Tutor Behaviour Research Articles

Tutees' Bullying Experiences in Employment of Pair Tutoring: A View from Grade Two Pupils

Bullies can victimize others in a multitude of ways. While some are hidden and private, others are obvious and public. Bullying in schools frequently takes place in unstructured learning environments. Direct bullying combines verbal and physical abuse. Verbal bullying occurs when a pupil is the target of remarks made aloud or information written that harms their feelings. This exploratory research study was to identify the experiences of bullying by tutees.The research sample comprised fifteen tutees at the Division of Misamis Oriental at the Tagoloan Central School, Philippines. Using the qualitative approach with an exploratory research design, the fifteen grade two tutees who experienced bullying inside the classroom during pair tutoring sessions were considered participants through purposively sampled selection. There was the utilization of in-depth interviews in the data gathering. The study adhered to ethical principles during the conduct. It strictly followed the components of trustworthiness: credibility, dependability, transferability, and conformability to review the validity of the qualitative data. The study revealed that during pair tutoring, tutees experienced verbal bullying- the tutor to the tutee as the tutor constantly uses mean remarks, such as You are dull. Relationship bullying to the tutee as the tutor becomes bossy and short-tempered by letting tutees learn quickly. Physical bullying to the tutee as the tutor eventually hits the tutee if the tutee cannot learn quickly. Along with the insights, the study emphasized that teachers must closely monitor by observing tutor behavior and words they utter during pair torturing sessions and select and train tutors; training should cover tutor roles and responsibilities so that bullying will not occur during pair tutoring sessions and bullying is an issue in education that needs to be solved to ensure pupils good learning outcomes by a safe learning environment. Bullying affects children's academic achievement because it makes them afraid to stand out and pursue their learning desires. Every teacher should work to stop bullying in the classroom by integrating anti-bullying policies and discipline into classroom discipline.

TUTORING: Instruction-Grounded Conversational Agent for Language Learners

In this paper, we propose Tutoring bot, a generative chatbot trained on a large scale of tutor-student conversations for English-language learning. To mimic a human tutor's behavior in language education, the tutor bot leverages diverse educational instructions and grounds to each instruction as additional input context for the tutor response generation. As a single instruction generally involves multiple dialogue turns to give the student sufficient speaking practice, the tutor bot is required to monitor and capture when the current instruction should be kept or switched to the next instruction. For that, the tutor bot is learned to not only generate responses but also infer its teaching action and progress on the current conversation simultaneously by a multi-task learning scheme. Our Tutoring bot is deployed under a non-commercial use license at https://tutoringai.com.

Observation and Analysis of Reciprocal Peer Teaching in University Guitar Classes

Abstract The purpose of this study was to observe and analyze the reciprocal peer teaching (RPT) behaviors of university students who were enrolled in an introductory-level guitar course. Students (N = 30) participated in two training sessions, were paired off in asymmetrical dyads based on a baseline examination of their individual performance skills, and arranged a 10-to-15-minute time to meet with their partner outside of class and record their RPT over the video conferencing platform Zoom. Using SCRIBE software (Duke, 2020) and a modified version of codes derived by Colprit (2000), the timing and durations of selected peer tutor behaviors were recorded. A total of 2 hours, 23 minutes, and 40 seconds of video footage was analyzed. Results of student surveys following the treatment period indicated the value of individualized instruction and newfound empathy for the teaching process. The explicit use of modeling and repetition coupled with the relative lack of negative feedback and guiding questions indicated that further training would have been beneficial in promoting tutee success. The present findings prompt questions regarding the training and implementation of RPT in university music classrooms and directions for future research.

Research-based training for undergraduate mathematics tutors

Undergraduate peer drop-in mathematics tutoring is a common form of support at the university level, yet research regarding how to train this specific group of tutors is underspecified. This paper aims to describe a training program for this population that is grounded in mathematics education research. It serves as a first step in conducting a design experiment on how training impacts tutor behaviours. This paper addresses the research question: How can mathematics education research inform tutor training design? First, the specific context for the training program is characterized, followed by challenges to training programs. Then, ways in which research on mathematics classroom teaching and learning can apply to tutoring are discussed. Finally, the training program is described in detail, including the research which informed the design, as well as the learning outcomes, activities, and feedback mechanisms. Broadly, the goals of the training program are to promote productive beliefs regarding tutoring and learning mathematics, to increase the use of NCTM’s [(2014). Principles to action.] teacher/student actions in tutoring practices, and to develop reflective practitioners. To guide the development of these skills and dispositions in tutors, tutors engage with tutoring scenarios, excerpts, and case studies. Tutors are also provided with opportunities to reflect on their own tutoring practices.

Near-peer teaching in problem-based learning: Perspectives from tutors and tutees.

This study explores how tutors and tutees perceived their teaching and learning experience in a near-peer teaching programme within a formal undergraduate medical-education curriculum. This mixed-methods study was conducted in an Asian medical school. First, a survey was administered to two groups of students, one that had been tutored by near-peers, and another with faculty tutors. Then, the near-peer tutors were interviewed and wrote reflection essays that the researchers collected. Quantitative analysis was used to analyse the survey responses, and qualitative analysis to analyse the interview and reflection data. Our study found no difference between near-peer tutees' and faculty tutees' perceptions of either tutor facilitation or tutor behaviours. Also, when near-peer tutors explained how their experience of delivering tutoring had influenced their professional-identity formation, they highlighted that they had gained skills important to their future careers as medical educators. Integrating near-peer teaching into undergraduate medical curricula could be beneficial to both tutors and tutees because of the social, cognitive, and professional congruence between these two groups, and due to its likely positive influence on their professional-identity formation.

Conceptualization and development of an autonomous and personalized early literacy content and robot tutor behavior for preschool children

Personalized learning has a higher impact on students’ progress than traditional approaches. However, current resources required to implement personalization are scarce. This research aims to conceptualize and develop an autonomous robot tutor with personalization policy for preschool children aged between three to five years old. Personalization is performed by automatically adjusting the difficulty level of the lesson delivery and assessment, as well as adjusting the feedback based on the reaction of children. This study explores three child behaviors for the personalization policy: (i) academic knowledge (measured by the correctness of the answer), (ii) executive functioning of attention (measured by the orientation and the gaze direction of child’s body), and (iii) working memory or hesitation (measured by the time lag before the answer). Moreover, this study designed lesson content through interviews with teachers and deployed the personalization interaction policy through the NAO robot with five children in a case user study method. We qualitatively analyze the session observations and parent interviews, as well as quantitatively analyze knowledge gain through pre- and posttests and a parent questionnaire. The findings of the study reveal that the personalized interaction with the robot showed a positive potential in increasing the children’s learning gains and attracting their engagement. As general guidelines based on this pilot study, we identified additional personalization strategies that could be used for autonomous personalization policies based on each child’s behavior, which could have a considerable impact on child learning.

Effective tutoring in mathematics learning support: the student perspective

In this paper, we report on the outcomes of a survey of students across 12 higher education institutions in Ireland and the UK. Participants were asked to give their views on what tutors should do and not do when they are providing Mathematics Learning Support to students. We present the categories that emerged from an analysis of student responses, including tutor behaviour, teaching methods, content knowledge and management items. We discuss the implications that these responses have for tutor selection and training, how they relate to mathematical pedagogy and we consider the high expectations that students appear to have for tutors, who are providing this supplemental support.

The effect of group-dynamics, collaboration and tutor style on the perception of profession-based stereotypes: a quasi-experimental pre- post-design on interdisciplinary tutorial groups

BackgroundGroup processes in inter-professional Problem-Based Learning (iPBL) groups have not yet been studied in the health-care educational context. In this paper we present findings on how group-dynamics, collaboration, and tutor style influence the perception of profession-based stereotypes of students collaborating in iPBL groups. Health-care students are trained in iPBL groups to increase their ability to collaborate with other healthcare professionals. Previous research focusing iPBL in healthcare implies that more systematic studies are desired, especially concerning the interaction between group processes and internalized professional stereotypes. The aim of this study is to investigate whether changes in group processes, collaboration, and tutor style, influence the perception of profession-based stereotypes of physician- and nursing-students.MethodsThe study is a quasi-experimental pre- post-design. The participants included 30 students from five different healthcare professions, mainly medicine and nursing. Other professions were physiotherapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy. The students were divided into four iPBL groups, each consisting of six to nine students and a tutor. Data were collected through systematic observation using four video-recorded tutorials. SPGR (Systematizing the Person Group Relation), a computer-supported method for direct and structured observation of behavior, was used to collect and analyze the data.ResultsTraditional stereotypical profession-based behaviors were identified in the first observed group meeting. Although the groups followed different paths of development, the group-dynamics changed in all groups over the 6 weeks of collaboration. Two of the groups became more cohesive, one became more fragmented and one became more polarized. Stereotypical behaviors became less frequent in all groups. Our findings indicate that tutor behavior has a strong influence on the development of the group’s dynamics.ConclusionOur findings strongly suggest iPBL is a means of reducing stereotypical behaviors, and may positively increase members’ ability to engage in inter-professional collaboration. Although the pattern of dynamics took different forms in different groups, we argue that iPBL forces students to see the colleague behind his or her profession, thus breaking professional boundaries. The tutor style significantly influenced the iPBL groups’ development. This study contributes to our field by emphasizing the effect of group-processes in increasing mutual understanding across professions.

Qualitative analysis of cognitive and social congruence in peer-assisted learning – The perspectives of medical students, student tutors and lecturers

ABSTRACT Background The teaching of students by peers, so-called peer-assisted learning, is effective based on cognitive and social congruence among students and student tutors. This study aims to investigate cognitive and social congruence by analysing the perspectives of students, student tutors and lecturers in order to receive a better understanding of these concepts and to improve the teaching in tutorials as well as the relationship among students and student tutors. Methods Cognitive and social congruence were assessed by conducting semi-structured interviews. An interview guide about teaching and relationship in tutorials was based on previous findings of Schmidt & Moust (1995) and Lockspeiser et al. (2008). The interviews were analysed inductively by using qualitative content analysis. Results Twenty-nine participants were interviewed. The following categories were found for cognitive congruence: knowledge base, high expertise by student tutors, same language and effective knowledge transfer. Social congruence was represented by relaxed learning atmosphere, sharing social roles, empathic and supportive behaviour of student tutors, sharing experiences, understanding difficulties and enjoying tutorial. Conclusion Cognitive and social congruence may be displayed on the practical behavioural level. Trust in student tutor could be found in both concepts on different levels. The qualitative results provide a deeper insight by indicating that the student tutors may play a ‘mediator’ role for the relationship between students and lectures.

Responsible ownership for cats and dogs from different urban neighborhoods of the City of Umuarama, Paraná, Brazil

The article analyzed the responsible care and well-being of dogs and cats of different districts of the municipality of Umuarama, PR. We interviewed 53 tutors by means of a directed questionnaire, obtaining 106 animals evaluated indirectly. It was possible to determine several aspects related to the behavior of tutors and important data related to animal welfare, and the deficiency of reproductive control being an important factor verified in this study. It was concluded that the responsible care is not fully exercised by the population of Umuarama, making urgent the elaboration of public policies to improve this situation.

Tutoring executives online: what drives perceived quality?

ABSTRACTStudies of learning and student satisfaction in the context of online university programmes have largely neglected programmes catering specifically to business executives. Such executives have typically been away from higher education for a number of years, and have collected substantial practical experience in the subject matters they are taught. Their expectations in terms of both content and delivery may therefore be different from non-executive students. We explore perceptions of the quality of tutoring in the context of an online executive MBA programme through participant interviews. We find that in addition to some of the tutor behaviours already discussed in the literature, executive students look specifically for practical industry knowledge and experience in tutors, when judging how effective a tutor is. This has implications for both the recruitment and training of online executive MBA tutors.

Aeroengine Performance Prediction Based on Double-Extremum Learning Particle Swarm Optimization

AbstractTo predict the performance parameter changing trend of an aeroengine, a novel double-extremum learning particle swarm optimization (DELPSO) algorithm is proposed. Inspired by human learning behavior, this algorithm simulates this behavior, including the strategies of collective learning, private tutoring, and research behavior, so that obtained final solutions would be in the global optimal area or its neighbor area as close as possible. Meanwhile, to improve the prediction performance, a nonlinear mapping function is designed to describe the feature relationship between inputs and outputs of historical data. Based on the DELPSO, the fitness function synthetically considers the changing trend and the prediction error and can adaptively select optimal parameters of the nonlinear mapping function. The experimental results demonstrate that the DELPSO has globally stable and reliable performance. To validate the prediction performance of the proposed DELPSO, it is also applied to an aeroengine. Its good prediction performance indicates that the proposed DELPSO is an important reference for maintenance decision-making of aeroengines.

Language education via audio/videoconferencing (LEVAC): A discursive investigation

The study seeks to identify discursive patterns of private online English lessons, perceived as satisfying by adult language learners from Russia. The analysis shows a stable discursive structure with asymmetrical role distribution between teachers and students. The study also shows that most language produced during the lessons was relatively simple and covered everyday topics. The dataset provides illustrations of two medium-specific characteristics of this learning environment: (i) the use of emoticons to complement speaking and (ii) interruptions from external users. The study raises questions regarding the use of teaching materials in private online teaching context, the learning outcomes of the identified curriculum genre and an apparent difference in pedagogic behaviour of native and non-native English tutors in relation to grammar error correction. The findings of this study will be of interest to a wide range of English-teaching stakeholders, including teachers, teacher-trainers and educational developers.

Exploring the relationships between perceptions of tutoring and tutoring behaviours: a focus on graduate students serving as peer tutors to college-level chemistry students

It has been established that both tutors and tutees gain from tutoring sessions. However, tutors' benefits may be enhanced or limited depending on the type of behaviours they perform during the tutoring sessions. Although behaviours enhancing both tutor and tutee learning can be promoted by training, generalized tutor training models that are often used do not take into account tutors' preexisting perceptions of tutoring, which may guide their instructional behaviours. The goals of this multiple-case study of three chemistry tutors are to characterise their perceptions of tutoring, their behaviors during tutoring sessions, and the connections between their perceptions and behaviors. Data was collected through interviews in which tutors' perceptions of tutors and tutoring were probed and through video recordings of three to four sessions for each tutor. Interviews were analyzed using a thematic analysis approach. Video recordings of sessions were analyzed using a list of codes corresponding to different types of behaviours that had been reported in prior tutoring studies. Analysis of the interviews indicated that tutors' perceptions of tutoring did not overlap fully across all the three tutors. Cross-case analysis indicates that tutors' perceptions of tutees and of the role of tutor were reflected in the instructional behaviours the tutors enacted during the sessions. The results of this study may be used to improve tutor training programmes, particularly through examining individual tutor's perceptions of tutoring as this may help anticipate natural instructional preferences of tutors.

Exploring the Importance of Age Factor in the Delivery and Implementation of Tutorship Programme in Institutions of Higher Learning with Empirical Examples Drawn from One Institution of Higher Learning

Incontrovertibly, the conceptualization and implementation of tutorial programs in many higher education settings can be a panacea if the programme can bolster learning and improve throughputs among the learners of different cadres. Although traditionally tutoring has involved older and more experienced individuals taking charge of the role of assisting others, the age factor has become a critical factor possibly stifling the success of the programme. The study adopted a mixed method approach. Multiple data collection methods were employed through semi structured questionnaires to first year students and focus group discussions with tutors. The study found that age was a strong determinant of tutorial learning. On one hand, younger tutees felt uncomfortable with older tutors who exerted their authority the same way as teachers. On the other hand, some of the more mature first year students were less confident of the younger tutors’ support in learning. The study also observed a strong influence of cultural values in the tutee expectations of tutor behaviour. The study recommends that tutor age be considered when allocating tutors to specific tutorial groups. Ongoing awareness workshops and talks on appreciating diversity and the key principles of tutoring need to be conducted with tutors so that they develop skills in handling tutees in a cross age tutoring model. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n27p924

Intelligent Tutoring System

Intelligent Tutoring System is a tutor behaviour system which can be used as an alternative goal for interactive e-learning and distant learning. This system can provide an adaptive system to support student’s learning and retention process based on their characteristic and needed. There are development method such as bayesian network, and neural network that can build fundamental component of Intelligent Tutoring System. This paper will give some concepts and examples for implementing those method from other papers.
 Index Terms—intelligent tutoring system, artificial intelligent, neural network, bayesian network, ontology

To what extent do tutor-related behaviours influence student learning in PBL?

The purpose of this study was to investigate how tutor behaviours influence learning in problem-based learning (PBL). A previous study had indicated a significant influence of the tutor's social congruent behaviour on the PBL process and this study further investigates this finding by examining two groups of tutors displaying differences in social congruence. The participants were 77 students under the tutelage of four tutors and a self-report questionnaire ranked two tutors to be more socially congruent as compared to the other two. Student learning was measured by a concept recall test and the results from the analysis of covariance indicated a significant impact of the tutor's social congruent behaviour on learning after the problem analysis phase but not on the self-directed learning and reporting phases. It was concluded that the academic abilities of students and the small number of tutors involved may have affected the results, which led to the second part of this study. A group of 11 tutors were selected and the impact of their behaviours on student achievement measured by the module grade was examined. Results indicated that the tutor behaviours had a greater influence on average students as compared to the academically stronger and weaker students. This finding suggests that students who are academically stronger are not as reliant on the tutor while average students may depend more on the tutor to guide and motivate them in order to achieve the learning goals.

How to be a qualified PBL tutor

Problem-based learning has gradually become an important pedagogical tool in the medical curriculum.Behaviors of PBL tutor play an unique role in teaching.A good PBL tutor must consider the following issues:ample preparing before class,awareness of learning outside the tutorial room,social congruence,dealing with the difficult student and dysfunctional group,sharing the PBL experience and seeking support or advice from peers. Key words: Problem-based learning; Tutor behaviors ; Social congruence

Shared Practices amongst Teachers in Online Training Courses

This paper researches some aspects of shared practices and social interactions amongst language teachers who took part in a modular in-service teacher training programme taught online in 2010. It evaluates whether and how the sharing of teaching practices took place in one of the courses and it investigates the sociocollaborative quality of the learning, looking for indicators of social and teaching presence based on the model of the community of inquiry (Garrison, Anderson and Archer, 2000). The main course activity used was the forum as a tool for asynchronous communication because discussion fora allow for reflection, feedback and extended comments, thus fostering peer collaboration (Lamy, M.-N. & Hampel, R., 2007: 40). The analysis explores patterns of participation, the tutor-learner interactions, the tutor behaviour and the interactions amongst the participants. Throughout the course, many posts were found which reflect on teaching practice and demonstrate the sharing of teaching expertise. However, it appears that collaborative communication in an online course is difficult to achieve. Most discussions follow a simple cue (task) – response (by participant) – feedback (by tutor) structure and fail to develop further feedback levels.

Delivery and Evaluation of Synchronous Online Reading Tutoring to Students At-Risk of Reading Failure

In a technological society, demands for higher literacy are ever increasing, creating grievous consequences for those who fail to meet these demands (National Research Council, 1998). Both legislative mandates, such as NCLB, and developments in the provision of reading instruction, such as RtI, have increased the demand for high quality tutoring services. However, the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE, 2005) and state officials (Richard, 2005) report that access to intensive supplemental tutoring may be limited in rural areas due to limited availability of qualified providers. One way to overcome this obstacle is to supplement classroom instruction with live systematic, comprehensive, and explicit online reading tutoring. The purpose of this manuscript is to describe and discuss a preliminary investigation of the effects of live online reading tutoring on 4th grade students in a high minority, high poverty school in Philadelphia, PA. Although this study was not conducted in a rural location, the implications are great for rural schools where qualified tutors may be nonexistent or inaccessible. Using a distance teleconferencing system, trained and supervised undergraduate students located at Utah State University delivered tutoring. The researchers employed a multiple-baseline across participants design to determine, the effects of 1:1 online reading tutoring on reading fluency scores for 3 students. In addition, they compared data on tutors' face-to-face and online tutoring behaviors. Data collected from parents, teachers, tutees, and tutors evaluating the effectiveness, efficiency, and feasibility of online tutoring for remediating students' skill deficiencies are presented and discussed.