Workshops

IEEE-TLT is one of the major journals sponsored by the Education Society; and  the Technical Committee on Immersive Learning Environments (TC-ILE) is a new and growing community in the same society. The aim of this workshop is to connect the research and publishing community with the TLT journal and the TC-ILE community through knowledge sharing and networking activities. We propose to hold a 90-Minute Hybrid event during the main conference open for all EduCon 2023 participants. TC-ILE members and IEEE TLT editors are welcome to join and help facilitate this workshop. This workshop will zoom in on how to write and publish in indexed journals such as TLT. We will also  introduce TC- ILE and working groups, to explore and initiate research and development collaborations.

Have you ever struggled to get your students interested in your classroom? To get them engaged and pay attention to your lesson? Today's learners are very different from older generations; not only are they tech savvy but they also have short spans of attention if something isn’t interesting to them. Gamification and Game-Based-Learning, can be very effective to increase motivation and engagement of learners in the classroom. Changing the traditional way of education is very challenging. Not only is it difficult to convince educational leaders that games and video games can serve as powerful educational tools, but also many educators don’t know how to integrate games into their curriculum.

Engineering education has nuances that require a balanced mix of talented teachers, learning resources and a supportive environment for learning. These factors become increasingly important in the global south where resources are limited hence affecting both talent and learning environment. Educators in these environments therefore have to do twice as much to accomplish effective STEM education for their learners, the students. The imbalance becomes more skewed when gender biases come into play for instance for the African girl child. Without a good foundational and relatable understanding of how circuits and systems factor into her daily life, the idea of Engineering becomes a distant thought. In this workshop, we share our experience and expertise on how to engage and bring out the engineer in the disenfranchised girl who may not have much of an opportunity to interact with engineering.

It is no doubt that in an era of digital transformation, computer programs are integral to society and business. Thus, Introductory programming courses (IPC) are now a mandatory part of most undergraduate programs. IPCs are usually challenging to some students, and high dropout rates are reported. The research community has addressed the problem extensively providing multidisciplinary improvisations in curriculum, pedagogical methods, cognitive aspects, supporting tools, and in designing assessments. Having a user-centered adaptive learning system, taking into consideration the individual needs and learning abilities of the student, can be the solution. However, the current state of knowledge and practice in this field is limited. In an attempt to fill in this gap, our aim is to develop what we call "The Habit of Coding": by getting students motivated to learn and work autonomously, losing their fears of coding. In other words, how can coding be a regular habit in the student's life that they motivate themselves to do and learn. We believe that having a habit of coding is the same as developing a habit in any other life skill, and it can suffer the same pitfalls. The aim of this workshop is to discuss the effectiveness of student-centered learning environments, tips and tricks to develop a habit of coding, and how to apply pink's theory of intrinsic motivation (Autonomy, Mastery, and Purpose) to developing programming skills.