For the Love of Mathematical Research: A Conversation with Undergraduate Research Students

One of my passions as a professor is creating opportunities for students to ask questions about mathematics. Posting about students\u27 perspectives on mathematics research from In All Things - an online journal for critical reflection on faith, culture, art, and every ordinary-yet-graced square inch of God’s creation. https://inallthings.org/for-the-love-of-mathematical-research-a-conversation-with-undergraduate-research-students

Exploring the Process of Motivating Undergraduate Online Student from Online Instructors\u27 Perspectives: A Qualitative Case Study

The purpose of this case study was to describe the process of motivating online undergraduate students from the online instructors’ perspectives at online institutions. The theory guiding this study was B.F. Skinner’s reinforcement theory as it provided insight into how students are motivated using reinforcements. This is imperative to this study as instructors provide many of these reinforcements to their student population. This study was designed to answer a central question: How do online instructors describe the process of keeping their students motivated within the online classroom? Utilizing the prescribed data collection methods, a sample was derived from Cherry Hill College, an online college that operates throughout the United States, and used a convenience sampling size of 10 participants. Data collection was based on individual interviews, a focus group, and questionnaires to identify common themes and experiences amongst the instructors who participated in this study. The data analyzed was used to reflect on major themes that shaped the findings of this study regarding instructors’ perspectives of student motivation in the undergraduate online classroom. The findings of the research study indicated instructors impact student motivation. With the ability to recognize motivated and unmotivated students, utilizing effective communication and methods of reinforcement with proactive outreach, the instructors could positively impact student motivation and retention rates

EFL Undergraduate Students’ Competence, Relatedness, and Autonomy in Online Learning: A Self-Determination Perspective

Due to the pandemic of Covid-19, numerous educational institutions have attempted to shift their pedagogical instruction from face-to-face to online teaching and learning. A plethora of studies have been published on how online learning should be provided. However, there is a paucity of research on the psychological needs that online learning provides for language learners. To bridge that gap, this descriptive study aims to investigate the university students' perspectives on psychological needs, particularly regarding their competence, relatedness, and autonomy concerning self-determination theory. The quantitative research design study attempts to investigate students' autonomy, competence, and relatedness in online tertiary learning. Sixty people were asked to fill out a survey-based questionnaire that included questions about autonomy (5 items), competence (5 items), and relatedness (8 items). The study's findings reveal that online grammar sessions meet undergraduate students' basic physiological learning needs despite the lack of physical human interaction. Among those three aspects, students' sense of relatedness had the highest mean. It meant the undergraduate students had no feeling of isolation while attending online learning. This present study suggests that teachers should consider students' interests to improve autonomy, competence, and relatedness

Social Perspectives of Globalizing VoIP Technology

Based on theoretical lenses of fads and fashions and isomorphic pressures, this research in progress proposes social perspectives that help understand the rapid penetration of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) in the global market. Online interviews between sixteen undergraduate students and their interviewees worldwide provided preliminary understanding which revealed that users often developed awareness of VoIP technology because of their social contacts and their purpose for using VoIP was mostly for maintaining social connections. The potential contribution of such social perspectives on VoIP technology in the global market could thus be expected

Why are Spiritual Aspects of Care so hard to Address in Nursing Education?’ A Literature Review (1993-2015)

Difficulties persist in conceptualising spiritual needs and understanding their relationship to religious needs and relevance to wellbeing. This review was undertaken to clarify some of these issues. It set out to establish what is already known about how issues of spiritual assessment and care are addressed in undergraduate nursing education. Using a systematic approach, a literature review covering the period 1993-2015 was undertaken. Reviewed materials were collected from mainly online sources including with searches conducted using CINHAL, SUMMON and PubMed databases, after defining keywords and inclusion and exclusion criteria. The study found that Spirituality appears to be a broad but useful category which is concerned with how people experience meaning and purpose in their lives. However, it also established that here are relatively few studies focused on how spiritual care competencies could be developed in nursing students. There is also little work exploring nursing educators’ perspectives and experiences about how to develop spiritual competencies in their students. The study concludes that further research is necessary in order to bridge the gap between aspirations and practice

Effectiveness of feedback provision for psychology undergraduate students

Research on feedback for undergraduate students has usually focused on either the tutor or the student perspective. Some tutors perceive that students do not read or learn from feedback, whilst students sometimes claim that feedback can be difficult to understand and unconstructive. We investigated tutor and student perspectives through online questionnaires. Fifty-seven staff and 213 psychology undergraduates responded. The questionnaires were used to determine the extent to which students learn from feedback, and the extent to which tutors employ feedback as a teaching tool. Our preliminary findings suggest that both groups agree that written feedback is not ideal, and that the two-way dialogue intended is not always effective. There may be a lack of understanding of communication on both sides. Staff feel that their feedback is clear, but students sometimes disagree, and students do not value feedback on grammar and referencing, whereas staff believe that this is useful. Further research is now being conducted to develop understanding of staff and student perspectives on feedback, and to use the findings to inform improved accessibility of feedback for students, and efficiency of feedback provision for tutors

Students’ Motivation to Attend Synchronous Online Lectures

This study aims to sightsee students\u27 perceptions of how online lectures should be through exploring factors that increase students\u27 motivation to attend live zoom classes. A quantitative approach was used to achieve the purpose of the study. The data was collected through an electronic questionnaire using Google forms to explore students\u27 attitudes and perspectives on influencing their attendance to online learning sessions. Five hundred eighty-five participants (154 males and 431 females) in the study made the decision to answer the questionnaire electronically via Google Drive. The study participants were undergraduate students from two universities located north of the West Bank-Palestine. The findings revealed various factors, which may affect students\u27 motivation to attend online lectures. These factors are; instructional and pedagogical practices, synchronous classroom management, technology characteristics, and continuity to attend online classes. Further research is recommended to validate the tool researchers found to build a model describing the relationship among these factors and predict the learners\u27 motivation