Sahabat-AI would enable Indonesians to build artificial intelligence-based services and applications in Bahasa Indonesia and various other local languages, with the understanding of local context, the companies said in a joint statement.

Look at your organization and consider the unstructured text or audio data you gather and the possible revelations it may hold. That data reflects the voices of those you serve and holds the potential to help you deliver better experiences, improve quality of care and enrich human engagement. There are powerful stories to be told from your unstructured text data. And the best way for you to find them is with natural language processing.

Text analytics and natural language processing are not new concepts. Most knowledge management professionals have been grappling with these technologies for years. From the KM perspective, these technologies share the same fundamental purpose: They help get the right information to employees at the right time.

During her visit to Kosovo from 7 to 10 June 2016, the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities Astrid Thors focused on education, implementation of the framework of language rights and access to justice.

The High Commissioner continues to urge for the adoption of the Strategy for the Protection and Promotion of Language Rights, contending that it will make the implementation of legislation more efficient and improve the quality and the consistency of different language versions of legal acts. “When in place, the strategy will lead to positive results quickly,” said Thors.

The visit included Prishtinë/Priština, Mitrovicë/Mitrovica, Prizren, Janjevë/Janjevo and Gračanica/Gracanicë where Thors met with ministers, local authorities, media representatives, judges, university professors and students, as well as representatives of the international community. The High Commissioner was joined in several meetings by the Head of the OSCE Mission in Kosovo Jean-Claude Schlumberger.

Thors commended the recent adoption of an administrative instruction of the Ministry of Education Science and Technology, which will make it easier for members of non-majority communities to pursue studies at universities in Kosovo as it, among others issues, improves the functioning of the existing quota system.

Whilst visiting the University of Prizren, the High Commissioner expressed concern that courses taught in Turkish and Bosnian have not yet received official accreditation for the next academic year. Such courses cater to the fundamental needs of non-majority communities in Kosovo. “I encourage relevant authorities to take urgent measures so that these options remain available also the next academic year,” said Thors.

High Commissioner Thors discussed extensively with a number of stakeholders the prospective establishment of the Association/Community of Serb majority municipalities as well as ways to overcome the current stalemate in the process. She heard views on the need to respect the relevant legal framework but also to meet the expectations of concerned communities, in north Kosovo as elsewhere. Thors also noted the concerns expressed by Serbs living outside Serb majority municipalities, as well as non-Serb non-majority communities, who fear they will not benefit from the process.

In several meetings Thors pointed to the need to improve access to justice for all non-majority communities, to thoroughly follow up on crimes targeting them, as well as to fully enforce their property rights. “When such crimes are investigated and prosecuted, it sends a powerful and reassuring message to non-majority communities that their rights will be effectively protected by the authorities.”

On the last day of her visit, Thors attended a class of Serbian language instruction for Kosovo Albanian officials from the municipality of Prishtinë/Priština, part of a flagship partnership project on language acquisition by municipal officials sponsored by the Office of the Language Commissioner and the HCNM, with German funding, and implemented by the ECMI Kosovo.

The visit served to underline the importance attached by the High Commissioner to language learning as a key building block for integrated societies: “Speaking more than one language is beneficial, both for the person who speaks them and for society as a whole; it is even more important for local government officials, who regularly engage with members of public, to be able to communicate with every person in their community.”

Related Stories

• OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities calls for renewed dialogue between all political and social actors in Croatia
• OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities holds fifth regional summer school on multilingual and multicultural education in Central Asia
• High Commissioner Thors, in her OSCE Permanent Council address, discusses country engagement and highlights the increase in hate speech targeting national minorities

During her visit to Kosovo from 7 to 10 June 2016, the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities Astrid Thors focused on education, implementation of the framework of language rights and access to justice.

The High Commissioner continues to urge for the adoption of the Strategy for the Protection and Promotion of Language Rights, contending that it will make the implementation of legislation more efficient and improve the quality and the consistency of different language versions of legal acts. “When in place, the strategy will lead to positive results quickly,” said Thors.

The visit included Prishtinë/Priština, Mitrovicë/Mitrovica, Prizren, Janjevë/Janjevo and Gračanica/Gracanicë where Thors met with ministers, local authorities, media representatives, judges, university professors and students, as well as representatives of the international community. The High Commissioner was joined in several meetings by the Head of the OSCE Mission in Kosovo Jean-Claude Schlumberger.

Thors commended the recent adoption of an administrative instruction of the Ministry of Education Science and Technology, which will make it easier for members of non-majority communities to pursue studies at universities in Kosovo as it, among others issues, improves the functioning of the existing quota system.

Whilst visiting the University of Prizren, the High Commissioner expressed concern that courses taught in Turkish and Bosnian have not yet received official accreditation for the next academic year. Such courses cater to the fundamental needs of non-majority communities in Kosovo. “I encourage relevant authorities to take urgent measures so that these options remain available also the next academic year,” said Thors.

High Commissioner Thors discussed extensively with a number of stakeholders the prospective establishment of the Association/Community of Serb majority municipalities as well as ways to overcome the current stalemate in the process. She heard views on the need to respect the relevant legal framework but also to meet the expectations of concerned communities, in north Kosovo as elsewhere. Thors also noted the concerns expressed by Serbs living outside Serb majority municipalities, as well as non-Serb non-majority communities, who fear they will not benefit from the process.

In several meetings Thors pointed to the need to improve access to justice for all non-majority communities, to thoroughly follow up on crimes targeting them, as well as to fully enforce their property rights. “When such crimes are investigated and prosecuted, it sends a powerful and reassuring message to non-majority communities that their rights will be effectively protected by the authorities.”

On the last day of her visit, Thors attended a class of Serbian language instruction for Kosovo Albanian officials from the municipality of Prishtinë/Priština, part of a flagship partnership project on language acquisition by municipal officials sponsored by the Office of the Language Commissioner and the HCNM, with German funding, and implemented by the ECMI Kosovo.

The visit served to underline the importance attached by the High Commissioner to language learning as a key building block for integrated societies: “Speaking more than one language is beneficial, both for the person who speaks them and for society as a whole; it is even more important for local government officials, who regularly engage with members of public, to be able to communicate with every person in their community.”

Related Stories

• OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities calls for renewed dialogue between all political and social actors in Croatia
• OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities holds fifth regional summer school on multilingual and multicultural education in Central Asia
• High Commissioner Thors, in her OSCE Permanent Council address, discusses country engagement and highlights the increase in hate speech targeting national minorities

Google Forms – Can tell from the language in your question that you will want checkboxes, and changes the question type automatically.

/via Jack Hallahan

Deblonde, C; Campbell, J E; Chow, W; Cocking, R B; Huntley, D H; Parent, M; Rice, J M; Robertson, L; Smith, I R; Weatherston, A; Zawadzka, K. Geological Survey of Canada, Open File 8236, version 2.5.1, 2024, 9 pages, https://doi.org/10.4095/332530
<a href="https://geoscan.nrcan.gc.ca/images/geoscan/gid_332530.jpg"><img src="https://geoscan.nrcan.gc.ca/images/geoscan/gid_332530.jpg" title="Geological Survey of Canada, Open File 8236, version 2.5.1, 2024, 9 pages, https://doi.org/10.4095/332530" height="150" border="1" /></a>

Reading depends on spoken language. This is a simple statement with profound consequences for children whose spoken language differs from the language they are expected to read. For most children, the language skills they bring to school will support learning to read, which is mainly learning to understand their spoken language in a new form: print. However, some children’s language skills differ in important ways from the classroom language variety, and teachers rarely receive sound guidance on how to enhance their literacy instruction to meet these children’s needs.

OM workers Ed and Kim are learning Kurdish in order to reach out to refugees in their heart language.

After struggling to connect with an immigrant woman in Zurich, one worker listens to the woman’s story and thus learns the language of her heart.

The 1662 Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England (you can download it by clicking the picture to the left or the link below) is still technically the only "official" prayer book of the Church of England, the mother church (for the moment at least) of the Anglican Communion. It itself is the result of more than a century of liturgical development through a turbulent time in British history. Its literary and theological influence is immense; this alone makes it an important document.

William Tyndale holds the distinction of being the first man to ever print the New Testament in the English language. Tyndale also went on to first translate much of the Old Testament from the original Hebrew into English, but he was executed in 1536 for the "crime" of printing the scriptures in English before he could personally complete the printing of an entire Bible. His friends Myles Coverdale, and John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers, managed to evade arrest and publish entire Bibles in the English language for the first time, and within one year of Tyndale's death. - These Bibles were primarily the work of William Tyndale.

Some months ago, I got really fed up with C. Like, I don’t hate C. Hating programming languages is silly. But it was way too much effort to do simple things like lists/hashmaps and other simple data structures and such. I decided to try this language called Odin, which is one of these “Better C” languages. And I ended up liking it so much that I moved my game Artificial Rage from C to Odin. Since Odin has support for Raylib too (like everything really), it was very easy to move things around. Here’s how it all went.. Well, what I remember the very least. ↫ Akseli Lahtinen You programmers might’ve thought you escaped the wrath of Monday on OSNews, but after putting the IT administrators to work in my previous post, it’s now time for you to get to work. If you have a C codebase and want to move it to something else, in this case Odin, Lahtinen’s article will send you on your way. As someone who barely knows how to write HTML, it’s difficult for me to say anything meaningful about the technical details, but I feel like there’s a lot of useful, first-hand info here.

Your body language is a fundamental part of who you are; chances are you do not even think about how you stand, sit, and move. You should, of course, because other people instinctively pick up the nonverbal signals you send.

Oddly enough, you also pick up on your own nonverbal signals. Gestures and postures make a dramatic impact on how you think, feel, and perform.

Want to use body language to be an even better you? Here are ten simple ways:

complete article

Look the part You may be trembling inside, but you want to appear strong and in control. How can you communicate confidence that you may or may not be feeling? Try following these simple tips.

complete article

Kyra Wilson, Aylin Caliskan, Proceedings of the AAAI/ACM Conference on AI, Ethics, and Society, Nov 13, 2024

The topic of AI-based recruitment and hiring has been discussed here before and research continues apace. This item (13 page PDF), despite the characterization in GeekWire, is a fairly narrow study. It looks at three text-embedding models based on Mistral-7B-v0.1, and tests for gender and racial bias on applications containing name and position only, and name and position and some content (the paper discusses removing the name but does do it). The interesting bit is that intersectional bias (ie., combining gender and race) is not merely a combination of the separate biases; while separate biases exaggerated the discrimination, "intersectional results, on the other hand, do correspond more strongly to real-world discrimination in resume screening." Via Lisa Marie Blaschke, who in turn credits Audrey Watters.

Fr. Stephen offers a meditation on the theme of desire and ecstasy in the writings of the Fathers, and its importance for the gospel.

Does the degradation of language reflect a degradation of the human being? Yes, it does.

A project invoving schoolchildren aims to present the story of Irish language revival in Belfast.

Norwich City captain Kenny McLean will miss an additional game following his recent sending off against Middlesbrough for bad language towards a match official.

To achieve psychological and emotional analysis of massive internet chats, researchers have used statistical methods, machine learning, and neural networks to analyse the dynamic tendencies of texts dynamically. For long readers, the author first compares and explores the differences between the two psychoanalysis algorithms based on the emotion dictionary and machine learning for simple sentences, then studies the expansion algorithm of the emotion dictionary, and finally proposes an extended text psychoanalysis algorithm based on conditional random field. According to the experimental results, the mental dictionary's accuracy, recall, and F-score based on the cognitive understanding of each additional ten words were calculated. The optimisation decreased, and the memory and F-score improved. An <i>F</i>-value greater than 1, which is the most effective indicator for evaluating the effectiveness of a mental analysis problem, can better demonstrate that the algorithm is adaptive in the literature dictionary. It has been proven that this scheme can achieve good results in analysing emotional tendencies and has higher efficiency than ordinary weight-based psychological sentiment analysis algorithms.

Aim/Purpose : To examine the use of a flipped classroom in the English Language subject in secondary classrooms in Hong Kong. Background: The research questions addressed were: (1) What are teachers’ perceptions towards the flipped classroom pedagogy? (2) How can teachers transfer their flipped classroom experiences to teaching other classes/subjects? (3) What are students’ perceptions towards the flipped classroom pedagogy? (4) How can students transfer their flipped classroom experiences to studying other subjects? (5) Will students have significant gain in the knowledge of the lesson topic trialled in this study? Methodology: A total of 57 students from two Secondary 2 classes in a Band 3 secondary school together with two teachers teaching these two classes were involved in this study. Both quantitative and quantitative data analyses were conducted. Contribution: Regarding whether the flipped classroom pedagogy can help students gain significantly in their knowledge of a lesson topic, only one class of students gained statistically significantly in the subject knowledge but not for another class. Findings: Students in general were positive about the flipped classroom. On the other hand, although the teachers considered that the flipped classroom pedagogy was creative, they thought it may only be useful for teaching English grammar. Recommendations for Practitioners: Teachers thought that flipping a classroom may only be useful for more motivated students, and the extra workload of finding or making suitable pre-lesson online videos is the main concern for teachers. Recommendations for Researchers: Both quantitative and qualitative analyses should be conducted to investigate the effectiveness of a flipped classroom on students’ language learning. Impact on Society : Teachers and students can transfer their flipped classroom experiences in English Language to teaching and studying other subjects. Future Research: More classes should be involved and a longer period of time should be spent on trial teaching in which a flipped classroom can be implemented in different lesson topics, not only teaching grammar. Teachers also need to determine if students can use the target language item in a task.

Aim/Purpose: The purpose of this exploratory case study was to understand how teachers, working with English Language Learners (ELLs), expanded their knowledge and instructional practices as they implemented a one-to-one iPad® program. Background: English Language Learners experience linguistic, cultural, and cognitive shifts that can be challenging, and at times lead to isolation for ELLs. While technology can be engaging, devices alone do not shift instructional practices, nor lead to student learning. Technology must be leveraged through shifts to pedagogical practice and linked thoughtfully to content goals. Methodology: This research was conducted through a qualitative case study of educators at an international school. Contribution: This study describes promising pedagogical practices for leveraging 1:1 mobile devices for ELLs. Findings: iPads can be a support for ELL students. One-to-one iPads allowed teachers to experiment with new pedagogical approaches, but this development varies greatly between teachers. During the 1:1 implementation there were challenges reported. Recommendations for Practitioners: In order to mitigate some of these challenges, and build on the success of this study, the researcher suggests developing a common vision for technology integration, using collaborative models of ELL teaching, and investing in professional development. Recommendation for Researchers: Researchers should continue to document and observe the learning outcomes of ELL students in 1:1 environments, including an experimental study. Impact on Society: ELLs can benefit from 1:1 technology, and new pedagogical practices. For teachers to implement these new practices conversations on philosophy, engagement with families, and consistent professional development. Future Research: Future research can continue to expand the population of ELL students in 1:1 mobile learning environments; and the most powerful pedagogical practices.

Aim/Purpose: This paper focuses on designing and implementing the rubric for objective JAVA programming assessments. An unsupervised learning approach was used to group learners based on their performance in the results obtained from the rubric, reflecting their learning ability. Background: Students' learning outcomes have been evaluated subjectively using a rubric for years. Subjective assessments are simple to construct yet inconsistent and biased to evaluate. Objective assessments are stable, reliable, and easy to conduct. However, they usually lack rubrics. Methodology: In this study, a Top-Down assessment approach is followed, i.e., a rubric focused on the learning outcome of the subject is designed, and the proficiency of learners is judged by their performance in conducting the task given. A JAVA rubric is proposed based on the learning outcomes like syntactical, logical, conceptual, and advanced JAVA skills. A JAVA objective quiz (with multiple correct options) is prepared based on the rubric criteria, comprising five questions per criterion. The examination was conducted for 209 students (100 from the MCA course and 109 from B.Tech. course). The suggested rubric was used to compute the results. K-means clustering was applied to the results to classify the students according to their learning preferences and abilities. Contribution: This work contributes to the field of rubric designing by creating an objective programming assessment and analyzing the learners’ performance using machine learning techniques. It also facilitates a reliable feedback approach offering various possibilities in student learning analytics. Findings: The designed rubric, partial scoring, and cluster analysis of the results help us to provide individual feedback and also, group the students based on their learning skills. Like on average, learners are good at remembering the syntax and concepts, mediocre in logical and critical thinking, and need more practice in code optimization and designing applications. Recommendations for Practitioners: The practical implications of this work include rubric designing for objective assessments and building an informative feedback process. Faculty can use this approach as an alternative assessment measure. They are the strong pillars of e-assessments and virtual learning platforms. Recommendation for Researchers: This research presents a novel approach to rubric-based objective assessments. Thus, it provides a fresh perspective to the researchers promising enough opportunities in the current era of digital education. Impact on Society: In order to accomplish the shared objective of reflective learning, the grading rubric and its accompanying analysis can be utilized by both instructors and students. As an instructional assessment tool, the rubric helps instructors to align their pedagogies with the students’ learning levels and assists students in updating their learning paths based on the informative topic-wise scores generated with the help of the rubric. Future Research: The designed rubric in this study can be extended to other programming languages and subjects. Further, an adaptable weighted rubric can be created to execute a flexible and reflective learning process. In addition, outcome-based learning can be achieved by measuring and analyzing student improvements after rubric evaluation.

Aim/Purpose: The purpose of this research is to determine whether ESL teaching videos as a form of asynchronous online knowledge sharing can act as an aid to ESL learners internalizing knowledge in language acquisition. In this context, internalizing knowledge carries the meaning of being able to remember language, and purposefully and accurately use it context, including appropriacy of language, and aspects of correct pronunciation, intonation, stress patterns and connected speech, these being the elements of teaching and practice that are very often lacking in asynchronous, online, instructional video. Background: Knowledge Management is the field of study, and the practice, of discovering, capturing, sharing, and applying knowledge, typically with a view to translating individuals’ knowledge into organizational knowledge. In the field of education, it is the sharing of instructors’ knowledge for students to be able to learn and usefully apply that knowledge. In recent pandemic times, however, the mode of instruction has, of necessity, transitioned from face-to-face learning to an online environment, transforming the face of education as we know it. While this mode of instruction and knowledge sharing has many advantages for the online learner, in both synchronous and asynchronous learning environments, it presents certain challenges for language learners due to the absence of interaction and corrective feedback that needs to take place for learners of English as a Second Language (ESL) to master language acquisition. Unlike other subjects where the learner has recourse to online resources to reinforce learning through referencing external information, such as facts, figures, or theories, to be successful in learning a second language, the ESL learner needs to be able to learn to process thought and speech in that language; essentially, they need to learn to think in another language, which takes time and practice. Methodology: The research employs a systematic literature review (SLR) to determine the scope and extent to which the subject is covered by existing research in this field, and the findings thereof. Contribution: Whilst inconclusive in relation to internalizing language through online, asynchronous instructional video, through its exploratory nature, the research contributes towards the body of knowledge in online learning through the drawing together of various studies in the field of learning through asynchronous video through improving video and instructional quality. Findings: The findings of the systematic literature review revealed that there is negligible research in this area, and while information exists on blended and flipped modes of online learning, and ways to improve the quality and delivery of instructional video generally, no prior research on the exclusive use of asynchronous videos as an aid to internalizing English as a second language were found. Recommendations for Practitioners: From this research, it is apparent that there is considerably more that practitioners can do to improve the quality of instructional videos that can help students engage with the learning, from which students stand a much better chance of internalizing the learning. Recommendation for Researchers: For researchers, the absence of existing research is an exciting opportunity to further explore this field. Impact on Society: Online learning is now globally endemic, but it poses specific challenges in the field of second language learning, so the development of instructional videos that can facilitate this represents a clear benefit to all ESL learners in society as a whole. Future Research: Clearly the absence of existing research into whether online asynchronous instructional videos can act as an aid to internalizing the acquisition of English as a second language would indicate that this very specific field is one that merits future research. Indeed, it is one that the author intends to exploit through primary data collection from the production of a series of asynchronous, online, instructional videos.

Aim/Purpose: This exploratory qualitative case study examines the perceptions of high-school learners of English regarding a pedagogical intervention involving progressive reduction of captions (full, sentence-level, keyword captions, and no-captions) in enhancing language learning. Background: Recognizing the limitations of caption usage in fostering independent listening comprehension in non-captioned environments, this research builds upon and extends the foundational work of Vanderplank (2016), who highlighted the necessity of a comprehensive blend of tasks, strategies, focused viewing, and the need to actively engage language learners in watching captioned materials. Methodology: Using a qualitative research design, the participants were exposed to authentic video texts in a five-week listening course. Participants completed an entry survey, and upon interaction with each captioning type, they wrote individual reflections and participated in focus group sessions. This methodological approach allowed for an in-depth exploration of learners’ experiences across different captioning scenarios, providing a nuanced understanding of the pedagogical intervention’s impact on their perceived language development process. Contribution: By bridging the research-practice gap, our study offers valuable insights into designing pedagogical interventions that reduce caption dependence, thereby preparing language learners for success in real-world, caption-free listening scenarios. Findings: Our findings show that learners not only appreciate the varied captioning approaches for their role in supporting text comprehension, vocabulary acquisition, pronunciation, and on-task focus but also for facilitating the integration of new linguistic knowledge with existing background knowledge. Crucially, our study uncovers a positive reception towards the gradual shift from fully captioned to uncaptioned materials, highlighting a stepwise reduction of caption dependence as instrumental in boosting learners’ confidence and sense of achievement in mastering L2 listening skills. Recommendations for Practitioners: The implications of our findings are threefold: addressing input selection, task design orchestration, and reflective practices. We advocate for a deliberate selection of input that resonates with learners’ interests and contextual realities alongside task designs that progressively reduce caption reliance and encourage active learner engagement and collaborative learning opportunities. Furthermore, our study underscores the importance of reflective practices in enabling learners to articulate their learning preferences and strategies, thereby fostering a more personalized and effective language learning experience. Recommendation for Researchers: Listening comprehension is a complex process that can be clearly influenced by the input, the task, and/or the learner characteristics. Comparative studies may struggle to control and account for all these variables, making it challenging to attribute observed differences solely to caption reduction. Impact on Society: This research responds to the call for innovative teaching practices in language education. It sets the stage for future inquiries into the nuanced dynamics of caption usage in language learning, advocating for a more learner-centered and adaptive approach. Future Research: Longitudinal quantitative studies that measure comprehension as captions support is gradually reduced (full, partial, and keyword) are strongly needed. Other studies could examine a range of individual differences (working memory capacity, age, levels of engagement, and language background) when reducing caption support. Future research could also examine captions with students with learning difficulties and/or disabilities.

Aim/Purpose. This study seeks to determine the impact of a card game intervention in improving the English verbal communication of nursing students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Background. Many international students studying in Australia experience setbacks in their university studies due to English language difficulties. This paper outlines how an educational card game designed can be played by nursing students from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds as an intervention for their English verbal communication development. Methodology. The study used a descriptive qualitative approach to analyse the learning experiences of forty-five (N=45) nursing students from CALD backgrounds undertaking their second semester at a metropolitan university in Victoria, Australia after being introduced to an educational card game developed by the first author. The card game was designed to explore the use of English pragmatic markers, which are words, phrases, or verbal cues that signal or emphasise the intentions of the speaker. Following the intervention, participants were queried in a survey about their experiences with English language speaking and how the game improved their verbal communication skills. Contribution. This paper provides knowledge about how a game can be designed to enhance the English verbal communication skills of nursing students from CALD backgrounds which could help them in their clinical placements and their adjustment into Australian society. Findings. Three intertwining themes that emerged from the data analysis were education content, skills development, and fun and creativity. These themes signify the importance of providing opportunities for learners to creatively practise the educational content in simulative contextualised situations within a safe, comfortable, and inclusive learning environment. Recommendations for Practitioners. Educators still need to consider the importance of inclusivity of students from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds as part of successful integration into the culture of their host countries. Recommendations for Researchers. The findings emphasise the need for educators and researchers to understand the challenges facing these students in relation to marginalisation and discrimination and how they can design an intervention that is engaging and inclusive. Impact on Society. The findings also put forward the awareness of pragmatics as part of both English language learning and integration into the society of a host country as students learn how to express intention appropriately in various interactions. Furthermore, the themes presented in this paper suggest that not only should an educational game or an intervention contain relevant educational content and practical activities for skills development, but they must also be enjoyable by encouraging creativity and social interaction. Future Research. The results of this study also open possible future studies that involves the adaptation of a digital version of the card game or possible implementation of the game in other health professional programs in universities and other educational institutes.

Aim/Purpose. Higher education institutions face difficulties and challenges when it comes to distance learning. The purpose of this paper is to examine self-efficacy indicators and student satisfaction during online English classes. Background. E-learning has been very relevant since the Covid-19 era and is still relevant today. It is possible for students to study regardless of their location or time. By measuring students’ self-efficacy, instructors can gain valuable insights into their students’ ability to create social interaction, cope with technology, and acquire knowledge and tools to manage the learning process. Methodology. This study uses mixed methods along with two measurements. Before and after the course, quantitative and qualitative data were collected. Higher education students in Israel participated. A total of 964 students enrolled in English as a foreign language courses at the pre-basic, basic, and advanced levels. Contribution. Analyzing self-efficacy from several angles provides insight into students. What influences students’ confidence and belief in their ability to succeed in online courses. Moreover, how students perceive their own learning and how they cope with challenges. Findings. Compared to the measurement before the course, self-efficacy decreased on average. Most significant decreases occurred in ‘creating social interactions’ and ‘acquirement of knowledge and tools’ to manage the learning process. A slight decrease was observed in the ability to cope with technology. Additionally, self-efficacy and satisfaction with the course were positively correlated. Recommendations for Practitioners. An overview is provided of the most effective tools and techniques for teaching languages in digital format in this paper. This will allow instructors to design and deliver courses in a more effective way. Thus, they will be able to make better informed decisions, resulting in better outcomes for students. Recommendations for Researchers. Distance Learning courses should resemble the common digital environments in everyday life, rather than imitating face-to-face courses mainly in the field of social interaction. Impact on Society. Digital tools should be encouraged that facilitate effective learning processes instead of sticking to traditional methods that characterize face-to-face courses. Using common interfaces in daily use among the general population will enable the implementation of these recommendations. Future Research. Future studies could be helpful if they compared the English courses developed in the CEFR model with those taught face-to-face as well as those taught online. In addition, motivation and self-monitoring should be examined in both synchronous and asynchronous courses as well.

Large graphs or automata have their data that cannot fit in a single machine, or may take unreasonable time to be processed. We implement with MapReduce and Giraph two algorithms for intersecting and minimising large and distributed automata. We provide some comparative analysis, and the experiment results are depicted in figures. Our work experimentally validates our propositions as long as it shows that our choice, in comparison with MapReduce one, is not only more suitable for graph-oriented algorithms, but also speeds the executions up. This work is one of the first steps of a long-term goal that consists in a high level distributed graph processing language.

In recent years, schools (as well as universities) have added cyber security to their computer science curricula. This topic is still new for most of the current teachers, who would normally have a standard computer science background. Therefore the teachers are trained and then teaching their students what they have just learned. In order to explore differences in both populations’ learning, we compared measures of software quality and security between high-school teachers and students. We collected 109 source files, written in Python by 18 teachers and 31 students, and engineered 32 features, based on common standards for software quality (PEP 8) and security (derived from CERT Secure Coding Standards). We use a multi-view, data-driven approach, by (a) using hierarchical clustering to bottom-up partition the population into groups based on their code-related features and (b) building a decision tree model that predicts whether a student or a teacher wrote a given code (resulting with a LOOCV kappa of 0.751). Overall, our findings suggest that the teachers’ codes have a better quality than the students’ – with a sub-group of the teachers, mostly males, demonstrate better coding than their peers and the students – and that the students’ codes are slightly better secured than the teachers’ codes (although both populations show very low security levels). The findings imply that teachers might benefit from their prior knowledge and experience, but also emphasize the lack of continuous involvement of some of the teachers with code-writing. Therefore, findings shed light on computer science teachers as lifelong learners. Findings also highlight the difference between quality and security in today’s programming paradigms. Implications for these findings are discussed.

This paper reports on a case study of a group of six non-native English speaking migrant women’s experiences learning English vocabulary in a mobile assisted language learning (MALL) environment at a small community centre in Western Australia. A sociocultural approach to learning vocabulary was adopted in designing the MALL lessons that the women undertook. The women provided demographic information, responded to questions in a pre-MALL semi-structured interview, attended the MALL lessons, and completed a post-MALL semi-structured interview. This study explores the sociocultural factors that affect migrant women’s language learning in general, and vocabulary in particular. The women’s responses to MALL lessons and using the tablet reveal a positive effect in their vocabulary learning.

As a result of the rapid development of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and the growing interest in Internet-based tools for language classroom, it has become a pressing need for educators to locate, evaluate and select the most appropriate language-learning digital resources that foster more communicative and meaningful learning processes. Hence, this paper describes a mixed research project that, on the first hand, aimed at proposing a Checklist for evaluating language websites built on the principles of the Communicative Approach, and on the second hand, sought to strengthen the teachers’ Knowing-how-to-do skill as part of their digital competence. To achieve these goals, a four-phase research procedure was followed that included reviewing relevant literature and administering qualitative and quantitative research methods to participants (i.e., language teachers, an expert in the Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) field and a college professor) in order to gain insights into problematic issues and, thereafter, to contribute to the creation and validation of the Checklist model and the Study Guide. The findings revealed that: (a) evaluating language websites leads to the enhancement of the teachers’ practical skills and their knowledge of the technological language; and (b) having an assessment instrument allows educators to choose the materials that best meet their communicative teaching purposes.

Aim/Purpose: To develop a framework for utilizing Mobile Assisted Language Learning (MALL) to assist non-native English migrant women to acquire English vocabulary in a non-formal learning setting. Background: The women in this study migrated to Australia with varied backgrounds including voluntary or forced migration, very low to high levels of their first language (L1), low proficiency in English, and isolated fulltime stay-at-home mothers. Methodology: A case study method using semi-structured interviews and observations was used. Six migrant women learners attended a minimum of five non-MALL sessions and three participants continued on and attended a minimum of five MALL sessions. Participants were interviewed pre- and post-sessions. Data were analysed thematically. Contribution: The MALL framework is capable of enriching migrant women’s learning experience and vocabulary acquisition. Findings: Vocabulary acquisition occurred in women from both non-MALL and MALL environment; however, the MALL environment provided significantly enriched vocabulary learning experience. Future Research: A standardised approach to measure the effectiveness of MALL for vocabulary acquisition among migrant women in non-formal setting

Congcong FANG,Yun JIN,Guanlin CHEN,Yunfan ZHANG,Shidang LI,Yong MA,Yue XIE, Vol.E107-D, No.11, pp.1463-1467
Currently, an increasing number of tasks in speech emotion recognition rely on the analysis of both speech and text features. However, there remains a paucity of research exploring the potential of leveraging large language models like GPT-3 to enhance emotion recognition. In this investigation, we harness the power of the GPT-3 model to extract semantic information from transcribed texts, generating text modal features with a dimensionality of 1536. Subsequently, we perform feature fusion, combining the 1536-dimensional text features with 1188-dimensional acoustic features to yield comprehensive multi-modal recognition outcomes. Our findings reveal that the proposed method achieves a weighted accuracy of 79.62% across the four emotion categories in IEMOCAP, underscoring the considerable enhancement in emotion recognition accuracy facilitated by integrating large language models.
Publication Date: 2024/11/01

Theories of status rarely address unearned status gain—an unexpected and unsolicited increase in relative standing, prestige or worth, attained not through individual effort or achievement, but from a shift in organizationally valued characteristics. We build theory about unearned status gain drawing from a qualitative study of 90 U.S.-based employees of a Japanese organization following a company-wide English language mandate. These native English-speaking employees believed that the mandate elevated their worth in the organization, a status gain they attributed to chance, hence deeming it unearned. They also reported a heightened sense of belonging, optimism about career advancement, and access to expanded networks. Yet among those who interacted regularly with Japanese counterparts, narratives also revealed discomfort, which manifested in at least two ways. These informants engaged in "status rationalization," emphasizing the benefits Japanese employees might obtain by learning English, and prevaricated on whether the change was temporary or durable, a process we call "status stability appraisal." The fact that these narratives were present only among those working closely with Japanese employees highlights intergroup contact as a factor in shaping the unearned status gain experience. Supplemental analysis of data gathered from 66 Japanese employees provided the broader organizational context and the nonnative speakers' perspective of the language shift. These findings expand our overall understanding of status dynamics in organizations, and show how status gains can yield both positive and negative outcomes.

This rather difficult read introduces the programming language FSM and the programming platform DrRacket. The author asserts that it is a convenient platform to design and prove an automata-based software

I had one big question after taking on this review: How relevant is this book with the advent of large language models (LLMs)? In the past two years, the launches of OpenAI’s GPT and Google’s Gemma, amongst others, have severely disrupted the study of natural language