Game On!

Today, there is growing interest in digital game-based learning (DGBL) due to the increase in the variety of educational and commercial games available. Literature indicates that video games in general have entertaining, motivational, and educational benefits. Despite this, there is a lack of research comparing game types to assess their value for learning. Typically, DGBL approach may include a variety of game types, like those designed for educational purposes such as digital education games (DEGs), as well as those created for entertainment and commercial reasons, such as massively multiplayer online games (MMOs). Digital games do possess a significantly high capacity to keep users engaged, which is a potential that can be used to motivate learners to interact more deeply with their learning environments, and consequently enhance their performances. This study supports the hypothesis that both DEGs and MMOs can be instrumental in improving engagement and learning versus traditional teaching methods. The article shares the results of the mixed methods study that examined the use of one DEG and four MMOs in undergraduate courses within a community college. The results suggest that learner performance and engagement are enhanced when using DGBL for both types of games, versus the traditional teaching methods. Additionally, practitioner and future research implications are also discussed.

Strategies for giving feedback in the operating room

Feedback is crucial to learning and is a difficult concept to define, occurring as a consequence of learner performance with the ultimate aim of influencing change in the learner. Here, we discuss strategies for giving feedback in the operating room revolving around the following themes: encouraging a sociocultural process, forming an educational alliance, sharing training goals, finding the appropriate time, giving task-specific feedback, approaching unsatisfactory performance and providing follow-up. It is essential that surgeons understand the fundamental feedback theories at play in the operating room described in this article and how they influence surgical training at all stages.

Teacher support, preparedness and resilience during times of crises and uncertainty: COVID-19 and education in the Global South

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated existing education inequities, further marginalising those with poor and limited education opportunities, particularly in conflict, fragile, and insecure contexts. In the Global South, the COVID-19 pandemic compounds existing crises, frailties, and inequities as the impoverished suffer food insecurity, physical conflict, and crises of health and water. Existing research suggests that the pandemic has further disadvantaged marginalised communities, weakened learner performance, increased learning losses, and stretched already strained education budgets. However, little is known about the role of teachers in the policymaking process relating to matters that have a direct impact on their work. It is this gap that we address in this paper. Drawing on research, commissioned by the Open Society Foundation and Education International, based on a detailed desk-based review and interviews with purposefully selected Teachers' Union and Government officials in eight African countries, we examine the role of teachers in education policy-making processes and the kinds of support made available to them, or the lack thereof, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Using the conceptual framing of de Sousa Santos's sociology of absences and cognitive injustice, we demonstrate that teachers have been absent from policymaking processes and have not been adequately provided with the necessary professional development (PD) and psychosocial support to navigate the uncertainties and pedagogical requirements imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Covid-19 Vaccine and Scholastic Performance of Learners: A Perspective of Internal Stakeholders

This paper interrogates the relationship between the availability of the Covid-19 vaccine and the impressive learner results in secondary schools. The paper resulted from diverse discourses, some of which emphasize that the prevalence of Covid-19 in the world has dampened schools' learning moods to the level of flooring learner performance. This paper is conceptual and empirical within the qualitative research paradigm. The question guiding this paper is: to what extent could secondary schools produce inspiring learner results through revelatory information on the availability of vaccination for Covid-19 sufferers? Narrative inquiry and interviewing techniques were used to collect data. Out of the population of 15 secondary schools in one of the circuits in Sekhukhune district in Limpopo Province, South Africa, 3 were conveniently sampled. In each of the 3 sampled secondary schools, only Deputy Chairpersons of the School Governing Bodies and Chairpersons of the Representative Council of Learners became research participants. Findings revealed that underrating the revelatory information of vaccine availability for Covid-19 sufferers was costly for schools. Secondly, failure to consolidate learner solidarity against Covid-19 to improve the quality of schooling life was a problem. Thirdly, the inability by schools to prevent passive teaching and learning through the utilization of the Covid-19 threat. Fourthly, the inability by secondary schools to apply Covid-19 threat to encourage overachievement by learners. Fifthly, inability by schools to push back the frontiers of mediocre performance by applying Covid-19 as a rallying point. Lastly, schools failed to utilize the prevalence of Covid-19 to keep pupils psychologically and developmentally ready for lessons. The researcher recommends applying the ebullient classroom environments to keep teaching and learning memorable, theatrical, and therapeutic, despite the prevalence of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Rapid Cycle Deliberate Practice in Healthcare Simulation: a Scoping Review

Rapid cycle deliberate practice (RCDP) is a type of simulation-based medical education (SBME) where learners cycle between deliberate practice and directed feedback until skill mastery is achieved before progressing to subsequent learning objectives. This scoping review examines and summarizes the literature on RCDP, compares RCDP to other modes of instruction, and identifies knowledge gaps for future research. Of the 1224 articles identified, 23 studies met inclusion criteria. The studies varied in design, RCDP technique implementation strategies, and outcome measures. RCDP is associated with positive outcomes in immediate learner performance. It is unclear if RCDP is superior to traditional simulation.

IEyeGASE: An Intelligent Eye Gaze-Based Assessment System for Deeper Insights into Learner Performance

In the current education environment, learning takes place outside the physical classroom, and tutors need to determine whether learners are absorbing the content delivered to them. Online assessment has become a viable option for tutors to establish the achievement of course learning outcomes by learners. It provides real-time progress and immediate results; however, it has challenges in quantifying learner aspects like wavering behavior, confidence level, knowledge acquired, quickness in completing the task, task engagement, inattentional blindness to critical information, etc. An intelligent eye gaze-based assessment system called IEyeGASE is developed to measure insights into these behavioral aspects of learners. The system can be integrated into the existing online assessment system and help tutors re-calibrate learning goals and provide necessary corrective actions.

A Content Analysis of the Highly-Cited Articles in Medical Education: Commitment to Addressing Change and Reliance On Theory

Background: The medical education community is reflecting increasingly on the role and nature of research in the field. Useful sources of data to include in these reflections are a description of the topics in which we are investing our energies, an analysis of the extent to which there is a sense of progress on these topics, and an examination of the mechanisms by which any progress has been achieved. The purpose of the present study was to provide an insight into the highly cited themes of research into medical education.Methods: This study is a content analysis of highly cited articles in medical education. An in-depth content analysis was conducted, identifying meaning units, which were compacted and coded with labels.Results: During a variety of topics, methods and strategies, 764 codes, 24 descriptive themes, and 7 categories were extracted from the content analysis as the most prominent. Categories for future medical education research were: Modern technology updating in medical education; Learner performance improving; Sociological aspects of medical education; Clinical reasoning; Research methodology concerns of medical education; Instructional design educational models; and Professional aspects of medical education.Conclusions: Medical education is in need of moving to a more theory and discovery driven approach and would profit from broadening its scope and reformation that might bring answers to new concerns. An emphasis on creating more systemic knowledge and theoretical models will nurture the generalizable scientific knowledge and will increase the medical education chance to drive the development of research on learning and instruction.

Impact Of Engine Room Simulator As A Tool For Training And Assessing Bsmare Students’ Performance In Engine Watchkeeping

Ship engine room simulator is a tool used by maritime academies that offer the Marine Engineering Program. According to the Standards of Training Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers (STCW), to provide physical realism in training and assessment, simulators are employed. Assessment programs have the intent of providing results that educators will utilize to improve their teaching strategies and improve learner performance (Klinger et al. 2008). This study aimed to (1) Determine the level of competencies of the Bachelor of Science in Marine Engineering cadets in Engine Watchkeeping with Resource Management before and after their exposure to the training on the use of the simulator as a tool for learning, and (2) To find out if there is a significant difference in the level of competencies of the cadets in Engine Watchkeeping before and after the training on the use of the simulator as a tool for learning. Mean and Wilcoxon tests were utilized to analyze the data. It was found that a significant difference in the level of competencies of the cadets in Engine Watchkeeping before and after the training, which implies that the Engine Room Simulator is a tool for learning and assessing the competencies of students in Engine Watchkeeping is effective. The study recommends that instructors should maximize the use of the available simulators in teaching the course. Students shall have a hands-on experience as supplementary to the theories that they learn.