An activity systems view of learning programming skills in a virtual lab: A case of University of Jos, Nigeria

It is difficult to learn professional courses such as Computer Science without hands-on activities with appropriate technical support. Computer Science programming courses are the core of a Computer Science qualification and some of the learning outcomes of a Computer Science programming course are writing program code, program testing and debugging. Inadequate computers in the computer laboratory and policies that restrict the concept of 'Bring Your Own Technology' (BYOT) inside the computer laboratory posed a challenge to hands-on programming activities. However, students in the Computer Science department at the University of Jos learn computer-coding theory, but unable to have hands-on experience due to several reasons. This research investigates how use of virtual lab on Moodle Learning Management System (LMS) could enhance students' acquisition of Java programming skills. The virtual lab provides a lab environment for students to practice programming and experiment concepts learned. Activity Theory was used as a theoretical framework to analyse the activity of Java programming on the virtual lab. Seven participants including the lecturer were enrolled on the Java Programming Language virtual lab practical sessions for this research work. The research activity system focuses on Java hands-on programming tasks for a period of three weeks and after that data was collected using interview and content generated from the virtual lab activities' chats and forum. Interview questions were developed and administered to students, while a semistructured interview with the lecturer was conducted. The data collected from the interviews and the contents collated from chats and forum activities were coded using ICT data analysis tool Nvivo, based on thematic analysis. The data was thoroughly reviewed, explained, interpreted, and analysed using the theoretical framework, activity theory. The results show that the virtual lab helped students perform practical programming activities, where students accessed and used the virtual lab concurrently at any time and place. The participants used their private computers, mobile devices in the hostels, at home, or at hotspots to access the virtual lab. However, accessing the virtual lab required adequate Internet connection. The virtual lab programming activity system promoted student-centred learning, self-paced practice, and enabled students to repeat or revisit incorrect assignments multiple times. The activity system's subject (lecturer, students) interacts with the mediating tools (mobile devices, virtual lab) to perform the object (Java programming), which enhanced the achievement of the outcome (programming skills). Therefore, it can be said that the virtual lab mediated hands-on programming activities

Integrating Computer Applications Into Economics Electives

Typically, undergraduate economics electives focus on content rather than methods, in spite of the fact that empirical work is fundamental to the practice of economics. This article describes an alternative approach to teaching content by using computer applications that emphasise the empirical testing or applications of the theory. Students enjoy economics courses more when they are taught in this way and lab assignments provide opportunities to teach a broad skill set that is important to many undergraduate economics majors.

Laboratory activities and physics learning at high school: an exploratory study in portuguese settings

In this paper we present findings of an exploratory study, included in a wider investigation which intends to promote meaningful learning of physics concepts, based on experimental work and supported by metacognition tools. The aim of this research was to recognize promoting learning situations in Physics lab. Interviews and questionnaires were applied to teachers and students from four Lisbon high schools. Results show that lab work in physics has a low frequency and, generally, has a demonstration format. Both teachers and students recognize potentialities of lab work to promote learning. Learning is poor when students just observe and/or accomplish commands. Both teachers and students consider the relation theory/experimentation and students doing themselves as fundamental to achieve better learning. In addition to pointing out several problems concerning lab work, teachers envisage it in a very traditional way. So, innovative strategies and methodologies, such as computer use and open-ended problems, pointed by research in science investigation as promoting learning, are left aside

Internship in Information Technology Service

This spring semester I had the opportunity to do my internship in department of Information Technology Service (ITS) in KSU. I interned in the Computer Lab which is one division of ITS. The purpose of my internship is to demonstrate the ability to apply what I have learned from the classroom to an actual work experience. The analysis of the theory taught in classroom and its application in practice also is showed in the internship paper. My internship paper was mainly composed of there parts: description of internship, policy analysis in ITS, and recommendations. The first part was the description of my internship in ITS. It included the organizational structure of ITS, the mission and statement, what I did during the internship, and the analysis of Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threats (SWOT) in Computer Lab. The second part was important one. In this part, I focused on the analysis of policy making and explained how the policies are being made in ITS. I took the Zimbra email system as a typical example to analyze the policy making in this department. There were some differences between the theory taught and the application in practice. The last part included something special in the internship, the connections of public administration theory, the comparison between Kennesaw State University and the college in China, and some recommendations and suggestions. At the end of the paper, there is a conclusion to sum up what I learned from the internship

Teaching to do economics with the computer

This paper presents the course "Doing Economics with the Computer" we taught since 1999 at the University of Bern, Switzerland. "Doing Economics with the Computer" is a course we designed to introduce sophomores playfully and painlessly into computational economics. Computational methods are usually used in economics to analyze complex problems, which are impossible (or very difficult) to solve analytically. However, our course only looks at economic models, which can (easily) be solved analytically. This approach has two advantages: First, relying on economic theory students have met in their first year, we can introduce numerical methods at an early stage. This stimulates students to use computational methods later in their academic career when they encounter difficult problems. Second, the confrontation with the analytical analysis shows convincingly both power and limits of numerical methods. Our course introduces students to three types of software: spreadsheet and simple optimizer (Excel with Solver), numerical computation (Matlab) and symbolic computation (Maple). The course consists of 10 sessions, we taught each in a 3-hour lecture. In the 1st part of each session we present the economic problem, sometimes its analytical solution and introduce the software used. The 2nd part, in the computer lab, starts the numerical implementation with step-by-step guidance. In this part, students work on exercises with clearly defined questions and precise guidance for their implementation. The 3rd part is a workshop, where students work in groups on exercises with still very clear defined questions but no help on their implementation. This part teaches students how to practically handle numerical questions in a well-defined framework. The 4th part of a session is a graded take home assignment where students are asked to answer general economic questions. This part teaches students how to translate general economic questions into a numerical task and back into an economically meaningful answer. A short debriefing in the following week is part 5 and completes each session

Fields and Consumer Groups: The Layered and Overlapping Roles of Culture

The first essay investigates Bourdieu’s conceptualization of fields and its use in the marketing literature. It suggests that fields do not exist in isolation, but rather work together in a number of different possible configurations. Fields are reconceptualized as dominated, overlapped, unrelated, contrasted, and co-constituted, rather than completely distinct and opens a new theoretical space for interpretive researchers in marketing. The second essay is a descriptive ethnography of a local fab lab. The essay describes in rich detail the ways in which new skills are developed in a shared work environment, and contextualizes the findings using practice theory as a lens. The essay serves to highlight the co-productive nature of the workshop as well. The final essay merges the theory development from essay one and the context and data collection of essay two to create new insights into the nature of layered fields. The essay demonstrates meaningful connections between disparate cultural fields using the cultural context of computer construction. In doing so, the essay demonstrates the real-world effects of overlapping and layered fields, and how the social structure plays out within the space of personal computer builders. Depending on how the field is configured, the layered fields allow for transfer of capitals, a better understanding of liminality, and important insights into the social structure and institutional nature of the field

The Impacts of Individual Emotional state and Emotional Framing of Phishing Attack on Susceptibility to Phishing: An Emotional Congruence Perspective

People’s overdependency on the Internet has given rise to an increasing number of cybercrimes. To help combat these cybercrimes, it is essential to understand factors that can make people vulnerable and susceptible to such crime. Specifically, we focus on phishing attacks, which are increasing in frequency and can have many negative impacts on their victims. Thus, we seek to answer the question: What are the determinants for susceptibility for phishing attacks? Drawing on emotional congruence theory, our work-in-progress study not only examines the direct impacts of individual emotion, and emotional framing of phishing attack, but also focuses on the interactive impacts of the two factors. We will conduct both online and lab experiments to investigate the above research question. We contribute to the human computer interaction (HCI) literature by offering insights on how message design of phishing attack can interplay with individual emotion to influence an individual’s phishing susceptibility

Taking a pedagogical turn: What happens when the student /teacher conference moves to the center of the basic writing course

This dissertation examines the redesign of a basic writing course at a large, urban, majority-minority public university in Miami, Florida. In the redesigned course, there are no regular class meetings at all. Instead, small groups of five students meet with a teacher in writing circles, where they workshop papers. The content of the course is provided by a third-party software program in a dedicated computer lab. The redesign project is examined in light of the particular institutional history of Florida International University, with special emphasis on the roles of space, time, and face-to-face interaction in the teaching of writing to a richly diverse student body. Support for the course redesign is adduced from the work of other scholars in social linguistics, Teaching English as a Second or Other Language, classroom discourse analysis and composition theory. The study finds that the changes in the delivery methods of the course can benefit teachers, students, and the institution

The LAB@FUTURE Project - Moving Towards the Future of E-Learning

This paper presents Lab@Future, an advanced e-learning platform that uses novel Information and Communication Technologies to support and expand laboratory teaching practices. For this purpose, Lab@Future uses real and computer-generated objects that are interfaced using mechatronic systems, augmented reality, mobile technologies and 3D multi user environments. The main aim is to develop and demonstrate technological support for practical experiments in the following focused subjects namely: Fluid Dynamics - Science subject in Germany, Geometry - Mathematics subject in Austria, History and Environmental Awareness – Arts and Humanities subjects in Greece and Slovenia. In order to pedagogically enhance the design and functional aspects of this e-learning technology, we are investigating the dialogical operationalisation of learning theories so as to leverage our understanding of teaching and learning practices in the targeted context of deployment

Rage Against the Machines: How Subjects Learn to Play Against Computers

We use an experiment to explore how subjects learn to play against computers which are programmed to follow one of a number of standard learning algorithms. The learning theories are (unbeknown to subjects) a best response process, fictitious play, imitation, reinforcement learning, and a trial & error process. We test whether subjects try to influence those algorithms to their advantage in a forward-looking way (strategic teaching). We find that strategic teaching occurs frequently and that all learning algorithms are subject to exploitation with the notable exception of imitation. The experiment was conducted, both, on the internet and in the usual laboratory setting. We find some systematic differences, which however can be traced to the different incentives structures rather than the experimental environment