Are book publications disappearing from scholarly communication in the social sciences and humanities?

In the social sciences and humanities book publishing takes a prominent role, both in terms of communicating with international peers and with a broader intelligentsia (Hicks, 2004; Verleysen & Engels, 2014). Empirical evidence regarding the evolution of the share of scholarly book publications in the total volume of scholarly publications in a given country is rare. In this study we intend to fill this gap with an analysis of the comprehensive coverage data on the share of peer reviewed book publications (book chapters, edited volumes and monographs) that are available from Flanders and Slovenia for the period 2004 to 2015. We supplement these data with data on peer reviewed book chapters and monographs from Norway for the period 2005-2015 as well as data on all types of peer reviewed book publishing for the period 2009 to 2014 for Poland and 2011 to 2015 for Finland

Investigation of university students' perceptions of their educators as role models and designers of digitalized curricula

© 2020 Andreja Istenič Starčič. Higher education graduates need 21st-century skills, both learning skills and competences for working with technology. However, research indicates an insufficient integration of ICTs into teaching and learning. In this paper, we examine students' perception of various technology-based issues: (a) ICT integration within a Slovenian university's learning environment, (b) teachers as role models for ICT use, and (c) the processes of collaboration and creativity as integrative parts featured in learning technologies. We studied beliefs about the contribution of ICT use to teaching and learning as the primary factors influencing ICT integration. A one-way ANOVA revealed that students in teacher education and education studies, as compared to students in other disciplines, perceive their teachers as effective designers of and as role models for ICT integration, although they do not perceive their teachers as leaders in new technology use. Effective leadership in technology innovation and the diversity of instructional design in guided and student-driven learning environments require continual curriculum development

The effect of outdoor lessons in natural sciences on students’ knowledge, through tablets and experiential learning

© 2020, Scientia Socialis Ltd. All rights reserved. Experiential learning was intro-duced to support a child’s concept development towards evolution scientific literacy. This study examined the effect of an experiential learning model (The Mobile Natural Science Learning-MNSL) on the knowledge of 4th grade primary school students in Slovenia, during natural science school lessons at the seashore through the use of tab-lets. Mobile technology provides authentic learning, assisting outdoor lessons provid-ing material and environmental context in learning, which support the experience of a learner. In the experimental group (N = 95), outdoor learning in the seashore included Kolb’s experiential learning cycle with the integration of tablets. In the control group (N=97), the teachers used concrete experience for exploring the seashore, excluding the Kolb’s cycle. The data were collected by using two science knowledge pre and post – tests. The test items were classified into three TIMSS’ cognitive domains: 1) factual knowledge, 2) conceptual understanding, and 3) reasoning and analysis. Differences between groups were analysed through Mann-Whitney U-test and showed that the experimental group had better learning outcomes than the control group. Findings indicate that the MNSL-model had a positive effect on students’ achievement in science, more precisely in knowledge on marine organisms and life at the seashore

Problem-Based Geometry in Seventh Grade: Examining the Effect of Path-Based Vs. Conventional Instruction on Learning Outcomes

This experimental study examined the impact of learning and teaching geometry in seventh-grade geometry education comparing learningpath and conventional instruction. According to constructivism, a learning path with the use of learning objects should enhance learner autonomy and selfdirectedness by providing differentiated instruction. We designed a model of path-based geometry learning in a learning management system–based learning environment with the use of dynamic geometry programs and applets, which fosters visualisation and the exploration of geometric concepts through the manipulation of interactive virtual representations. The results show that the experimental group (EG) achieved higher scores on all levels of knowledge and statistically significantly better results in taxonomy level-III tasks (problemsolving knowledge) and overall score than the control group (CG). There was initial equivalence between the EG and CG in prior knowledge. The authors concluded that path-based geometry learning empirically develops knowledge at higher cognitive levels

Multilingual publishing in the social sciences and humanities: A seven-country European study

© 2020 The Authors. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of Association for Information Science and Technology We investigate the state of multilingualism across the social sciences and humanities (SSH) using a comprehensive data set of research outputs from seven European countries (Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Flanders [Belgium], Norway, Poland, and Slovenia). Although English tends to be the dominant language of science, SSH researchers often produce culturally and societally relevant work in their local languages. We collected and analyzed a set of 164,218 peer-reviewed journal articles (produced by 51,063 researchers from 2013 to 2015) and found that multilingualism is prevalent despite geographical location and field. Among the researchers who published at least three journal articles during this time period, over one-third from the various countries had written their work in at least two languages. The highest share of researchers who published in only one language were from Flanders (80.9%), whereas the lowest shares were from Slovenia (57.2%) and Poland (59.3%). Our findings show that multilingual publishing is an ongoing practice in many SSH research fields regardless of geographical location, political situation, and/or historical heritage. Here we argue that research is international, but multilingual publishing keeps locally relevant research alive with the added potential for creating impact