University teachers and open educational resources: case studies from Latin America

The Open Education movement has made efforts to systematise experiences and to evaluate the adoption of Open Educational Resources (OER). However, OER adoption is not part of the prevailing paradigm in higher education, both at the global level and in Latin America. This paper describes results of a study that analysed the social representations regarding the development, use, and reuse of OER by university teachers in their pedagogical practices. We conducted a study of 12 cases from Latin American universities based on Grounded Theory. The results show that the use and reuse of OER lacks of public and institutional policies. The main agents are teachers organised in teams that support OER adoption. The reasons that encourage the creation of OER are mainly intrinsic, such as the pleasure derived from contributing and sharing, as well as external and related to professional development needs from the reflection on one’s own educational practice. Educators consider it essential to evaluate the resources created so that they can be reused in continuous improvement processes. Commercial use and misappropriation of the works are two of the main tensions identified. The community factor of teaching guides most behaviours in OER adoption in educational institutions and is presented as an inherent part of the development and transformation of the curriculumThis research was supported in part by: Red Iberoamericana para la Usabilidad de Repositorios Educativos, Red 513RT0471 (RIURE); Interdisciplinary Space, Sectoral Commission of Education, and Sectoral Commission of Scientific Research, Universidad de la RepúblicaS

Presentación

[ES] Presentación del monográfico "Engineering Education".Llamas Nistal, M.; Vallverdú, F. (2013). Presentación. REDU. Revista de Docencia Universitaria. 11(0):15-18. https://doi.org/10.4995/redu.2013.5545OJS151811

An xAPI application profile to monitor self-regulated learning strategies

Self-regulated learning (SRL) is being promoted and adopted increasingly due to the needs of current education, student centered and focused on competence development. One of the main components of SRL is learners' self-monitoring, which eventually contributes to a better performance. Monitoring is also important for teachers, as it enables them to know to what extent their learners are doing well and progressing properly. At the same time, the use of technology for learning is now common and facilitates monitoring. Nevertheless, the available software still offers poor support from the SRL point of view, especially, for SRL monitoring. This clashes with the growth of learning analytics and educational data mining. The main issue is the wide variety of SRL actions that need to be captured, commonly performed in different tools, and the need to integrate them to support the development of analytics and data mining developments, making imperative the search of interoperable solutions. This paper focuses on the standardization of SRL traces to enable data collection from multiple sources and data analysis with the goal of easing the monitoring process for teachers and learners. First, the paper analyzes current monitoring software and its limitations for SRL. Then, after a brief analysis of available standards on this area, an application profile for the eXperience API specification is proposed to enable the interoperable recording of the SRL traces. The paper describes the process followed to create the profile, from the analysis to the final implementation, including the selection of the interactions that represent relevant SRL actions, the selection of vocabularies to record them and a case study.Xunta de Galicia | Ref. ED431B 2017/67Xunta de Galicia | Ref. ED431D 2017/1

Predictors and early warning systems in higher education: a systematic literature review

The topic of predictive algorithms is often regarded among the most relevant fields of study within the data analytics discipline. Nowadays, these algorithms are widely used by entrepreneurs and researchers alike, having practical applications in a broad variety of contexts, such as in finance, marketing or healthcare. One of such contexts is the educational field, where the development and implementation of learning technologies led to the birth and popularization of computerbased and blended learning. Consequently, student-related data has become easier to collect. This Research Full Paper presents a literature review on predictive algorithms applied to higher education contexts, with special attention to early warning systems (EWS): tools that are typically used to analyze future risks such as a student failing or dropping a course, and that are able to send alerts to instructors or students themselves before these events can happen. Results of using predictors and EWS in real academic scenarios are also highlighted

Profiling students’ self-regulation with learning analytics: a proof of concept

The ability to regulate one's own learning processes is a key factor in educational scenarios. Self-regulation skills notably affect students' ef cacy when studying and academic performance, for better orworse. However, neither students or instructors generally have proper understanding of what self-regulated learning is, the impact that it has or how to assess it. This paper has the purpose of showing how learning analytics can be used in order to generate simple metrics related to several areas of students' selfregulation, in the context of a rst-year university course. These metrics are based on data obtained from a learning management system, complemented by more speci c assessment-related data and direct answers to self-regulated learning questionnaires. As the end result, simple self-regulation pro les are obtained for each student, which can be used to identify strengths and weaknesses and, potentially, help struggling students to improve their learning habits.Xunta de Galicia | Ref. ED431B 2020/3

Monitoring students’ self-regulation as a basis for an early warning system

Among the elements that determine a student’s academic success, their ability to regulate their own learning processes is an important, yet typically underrated factor. It is possible for students to improve their self-regulated learning skills, even at university levels. However, they are often unaware of their own behavior. Moreover, instructors are usually not prepared to assess students’ self-regulation. This paper presents a learning analytics solution which focuses on rating selfregulation skills, separated in several different categories, using activity and performance data from a LMS, as well as self-reported student data via questionnaires. It is implemented as an early warning system, offering the possibility of detecting students whose poor SRL profile puts them at risk of academic underperformance. As of the date of this writing, this is still a work in progress, and is being tested in the context of a first year college engineering course

Supporting intensive continuous assessment with BeA in a flipped classroom experience

This paper presents the changes performed in a university course to adopt European Higher Education Area principles taking advantage of new technologies and educational approaches. Particularly, a Flipped Classroom model that also involves an Intensive Continuous Assessment approach is adopted, moving the presentation of theoretical contents to videos that can be watched outside of the classroom and using the classroom face-to-face time to provide explanations, problem solving and to perform assessment activities every week. A main part of innovation in the experience comes from the use of an online tool (BeA - Blended e-Assessment) that facilitates the assessment and reviewing of paper-based exams. This tool supports teachers in assessment tasks, that can be performed in a faster, simpler, more transparent and less error-prone way. The paper shows the results of an experience involving a control group and an experimentation group, in which this new approach and tool have been applied. The results obtained demonstrate the effectiveness of both proposals. In conjunction, the paper describes how a traditional university course based on lectures can be successfully adapted to a more innovative approach based on the principles of active learning and accountability thanks to the use of our blended e-Assessment tool.Xunta de Galicia | Ref. ED431B 2017/67Xunta de Galicia | Ref. ED431D 2017/12Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad | Ref. TIN2016-80515-

Exploring the synergies between gamification and data collection in higher education

In recent years, gamification techniques have been gaining popularity in all kind of educational scenarios, helping students improve their learning process by fostering engagement and attention. Implementing gamification aspects in a course can also provide an opportunity to gather student data that would not have been available otherwise. This paper describes a data gathering process in the context of a university course, as a work-in-progress. Among these data there is information regarding the participation of students in quizzes presented as games in the classroom. These quizzes combined questions covering course con-tents, as well as some regarding self-regulated learning habits. The main advantage observed was a high student participation in the quizzes. As a result, this gamification approach proved to be a more effective way to gather student data compared to other methods applied in previous academic years, which often failed due to many students ignoring optional activities.Xunta de Galicia | Ref. ED431B 2020/3

Sustainability of Open Educational Resources: the eCity case

[EN]The promotion of Open Educational Resources (OER) as reusable tools for teachers and students is highly relevant but the nature of the income model requires specific strategies to maintain and update those resources. eCity is a city simulation game that supports a Problem Based Learning (PBL) pedagogical methodology in secondary schools and, at the same time, fosters the interest of students in following an Engineering career. The game is freely available through online stores and the generated interest (about 100.000 downloads so far) has raised the need to discuss and adopt a sustainability strategy for the maintenance of the game and the development of new versions. This article presents possible alternatives for that strategy

Sustainability of Open Educational Resources: the eCity case

[EN]The promotion of Open Educational Resources (OER) as reusable tools for teachers and students is highly relevant but the nature of the income model requires specific strategies to maintain and update those resources. eCity is a city simulation game that supports a Problem Based Learning (PBL) pedagogical methodology in secondary schools and, at the same time, fosters the interest of students in following an Engineering career. The game is freely available through online stores and the generated interest (about 100.000 downloads so far) has raised the need to discuss and adopt a sustainability strategy for the maintenance of the game and the development of new versions. This article presents possible alternatives for that strategy