Psychometric analyses of the Canvas Quizzes and STEM Staff’s Anxiety

© 2022 University of Hertfordshire.Quizzes are the most frequent tools used by academic tutors in the module assessments of the programme of studies. This article focuses on the use of statistical parameters of the Canvas quizzes that possess very intriguing features for academics and learning teaching technologists. Some useful psychometric analyses of the quiz items are scrutinised based on auto-generated statistical parameters. For example, standard deviation; distractors; difficulty, and discriminatory indices, respectively, are effectively used to ensure the quality of questions and overall quizzes for graded assessments. The main thrust of this article is to value the staff’s good practices and dedication in developing quizzes fit-for-the purpose despite their increasing workload and encourage young learning technologists and quiz-enthusiasts to invest more efforts in making use of the statistical parameters in evaluating the quality of the quizzes, items in the quizzes, the sustained learning of the students, and fulfilling academic quality assurances’ requirements to cover overall learning objectives of courses and programme of studies.Peer reviewe

Engaging students of Engineering & Technology in positive Group Dynamics using randomly generated Instant Virtual Group (IVG) quizzes

A quiz template is developed keeping in mind the group dynamics to engage and encourage group work activities among E&T undergraduates. The Microsoft® Excel VBA programming was used to create random instant virtual groups (IVGs) and to select random questions. Although the IVG quiz selects group members randomly, yet the programming enables “controlled” reoccurrence keeping the entire class in alert state (i.e. allowing previous members from other groups to reappear and regroup). During the quiz, a small group cooperatively engaged working towards solution and at the end of each quiz question each group member is peer assessed by entire class following pre-set rules of engagement. At the end of quiz, the analyses are auto-plotted showing individual and group contributions flagging out, the best, good and the poor performers. The developed quiz workbook can be easily adopted for the reuse in any group assessment activity by simply changing the attendance list and question bank. The quiz template was used in piloting an epistemological study of various taught modules at different programme levels in various pathways of MEng-BEng and MSc Engineering programmes. The results of a survey analysing the effectiveness of such IVG quizzes using Chi-square test predicted an overall 71% net positive student’s responses with an average above 59% for various programme levels. Furthermore, the data analysis suggested that Level 4 and MSc cohorts comparatively need more tutor support in their group work as they have limited exposure to group dynamics. The significance of eye-contact and positioning of peers in-classroom randomised IVGs were also studied, which revealed that increasing separation between peers and their obscured locations obstructing their eye-contacts show adverse effects on group homotopy recommending maximum five members in an IVG creating effective cooperative communication. The random IVG quiz is tutor centred activity and mainly designed engaging students in-class active learning, and is suitable for small to medium class size of 30-35, nonetheless, large cohort size can be supported by splitting in batches

A study of moisture distribution in Malaysian wood by neutron radiography

A study on moisture distribution in several types of malaysian wood is presented, based on the transmission of various wood samples by neutron beam via neutron radiography technique. The aim of the study was to investigate the water uptake behaviour, and drying process in different species of wood. The experimental set-up, the detector system used and the evaluation procedure are described. Neutron radiographic images that describe the moisture distribution in the wood samples have been produced. Qualitative information obtained from the images provides a general understanding of the behaviour of wood during its interaction with water under different conditions. Results obtained indicate the potential for further use of this method in studying several moisture-related practical problems in wood manufacturing industr