CHORUS Deliverable 2.2: Second report - identification of multi-disciplinary key issues for gap analysis toward EU multimedia search engines roadmap

After addressing the state-of-the-art during the first year of Chorus and establishing the existing landscape in multimedia search engines, we have identified and analyzed gaps within European research effort during our second year. In this period we focused on three directions, notably technological issues, user-centred issues and use-cases and socio- economic and legal aspects. These were assessed by two central studies: firstly, a concerted vision of functional breakdown of generic multimedia search engine, and secondly, a representative use-cases descriptions with the related discussion on requirement for technological challenges. Both studies have been carried out in cooperation and consultation with the community at large through EC concertation meetings (multimedia search engines cluster), several meetings with our Think-Tank, presentations in international conferences, and surveys addressed to EU projects coordinators as well as National initiatives coordinators. Based on the obtained feedback we identified two types of gaps, namely core technological gaps that involve research challenges, and “enablers”, which are not necessarily technical research challenges, but have impact on innovation progress. New socio-economic trends are presented as well as emerging legal challenges

UNDERSTANDING THE VALUE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN ORGANISATIONS: A TAXONOMIC APPROACH

While organizations strive to leverage the vast information generated daily from social media platforms and both decision makers and consultants are keen to identify and exploit this information’s value, there has been little research into social media in the business context. Social media are diverse, varying in scope and functionality, this diversity entailing a complex of attributes and characteristics, resulting in confusion for both researchers and organizations. Taxonomies are important precursors in emerging fields and are foundational for rigorous theory building. Though aspects of social media have been studied from various discipline perspectives, this work has been largely descriptive. Thus, while the need for a rigorous taxonomy of social media is strong, previous efforts to classify social media suffer limitations – e.g. lack of a systematic taxonomic method, overreliance on intuition, disregard for the users’ perspective, and inadequate consideration of purpose. Thus, this study was mainly initiated by the overarching question “How can social media in the business context be usefully classified?” In order to address this gap, the current paper proposes a systematic method for developing a taxonomy appropriate to study social media in organizations context, combining Nickerson et al,’s (2012) IS taxonomy building guidelines and a Repertory grid (RepGrid) approach

Learning design – making practice explicit

New technologies have immense potential for learning, but the sheer variety possible also creates challenges for learners in terms of navigating through an increasingly complex digital landscape and for teachers in terms of how to design and support learning interventions. How can learners and teachers make informed decisions about what technologies to use in the design and support of learning activities? This presentation will consider this question and present a new methodology for design – 'learning design', which aims to shift the creation and support of learning from what has traditionally been an implicit, belief-based practice to one that is explicit and design based. Learning design research at the Open University, UK has included the development of a set of conceptual design views, a tool for visualising designs (CompendiumLD) and a social networking site, for sharing and discussing learning and teaching ideas and designs (Cloudworks). An overview of this work will be provided, along with a discussion of the perceived benefits of this new approach to educational design

The Wisdom of Crowds in Government 2.0: Information Paradigm Evolution toward Wiki-Government

This essay, exploring the peer-to-peer collaborative atmosphere penetrating Wikivism, crowd-sourcing and open-source movement, identifies a new paradigm of public information as evolution toward Wiki-government. Citizen participants can collectively create public information via various platforms enabled by Web 2.0 technologies. Under the new participatory paradigm that a large number of individual citizens and government cocreate public information, not only do Wiki-oriented government agencies benefit from crowd wisdom, but citizens also learn from their colleague citizens. Crowd-sourcing to collect the wisdom of crowds is categorized into four types by matching between the quantity and the quality of participation: civic-sourcing, mob-sourcing, professionalism, and fiasco. For Wiki-government, a mass of well-informed and concerned participants in civic-sourcing make more desirable outcomes for a society than fewer, poorly-informed and unconcerned people. Thus, civic-sourcing promises greater advantages for government over professionalism and mob-sourcing. Three strategies for civic-sourcing (Wiki/open-sourcing, contest, or social networking) can be employed through different working mechanisms, with different motivators for participation, and under different approaches to human nature of key participants

Mapping for the Masses: Accessing Web 2.0 through Crowdsourcing

The authors describe how we are harnessing the power of web 2.0 technologies to create new approaches to collecting, mapping, and sharing geocoded data. The authors begin with GMapCreator that lets users fashion new maps using Google Maps as a base. The authors then describe MapTube that enables users to archive maps and demonstrate how it can be used in a variety of contexts to share map information, to put existing maps into a form that can be shared, and to create new maps from the bottom-up using a combination of crowdcasting, crowdsourcing, and traditional broadcasting. The authors conclude by arguing that such tools are helping to define a neogeography that is essentially "mapping for the masses,'' while noting that there are many issues of quality, accuracy, copyright, and trust that will influence the impact of these tools on map-based communication

Higher education students’ media usage: A longitudinal analysis

Responding to the lack of longitudinal analyses on media usage in higher education, this study explores the changes of higher education students’ access to and use of technology for learning in 2012, 2015 and 2018. Using an online questionnaire, a total of 5,572 German higher education students participated. Via descriptive and inferential analysis, the data show a clear trend towards using flexible, location-independent devices, accompanied by a rapid increase in the use of instant messaging. This is in line with an increasing demand for digital and flexible learning opportunities such as web-based training and lectures as podcasts or vodcasts, which is not met by higher education institutions. On that basis, improvements in development and application of these digital tools seem crucial for German higher education institutions and should be considered by educational technologists and decision makers. Of particular relevance against the background of the COVID-19 pandemic that started in Spring 2020, this longitudinal analysis provides a framework for the ongoing development and implementation of digital media in teaching and learning at higher education institutions

Higher education students’ media usage: A longitudinal analysis

Responding to the lack of longitudinal analyses on media usage in higher education, this study explores the changes of higher education students’ access to and use of technology for learning in 2012, 2015 and 2018. Using an online questionnaire, a total of 5,572 German higher education students participated. Via descriptive and inferential analysis, the data show a clear trend towards using flexible, location-independent devices, accompanied by a rapid increase in the use of instant messaging. This is in line with an increasing demand for digital and flexible learning opportunities such as web-based training and lectures as podcasts or vodcasts, which is not met by higher education institutions. On that basis, improvements in development and application of these digital tools seem crucial for German higher education institutions and should be considered by educational technologists and decision makers. Of particular relevance against the background of the COVID-19 pandemic that started in Spring 2020, this longitudinal analysis provides a framework for the ongoing development and implementation of digital media in teaching and learning at higher education institutions

The impact of brand communication on brand equity through Facebook

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to fill the gap in the discussion of the ways in which firm-created and user-generated social media brand communication impacts consumer-based brand equity metrics through Facebook. Design/methodology/approach: We evaluated 302 data sets that were generated through a standardized online-survey to investigate the impact of firm-created and user-generated social media brand communication on brand awareness/associations, perceived quality, and brand loyalty across 60 brands within three different industries: non-alcoholic beverages, clothing, and mobile network providers. We applied structural equation modeling techniques (SEM) to investigate the effects of social media brand communication on consumers’ perception of brand equity metrics, as well as in an examination of industry-specific differences. Findings: The results of our empirical studies showed that both firm-created and user-generated social media brand communication influence brand awareness/associations; whereas, user-generated social media brand communication had a positive impact on brand loyalty and perceived brand quality. Additionally, there are significant differences between the industries being investigated. Originality/value: This article is pioneering in that it exposes the effects of two different types of social media brand communication (i.e., firm-created and user-generated social media communication) on consumer-based brand equity metrics, a topic of relevance for both marketers and scholars in the era of social media. Additionally, it differentiates the effects of social media brand communication across industries, which indicate that practitioners should implement social media strategies according to industry specifics to lever consumer-based brand equity metrics

Teaching, learning, and assessment activities used in additional language courses offered in blended contexts to promote the development of learners’ language skills in higher education

Abstract : This master’s dissertation explores the teaching, learning, and assessment activities that higher education instructors use in additional language courses in a blended format from an instructional design perspective. The types of activities that instructors use in order to develop learners’ language skills and the design of blended language courses have been under-researched in the literature, even though blended learning approaches in language learning have been used approximately since 2000 (Grgurović, 2017). Given the fast technology development, particularly web 2.0 technologies and other digital tools, and the possibility of learning an additional language, it becomes highly important to understand how additional language teaching and learning take place in these contexts. Moreover, the COVID¬ 19 pandemic has accelerated how technology is used by higher education institutions (Skulmowski & Rey, 2020). Therefore, in this study, the focus is on the language activities performed in the different types of blended courses, such as blended courses, blended online courses, and blended synchronous courses, as well as the mode in which they are performed: asynchronous, synchronous and face to face. The general objective of this study is to describe the additional language teaching, learning, and assessment activities used by instructors in blended courses to promote additional language skills development in higher education. To attain this objective, I formulated two specific objectives: 1. Describe instructors’ choices of teaching, learning, and assessment activities, and digital tools used in additional language blended courses. 2. Describe the complementarity between asynchronous, synchronous, and face to face activities’ modes. This study uses a qualitative methodology that is aligned with the objectives of the dissertation. The selected sample consists of three additional language instructors who taught English, French, and Spanish in a blended format at a university in Quebec province. The data collection methods include a semi-structured interview and the use of course documents. The data analysis methods consist of a descriptive thematic analysis and a documentary analysis. Moreover, the results and discussion are presented in the form of an article that has been submitted for publication to the Japan Association for Language Teaching Computer Assisted Language Learning Special Interest Group Journal (JALT CALL journal). It should be highlighted that this study uses secondary data from a larger study called “Élaboration et validation d'un modèle explicatif de la persévérance et de la performance dans les cours hybrides en enseignement supérieur” (Lakhal et al., 2019) which was subsidized by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). The results of this study show that the activities performed in the blended courses for additional language learning are varied and are influenced by the affordances of technology and the blended courses’ modes. Generally, in these courses different skills and areas are developed: speaking, listening, reading, writing, subskills (i.e., grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation), digital competency, metacognition, and content transfer and consolidation. The participants used the asynchronous mode for doing content transfer activities, developing learners’ digital competency, developing their comprehension skills, and preparing them for synchronous and/or face-to face modes. When it comes to synchronous and face to faced modes, the participants selected them to promote interaction and collaboration among learners, thus it involved the development of productive skills such as writing and speaking. Nevertheless, the four skills are spread in the different course modes, so they are not specific to only one mode. Concerning the digital tools used in the courses, they were diverse and mainly linked to the licenses available to the university. However, the study specifies a range of digital tools and the activities they support, some are specific to language teaching and learning. Finally, these results are relevant to the field in that they contribute to filling a gap in the scientific literature concerning the intersection between additional language teaching and learning and blended learning, they add knowledge to the discussion available in the scarce scientific literature about this intersection, and finally, they provide insights to language instructors in higher education teaching in blended formats about the different activities available to be taught in blended courses and reasons to implement them

An activity theory investigation of tool-use in undergraduate mathematics

This mixed methods study investigates a number of aspects related to tool-use in undergraduate mathematics as seen from an Activity Theory perspective. The aims of this study include: identifying the tools that undergraduates use; seeking for an empirically-based typology of these tools; examining how undergraduates themselves can be profiled according to their tool-use; and finally identifying the factors influencing students tool preferences. By combining results from survey, interview and diary data analyses, it was found that undergraduates in the sample preferred using mostly tools related to their institution s practice (notes, textbooks, VLE), other students and online videos. All the tools students reported using were classified into five categories: peers; teachers; external online tools; the official textbook; and notes. Students in the sample were also classified into five distinct groups: those preferring interacting with peers when studying mathematics (peer-learning group); those favouring using online tools (online-learning group); those using all the tools available to them (blended-learning group); those using only textbooks (predominantly textbooks-learning group); and students using some of the tools available to them (selective-learning group). The main factor shaping students tool choices was found to be their exam-driven goals when examined from an individual s perspective or their institution s assessment related rules when adopting a wider perspective. Results of this study suggest that students blend their learning of mathematics by using a variety of tools and underlines that although undergraduates were found to be driven by exam-related goals, this is a result of the rules regulating how Higher Education Institutions (HEI) function and should not be attributed entirely as stemming from individuals practices. Assigning undergraduates exam- driven goals to their university s sociocultural environment, was made possible by combining two versions of Activity Theory (Leontiev and Engestrøm s) and analysing data at two different levels (individual and collective respectively)