This thesis explores the design and evaluation of a collaborative, inquiry learning Intelligent Tutoring System for ill-defined problem spaces. The common ground in the fields of Artificial Intelligence in Education and Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning is investigated to identify ways in which tutoring systems can employ both automated coaching and collaborative techniques to support students as they learn. The resulting system, Rashi, offers feedback on student work by using an Expert Knowledge Base to recognize students' work. Evaluation in actual classrooms demonstrated that collaboration significantly improves students' contributions, and some evidence suggests that there is a significant positive correlation between the amount of coaching received and metrics that represent positive inquiry behavior. Finally, this thesis highlights the potential for combining coaching and collaboration such that 1) collaborative work can create more opportunity to provide automated coaching and 2) automated coaching can identify key moments when collaboration should be encouraged.

This dissertation investigates how students perceive of new writing technologies and the culture associated with them, especially as these technologies are being incorporated into composition classrooms. In order to assess technology and create pedagogical practices that facilitate the writing development of students, composition scholars need to explore the attitudes of students entering into computerized writing environments. This study solicits the input of students in order to assess their understandings of computer technologies and computer culture, and the impact these technologies have on their experience in writing classrooms. This provides a sense of their perspectives on questions of technology and therefore begins to present a fuller picture of the context within which we teach. The study also creates a model for research that involves students actively in the research process. In order to encourage the input of students, the project was composed of several parts including a survey of eight first-year composition courses and follow-up discussions with each of these classes. However, the bulk of the data comes from eleven students who participated in a specially designed course entitled “Writing and Technology” that invited students to participate in the research process. The results demonstrate that teachers need to be aware of students' various skill levels with computers and teach accordingly. Furthermore, the study indicates that economic class plays a large role in determining a student's competency and perspective on computers. Finally, the project suggests that students hold various opinions on technology and how gender, race, and class might mark it. It is important to bring issues relating to technology and computer culture to the forefront when we teach, rather than letting computers remain “invisible” and therefore neutral objects.

First year students at a Higher Education University in Windhoek in a Principles of Language English class are expected to use Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to improve their language proficiency in a fun and interesting manner. However, it was observed that students have varied digital literacy skills which are not in line with Namibia's ICT Policy. The study set out to find out why students who came from the same Namibian secondary public schooling system, and was exposed to the same curriculum, had such varied digital literacy proficiency. Principal of Language is the natural environment for the researcher and the students in this study. This study follows Eshet-Alkalai's definition of digital literacy. Bourdieu's concept of cultural capital was used to develop an explanation for the observed varied digital literacy skills and to find out if English lecturers should continue with the use of ICTs in the English class. This study was limited to the specific needs and digital literacy deficiency of students as observed in the Principal of Language class. Data was collected from 47 first time Principles of Language, first year students. In addition, this study also relied on the experiences of two ICT subject lecturers. Different data collection instruments were used: student questionnaires, interviews and focus group discussions and faculty interviews. The study revealed that despite Namibia's ICT policy that calls for learners to be prepared at high school for the integration of ICTs, quite a number of first year students had no digital literacy skills. Some students only got to use a computer for the first time at university. Despite these challenges students were not averse to the use of ICTs to improve their English but expect lecturers to first teach them how to use the tools. Lecturers need to realise that not all first year students are computer literate.

abstract: ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of virtual office hours in the online classroom on engagement and course completion among criminology students at Arizona State University. The study relied on an action research mixed-method design. The goal of the interventions was to increase the engagement of all members of the class. The study’s conceptual framework drew from Albert Bandura’s (1977) social learning theory that combines cognitive psychology and behaviorism to describe the learning process within individuals, as well as Garrison, Anderson, and Archer’s (2000) Community of Inquiry Framework, which is based on constructivist learning theory, where individuals actively make sense of their experiences (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008). For the quantitative portion of the data collection, 60 students in my CRJ 305: Gender and Crime criminology iCourse were asked to participate in a pre- and post-intervention survey. For the qualitative portion of the data collection, I collected field notes during virtual office hours and invited all virtual office hour participants to participate in post-intervention interviews. From those who responded to my invitation, I conducted one-on-one interviews. Once analyzed, descriptive data and self-reporting Question #5 indicated that the intervention—virtual office hours—did have an impact on student engagement and successful course completion. Additional quantitative data collected (mean grade point averages), once compared, suggested that those who participated in virtual office hours overall had a final higher grade point average. The interview responses and field notes suggested that virtual office hours did have an impact on student engagement and successful course completion by allowing students to develop relationships, feel more connected, and be more successful. Overall, students found that virtual office hours allowed for a more visual and personal space where they felt comfortable and could develop a relationship with others, the kind of meaningful relationship that needs to happen with online students in order for them to be as successful, if not more so, than in traditional learning environments. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Educational Leadership and Policy Studies 2020

abstract: Educational technologies can be great tools for learning. The implementation of learning aids and scaffolds within these technologies often make them effective; however, due to various problems, students may take more passive approaches to learning when using these educational tools. This tends to lead to interactions that impair learning. This study approaches this issue by reexamining the learner’s role when interacting with educational technologies. Specifically, the current study attempts to support learning and perceptions by inviting students to approach a learning task like an interface designer or instructional designer. These roles derive from a previous study on higher agency roles. The results of the current study indicate that participants learned across all conditions, suggesting the assignment of roles may not impair learning. However, learning outcomes did not differ between conditions. Additionally, the interface designer and instructional designer roles were more critical of the sounds and organizations of each video than the learner role. Limitations of the study and future directions are discussed. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Human Systems Engineering 2020

Teachers are increasingly expected to use digital resources to facilitate learning. Recent research in Higher Education has indicated the existence of a digital divide among students. With the changing role of the English teacher as a facilitator of critical skills and the traditional centrality of literacy to the English classroom, digital literacy has an integral place in English teacher education, despite its absence from the current South African English curriculum. However, integrating digital literacy is challenging and often resisted by teachers. This qualitative case study provides a detailed description and analysis of how pre-service English teachers perceived their own, their learners' and other teachers' digital literacy practices, and how these perceptions relate to their own practices. The study is informed by post-structuralist theory, drawing on the New Literacy Studies (NLS), which views literacy as embedded in social practice, imbued with power and highly dependent on context. It is believed that gaining a deeper understanding of perceived and actual digital literacy practices within specific contexts could lead to an in-depth knowledge of how digital literacy may be integrated in teacher education. The case comprises four English Method students at a relatively elite South African university who were enrolled for the Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) professional qualification. The participants viewed their own proficiency in digital literacy as limited. The data were gathered from four sources: the participants' detailed lesson plans where digital literacy has been integrated; their reflections upon these lesson plans; questionnaires providing background on their biographies and experiences with technology and a focused group interview. The study found that the participants associated some digital resources with their own and their learners' private lives and therefore did not recognize the value of these resources as educational tools. In addition, the participants experienced the internet as overwhelming and conflated digital literacy with 'Internet Literacy'. They did not find good examples of practice from other teachers at the schools where they undertook their teaching practicals. The way they perceived their learners' practices could have serious consequences for how they facilitate learning and negotiate power differentials in the classroom. Drawing on these findings, the thesis ends with a framework for the integration of digital literacy into teacher education. The framework draws on insights from Authentic Learning, New Literacy Studies and constructivist notions of learning to propose a carefully-scaffolded model which starts with students' own internet practices and provides models and authentic tasks in order to show them the affordances of digital literacy for promoting learning in the English classroom.

Computational thinking is increasingly recognized as an important skill set to learn for people living in the 21st century, and the middle school years comprise a critical stage to introduce children to computational thinking. Video game based learning is a promising way to foster computational thinking among middle school students, however, it is relatively less researched compared to other methods. In this dissertation study, I evaluated the effectiveness of a video game Penguin Go on developing middle school students’ computational thinking skills, as well as on improving their attitudes toward computer science. I designed Penguin Go to cover the core components of computational thinking, including problem decomposition, abstraction, algorithmic thinking, conditional logic, iterative thinking, and debugging. I implemented the game based on Blockly, a block-based programming language. The game was evaluated with 43 middle school students during two weeks. In addition to the overall effectiveness of the game, I aimed to investigate the impact of a specific game feature—constraints on the number of blocks in a solution—on both students’ computational thinking skills and their attitudes toward computer science. Results showed that after playing Penguin Go for less than two hours, students’ computational thinking skills improved significantly, however, the additional constraints did not generate a significant impact on learning gains. Also, the game did not bring about significant attitudinal changes among students. The additional constraints, however, resulted in a significant negative change in students attitudes toward computer science. Implications of the findings and possible directions for future research regarding using these types of games to foster computational thinking are discussed. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester 2017. / November 1, 2017. / block-based programming language, blockly, computational thinking, computer science, game-based learning, problem solving / Includes bibliographical references. / Valerie J. Shute, Professor Directing Dissertation; Lawrence C. Dennis, University Representative; Robert A. Reiser, Committee Member; Fengfeng Ke, Committee Member; Russell George Almond, Committee Member.

This study explored whether guided reflection using predetermined prompts can enhance preservice teachers' development of technology integration self-efficacy (TISE) beliefs. A quantitative approach and a quasi-experimental, pre- and posttest design with two experimental groups and a control group were used. Two types of guided reflection prompts were designed for the experimental groups: future time reflection (FTR) prompts and near time reflection (NTR) prompts. These two different types of reflection prompts focus on different temporal perspectives. Ninety-three participants were recruited from an undergraduate educational technology course, containing six sections, at a large southeast public university. Intact class sections were randomly assigned to one of three conditions. Participants in the control condition responded to prompts that did not ask for reflection, while participants in the FTR and NTR conditions responded to prompts that directed them to reflect on their experiences and write about technology implementation from two different temporal perspectives (i.e., future professional practices versus recent learning) in order to facilitate self-assessment and greater awareness of their strengths and weaknesses in regard to technology integration. The results of the study revealed no significant effect of reflection on TISE, and depth of reflection did not have a significant impact on the development of TISE. In addition, different temporal types of guided reflection prompts did not yield different degrees of TISE. While the quantitative results did not show the treatment effect on TISE, the analyses of open-ended questions revealed that the process of reflection can be helpful in analyzing and synthesizing information learned in the classroom. Thus, reflection may foster TISE if one understands the concept and its value. Based on these findings, several possible reasons why the results did not match the expectations and suggestions for future research are offered. This study attempts an initial exploration of a potential relationship between use of reflection and TISE as well as the application of future-time reflection, both of which are issues that received only limited attention in empirical studies. It is the researcher's hope that this work will encourage a greater research effort toward these complex issues. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems in partial fulfillment of the Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester 2015. / December 3, 2015. / Future time reflection, Guided reflection prompts, Reflection, Self-efficacy, Teacher education, Technology integration self-efficacy / Includes bibliographical references. / Vanessa P. Dennen, Professor Directing Dissertation; Stacey Rutledge, University Representative; Fengfeng Ke, Committee Member; James D. Klein, Committee Member.

Problem solving skills have been widely used to achieve desired outcomes in everyday life and professional contexts. To solve a complex problem in a real situation, people need to improve causal reasoning and systems thinking. Causal mapping can be used as an instructional method to develop and support students’ causal reasoning and systems thinking by establishing their own mental models. Also, causal maps can be used to assess students’ understanding of complex problems. However, it is required to determine which mapping processes produce more accurate maps dependent upon individual differences in prior knowledge, because students’ causal maps can vary depending on the level of prior knowledge and which mapping processes are used to construct causal maps. Given this issue, the purpose of this study was to identify a) the mapping processes that are dependent on students’ prior knowledge; and b) the mapping processes that can help students produce more accurate causal maps and achieve deeper understanding. In this study, 43 students constructed three different causal maps for three topics, and a total of 127 mapping recordings and causal maps were collected and analyzed using post hoc analysis. The findings revealed that students with high and medium levels of prior knowledge showed a slight tendency to use the backward approach over the forward approach, whereas students with low levels of prior knowledge showed an equal tendency to use both approaches. Students across all three levels of prior knowledge were more likely to use the breadth-first approach over the depth-first and unidentified approaches. Students that produced higher and lower quality causal maps both showed a slight tendency to use the backward approach over the forward approach and a higher tendency to use the breadth-first approach over the depth-first approach. The ratio of forward vs. backward approaches was negatively and significantly correlated with the quality of causal maps. Therefore, when students mostly used the forward approach, they constructed lower quality causal maps. In addition, the ratio of breadth-first vs. depth-first approaches was positively and significantly correlated with the quality of causal maps. This indicates that when students mostly used the breadth-first approach, the quality of their causal maps increased. Prior knowledge had a direct negative effect on the ratio of forward/backward approach and the ratio of breadth-first/depth-first approach, however prior knowledge had a direct positive effect on map quality. The ratio of forward/backward approach had a direct negative effect on map quality, and the ratio of breadth-first/depth-first approach had a direct positive effect on map quality. In conclusion, the main implication of this study is that instructors need to encourage students to jointly use the backward and the breadth-first approaches when working to solve diagnosis-solution problems. And, educational researchers need to design causal mapping software/tools to facilitate the backward and the depth-first approaches so that causal mapping can help students achieve higher levels of understanding controlling for individual differences in prior knowledge and causal reasoning skills, and be used to measure their causal understanding. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Educational Psychology and Learning Systems in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester 2016. / November 16, 2016. / causal mapping, causal mapping process, causal map quality, prior knowledge, problem solving / Includes bibliographical references. / Allan Jeong, Professor Directing Dissertation; Paul Marty, University Representative; James Klein, Committee Member; Vanessa Dennen, Committee Member.

The objective of computer acquisitions is generally to have the computers used in ways that assist faculty in their teaching, research, and other work-related activities. The conceptual model and the research design of this study were based on the premise that the needs and concerns of users must be understood and addressed in order to achieve a desired level of utilization of computer resources. This study examined the perceptions of faculty members about a new networked system of microcomputers. An administrative decision had been made to provide all full-time faculty members with a microcomputer networked to shared laser printers with communications capabilities. The concerns most frequently expressed by faculty were indicative of the early stages of using an innovation. This can be explained in part by the fact that the self-reported ratings for computer software experience indicated that as a group this faculty was at a beginner level. The faculty expressed concerns about learning how to use the networked computers as well as concerns how the college would manage the system so that it would be a cost effective acquisition. Statistical analysis indicated that faculty members' characteristics like age and gender were not indicators of the concerns reported. However, a statistically significant relationship was found between computer software experience and reported stages of concern. The results also showed that the more self-reported computer software experience, the higher the scores on the later stages of concern: Consequence, Collaboration, and Refocusing. There was also a statistically significant relationship found between computer experience and discipline and interest in learning new software and discipline. The disciplines where it would be expected that faculty might make greater use of computer resources (i.e. Sciences) did show greater self-reported experience amongst the faculty. Also, those in disciplines with the least self-reported experience indicated interest in learning new software sooner than those in disciplines with more experienced faculty. The responses to the open-ended question and the interview data confirmed and added to the information gathered from the quantitative analysis. The study concludes with recommendations that may be useful to others managing technological innovations of this nature.