Traditional microscopy instruction versus process-oriented virtual microscopy instruction: a naturalistic experiment with control group

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Virtual microscopy is being introduced in medical education as an approach for learning how to interpret information in microscopic specimens. It is, however, far from evident how to incorporate its use into existing teaching practice. The aim of the study was to explore the consequences of introducing virtual microscopy tasks into an undergraduate pathology course in an attempt to render the instruction more process-oriented. The research questions were: 1) How is virtual microscopy perceived by students? 2) Does work on virtual microscopy tasks contribute to improvement in performance in microscopic pathology in comparison with attending assistant-led demonstrations only?</p> <p>Method</p> <p>During a one-week period, an experimental group completed three sets of virtual microscopy homework assignments in addition to attending demonstrations. A control group attended the demonstrations only. Performance in microscopic pathology was measured by a pre-test and a post-test. Student perceptions of regular instruction and virtual microscopy were collected one month later by administering the Inventory of Intrinsic Motivation and open-ended questions.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The students voiced an appreciation for virtual microscopy for the purposes of the course and for self-study. As for learning gains, the results indicated that learning was speeded up in a subgroup of students consisting of conscientious high achievers.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The enriched instruction model may be suited as such for elective courses following the basic course. However, the instructional model needs further development to be suited for basic courses.</p

Scanpath analysis of expertise and culture in teacher gaze in real-world classrooms

Humans are born to learn by understanding where adults look. This is likely to extend into the classroom, making teacher gaze an important topic for study. Expert teacher gaze has mainly been investigated in the laboratory, and has focused mostly on one cognitive process: teacher attentional (i.e., information-seeking) gaze. No known research has made direct cultural comparisons of teacher gaze or successfully found expert–novice differences outside Western settings. Accordingly, we conducted a real-world study of expert teacher gaze across two cultural settings, exploring communicative (i.e., information-giving) as well as attentional gaze. Forty secondary school teachers wore eye-tracking glasses, with 20 teachers (10 expert; 10 novice) from the UK and 20 teachers (10 expert; 10 novice) from Hong Kong. We used a novel eye-tracking scanpath analysis to ascertain the importance of expertise and culture, individually and as a combination. Attentional teacher scanpaths were significantly more similar within than across expertise and expertise + culture sub-groups; communicative scanpaths were significantly more similar within than across expertise and culture. Detailed analysis suggests that (1) expert teachers refer back to students constantly through focused gaze during both attentional and communicative gaze and that (2) expert teachers in Hong Kong scan students more than experts do in the UK

Scaffolding in teacher-student interaction: a decade of Research

Although scaffolding is an important and frequently studied concept, much discussion exists with regard to its conceptualizations, appearances, and effectiveness. Departing from the last decade’s scaffolding literature, this review scrutinizes these three areas of scaffolding. First, contingency, fading, and transfer of responsibility are discerned in this review as the three key characteristics of scaffolding. Second, an overview is presented of the numerous descriptive studies that provided narratives on the appearances of scaffolding and classifications of scaffolding strategies. These strategies are synthesized into a framework for analysis, distinguishing between scaffolding means and intentions. Third, the small number of effectiveness studies available is discussed and the results suggest that scaffolding is effective. However, more research is needed. The main challenge in scaffolding research appears to be its measurement. Based on the encountered and described measurement problems, suggestions for future research are made

Exploring teachers' instructional design practices from a systems design perspective

Curricular changes in higher vocationaleducation have rendered teachers' instructionaldesign activities increasingly important. Usinga repertory grid technique, this paper sets outto analyse current design activities of tenteacher trainers. Their actual approach iscompared with an instructional systems design(ISD) approach and related to innovativeteacher roles. Teachers' activities show animbalance in two ID phases, that is problemanalysis and evaluation. The results suggestthat they attempt to translate curricular goalsdirectly into concrete lessons and they payrelatively little attention to evaluation. Inline with this finding, they underrate the twoinnovative teacher roles of the `diagnostician'and the `evaluator'. It is argued thatimbalanced or incomplete design approaches andperceived roles may hinder innovation ineducation. Implications for the support ofteachers' design activities are discussed

Fostering self-regulation in training complex cognitive tasks

\u3cp\u3eIn complex cognitive domains such as air traffic control, professionals must be able to adapt to and act upon continuing changes in a highly advanced technological work environment. To function optimally in such an environment, the controllers must be able to regulate their learning. Although these regulation skills should be part of their training, this is not usually the case. This study evaluates a training program that integrates air traffic control skills with regulation skills. The participants were 29 air traffic control students who followed either the original training program (n = 12) or a new program (n = 17) in which the development of regulation skills was embedded in the training of domain specific skills. Compared to students in the original program, the students in the new program showed increased self-efficacy in the use of self-regulated learning skills with improved performance in domain specific competences. The implications of these findings are discussed with regard to the daily training practice of complex cognitive skills.\u3c/p\u3

A training approach for the transition of repeatable collaboration processes to practitioners

This paper presents a training approach to support the deployment of collaboration process support according to the Collaboration Engineering approach. In Collaboration Engineering, practitioners in an organization are trained to facilitate a specific collaborative work practice on a recurring basis. To transfer the complex skill set of a facilitator to support the practitioner in guiding a specific collaboration process design, we propose a detailed training approach based on the logic of Cognitive Load Theory. The training approach focuses on transferring knowledge and skills in the form of thinkLets, i.e. repeatable facilitation techniques. Furthermore, the training contains a process simulation to practice challenges in collaboration support. The training approach was positively evaluated using a questionnaire instrument in a case study.Multi Actor SystemsTechnology, Policy and Managemen