Information and Learning Science

Lin, Feng; Sun, Jingjing

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-10-2023-0143

This paper aims to present a practical guide for designing effective synchronous online teaching to support student engagement.Design/methodology/approachThis practical guide was developed by drawing insights from literature and our own practical experiences.FindingsThis paper developed BEST principles (i.e., Building positive relationships, Engage through interactions, Scaffold collaborative learning, and Timely feedback) as a practical framework for guiding the design of synchronous online teaching. This paper also discussed the pedagogical roles digital tools can play in supporting online teaching and the various design considerations.Practical implicationsThis guide can serve multiple purposes: a practical framework for guiding the design of online teaching, a reflective instrument to evaluate the effectiveness of online teaching, and a resource for teacher professional development training in online teaching. It also has implications for the design of learning in other modalities (e.g. face-to-face and hybrid learning).Originality/valueWhile some prior research has put forth principles and instructional strategies for designing online teaching, they tend to be more conceptual, and few have integrated principles with empirical evidence and technological solutions. This paper creates a comprehensive guide that integrates learning principles, technology and design considerations for effective online teaching.

Koçak, Seval; Sümer, Murat

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-10-2023-0150

This study aims to determine gains acquired by school administrators in the process of emergency remote teaching based on problems they experienced and strategies they used in the process, as well as skills that increased in importance with this process.Design/methodology/approachThis study was designed as a case study, which is one of the qualitative research methods.FindingsAfter the analysis of the data, the themes are as follows: problems experienced, administrative gains provided by the process and administrative skills that increase in importance. In this study, it was found that school administrators used different strategies to solve the problems encountered in the emergency remote teaching process, and these strategies provided them with different perspectives.Originality/valueThis crisis can be turned into an opportunity and that it is necessary to suggest new ways by drawing lessons from this crisis.

Xia, Yu; Yan, Shulong; Jiang, Mengying

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-10-2023-0144

The rapid emergency remote teaching has moved informal learning programs online including makerspaces, which has created an opportunity for harnessing the benefits of virtual makerspaces. This study reports on findings from three club designers and facilitators’ reflections on a fully virtual maker club offered in the summer of 2023. This paper aims to inform practitioners of the potential challenges and strategies to resolve various issues.Design/methodology/approachReflective video journaling was conducted by facilitators. Videos were transcribed and analyzed for observations, learning events, challenges and strategies.FindingsFindings present strategies adopted to address problems during implementation and a checklist for practitioners. The problems are associated with the learning environments, technology tools and student participation. The authors adopted in-the-moment and short-term strategies to tackle the problems and long-term strategies that bear implications for future virtual makerspaces.Practical implicationsThis paper can provide direct guidance to practitioners in schools, libraries, museums, etc., who plan to offer informal collaborative learning for children online. It prepares practitioners for the potential challenges and equip them with concrete strategies and questions.Social implicationsFully virtual makerspaces have the potential to reach a wider range of audience.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is the first to report the reflective findings on a fully virtual makerspace club that comprehensively covers challenges and strategies before, during and after the club, which has direct implications for future offerings of such programs.

Portier-Charneau, Coralie; Sanchiz, Mylene

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-11-2023-0185

This paper aims to examine whether the instructional message used to introduce game-based learning (GBL), prior knowledge, flow and prior gaming experience have an impact on secondary students’ learning outcomes, perceived game utility and motivation to use the game.Design/methodology/approachFifty-four 9th grades students enrolled in this quasi-experimental study. Both groups played the same game. The experimental group was told that they would be playing a game, whereas the control group was told that they would be doing an exercise. The game was designed to promote knowledge recall about familiar mathematical concepts. Prior knowledge was assessed. An immediate and a two-days delayed post-evaluated learning outcomes. Flow, prior gaming experience, perceived game utility and motivation to use the game were assessed with questionnaires after playing.FindingsIntroducing the GBL activity as a game increased immediate learning outcomes for low knowledgeable students, but these benefits did not extend to longer term. Indeed, when the GBL activity was presented as an exercise, low higher knowledgeable students obtained poorer longer-term learning outcomes than more knowledgeable ones, whereas no difference appeared when the GBL was introduced as an exercise. Prior gaming experience and the type of instructional message used to introduce a GBL activity positively influenced perceived game utility and motivation to use the game.Originality/valueThis study is the first to highlight that the way a GBL activity is framed affects differently low and higher knowledgeable students’ learning outcomes and influences perceived game utility and motivation to use the game.

Nurlaela, Nurlaela; Amiruddin, Amiruddin; Irfan, Andi Muhammad; Setialaksana, Wirawan

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-10-2023-0136

Student in-class participation is a crucial aspect in the learning process, including in synchronous learning process. Several variables may hinder students from actively participating in synchronous learning including communication anxiety. As behavior, student in-class participation can be modeled using theory of planned behavior (TPB) with communication anxiety as barrier variable. The current study aims to investigate student decision-making process to actively participate in synchronous online learning using TPB frameworks and examine the effect of communication anxiety as part of extended TPB.Design/methodology/approachThis was quantitative nonexperimental research conducted by gathering cross-sectional data through electronic survey. A total of 1,009 Indonesian college students voluntarily participate in the survey. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data and test the hypothesis.FindingsThe results indicate that there was significant and positive effect between TPB-related variables: (1) attitude, (2) subjective norms, (3) behavioral control, (4) intention and (5) behavior. Communication anxiety, as an additional variable in the extended model, shows significant and negative effects on behavioral control and active participation behavior. However, the communication anxiety indicates insignificant effect on students’ intention to participate in online synchronous learning. The findings support the evidence that students’ intention to actively participate in synchronous learning can be described using TPB and communication anxiety hinders student to actively participate in synchronous learning.Originality/valueThe paper extends TPB on student active participation. Prior research limited to original theory of planned behavior (TPB) on student in-class and massive open online course (MOOC) participations, whereas the current research includes communication anxiety as additional variable on extended TPB to understand students’ intention to actively participate in synchronous online learning.

Sharma, Priya; Sandoval-Llanos, Jose; Foster, Daniel; Miller Foster, Melanie

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-10-2023-0135

This study aims to examine the role of key network actors in relation to the discourse structure of a microblogging hashtag stream within a global agricultural educators’ conference over two years. Prior work in online networks suggests that participation is dominated by highly active members, and in this study, the authors focus on examining what types of discourse are shared and reshared by key actors.Design/methodology/approachThe authors used a combination of social network analyses and qualitative discourse coding to examine approximately 1,390 posts associated with the conference hashtag over two consecutive years.FindingsThe study analyses uncovered a set of common key participants over both years and common types of discourse used by those key participants. Key participants took on roles of resharing messages and contributed to discourse by retweeting posts that highlighted participants’ thoughts and feelings related to the conference and the discipline.Research limitations/implicationsThis research has implications for encouraging diverse participants and diverse discourses related to key community goals. Design suggestions include identifying and inviting key actors as collaborators to reshare discourse that clearly aligns with community goals and using smaller hashtag spaces to encourage broader participation.Originality/valuePrior work on microblogging has highlighted either the types of discourse and information sharing or the structures of the network interactions within conference hashtag streams. This study builds on this prior work and combines discourse and structure to understand the ways in which key network figures reshare discourse within the community, a facet that has been underreported in the literature.

Hennig, Frederike; Wesche, Jenny Sarah; Handke, Lisa; Kerschreiter, Rudolf

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-10-2023-0155

Mentoring supports children, adolescents and young adults on their career paths and presents an important extracurricular educational format. The COVID-19 pandemic created a strong impetus for the deployment of virtual mentoring programs (VMPs), in which mentors and mentees communicate completely or predominantly through information and communication technologies (ICTs). Because it is unclear whether VMPs remain an attractive offer to mentors and mentees in post-pandemic times, this study aims to investigate the specific motivations of mentors and mentees to participate in VMPs and to draw conclusions about the effective design of VMPs.Design/methodology/approachIn a qualitative study, the authors recruited 200 university students for an online survey, in which participants provided text responses regarding their motivations to participate in a youth or academic VMP as a mentor or mentee.FindingsPotential mentors and mentees expect social components in VMPs. However, the results suggest that participants expect less psychosocial compared to career-related support from virtual mentoring, expect meaningful connections to be established only to a certain extent and do not expect role modeling from mentors. Furthermore, participants voiced mixed opinions about the virtual nature of mentoring programs, revealing a general field of tension (i.e. virtuality improves flexibility vs virtuality impairs relationship building). On this basis, design suggestions regarding VMPs are provided.Originality/valueThis study expands existing knowledge about VMPs by analyzing relevant factors when forming the intention to participate in a mentoring program, considering both youth and academic mentoring.

Knight, Simon; Bowdler, Isabella; Ford, Heather; Zhou, Jianlong

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-02-2024-0016

Informational conflict and uncertainty are common features across a range of sources, topics and tasks. Search engines and their presentation of results via search engine results pages (SERPs) often underpinned by knowledge graphs (KGs) are commonly used across tasks. Yet, it is not clear how search does, or could, represent the informational conflict that exists across and within returned results. The purpose of this paper is to review KG and SERP designs for representation of uncertainty or disagreement.Design/methodology/approachThe authors address the aim through a systematic analysis of material regarding uncertainty and disagreement in KG and SERP contexts. Specifically, the authors focus on the material representation – user interface design features – that have been developed in the context of uncertainty and disagreement representation for KGs and SERPs.FindingsSearches identified n = 136 items as relevant, with n = 4 sets of visual materials identified from these for analysis of their design features. Design elements were extracted against sets of design principles, highlighting tensions in the design of such features.Originality/valueThe authors conclude by highlighting two key challenges for interface design and recommending six design principles in representing uncertainty and conflict in SERPs. Given the important role technologies play in mediating information access and learning, addressing the representation of uncertainty and disagreement in the representation of information is crucial.

Jung, Yong Ju; Kim, Soo Hyeon; Choi, Gi Woong

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-10-2023-0157

The purpose of this paper is to revisit previous design principles and guidelines for online makerspaces in public libraries (Kim et al., 2020) and expand the design principles with more updated implications and examples from the literature published during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.Design/methodology/approachThe authors reviewed recently published papers about online transitions of makerspaces, especially during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, summarized their implications and deduced applicable design principles and guidelines.FindingsThis paper proposes updated design principles and guidelines based on four key areas: Program and service design; Tools and materials; Facilitation; and Logistic support. These updated design principles considered a wider range of patrons that public library makerspaces may serve, the digital divide issues and logistic concerns that should be addressed beyond the scope of a single makerspace.Originality/valueThis paper compiles various lessons learned and strategies regarding online makerspaces and maker programming for public libraries and provides helpful design principles and guidelines for the continued use of online components for makerspace services and programs.

Archila, Pablo Antonio; Ortiz, Brigithe Tatiana; Truscott de Mejía, Anne-Marie; Molina, Jorge

2024 Information and Learning Science

doi: 10.1108/ils-04-2024-0040

In November 2022, the commercial company, OpenAI, launched ChatGPT. Since then, university students have rapidly become regular users of this artificial intelligence (AI) platform. One reason for this is the powerful capability of this generative AI tool to produce textual content, which in many cases, is almost indistinguishable from human-generated content. Another reason is that ChatGPT easily gives anyone access to knowledge. However, there is a problem as the vast majority of its users have no idea how this AI platform works and thus overlook the importance of thinking critically about information communicated in ChatGPT. While some call for banning this generative AI tool, this study aims to provide evidence that science classrooms can become scenarios where students find explicit, concrete, and realistic opportunities to critically evaluate scientific information generated by ChatGPT.Design/methodology/approachAn intervention study was conducted with 55 students (26 females and 29 males, 17–24 years old) during a university Spanish-English bilingual science course taught within an active learning environment. The data consist of the written critiques of the students about Spanish-English bilingual scientific texts produced by ChatGPT.FindingsResults indicate that the intervention had a positive effect on students’ abilities to construct sound arguments in Spanish and in English while judging the quality of scientific texts produced by this AI bot. Moreover, the findings suggest that the intervention enriched students’ skills to make improvements to texts produced by this generative AI tool.Originality/valueThe evidence provided in this study contributes to the exploration of possibilities to help students become critical users of ChatGPT.