Synchronous online teaching through video-conferencing software (VCS) has become a common mode of instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic. This mode brings unique challenges for teachers that require specific professional digital competences. One such challenge is conducting formative assessment. Through the use of in-depth interviews with nine…

Under the development of the information age, traditional Chinese teaching model of college English reading courses can no longer meet the needs of the times, and needs to be reformed urgently. From the perspective of mobile learning, this paper tries to combine modern educational technology with classroom teaching by using an online English…

Engaging students in an international online setting that is interdisciplinary and culturally diverse is a challenge. A joint classroom between German and Ugandan universities used a formative assessment approach paired with active learning elements to foster individual and peer learning in an international virtual setting. A survey at three…

The University of Calgary transitioned to online teaching in March 2020. Subsequent months saw instructors working to overcome the personal, technological, and pedagogical challenges involved in this. Central to those discussions was the need to increase student engagement and develop effective assessment formats. Based on student feedback and…

The unexpected COVID-19 pandemic posed significant challenges to teachers' feedback-giving practice. This study reports on an inquiry into 16 Chinese EFL teachers' feedback changes during the pandemic, with a focus on whether and how the teachers changed their feedback practice when a range of digital assessment tools and online instructional…

Learning analytics (LA) offer benefits and challenges for online learning, but prior to collecting data on high-stakes summative assessments as proof of student learning, LA researchers should engage instructors as partners to ensure the quality of course materials through the formative evaluation of individual items (Bienkowski et al., 2012;…

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) issues are urgent in education. We developed and evaluated a massive open online course (N = 963) with embedded equity simulations that attempted to equip educators with equity teaching practices. Applying a structural topic model (STM)--a type of natural language processing (NLP)--we examined how…

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) OpenCourseWare (OCW) was launched in 2001. It is one of the earliest Open Educational Resources (OER). MIT OCW has published more than 2,400 courses which are available at no cost, the majority of which are STEM related. The purpose of this exploratory study was to examine the pedagogical strategies…

Project-based learning (PBL) involves a highly complex and learner-centered approach. It relies on formative assessment (FA) with ongoing feedback to help learners move through the PBL process to the eventual co-construction of a shared artefact. Conversation and discussion are central to the process. However, in a face-to-face context of…

How should teachers spend their STEM-focused professional learning time? To answer this question, Heather Hill, Kathleen Lynch, Kathryn Gonzalez, and Cynthia Pollard analyzed a recent wave of rigorous new studies of STEM instructional improvement programs. They found that programs work best when focused on building knowledge teachers can use…

Within the burgeoning literature on online formative assessment mediated by particular ICT tools in writing courses, the scrutiny focusing on the enactment of assessment for learning (AfL) in the similar context has been inadequately addressed. This current study, therefore, is in an attempt to fill this empirical void by exploring how EFL…

e-learning practitioners have long recognised the benefits of using online training to achieve knowledge transfer, less is understood about facilitating the sharing of values, attitudes, critical thinking, and localisation using online platforms. In this article an online learning platform in the context of an international scientific program was…

Using game-based learning strategies, such as quiz-style PowerPoint games as an e-learning and teaching pedagogy can make a positive impact on how students learn, how they process and retain information, and how they interact with digital media. However, little is known about their impact on students' information literacy development. This…

The rapid expansion of computer science (CS) instruction in primary and secondary education has highlighted the shortage of teachers qualified to teach the subject. A key strategy for building CS teaching capacity has been preparing teachers of other subjects (e.g., math, technology applications, business) to teach introductory CS through…

To address the emotional and mental health needs of teachers during the COVID-19 pandemic, existing instructional technology tools can be rapidly adapted to support trauma-informed educational practices. In this action research and practice brief, the instructional strategies and communication tools used to support the mental health needs of…