Search

A data-driven model where individual learning behavior is a linear combination of certain stylized learning patterns scaled by learners' affinities is proposed. The absorption of stylized behavior through the affinities constitutes "building blocks" in the model. Non-negative matrix factorization is employed to extract common learning patterns and their affinities from online learning data ensuring meaningful non-negativity of the result. The empirical learning patterns resulting from the actual course interaction data of 111 undergraduate university students are connected to a learning style system. Bootstrap-based inference allows to check the significance of the pattern coefficients. Dividing the learners in two groups "failed" and "passed" and considering their mean affinities leads to a bootstrap-based test on whether the course structure is well balanced regarding the learning preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The focus on how we teach widening participation students needs to change and the call from the Office for Students (OfS) to create Access and Participation Plans in 2018 was a much needed one. Between 2017 and 2020 St Patrick's College, London redesigned its learning and teaching methodologies to create a unique learning experience for non-traditional students which is known as Chunked Experiential Learning. This approach is student-centred, is designed to build both knowledge and skills within students, and encapsulates several key areas which drive towards student success; chunks of learning to avoid distraction or boredom, knowledge transference which makes the most appropriate use of a lecturer's knowledge, experiential learning to build skills, confidence and real-world capabilities, assessment practice to provide students with an understanding of assessment formats - formatively and without pressure - one step at a time, deliberate feedback to ensure that students know how to improve their work and classroom conduct and opportunities for reflection, which builds a personalised, contextual learning and a rapport with teachers. The methodological approach has demonstrated initial efficacy upon results through vastly increased submission rates, pass rates and student satisfaction responses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to investigate and compare two forms of learning logs using Google Sheets – individual and collaborative learning logs – and their effect on EFL university students' development of learner autonomy over the course of a semester. Subjects were 62 EFL learners from an intact English elective course at a private university in Taiwan. Qualitative data were retrieved from semi-structured and focus-group interviews, log records, and class surveys. Results demonstrate learners' use of metacognitive strategies in the logging process and the interplay between learner beliefs and their cognitive process as well as emotional intelligences. Benefits of social interaction were also revealed in the use of collaborative learning logs. Finally, problems encountered during the implementation are discussed with proposed solutions offered for researchers and teachers interested in replicating the study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the article is to study the prediction model of an individual learning style in e-learning systems to enhance the effectiveness of dentistry education. In developing the model, Neil Fleming's VARK concept of information perception was applied. The statistical data of the Russian Federal State Statistics Service on the students' distribution in the field of preparation of dentists in higher educational institutions for 2018–19 was used to assess the current state of development of dental education and the possibilities of introducing e-learning systems. In order to achieve the goal set, the anonymous survey was conducted among dental students of the I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University (MSMU). To compare the state of dental education with the developed countries, the study provides a survey performed by the American Dental Association in the United States. The investigation among the MSMU students involved 18 male and 24 female participants. The correlation analysis of the relationships between different learning styles revealed the closest relation between auditory and visual learning. Since the correlation was negative (r = −0.500), the visual style was considered less developed. Based on the data obtained, a model for predicting an individual learning style based on a specially designed questionnaire was proposed to improve the e-learning of dental students. The information resulted from the current research will contribute to the promotion of a profound study of academic disciplines in the field of dental education by developing an e-learning system. Thus, the use of students' cognitive skills could be improved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

More and more students attend private supplementary tutoring to improve their academic achievement. Private tutoring might be understood as a reaction to insufficient instructional quality in school, especially regarding individual support. However, it might also be possible that parents generally see insufficient grades as an indicator of lacking support and engage a tutor in hopes of improvement or to enhance a competitive edge for their children. So far, the relationship between tutoring attendance and perceived individual learning support during classroom lessons has not been tested. We used multilevel analyses based on N = 2,842 students in 102 Grade 5 classrooms at German academic track schools to test for a relationship between private tutoring in several subjects and students' shared perception of the instructional quality in these subjects. On the individual level, we controlled for typical predictors of private tutoring such as academic achievement and family income, as well as for additional variables such as working behaviour and parental homework assistance. In classrooms with more individual support, students were less likely to start private tutoring in English. However, we did not find comparable relationships for tutoring in mathematics and German. Therefore, school principals and educational policy‐makers should monitor the incidence of private tutoring and consider within‐school structured tutoring programmes as an effective measure to improve academic achievement and to meet parents' desire for individualised instruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose a meta-learning model to hierarchically integrate individual learning and social learning schemes. This meta-learning model is incorporated into an agent-based model to show that Herbert Scarf's famous counterexample on Walrasian stability can become stable in some cases under a non-tâtonnement process when both learning schemes are involved, a result previously obtained by Herbert Gintis. However, we find that the stability of the competitive equilibrium depends on how individuals learn—whether they are innovators (individual learners) or imitators (social learners), and their switching frequency (mobility) between the two. We show that this endogenous behavior, apart from the initial population of innovators, is mainly determined by the agents' intensity of choice. This study grounds the Walrasian competitive equilibrium based on the view of a balanced resource allocation between exploitation and exploration. This balance, achieved through a meta-learning model, is shown to be underpinned by a behavioral/psychological characteristic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study sets out to understand how small and medium enterprises (SMEs) learn through inter-firm conduits and carry the acquired knowledge through their processes. This research answers the question: How does knowledge sharing in inter-firm relationships influence a firm's offering? The study focuses on supplier–customer relationships and presents evidence of supplier learning through 12 episodic interviews from four Finnish SMEs. The results highlight interaction and open communication, which enable firms to not only understand customer needs but also identify opportunities. The acquired knowledge sense-making routines help understand customers' way of working and how to align the offerings with their needs. Customer involvement in the offerings process strengthens the relationship and helps generate steady growth. The findings yield practical implications for managers by providing a value-enhancing solution to address customer needs; it should begin with understanding customers' way of working, their problems and the job they intend to perform. Cette étude vise à expliquer comment les PME acquièrent des connaissances à travers leurs réseaux d'entreprises et transfèrent ces connaissances à leurs processus. Cette recherche répond à la question : Comment le partage des connaissances à travers les relations entre entreprises influence-t-il l'offre d'une entreprise ? L'étude se concentre sur la relation fournisseur-client et présente des données prouvant l'apprentissage des fournisseurs grâce à des entretiens épisodiques avec des représentants de quatre entreprises finlandaises. Les résultats mettent l'accent sur l'interaction et la communication ouverte qui permettent aux entreprises, non seulement de comprendre les besoins de la clientèle, mais aussi d'identifier des opportunités. Les efforts routiniers de compréhension des connaissances acquises aident à comprendre la manière de fonctionner des clients et comment ajuster l'offre à leurs besoins. L'implication des clients dans le processus d'offre renforce la relation avec eux et contribue à générer une croissance constante. Les résultats font émerger des implications pratiques pour les directeurs d'entreprises en leur fournissant une solution valorisante pour répondre à la question des besoins de la clientèle ; elle passe d'abord par une compréhension de la manière dont les clients fonctionnent, de leurs problèmes et du travail qu'ils comptent exercer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Previous research has identified a range of learner factors and contextual factors that mediate L2 learners' engagement with written corrective feedback (WCF). However, much remains to be known about how these factors impact individual learners' engagement with WCF in L2 classrooms. To address this issue, the paper draws upon the ecological perspective on language learning to discuss the data collected in a case study on Chinese university EFL students' engagement with WCF. Data were collected from multiple resources including students' writing, verbal reports, interviews, field notes, and class documents. While the context, ranging from the textual level to the broad sociocultural level, was found to provide resources that could afford learning, engagement hinged on whether students were able and willing to perceive and use those affordances. The findings suggest that learner engagement with WCF can be conceptualized as a process of perceiving and acting upon embedded learning opportunities afforded by WCF, and highlight the importance of establishing an alignment between affordances and learner agency to enhance individual students' engagement with written feedback. Highlights • The paper takes an ecological perspective on learner engagement with WCF. • WCF, among other learning resources, are situated in the multi-layered context. • Learner engagement with WCF is a process of perceiving and acting upon affordances. • Multiple learner factors and contextual factors influence learner engagement with WCF. • Engagement requires an alignment between learner agency and affordance in the context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract In this article, we present a new model of teachers' assessment competence. The model is based on the educational competence concept, thus defining competences to be context-specific, learnable cognitive dispositions that are needed to successfully cope with specific situations. Integrating research on assessment processes, practices, and products, we specify the range of situations our model applies to, and discuss how its elements may become involved and measurable in a variable assessment process. The model aims to inspire future integrative research on the description, explanation, prediction, and promotion of teachers' assessments in various situations. Graphical abstract Image 1 Highlights • A new conceptual model on teachers' assessment competence is introduced. • Competence, as its base, is a learnable situation-specific cognitive disposition. • The model integrates research on assessment processes, practices, and products. • We discuss how its elements become measurable in a variable assessment process. • The model aims to inspire integrative research on assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract To support individual learning, teachers have to accurately judge student characteristics such as pre-achievement and self-concept of ability as pre-requisites for learning (Corno, 2008). This study investigated whether teacher judgment accuracy in interplay with student characteristics was predictive for verbal teacher-student interactions. A video study of N S = 348 students in N C = 18 mathematics classrooms was conducted. Multilevel analyses showed that student self-concept was predictive of verbal teacher-student interactions. In addition, adaptive teacher questions were observed for students with lower pre-achievement. Conclusions with regard to adaptive functions of teacher judgment accuracy in the process of teaching are drawn. Highlights • Self-concept of ability is related to frequent teacher-student interactions. • Teacher judgment accuracy is related to adaptive teacher questioning. • Teacher judgment accuracy is not related to adaptive teacher feedback. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A well‐trod debate at the nexus of cognitive science and linguistics, the so‐called past tense debate, has examined how rules and exceptions are individually acquired (McClelland & Patterson, ; Pinker & Ullman,). However, this debate focuses primarily on individual mechanisms in learning, saying little about how rules and exceptions function from a sociolinguistic perspective. To remedy this, we use agent‐based models to examine how rules and exceptions function across populations. We expand on earlier work by considering how repeated interaction and cultural transmission across speakers affects the dynamics of rules and exceptions in language, measuring linguistic outcomes within a social system rather than focusing individual learning outcomes. We consider how population turnover and growth effect linguistic rule dynamics in large and small populations, showing that this method has considerable potential particularly in probing the mechanisms underlying the linguistic niche hypothesis (Lupyan & Dale,). Cuskley, Loreto & Kirby (2018) explore how the diversity of social groups influences the linguistic system. Using agent‐based modelling for simulating language evolution in a concentrated time frame, they suggest that the morphology of languages (e.g. the plural ‐s or past tense ‐ed in English) used in larger groups including more non‐native speakers is less complex. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several theories, which attempt to give an account of cumulative culture, emphasize the importance of high‐fidelity transmission mechanisms as central to human learning. These high‐fidelity transmission mechanisms are thought to account for the ratchet effect, that is, the capacity to inherit modified or improved knowledge and skills rather than having to develop one's skills from the ground up via individual learning. In this capacity, imitation and teaching have been thought to occupy a special place in the explanation of cumulative culture because they are both thought to function as high‐fidelity transmission mechanisms. In contrast to this standard view, I will argue that imitation and teaching are not both best construed as primarily high‐fidelity transmission mechanisms. Rather, I will argue that though both can contribute to the high‐fidelity transmission of information, imitation and teaching make two distinct contributions to cumulative culture. I will claim that imitation functions primarily as a high‐fidelity transmission mechanism while teaching is primarily responsible for the innovation and creativity characteristic of cumulative culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For students, cognitive and motivational-affective characteristics are the most powerful prerequisites for successful learning. For teachers, judgments on their students’ characteristics shape how they plan and implement instructional activities in order to offer individual learning support. On the student side, research is starting to find out more about the interplay of different characteristics within individual students. On the teacher side, studies still regard teacher judgment accuracy of only single characteristics. By taking a person-centered approach, regarding NS = 503 students and their NT = 41 mathematics and languages arts teachers, our manuscript joined teacher and student perspectives on student characteristics interplay and suggests methodology to compare them. We found that student assessments suggested ample diversity regarding this interplay–and teachers did not perceive this. In their views, “homogeneous” sets of average characteristics were dominant. Findings suggest addressing students’ views and the diagnosis of their characteristics in teacher education to enable individual support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cognitive load theory has traditionally been associated with individual learning. Based on evolutionary educational psychology and our knowledge of human cognition, particularly the relations between working memory and long-term memory, the theory has been used to generate a variety of instructional effects. Though these instructional effects also influence the efficiency and effectiveness of collaborative learning, be it computer supported or face-to-face, they are often not considered either when designing collaborative learning situations/environments or researching collaborative learning. One reason for this omission is that cognitive load theory has only sporadically concerned itself with certain particulars of collaborative learning such as the concept of a collective working memory when collaborating along with issues associated with transactive activities and their concomitant costs which are inherent to collaboration. We illustrate how and why cognitive load theory, by adding these concepts, can throw light on collaborative learning and generate principles specific to the design and study of collaborative learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many current authors point toward the heightening of networked individualism and how this affects community creation and engagement. This trend poses strong challenges to the potential beneficial effects of collective intelligence. Education is one of the realms that can strongly suffer from this globalized individualism. Learning is deeply enhanced by social interactions and losing this social dimension will have long-lasting effects in future generations. Networked learning is also a by-product of our societal context, but not per se individual. Our paper presents a case—the HANDSON massive open online course (MOOC)—in which a purposely designed learning environment fosters the emergence of a kind of collective intelligence which, by the learners own accord, brings about a heightened sense of community. The MOOC’s design managed to enable individual learning paces without killing the social dimension. Thus, we argue that when learning together intentionally and informally in networked online environments, small and temporary communities (pop-up communities we call them) will form. This nascent sense of community is a first step that will ultimately contribute to the common good. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the late 50's or early 60's, there were huge interests towards building learning systems for individual learning and they are called with various names such as Intelligent Tutoring System, Microworld, Computer Based Training, Computer Aided System, Intelligent Computer Aided Instruction and others. They are made to be different with regard to the technological approaches and the learning pedagogies, knowledge models and student models. Over the years, the interest of building learning systems has migrated from individual learning on content knowledge to community learning as the result of the recent Web 2.0 and Web 3.0 sociotechnological wave. The paper describes the work that was done to develop the learning system in both situations - content knowledge and social knowledge where the experiences mainly in capturing the knowledge and representing them are different. The paper signifies the differences in terms of developing experiences and methodologies for building the content knowledge and social knowledge based on the previous works. The finding of the previous works tells that context knowledge is derived from structured sources and also referred to single-sourced expertise while the social knowledge is more challenging due to its unknown structure of knowledge as well as may derive from various experts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collaboration scripts have repeatedly been implemented in Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) to facilitate collaboration processes and individual learning. However, finding the right degree of structure is a subtle design task: scripts that are too rigid may impair self-regulation and hinder learning; scripts that are too flexible may fail to evoke high-level interactions. This study investigated whether making collaboration scripts adaptable would be a way to raise their effectiveness. Three experimental phases were realized: In a first phase (exposure phase), all students solved three problem cases by aid of a collaboration script in an asynchronous, text-based CSCL environment. In a second phase (treatment phase), another three cases were presented that were to be solved by aid of a different theory that was presented to the learners through a summary on a sheet of paper. During this phase, a three-groups between-subject design was realized: (a) an unscripted condition, in which students received no specific guidance how to structure their collaboration, (b) a non-adaptable script condition, in which students' collaboration was guided by the collaboration script they were trained in before, and (c) an adaptable script condition, in which students were allowed to modify parts of the trained script based on their self-perceived needs. In a third phase (subsequent transfer phase), students received a new case that they were to solve without guidance. N = 87 university students participated. Results showed that during the treatment phase, planning processes were most often performed in the unscripted condition. Yet, the adaptable script substantially increased students' engagement in metacognitive activities of planning compared to learning with a non-adaptable script, and increased monitoring and reflection activities when compared to learning without script. Mediation analyses showed that the adaptable script facilitated learners' use of self-regulation skills in the subsequent, unscripted transfer phase through the promotion of co-regulation processes of reflection in the treatment phase. The results reveal that adaptable scripting is a promising means of implementing flexible scripting and promoting self-regulation in CSCL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Culture is considered an evolutionary adaptation that enhances reproductive fitness. A common explanation is that social learning, the learning mechanism underlying cultural transmission, enhances mean fitness by avoiding the costs of individual learning. This explanation was famously contradicted by Rogers (1988) , who used a simple mathematical model to show that cheap social learning can invade a population without raising its mean fitness. He concluded that some crucial factor remained unaccounted for, which would reverse this surprising result. Here we extend this model to include a more complex environment and limited resources, where individuals cannot reliably learn everything about the environment on their own. Under such conditions, cheap social learning evolves and enhances mean fitness, via hybrid learners capable of specializing their individual learning. We then show that while spatial or social constraints hinder the evolution of hybrid learners, a novel social learning strategy, complementary copying, can mitigate these effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learning plays an important role in the life of many animals. In social insects, colony foraging success depends on the combined actions of many individuals and learning contributes to individual foraging success. In many ants, for example, route learning helps foragers to navigate between the nest and a food source. Here, we studied if the foraging success of a colony depends on the routelearning performance of its individuals. We used a doubly bifurcating T-maze to assess the route-learning performance of ants from 12 Lasius niger colonies. We also measured the propensity of workers to deposit trail pheromone and to explore the surrounding of their nest. We then tested colony foraging performance in a complex maze, set up either as a poor environment (one food source at the end of one tip), or a rich environment (a food source at the end of each tip). We found that individual learning performance was linked to colony foraging success in the rich, but not the poor environment. The propensity of individual ants to lay pheromone correlated negatively with their learning performance and only predicted colony foraging success in colonies with poor learning abilities in a rich environment. The strongest predictor of colony foraging success was exploratory activity, which differed consistently between colonies. Our results suggest that the importance of individual learning for colony foraging success depends on the environment and that explorative activity is an important factor for colony foraging success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores how blended learning can contribute to interior design students’ learning outcomes, their engagement with non-studio courses and affect their learning achievements. Within the framework of the study, a blended learning experience was carried out in ‘IAED 342 Building Performance’ module at Bilkent University, Turkey. A total of 120 interior architecture students were surveyed about their experiences on five fields of instruction: (1) course design, learning material and electronic course environment; (2) interaction between students and instructor; (3) interaction with peers; (4) individual learning process; and (5) course outcomes. Frequency distributions, chi-square factor and regression analyses were calculated. Four blended learning factors were developed and their contribution to learning outcomes was analysed. The results showed that teaching both online and face-to-face can create an effective learning environment for non-studio classes, while contributing to a considerable value for the interior design education in terms of teaching process. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Children managing chronic health conditions face many obstacles which can impede their learning during periods of hospitalisation. In one particular hospital, a team of educators deemed it necessary to take a personalised learning approach in order to maintain students' educational progress, namely making use of individual learning plans (ILPs). This team adopted an evidence-informed practice (EIP) approach to the issue in order to persuade administrators of the need for change. The successful implementation of the EIP approach led to the inclusion of the ILP form in patients' medical records, which is thought to be a first for Australia. Although EIP is regarded highly by practitioners and policy makers, there can be difficulties when implementing this approach. This study aims to identify the enabling features that permit EIP to be successfully implemented and to examine the ways in which EIP can lead to improved practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study focuses on how teachers construe and give meaning to a pedagogical experiment in which the use of the home language in a primary school in Flanders was permitted in order to acknowledge the urban multilingual realities and resources of the pupils and to turn them into didactic capital (functional multilingual learning, FML). Using ethnographic interviews, teachers were asked to comment on recorded classroom activities in which FML played a role. Results showed that teachers created space for FML by facilitating and stimulating peer interaction, but tended to leave the interaction in the hands of the pupils. Teachers viewed individual learning outcomes as more important than collectively organized interactional efforts. Individual pupil characteristics occurred as a starting point to manage and organize classroom activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The results of studies are presented for the elemental composition of peat from the Ilas ombrotrophic bog (White Sea drainage basin). The calculations of enrichment factors of trace elements over the section of the bog peat relatively to the average composition of the Earth's continental crust showed that the concentrations of most of chemical elements is determined by the contributions of lithogenic and biogenic sources, and the content of trace elements is equal to the background level. Enrichment growth since the beginning of intense development of European industry until the early 21th century was revealed only for Zn, Sb, Pb, and Cd. These elements were supplied to the bog resulting from long-range air transport and precipitation from the atmosphere. No pronounced heavy-metal contamination caused by the Arkhangelsk agglomeration was revealed for the peat in the Ilas bog. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper looks at the use and application of the Individual Learning Profile in measuring the hemispheric preferences of students. The purpose of the web-based version of the ILP analysis is to discover each student's natural learning style, by identifying the dominant eye, ear, hand, foot and brain hemisphere. This information is used to create learning environments that stimulate, motivate and engage students. The ILP identifies the optimal teaching styles that match the dominant learning style of one student, a group, or an entire class. The idea that one side of the brain may be dominant in controlling movements of hands, feet, eyes, and ears, and that individuals have a preference that informs how they move and learn, impacts the educational environment. A sampling of the data that has been collected to validate the ILP will be used to demonstrate the vast amount of information that can be acquired from the ILP reports and on-line assessment. The instrument has the potential to provide a connection between the side of the body we favor for seeing, hearing, touching, and moving and the way we think, learn, work, play, and relate to others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background. The Careers Office is a part of Wroclaw University of Technology (Polaid). It is responsible for job activation of students and graduates. Challenges and changes coming from dynanic job market relations encourage tean members of the Careers Office to take a new approach in management and self-development. Research amis. This paper presents some innovative actions undertaken by the office such as: researches of student's expectations or organization change elements (i.e. involving students as volnteers). The aim of this article is to provet at areers office can be recognized as a learning organization. Second goal is assessment try of effectiveness rate of the Office in selected aspects of their activity backed by interviews and survey anong students. Methodology. The search for an appropriate franework of learnmg organization definition was based on scientific literature review. Exploration of actual action undertaken by the office as based on as survey a ong the students and partially standardized interview with employees of the office. Key findings. The Careers Office can be recogiized as a learning organization based on its multiple definitions elements. The majority of students assessed their Career Office as good in the survey, although their expectations towards organization and the university are very high. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background. Culture as the sole of each organization is examined itself or in different management concepts. Many studies identify culture as a main dimension in the organizational learning process or in learning organizations, both in the private and public sector. However there is a lack of research focusing on municipalities, especially in transformed countries. Ongoing changes in the task of imposed by the government as well as those resulting from the European grants cause needs for appropriate culture which is one learning organization dimensions in the light of theory. Research aims. This paper explores which variables shaping organizational culture are important for the local municipalities in relation to their scope and to propose their consistent typology for the state of art in research in the example of a transformed country. Methods. A questionnaire survey was conducted among 670 municipalities, with response rate of 26,7% of total population. The questionnaire was filled in by one official from each municipality, who takes one of the following position: mayor, deputy mayor or municipality secretary. Key findings. The analysed research results clearly demonstrate that the level of culture in the rural municipalities is higher than in the urban rural municipalities and urban municipalities. It could be observed, inter alia, that high-rang officials (head of division or mayor) tend to be afraid to talk about their mistakes and there is hardly any atmosphere for constructive remarks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background. The importance of learning in and by organizations has since long been recognized by academic and practitioner scientists for both business and public sector organizations. In particular in the last decades interest in organizational learning has been growing. There are important reasons for considering the acquisition of knowledge in public service organizations. Research aims. The paper reviews the state of research evidence in the field. The main question of this study is how important it is for employees in public sector to acquire the knowledge and use their full potential in the workplace and whether these organizations Methods. The main source of empirical data is carried out by the authors of the study in public sector organizations. Key findings. The study was conducted using a questionnaire survey. The research shows high expectations related to knowledge acquisition opportunities in the workplace and partial fulfilment of these expectations by the subject organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the effect of a collaboration script - i.e. a set of instructions to improve collaboration between learning partners - for a wiki task. Participants were first-year university students in Educational Sciences ( N = 186) collaborating in groups of five during a three-week period to create a wiki on peer assessment in education. Two conditions were contrasted: a scripted and a non-scripted condition. The effect of scripting was measured in four ways (questionnaires, log-file analyses, group product scores, and individual pre–post-test scores). Results show significant positive effects of scripting with respect to the collaborative group processes and students' feelings of shared responsibility. No significant effects of scripting were found with respect to the developed wiki products. As for students' individual learning outcomes, results showed a significant increase from pre- to post-test for all students. Although the increase was higher in the scripted condition, the difference between the conditions was not statistically significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite several researchers reporting evidence that 3D Virtual Worlds can be used to effectively support educational processes in recent years, the integration of this technology in real learning processes is not as commonplace as in other educational technologies. Instructional designers have to balance the cost associ-ated with the development of these virtual environments with the expected outcomes reported by the use of the new technology, but for some types of learning processes those outcomes are not always easily predicted. In this document the authors experience using 3D Virtual Worlds is summarized with the aim of getting a deeper understanding of their potential pedagogical use when supporting two different types of learning activities commonly included on a course: direct instruction, which exploits the social dimension of the technology, and individual learning activities in which that feature is not used. Based on those experiences a set of guidelines for designing 3D virtual world learning environments is proposed [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Didasc@lia: Didáctica y Educación is the property of Universitaria de Las Tunas, Centro de Estudios de Didactica and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

We investigate whether two players in a long-run relationship can maintain cooperation when the details of the underlying game are unknown. Specifically, we consider a new class of repeated games with private monitoring, where an unobservable state of the world influences the payoff functions and/or the monitoring structure. Each player privately learns the state over time but cannot observe what the opponent learned. We show that there are robust equilibria in which players eventually obtain payoffs as if the true state were common knowledge and players played a “belief-free” equilibrium. We also provide explicit equilibrium constructions in various economic examples. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Individual learning is out of sync with the elements of a curricula and the daily program of a teacher. At a time when multidigit multiplication methods are taught, many children are not perfectly performing the basic multiplication table. Teachers organize settings for learning and they usually have no time to give an individual feedback to every single student. Furthermore they have no physiological capacity to produce statistics and to investigate the probable causes of errors. Our goal is to give teachers a tool to help them to review and train some typical requirements for written multiplying. We use the ubiquity of the Internet and provide on different devices free applications with written multiplication problems. All data are collected centrally and are used to determine typical errors. These data could also be used to answer further new questions and test new hypothesis. This is one aspect of Learning Analytics. The given tasks are automatically adapted to the skill level of a student. Teachers can see every detail of the solution process of every task. But really useful is that teachers can see the typical problems of each student as well as of the whole class every time at a glance. They need just a connection to the database with a web browser - anywhere, anytime. Finally the first evaluation of the system pointed out some remarkable results. Children are learning with the system in the intended way according to the shown learning curves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This note is a write up of a talk given at the ILAS meeting in Braunschweig, 2011, at the minisymposium celebrating the 80th birthday of Miroslav Fiedler. The purpose of the talk is to outline the impact of Fiedler’s work on the development of spectral graph theory. Fiedler is best known for putting forward the algebraic connectivity and its eigenvector. These two topics were genuine gold strikes which have motivated thousands of studies in pure and applied science. But there is more in Fiedler’s work that influences spectral graph theory, and still more waiting to be discovered. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In his paper, Foxall displays exemplary academic honesty in discussing limitations of the theoretical model that he has developed, despite its wide adoption in several areas of consumer behavior research. The exclusive adherence of the model to an extensional language, according to its author, hinders an adequate account of behavior continuity, a personal level of explanation of behavior and a delimitation of behavioral interpretation. In order to overcome such limitations, the author proposes the implementation of intentional idiom in the model, by distinguishing between informative and symbolic reinforcement. Symbolic consequences would be derived from what the individual thinks, believes, desires, or feels to be the case and are described in intentional language, involving social conventions and status conferring rules. These proposals will probably instigate developments in the field, at least in three directions: the inclusion of other dispositional concepts in the model, in addition to intentional expressions; the adoption of dispositional concepts in describing individuals' learning histories; and the improvement of the theoretical notion of self-reinforcement, which seems central to the proposed concept of symbolic reinforcement. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Long before the origins of agriculture human ancestors had expanded across the globe into an immense variety of environments, from Australian deserts to Siberian tundra. Survival in these environments did not principally depend on genetic adaptations, but instead on evolved learning strategies that permitted the assembly of locally adaptive behavioral repertoires. To develop hypotheses about these learning strategies, we have modeled the evolution of learning strategies to assess what conditions and constraints favor which kinds of strategies. To build on prior work, we focus on clarifying how spatial variability, temporal variability, and the number of cultural traits influence the evolution of four types of strategies: (1) individual learning, (2) unbiased social learning, (3) payoff-biased social learning, and (4) conformist transmission. Using a combination of analytic and simulation methods, we show that spatial-but not temporal-variation strongly favors the emergence of conformist transmission. This effect intensifies when migration rates are relatively high and individual learning is costly. We also show that increasing the number of cultural traits above two favors the evolution of conformist transmission, which suggests that the assumption of only two traits in many models has been conservative. We close by discussing how (1) spatial variability represents only one way of introducing the low-level, nonadaptive phenotypic trait variation that so favors conformist transmission, the other obvious way being learning errors, and (2) our findings apply to the evolution of conformist transmission in social interactions. Throughout we emphasize how our models generate empirical predictions suitable for laboratory testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Education Policy Analysis Archives / Archivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas / Arquivos Analíticos de Políticas Educativas is the property of Educational Policy Analysis Archives & Education Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Abstract: Market microstructure studies of intraday trading patterns have established that there is a regular pattern of high volumes near both the open and close of the trading day. points out the many difficulties in specifying all the necessary elements of a strategic model for determining and attaining an equilibrium describing intraday patterns. We develop an autonomous agent-based market microstructure simulation with both informed agents and uninformed liquidity-motivated agents. Both types of agents can learn when to trade, but are zero-intelligence on all other behavior. We do not impose an equilibrium concept but instead look for emergent behavior. Our results demonstrate that trading patterns can arise in such a model as a result of interactions between informed and uninformed agents even though the agents are non-strategic and not fully rational. As long as there is rudimentary social or individual learning, uninformed liquidity-motivated agents can coordinate to avoid trading with informed agents and suffering adverse selection losses. The extent and pattern of coordination between uninformed agents depends on the learning specification, the percentage of informed agents and the degree of cooperation/competition among the informed agents. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The concept Communities of Practice (Wenger, 1998), a component of learning communities, has had a powerful influence in areas as diverse as business practice, interaction in academic departments, and in the way that school teachers plan for their students. This paper reports data from an ongoing cross-cultural study of practitioners' perceptions regarding ways to improve team and individual learning. The data are from three case studies: two university academic departments [one in Australia and one in China] and one Chinese hi-tech company. This allows comparison of ways in which learning communities operate in different cultural and political milieu. The study offers unique insights into how educational organizations operate as learning communities and, consequently, how we may be more effective in promoting workplace learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses ethnographic research from two Year 8 classes in two middle-sized secondary schools about a kilometre apart in a Swedish west-coast town to examine how new policies for personalised learning have developed in practice, in the performative cultures of modern schools in a commodity society. One school stands in a predominantly middle-class area of privately owned 'low-rise' houses. The other is in an area of 'high-rise' rented accommodation, where the first language of many homes is not Swedish. The differences are important. According to the article, personalised learning mobilises material and social resources in these schools that support new forms of individualistic, selfish and private accumulations of education goods from public provision and a valorisation of self-interest and private value as the common basis for educational culture. The article describes this cultural production in school and links it to processes of cultural and social reproduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Convergence to the Nash equilibrium in a Cournot oligopoly is a question that recurrently arises as a subject of controversy in economics. The development of evolutionary game theory has provided an equilibrium concept more directly connected with adjustment dynamics, and the evolutionary stability of the equilibria of the Cournot game have been extensively studied in the literature. Several articles show that the Walrasian equilibrium is the stable ESS of the Cournot game. But no general result has been established for the difficult case of simultaneous heterogenous mutations. Authors propose specific selection dynamics to analyze this case. proposes using a genetic algorithm for studying learning dynamics in this game and obtains convergence to Cournot equilibrium with individual learning. The resulting convergence has been questioned by . The aim of this article is to clarify this controversy. It analyzes the mechanisms that are behind these contradictory results and underlines the specific role of the spite effect. We show why social learning gives rise to the Walrasian equilibrium and why, in a general setup, individual learning can effectively yield convergence to the Cournot equilibrium. We also illustrate these general results by systematic computational experiments. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This integrative literature review synthesizes the concepts and process of organizational knowledge creation with theories of individual learning. The knowledge conversion concept (Nonaka & Takeuchi, 1995; Nonaka, Toyama, & Byosière, 2001) is used as the basis of the organizational knowledge creation process, while major learning theories relevant to working adult learners are newly synthesized into four types of individual learning processes: adaptive, generative, transformative, and reflective. The results suggest an integrative conceptual flow map of individual and organizational learning facilitated by culture and management system enablers. Implications for using this conceptual framework for practicing performance technology solutions are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]