End-user authored tutorials are increasingly becoming the norm for assisting users with learning software applications, but little is known about the quality of these tutorials. Using metrics derived from previous work, I characterize the quality of text- and image-based Photoshop tutorials available to users online. I compare these tutorials across four sources representing tutorials that are, i) written by a close-knit online community, ii) written by expert users, iii) most likely to be found, and iv) representative of the general population of tutorials. I found that not only are expert users generally writing higher quality tutorials than the other authors, but also, many of the typical tutorials are suffering from some important limitations. Most notably, they often lack attempts to help users avoid common errors, and seldom provide users with appropriate amounts of reasoning for undertaking steps. I also examine a typical tutorial rating system and find that it does not sufficiently distinguish quality between tutorials. I demonstrate the use of my findings by presenting two applications that I designed: a tutorial authoring tool, and a tutorial presentation site.

End-user authored tutorials are increasingly becoming the norm for assisting users with learning software applications, but little is known about the quality of these tutorials. Using metrics derived from previous work, I characterize the quality of text- and image-based Photoshop tutorials available to users online. I compare these tutorials across four sources representing tutorials that are, i) written by a close-knit online community, ii) written by expert users, iii) most likely to be found, and iv) representative of the general population of tutorials. I found that not only are expert users generally writing higher quality tutorials than the other authors, but also, many of the typical tutorials are suffering from some important limitations. Most notably, they often lack attempts to help users avoid common errors, and seldom provide users with appropriate amounts of reasoning for undertaking steps. I also examine a typical tutorial rating system and find that it does not sufficiently distinguish quality between tutorials. I demonstrate the use of my findings by presenting two applications that I designed: a tutorial authoring tool, and a tutorial presentation site.

I denna studie ligger fokus på utformning av videoinstruktioner i bildämnet på gymnasieskolan vilka utvärderats via intervjuer av olika informanter, lärare och studenter. De videoinstruktionerna som utformades under arbetet bearbetades efter bland annat motivationsteorier, didaktik i bildklassrummet och innefattar konkreta material samt tekniska instruktioner. Uppgifterna har producerats med självporträtt som det sammanhängande temat, i de olika tekniker som tas upp under ämnet bild. Enligt läroplanen skall eleverna bland annat med hjälp av olika tekniker och uttryckssätt genom både traditionella metoder samt nyare konstformer, få en bättre förmåga att själva utforma konstbilder och konstföremål med olika uttryck och budskap. Teknikerna sammanställdes till instruktionsfilmer som kan användas som ett stöd till lektioner i bild. Videoinstruktionerna hade även som mål att motivera eleverna, samt att möta elevers varierande inställning och arbetssätt oberoende vilken motivationsgrad de har i ämnet. En intervju genomfördes med en lärare efter att ha visat videoinstruktionerna. En gruppintervju genomfördes med lärarstudenter, detta för att inhämta deras åsikter om videoinstruktionen som läromedel. Centrala teman som framfördes av informanterna under intervjuerna var bland annat att videoinstruktionen har flera fördelar i en skolmiljö. Det sparar tid och är ett inlägg i elevernas IT kultur som de lätt kan relatera till. Videoinstruktionen är motiverande för eleverna men har begränsningar. Instruktionens budskap måste slipas noga för att komma fram i den form som läraren avser. Den bör även användas i kombination med annan undervisning för bästa resultat.

Video tutorials are a popular medium for learning to perform different tasks in feature-rich software applications. In existing systems, the comments are generally shown below the video in threads. This separation of video and comments creates cognitive load when users try to link comments with the video. We designed and developed 'VidComm', a prototype interface enabling users to filter comments from different categories and link them directly to the tutorial content – and thus enhancing the existing video tutorial comment system. An evaluation of VidComm suggests that this system helps users find particular information from comments more quickly and accurately than a traditional commenting system. / February 2016

L'objet de ce travail est de proposer et évaluer des dispositifs pédagogiques mis en place pour faciliter l'apprentissage du Dessin Assisté par Ordinateur, dans ses phases cruciales de méthodologie de représentation d'un dessin. Sur base d'observations et d'une revue de littérature relative au travail en groupe, à l'apprentissage par projets, à la conception et l'impact de didacticiels, nous rendons compte de trois expériences menées dans le cadre de la formation des ingénieurs. Pour ce faire, cinq didacticiels et six environnements de travail ont été créés et testés auprès d'étudiants de première année. Ils permettent d'aborder l'apprentissage du Dessin Assisté par Ordinateur via le logiciel AutoCad®, de ses possibilités de simple crayon électronique à l'animation en images de synthèse, et quelques notions de Conception Assistée par Ordinateur. Les principaux résultats de ces expériences mettent en évidence l'intérêt de l'auto-apprentissage, le rôle du groupe, celui du tuteur et l'importance de la nature de la tâche, dans le processus didactique. Plus particulièrement, nous démontrons la possibilité d'aborder les concepts de base du DAO de manière autonome à l'aide d'outils adéquats, la nécessité de combiner le travail en groupe à l'intervention d'un tuteur pour aborder, notamment, les questions de méthode associées à l'analyse des dessins à réaliser, et la nécessité de proposer, dans la formation des ingénieurs, des environnements d'apprentissage et d'enseignement contextualisés.

Poster presented at ALA Annual Conference 2013, Chicago, IL / In the spring semester of 2013, the University of Arizona Libraries partnered with the Eller College of Management to provide instruction to all first-semester Eller students. An online toolkit of library resources was created in Blackboard. The first day of the semester, two groups of 250 students each assembled into a lecture hall and received an overview of the Eller first-year experience, which included a 50-minute library instruction session. The challenge was how to provide an environment in which the students could have hands-on instruction while receiving personalized assistance and also to ensure that the students retained the concepts learned. The librarians utilized online quizzes to guide the in-class instruction and then required a four-part post-class tutorial, using interactive guide-on-the-side technology to strengthen retention and follow-up quizzes to test retention. This poster’s charts, screen shots, and photos will examine the process, the technology utilized, and results from the quizzes and website analytics.

Recent efforts in engineering education research have set in motion reform advocating more active learning in the classroom. Active learning centers on the student and consists of pedagogical approaches to address the broad spectrum of educational backgrounds and demographics. In order to further the research focused on active learning products, appropriate and innovative assessment methods must be developed. For this thesis, innovative active learning modules are the focus of the analysis. In total, 12 Finite Element tutorials are designed and assessed using both statistical analysis and confidence interval correlations. Fundamental and informative assessment strategies have been developed to iteratively improve active learning approaches. Results of this process show that the finite element tutorials lead to enhanced student learning that can span across student demographics. Certain cases do exist where unique learning styles or personality types respond more positively to this pedagogical technique than others. Global outcomes are presented to assess these tutorials cumulatively, as active learning products. Finally, the assessment methodology is redesigned into a useful toolkit for educators to follow in furthering efforts of integrating active learning into any engineering classroom. / text

Information literacy is a relatively new concept in Turkey and is most accessible to English Language Learners. This article-format dissertation identifies the information needs and habits of English Language and Literature majors at a major Turkish university, discusses the development of an online intervention to teach information literacy to these students, and tests the efficacy of using Turkish subtitles to teach information literacy skills to these English majors. Article 1 surveyed students majoring in English Language and Literature about their attitudes towards library usage and sources. Student attitudes revealed a preference for internet sources over library sources and a belief that internet sources are more likely than library sources to provide students with the information they need. In response to the need for increased information literacy instruction, an online tutorial was developed to teach information literacy skills that focus on the Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education. Article 2 discusses the design and development of this tutorial. Article 3 tests the most effective language configuration for students to learn these information literacy skills, finding that students that completed the tutorial with an English-language soundtrack and Turkish subtitles finished tasks at a statistically significant faster pace than other groups and with statistically significant more success. Overall, Turkish English majors showed a need for increased information literacy skills. A subtitled tutorial is one way to provide this information literacy training.

Master of Science / Department of Computing and Information Sciences / Daniel A. Andresen / Tutorials and Quiz Android Mobile application is an application which gives you brief tutorials on various programming languages and technologies to the user who has installed this application. It gives video tutorials and training on different technologies. The mobile application also contains sample code, interview questions, and answers. This application also conducts a quiz to the user who is interested in a particular technology for checking their knowledge on the subject. It has different levels like Basic Level and Advanced Level quiz. This application conducts a quiz in the form of multiple choice questions. After the completion of the quiz the application generates reports based on the quiz conducted. The user can also test their knowledge on those technologies based on a timed quiz, we can include the above technology questions in this application. We can give a time frame for each question and all the questions are to be answered in that specified time period. Say for example we can give 20 seconds to answer a question. If the user gives an incorrect answer, will be exited out of the quiz.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 25-28, 1993 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / In today's world, the importance of training for telemetry systems continues to grow as new technologies provide users with ever-increasing capabilities. Successful training programs ensure telemetry systems quickly become operational yielding the acquisition of critical test data. Over the years, training programs have been greatly impacted by the changes in defense contracts -- specifically funding. Today's aggressive telemetry market requires contractors to develop complex telemetry systems within the constraints of Firm Fixed price (FFP) contracts and within very short schedules. As a result of these conditions, training programs have changed significantly over the last ten years. Projects which used to have dedicated training personnel (instructors, technical writers, etc.) now rely on the system developers to provide the training. In actuality, the quality of training has improved with this new approach. Now students benefit from having the most knowledgeable personnel teach them about the system and, often times, latent problems with the system are efficiently identified and corrected. This paper will summarize the evolution of training programs for telemetry systems developed by Computer Sciences Corporation. The benefits of a scenario where the system architects train the end users with the use of increased "hands-on" training will be explored.