Understanding the effects of a teacher video on learning from a multimedia document: an eye-tracking study

The present study investigated the effects on students’ learning experience of adding a video of a teacher to an e-learning module. A total of 43 undergraduates were asked to learn the content of a pedagogical document either with or without a teacher video on the screen. Although video captures of teachers are increasingly being integrated into online courses, few studies have investigated their impact and the best way of optimizing them. According to the social-cue hypothesis, the presence of a teacher (face and gestures) positively influences learners’ motivation and engagement in their learning. By contrast, the interference hypothesis holds that the teacher’s presence can lead to poor performances, as it acts as a source of visual interference that diverts students’ attention away from the relevant information. By assessing subjective ratings and learning outcomes, the present study tended to support the social-cue hypothesis, as it showed that adding a teacher video on screen significantly improved students’ retention of the spoken explanations, without disturbing either their performances on diagram and transfer problems or the time needed to process the document. Eye-tracking data showed that students spent 25% of their time watching the teacher video. Adding this video had no significant observable effects on the subjective ratings (i.e., social presence, evaluation of the teacher’s motivational skills, situational interest, cognitive load). These results suggest that videos of teachers can be used to improve social cues in multimedia learning without creating interference effects.     

Sleep restriction and degraded reaction-time performance in Figaro solo sailing races

Abstract

In solo offshore sailing races like those of the Solitaire du Figaro, sleep must be obtained in multiple short bouts to maintain competitive performance and safety. Little is known about the amount of sleep restriction experienced at sea and the effects that fatigue from sleep loss have on sailors’ performance. Therefore, we assessed sleep in sailors of yachts in the Figaro 2 Beneteau class during races and compared response times on a serial simple reaction-time test before and after races. Twelve men (professional sailors) recorded their sleep and measured their response times during one of the three single-handed races of 150, 300 and 350 nautical miles (nominally 24–50 h in duration). Total estimated sleep duration at sea indicated considerable sleep insufficiency. Response times were slower after races than before. The results suggest that professional sailors incur severe sleep loss and demonstrate marked performance impairment when competing in one- to two-day solo sailing races. Competitive performance could be improved by actively managing sleep during solo offshore sailing races.     

Interactivity Defuses the Impact of Mathematics Anxiety in Primary School Children

Math anxiety impedes performance in simple arithmetic tasks. Anxiety constrains working memory capacity and particularly the attentional functions of the central executive. The experiment reported here explored how interactivity mitigated the impact of math anxiety on the performance of elementary school students with simple additions. It manipulated two independent variables. The first was the length of the additions—involving either 7 or 11 number tokens (the value of the tokens ranged from 1 to 20). The other was the level of interactivity: in the low interactivity condition participants could not touch or point to the number tokens that configured the sums, and in a high interactivity condition participants could manipulate the tokens as they saw fit in deriving their answer. The length of the addition had an impact on accuracy, with longer sums leading to poorer performance. However, overall, performance in the high interactivity condition was superior, in terms of accuracy, absolute calculation error and efficiency, than performance in the low interactivity condition. Mathematics anxiety significantly predicted performance in the low interactivity condition, but not in the high interactivity condition. These results suggest that working memory resources are augmented through interactivity with the physical problem presentation, defusing the impact of anxiety on performance.     

Developing Children's Understanding of Fractions: An Intervention Study

Fractions constitute a stumbling block in mathematics education. To improve children's understanding of fractions, we designed an intervention based on learning‐by‐doing activities, which focused on the representation of the magnitude of fractions. Participants were 292 Grade 4 and 5 children. Half of the classes received experimental instruction, while the other half pursued their usual lessons. For 10 weeks, they played five different games using cards representing fractions (e.g., Memory and Blackjack). Wooden disks helped them represent and manipulate fractions while playing games. Our results showed an improvement in the conceptual understanding of fractions. The findings confirmed that the usual practice in teaching fractions is largely based on procedural knowledge and provides only minimal opportunities for children to conceptualize the meaning and magnitude of fractional notations. Furthermore, our results demonstrate that a short intervention inducing children to manipulate, compare, and evaluate fractions improves their ability to associate fractional notations with numerical magnitude.     

Fostering Good Governance at School Level in Honduras: The Role of Transparency Bulletin Boards

Corruption is at the core of weak governance. In the education sector, corruption is a threat to the quality of and access to education. Although the diagnosis is straightforward, effective reforms are more difficult to implement. The principles of good governance (transparency, participation, accountability, and integrity) provide us guidance, but innovative ways need to be found to fill these principles with life and create dynamics of change. We present a simple, efficient experience of introducing transparency and fostering participation and therefore accountability at the school level in Honduras. The transparency bulletin boards (murales de transparencia) are a homegrown response to the call for improving governance in a challenging environment.     

Personality and preference for evaluation methods: A study among business administration students

The goal of this study is to verify whether preference for evaluation methods can be predicted by personality as defined by the Big Five model, when controlling for gender and business major. A sample of 108 students enrolled in two compulsory undergraduate business courses completed an online questionnaire. Analysis of multiple linear hierarchical regressions indicate that gender, business major and personality account for 7–16% of the variance in preference for case studies, group work, oral exams, written exams, multiple choice tests, and practical work. These findings are discussed with regard to the relationship between personality factors predicting preference for evaluation methods and potential impacts on student evaluation and academic success in business schools.     

Inferencias causales y clasificación: su relación en niños de 4–7 años

Resumen

La presente investigación analiza la relación entre la adquisición de la clasificación y la ca- pacidad para realizar inferencias causales. Además, se pretende comprobar en qué medida los contenidos de las historias causales (en términos de animado/inanimado, de los antecedentes y los consecuentes) provocan diferencias en la ejecución. Participaron 70 niños de 8 centros públicos de EGB de Murcia, el rango de edad oscilaba entre 4;0 y 7;10. Los resultados indican cómo a medida que los sujetos dominan la clasificación muestran una mayor capacidad para realizar inferencias causales. No aparecen diferencias en la ejecución debida a los contenidos de las historias. Finalmente, se propone un modelo causal, a partir del modelo de equilibrio de la teoría de Piaget, sobre el desarrollo de las inferencias causales.     

Love Foolosophy: Pedagogy,parable, perversion

Abstract

Popular filmic and literary stereotypes of teachers from Brodie and Chips to Keating and Schneebly have not only reflected a public desire for radically innovative and perverse teaching practices, but also created those paradigms in ways that are not always readily identifiable or traceable. This article seeks to analyse tensions between traditional institutional protocols and contemporary populist opinion on the role of the effective teacher. In doing so, the article takes Peter Weir’s Dead Poets Society (1989) as a primary example of those tensions and argues for a perverse ‘foolosophical’ view of pedagogical performance and a new appreciation for the necessity of ignorance in the classroom. Since ignorance and understanding are not taken as unambiguous antonyms, the article proposes that effective teaching and learning occur most effectively in the interstices between humility and hospitality.     

Utilising creative methodologies to elicit the views of young learners with additional needs in literacy

The research described in this article aimed to explore and examine the dominant ‘assessment’ and ‘participation’ stories of upper‐primary pupils with long‐standing and marked literacy learning needs, their views on how their level of participation in the assessment and remediation of their additional needs might be increased and also how they perceive themselves as literacy learners. This qualitative small‐scale study adopted a case study approach and utilised creative methodologies in the context of focus groups to investigate sensitively the views and experiences of Key Stage 2 pupils with additional needs in literacy. The findings discussed here are based on the outcomes from the four Northern Irish schools that participated in the original cross‐border (Northern Ireland/Republic of Ireland) study. Findings are discussed in the context of strategies for promoting holistic and empowering pathways for learners with additional needs in literacy.