ethanporcaro/eric-fulltext-meta huggingface dataset:
Harnessing the Potential of ICTs for Literacy Teaching and Learning: Effective Literacy and Numeracy Programmes Using Radio, TV, Mobile Phones, Tablets, and Computers
Author: Hanemann, Ulrike, Ed.
Date: 2014-00-00
Type: Reports - Evaluative
Subjects: Information Technology,Educational Technology,Technology Integration,Videoconferencing,Literacy,Numeracy,Teaching Methods,Instructional Materials,Program Effectiveness,Case Studies,Television,Radio,Literacy Education,Telecommunications,Handheld Devices,Computer Uses in Education,Adult Literacy,Distance Education,Program Descriptions,Program Implementation,Program Content,Foreign Countries

Different technologies have been used for decades to support adult education and learning. These include radio, television and audio and video cassettes. More recently digital ICTs such as computers, tablets, e-books, and mobile technology have spread at great speed and also found their way into the teaching and learning of literacy and numeracy skills. The large spectrum of ICTs, which can be applied to different contexts, includes satellite systems, network hardware and software as well as videoconferencing and electronic mail. Each one of these technologies opens up new possibilities to develop literacy skills from the safety of one's home and offers a virtually unrestricted access to learning materials (Kim et al., 2012). &quot;Harnessing the Potential of ICTs for Literacy Teaching and Learning,&quot; presents a compilation of 26 case studies of literacy and numeracy programmes that successfully use radio, TV, mobile phones, tablets and computers. This compilation shows that ICTs can supplement face-to-face adult literacy teaching and help to maintain and develop literacy skills to higher proficiency levels.
UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning: Annual Report 2013
Author: UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) (Germany)
Date: 2014-00-00
Type: Reports - Descriptive
Subjects: Lifelong Learning,Governing Boards,Adult Learning,Adult Education,International Organizations,Educational Policy,Literacy Education,Basic Skills,Program Descriptions,Capacity Building,Gender Differences,Daily Living Skills,Outcomes of Education,Foreign Countries,Annual Reports

In the introduction to this report, UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) Director, Arne Carlsen, announces that UIL is presenting a new design and a new concept, aiming to make the report more reader-friendly. The main activities are highlighted, testimonies from beneficiaries and actors are included, and the report opens with a chronological overview of the year. Also contained in this report are: (1) &quot;Medium Term Strategy&quot;, by Chairperson of UIL's Governing board, Jean-Marie Ahlin Byll-Cataria; (2) and UIL's Role within UNESCO, by Dr. Qian Tang, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Education. Other items provided in the report include: (1) Overview of Key Activities 2013; (2) Lifelong Learning Policies and Strategies Programme; (3) Literacy and Basic skills Programme; (4) Adult Learning and Education Programme; (5) Documentation Center and Library; (6) Publications and Information; (7) Governing Board and Staff; (8) Financial Report; and (9) Further Documents and References.
Key Issues and Policy Considerations in Promoting Lifelong Learning in Selected African Countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Namibia, Rwanda and Tanzania. UIL Publication Series on Lifelong Learning Policies and Strategies. No. 1
Author: Walters, Shirley
Date: 2014-00-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: International Organizations,Lifelong Learning,Role,Counseling,Guidance,Foreign Countries,Educational Policy,Grounded Theory,Program Descriptions,Semi Structured Interviews,Economic Progress,Educational Development,Informal Education,Qualitative Research

This cross-national study focuses on key issues and policy considerations in promoting lifelong learning in Ethiopia, Kenya, Namibia, Rwanda, and Tanzania (the five African countries that took part in a pilot workshop on &quot;Developing Capacity for Establishing Lifelong Learning Systems in UNESCO Member States: at the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning in 2010&quot;. The methodology used in the study is inspired by grounded theory which involves the use of systematized data collection and analysis procedures to generate, develop and derive inductively contextualized theory about a phenomenon. Through desk research and field work, the study team has selected examples of lifelong learning policy and programmes in the five participating countries. The report reflects on the porous boundaries that exist between the sectors and highlights six key issues that affect the operationalization of lifelong learning, namely: (1) conceptual understandings of lifelong learning; (2) recognition of learning achievements; (3) the role of counselling and guidance; (4) teachers and facilitators; (5) financial resources, and infrastructure; and (6) coordination among stakeholders. The lessons learned from the study are summarized in ten concrete recommendations for further action and reform. If adapted to local contexts, these recommendations can be implemented fully or partly in many other countries. Appended are: (1) List of Interviewees; and (2) Semi-Structured Questions for the Fieldwork. A bibliography is also provided.
The Early Childhood Educator Preparation Innovation Grants: Lessons from Initial Implementation. Executive Summary. IERC 2015-2
Author: Lichtenberger, Eric J.
Date: 2015-00-00
Type: Reports - Descriptive
Subjects: Early Childhood Education,Grants,Preschool Teachers,Educational Innovation,Teacher Education Programs,Barriers,Partnerships in Education,Educational Practices,Educational Strategies,Goal Orientation,Educational Objectives,Interviews,Institutional Characteristics,Articulation (Education),Academic Advising,Organizational Change,Student Characteristics,Educational Cooperation,Technology Uses in Education,Enrollment,Systems Approach,Program Administration

The Illinois Board of Higher Education (IBHE) sought to evaluate the implementation of the Early Childhood Educator Preparation Program Innovation (EPPI) grant. The grantees consisted of partnerships that included community colleges, four-year institutions, and in some cases community-based entities or schools, such as Head Start programs. The four-year institution in the partnership was required to be the fiscal agent for the grant and had to be accredited with a currently approved early childhood educator preparation program. These grants were competitive and the proposals required that the potential grantees demonstrate the extent to which their grant-related activities furthered the work of the Illinois Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge. The main goals of this study were to: (1) examine how the grant recipients were implementing the changes set forth in their grant proposals; (2) identify initial barriers to implementation of grant activities; (3) identify catalysts that aided in goal attainment and/or partnership development; and (4) consider the sustainability of the impact of the grant-related activities. Through structured telephone interviews, the Illinois Education Research Council (IERC) solicited a brief description of major activities associated with the grant; catalysts and/or levers enhancing grant activities; barriers inhibiting implementation of grant activities; and successful strategies utilized to overcome barriers. [For the full report, see ED560508.]
The Early Childhood Educator Preparation Innovation Grant: Lessons from Initial Implementation. IERC 2015-2
Author: Lichtenberger, Eric J.
Date: 2015-00-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: Early Childhood Education,Grants,Preschool Teachers,Educational Innovation,Teacher Education Programs,Barriers,Partnerships in Education,Educational Practices,Educational Strategies,Goal Orientation,Educational Objectives,Interviews,Institutional Characteristics,Articulation (Education),Academic Advising,Organizational Change,Student Characteristics,Bias,Educational Cooperation,Technology Uses in Education,Enrollment,Systems Approach,Program Administration

The Illinois Board of Higher Education (IBHE) sought to evaluate the implementation of the Early Childhood Educator Preparation Program Innovation (EPPI) grant. The grantees consisted of partnerships that included community colleges, four-year institutions, and in some cases community-based entities or schools, such as Head Start programs. The four-year institution in the partnership was required to be the fiscal agent for the grant and had to be accredited with a currently approved early childhood educator preparation program. These grants were competitive and the proposals required that the potential grantees demonstrate the extent to which their grant-related activities furthered the work of the Illinois Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge. The main goals of this study were to: (1) examine how the grant recipients were implementing the changes set forth in their grant proposals; (2) identify initial barriers to implementation of grant activities; (3) identify catalysts that aided in goal attainment and/or partnership development; and (4) consider the sustainability of the impact of the grant-related activities. Through structured telephone interviews, the Illinois Education Research Council (IERC) solicited a brief description of major activities associated with the grant; catalysts and/or levers enhancing grant activities; barriers inhibiting implementation of grant activities; and successful strategies utilized to overcome barriers. Appendices contain the basic interview protocol and supplementary tables. [For the executive summary of this report, see ED560507.]
Methodological Challenges in the Analysis of MOOC Data for Exploring the Relationship between Discussion Forum Views and Learning Outcomes
Author: Bergner, Yoav
Date: 2015-06-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Online Courses,Data Analysis,Discussion Groups,Outcomes of Education,Research Methodology,Research Problems,Models,Tests,Activities,Learner Engagement,Student Motivation,Scores,Ability,Multiple Regression Analysis

Determining how learners use MOOCs effectively is critical to providing feedback to instructors, schools, and policy-makers on this highly scalable technology. However, drawing inferences about student learning outcomes in MOOCs has proven to be quite difficult due to large amounts of missing data (of various kinds) and to the diverse population of MOOC participants. Thus significant methodological challenges must be addressed before seemingly straightforward substantive questions can be answered. The present study considers modeling final exam performance outcomes on early-stage ability estimates, discussion forum viewing frequency, and overall assessment-oriented engagement (AOE, seen as a proxy measure of motivation). These variables require careful operationalization, analysis of which is the principle contribution of this work. This study demonstrates that the effect sizes of discussion forum viewing activities on final exam outcomes are quite sensitive to these choices. [For complete proceedings, see ED560503.]
Revising the 2001 Revised Recommendation Concerning Technical and Vocational Education. Report of the UNESCO-UNEVOC Special Virtual Conference, 1-14 April 2014
Author: UNESCO-UNEVOC International Centre for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (Germany)
Date: 2014-00-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Teleconferencing,Technical Education,Vocational Education,Foreign Countries,Standard Setting,International Cooperation,Labor Market,Teaching Methods,Evaluation Methods,Educational Finance,Quality Assurance,Educational Research,Educational Change,Change Strategies,Academic Standards,Educational Objectives

This virtual conference is part of a larger consultation process through which UNESCO will consult with practitioners and researchers; representatives of key stakeholder groupings such as employers' federations, trade unions and youth organizations; other international agencies and Member States in order to draft a new Revised Recommendation that will be taken to the 2015 UNESCO General Conference for discussion and adoption. The virtual conference was convened jointly by the UNESCO-UNEVOC International Centre for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) in Bonn, Germany, and the UNESCO TVET Section in Paris, France. It was intended to be a unique opportunity for everyone in the TVET community to make their voice heard and be part of a global consultation process on shaping the future of TVET. The objectives of this virtual conference were: (1) to consult widely with stakeholders from different socio-economic and professional contexts and locations within the TVET system on their views regarding the direction of change for the Revised Recommendation; and (2) to produce a report of the virtual conference that would serve as an input into a meeting of a small invited group of international experts who would be charged with producing a draft of the Revised Recommendation. The key questions asked as part of the virtual conference were as follows: (1) What should be the scope of a successful international standard-setting instrument in the field of TVET?; (2) What, for the purpose of this revised instrument, should be understood by the term &quot;TVET&quot;?; (3) What should be the guiding principles upon which to base the Revised Recommendation?; and (4) How should the text of the Revised Recommendation be organized so as to be applicable to a diversity of country contexts and to remain current in a constantly changing world? [The conference was moderated by Simon McGrath.]
Vocational Pedagogy; What It Is, Why It Matters and How to Put It into Practice. Report of the UNESCO-UNEVOC Virtual Conference, 12-26 May 2014
Author: UNESCO-UNEVOC International Centre for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (Germany)
Date: 2014-00-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Technical Education,Vocational Education,Educational Improvement,Teleconferencing,Teaching Methods,Foreign Countries,Teacher Competencies,Educational Practices,Skill Development,Job Skills

Around the world technical and vocational education and training (TVET) is widely seen as having a key role in promoting both economic and socio-economic growth, increasing productivity, empowering citizens and alleviating poverty. Yet the quality of TVET in terms of learner outcomes and teaching inputs is variable. In some countries this unhelpful inconsistency is being addressed through the use of accountability regimes to validate the quality of provision, in others through increased professionalization and training of the TVET workforce. Other methods of improving TVET include investment in buildings and equipment, better engagement of employers in the process of curriculum development, the use of smart technologies and the development of formative assessment practices. The objective of the two-week virtual conference on Vocational Pedagogy on the e-Forum was to explore vocational pedagogy--what it is, why it matters and how teachers can put it into practice. Between 12 to 26 May 2014, 197 Participants from 65 different countries virtually attended the online conference. The discussion focused on four broad topic areas: (1) Aspects of vocational pedagogy of most interest to participants; (2) The concept of signature pedagogies; (3) Why a broad conception of TVET matters; and (4) The qualities of a great TVET teacher and how these can be cultivated. [The conference was moderated by Bill Lucas.]
Machine Beats Experts: Automatic Discovery of Skill Models for Data-Driven Online Course Refinement
Author: Matsuda, Noboru
Date: 2015-06-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Online Courses,Skills,Automation,Models,Data,Formative Evaluation,Correlation,Comparative Analysis

How can we automatically determine which skills must be mastered for the successful completion of an online course? Large-scale online courses (e.g., MOOCs) often contain a broad range of contents frequently intended to be a semester's worth of materials; this breadth often makes it difficult to articulate an accurate set of skills and knowledge (i.e., a skill model, or the QMatrix). We have developed an innovative method to discover skill models from the data of online courses. Our method assumes that online courses have a pre-defined skill map for which skills are associated with formative assessment items embedded throughout the online course. Our method carefully exploits correlations between various parts of student performance, as well as in the text of assessment items, to build a superior statistical model that even outperforms human experts. To evaluate our method, we compare our method with existing methods (LFA) and human engineered skill models on three Open Learning Initiative (OLI) courses at Carnegie Mellon University. The results show that (1) our method outperforms human-engineered skill models, (2) skill models discovered by our method are interpretable, and (3) our method is remarkably faster than existing methods. These results suggest that our method provides a significant contribution to the evidence-based, iterative refinement of online courses with a promising scalability. [For complete proceedings, see ED560503.]
Student Models for Prior Knowledge Estimation
Author: Nižnan, Juraj
Date: 2015-06-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Prior Learning,Models,Intelligent Tutoring Systems,Bayesian Statistics,Computation,Geography Instruction,Prediction,Accuracy

Intelligent behavior of adaptive educational systems is based on student models. Most research in student modeling focuses on student learning (acquisition of skills). We focus on prior knowledge, which gets much less attention in modeling and yet can be highly varied and have important consequences for the use of educational systems. We describe several models for prior knowledge estimation--the Elo rating system, its Bayesian extension, a hierarchical model, and a networked model (multivariate Elo). We evaluate their performance on data from application for learning geography, which is a typical case with highly varied prior knowledge. The result show that the basic Elo rating system provides good prediction accuracy. More complex models do improve predictions, but only slightly and their main purpose is in additional information about students and a domain. [For complete proceedings, see ED560503.]
Discovering Prerequisite Structure of Skills through Probabilistic Association Rules Mining
Author: Chen, Yang
Date: 2015-06-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Skills,Data Analysis,Students,Performance,Computation,Intelligent Tutoring Systems,Models,Probability

Estimating the prerequisite structure of skills is a crucial issue in domain modeling. Students usually learn skills in sequence since the preliminary skills need to be learned prior to the complex skills. The prerequisite relations between skills underlie the design of learning sequence and adaptation strategies for tutoring systems. The prerequisite structures of skills are usually studied by human experts, but they are seldom tested empirically. Due to plenty of educational data available, in this paper, we intend to discover the prerequisite structure of skills from student performance data. However, it is a challenging task since skills are latent variables. Uncertainty exists in inferring student knowledge of skills from performance data. Probabilistic Association Rules Mining proposed by Sun et al. (2010) is a novel technique to discover association rules from uncertain data. In this paper, we preprocess student performance data by an evidence model. Then the probabilistic knowledge states of students estimated by the evidence model are used by the probabilistic association rules mining to discover the prerequisite structure of skills. We adapt our method to the testing data and the log data with different evidence models. One simulated data set and two real data sets are used to validate our method. The discovered prerequisite structures can be provided to assist human experts in domain modeling or to validate the prerequisite structures of skills from human expertise. [For complete proceedings, see ED560503.]
From Predictive Models to Instructional Policies
Author: Rollinson, Joseph
Date: 2015-06-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Prediction,Models,Educational Policy,Intelligent Tutoring Systems,Accuracy,Academic Achievement,Teaching Methods,Measurement Techniques,Mastery Learning,Instructional Effectiveness,Mathematical Models,Comparative Analysis,Statistical Data,Data Analysis

At their core, Intelligent Tutoring Systems consist of a student model and a policy. The student model captures the state of the student and the policy uses the student model to individualize instruction. Policies require different properties from the student model. For example, a mastery threshold policy requires the student model to have a way to quantify whether the student has mastered a skill. A large amount of work has been done on building student models that can predict student performance on the next question. In this paper, we leverage this prior work with a new when-to-stop policy that is compatible with any such predictive student model. Our results suggest that, when employed as part of our new predictive similarity policy, student models with similar predictive accuracies can suggest that substantially different amounts of practice are necessary. This suggests that predictive accuracy may not be a sufficient metric by itself when choosing which student model to use in intelligent tutoring systems. [For complete proceedings, see ED560503.]
A Framework for Multifaceted Evaluation of Student Models
Author: Huang, Yun
Date: 2015-06-00
Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers
Subjects: Guidelines,Models,Prediction,Evaluation Methods,Statistical Analysis,Comparative Analysis,Intelligent Tutoring Systems,Instructional Effectiveness,Physics,Probability,Geometry,Computer Software,Mathematics Instruction,Science Instruction,Online Courses,Data Analysis

Latent variable models, such as the popular Knowledge Tracing method, are often used to enable adaptive tutoring systems to personalize education. However, finding optimal model parameters is usually a difficult non-convex optimization problem when considering latent variable models. Prior work has reported that latent variable models obtained from educational data vary in their predictive performance, plausibility, and consistency. Unfortunately, there are still no unified quantitative measurements of these properties. This paper suggests a general unified framework (that we call Polygon) for multifaceted evaluation of student models. The framework takes all three dimensions mentioned above into consideration and offers novel metrics for the quantitative comparison of different student models. These properties affect the effectiveness of the tutoring experience in a way that traditional predictive performance metrics fall short. The present work demonstrates our methodology of comparing Knowledge Tracing with a recent model called Feature-Aware Student Knowledge Tracing (FAST) on datasets from different tutoring systems. Our analysis suggests that FAST generally improves on Knowledge Tracing along all dimensions studied. [For complete proceedings, see ED560503.]