With the popularity of online education, multiple technology-based educational tools are gradually being introduced into online learning. The role of gamification in online education has been of interest to researchers. Based on learners’ visual, auditory, and kinesthetic (VAK) learning styles, this study uses an empirical research method to investigate the behavioral intention of students to participate in online gamified classrooms in selected universities located in Guangdong province and Macao. The main contributions of this study are to focus on the impact that differences in learning styles may have on the behavioral intentions of learners and to include the “perceived learning task” as an external variable in the theoretical framework. The main research findings are: perceived usefulness and enjoyment are partially mediated between VAK learning styles and the intention to participate in online gamified classrooms; and perceived learning tasks are partially mediated between perceived usefulness and the intention to participate in online gamified classrooms. According to the findings and the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), this study constructs the Technology-Learning Behavior Acceptance Model (T-LBAM) to explore the intrinsic influencing factors of students’ intention to participate in gamified online classes and makes suggestions for future online gamification teaching.
This study aimed to explore students’ effectiveness in scientific courses that have adopted the framework of constructive alignment. The researchers conducted an experimental study in the education sector to compare two different teaching models—traditional and following constructive alignment—and used statistical tools to analyse differences in students’ learning effectiveness. The course “Management Information System” (MIS) was specifically chosen to investigate how constructive alignment initiatives used in the course influenced students’ learning effectiveness. Two groups of students were selected as the control group and the experimental group, respectively. In the experimental group, the intended learning outcomes, teaching and learning activities, and assessment tasks were always aligned by the instructor. The learning effectiveness of the two groups was evaluated by the Course Experience Questionnaire Survey and academic grades. After this study, it was found that significant improvement—in terms of students’ learning experience scores and academic grades—was seen in the experimental group compared with the control group. This study has further verified that implementing a constructive alignment template can significantly improve students’ learning effectiveness in scientific courses, hence providing theoretical and practical references for teaching and learning in scientific courses.
1 January 2022 in Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society
This paper investigates the temporal trend and regional disparity of China’s agricultural green total factor productivity (AGTFP) during 1997‐2016. Combined with the green Luenberger productivity indicator, two different data envelopment analysis models with the biennial environmental technology are constructed for robust checks. Compared with the existing literature, more agricultural carbon emissions are used as the undesirable outputs in the models. It is found that AGTFP in the whole of China and all of its sub‐regions (the east, the middle, and the west) showed an overall increase, with the drive of high technical progress. The east had the largest AGTFP, and the middle experienced the largest AGTFP growth. More specifically, with respect to AGTFP, the total difference and the gross difference among the three regions as well as the specific difference within regions widened during these periods. There was an absolute convergence trend of AGTFP in the whole of China as well as the middle and the west. The speed of convergence was highest in the west.
In the context of constructing regional education and talent hub, Macao’s higher education talent development strategy impacts the creation of a regional talent hub and the process of industrial diversification. This study adopts a text analysis approach. Through the analysis of 118 texts and the construction of the game model, it reveals that Macao’s talent development has been passing through a “market-controlled” and “policy-driven” stage due to the uniqueness of economic and social development. The model of cooperative game based on endosymbiosis implicates that the talent attraction strategy of higher education can play a leading role in socio-economic development to form a cooperative and symbiotic equilibrium with the region as a whole through the “climbing period” when the “actual state” catches up with the “expected value.” This paper proposes some policy recommendations, including: prospective discipline layout, breaking down of institutional barriers, cooperation and exchange of talent cultivation, and the creation of a talent-sharing mechanism for promoting the construction of a regional talent hub.
Due to the special historical background, Macao has formed the cultural characteristics of coexistence of tradition and modernity. Influenced by historical environment, policy and economic factors, the cultural and educational policy in Macao has a special development process. From the perspective of Macao's cultural education policy development, the core idea of Macao's cultural education policy development is to take Chinese culture as the mainstream and develop with the coexistence of diverse cultures. Consolidating the foundation of Chinese culture in the stage of basic education and leading the development of multicultural coexistence in the stage of higher education are concrete ways to realize cultural education development in Macao. In the future, cultural education path in Macao should rely on the basic education, higher education and relevant research institutions and promote the construction of "one base" with "Chinese culture as the mainstream and multi-cultural coexistence". Based on the foundation and current situation of Macao's cultural education, this article proposes to build a virtual base of Macao's cultural education in the information age. Under the background of the development of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, the cultural education policies in the future in Macao still need to be further improved from the aspects of financial support, system improvement, institutional setting and cultural publicity.