Divaharan, Shanti

The Project work (PW) initiative was introduced by the Ministry of Education, Singapore, to provide students with the opportunities to foster collaborative learning skills, to improve both oral and written communication, to practise creative and critical thinking skills, and to develop self-directed inquiry and life-long learning skills (Ministry of Education, 1999). Although PW has been introduced for a few years, there has not been much research done in the Singapore context, especially in terms of its effect on students’ motivation. To fill the empirical gap, this study examined the extent in which PW promoted students’ intrinsic motivation, as well as satisfied students’ needs for competence, choice and relatedness. Specifically, data was collected from 7 classes of Secondary 2 students with the use of a modified version of the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI, McAuley, Duncan, & Tammen, 1989) to assess students’ intrinsic motivation and their perceived choice, competence and relatedness in the PW context and in their normal mathematics or science lessons. Comparisons were made to establish whether there was any significant difference in terms of the students’ experiences in the different learning contexts.

The focus of this qualitative research study was to ascertain the nature of the secondary school socio-cultural context that provided support or inhibited Type II ICT use in the lessons by teachers to engage the students in the learning process. ICT use could be classified as Type I or Type II. If the applications assisted the teaching process, making it easier and more efficient, then the ICT integration could be classified as Type I ICT use. If new opportunities have been opened up for teaching the subject or content in a more significant manner where the students are actively involved in the learning process, then the ICT use could be classified as Type II.

Activity Theory was used as a framework to design the study. It is a framework that focuses on the interaction of human activity and consciousness within its relevant environment context. Activity theory provides a powerful tool with which the human activity can be analysed within the cultural-historical context in which the activity is taking place. Activity systems were used to provide structure for data collection as well as for analysis of data.

A multiple-case study approach was adopted. Three secondary schools representing different school types were chosen, namely independent, autonomous and government. Data collection comprised of ICT integrated lesson observations, interviews with teachers, Head of Department for ICT (HOD/ICT), principal and students as well as analysis of relevant documents.

The findings of the study revealed that interaction of factors such as clear articulation of ICT goals to teachers and Heads of Departments and active involvement of Heads of Department of Instructional Programmes (IP/HODs) and teachers were important in the implementation process. Good support structures such as sharing within the department, relevant professional development complemented by ICT skills training and ICT-enabled infrastructure were a necessity. Teachers looked towards the principal to role-model expectations and to provide encouragement. The key agents of ICT integration within curriculum are the IP/HODs who need to be empowered to lead their departments to meet the requirements of the school with regard to ICT integration. It is therefore, pertinent for schools to function as learning organisations to effectively integrate educational innovations and to translate them into practices at the classroom.

The objective of the research study was to determine whether the introduction of the IT-based writing activities in a contructivist classroom setting improves students' written English. The research involved students from three streams, namely the Express stream. Normal Academic [N(A)] steam and the Normal Technical [N(T)] stream. A total of 103 students from the secondary level were involved in this research study. 37 students were from the Express stream, 38 from the N(A) stream and 28 from the N (T) stream. The research was conducted using a survey data sheet (ASLAT), a questionnaire (SAIEL) and classroom observations. The research study was conducted in three stages :

(i) Pre-intervention stage (no IT-based writing tools were introduced)

(ii) Intervention stage I (IT-based writing tools were introduced with scaffolding)

(iii) Intervention stage II (IT-based writing tools with no scaffolding)

The findings of the study imply that using IT-based writing tools does not improve students' written English in the various grammar components. Improvement was also in the students' final written product. Within the three streams , the N (A) stream saw the greatest improvement . In addition to contributing to the improvement of the students' written English, the contructivist classroom setting has helped students to become independent learners.

The study presented in this paper involved 124 Singaporean pre-service teachers who were attending a core information and communications technology (ICT) module, which is a component of their teacher education program. During this module, the pre-service teachers were introduced to the interactive whiteboard (IWB) through an instructional approach that consisted of tutor modeling, self-paced exploration, peer sharing, and team-based design projects. The pre-service teachers experienced the IWB first as ‘students’ and then explored it as teachers planning for implementation in their lessons. Qualitative data of pre-service teachers’ reflections was collected to analyse their perceptions of the IWB use in their lessons and to examine how they learnt to use the board. The findings illustrated that pre-service teachers predominantly felt that the IWB was useful for engaging students in the learning process and for generating active participation vis-à-vis the interactive affordances of the board. The findings also revealed that learning about technology in teams was most useful for the successful assimilation of a technology tool that was new and unfamiliar to pre-service teachers. This paper examines how the existing IWB instructional approach can be modified to help pre-service teachers learn pedagogical uses of the IWB more effectively.

Digital gaming is fast becoming a favorite activity all over the world. Yet very few studies have examined the underlying motivational processes involved in digital gaming. One motivational force that receives little attention in psychology is passion, which could help us understand the motivation of gamers. The purpose of the present study was to identify subgroups of young people with distinctive passion profiles on self-determined regulations, flow dispositions, affect, and engagement time in gaming. One hundred fifty-five students from two secondary schools in Singapore participated in the survey. There were 134 males and 8 females (13 unspecified). The participants completed a questionnaire to measure harmonious passion (HP), obsessive passion (OP), perceived locus of causality, disposition flow, positive and negative affects, and engagement time in gaming. Cluster analysis found three clusters with distinct passion profiles. The first cluster had an average HP/OP profile, the second cluster had a low HP/OP profile, and the third cluster had a high HP/OP profile. The three clusters displayed different levels of cognitive, affective, and behavioral outcomes. Cluster analysis, as this study shows, is useful in identifying groups of gamers with different passion profiles. It has helped us gain a deeper understanding of motivation in digital gaming.

In this paper, we report the perceptions of a CSCL-inspired curriculum implemented with a cohort of net generation student teachers. The motivation behind this study is to examine the influence of CSCL pedagogy on net generation student’s learning. Using convenience sampling, a total of 1081 student teachers participated in the survey consisting of factors on course content, delivery, learning environment and general experience. The findings revealed that the course in terms of all four factors has been very positively received. The CSCL-inspired instructional approach is found to have benefited net generation student teachers’ learning.

The objective of this research study was to determine whether the introduction of IT-based writing activities in a constructivist classroom setting improves students’ written English. The research involved students from three streams, namely the Express stream, Normal Academic [N(A)] stream and the Normal Technical [N(T)] stream. A total of 103 students from the secondary level were involved in this research study. 37 students were from the Express stream, 38 from the N(A) stream and 28 from the N(T) stream. The research was conducted using a survey data sheet, a questionnaire and classroom observations. The research study was conducted in three stages: (1) Pre-intervention stage (no IT-based writing tools were introduced). (2) Intervention stage I (IT-based writing tools were introduced with scaffolding). (3) Intervention stage II (IT-based writing tools with no scaffolding). The findings of the study imply that using IT-based writing tools does improve students’ written English in the various grammar components. Improvement was also evident in the students’ final written product. Within the three streams, the N(A) stream saw the greatest improvement. In addition to contributing to the improvement of the students’ written English, the constructivist classroom setting has helped students to become independent learners.

The COVID-19 global pandemic has caused disruptions around the world with devastating consequences socially and economically. Education was not spared. Schools and institutions of higher learning (IHLs) had to grapple with new sets of demands. With most countries forced into lockdown to stem the spread of the virus, some turned to technology-mediated learning to provide some kind continuity for learning to still take place. This concept paper will share some of the key learning points and strategies culled from experiences having to pivot almost overnight to embracing technology and new learning environments, which were sometimes remote or neglected in a milieu and culture that often prided itself in effective physical face-to-face interactions. This article will then draw upon how the Blended Learning approach, undergirded by Connectivism, was implemented in a local IHL. Examples of the different types of blended learning designs that were employed will be described alongside examples on how educators can distinguish between them to engage their learners in both modes.

This paper traces the evolution of the design framework for the use of technology in a teacher education program in a Singaporean university. This course focuses on developing student teachers’ capacity for the use of ICT in teaching and learning. We report our two-level reflection: one that focuses on the trajectory of the course design, and one that reflects on the university faculty’s pedagogical practices when conducting this course. The goal of this course in the last decade has transformed from a focus on technology skills to pedagogical and knowledge creation. The current goal of the course is to develop student teachers’ pervasive use of technology tools to collaborate, design, reflect and think critically. The challenge for the faculty in a teacher education higher learning institute is to design a course that would present opportunities for student teachers to experience the technology tools as learners themselves so as to become teachers who will be doyens in designing technology tool integrated learning. We contend that the experiences of technology tools help to deepen the student teachers’ knowledge about technology integration. As student teachers experience technology tools in tandem with theory, the immersive experience may translate into designing apt technology-integrated lessons for their learners.