A Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) is a course that is offered fully online and is usually open for enrollment by any individual, with no limit on the number of participants. MOOCs are a popular resource for learning worldwide with over 23 million new learners registering for MOOCs in 2017 alone. Coursera, the most popular MOOC platform, has…

Skills associated with collaborative problem solving (CPS), especially in STEM-related disciplines, are increasingly regarded as essential for success in work and life. In the last decade, simulation-based games have emerged as rich environments for the situated learning of such skills, and are instrumental in the study of CPS because they provide…

Computational risk detection holds promise for shielding particularly vulnerable groups from online harm. A thorough literature review on real-time computational risk detection methods revealed that most research defined 'real-time' as approaches that analyze content retrospectively as early as possible or as preventive approaches to prevent risks…

The dissertation, with a collected papers approach, focused on evaluating the implementation of MI curriculum in high school Biology I classes in south Florida. The dissertation included the development and validation of the Biology Identity and Persistence Survey (BIPS), the connection of instructors' teaching practices with students' biology…

Discourse analysis of literature circles can lead educators to understand the different types of interactions taking place as students talk about text. Social and academic interactions exist in both face-to-face and online discussions of reading material. This study examines two different settings of literature circles and compares interactions of…

This qualitative study explored the experiences of an online learner at a community college. The purpose of the study was to investigate community college students' perception of online courses through an examination of their experiences with online learning. The community of inquiry theory was used as a guide to better understand the importance…

As a result of reforms like the Common Core Standards and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) and its framework, science instruction is transitioning from traditional forms of science to reformist curriculum. Classrooms committed to an epistemological approach to science education will have students engaging in a co-construction of…

Collaborative inquiry learning environments, such as "The Tutorials in Physics Sensemaking," are designed to provide students with opportunities to partake in the authentic disciplinary practices of argumentation and sensemaking. Through these practices, groups of students in tutorial can build shared conceptual understandings of the…

The present study investigated The Mixxer language exchange site (https://www.language-exchanges.org/) as a typical informal online community of self-directed language learners with a focus on how learners interact with each other. Learners' perception was also studied regarding how their language learning was impacted by their participation in…

The purpose of this study was to explore the formation of teacher identity among four teachers of students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and my own by examining our perspectives, influences, and experiences at different points in our careers and determining the similarities and differences that exist in our professional and educational…

This year-long ethnographic study examined teacher and student discourse when interpreting text in a children's philosophy club. Specifically, the study investigated how the opportunities for learning a new discussion form, philosophical conversation, were acted, talked, and written into being as students and their teacher interacted with each…

Teachers want and need students to excel in the classroom. Cooperative learning is one method recognized to address this. Numerous researchers have shown that cooperative learning leads to improved skills in teamwork and communication in other fields (Johnson and Johnson, 2007; Slavin, 1995). Cooperative learning used in this study showed that the…

This research investigated faculty choice of web-based technologies for interaction in online economics courses and students' perception of those technologies. The literature review of online interaction has established the importance of learner-learner, learner-instructor and learner-content interaction in distance learning. However, some…