This is a case study linked with action research focused on exploring ways to foster the creativity process in Computer and Information Technology (CIT) lessons. The study is divided into three pilot phases and three main phases of implementation. After exploring creativity in the literature, in the pilot phases creativity is defined, and creativity assessment and analysing tools are designed and tested. In the three phases of the Main Study, an Action Research cycle is used with a series of actions identified in every phase. At the end of each phase, actions and strategies are being reviewed with revised actions formulated and implemented in the next phase.

This research targeted complex abstract concepts in Computer Science and focused on bringing about the visualisation of such concepts using virtual world technologies. The research proposed the use of virtual world elements to support the understanding and learning of six computer science subjects having difficult theory concepts at the Higher Education level. The researcher decided to choose Higher Education as the platform for this research, due to the significant need to understand and learn complex abstract concepts of Computer Science at this level. The framework of the research is Higher Education within Further Education, which was chosen for its challenging nature with regards to students’ background and the level of additional support required for their success. The Second Life virtual world was selected and utilised to build purposely designed and scripted scenarios to empower the visualisation of complex theory concepts of the selected computer science subjects. These scenarios were embedded, in a predetermined order, within the curriculum delivery of a number of selected Computer Science modules from a Foundation Degree and a BSc (Hons) in Computing Programmes in a FE college in England. The research activities were carried out in two academic years, 2012/2013 and 2013/2014, in order to involve more students and obtain additional data to effectively, and more accurately, answer the research questions. The research aimed at identifying the extent to which using virtual world technologies to visualise difficult theory concepts in Computer Science subjects, might enhance students' learning and achievement. The research outcomes provided positive answers to the four research questions, which pursued the extent to which the visualisation of such concepts using Second life virtual world might, 1) facilitate students’ understanding of the complex abstract concepts in their HE Computer Science subjects, 2) increase students’ engagement in their HE Computer Science sessions, 3) enhance affective quality (to include elements such as appeal, enjoyment, interest and appreciation), and 4) improve student’s achievement (i.e. grades) in the targeted modules. In answer to these questions, the research outcomes showed that subject difficulty was reduced by 25% and around three quarters of students acknowledged enhanced learning in the virtual environment. Seventy percent of students acknowledged becoming more engaged in their study sessions that were carried out in virtual worlds, and more than three quarters of students acknowledged enhanced affective quality. Finally, around 85% of the modules covered by the research witnessed improved students’ achievement (i.e. higher grades). The researcher explained potential use, advantages and limitations of employing Second Life in Higher Education in general and HE Computer Science in particular, and provided recommendations to academic institutions that are interested in applying such virtual world technologies to overcome the challenges involved.

The massive advances in information and communication technology (ICT), in the last few decades, encouraged many developed and developing countries to invest in the ICT sector in education. The internet, computers, interactive whiteboards and an assortment of other technological tools have now turned out to be valuable teaching and learning resources. Saudi Arabia is not in isolation from this, they have invested heavily in the ICT field. However, the progression has often been disappointing; there is still a great gap between the availability of ICT technology and methods of implementation, resulting in a number of serious questions being raised for decision-makers and educators alike. One of the most important of these questions is 'what factors affect the successful implementation of ICT in schools’. Hence, the importance of this study is to find an answer to this question and related questions from the participants' perspective. Consequently, the research issue is addressed through a cross-sectional case study strategy, qualitative and quantitative mixed-method choices. In addition, a closed questionnaire and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data from four different perspectives (head teachers, teachers, students in Jeddah secondary school and two ICT directors in Saudi Ministry of Education). Generally, the results showed that ICT was perceived as an important tool in improving performance, collaboration, learning experience and learning outcomes. However, the study found some challenges that affect the application of ICT in Saudi schools, for example, the lack of space, resources, maintenance, a lack of ICT skills among school along with a lack in ICT training and a lack of clear ICT policies. However, the overcoming of such challenges could turn them from ‘challenges ‘into ‘positive factors’ to aid in the success of ICT implementation. Hence, the importance of this research is to suggest a strategic approach to guide decision-makers, educators and further studies in the future to promote the successful implementation of ICT in education, in general, and in Saudi secondary schools in particular.

No description available.

The aim of this research was to investigate students' perceptions of function as they interacted with the different dynamic representations of function made available through computer environments. Microworlds were designed comprising sequences of activities around the software, Function Probe, and two adaptations of DynaGraph, DG Parallel (with parallel axes) and DG Cartesian (using Cartesian axes). A series of case studies of four pairs of students was undertaken in Brazil in order to trace the evolution in students' perceptions of a selection of function properties; namely turning point, variation, range, symmetry and periodicity. This diversity of properties was chosen to examine different ways students analyse functions: pointwise, variational, global and pictorial. Starting with an examination of the curriculum followed by the case study students as a means to describe the origins of their perceptions, a longitudinal investigation was undertaken in order to identify the main features of each of the microworlds that appeared to contribute to students' progress. The students' perceptions were analysed by drawing attention to their origins, their usefulness and their potential limitations (from a mathematical point of view). A methodology for this longitudinal study was devised which incorporated visual presentations to capture the main characteristics of students' perceptions. The results showed that DG Parallel, a 'new' representation, prompted the development of perceptions free of previous limitations and sufficiently robust to allow revision. However, properties previously perceived pictorially were rarely identified in DG Parallel. Together with DG Cartesian, interactions with this microworld provoked the students to develop a variational view of some of the function properties. In addition, DG Cartesian served as a two-way bridge between variational and pictorial views. By way of contrast, using the tools in FP to transform graphs seemed not to shape perceptions, but to assist in the exploration of the function properties.

The work presented in this thesis is motivated by the need to develop practical guidelines to inform the pedagogical design of learning objects and the instructional contexts in which they are used. The difficulty is that there is no standard definition for pedagogical design or appropriate guidelines, in contrast with technical guidelines. Researchers and academic practitioners hold different understandings of the pedagogical values in the design of learning objects that determine their quality and effectiveness as educational software. Traditionally, empirical studies for the evaluation of learning objects gather rating data from the main consumers (i.e. instructional designers, teachers, and students) to assess a variety of design aspects. In this research, it is argues that, in order to evaluate and improve pedagogical design, valuable information can be extracted by analysing existing differences between students and how they use learning objects in real instructional contexts. Given this scenario, investigating the pedagogical aspects of the design of learning objects and how the study of students' behaviour with them can serve to inform such design became the main research interest of this thesis. The exploratory research presents a review of standard technical guidelines and seven evaluation frameworks for learning objects that emerged in the period from 2000 to 2013, revealing a wide spectrum of criteria used to assess their quality and effectiveness. The review explores the advantages and faults of well-known methodologies and instruments for the evaluation of learning materials and presents a selection of 12 pedagogical attributes of design, with a detailed analysis of their meanings and implications for the development of learning objects. The 12 pedagogical attributes of design are: Learning Objective, Integration, Context, Multimedia Richness, Previous Knowledge, Support, Feedback, Self-direction, Interactivity, Navigation, Assessment, and Alignment. The empirical research is based on two case studies where blended learning techniques are used as a new teaching approach for first-year Computer Programming courses at the Austral University of Chile. A virtual learning environment was customized and used in these courses to deliver different types of learning contents and assignments. Three studies were carried out for each course: the first study shows the relationships between students' interactions with different materials; the second study demonstrates the influence that learning styles exert upon these interactions, and the third study collects students' scores about the twelve pedagogical aspects of the learning resources used during the course. The results demonstrate that a relationship exists between the pedagogical attributes of the design of different learning resources and students' interactions with them. Regardless of the learning style preferences of individuals in both cohorts, the design attributes that have the greatest effect on students' behaviour with learning objects and with the whole instructional context are Interactivity, Support, Feedback, and Assessment. From the three sources of data only a combination of two of them, behavioural data and students' scores are valuable sources of empirical data to inform pedagogical design aspects of learning resources. However, it is necessary to establish a direct mapping between design attributes and expected behavioural indicators to facilitate the identification of improvements in the pedagogical design of learning resources.

Η γλώσσα προγραμματισμού Scratch είναι ιδανική για την εισαγωγή στον προγραμματισμό. Η νέα αυτή γλώσσα ανήκει στο παράδειγμα του ταυτόχρονου προγραμματισμού. Στην εργασία αυτή περιγράφεται η σχεδίαση και η αξιολόγηση ενός εξαμηνιαίου μαθήματος για την εκμάθηση της Scratch με σκοπό αφενός να μελετηθεί ο τρόπος με τον οποίο οι αρχάριοι προγραμματιστές προσεγγίζουν το θέμα του συγχρονισμού και αφετέρου να διατυπωθούν προτάσεις για τη βελτίωση του μαθήματος. Η μεθοδολογία που εφαρμόστηκε είναι βασισμένη σε σχεδιασμό ερευνητική μεθοδολογία. / Scratch programming language is ideal for introductory programming courses. This new language follows the concurrent programming paradigm. Ιn the thesis the design and evaluation of a course for learning programming with Scratch is described. The approach that beginners programmers use for the necessary synchronization is studied and a new proposal for the laboratory course is presented. The design based research methodology is followed.

This dissertation describes an authoring environment, called IWE, which allows a teacher to develop computer-based interactive worked examples without bespoke programming. The focus is on worked examples that involve transforming one representation into another using judgments not algorithms or rules. The worked examples created are all drawn from Computing Science; for example, transforming a requirements specification into an entity-relationship diagram. Teachers model the problem-solving process as a sequence of steps demonstrating how the problem is translated step-by-step into a solution, explaining the decision-making in each step. They can incorporate questions within the examples to increase student engagement and encourage students to do active thinking. Students interact with the transformation process at their own pace to obtain experience of problem-solving. Teachers are able to evolve the examples based on feedback from students and usage data from the system. A review of educational literature identified the best practice guidelines for designing and presenting effective worked examples for novices and faded worked examples for intermediate learners. These guidelines informed the essential requirements of IWE. A prototype authoring environment was designed, implemented and evaluated. Educational literature also recommends using worked examples combined with practice of problem solving. A field study was conducted applying these recommendations to evaluate the usability of IWE. Evaluations were carried out with teachers to assess their ability to create and modify interactive worked examples while the teaching of their courses was in progress. Evaluations were also carried out with students to assess the usability of IWE. The main conclusion of this research, based on analysis of the evaluations, is that the prototype of IWE is useable by both teachers and students. It allows teachers to create interactive worked examples following best practice and evolve existing examples on the basis of feedback. It allows students to use interactive worked examples independently following best practice. Finally, the dissertation identifies some possibilities for widening the scope of this research.

L’exploitation des traces d’interaction lors de tâches d’apprentissage permet différents types de retour d’expérience : retour immédiat pour l’apprenant sur sa tâche, retour d’expérience au niveau d’un groupe de pairs, retour d’expérience vers le tuteur en situation d’apprentissage, retour d’expérience vers les concepteurs de formation. Ces retours d’expérience s’expriment le plus souvent sous une forme synthétique : des indicateurs. Ce travaille apporte des solutions originales aux deux facettes indispensables à toute ingénierie des indicateurs : 1) intégration d’un système à base de traces comme nouvelle brique disponible pour la conception d’EIAH (intégration dans un framework de type Moodle) ; 2) Elaboration d’un processus intégré de transformations explicites de traces modélisées préparant à un calcul explicite d’indicateurs. Les connaissances de modélisation des traces, des transformations et de la description de la formule d’indicateur sont capitalisées, facilitant la réutilisation et la constitution de bibliothèques d’indicateurs « prêts à l’emploi ». Pour illustrer l’approche, nous avons développé un jeu de modèles de traces et de transformations adaptées à une situation cible choisie pour sa richesse interactive. Ce jeu de modèles pourra concerner l’apprenant seul, mais aussi le groupe de pairs et éventuellement le groupe classe pour révéler certains phénomènes, tels que la collaboration, non visibles au niveau de l’individu seul. L’outil développé, pour faire la démonstration de l’approche proposée, a été testé en vraie grandeur sur plusieurs terrains universitaires et est disponible en téléchargement pour Moodle. / The exploitation of user’s interaction historic provides different level of experience’s feedback and for different kind of users: experience feedback for teachers, student, group of students, TEL designers. This work provides novel solutions to two essential aspects to any engineering indicators: 1) Integration of a Trace Based System as a new component for TEL systems design (integration in a framework as Moodle for example); 2) Building a set of Trace models with a transformations process to compute explicitly indicators. Knowledge modeling traces, transformations, and indicators’ formula description are capitalized, allowing the reuse and the creation of indicators library “ready to use” To illustrate the approach, we have developed a set of traces models and transformations adapted to a chosen learning situation. This set of models will involve him- self, the peers group and possibly the whole class to reveal some phenomena, such as collaboration. A demonstration software has been developed and tested in three different university contexts and is available for download for Moodle.

This thesis concerns a longitudinal study of the practice of Live Peer Assessment on two University courses in Computer Science. By Live Peer Assessment I mean a practice of whole-class collective marking using electronic devices of student artefacts demonstrated in a class or lecture theatre with instantaneous aggregated results displayed on screen immediately after each grading decision. This is radically different from historical peer-assessment in universities which has primarily been asynchronous process of marking of students' work by small subsets of the cohort (e.g. 1 student artefact is marked by < 3 fellow students). Live Peer Assessment takes place in public, is marked by (as far as practically possible) the whole cohort, and results are instantaneous. This study observes this practice, first on a level 4 course in E-Media Design where students' main assignment is a multimedia CV (or resume) and secondly on a level 7 course in Multimedia Specification Design and Production where students produce a multimedia information artefact in both prototype and final versions. In both cases, students learned about these assignments from reviewing works done by previous students in Live Peer Evaluation events where they were asked to collectively publicly mark those works according to the same rubrics that the tutors would be using. In this level 4 course, this was used to help students get a better understanding of the marks criteria. In the level 7 course, this goal was also pursued, but was also used for the peer marking of students' own work. Among the major findings of this study are: • In the level 4 course student attainment in the final assessment improved on average by 13% over 4 iterations of the course, with very marked increase among students in the lower percentiles • The effectiveness of Live Peer Assessment in improving student work comes from o Raising the profile of the marking rubric o Establishing a repertoire of example work o Modelling the 'noticing' of salient features (of quality or defect) enabling students to self-monitor more effectively • In the major accepted measure of peer-assessment reliability (correlation between student awarded marks and tutor awarded marks) Live Peer Assessment is superior to traditional peer assessment. That is to say, students mark more like tutors when using Live Peer Assessment • In the second major measure (effect-size) which calculates if students are more strict or generous than tutors, (where the ideal would be no difference), Live Peer Assessment is broadly comparable with traditional peer assessment but this is susceptible to the conditions under which it takes place • The reason for the better greater alignment of student and tutor marks comes from the training sessions but also from the public nature of the marking where individuals can compare their marking practice with that of the rest of the class on a criterion by criterion basis • New measures proposed in this thesis to measure the health of peer assessment events comprise: Krippendorf's Alpha, Magin's Reciprocity Matrix, the median pairwise tutor student marks correlation, the Skewness and Kurtosis of the distribution of pairwise tutor student marking correlations • Recommendations for practice comprise that: o summative peer assessment should not take place under conditions of anonymity but that very light conditions of marking competence should be enforced on student markers (e.g. > 0.2 correlation between individual student marking and that of tutors) o That rubrics can be more suggestive and colloquial in the conditions of Live Peer Assessment because the marking criteria can be instantiated in specific examples of student attainment and therefore the criteria may be less legalistically drafted because a more holistic understanding of quality can be communicated.