How to throw chocolate at students : a survey of extrinsic means for increased audience attention

This paper presents an overview of established and innovative means and teaching approaches that contribute to higher students' attention during lecture. The results are based on an international survey among lecturers from eleven universities. This survey was initiated by three lecturers from different countries who met at EDUCON 2016. The objective was to collect teaching experiences about playful means that motivate students to be attentive during a lecture. The proposed teaching approaches fall into three categories: established teaching methods, unconventional extrinsic methods, and tools. We focus on the extrinsic methods and discuss 14 illustrative examples of these approaches

Effective Evaluation of the Non-Technical Skills in the Computing Discipline

© 2019, Journal of Information Technology Eucation Research. Aim/Purpose Assessing non-technical skills is very difficult and current approaches typically assess the skills separately. There is a need for better quality assessment of these skills at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Background A method has been developed for the computing discipline that assesses all six non-technical skills prescribed by ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology), the accreditation board for engineering and technology. It has been shown to be a valid and reliable method for undergraduate students Methodology The method is based upon performance-based assessment where a team of students discuss and analyze an ill-defined authentic issue over a 12-day period on a discussion board Contribution This is the first published method to assess all six skills simultaneously in com-puting and here it has been trialed with postgraduate students. Findings The results show that the method, though originally designed for undergradu-ates, can successfully be used with postgraduate students. Additionally, the post-graduate students found it to be very beneficial to their learning. Recommendations for Practitioners This method can successfully assess non-technical skills at tertiary level in the computing discipline and it can be adapted to other disciplines. Though de-signed for assessment it has been found to be an ideal method for teaching the skills at both undergraduate and post graduate levels. Recommendations for Researchers Compared with other assessment approaches this method has many advantages: it is a direct method of measurement, it is a rigorous method and it assesses all skills simultaneously Impact on Society Proficiency in non-technical skills is critical for development of knowledge-based economies. This method is a tool to assist in developing these skills. Future Research Researchers can examine how the method benefits students in their context and examine if there are differences between their context and the UAE context presented here. Researchers can work on developing a rubric solely for post-graduate use i.e., to capture the range of levels among postgraduates

Understanding Influencers of College Major Decision: The UAE Case

This study aims to understand and analyze what influences female students to choose a college major in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). To accomplish our target, we conducted a survey with mostly female first-year undergraduate students (N = 496) at Zayed University to understand the personal, social, and financial factors influencing students’ major choices. Further, this study also asked students to specify their actions before deciding on their major and assessed the information that could be helpful for future students to decide on their majors. Last, the study investigated how Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) students differ from other students in their major decision. The results show that financial factors such as income and business opportunities related to the major are crucial. Further, gender suitability for the job and passion are influential. Students conduct internet searches, use social media, and read brochures in the process of major decisions. Moreover, students think job alignment with the UAE vision and information related to job availability, income, and skills are critical for future students to decide on their major. Finally, STEM students are more influenced by business opportunities, prestige, and career advancement than others

Computational thinking and robotics in education

After the computational thinking sessions in the previous 2016-2018 editions of TEEM Conference, the fourth edition of this track has been organized in the current 2019 edition. Computational thinking is still a very significant topic, especially, but not only, in pre-university education. In this edition, the robotic has a special role in the track, with a strength relationship with the STEM and STEAM education of children at the pre-university levels, seeding the future of our society

Remote Laboratories for Teaching and Training in Engineering

Typical mechatronic systems are a combination of advanced technologies involving several disciplines. This multidisciplinary approach to the development of industrial applications provides great opportunities for the implementation of e-learning environments and collaborative schemes. Engineering education, in particular, benefits from many of these advances, among which, virtual instrumentation is a useful tool for the development of virtual environments, e-learning spaces and, particularly, remote laboratories. This chapter describes the implementation of web-based laboratories that allow the remote operation of experiments used as training exercises in undergraduate engineering courses. The remote laboratories were developed using LabVIEW® software, and they enable remote control and monitoring of laboratory equipment, allowing engineering students to perform experiments in real time, at their own pace, from anywhere, and whenever is suitable for them. Besides the experimental training that the web-based laboratories provide to students, the system is also a powerful teaching tool since real-time demonstrations of the experiments can be performed, and they also can be simultaneously monitored by a group of students. This approach is highly beneficial for engineering schools in developing countries, as resources can be shared through the Internet. A description of the system and three proposed experiments is presented, together with the experimental results

INTERACTIVE EMIRATE SIGN LANGUAGE E-DICTIONARY BASED ON DEEP LEARNING RECOGNITION MODELS

According to the ministry of community development database in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) about 3065 people with disabilities are hearing disabled (Emirates News Agency - Ministry of Community Development). Hearing-impaired people find it difficult to communicate with the rest of society. They usually need Sign Language (SL) interpreters but as the number of hearing-impaired individuals grows the number of Sign Language interpreters can almost be non-existent. In addition, specialized schools lack a unified Sign Language (SL) dictionary, which can be linked to the Arabic language being of a diglossia nature, hence many dialects of the language co-exist. Moreover, there are not sufficient research work in Arabic SL in general, which can be linked to the lack of unification in the Arabic Sign Language. Hence, presenting an Emirate Sign Language (ESL) electronic Dictionary (e-Dictionary), consisting of four features, namely Dictation, Alpha Webcam, Vocabulary, and Spell, and two datasets (letters and vocabulary/sentences) to help the community in exploring and unifying the ESL. The vocabulary/sentences dataset was recorded by Azure Kinect and includes 127 signs and 50 sentences, making a total of 708 clips, performed by 4 Emirate signers with hearing loss. All the signs were reviewed by the head of the Community Development Authority in UAE for compliance. ESL e-Dictionary integrates state-of-the-art methods i.e., Automatic Speech recognition API by Google, YOLOv8 model trained on our dataset, and an algorithm inspired by bag of words model. Experimental results proved the usability of the e-Dictionary in real-time on laptops. The vocabulary/sentences dataset will be publicly offered in the near future for research purposes

Adaptación de la asignatura de ingeniería de fabricación a un modelo semipresencial basado en la metodología b-learning

Memoria ID-151. Ayudas de la Universidad de Salamanca para la innovación docente, curso 2020-2021

A Low-Cost Immersive Virtual Reality System for Teaching Robotic Manipulators Programming

Laboratory tasks are a powerful pedagogical strategy for developing competences in science and engineering degrees, making students understand in a practical way the theoretical topics explained in the classroom. However, performing experiments in real conditions is usually expensive in terms of time, money and energy, as it requires expensive infrastructures that are generally difficult to maintain in good conditions. To overcome this problem, virtual reality has proven to be a powerful tool to achieve sustainability, making it easy to update laboratories without the need to acquire new equipment. Moreover, the ability to introduce practical knowledge into classrooms without leaving them, makes virtual laboratories capable of simulating typical operating environments as well as extreme situations in the operation of different devices. A typical subject in which students can benefit from the use of virtual laboratories is robotics. In this work we will develop an immersive virtual reality (VR) pedagogical simulator of industrial robotic arms for engineering students. With the proposed system, students will know the effects of their own designed trajectories on several different robotic arms and cell environments without having to buy all of them and being safe of damaging the cell components. The simulation will be checking for collisions of the elements in the scene and alert the student when they happen. This can be achieved with a robotic simulator, but the integration with immersive VR is intended to help students better understand robotics. Moreover, even having a real robotic arm available for students, with this proposed VR method, all the students have the opportunity to manage and learn his own version of the robotic cell, without waiting times generated by having less robotic arms than students in classroom.This work was funded by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain (Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad de España), through Reference TIN2017-89266-R Project

Teacher training on Educational Robotics: a systematic review

3noopenThis study systematically reviews the literature concerning structured training experiences with Educational Robotics (ER) by in-service teachers (ISTs) and pre-service teachers (PSTs). The sixteen papers selected highlight the relevance of these courses in order to update professional identity and to support professional development (PD) beginning with undergraduate education. Through these training sessions, both ISTs and PSTs adapted and integrated their knowledge about robotics and the pedagogy behind it, coming to understand the benefits that new technologies can offer. Therefore, they built a positive attitude towards ER and enhanced their self-efficacy. This enables teachers to properly integrate ER in the classroom, using a more conscious and less obsolete methodology. Consequently, they become, together with their students, active co- designers of the educational process. Finally, improvements in teaching methods and contents will significantly impact on the learning process, especially in terms of motivation and inclusion.openGiannandrea, L.; Gratani, F.; Renieri, A.Giannandrea, L.; Gratani, F.; Renieri, A