Using information technology is integral living in a modern world. It lets us search for necessary information. School is the place where people obtain this competence. To pursue this objective school uses computer-based teaching programs. “Akis M” is one of the commonly used for teaching geography at school. This interactive program has thematic Lithuanian maps and database of related information. First part of this work is dedicated to examine all available handbooks intended for teaching Lithuanian geography and all available illustrations in them. Referring to Lithuanian geography syllabus and handbooks I developed visual database for teaching program “Akis M” In order to develop this visual database I chose to use landscape of Vilnius region as a basis. Landscape is made of several parts: relief, soil, weather, flora and fauna and human impact. All these parts form our environment. Second part of this work is assigned to analyze existing teaching program “Akis M2” propose new functions and new development. One of which is visual database of Vilnius region landscapes. After scrutinizing landscapes of Vilnius district visualization scheme was created. With reference to this scheme visual data was collected. All of seven landscapes in Vilnius district were visualized. Four of them, covering most of Vilnius region, are visualized with most places. Other three have less visualization places. Using “Arc View” software map of landscapes was created. This map and related... [to full text]

Across many domains, Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITSs) are used to facilitate practice, providing a customized learning environment and personal tutoring experience for students to learn at their own pace through effective student modeling and feedback. Most current ITSs are built around cognitive learning theories including Ohlsson's theory on learning from performance errors and Anderson's ACT theories of skill acquisition which focus primarily on providing negative feedback or corrective feedback, facilitating learning by correcting errors. Research into the behavior and methods used by expert tutors suggest that experienced tutors use positive feedback quite extensively and successfully. This research investigates positive feedback; learning by capturing and responding to correct behavior, supported by cognitive learning theories. The research aim is to develop and implement a systematic approach to delivering positive feedback in Intelligent Tutoring Systems, in particular SQL-Tutor, a constraint-based tutor which instructs users in the design of Structured Query Language (SQL) database queries. An evaluation study was conducted at the University of Canterbury involving a control group of students who used the original version of SQL-Tutor giving only negative feedback and an experimental group using the modified version of SQL-Tutor where both negative and positive feedback were given. Results of the study show that students learn quite similarly from one system to another, however those in the experimental group take significantly less time to solve the same number of problems, in fewer attempts compared to those in the control group. Students in the experimental group also learn approximately the same number of concepts as students in the control but in much less time. This indicates that positive feedback results in increased amount of learning over a shorter period of time and improves the effectiveness of learning in ITSs.

The aim of this thesis is to examine how teachers use computer based assessment in their work and what user barriers they experience while working with computer based assessments. The result of the thesis is meant to provide an understanding of which factors affect the use of computer based assessments and how a company who provide computer based assessments applications can increase the rate of use amongst teachers.To investigate this, the author examined a company in Sweden who provide a computer based assessment application for both universities and high schools. The study was carried out at two different schools, a university and a high school, both located in Stockholm. In total nine teachers were interviewed. The author also conducted observations at the company whose computer based assessment application was examined.The author’s findings suggest that a lack of functions within the application and lack of costumer support from the company all negatively impacted the teacher’s use of the application. There were also findings that could suggest that a lack incentive to use the application may have negatively impacted teacher’s rate of use.To increase the rate of use, the author suggest that companies must work closer with teachers to understand their routines and develop applications accordingly. Companies should also be using teachers who already are using computer based assessment to develop incentives so that other teachers may start to use computer based assessments applications more frequently

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The present study utilized Microsoft Visual Basic 2008 to investigate the role of comparing high and low preferred education-based stimulus equivalence protocols for adults with developmental disabilities outside the educational system. First, participants were exposed to all educational categories and completed a paired choice preference assessment to identify high and low preferred protocols. Next, participants completed high and low preferred protocols following an alternating treatments design, with an initial pretest, training, posttest, and a test for an emergent topography (typing skills). Results showed evidence of higher preference through duration and errors per min measures for two of three participants, with results unclear for a third participant. Furthermore, one participant displayed all equivalence classes expected of the training protocol, while another demonstrated all emergent relations for the high preferred protocol but only one of six for the low preferred protocol, and the last participant exceeded criterion for four of six posttests for the high preferred protocol, and two of six for the low preferred protocol. The results are discussed in terms of measures for preferences, habilitation, modifications to training protocols, the study's limitations, and directions for future research.

Please read the abstract in the 00front part of this document / Thesis (DPhil (Information Science))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Information Science / unrestricted

A challenge for both researchers and practising teachers is to develop, disseminate and implement methods to help all students acquire good reading skills. One way to do this is to conduct intervention studies. Within the framework of this dissertation two such studies are carried out with the purpose of promoting the reading development of children whose reading ability has not yet reached the adequate age level. The empirical material consists of two studies containing different interventions. These studies form the basis of the four articles included in the dissertation. The overall aim was to analyse the effects of the interventions with regard to both quantitative aspects of pupils’ reading abilities as well as the qualitative aspects of interpreting intervention as a method for promoting reading development. The interventions contain training programmes aiming at promoting pupils’ reading development. The participants of the first study attended grades 1-4, while in the other study only pupils from grade 2 participated. The first study comprises two different training programmes, one of which was computer-based. In the other study both training programmes were computer-based. One programme focused on phonology, whereas the other was more oriented towards reading comprehension. Results showed that pupils who received a combination of phonological and comprehension training made greater progress on tests measuring word decoding, phonological ability and reading comprehension than the comparison groups. These results are valid in the short term, i.e. immediately after the end of the intervention, but also in the long term, one year after the intervention was concluded. The results also demonstrate that computer-based intervention in reading training with a strict framework, combined with individually adapted contents may be both effective and motivating and also have a substantial effect on the success of the interventions. The results from one of the studies also showed that it is possible to achieve positive results on pupils’ reading skills with interventions that do not contain any homework. The main contribution of this thesis is important for further research and measures for children with reading disabilities.

Looks at the findings of a survey of 115 Saudi Arabian managers who had completed their undergraduate education in the United States in relation to the informational and computing resources and their applications in Saudi organisations. Considers the role of computers in business and highlights the lack of specialists able to train within the country. Concludes that whilst the skills to use information technology exist, they are limited by cultural resistance to change, traditional viewpoints, authoritarian leadership and bureaucracy. Advocates government encouragement and ties with developed nations to help change such attitudes.

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