1,720,957 research outputs found
A Qualitative Study on Technology-Mediated TBLT for Soft Skill Development in an ESAP Course
No full textThe present study explores the implementation of technology-mediated Task-Based Language
Teaching (TBLT) in an undergraduate course and to what extent that affects the students’ soft skill
development. The qualitative study involves 11 English for Specific Academic Purposes (ESAP) first-year students of the Fine Arts Department and implements three technology-mediated tasks: a gallery
interview, increasing audience engagement with books and creating an artefact for promotional
purposes, all designed by author one. The tasks provide real-content and reinforce the development of
three soft skills: convincing, problem-solving and creativity skills, pertinent to a Fine Arts context. The
purpose of the study is to explore a) to what extent the students believe the technology-mediated
tasks affect their soft skill development throughout the semester and b) which set of skills they believe
they have developed more through the tasks. The study uses the collection and analysis of qualitative
data through two semi-structured interviews conducted in weeks 3 (beginning) and 13 (end) of the
semester. Qualitative research aims to offer a more exploratory investigation of the development of
the students’ soft skills. Research findings reveal that the tasks positively affect the students’ soft skills
to a large extent, while convincing skills are more developed through the tasks. Thematic analysis also
illustrates that students feel the whole ESAP curriculum and the class oral discussions conduce to the
development of their soft skills
Using the TESOL Technology Standards Framework to evaluate students’ technological knowledge in an undergraduate Italian course
No full textThe ubiquitous nature of technology has offered unprecedented opportunities for the learning
experience. Various technological tools have become commonplace while many elaborate on the
possibilities of authentic learning experiences created by immersive virtual applications. This reflective
paper aims to evaluate how the integration of the TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of other
Languages) Technology Standards Framework can help align an Italian undergraduate course with the
expected student learning outcomes in terms of technology. The students’ part of the TESOL Technology
Standards Framework was used for this reflective evaluation. Each standard makes use of performance
indicators that are reviewed and commented on. Furthermore, specific and general outcomes are
supplemented in the Discussion and Conclusion section regarding the findings and the results of the
overview. The course used for the purposes of this paper is Italian I, an A2-level elective course, offered
at a public University. Italian I aims to develop students’ four skills: reading, writing, listening and
speaking through contextualized learning, enhanced by innovative technological tools
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
A social constructionist approach to teaching and learning vocabulary for Italian for academic purposes
No full textThis study presents the way Parmaxi and Zaphiris’s (2015) social
constructionist framework was used in order to teach and learn vocabulary in an
Italian for Specific Academic Purposes (ISAP) tertiary course. The participants
(beginner students) were guided to build in groups an artifact, i.e a specific academic
vocabulary collection. To do so, they used Quizlet; this online learning tool allows
the creation of digital artifacts, such as vocabulary flashcards, games and quizzes,
and the sharing of the collections created. The purpose of the creation of the
artifact was the learning and sharing of vocabulary in Italian used in the specific
area of the students’ university fields of study. The data revealed that the social
constructionist approach facilitated a more engaged and motivating attitude towards
learning, allowing students to work constructively and collaboratively and share
their knowledge with the use of new technologies
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
Integrating a virtual reality application to simulate situated learning experiences in a foreign language course
No full textImmersion through Virtual Reality (VR) gives the subjective impression that the learner has a realistic experience (Dede, 2009). The pedagogical potential of VR provides the means of enabling constructivist places of contextualised learning. This paper aims to examine the potential the VR application Mondly may have to maximise interactivity and aid learners in proactively experiencing empirical conversations that emulate authentic contexts. The research took place in an undergraduate course Italian I (A1, Common European Framework of Reference for languages), offered by the Cyprus University of Technology. The present study adopts a quasi-experimental design to evaluate the impact of Mondly on Italian learning. Digital material is incorporated into the lesson to promote contextualised learning. An experimental group is subjected to learning through Mondly whereas a control group is subjected to conventional lectures utilising the same material as the experimental group
- …
