiness. “Politics of Emotions in Inside-Out” examines Pixar’s movie as a good example of how certain psychological traditions shape popular narratives of emotional culture (42). García González reflects on the way this text may be read as an example of the “imperative of happiness” as an individual achievement. “Emotions on the Edge: Taboo Subjects and Adult Anxieties” presents an empirical study of children and books. The author analyzes how certain “edgy” topics are discussed with young audiences. This chapter offers important reflections about adult interventions in these mediated situations. “Imagining Migration: Narratives of Hospitality” deals with a frequent theme in current children’s literature. García Gonzalez shares [End Page 70] reflections from the analysis of a corpus of texts that deal with the subject of migration in general and international adoption in particular—the subject of her doctoral thesis. The author warns that in many cases, these texts approach complex issues in a simplistic way, telling singular stories of people who migrate and mobilize the help of the locals: “The operation of these stories is to leave out of our knowledge something that would seem harmful for us to know: global injustice” (84). “Necropolitics in The Isle and The Mediterranean” builds on the theme of the previous chapter with Achille Mbembe’s concept of necropolitics. García González analyzes here two works by Armin Greder, which highlight the brutality with which certain populations are left to die. “The Problem with Narratives of Empowerment for Girls” problematizes certain books for children aligned with mainstream “girl power” discourses. According to the author, the problem with these narratives is that they suggest a simplistic idea of individual empowerment. From an intersectional perspective, the author wonders: “Can a text be feminist and, at the same time, reproduce colonial imaginaries? I am afraid that a merely post-feminist text that embodies ideas of achievement and overcoming, or an approach to liberal feminism with the slogan for gender equality does not involve rethinking how dominations are produced, and how some lives develop more precariously than others” (121).3 “Narrating the Silences of the Dictatorship” studies the way the Chilean dictatorship is presented in books for children. The author analyzes several texts to understand how both references and silences work to express the intensity of...

A Simulation Environment for enhancing the student experience in advanced networking concepts

Several subjects in Computer science necessitate practical and realistic classes in addition to supporting the theoretical underpinning taught to the students. In various subjects’ practical exposure & skill is imperative to meet the industry requirements. However, educational establishments can't provide an out-and-out environment for every student to practice. Providing an appropriate Lab for apprentices that bestows desired exposure and feel of a real Network has been a challenging task for every educational establishment. Virtual Labs have been a major milestone and are effectively implemented in numerous colleges and universities throughout the world. In this article, the author is providing a complete setup and functionality of Implementing Virtual Private Networks using virtual Labs to reflect a more realistic and appropriate Networking environment for instructional and educational purposes. Fresh graduates or Diploma holders rarely have practical exposure and experience in deploying and implementing VPNs. Establishing a Virtual Private Network is a cumbersome job, and lack of practical exposure makes it even difficult for a fresher to establish one exclusively for the employer. The Author is providinga guideline for the users so that they can establish Virtual Private Networks using virtual machines. Hencepresenting an environment wherein students can have numerous deployments of VPNs with different features. The students gain the required exposure and develop an understanding of Virtual Private Networks meticulously and pragmatically.

Perceptions of digital competence in learning and teaching English in the context of online education

Digital competence has become a crucial capability in the learning process, in the working place, and in personal communication. The aim of the article is to explore master students’ perceptions of their digital competence by identifying frequency, expertise, and satisfaction in using information communication technologies (ICT) in their learning process when studying at university and teaching English as a foreign language (EFL) in the context of online education. The sample comprised 49 master students who participated in distant evening classes at a private university in Kazakhstan while working simultaneously as teachers of English in various educational institutions during the day. Master students’ perceptions of digital competence is one of the approaches to reveal the gaps in students’ digital competence development necessary for learning and teaching EFL online. The main research tool for data collection was the online survey allowing the master students to measure their level of digital competence. Evident from the results, the majority of respondents are digitally competent; yet there is a cohort of master students who scored low on ICT skills needed for teaching and admitted the necessity of improvement. Also, according to the findings, the respondents’ frequency, expertise, and satisfaction level by their digital competence needed in the learning is higher than that in teaching. This can also imply that even though the frequency and expertise in using digital technologies for learning contributes to the development of the expertise in using them for conducting their own classes, master students need special training on the use of ICT for pedagogical purposes.