This paper analyzes the key determinants of the quality of preschool education in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Based on the analysis of recent data, the paper indicates the status and development trends in this regard in the last decade. Although preschool education in Bosnia and Herzegovina has a long tradition, it is facing a number of challenges, mostly arising from the arrangement of the state system and post-war transition processes which have significantly impoverished this level of education. Therefore, the main goal of this paper is to point out the recent public policy efforts made in the attempt to ensure the quality of preschool education in Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as the effects that are being achieved in this regard. Since quality can be approached from the aspects of structure and process, the elementary structural and process dimensions of preschool education will be taken as units of this analysis. Conceptualizing the results of this analysis, the status and quality of preschool education in Bosnia and Herzegovina will be positioned through an orientation towards the European framework for the quality and development trends of preschool education in Europe.

The aim of this article is to highlight the history of social work in Kosovo, regarding the major political climate from 1945 to the present. Unfavorable political developments that have existed in Kosovo for a long historical period have made it impossible to develop the social work profession compared to the countries of the region. Although the Former Yugoslav Federation claimed to be a socialist country, the social differences between states and provinces within this were large. The findings of the paper show that social work did not develop in Kosovo as a profession until specific structures, such as the emergence of the University of Pristina as a legal structure of education for Kosovo Albanians, which has been offering a degree program in social work for almost a decade now. The political orientation and organizational infrastructure are highly relevant for the execution and education of social work. Literature review is the methodological framework of this paper. Education and social work have been shown to be an extraordinary opportunity for the transformation of society.

The loss of direct experiences with nature among today's children is of concern as it affects their conservation willingness (CW). While little is known about the influence of live experiences on CW, much less is known about how these events are related. This study aimed to examine the serial mediating effects of biodiversity knowledge (BK) and affective attitudes (AA) on the relationship between live experiences with species and CW. An online questionnaire was administered to 429 school children (11-12 years) in the Maldives. A two-serial mediation analysis revealed that live experiences exerted significant negative direct and positive indirect effects on CW. Thus, although a predictive sequential pathway from live experiences to BK to AA to CW was confirmed, partial mediation involving other mediators or moderators is likely. The direct effects of live experiences on BK and AA and of BK on AA suggest that experiential learning that stimulates AA is necessary to achieve overall positive impacts on CW. Therefore, educators and policymakers are critical in providing first-hand experiences to instill positive biodiversity conservation traits in children, enabling successful education for sustainable development and long-term biodiversity conservation.

COVID-19 pandemic forces training for principals to be conducted online. This study aims to evaluate the context, input, process, response, study, behavior, and outcome to determine the effectiveness and make recommendations for training. The approach used in this study was a mixed method with a concurrent embedded design and a qualitative method as the main method. The subjects of this study were the principals, committees, and instructors. Data were collected through interviews, observations, and questionnaires and analyzed using Miles and Huberman's model, descriptive analysis, and a t-test. The results show that e-training is effective in context, input, and process. Response, learning, and attitude assessments prove that knowledge, skills, and attitude have improved. Participants will be able to implement the experience gained and impact school quality improvement. This study contributes to the combination of the two evaluation models proven to produce a complete result. The study for the e-training recommends needed assessment before the training, the activity before the training to acquire the skills in using the learning management system, and the monitoring and evaluation after the training.

Nowadays, Peruvian physicians commonly give oral medical reports to a patient´s family in English. For this reason, this research seeks to demonstrate the effectiveness of an Intervention Program for improving oral skills through role-playing activities, one hand, and, on the other, it aims to discover the kind of motivation, both goals in 40 students belonging to the Medicine Faculty of Universidad Nacional de Piura. This study has two parts, in the first quantitative phase, it measured the level of oral skills in these students, through an oral pre-test. After that, the students participated in an intervention program consisting of role-playing activities where the doctors usually use radiography to explain a medical condition. Then, the students were evaluated on their oral skills using an imaginary hospital situation similar to the pre-test. In the second part, the qualitative phase measured the Motivation of these students using the Attitude Motivation Test Battery (AMTB) in addition, a semi-structured interview could support the findings obtained in the aforementioned survey. The main findings were the improvement of oral skills and both Integrative and instrumental motivation in these students thanks to role-playing activities application.

The present research aimed to test an Amharic version of the multi-dimensional Work Task Motivation Scale for Teachers (WTMST), which measures the five pillars of university instructors’ motivation toward teaching and student evaluation tasks based on self-determination theory (SDT). Therefore, the WTMST offers the first instrument to measure all five motivational elements, and today it is one of the most applicable instruments to assess teachers’ motivation. An Amharic version of the WTMST for teaching and student evaluation tasks was adopted and assessed in large-scale data (N=1,117). Our findings demonstrate excellent reliability and construct validity (convergent, discriminant, divergent and factorial). Besides, the results of the model comparisons provided that out of the four theoretically competing models (single-order factor, correlated factor, higher-order factor and bi-factor models), the bi-factor model was the most-fitted one used for measurement invariance across various groups. Results also suggest that the factor structure of the WTMST for both teaching and student evaluation tasks demonstrate consistency across gender (men, women), university types (research, applied, and general university), age and experience in teaching. Therefore, the WTMST for teaching and student evaluation tasks may be valid in Ethiopian higher education settings.

COVID-19 and the expansion of distance learning pose new challenges to the educational system. Soft skills are imperative in this context, for children's effective and adaptive learning. The following study aims to discover teachers' representations by identifying their common conceptual framework of soft skills in primary school. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with teachers. The teachers' comments helped identify and define a framework of soft skills that would help children learn effectively. The results illustrate that the lack of practice of soft skills activities depends on the teachers' perceptions of the importance of their role in transmitting disciplinary knowledge. The study concluded that the lack of a clear and shared vision of soft skills influences the representations and practice of teachers.

The study aims to identify how kindergarten teachers perform early literacy assessments in the classroom and the challenges these teachers have in performing such assessments. During the study, the data were gathered through an in-depth interview in the form of a forum group discussion (FGD). Then, the phenomenological data were attained from 30 public and private Kindergarten teachers. The researchers could illustrate how these kindergarten teachers assessed their children's early literacy through these data. Furthermore, the study results show that the teachers' literacy knowledge has been sufficient and that the literacy programs for the children have been variously designed in each school. The teachers' techniques in performing the early literacy assessment are observation and documentation (portfolio), and the measurement of literacy skills itself refers to the scope of literacy. Concerning the findings, numerous obstacles and expectations that kindergarten teachers have are also discussed within the study.

Teacher agency is a set of actions that a teacher takes beyond what is generally expected of them. The concept merits examination, as agency can bolster teachers’ ability to set and achieve professional development goals. To better understand how to study, and use, this relatively new concept in the academic literature, a systematic review of 164 publications written by researchers from 41 countries was conducted in order to document the research approaches used to study teacher agency, the participants whose agency was documented in a school setting, the methodology used and the type of analysis performed. The study found that teacher agency has been documented qualitatively in the form of case studies comprising interviews of a small number of individuals, with no consensus in terms of interview protocol. In most cases, the results are analyzed using emergent coding. The way that agency is documented varies but is most often underpinned by an ecological approach.

This descriptive research study aimed to assess the management of the existing policies, guidelines, and procedures on the implementation of the interdisciplinary approach in performance-based assessment (IAPA) before and during Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) as a basis for proposing improvements for its implementation in the “new normal”. 30 senior high school science teachers and school leaders from 5 private and 5 public schools in Metro Manila, Philippines, participated in this study. The participants assessed the management of existing policies, guidelines, and procedures on the IAPA’s implementation using a survey questionnaire and identified its strengths and weaknesses using an interview guide. The researchers developed the instruments used for data collection but subjected to experts’ validation and reliability test. Results reveal that the management of IAPA was effective and that it benefits students and teachers in many ways. However, it has also weaknesses, which are associated with the role of school leaders in the implementation of the policies, guidelines, and/or procedures, especially during the new normal education setting. The study provides suggestions for improving IAPA implementation in the new normal covering both the face-to-face and online learning modalities

The purpose of this study was to explore the factor structure of a measurement and to evaluate its internal reliability. Overall, 525 math-majoring elementary school teachers volunteered to participate in this study by answering online survey questions via Google Form. These samples were randomly partitioned into 262 participants for exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and 263 observations for confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The EFA tended to largely prefer a four-factor solution, which was proven to explain over 68% of the variation in the data. Awareness, effectiveness, engagement, and opportunity were the provisional labels for these hidden variables. The CFA results verified and validated the four-factor model, with all test measures exceeding the specified thresholds, suggesting an acceptable and excellent fit. The results of this study, on the one hand, provide four key areas for realistic math teachers, educators, and policymakers to discuss as opposed to examining individual indicators, and on the other hand, they serve as a foundation for interested researchers to conduct additional analyses, such as multivariate linear regression or complement for cluster analysis.

This study explored the effects of collaborative writing strategies on students' writing skills and self-efficacy. The study used a mixed methods design combining quantitative and qualitative approaches. Several instruments were used in data collection, including questionnaires, writing tests, writing assessment rubrics, and semi-structured interviews. The participants were randomly divided into two groups: the experimental group and the control group, which comprised 62 students. Data from the questionnaire and writing tests were analyzed using one-way MANOVA and MANCOVA tests, while interview data were explored using thematic analysis techniques. Participants were randomly divided into two groups: the experimental group and the control group. The results showed that collaborative writing strategies could improve students' writing skills and self-efficacy. Moreover, the qualitative results showed that most students responded positively to using these strategies to improve their writing skills and self-efficacy.

The aim of this study was to investigate how the use of the technologized model of critical thinking development affected the self-study process of students of higher educational institutions (HEIs). The research methodology was based on a combination of qualitative and quantitative empirical methods, as well as a descriptive approach to data analysis. The study involved a quasi-experimental model supposed to influence the variables under study. The technology-based educational model of autonomous learning with a focus on the critical thinking development in students of HEIs consisted of the following processes, such as: communication, analysis, synthesis, problem-solving, evaluation, and reflection. The Watson Glaser Test was adapted to monitor the level of students’ critical thinking. The average score on the final control of students’ knowledge was used to monitor the experimental group students’ performance. By monitoring the development of students’ critical thinking and the dynamics of their performance in the course of training, where 90% of the time students studied independently, it was established that the use of a technological educational model had a positive effect on the critical thinking of students of HEIs, and as a result, the effectiveness of their self-study.

Teachers play an important role in helping students improve their learning and achieve the intended curriculum outcomes. Therefore, it is essential to look at teachers’ knowledge, understanding, and perceptions of any educational innovation. The present study aims to examine knowledge, understanding and perceptions of Rwandan science teachers with respect to the competence-based curriculum (CBC) introduced in 2015. The 2015 curriculum framework included features like the rationale for its adoption, the concept of competence, different competences to be developed by learners upon CBC implementation, principles guiding CBC implementation, and cross-cutting issues to be addressed by CBC implementation. This research is a multiple case study that adopted a qualitative approach with interpretivism paradigm. Twelve science teachers from three secondary schools, selected based on their differing teaching experience, participated in the study. Data were collected through semi-structured face-to-face interviews. The data were transcribed and qualitatively analyzed using content analysis. The findings revealed some satisfactory knowledge, understanding and perceptions of science teachers. Further, knowledge and understanding gaps as well as negative perceptions of CBC were identified. Towards the effective and efficient implementation of the CBC, this research suggests appropriate training and establishment of the school community of practices for improving teachers’ experience of the CBC.

This qualitative study is part of a feasibility study conducted by State University of Malang (SUM), Indonesia, to determine stakeholder needs for a study program specializing in managing bilingual education. The study participants included one SUM lecturer who held a managerial position in the division of SUM laboratory schools and twelve teachers/leaders of bilingual schools in some cities in East Java and South Sulawesi. Data were collected using an online questionnaire and in-depth interviews with two selected participants. The results indicate issues related to teachers' English competencies, materials development, and integrating an internationally-oriented curriculum into the national curriculum. Teachers' low English competencies prevented them from conducting teaching and learning bilingually and developing instructional materials in appropriate English. In addition, the combination of national and international curricula was identified as the biggest challenge for bilingual schools. The teachers/leaders were never trained to manage the bilingual program. They learned based on their experiences, and it took years to figure out how to manage bilingual programs successfully. Therefore, the establishment of a new program of study is needed.

This study aims to investigate lecturers' needs for academic writing learning materials and determine their prototypes. This study is qualitative research in the form of an exploratory case study. The research instruments were semi-open-ended questionnaires and unstructured and open-ended interview guides. The data were analyzed using content analysis. The results show that the developed learning material for academic writing skills contains seven needs for lecturers in the Department of Indonesian Language and Literature. Four of them have not been found by previous researchers. The results from this study provide new knowledge and contribution to the literature about the need to prototype the learning materials. The lecturers or other researchers can use these seven needs in prototyping learning materials for academic writing skills, such as the needs of learning materials, their forms, presentation system, language use, evaluation form, main menu design, and the way of creating learning materials.

Under the influence of neo-liberalism and marketization, education is increasingly becoming more content-focused than character one. Ignoring the fact that money, science, and technology may take a person to the moon, these are ethical and moral values that take him/her to the even loftier heights of humanity. Recent COVID-19-driven focus on information and communication technology (ICT) and digital learning have further added to these woes by focusing more on human-machine interaction than human-human ones. Traditional models for inculcating these values through education which heavily rely on the physical presence of teachers do not seem to work in these circumstances. This demands a model for inculcating these values in learning management systems/ e-learning platforms. This study contributes in this regard by first identifying key players and factors, and then proposing a model for it. Using the Delphi model, it gathers opinions from 59 experts in two rounds. Academic institutions, society and online community members, teachers, and e-contents were identified as key factors and players. It suggests a holistic approach-based model through which all of them play their role and collaborate through an e-learning platform. That platform can be used to disseminate information, create awareness, monitor, and report the e-learners. It uses pull and push strategies to help the e-learners to develop those values.

The successful application of the problem-based learning (PBL) approach requires feedback from the tutor to the student to guide the latter's learning process. The aim of this study was to characterise the views of a group of Chilean undergraduate students of Primary Teaching and their tutors regarding PBL methodology, and the role of feedback in it. Qualitative research was carried out based on a case study that gathered the views of students and tutors through a focus group. The methods of analysis adapted to the needs of this study are those derived from discourse analysis and especially from discourse in interaction in its three dimensions: interlocution (framework of participation), thematic (topic of discussion) and enunciative (enunciative positioning). The results indicate that students' views emphasised the inter-student collaboration involved in PBL, while tutors emphasised the motivational value of the methodology. However, both recognised the important role that feedback plays in enhancing learning opportunities. Knowing the views of both tutors and learners is central to improving PBL and feedback practices.

Teaching a subject in a vocational high school (VHS) requires specialized instructional design strategies. Recently, instructional VHS used a computer-based platform to teach theory and practice. The computer will assist teachers in creating instructional media. This study aims to design augmented reality-based virtual laboratory media for electro-pneumatic practicum learning in order to ease teachers and students to learn the pneumatic practice. It is specially designed for practical learning purposes. The method used in this research is research and development. The assessment results from Instructional design experts 4.5, material experts 4.5, media experts 4.4, and language experts 4.8. Based on the assessment of experts, this augmented reality-based virtual laboratory media is feasible to use. Next, the results of this study are a prototype of students' pneumatic practice tools installed on mobile phones consisting of eight worksheets. In the designed augmented reality media, 1) 3-dimensional pneumatics can be rotated in all directions so that students understand. 2) Pneumatic job sheet, where on the augmented reality media designed for the simulation circuit, there is an explanation of the components and how they work, and a simulation through markers.

It is important for students who learn history to have the skills to think, read and analyze historical sources because past events can only be reconstructed and understood from these numerous resources. Various media methods are needed to support the development of these skills, especially in online learning. Therefore, this research aims to create a virtual field trip (VFT) based history learning media to help students improve their thinking skills using primary source evidence. It was carried out by using the research and development (R&D) method consisting of four stages, namely analysis, designs, conducting trials, and testing media effectiveness. The sample subjects consisted of six teams as expert validators, seven history teachers, 70 and 280 Class X students who assessed the product's practicality and determined the developed media's effectiveness. Data were collected through expert validation, student and teacher response questionnaire sheets, as well as description exams. The level of validity and practicality of the medium were determined using descriptive analysis, while the N-Gain approach evaluated the media's effectiveness. The expert validation result is very good, with an average score of 3.77. The teacher and student response tests showed an average score of 4.67, indicating that the VFT medium is practical for learning history. The N-Gain value of 72% showed that the students' abilities to use primary source evidence are increasing. Therefore, using VFT based history classes to develop explanation skills using primary source evidence is feasible, practical, and useful.