Secondary analysis of large-scale assessment data: an alternative to variable-centred analysis

International large-scale assessments are now part of the educational landscape in many countries and often feed into major policy decisions. Yet, such assessments also provide data sets for secondary analysis that can address key issues of concern to educators and policymakers alike. Traditionally, such secondary analyses have been based on a variable-centred approach that gives rise to league tables. In the study reported here, a person-centred analysis is used as an alternative to the traditional approach. Data from the International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS) were analysed to investigate Asian students' attitudes to their future civic participation. Cluster analysis with validity measures showed that 4 distinct groups of students were identified within the societies studied thus highlighting the diversity within the samples. These results cannot be achieved with a conventional variable approach to analysis, and they suggest the usefulness of exploring alternative approaches to secondary data analysis.     

Investigating the effects of gamification-enhanced flipped learning on undergraduate students’ behavioral and cognitive engagement

ABSTRACT

In recent years, flipped learning has attracted much attention around the world. This instructional approach is appealing because it can free up class time for knowledge application activities with help from the instructor and peers. However, its implementation can be fraught with challenges. Student disengagement in out-of-class activities, for example, is one of the major challenges of flipped learning. The purpose of this study is to examine whether gamification can enhance student engagement in a flipped course. A comparison study was conducted, involving two classes of undergraduate students in an Information Management course. The results indicated that students in the gamification-enhanced flipped learning group (n?=?48) were more likely to complete the pre-class and post-class activities on time than those in the non-gamified flipped learning group (n?=?48). Students in the gamification-enhanced flipped learning group also produced higher quality artifacts than the non-gamified flipped learning group in the pre-class thinking activities. Moreover, students in the gamification-enhanced flipped learning group scored significantly higher in the post-course test than did their non-gamified counterparts.     

Empirical study of motivators and barriers of teacher online knowledge sharing

The focus of this study was to understand knowledge flows among teachers by examining what types of knowledge was shared by teachers, as well as what motivates or hinders teachers to share knowledge online. We examined an electronic mailing list (listserv) supporting a community of practice of literacy teachers. Data were gathered on the teachers in the listserv through online observations. Additional data were collected through semi-structured telephone interviews with 20 teachers. Findings suggest that two motives of community involvement––collectivism, and principlism appear to be the main motivators for knowledge sharers to share knowledge, while lack of knowledge and competing priority appear to be the main barriers. Practical implications for knowledge sharing and suggestions for future research are discussed. The findings of this study inform teachers, listserv moderators, teacher associations, as well as researchers of educational technology who are interested in knowledge sharing among teachers within communities of practice mediated by computer networks.

Higher-level knowledge construction in asynchronous online discussions: an analysis of group size, duration of online discussion, and student facilitation techniques

This study is concerned with the challenge of understanding what factors may influence students’ higher level knowledge construction. We defined higher level knowledge construction occurrences as the sum of the number of phases II to V measured using Gunawardena et al.’s (J Educ Comput Res 17(4):397–431, 1997) interaction analysis model. This paper is organized into two studies. In the first study, we examined the relationship between the frequency of higher level knowledge construction occurrences and group size, as well as the duration of the online discussion. Data were collected through online observations of 40 discussion forums. We found a significant positive relationship between group size and the frequency of higher level knowledge construction occurrences. However, there was no correlation between the duration of the online discussion and the frequency of such occurrences. In the second study, we examined the types of student facilitation techniques used. A further analysis of the data was conducted—of the 40 forums, 14 forums with higher incident rate of higher level knowledge construction occurrences were identified. Fourteen less frequent forums were then randomly chosen from the remaining forums. We found significant differences in the frequency of four student facilitation techniques employed between the more frequent group and the less frequent one. The results of this study suggest that using these four techniques more frequently may promote knowledge construction in asynchronous online discussions.     

Flexibility in Setting Fees

In this paper we consider various issues relating to the fees which are charged to overseas students. The introduction of 'full-cost fees' by the Government in 1980 had a dramatic effect on the overseas student intake initially. Since that date there has been a steady, slow recovery in numbers. The home student position has also changed with an end to hopes of steady overall expansion of traditional students and the looming implications of the falling birthrate of the late 1960s and 1970s .
Against this background we consider three topics: experience so far in setting fees, the alternative approaches that are available and the theoretical and practical implications of each .