Education Commons^™

Open Textbook Project, Sue Ann Gardner

University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries: Conference Presentations and Speeches

An overview of an open educational resource textbook project administered from the University Libraries, University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Images of some of the textbook authors are included.

Exploring The Relationship Between Online Discourse And Commitment In Twitter Professional Learning Communities, Wanli Xing, Fei Gao

Visual Communications and Technology Education Faculty Publications

Educators show great interest in participating in social-media communities, such as Twitter, to support their professional development and learning. The majority of the research into Twitter-based professional learning communities has investigated why educators choose to use Twitter for professional development and learning and what they actually do in these communities. However, few studies have examined why certain community members remain committed and others gradually drop out. To fill this gap in the research, this study investigated how some key features of online discourse influenced the continued participation of the members of a Twitter-based professional learning community. More than 600,000 tweets …

The Lost & Found Game Series: Teaching Medieval Religious Law In Context, Owen Gottlieb, Ian Schreiber

Presentations and other scholarship

Lost & Found is a strategy card-to-mobile game series that teaches medieval religious legal systems with attention to period accuracy and cultural and historical context. The Lost & Found project seeks to expand the discourse around religious legal systems, to enrich public conversations in a variety of communities, and to promote greater understanding of the religious traditions that build the fabric of the United States. Comparative religious literacy can build bridges between and within communities and prepare learners to be responsible citizens in our pluralist democracy. The first game in the series is a strategy game called Lost & Found …

Understanding The Role Of Institutional Repository In Digital Preservation In Academic Libraries: A Review Of Literature, O. P. Saini

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

One of the leading objectives of the libraries is to provide the latest and timely information to its clientele and keep them updated with the new arrivals related to their subject areas. However, a limited storage capacity of libraries is throwing a challenge before librarians from the beginning of libraries. The latest developments in the libraries for information management, preservation, and dissemination involve a high rate of computer technologies. Institutional Repository (IR) is a new breed which has the potential to store any amount of information in little space and preserve it for a long-term perspective. Therefore, many of the …

Digital Commons Users Discuss The Bepress Acquisition, Paul Royster, Roger Weaver, Marilyn Billings, Phillip Fitzsimmons, Terri Fishel

Faculty Articles & Research

Description: Since the acquisition of the Berkeley Electronic Press (bepress) by Elsevier last summer, there has been much discussion online, in listserves, and elsewhere about what that development means for the future of open access and scholarly communications. The people most directly affected are the users of the bepress DigitalCommons repository hosting service. Some have recoiled in horror at the new ownership situation, others are waiting to see what happens next. This is a panel discussion by current users concerning what they see in the road ahead, including what they regard as essential services, possible options, functionality requirements, and …

Too Many Cooks: Redesigning The English Program Website, Joshua Horton, Alex Battitori, Tyler Breedlove, Morgan Ebbs, Courtney Schlund, Chanda Williams, Celia Patterson

Paper Presentations

The purpose of this project was to produce new content for the English Program webpages for Dr. Patterson’s course, ENGL 875 Seminar: Writing for the Web. Throughout all stages of this project, we consulted Janice Redish’s book Letting Go of the Words. The first stage of the project was to identify the webpages’ target audiences; this was achieved through the creation of personas that reflected the demographics of users. Through these personas, we developed a series of tasks for a preliminary usability test. Subsequently, we conducted the preliminary test on the existing English Program webpages using test subjects that reflected …

Adolescents’ Perceptions Of “Cheating” In Gaming And Educational Settings, Brandon Nease, Michelle Samura

Education Faculty Articles and Research

Background. Given the widespread popularity of video gameplay among adolescents, it is important to understand the relationship between video gameplay and adolescent behaviors in various contexts.

Aim. This exploratory study aimed to explore adolescent gamers use of player guides and cheat codes during video gameplay in order to understand how they reason about the relationship between cheating in video games and cheating in academic settings.

Method. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with adolescents in order to gain in-depth insight into participants’ perspectives on video gameplay and their perceptions of cheating in video games and academic settings. Interview data was coded and …

Learning In The Wild: Coding For Learning And Practice On Reddit, Caroline A. Haythornthwaite, Priya Kumar, Anatoliy Gruzd, Sarah Gilbert, Marc Esteve Del Valle, Drew Paulin

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

Learning on and through social media is becoming a cornerstone of lifelong learning, creating places not only for accessing information, but also for finding other self-motivated learners. Such is the case for Reddit, the online news sharing site that is also a forum for asking and answering questions. We studied learning practices found in ‘Ask’ subreddits AskScience, Ask_Politics, AskAcademia, and AskHistorians to develop a coding schema for informal learning. This paper describes the process of evaluating and defining a workable coding schema, one that started with attention to learning processes associated with discourse, exploratory talk, and conversational dialogue, and ended …

Proceedings Of The Cuny Games Conference 4.0: The Interactive Course, Robert O. Duncan, Joe Bisz, Julie Cassidy, Kathleen Offenholley, Maura A. Smale, Carolyn Stallard, Deborah Sturm, Anders A. Wallace, Cuny Games Network

Publications and Research

Proceedings of the CUNY Games Conference, held from January 22-23, 2018, at the CUNY Graduate Center and Borough of Manhattan Community College.

Critical Play with History (Panel) - Composition & Storytelling - Health & Cognitive Sciences - Gaming Anthropology: Teaching Culture and Power Through Games and Design (Panel) - Twine & Writing Games - Easy Ideas II - STEM Games - Global Games for Change Catalog (Panel) - Comics & Active Learning - Fact Checking & Research - Computer Science & Game Design - SimGlobal: Building a Serious Roleplay Course for the Social Sciences (Panel) - Role Playing Games, Narrative, …

Using Mobile Devices To Facilitate Student Questioning In A Large Undergraduate Science Class, Helen Crompton, Stephen R. Burgin, Declan G. De Paor, Kristen Gregory

Teaching & Learning Faculty Publications

Asking scientific questions is the first practice of science and engineering listed in the Next Generation Science Standards. However, getting students to ask unsolicited questions in a large class can be difficult. In this qualitative study, undergraduate students sent SMS text messages to the instructor who received them on his mobile phone and via Google Glass. Using observations, coding of texts, and interviews, the researchers investigated the types and level of questions students asked and the perceptions of the instructor and TAs on how the messages were received. From the findings of this study, it is evident that students asked …

Impact Of Social Media On Ghanaian High School Students, Frankie Asare-Donkoh

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Many high school students in Ghana have access to social media using several devices with internet connectivity including Ipads, mobile phones, laptops, tablets and others. Some parents and educationists believe social media has negative impact on students. They argue that social media makes students incapable of making independent and critical analysis of issues and events. Notwithstanding this, other parents, educationists and students applaud the positive impact of social media on learning and social cohesion. The findings of this study reveal that social media has positive impact on the academic and social life of Ghanaian senior high school students.