The content of argumentative essays is determined by multiple factors, but belief influences are understudied compared to topic knowledge and argument schema. We investigate how beliefs influence the inclusion of basic components in argumentative writing. A pre-screening survey identified believers and disbelievers in gun control effectiveness. In…

Some types of instructions for creativity tasks (such as explicitly telling people to be creative) can boost performance. Showing people examples or telling them ways of approaching the problem before they begin a creativity task can help, but results are mixed about whether it is better to emphasize positive examples/approaches that can be…

This essay analyzes the educational significance of the metaphysical novel, that is, how it can be used to educate ourselves and our students. Mordechai Gordon begins by describing the nature of the metaphysical novel while contrasting it to "pure" philosophy and theory building. Gordon also situates Beauvoir's insights in the broader…

This scope-review presents the milestones of how Hierarchical Rater Models (HRMs) become operable to used in automated essay scoring (AES) to improve instructional evaluation. Although essay evaluations--a useful instrument for evaluating higher-order cognitive abilities--have always depended on human raters, concerns regarding rater bias,…

Background: The application of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in education has been deepening. However, at the same time, behaviours that jeopardise academic health, such as learners' over-reliance on generative AI and massive plagiarism of generated content of generative AI in essay writing, have begun to emerge, and the issue of…

Evaluating written texts is believed to be a time-consuming process that can lack consistency and objectivity. Automated essay scoring (AES) can provide solutions to some of the limitations of human scoring. This research aimed to evaluate the performance of one AES system, Grammarly, in comparison to human raters. Both approaches' performances…

Although many studies modelled writing quality by analysing basic skills (spelling, grammar, etc.), few focused on top-down compositional strategies at the discourse level. We propose that using both narrative and argument discourse modes in an argumentative essay (a multi-discourse mode [MDM] strategy) capitalizes on their complementary…

Writing an integrated essay based on multiple-documents requires students to both comprehend the documents and integrate the documents into a coherent essay. In the current study, we examined the effects of summarization as a potential reading strategy to enhance participants' multiple-document comprehension and integrated essay writing.…

Identifying high-quality educators at the point of hire can reduce future recruitment costs and minimize the impact of attrition on school organizations and student learning. One low-cost way to screen applicants and learn about their beliefs, values, and pedagogy is through their short-essay writing samples. However, there is limited research…

Linguistic accuracy (LA) has been shown to be indicative of second language (L2) essay quality through the use of various measurements, such as error counts and error-free T-units. However, concerns persist regarding the precise definition of LA, as findings in recent literature often depend on the specific measures of LA employed. This study…

Our field is brimming with insights into how children learn mathematics. Yet, much of this treasure fails to reach a group that holds significant influence over children's learning: parents. While most parents want their child to succeed in the subject, many do not know how to help, or are so wounded from their own mathematics education that they…

In this manuscript, I lift Black feminisms as a methodological intervention on a holistic meaning-making theory and its relationship to anti-Blackness. Specifically, I employed a Black feminist literary criticism, which presumes that Black people have cultivated living and survival practices throughout their history in the United States. I…

This study used cognitive semantics to initiate a narrative dialogue in secondary school classrooms. It focused on examining empirical relationships between exercises, such as 'exegetical reading', 'mystery' and 'concepts to work with' and students' learning -- their acquisition and application of the religious concept of 'image of God' outlined…

A standard learning outcome for students in humanities courses, from middle school into higher education, is to craft clear, specific arguments based on evidence. A common assignment to develop and assess this learning outcome is the take-home essay. Generative AI models, such as ChatGPT, Copilot, and Grammarly, are quickly able to generate such…

As ChatGPT continues to reshape student engagement and instructional design, it is crucial to examine its practical implications. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of ChatGPT3.5 and ChatGPT4 as potential automated essay scoring (AES) systems. Fifty authentic, student-written annotated bibliographies were evaluated by three human raters…