Department of General Education and Language
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Item Augmented Reality: A Game-Changer for Pre-Service Teacher Preparation(Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc., 2023) Abusini, Bushra S.; Abulibdeh, Enas; Alghazo, Emad M.; Abulibdeh, AbdallahItem Avoiding the Phishing Bait: The Need for Conventional Countermeasures for Mobile Users(Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc., 2018-07-02) Baadel, Said; Thabtah, Fadi; Majeed, AsimItem A clustering approach for autistic trait classification(Taylor and Francis Ltd, 2020-07-02) Baadel, Said; Thabtah, Fadi; Lu, JoanMachine learning (ML) techniques can be utilized by physicians, clinicians, as well as other users, to discover Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) symptoms based on historical cases and controls to enhance autism screening efficiency and accuracy. The aim of this study is to improve the performance of detecting ASD traits by reducing data dimensionality and eliminating redundancy in the autism dataset. To achieve this, a new semi-supervised ML framework approach called Clustering-based Autistic Trait Classification (CATC) is proposed that uses a clustering technique and that validates classifiers using classification techniques. The proposed method identifies potential autism cases based on their similarity traits as opposed to a scoring function used by many ASD screening tools. Empirical results on different datasets involving children, adolescents, and adults were verified and compared to other common machine learning classification techniques. The results showed that CATC offers classifiers with higher predictive accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity rates than those of other intelligent classification approaches such as Artificial Neural Network (ANN), Random Forest, Random Trees, and Rule Induction. These classifiers are useful as they are exploited by diagnosticians and other stakeholders involved in ASD screening. © 2020 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.Item Costs and benefits of private tutoring programs: the South Korean case(Emerald Group Holdings Ltd., 2021) Hultberg, Patrik T.; Calonge, David Santandreu; Choi, TyPurpose: The purpose of the study is twofold: to offer a theoretical model that illuminates families' motivation to invest in private tutoring and to consider the implications of such investments in the context of South Korea. Given that parents invest in private tutoring for their child if the perceived expected benefits, at the time of enrollment, are greater than the direct and indirect costs of such tutoring, the study explores how private tutoring may affect educational inequities and possibly lead to inferior social outcomes. Design/methodology/approach: A theoretical model based on the human capital approach was developed. Three questions based on stylized facts were addressed: (1) Why would a household send a child to private tutoring? (2) Why do different households invest in different amounts of private tutoring? (3) Why may a household over-invest in private tutoring? Findings: The findings of this study indicate that the demand for private tutoring services decreases with the costs of private tutoring, while increasing as levels of academic readiness and aptitude, levels of household education, levels of current wealth and expected returns to private tutoring increase. These findings imply that private tutoring may exacerbate social inequities and cause an inferior social outcome, but that a government can influence the demand for tutoring through taxation. Research limitations/implications: This study did not address the non-pecuniary benefits that may be derived from private tutoring. The most important limitation and potential source of weakness of the study is that the model is theoretical. These results therefore need to be interpreted with caution. Practical implications: The study indicates the need for private households, as well as government officials, to carefully consider the costs and benefits of private tutoring in South Korea. Although the study focuses on South Korea, the findings may apply to other countries in which private tutoring offerings are prominent. Social implications: The educational choices that families make for their children have important financial and social implications in all countries, but especially in South Korea. The important implication is that private tutoring will tend to aggravate educational and social inequality. Originality/value: The existing body of research on private tutoring investment in South Korea suggests that the phenomenon is ubiquitous, growing and spreading to other countries. Furthermore, the motivation behind households' decisions to invest in private tutoring for their children is not always addressed in the published literature. Also, far too little attention has been paid to the economic impact private tutoring has on households and children, as well as society in general. © 2021, Emerald Publishing Limited.Item A Critical Examination of the Arab Undergraduate Students’ Perceptions of their Academic Arabic Proficiency in Three EMI Universities in the UAE(Canadian Center of Science and Education, 2019) Masri, Taghreed IbrahimThe overwhelming power that English enjoys has become a threat to many indigenous languages that are losing the battle against English dominance and hegemony. One facet for this threat is the use of English as a medium of instruction (EMI). The EMI policy has been a naturalized and taken-for-granted practice without questioning or problematizing. As a result, academic Arabic is almost absent from the academic scene in the UAE higher education. This study aims to problematize the use of English as medium of instruction at three universities in the United Arab Emirates. It also aims to critically explore the perceptions of Arab university students who were in Arabic schools, of their Arabic proficiency after studying at university. Based on critical theoretical framework and approached from interpretive and critical paradigms, the study used a mixed-methods approach of quantitative and qualitative data collection methods. 268 surveys and 20 semi-structured interviews showed that students were aware of the decline in their Arabic proficiency due to studying via English. Results also indicated that students showed symptoms of Academic language attrition. c2019 by the author(s).Item Cybersecurity awareness: A critical analysis of education and law enforcement methods(Slovene Society Informatika, 2021) Baadel, Said; Thabtah, Fadi; Lu, JoanAccording to the international Anti-Phishing Work Group (APWG), phishing activities have abruptly risen over the last few years, and users are becoming more susceptible to online and mobile fraud. Machine Learning techniques have potential for building technical anti-phishing models, with a handful already implemented in the real time environment. However, majority of them have yet to be applied in a real time environment and require domain experts to interpret the results. This gives conventional techniques a vital role as supportive tools for a wider audience, especially novice users. This paper reviews in-depth, common, phishing countermeasures including legislation, law enforcement, hands-on training, and education among others. A complete prevention layer based on the aforementioned approaches is suggested to increase awareness and report phishing to different stakeholders, including organizations, novice users, researchers, and computer security experts. Therefore, these stakeholders can understand the upsides and downsides of the current conventional approaches and the ways forward for improving them. © 2021 Slovene Society Informatika. All rights reserved.Item Data analytics : intelligent anti-phishing techniques based on machine learning(World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte Ltd, 2019) Baadel, Said; Lu, JoanAccording to the international body Anti-Phishing Work Group (APWG), phishing activities have skyrocketed in the last few years and more online users are becoming susceptible to phishing attacks and scams. While many online users are vulnerable and naive to the phishing attacks, playing catch-up to the phishers' evolving strategies is not an option. Machine Learning techniques play a significant role in developing effective anti-phishing models. This paper looks at phishing as a classification problem and outlines some of the recent intelligent machine learning techniques (associative classifications, dynamic self-structuring neural network, dynamic rule-induction, etc.) in the literature that is used as anti-phishing models. The purpose of this review is to serve researchers, organisations' managers, computer security experts, lecturers, and students who are interested in understanding phishing and its corresponding intelligent solutions. This will equip individuals with knowledge and skills that may prevent phishing on a wider context within the community. © 2019 World Scientific Publishing Co.Item Diversifying The Teaching Methods : Student’s Perceptions of Smart Learning(Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc., 2019-12) Abulibdeh, Enas; Abu Libdeh, Abdalla; Trayek, Fuad A.; Murshidi, GhadahThere is an increasing need for improving the e-learning systems and so integrating smart Applications into education is a useful communication tool in interactive educational environment for both learners and teachers. The introduction of smart Applications has revolutionized education by providing a smart learning environment creating a new style in learning known as smart learning. The main purpose of this study is to shed light on this new concept of learning and highlighting the attributes and features of smart classroom. It aims to investigate the student's perception of smart learning and their extent of using different smart learning tools. The study was conducted at several Universities in the United Arab Emirates sampling 411 students enrolled in different programs. © 2019 IEEE.Item Divided difference operators in equivariant KK-theory(World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., 2014) Leung, Ho HonLet G be a compact connected Lie group with a maximal torus T. Let A, B be G-C*-algebras. We define certain divided difference operators on Kasparov's T-equivariant KK-group KKT(A, B) and show that KK G(A, B) is a direct summand of KKT(A, B). More precisely, a T-equivariant KK-class is G-equivariant if and only if it is annihilated by an ideal of divided difference operators. This result is a generalization of work done by Atiyah, Harada, Landweber and Sjamaar. © 2014 World Scientific Publishing Company.Item Education policy in South Korea : a contemporary model of human capital accumulation?(Cogent OA, 2017) Hultberg, Patrik; Calonge, David Santandreu; Kim, Seong-HeeWe argue that South Korean families with children are today overinvesting in the level of education due to their high levels of expenditures on private after-school tutoring programs. This situation has evolved due to a combination of factors: a changing labor market, increasing housing and debt payments, as well as an educational “arms race” among Korean families with children. These changes are exacerbating both economic and social issues in Korean society, but are increasingly difficult to address due to issues of complementarity and coordination failures related to educational expenditures. Korea might be inexorably falling into a surprising “education trap.”. © 2017 The Author(s).Item English Medium Instruction and Human Linguistic Rights: Academic, Psychological and Cultural Suffering(Brill | Nijhoff, 2020) Masri, Taghreed IbrahimIn higher education in the UAE, English is used as the medium of instruction, while academic Arabic is relegated to few electives that can be also taken in English. Policy makers perceive the transition from Arabic medium instruction (ami) schools to English medium instruction (emi) universities as normal and automatic. This study aims to explore how students see this transition, and whether they find it automatic and smooth, or embroiled in hardship and difficulties. It is based on a critical theoretical framework and is approached using exploratory critical methodology. Twenty semi-structured interviews were conducted with twenty undergraduate Arab students in three English-medium universities. Results showed that students faced psychological, academic, social and cultural difficulties associated with the transition from Arabic schools to English-medium instruction universities.Item Equivariant structure constants for hamiltonian-T -spaces(TUBITAK, 2014) Leung, Ho HonIf there exists a set of canonical classes on a compact Hamiltonian-T -space in the sense of R Goldin and S Tolman, we derive some formulas for certain equivariant structure constants in terms of other equivariant structure constants and the values of canonical classes restricted to some fixed points. These formulas can be regarded as a generalization of Tymoczko's results. © TÜBİTAK.Item Exploratory study on the impact of game-based learning on student engagement(Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc., 2015) Yousef, Dima; Baadel, Said; Makad, RamaMotivating students has always been the main concern of seasoned and new teachers. This is evident as they plan their lessons meticulously to ensure that their students are actively engaged in some form of activity or preparing for a task. The purpose of the paper is to examine the advantages, obstacles, and impact of using games on student engagement and involvement throughout the learning process. The findings will reveal that game-based learning has a profound and positive outcome on student level of motivation, comprehension, and retention of newly taught concepts. © 2014 IEEE.Item Facial recognition cane for the visually impaired(Springer Verlag, 2016) Majeed, Asim; Baadel, SaidThe modern era is accompanied by various traditional mobility aids which help visually impaired to stay independent and enabling them detecting the objects and scanning surroundings. The use of haptic touch, as well as ultrasound, is embedded in today’s smart canes which detect obstacles up to 3 m distance, GPS navigation, informs the user through Bluetooth and earpiece, and guide the visually impaired to direct from one location to another. The evolution of this technology has motivated the integration of inexpensive camera technology within the cane for facial recognition purposes. The concept of developing this intelligent smart cane which would detect obstacles from up to 10 m as well as recognises friends and family faces, was envisioned by students at Birmingham City University. The developments in this product and adopted technologies guide a visually impaired user to detect obstacles and to find an alternative route while at the same time try to recognize any family or friends within the vicinity. These have been reflected in this research paper along with the limitations and wider issues which may come up when adopting the high-tech advances. © Springer International Publishing AG 2016.Item Faculty perceptions of online presence: intercultural considerations(Emerald Publishing, 2023-10-30) Yousef, Dima; Takshe, Aseel A.; Contu, DavidePurpose: The Covid-19 pandemic forced educational institution to rapidly switch to online delivery. Even if the pandemic seems to be over, online learning will continue to constitute at least a part of the course’s delivery in the future. With that in mind, this study aims to explore the factors that influence teaching presence online and how these perceptions will guide teachers to adopt practices that will impact their presence accordingly. Given the changes implemented due to the pandemic, this study is essential to identify the significance of teaching and social presence in online classes. Design/methodology/approach: Semi-structured interviews were used to find answers to the posed research questions. Exploring the perceptions and experiences of four university teachers, this study, informed by the community of inquiry (CoI) model, investigated the impact of teaching and social presence on the online learning experience in higher education. Findings: The findings indicate that teachers acknowledged the importance of these two elements in teaching online. Moreover, the study investigates how teachers could establish teaching and social presence to enhance the online learning experience. Originality/value: The study explores teachers’ views on the importance of presence, their practices to achieve in an online learning environment and addresses a gap in the literature on “teaching presence from the educator’s perspective, [since] most studies exploring the student’s perspective” (Gurley, 2018, p. 200). © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.Item Frugal MOOCs: An adaptable contextualized approach to MOOC designs for refugees(Athabasca University, 2019-12) Shah, Mariam Aman; Calonge, David SantandreuThere is a growing body of literature that recognizes the role Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) can play in improving access to education globally, and particularly to thousands of people in developing and developed countries. There is increasing concern, however, that the millions of displaced refugee learners throughout Europe, the Middle East, and other regions are still disadvantaged when it comes to engaging in learning through MOOCs. The reasons for this disadvantage range from a lack of appropriate infrastructure or other supporting structures, to a lack of contextualized content. So far, little attention has been paid to contextualized MOOC models, which may both impact policies and be adapted to the specific needs of these learners who often do not have the means to access many education opportunities. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to propose a frugally-engineered MOOC model that addresses the barriers of access and participation for refugees. This paper engages in an exploratory research methodology, using findings from the literature and expert opinions gathered through interviews. These findings lead to the development of what the authors call a Frugal MOOC Model which can be contextualized to meet the needs of refugee learners. The paper goes on to highlight the development of the Frugal MOOC Model as the first phase of an ongoing study. It concludes with recommendations for the next phase of the study: how to implement the newly developed model. © Athabasca University.Item Global triumph or exploitation of security and privacy concerns in E-learning systems(Springer Verlag, 2016) Majeed, Asim; Baadel, Said; Haq, Anwar UlThis paper identifies the causes of privacy concerns which emerged when an educational institution launched an automated proctoring technology to examine E-Learners. In the modern era of information, privacy is an integral concern due to its fluid, dynamic and complex nature. In certain situations where it is very difficult to understand the privacy concerns, privacy is often misunderstood by the interactive systems designers. The qualitative data in this research was collected using content analysis approach from 120 online bloggers and useful insights were found; those that pertained to the privacy concerns for E-Learners. The findings revealed both practical and theoretical implications for both the institutions offering online courses and organization designing tools for proctoring. © Springer International Publishing AG 2016.Item Internet of everything (IoE) exploiting organisational inside threats : global network of smart devices (GNSD)(Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc., 2016) Majeed, Asim; Haq, Anwar Ul; Jamal, Arshad; Bhana, Rehan; Banigo, Funke; Baadel, SaidVarious disruptive technologies have evolved a paradigm for setting up the Internet-of-Everything (IoE) and continuous evolution of technologies has demanded those devices to communicate and exchange information with each other. The marketing research company Gartner has surveyed and estimated that around 30 billion devices would be interconnected and exchanging information by 2020. The IoE is accompanied by several substantial opportunities in all fields of life, ranging from the energy sector to the healthcare industry. The trail of IoE development has opened new doors of attack vectors. The evolution in the plethora of ubiquitous devices has raised several insider threats, thus generating concerns of security and privacy within enterprises who have framed the use of smart devices through IoE. This paper discusses a different perspective of security and privacy issues in IoE by considering insiders bringing personal smart devices to use within the enterprise. The central theme of this research is to identify the challenges and explore the extent of security and privacy issues a global network of smart devices could exacerbate within the enterprise. © 2016 IEEE.Item Managerial Recruitment Issues in China: The Expatriate Factor(Springer Science and Business Media B.V., 2017) Kabene, Stefane; Baadel, SaidWith China becoming the world’s largest economy, it must somehow manage the existing human capital. The problem lies in the lack of managerial talent currently located in China. This paper attempts to look how China is currently recruiting managers and examines the factors hindering the recruitment of Chinese-born and expatriate managers. China is recruiting managers using the same methods as the Western world. However, a strong emphasis is put on a factor known as guanxi. The shortage of Chinese-born managers can be attributed to financial reasons and the lack of education and government commitment. China’s culture is a major factor hindering the success of expatriates as well as the organizational structure in China because of the socialist culture. These issues must be addressed to attract managers into China to successfully compete in a globalized economy. © 2017, Springer International Publishing Switzerland.Item MCOKE: Multi-Cluster Overlapping K-Means Extension Algorithm(World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology, 2015) Baadel, Said; Thabtah, Fadi; Lu, JoanClustering involves the partitioning of n objects into k clusters. Many clustering algorithms use hard-partitioning techniques where each object is assigned to one cluster. In this paper we propose an overlapping algorithm MCOKE which allows objects to belong to one or more clusters. The algorithm is different from fuzzy clustering techniques because objects that overlap are assigned a membership value of 1 (one) as opposed to a fuzzy membership degree. The algorithm is also different from other overlapping algorithms that require a similarity threshold be defined a priori which can be difficult to determine by novice users.