Audio and Written Comments in an Online Undergraduate Composition Class: Student and Instructor Approaches and Preferences

This study investigated students’ and instructors’ approaches and preferences to audio and written comments in an online undergraduate composition class. A mixed-method design was employed utilizing both a survey instrument and interviews for data collection. Forty-nine students and five instructors participated. Students gave more positive ratings to audio comments than to written comments on global- and middle-level items. However, their impressions on the comprehensibility of audio and written comments at the micro level were mixed. Instructors showed a preference for audio comments over written comments in terms of time investment. In addition, instructor commenting styles and the medium used influenced the time invested in providing comments     

Talking it through: two French immersion learners’ response to reformulation

This article documents the importance of collaborative dialogue as part of the process of second language learning. The stimulus for the dialogue we discuss in this article was a reformulation of a story written collaboratively in French by Nina and Dara, two adolescent French immersion students. A sociocultural theoretical perspective informs the discussion of three sustained examples of the learners’ “talking it through” as they confront and resolve many language-related problems while comparing their story with its reformulation. A pre-test/post-test design allows us to demonstrate the combined effects on second language learning of the reformulation and the students’ reactions to it.     

Between two stories: assessment of and for learning

The study was conducted in a school for special education with small classes of six to 12 students. The aim was to illuminate how students’ understanding of written assessments could be related to assessment for learning. Twenty-nine students were asked to describe their understanding of written assessment in three different subjects and, further, to describe their perceptions in follow-up interviews. The two-step analysis first focused on individual understanding. Thereafter Vygotsky’s zone of proximal development (ZPD) was used as analytical tool. In the first analysis three categories were identified. Students’ understandings were related to subject matter knowledge, generic skills and attitudes. The findings of the second analysis indicated that written assessment often lacked formative features and cannot be seen as learning in the ZPD. Difficulties with schoolwork were seen as problems of the individual and the measures were directed towards the student. Even though the guidelines ask for a relational perspective a categorical perspective sometimes was adopted in the assessments. The implications of the study relate to the ways teacher’s assessment competences can encompass students’ understanding and how this can be translated into action.     

基于U3D的航空发动机涡轮装配模拟器开发

通过设计开发航空发动机涡轮装配模拟器,旨在改变传统教学实习的方式,改善实习条件和更新实习内容。文章系统地介绍了航空发动机涡轮装配模拟器的设计原理和组成,阐述了设计中的关键技术,并给出了模拟器的实现方案。模拟器采用CATIA和Acrobat 3D完成,发动机三维模型采用U3D格式,通过JavaScript实现了对U3D图形的控制。模拟器已经在本科教学中得到应用,实践表明该模拟器有很好的实用性和创新性。     

Facilitating fourth-grade students’ written argumentation: The use of an argumentation graphic organizer

Abstract

Literacy instruction in the 21st century must bolster students’ ability to critically process text and craft well-reasoned written argumentation. The authors investigated changes in fourth-grade students’ (N?=?28; 15 girls) written argumentation as they used a researcher-developed graphic organizer (i.e., Quality Talk graphic organizer [QT_GO]). The authors also examined the extent to which students’ graphic organizer performance predicted their written argumentation and whether such prediction was sustained across genres. Both QT_GO responses and written argumentation essays were scored for quantity and quality. Multilevel modeling analyses reveal that (a) both quantity and quality of students’ written argumentation essays statistically significantly improved after students used QT_GO and (b) students’ graphic organizer performance seemed to attenuate the effect of genre on their written argumentation for both quantity and quality. Results suggest that QT_GO facilitated students’ written argumentation, making it easier for fourth-grade students to write about both narrative and expository texts.     

Pre-service Mathematics Teachers’ Noticing Skills and Scaffolding Practices

A 14-week course program was designed to investigate pre-service teachers’ noticing skills and scaffolding practices. Six pre-service teachers were matched with a pair of sixth grade students to observe and scaffold students’ mathematical understanding while they were working on the given tasks. Data was collected through pre-service teachers’ own recorded videos of implementation of tasks, their written reflections about the implementations, videos of group reflections before and after the implementations, and students’ written work. The analysis of data revealed that pre-service teachers mostly noticed students’ errors and strategies during their interactions with students, they attended important instances about students’ thinking and justified their reasoning for their comments in their written reflections. However, while interacting with students, they usually used low level scaffolding practices such as asking for clarification, explanation, and justification rather than attempting to elicit students’ thinking and improve their understanding.     

Examining Elementary Students’ Development of Oral and Written Argumentation Practices Through Argument-Based Inquiry

Argumentation, and the production of scientific arguments are critical elements of inquiry that are necessary for helping students become scientifically literate through engaging them in constructing and critiquing ideas. This case study employed a mixed methods research design to examine the development in 5th grade students’ practices of oral and written argumentation from one unit to another over 16 weeks utilizing the science writing heuristic approach. Data sources included five rounds of whole-class discussion focused on group presentations of arguments that occurred over eleven class periods; students’ group writings; interviews with six target students and the teacher; and the researcher’s field notes. The results revealed five salient trends in students’ development of oral and written argumentative practices over time: (1) Students came to use more critique components as they participated in more rounds of whole-class discussion focused on group presentations of arguments; (2) by challenging each other’s arguments, students came to focus on the coherence of the argument and the quality of evidence; (3) students came to use evidence to defend, support, and reject arguments; (4) the quality of students’ writing continuously improved over time; and (5) students connected oral argument skills to written argument skills as they had opportunities to revise their writing after debating and developed awareness of the usefulness of critique from peers. Given the development in oral argumentative practices and the quality of written arguments over time, this study indicates that students’ development of oral and written argumentative practices is positively related to each other. This study suggests that argumentative practices should be framed through both a social and epistemic understanding of argument-utilizing talk and writing as vehicles to create norms of these complex practices.     

An Empirical Study of Students’ Sight Translation Practice

Most of the studies on sight translation are related to analyzing effort models.Some scholars have established effort models for interpreting activities.However,the majority of the research published in English was conducted between English and European languages.Experiments written in English on interpreting between English and Chinese are limited.The purpose of this research is to explore the problems that occurred in students’performance of sight translation with a view to improving students’performance and the training method.The results of the experiment show that ST skills are composed of two parts:linguistic capacity and delivery skills.The problems that occurred in the case study were presented as delivery problems.However,the reason for the problems was lack of linguistic transfer capacity.This study recommends that students should be trained both on linguistic capacity and delivery skills.     

Challenges in Argumentation and Paraphrasing Among Beginning Students in Educational Sciences

The present study aimed to identify difficulties in writing at the beginning of educational science programmes in the Finnish Open University by analysing the students’ written argumentation and use of sources at the textual level. The data were analysed using qualitative content analysis. The results showed that many students began their educational studies with weak writing competencies. While many of the problems were directly related to students’ failure to explain the ideas in their sources in their own words, some problems pertained to other aspects, such as the inability to construct convincing arguments. Understanding the nature of the problems in writing encountered by beginning students in educational sciences can help teachers foster students’ participation in academic discourse.     

Prompting secondary students’ use of criteria,feedback specificity and feedback levels during an investigative task

This study investigates the effects of prompting on secondary students’ written peer feedback in chemistry investigation reports. In particular, we examined students’ feedback features in relation to the use of criteria, feedback specificity, and feedback levels. A quasi-experimental pre-test post-test design was adopted. Reviewers in the prompted condition were provided with question prompts that asked them to pose written feedback to their peers on what they did or did not do well and suggestions for improvement, while reviewers in the unprompted condition gave written peer feedback without prompts. The findings showed that prompted peer feedback has a significant effect on the number of comments related to Knowledge of errors, Suggestions for improvement and Process level feedback. This study supports the view that prompting peer feedback in the use of criteria, feedback specificity and feedback levels opens up opportunity for reviewers to engage more meaningfully with peer feedback in report writing tasks.     

Understanding the role of students’ reflections in their uptake of teacher written feedback

This study reports on the role of students’ reflections in their teacher written feedback. Informed by a qualitative case study approach, this study collected data from 18 students across a semester of an English-as-a-foreign language writing course at a university in China. In the course, teacher written feedback and students’ reflections were both informed by writing as a meaning-making process. The data sources included 72 pieces of student essays, 144 pieces of reflection written by the students, and post-semester interviews with the students. The study showed that engaging students in writing reflections was helpful for developing their knowledge of writing, although the process somewhat followed a zigzag trajectory. The exercise helped them transcend their previous knowledge repertoires, thereby assisting them in critically understanding their revision process and refining their knowledge of writing in response to the teacher’s written feedback. In particular, the students felt that the meaning-making-based reflections provided clear and accessible layers for them to understand the close relationship between language and content. As such, the students felt that they were able to harness their reflections as a written venue through which they could critically digest the teacher’s written feedback and develop their knowledge of writing as a meaning-making process while dialoguing with their instructor.     

关注情境设置 培育学科素养——2020年高考英语天津卷作答析评

2020年高考英语天津卷两次笔试试题践行高考评价体系的考查要求,通过选择适切的语篇和设计指向学科素养的问题,精心设置情境。教师在教学中应依据高考评价体系和课程标准,加强主干知识的教学,提升学生语言运用能力,培养学生的思维品质,促进学生形成创新意识,培育学科素养。     

Dyslexia and the Studio: Bridging the Gap between Theory and Practice

It is generally accepted that art and design related disciplines attract a higher proportion of students with dyslexia than traditional academic counterparts. Combined with this is a prevalent perception that dyslexia predominantly affects students’ writing and linguistic ability and it is this, as well as an increased visual‐spatial sensibility, that attracts students to art and design disciplines. This article examines these ideas through the experience of fine art students on a degree course with a mandatory written element. Drawing on focus groups and interviews with students, it argues that the studio component, in terms of its learning environment and teaching methods, presents an equally challenging context for students with dyslexia and that the written element or lecture‐based studies can provide students with a valuable counterpoint to their studio practice.     

Written feedback provided by first-year engineering students,undergraduate teaching assistants,and educators on design project work

ABSTRACT

Feedback is an important part of design education. To better understand how feedback is provided to students on their engineering design work, we characterised and compared first-year engineering students’, undergraduate teaching assistants’, and educators’ written feedback on sample student design work. We created a coding scheme including two domains: Substance and Focus of feedback. Educators made more and longer comments than undergraduate teaching assistants, and undergraduate teaching assistants made more and longer comments than first-year students. The first-year students focused on giving specific directions in their feedback while educators and undergraduate teaching assistants asked thought-provoking questions. Students tended to make more comments about the ways that their peers had communicated their design work while educators and undergraduate teaching assistants made more comments about the design ideas presented in the sample work. This study offers implications for practice for supporting educators, undergraduate teaching assistants, and first-year engineering students to be able to provide feedback on design work.     

Action Research on Using Self-and Peer-assessment in Teaching of English Writing

The main purpose of this paper is to explore the perception of applying self-and peer-assessment in English writing,through an Action research process.The learning in the programme,the students have learnt translating Chinese into written English for first stage,and have learnt writing in English for second and third stage through self-and peer-assessment.The research result shows that the most students feel that the process of self-and peer-assessment are useful for improving their English writing skill and they feel that self-reflection and peer discussion around their English writing is helpful for promoting the development of self-and peer-assessment.Especially,key findings about four types of students are more important.Overall,based on student’s perception about using self-and peer-assessment,learning written in English is also an ongoing research,it can develop the ability of students’ ability to solve problems independently,and raise their language communicative competence gradually.     

Effects of self-questioning on EFL students’ engagement in literary reading / Los efectos del autocuestionamiento en la lectura comprometida de textos literarios de estudiantes de inglés como lengua extranjera

This study examines the effects of self-questioning on EFL students’ literary reading engagement. Two interventions were tested: (1) students generating questions while reading short stories, and then exploring their questions in small-groups; and (2) students generating questions while reading, and then reflecting through a free writing activity. Participants were 59 Vietnamese undergraduate students enrolled in an English as a foreign language course. A pre-test post-test control group design with switching replications was used, with a control condition in which the teacher (instead of the students) posed the questions. Students’ reading engagement was measured by a written response to a short story and a questionnaire. Results showed that both self-questioning interventions positively influenced students’ reading engagement compared to the control condition. A maintenance of effects was also observed. We conclude that self-questioning combined with group discussions or free writing promotes students’ reading engagement.     

Assessing students’ understanding about levers: better test instruments are not enough

This study was designed to investigate variations in students’ responses to lever problems across multiple assessment contexts and formats. Prior to and at the end of a four‐month science unit on simple machines, grade 6/7 students prepared semantic maps, wrote responses to application questions, discussed their written answers, and modelled solutions to practical problems using physical materials. We present data from pre‐ and post‐instruction interviews to show that students’ responses varied in kind and extent across assessment contexts and formats. Such variations in performance are consistent with situated cognition theories which assert that competence is heterogeneous across situations and is a function of interactions between individuals and the contexts in which they perform. Based on these findings, implications are drawn regarding more productive means of assessing students’ understanding in classrooms.     

Effectively feeding forward from one written assessment task to the next

Most studies into lecturers’ written feedback focus on the types of feedback found to be effective when students have the opportunity to act on that feedback, revise their written assignment and improve the mark they receive. But often students do not have this opportunity. Typically, they receive a mark and feedback on an assignment that they will never be able to rework and resubmit. This can leave students unsure about what to do with the feedback they receive. This paper reports on the use of high impact written feedback from lecturers that significantly improved student outcomes and grades from one assessment task to the next. It examines a range of factors which together make feedback in this context effective including: assessment design, use of grading standards and tutor training. These findings from a very large unit have significant implications for teaching staff who want to use feedback to feed forward and make a real difference to their students’ learning.     

高职工科类数学教材编写的若干思考

高职工科类数学课程,具有基础性、工具性和发展性,教材作为实现其课程性质的重要载体和系统有效开展教学活动的工具,应围绕满足专业技能培养需求、突出数学技术应用、体现素质教育的理念,以技能型人才成长和未来发展需求为本,根据“面向高职工科类专业,融入数学技术和文化,凸显分层学用数学”的理念,教材编写应侧重突出综合职业素养和创新意识的培养、数学技术与专业技能的融合和数学思想方法的熏陶,还要体现学生个性需求以及全过程的教学设计思想。