Õppimine ja väljalangemine IKT erialade esimesel aastal Eesti kõrgkoolide näitel

Loodusteaduste ja tehnoloogia valdkonnas on suureks probleemiks üliõpilaste väljalangemine IKT erialadelt. Siinse kvalitatiivse uurimuse eesmärk on mõista sügavamalt erinevusi väljalangenud ja edasiõppivate üliõpilaste vahel ning leida abinõud, mida saaks väljalangemuse vähendamiseks kasutusele võtta. Andmeid koguti intervjuudega kaheksalt väljalangenud ja kaheksalt õpinguid jätkanud üliõpilaselt. Tulemused näitavad, et iseseisev IKT õppimine enne kõrgkooli muudab õpingud kõrgkoolis lihtsamaks ning õpingute jätkamisele aitab kaasa tugevam akadeemiline ja sotsiaalne integratsioon. Erinevused väljalangenud ja õpinguid jätkanud üliõpilaste vahel ilmnevad vaid akadeemilise integratsiooni puhul. Seevastu eri õppevormides õppivate üliõpilaste erinevused seisnevad varasemates kogemustes, kõrgkooli astumise eesmärkides, õpingutele pühendumises ja sotsiaalses integratsioonis. Tulemuste põhjal saab esitada soovitusi IKT erialadelt väljalangemise ennetamiseks.  Summar

Nutiseadmete kasutamise profiilid loodusainete ja matemaatika õppimise kontekstis

Nutiseadmeid kasutatakse sageli igapäevaelus, kuid ei ole teada, mil viisil ja kui laialdaselt rakendatakse neid õppimise eesmärgil. Selle väljaselgitamiseks korraldati ülevaateuuring, milles osales 3521 õpilast 6. ja 9. klassist. DIGCOMPi raamistikust lähtudes hindasid õpilased, kui sageli nad kasutavad nutiseadmeid õppimiseks loodusainetes ja matemaatikas. Õpilased jagati hierarhilise klasteranalüüsi abil viide rühma: sünnipärased digikodanikud, infoinimesed, suhtlevad infoinimesed, loomeinimesed ja nutiseadmete mittekasutajad. Neist nelja esimese profiilid iseloomustavad eri viisil nutiseadmete kasutajaid, keda on kokku ligikaudu pool valimisse kuulunud õpilastest. Teise poole moodustavad nutiseadmete mittekasutajad, kelle seas saab eristada täpsemaid alarühmi (kokku 11). Alarühmade võrdlemine võimaldab kavandada viise, kuidas kujundada nutiseadmete kasutamise harjumust. Samuti ilmneb uurimistulemustest, et 6. ja 9. klassi õpilased ning poisid ja tüdrukud kuuluvad eri rühmadesse erineva tõenäosusega.  Summar

Why do students choose to study Information and Communications Technology?

Abstract It is a worldwide problem that although many students are highly interested in Information and Communications Technology (ICT), they do not study it at the higher education level, or if they do then many of them eventually dropout. We studied the reasons student candidates choose to study ICT, in order to gather data that can be used for improving future ICT recruitment and retention. During the admissions procedure to three higher education institutions in Estonia, 1,464 student candidates were asked what reasons influenced them to apply to Informatics or Information Technology. On average, 2.6 candidates competed per available position at the institutions. Qualitative content analysis was used to code the candidates' open-ended answers and resulted inductively in 14 distinguishable categories. The most frequent reasons for studying ICT were general interest in ICT, previous experience in the field, need for personal professional development, and importance of the field in the future. Interestingly, only a few candidates expressed as a reason the importance of high salaries. Chi-square analysis showed that candidates were accepted with higher probability if they found ICT to be suitable for them, or expressed good opportunities in the labour market. These results are useful for planning effective admission procedures to recruit ICT students

Akadeemilise, sotsiaalse ja professionaalse integratsiooni roll kõrgkoolis infotehnoloogia õpingutes üliõpilaste edasijõudmise prognoosimisel

Väitekirja elektrooniline versioon ei sisalda publikatsiooneInfotehnoloogia (IT) roll ühiskonnas on kasvanud ja üha enam vajatakse tööturul IT-oskustega kõrgharidusega töötajaid. Igal aastal alustavad üliõpilased kõrgkoolides IT õpinguid, kuid suur osa neist õpinguid ei lõpeta. Kõrgkoolis edasijõudmist mõjutavaid tegureid on palju ning käesolevas doktoritöös luuakse nendest süsteem. Üliõpilasi on erinevat tüüpi ja seetõttu eristatakse käesolevas doktoritöös ka üliõpilaste profiilid, et oleks võimalik erinevate profiilidega üliõpilastele pakkuda just neile sobivat toetust õpingutes edasijõudmiseks. Tulemused näitavad, et õppekava valikul oli üliõpilaste jaoks kõige olulisem varasem IT-ga seotud kogemus, mis põhjustas huvi IT õppimise vastu. Töötamisega seotud aspektid (nt töövõimalused, palgad) olid üliõpilaste jaoks olulised nii õppekava valikul kui ka õpingute jätkamisel. Õpingute jätkamisel mängisid tähtsat rolli ka sotsiaalsed suhted kõrgkoolis. Käesoleva doktoritöö aluseks on USA-s loodud mudel, mis näitab akadeemilise ja sotsiaalse integratsiooni rolli kõrgkoolis edasijõudmisel. Doktoritöö tulemuste põhjal täiendati mudelit professionaalse integratsiooni rolli lisamisega, et see sobiks paremini IT erialade jaoks. Koostati empiiriline mudel, mis näitab, et IT erialadel õpingutes edasijõudmisel on olulised nii akadeemiline, sotsiaalne kui ka professionaalne integratsioon. Eriti tugevalt tuli välja professionaalse integratsiooni roll, mis viitab, et IT üliõpilased tahavad õpingute käigus olla reaalselt seotud IT ettevõtetes tehtava tööga. Seega on üliõpilaste õpingutes edasijõudmise toetamisel oluline kõrgkoolide koostöö IT ettevõtetega nii õppekava arendamisel kui ka üliõpilastele praktiliste ülesannete andmisel. Üliõpilaste profiilide eristamisel leiti samuti, et osa üliõpilasi vajab õpingute jätkamiseks praktilist töökogemust IT valdkonnas. Lisaks eristati üliõpilaste profiilid, kes vajavad toetust keerulistes õppeainetes edasijõudmisel. Töö praktiline väärtus seisneb soovituste välja toomises, mis aitaksid tulevikus IT üliõpilasi toetada ja väljalangevust vähendadaThe role of Information Technology (IT) has grown in the society and more IT workers with higher education degree are needed at the labour market. Every year a number of IT students start higher education studies, but many of them do not graduate. Various factors could have effect on students’ retention and in the current dissertation, a system of these factors was created. As IT students have different characteristics, students profiles were also distinguished in the dissertation to find what kind of support students with different profiles need to graduate the studies. The results showed that prior contact with learning IT had big effect on students while choosing to study IT in higher education level. IT work related factors (e.g., job opportunities, salaries) were important for both choosing to study IT and continuing IT studies. In addition, social integration became important during studies and it has effect on student retention. The basis of this dissertation was a model developed in USA that shows the role of academic and social integration in retention. Based on the results, the model was further developed by adding the role of professional integration. An empirical model was created that shows that academic, social and professional integration have effect on IT students retention. However, the role of professional integration was the biggest and it suggests that IT students want to be involved in doing the real work at IT companies. Therefore, higher education institutions should collaborate more with IT companies in developing the curricula and offering IT work related tasks to the students. Also, distinguishing IT students’ profiles showed that some students need work practice to continue the studies. In addition, some students need support to pass the courses that are difficult for them. The practical value of the dissertation is in providing suggestions of what can be done in the future to support IT students and reduce dropout rates

Training Teachers to Use Globisens Labdiscs for Citizen Science Projects in School

Four schools in Estonia received Globisens Labdiscs with sensor technology enabling to collect scientific data about different aspects of environment with the aim to use these in Citizen Science (CS) related activities. The teachers were trained for this and they thought that CS approach has a great potential for using in school. However, the challenge is that at the beginning it is difficult for teachers and students to use the new technology. Adopting the CS paradigm may take time and participating more in real-life CS project could help guiding teacher to implement the CS approach in their teaching

Improvement of Inquiry in a Complex Technology-Enhanced Learning Environment

Inquiry learning is an effective approach in science education. Complex technology-enhanced learning environments are needed to apply inquiry worldwide to support knowledge gain and improvement of inquiry skills. In our study, we applied an ecology mission in the SCY-Lab learning environment and tested with 54 students (aged 14–18 years) how its rich technology and complexity could be applied in supporting students’ general inquiry knowledge, transformative inquiry skills, and domain-related knowledge. Reflection questions were applied in supporting inquiry. In this article, we show how different skills and knowledge improved and how these are related with each other

The Role of a Reflection Tool in Enhancing Students Reflection

International audienceReflection is a cognitive process that can help students understand and learn from their learningexperiences. This implies thinking back about the course of learning processes in order to enablebetter behaviour and actions in the future. Reflection is more efficient if it is supported by technologicaltools. These tools offer the ability to present detailed information about learning processes (e.g., useof time during a specific learning process) and the ability to provide guidance, for example in the formof questions that support reflection. In this paper we present the results of a study carried out with 9thgrade students (mean age 15.0 years, n=59) to clarify the role of a Reflection Tool to support students’reflection. The Reflection Tool in this study is a web-based application that was tailored for achemistry-based Inquiry Learning Space (ILS) called “What does pH measure?”. The ILS andReflection Tool were developed as part of the EU funded project called Go-Lab (see www.go-labproject.eu). Students were divided into two conditions. In experimental condition the Reflection Toolwas used and in the control condition it was not. Furthermore, two types of devices were used toimplement the Reflection Tool: tablets and personal computers. Assessment of the Reflection Toolwas based on coding the response to open-ended questions that support reflection. Two aspects wereassessed in students’ reflections: content (technical, situational and sensitising) and reflection level(description, justification, critique, dialogue and transfer). A qualitative analysis and a non-parametricMann-Whitney U-test were used to detect to what extent the Reflection Tool helps identify students’reflection content and levels. Although, there was no statistically significant difference in favour of theReflection Tool, the results still showed that the Reflection Tool enabled to identify students’ reflectioncontent and levels. In this paper we discuss the possible interpretations of these results

Improvement of Inquiry in a Complex Technology-Enhanced Learning Environment

Inquiry learning is an effective approach in science education. Complex technology-enhanced learning environments are needed to apply inquiry worldwide to support knowledge gain and improvement of inquiry skills. In our study, we applied an ecology mission in the SCY-Lab learning environment and tested with 54 students (aged 14–18 years) how its rich technology and complexity could be applied in supporting students’ general inquiry knowledge, transformative inquiry skills, and domain-related knowledge. Reflection questions were applied in supporting inquiry. In this article, we show how different skills and knowledge improved and how these are related with each other