While previous studies on assessments focused on measurement of principles and constructs, existing attention is given to content validation involving vocational education and skills. The emphasis on content validation has prompted a holistic perspective of teaching and learning to demand alternative research approaches. Using evidence of content validity based on expert judgment and assessment items, this paper argues that vocational knowledge and skills could be determined via constructs and construct functions. Content validity analysis was studied in two major phases, namely, through an assessment of an electrical technology course at a Malaysian higher education institution and expert panels’ examination of items. It was found that to increase confidence in providing reliable instruments for future empirical studies, a careful process in item development and content validity analysis was considered important. Therefore, applying these findings on item analysis and expert panels to reflect content validity can enhance the validity of assessment items.

The present study aimed to investigate the relationship between students’ academic motivation, implicit beliefs about intelligence and learning strategies among undergraduate healthcare students. First-year students of healthcare degree courses from a university in Southern Italy were surveyed. The study measured psychological constructs by means of Academic Motivation Scale, Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire, and Dweck’s implicit questions about beliefs of intelligence. Two regression models were computed to assess the association between students’ beliefs about intelligence, motivations for studying, and learning strategies. In the first regression model, predicting students’ use of cognitive strategies from implicit intelligence beliefs and motivations for studying, stronger autonomous motivations were significant predictors of cognitive strategies. The second regression model, predicting students’ use of metacognitive strategies from implicit intelligence beliefs and motivations for studying, was not significant. These findings can be useful to plan tailored educational interventions to promote students’ motivation, incremental beliefs about intelligence and their use of learning strategies positively related with academic performance.

The discussion about the loss of nationalism values in the Indonesian migrant workers’ (IMW’s) children in border areas, has become an important issue in the world of Indonesian education. The purpose of this study is to describe the role of Community Learning Center (CLC) in fostering nationalism values in IMW’s children, as well as to reveal the teaching experience and meaning of nationalism from the perspective of teachers at CLC Sarawak, Malaysia. The research uses qualitative method with case study approach that focuses on factors that can foster nationalism of IMW’s children. Data collection obtained through observation techniques, in-depth interviews, and documentation. The results showed meaningful findings according to the conditions in the education system in CLC, as well as socio-cultural conditions that affect every activity in the border area. The first finding indicates that CLC has an important (central) role in fostering the nationalism of IMW’s children in border areas. The second finding shows the fact that teachers are still experiencing some problems in the field, such as; limited access to information and communication, teacher education background, school conditions, limited educational units, learning facilities, and family and social environments. The third finding emphasizes the importance of nationalism for teachers who devote themselves to teaching in border areas, because teachers have a crucial role in transferring knowledge, providing meaningful learning experiences, and fostering the nationalism of IMW’s children.

The quality of the educational process within the humanistic concept and holistic-developmental approach is interpreted as the optimal adaptation to the individual needs and abilities of children, while inclusiveness presupposes equal inclusion and participation of all children. This article explores the opinions of teachers as bearers of pedagogical-educational process. The aim of this research was to determine how much importance teachers attach to certain dimensions of the educational process, and the procedures of inclusive practice. Empirical research included teachers in 5 preschool institutions (N=146). The research instrument was constructed based on relevant literature. Teachers in this sample recognize the importance: of individualized support to all children; of respecting the diversity; of collaboration with parents, and personal professional development. At the same time, the level of formal education and in-service teacher training is positively correlated with the assessment of importance towards child-oriented practice, and respect for diversity. Teachers with a higher level of education significantly value the importance of additional vocational training in the field of developmental and social risks, the use of community resources, and involvement of parents in planning individual support for children.

The initial period of young teachers' careers is always significant in developing their professional capability. This is when teachers start coming into contact with practical teaching, which is more diversified than the theoretical training at the University. In this research, the authors propose a process of combining the Lesson Study model with the micro-lesson teaching method. This process helps young teachers, especially those working in the Northern of Vietnam, improve their planning and implementation of a lesson plan following the Lesson Study model. It has four steps: (1). Plan a Lesson Study; (2). Organize demo teaching and attend lessons; (3): Self-evaluate and discuss lessons; (4): Apply for practical teaching. The methodology research is carried out on 62 young teachers in Vietnam to measure the pre-impact and post-impact results. The results reveal that the researched group has made significant progress on their teaching performances (the average points for their capability of planning lessons have increased from 2.54 to 3.28 and the average points for their capability of implementing lesson plans have increased from 2.48 to 3.18). This development can be considered as an excellent experience to bring the Lesson Study model into Vietnamese schools to improve teaching sustainably.

The research aims to develop an instructional tool based on Discovery Learning (DL) combined with a Metacognitive Knowledge Strategy (MKS) to enhance students’ Critical Thinking Skills (CTSs). In doing so, the study employed a Research and Development (R&D) method to develop such a tool. The developed instructional tool was tested for its validity by experts and practitioners’ evaluation. Further, the empirical data were collected from the results of implementation in learning and the student's responses, while the data of tools effectiveness were acquired from the critical thinking tests given to students (analyzed by related t-test). The developed instructional tools were implemented in a limited-scale trial of 32 students and a large-scale trial of 59 students. The results show that: firstly, the DL and MKS-integrated instructional tools are stated as valid in terms of the lesson plan, student worksheet, and critical thinking test. Secondly, the practicality criteria have been successfully met; the learning implementation, students’ activity, and students' responses were regarded as in accordance with the feasibility standard. Thirdly, the instructional tool was deemed effective in enhancing students’ CTSs (p = 0.05).

The main topic of the presented article is the pedagogical concept of self-reflection of students of Social Education. The authors understand the pedagogical concept as primarily educational determinants that influence and shape students’ self-reflection. To identify this aim, the authors formulate the main research question: How do social education students reflect on themselves as students, and what are the determinants of study self-reflection for social pedagogy students? The authors used the qualitative research strategy, specifically The Grounded Theory, through which sixty self-reflecting essays were analysed. These written self-reflections were further complemented with six in-depth interviews in which we acquired clarifying information on self-reflection and self-assessment of social education students. It was ascertained that students’ self-reflection is shaped through an awareness of internal and external study factors, which subsequently influence the overall concept of their study, motivation to perform, study style, and self-assessment.

Teacher professional development (TPD) is an important component of enhancing student learning and school education quality. Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training is reforming education, including curricula, teaching methods, and textbooks. Many requirements have to been done to effectively implement the reform, and TPD is considered a significant contribution. Using data from an in-depth interview with the principal, teacher questionnaires, and school policy-related documents, this qualitative case-study research in a selected high school for gifted students in Central Vietnam aimed to find out how TPD had been implemented in response to education reforms in Vietnamese high schools. TPD was widely perceived and respected by the principal and teachers in this case study, and these positive perspectives were transferred into practice with numerous effectively employed TPD strategies at this high school for students’ enhanced learning and achievements.

The study focused on education students' learning experiences and the differences in their activities before and during the pandemic. This research was carried out at the NEUST Gabaldon Campus during the academic year 2020-2021 vacation. A study design that combines descriptive-comparative and descriptive-correlational elements. The descriptive-comparative design was used to compare the number of hours students spent sleeping, studying, using social media, and academic performance before and during the pandemic. The descriptive-correlation design, on the other hand, was used to determine the relationship between a student's academic performance (GPA) and the number of hours spent sleeping, studying, and using social media during the pandemic. The 171 education students who participated in the study were chosen through stratified random sampling. The findings revealed that there is a significant difference in the number of hours spent sleeping, studying, and using social media before and during the pandemic. However, there is no significant difference in students' academic performance before and during the pandemic. The study also discovered a highly significant link between the number of hours spent studying and academic performance and between the number of hours spent in social media and the number of hours spent studying. Nonetheless, there is no statistically significant relationship between students' academic performance and the number of hours they sleep and the use of social media during the pandemic. In addition, there is no link between the number of hours they sleep and the amount of time they spend studying and using social media. The students agree that there are benefits and drawbacks to flexible learning. The study's theoretical and practical implications were also discussed.

This article contributes to the evidence base on the significance of context in enacting social justice leadership. It draws on data from the International School Leadership Development Network of 20+ countries who adopted a common qualitative approach involving interviews with principals identified as being social justice leaders. The article focuses on four case studies of Irish principals in varying primary elementary school contexts. Findings reveal local contextual features significantly impacted principals' perceptions, actions, and self-efficacy as social justice leaders. While the actions and motivation of the principals is similar, two of the principals, working in school contexts where the values and norms are not consonant with broader society, appear to lack confidence in their practice of social justice leadership. This article extends the existing evidence base by arguing for enhanced critical consciousness of all stakeholders related to the personal, institutional and community contexts in schools. It recommends a more flexible and iterative process of policy development to facilitate a more nuanced understanding of the cultural and ideological struggles in schools. Finally, it calls for governments and policy makers to take responsibility for and support disadvantaged communities as education alone cannot solve the issue of inequity.

The cooperative learning (CL) is an advanced instructional approach that uses different motivational procedures to make instruction significant and learners more responsible. This study aimed to investigate the effects of cooperative learning on students' achievement in chemistry among the advanced level in 12-year basic education schools; it engaged a quasi-experimental design with one treatment group and a comparison group (control); the first applied cooperative learning in teaching organic chemistry while in the control group, organic chemistry was taught by the conventional teaching methods (CTM). A sample of 257 students participated in the study. The data collected used an organic Chemistry Achievement Test, and its data were analyzed using SPSS version 23.0 and MS Excel 2016. The ANCOVA results showed that learners taught using cooperative learning achieved better than their counterparts in the control group (F=78.07, df=1, 256, p<.001) with the learning gains of 16.0% in traditional methods and 53.6% of cooperative learning approach, respectively. However, there was no statistically significant difference in gender of students. It is recommended that chemistry teachers be trained on cooperative learning and encouraged to apply it in their teaching methods to enhance students' academic achievement.

The formed primary level and dynamic and sustainable development of technological competence provides quality management of teaching activities, increases the efficiency of the educational process, accelerates the achievement of pedagogical goals. Delphi expert assessment technique is increasingly used in the paradigm of pedagogy. Due to the set of advantages and objectivity of assessments, it has become the dominant method of this study. The objective of the study is to determine the current level of manifestation of technological competencies, as well as generalized prospects for development and improvement of the identified level within the selected group of freelance teachers using the technology of independent expert assessments –the Delphi method. In general, the following methods were used in the current study: methods of data collection and coordination, anonymous brainstorming, Delphi expert assessment technique, statistical and mathematical processing of results through Delphi formulas, comparative method, generalisations. The diversified approach to the interpretation of the technological competence of faculty members allowed determining: a) the level of faculty members’ knowledge of modern educational technologies at 89.1%; b) activity-practical aspect of training at 83.0%; c) dissonance between the theoretical and empirical level of teacher training and the algorithm for fulfilling the potential in practice at 21.5%; d) mastery of individual creative technologies for the organisation of an effective educational process at 55.9%; e) forecasted development of technological competencies of faculty members in the 5-year perspective under the condition of application of special control and skill trainings at 50.7%. Conclusion of the study is that according to the arithmetic mean of experts’ assessments of differentiated levels of technological competence, the overall level was 75.1%. The average result of the initial student survey on the estimating of the teachers’ technological competence was 69.7%. The difference of 5.4% between the data allows stating that both methods were relevant in this particular case.

Numeracy is one of the essential competencies that the objectives of teaching math to primary students should be towards. However, many research findings show that the problem of “innumeracy” frequently exists at primary schools. That means children still do not feel at home in the world of numbers and operations. Therefore, the paper aims to apply the realistic mathematics education (RME) approach to tackling the problem of innumeracy, in the case of teaching the multiplication of two natural numbers to primary students. We conducted a pedagogical experiment with 46 grade 2 students who have not studied the multiplication yet. The pedagogical experiment lasted in six lessons, included seven activities and nine worksheets which are designed according to fundamental principles of RME by researchers. This is mainly a qualitative study. Based on data obtained from classroom observations and students’ response on worksheets, under the perspective of RME, the article pointed out how mathematization processes took place throughout students' activities, their attitudes towards math learning, and their learning outcomes. The study results found that students were more interested in math learning and understood the concepts of multiplication of two natural numbers.

The purposes of this study were to explore factors and indicators of life and career skills and to develop a life and career skills in the 21st century test for undergraduate students. This research employed a mixed-method study adopting an exploratory design: instrument development model to generate research tools. This study was divided into two phases; Phase 1 was to explore factors and indicators of life and career skills in 21st century, by using a qualitative method to analyze relevant documents; Phase 2 was the development of a life and career skills in 21st century test by adopting a quantitative method to collect data from students studying in 12 universities of the north-eastern region of Thailand via the test. In the second phase, the data were analyzed by descriptive statistics and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) Results revealed that the skills consisted of 6 factors and 35 indicators, and the test comprised 105 items. The quality of the test has been examined by five expertise, the reliability of all test items is acceptable, and all 6 factors demonstrated good construct validity. Factor loadings of six factors were 0.7940 -1.7816. This study can be implemented to measure the life and career skills of undergraduate students in any university to obtain data for establishing a policy and plans for maximizing students’ potential to achieve their careers and a happy living in 21st century after their graduation.

Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) preventive measures influenced teachers directly. The sudden shift to new teaching environment emerged unknown challenges influencing teachers’ work differently. As self-efficacy is a key factor of successful teaching, the goal of our study was to examine the relationship among teachers’ efficacy-related experiences, work satisfaction and workload during the pandemic. 769 teachers (55 men and 677 female, 32 undefined) completed the online version of the Norwegian Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale and the Relative Self-Efficacy Scale. Findings indicated significant positive correlation between job satisfaction and self-efficacy as well as job satisfaction and the sense of competency. Kruskal-Wallis Test proved higher level of self-efficacy among teachers with more experience in online teaching in the past. According to SEM analysis, job satisfaction is predicted by efficacy beliefs concerning the sense of competence, motivation, coping and conflict resolution. Our findings indicate that experience in online teaching methods can enhance self-efficacy, which contributes to higher job satisfaction.

Online learning during the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has awakened and affirmed the necessity of learning based on digital technology. The article was aimed to analyze the effectiveness of online learning at bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees of Islamic Religious Education as a reference to develop a learning pattern post-COVID-19 pandemic. The research employed a mixed-method design with a concurrent triangulation model. The samples were taken using stratified random and purposive sampling. Meanwhile, the data were collected through questionnaires, in-depth interviews, and forum group discussion. A descriptive analysis and one-way analysis of variance were used to analyze the quantitative data, while interpretative descriptive for the qualitative data. The research showed that online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic at the bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees of Islamic Religious Education have been effective. In detail, online learning at the doctoral degree was the most effective among all. On the other hand, face-to-face learning is still necessary. Therefore, the learning pattern developed post-COVID-19 pandemic combines face-to-face and online learning (hybrid learning). The formulation is adjusted to the characteristics, educational purpose and orientation, level of ability, readiness, and learning autonomy of the students at each educational level.

Student dropout, defined as the temporary or definitive suspension of the exercise of the right to education, is attributable to multiple variables classified into individual, academic, institutional, and socioeconomic determinants which may be exacerbated in the context of the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. Consequently, this work aims to synthesize, from the available evidence, the behaviour and influence of the explanatory variables of school dropout in infant school, primary school and, high school in Colombia for the period 2014-2019 compared to the period 2020-2021 under the COVID-19 pandemic conditions. The research methodology consisted of a systematic review of 125 indexed articles for 2014-2019 and 32 reports related to dropout in Colombian Basic education for the 2020-2021 period. The systematic review of the 157 articles revealed that dropout was studied and explained in both time periods, mainly from the academic determinant whose most cited explanatory variables were: ‘teachers’, ‘curriculum’ and ‘methodologies used’. Moreover, it could be perceived that in the period 2014-2019, the socioeconomic variable was the second dropout determinant, considering ‘family income” as the most important indicator, while in 2020-2021 the “infrastructure” and the ‘political environment’ remained as the most dominant. Lastly, in 2020-2021, the variable ‘teachers’ was highly cited showing that their practice made students maintain their interest despite the physical distance.

Despite the ubiquity of professional learning communities (PLCs) among researchers, studies on PLCs have widely differed in terms of dimensions used to conceptualise them. Thus, the study aimed to validate the conceptual model consisting of PLCs practices. The study employed a quantitative method using a survey. Firstly, a pilot test was conducted in which 103 school-teachers were involved in completing a questionnaire. The Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) had determined six dimensions and 20 elements of PLCs practices. Then, the field study was conducted using the new questionnaire. The survey involved 386 school-teachers from 25 High Performing Schools (HPS). The result revealed that: I) Based on the Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), multidimensional PLCs practice model is evidence in the Malaysian context. They are operationalised in six dimensions including visions, missions and values, professional leadership, collective and collaborative culture, sharing of best practices, conducive school climate, and strategic alliances among stakeholders and, ii) The level of PLCs implementation in HPS is high for all the dimensions. The practical implications from the study and future research recommendations were also discussed.

The following article is a qualitative study that analyses the perception of parents and high school students regarding teaching in times of Coronavirus disease COVID-19, with the idea of recognizing the facilitators and barriers for the teaching-learning process in the pandemic. The above, in the understanding that due to the sudden appearance of SARS-CoV-2, educational systems around the world had to adapt to virtual teaching, as a result of the confinement to which the population has been subjected during the year 2020 and a good part of the year 2021. The research is based on the interpretative-comprehensive paradigm, with a qualitative methodology, which considered the realization of four focus groups with students and four focus groups with secondary school parents, from two public high schools located in the province of Talca, Maule region, Chile. The findings of the study are related to the adverse effects of the pandemic on student learning, as a result of connectivity difficulties, and the emotional impact on the quality of life of young people and their families. On the other hand, learning at home is related to limited pedagogical strategies and evaluative aspects that do not allow verifying the real learning of the students.

Students drop out of schools for many reasons, and it has negative effects on the individual and society. This paper reports a study using data published in 2015 from the Educational Longitudinal Study conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics to analyze the influence of parental involvement on low-achieving U.S. students’ graduation rates from high school. Findings indicate that both students and parents share the same perspective on the need for parental involvement in their academic progress. For low-achieving high school students, parental involvement in academic work is a positive factor influencing students’ graduation from high school.