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This paper presents the results from a study undertaken to improve the teaching and learning effectiveness in engineering education courses, specifically for Technical and Vocational Education (TVE) system in Bahrain. A teaching and learning assessment tool was developed for participants (existing TVE teachers in electrical and electronic engineering and a pilot group of TVE students). The purpose was to examine the existing approaches of teaching and learning practised in TVE educational environment as well as learning styles preferred by TVE students. The results confirmed that TVE teachers applied limited methods of teaching and learning. However, TVE students had widely varying learning preferences, as they are more motivated by using the experiential learning approach. The experiential learning model allowed students to make their own learning choices and relate what they were learning to the real-work applications (using diagrams, hyperlinked text, video, pictures, interactive examples, virtual reality simulations, and animations). Based on the drawn conclusions, a teaching and learning guideline for engineering education was originated specifically for the needs of the TVE system in Bahrain. The guideline is a potential tool for structuring and improving engineering learning courses in TVE. The guideline will also help in meeting modern industrial requirements by equipping students with better skills, abilities and attitude. © Common Ground, Mohamed Alseddiqi, Rakesh Mishra, Salah Mahdi Abdulrasool.

One of the challenges facing contemporary higher education is the need to design and support authentic projects reflecting knowledge and skills relevant to the students both in the academic context and future employment field. This paper presents a project for 2nd year students preparing for careers in Instructional Technologies and Organizational Training. The project product was an interactive self-assessment item repository (SAIR) accessible via the department Learning Management System. The project involved a 3-stage instructional design, linking two courses. In the final stage student teams consulted with lecturers to ensure the quality and relevance of the product. The project design fulfils criteria for authenticity suggested by two different models. Our 3-year study showed that the SAIR gained quantity and quality along the instructional path. Lecturers' views indicated partial satisfaction with the SAIR and the interaction with student teams, along with an acknowledgment of the essential value of the process. students' views on tests and test items were probed prior to and following instruction, and some significant changes were found regarding tests, the usefulness of choice response test items, and their own ability to identify and correct faulty item formulation. Interviews suggested that students felt empowered by the instructional and technical tools they had gained.

Work Integrated Learning (WIL) programs, such as co-operative education programs, offer students a learning environment which exists outside the traditional classroom and specific discipline boundaries. This necessitates assessment practices that go beyond traditional practices and relationships. Work placement supervisors are best located to observe the students' learning and development and offer feedback on performance and improvement. An investigation was carried out in order to articulate the role of supervisors and work colleagues in facilitating learning in the workplace environment and their involvement in assessment practices. Interviews were conducted with academics and industry representatives on their perceptions of assessment task validity in terms of professional and generic skill development. A synthesis of the findings formed the basis of the research described in this paper. Key findings highlighted the need for better preparation of industry supervisors as to their role in providing feedback and assessment; better preparation of students for transition from the classroom to the workplace; and the importance of ongoing involvement of the three stakeholders (academic, supervisor and student) to maximise learning and professional development. Recommendations for assessment practices include suggestions on how to involve employers in appraising workplace performance; how to measure the real life application of learning; and the development of generic employability skills. © Common Ground, Kathy Henschke, Joan Richardson.

This paper discusses the findings of a research study concerning the use of e-portfolios to develop independent learning, from the perspectives of teachers and students in a Hong Kong university. While most of the findings confirm the value of e-portfolio practice reported in other contexts, they throw into relief a complicated interplay and conflict of factors that may thwart the good intentions of e-portfolio design and implementation. Insights derived from this research will illuminate the issues about eportfolio-mediated independent learning across a range of settings and learners.

Improving the effectiveness of eAssessment depends on the knowledge and experience of feedback-givers. This paper describes an indirect approach to improving feedback for learners - training the feedback-giver while actually preparing the feedback for the learners. Specifically, the aim is to help inexperienced teaching assistants (TAs) who lack training in how to provide quality feedback. The approach emphasises the ways in which feedback is organised through the use of feedback patterns. There is evidence that students in higher education, like adult learners, require improved feedback to make their learning more efficient. McFeSPA (metacognitive feedback scaffolding system for pedagogical apprenticeship) was designed and implemented as efeedback to help improve the TAs' feedback skills while marking programming assignments - and then evaluated to determine whether TAs could benefit from automated feedback. The evaluation involves examining the system with scaffolding turned off to help three TAs give feedback to a group of students and scaffolding turned on for three TAs using the full system. The results are broadly favourable. Copyright © 2010 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

Management skills are amongst the skills sought after by many employers. Producing graduates who possess skills/attributes beyond their course-related skills is critical in contributing towards the employability of graduates. Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS (UTP) has a mission to develop well-rounded engineering and technology graduates who not only possess technical competence, but also other employability skills to meet the requirements of the industry. The extent to which the university is preparing students on management skills is rather unexplored. This exploratory study therefore intends to fill the gap by examining the level of management skills possessed by UTP interns during their 8-month internship training at various companies in Malaysia. To get a better perspective on the issue studied, feedback was gathered from both the interns and their internship supervisors at the respective companies. Data collection was conducted from Jun - July 2008 during the final week of the internship period. A total of 96 respondents (48 interns and 48 supervisors) participated in the study. The findings suggested that, in general, the interns possessed moderately high management skills. Implications of the findings and avenues for further research are also discussed in this study. © Common Ground, Azrai Abdullah, Rohani Salleh, Subarna Sivapalan.

The labour market in South Africa (SA) has been characterized by very high and increasing rates of unemployment and an acute shortage of skilled workers. Consequently, finding competent people who will fit in with an organisation's culture, vision and strategic goals has been challenging. As a result, the recruitment drives of many organisations currently focus heavily on attracting skills as well as experience. One of the ways in which the skills shortage and lack of experience could be addressed would be by including an internship in the curricula of different programmes offered at Higher Education Institutions. The current study seeks to articulate from a student's perspective the value of internship in the professional preparation of sport management personnel and attempts to contribute to research in education by providing empirical evidence on the usefulness of internships and make recommendations thereon. A 47-item questionnaire was administered to 300 interns at three universities which offered sport management programmes with internship as a compulsory component. Analyses were performed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS - version 17). Principal component analysis (PCA) was conducted on the data. A final model consisting of seven factors which accounted for 77.80% of the overall variance in the scale item scores was produced. The factors were professional development (five items), personal development (five items), marketability (thee items), adaptability (thee items), relevance (thee items), opportunity for growth (two items) and networking (two items). The study found internships to be a valuable component in the sport management curriculum. Emanating from the findings several recommendations were made.

This paper seeks to examine the growth and development of tourism education within Great Britain, with specific reference to the situation in England and Wales. This is a subject that has received relatively scant attention since the publication of a number of seminal papers produced in the mid to late 1990's and early C20th. The paper reviews how tourism education has developed from relatively humble origins to that of a subject taught in a wide variety of education institutions. It examines what programmes seek to achieve in terms of knowledge skills development and preparing students to meet the labour needs of the tourism industry. It also reflects on where tourism education is going in terms of courses, course philosophy, levels of study, subject content and teaching and learning strategies.A number of key themes or issues will be highlighted all central to the thinking of the curriculum planner. These include an analysis of curriculum models, the importance of developing academic vocational and key transferable skills and the need to add value and increase employability. The paper concludes by examining the future of tourism education in an increasingly mature educational market. Here the development of the new 14-19 diplomas in travel and tourism and employer-led foundation degrees are discussed and the implications for curriculum development in higher education broached. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd.

A context-aware ubiquitous learning environment is an authentic learning environment with personalized digital supports. While showing the potential of applying such a learning environment, researchers have also indicated the challenges of providing adaptive and dynamic support to individual students. In this paper, a decision-treeoriented mechanism is developed for that purpose, enabling digital guidance for students to observe and classify real-world objects in the learning activities of natural science courses. To show the effectiveness of the innovative approach, a context-aware ubiquitous learning environment was implemented for the "butterfly and ecology" unit of a fourth-grade natural science course in Taiwan, and 42 students participated in the learning activity. From the surveys and interviews that were conducted to understand the functionalities of the system and the learning effectiveness for the students, the results show that the system had a positive impact on students' learning, especially on the affective domain, including participation, motivation, and interaction. © International Forum of Educational Technology & Society (IFETS).