Mobility Strategy of Multi-Limbed Climbing Robots for Asteroid Exploration

Scientific Conference (in press)

Mobility on asteroids by multi-limbed climbing robots is expected to achieve our exploration goals in such challenging environments. We propose a mobility strategy to improve the locomotion safety of ... [more ▼]

Mobility on asteroids by multi-limbed climbing robots is expected to achieve our exploration goals in such challenging environments. We propose a mobility strategy to improve the locomotion safety of climbing robots in such harsh environments that picture extremely low gravity and highly uneven terrain. Our method plans the gait by decoupling the base and limbs’ movements and adjusting the main body pose to avoid ground collisions. The proposed approach includes a motion planning that reduces the reactions generated by the robot’s movement by optimizing the swinging trajectory and distributing the momentum. Lower motion reactions decrease the pulling forces on the grippers, avoiding the slippage and flotation of the robot. Dynamic simulations and experiments demonstrate that the proposed method could improve the robot’s mobility on the surface of asteroids. [less ▲]

Education as risk factor of Mild Cognitive Impairment - the role of the gut microbiome. Presentation in symposium: Social determinants of brain health: From the search for mechanisms to recommendations to increase equity

Scientific Conference (2023, November)

Don’t try to be original! Web archives as ‘reborn digital sources’

Scientific Conference (2023, September 21)

Web archives as “born digital” source collections come with multiple biases, both concerning the archived web pages and web sites themselves, the web collections (notably those created on precise events ... [more ▼]

Web archives as “born digital” source collections come with multiple biases, both concerning the archived web pages and web sites themselves, the web collections (notably those created on precise events, like Paris terrorist attacks and the COVID-crisis), and the metadata. After explaining why web archives must be considered as a “reborn digital heritage” (Brügger,2016) and the multi-layered socio-technical transformations and mediations that are inherent to the archiving of the Web, the presentation will focus on scholary strategies to face such uncertainties, including best practices in documentation, scalable reading, and online source criticism. [less ▲]

Digital History and the Politics of Digitisation

Scientific Conference (2023, September 14)

This paper will explore a key question for historians today: what are the politics of cultural heritage digitisation and its implications for historical research? And how to assess this from a global ... [more ▼]

This paper will explore a key question for historians today: what are the politics of cultural heritage digitisation and its implications for historical research? And how to assess this from a global perspective? In a research environment that increasingly privileges what is available online, the questions of why, where, and how we can access what we can access, and how it affects historical research have become ever more urgent. My talk will outline a framework through which to contextualize the politics of (digital) heritage preservation, and a model to analyze its most important political dimensions. To add some historical perspective, I will put this discussion in the broader context of the ways in which technology has shaped historical research practices and knowledge production, not just in the past two decades but in fact already since the late 19th century. [less ▲]

What's digital about digital heritage ?

Scientific Conference (2023, September 07)

Digital heritage acquires a definition and an international status in 2003 when a charter is devoted to it by UNESCO. Whether digitised or born-digital, digital heritage has become an entire area of the ... [more ▼]

Digital heritage acquires a definition and an international status in 2003 when a charter is devoted to it by UNESCO. Whether digitised or born-digital, digital heritage has become an entire area of the conservation work of heritage institutions, particularly large national libraries, faced with the need to preserve an increasing volume of so-called born-digital documents. Work has gone on since the 1990s to digitize documents, press content and paper books. Digital heritage didn’t wait until 2003 to gain momentum. There have been pioneering and original initiatives, like Michael Hart’s Gutenberg project , launched in the 1970s, and the creation of the Internet Archive foundation in 1996. There is also a place dedicated to digital materials in several technical museums, or even dedicated museums that emerged, like the Mountain View Computer History Museum , the origin of which dates to the 1970s. Heritagisation approaches are clearly different, depending on whether the aim is to conserve hardware or software, move from analogue content to digital content, or collect born-digital content. The field of digital heritage is incredibly heterogeneous, as are the players and their goals. Furthermore, while the digitization work is sometimes entrusted originally to the same department within heritage institutions, under a general label dedicated to digital, they involve digital and heritage concepts that are not necessarily based on the same paradigms, and that involve not only different selection and curation processes, but different technical processes too. Digital heritage can also be hybrid, combining physical and digital aspects. An example of this is the preservation of video game heritage, which might involve conservation of the physical elements, arcade terminals, consoles and other devices, but also the controller boxes, dedicated magazines and the sometimes printed documentation associated with the games and devices. This turn towards digital heritagisation allows us, on the one hand, to think about the value and the meaning given to the technical objects and to computerised and digital content and, on the other, the changes affecting the players, business, and perimeters of heritagisation, as well as the user experience faced with this constantly growing heritage. This presentation focuses first on the digital characteristics of this heritage and its diversity, then on the conservation approaches, the processes at play, and the digital enrichments to which this heritage might be subject (OCR processing, metadata, etc.), in order to better understand this intertwinement of human preservation and curation and technical and digital processes. [less ▲]

Zwischen Autonomie und Überbehütung: Determinanten der Beziehungsqualität junger Erwachsener mit ihren Eltern.

Scientific Conference (2023, September 05)

Die Lebensphase der emerging adults ist durch große Varianz des Zeitpunkts der Bewältigung verschiedener Entwicklungsaufgaben geprägt. Die Phase des Erwachsenwerdens hat sich insbesondere in der ... [more ▼]

Die Lebensphase der emerging adults ist durch große Varianz des Zeitpunkts der Bewältigung verschiedener Entwicklungsaufgaben geprägt. Die Phase des Erwachsenwerdens hat sich insbesondere in der westlichen Welt in Folge wirtschaftlicher Veränderungen und komplexen Ausbildungsstrukturen verlängert. Dabei kann der elterliche Erziehungsstil das Streben nach Autonomie fördern oder auch einschränken. Helicopter parenting (HP) beschreibt die elterliche Überinvolviertheit. In dieser Lebensphase wird die Beziehung zu den Eltern, deren Leistungen oder Opfer neu bewertet (sense of indebtedness, SIP, Kang et al., 2010). Bisher wurde SIP hauptsächlich bei Eltern-Kind-Beziehungen mit Migrationshintergrund eingesetzt. In der vorliegenden Studie wurde die deutsche Version der SIP-Skala (Pfammater & Schwarz, 2022) an die Leistungen der Eltern allgemein, d.h. ohne Migrationshintergrund, angepasst. Ziel der vorliegenden Studie ist es die Ausprägung von SIP und die Erfahrung von überinvolvierter Elternschaft (HP- Skala Wilhelm et al. (2014) mit vier Dimensionen: Überinvolviertheit, Autonomieeinschränkung, Überbehütung und unangebrachte Schuldzuweisung) unter emerging adults zu testen und deren Einfluss auf die Beziehungsqualität zu den Eltern sowie die die Rolle der Selbstwahrnehmung als Jugendliche bzw. Erwachsene zu untersuchen. In einer Onlinestudie wurden dazu N=253 deutschsprachige Erwachsene (M=23.06 Jahre; SD=2.55; 55% weibliche Teilnehmerinnen) quantitativ befragt. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die Beziehung zu den Eltern von der überwiegenden Mehrheit als gut bis sehr gut eingeschätzt wird. Eine schlechtere Beziehung spiegelt sich auch in niedrigeren SIP-Werten wider und bezüglich HP in höherer Autonomieeinschränkung und niedrigerer Überinvolviertheit. Die Selbstwahrnehmung hat keinen Einfluss auf SIP, aber auf HP. Unter theoretischer Einbettung erfolgt eine differenzierte Diskussion der Ergebnisse. [less ▲]

Children’s agentic behaviour in literacy practices in crèches in Luxembourg

Scientific Conference (2023, September 01)

Agentic behaviour of young children has been researched in relation to language policies and language learning (Schwartz et al., 2021) but not in literacy practices. The present paper examines children’s ... [more ▼]

Agentic behaviour of young children has been researched in relation to language policies and language learning (Schwartz et al., 2021) but not in literacy practices. The present paper examines children’s participation in multilingual literacy activities in two crèches in Luxembourg and their agentic behaviour. A previous study has shown that three-year-olds displayed language-based agency and interpretively reproduced translanguaging practices (Kirsch & Mortini, 2021). According to language socialization theories, children actively participate in culture-specific events and appropriate norms, values, and interaction patterns, which they reproduce (Corsaro, 2005; 2018). These interpretive reproductions testify to children’s agentic behaviour. The data of the present qualitative longitudinal study include thick descriptions and video recordings of literacy activities. All interactions were analyzed with conversation analysis (Seedhouse, 2007). To examine, children’s agentic behaviour, we compared their interactions in planned literacy activities to those with peers. Prior to the data collection, the educators and the parents gave informed consent. During the data collection, we maintained the children’s assent by ensuring that they felt comfortable and only observed them in naturally occurring situations with educators. The findings reveal three types of agentic behaviour: children replicated strategies, creatively reproduced interaction practices and literacy practices, and opened up new spaces for developing literacies in home languages. The study has implications for educators as it shows them the ways in which children make meaning of their literacy activities. It is a reminder of the importance of being a good role model, a careful observer and listener, and a reflective practitioner. [less ▲]

Determination of overall factor for the application of the General Method based on plastic and strain-limited N-M interaction for composite compression members

Scientific Conference (2023, September)

The design of composite compression members can be realized based on the Gen-eral Method in accordance with Eurocode 4. This method represents a more sophis-ticated design based on advanced numerical ... [more ▼]

The design of composite compression members can be realized based on the Gen-eral Method in accordance with Eurocode 4. This method represents a more sophis-ticated design based on advanced numerical analysis. It may be applied for any type of composite column. The General Method contains two steps; the first step is de-fined as the global nonlinear finite element analysis (GMNIA) accounting for all ge-ometrical and physical nonlinear effect and considering geometrical and structural imperfection; while the second step represents the analysis on the cross-section level, by N-M interaction diagram to determine the overall safety factor 𝛾0. EN1994-1-1 requires the N-M-Interaction based on the plastic resistance. However, often the General Method is provided for those section, where the plastic resistance is not representing the real behavior. Therefore, the question is discussed why the N-M-Interaction should not be developed based on the strain-limited resistance consid-ering the approaches for concrete stress-strain curve in accordance with EN 1992-1-1 and for structural steel in accordance with prEN1993-1-14. In this paper, the application of general method is investigated for different type of composite columns with N-M interaction diagram evaluated with plastic and strain-limited resistance. Results are compared and discussed in terms of overall safety factor 𝛾0. Conclusions are provided for the further development of the General Method in Eurocode 4. [less ▲]

Researching children’s participation and agency in Luxembourg

Scientific Conference (2023, August 30)

This paper presents the concepts of participation and child agency. According to the United Nations Human rights, children have the right to express their views, and their voices should be considered ... [more ▼]

This paper presents the concepts of participation and child agency. According to the United Nations Human rights, children have the right to express their views, and their voices should be considered. This means for early childhood education (ECE), that children should be perceived as agents who actively participate in the daily life of the institution. Participation contributes to the development of children’s self-esteem, well-being, and self-efficacy (Correia et al., 2019). It is closely tied to agency which is the performative capacity to act with some autonomy and take position in relation to others (Almér, 2017). The theoretical frameworks draw on socio-cultural theories (Vygotsky, 1978) and theories of language socialization (Corsaro, 2018). Several qualitative longitudinal studies have researched participation and children’s agentic behaviour in ECE institutions in Luxembourg. Data is collected after informed consent has been obtained from the participants, but the researchers maintained the children’s assent by ensuring that they felt comfortable during the observations. Our teams investigated children’s participation in language and literacy activities. Mortini (2021) conceptualized language-based agency on a continuum from “participatory” to “controlling”. Children at the participatory end used their entire semiotic repertoire to engage in activities while those at the “controlling end” changed their learning activities. Based on Corsaro (2005) we found that children enacted their agency by creatively reproducing strategies as well as languaging and literacy practices (Kirsch & Mortini, 2021). Given that children’s participation is closely related to their personal development, it is important that educators perceive children as actors in ECE institutions. [less ▲]

Decolonising EMI lecturer training

Scientific Conference (2023, August 25)

In this talk I will argue for the decolonisation of EMI lecturer training. Often it is applied linguists and English language practitioners who are called upon to design and deliver such training. However ... [more ▼]

In this talk I will argue for the decolonisation of EMI lecturer training. Often it is applied linguists and English language practitioners who are called upon to design and deliver such training. However, the findings of my worldwide EMI lecturer training survey (Deroey, 2023) indicate that the multifaceted nature of such training means it should ideally involve collaborations with educationalists, EMI experts, disciplinary content experts (see also Macaro & Aizawa, 2022) and policy makers. My survey of 25 published EMI training initiatives in 18 countries shows common components to be not only language but also pedagogy, communication and EMI awareness. Recurring challenges include contextualisation, incentivisation and lecturer confidence. The reports also reveal that few EMI lecturers have received prior teacher training and that some are resistant to or have a limited understanding of EMI. Given the various needs of EMI lecturers and the resulting multifaceted nature of most EMI lecturer training programmes, it appears to make sense to position these as part of continuous professional development (Jiménez-Muñoz, 2020) involving a collaboration -or at least dialogue- between language professionals, educationalists, EMI experts, and stakeholders such as lecturers, students and policy makers. Decolonising EMI lecturer training through interdisciplinary collaboration as well as input by stakeholders arguably has several advantages. First, the cross-fertilisation of disciplinary expertise and experience could enhance such training (Galloway & Rose, 2022) and raise its status. Second, these collaborations could create a greater awareness of the challenges and affordances of EMI. Finally, such joint endeavours could open up new interdisciplinary research avenues into EMI that may in turn lead to a greater uptake of its findings. References Deroey, K. L. B. (2023). English medium instruction lecturer training programmes: content, delivery, ways forward. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 62, 1-16. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jeap.2023.101223 Galloway, N., & Rose, H. (2022). Cross-fertilisation, not bifurcation, of EMI and EAP. ELT Journal, 76(4), 538-546. Jiménez-Muñoz, A. (2020). Shortcomings in the professional training of EMI lecturers: skills-based frameworks as a way forward. In D. González-Álvarez & E. Rama-Martínez (Eds.), Languages and the internationalisation of Higher Education (pp. 120-139). Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Macaro, E., & Aizawa, I. (2022). Who owns English medium instruction? Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 1-14. 1 https://doi.org/0.1080/01434632.2022.2136187 [less ▲]

Seeing the Connection: A Systematic Review of Meta-Analyses on the Link Between Teacher-Student Relationships and Student Outcomes

Scientific Conference (2023, August 25)

Theoretical background School climate is a key construct with great potential to impact student outcomes. The construct is multidimensional and includes, for instance, academic, community, safety, and ... [more ▼]

Theoretical background School climate is a key construct with great potential to impact student outcomes. The construct is multidimensional and includes, for instance, academic, community, safety, and institutional environment aspects (Wang & Degol, 2016). While the dimensions may vary, researchers widely agree that teacher-student relationships play a vital role in establishing a positive school climate (Wang et al., 2020). Their role can be explained by Bronfenbrenner's (1979) bioecological theory identifying the driver of human development as the interaction with the persons in our closest (proximal) environment. Thus, in a school setting, emotional warmth and closeness or conflict and dependence in teacher-student relationships should also be associated with positive/negative student outcomes. Several meta-analyses uncovered significant associations between teacher-student relationships and school engagement, good peer relationships, executive functioning, well-being, and reductions in aggressive or disruptive behaviors (Endedijk et al., 2021; Nurmi, 2012; Roorda et al., 2011; Vandenbroucke et al., 2018). However, these meta-analyses differed in their methods and substantive findings. Moreover, the extant literature is ambiguous about which moderators (e.g., age) influence these relationships. Furthermore, the reporting and quality of meta-analyses in this field vary considerably, which can compromise the reliability and validity of their findings. Aims Given these research gaps, we systematically searched and reviewed the meta-analytic literature (Cooper & Koenka, 2012) to provide an overview of correlations between teacher-student relationships and student outcomes. In doing so, we examined three research questions: 1. To what extent are academic, behavioral, socio-emotional, motivational, and cognitive student outcomes associated with teacher-student relationships in the meta-analytic literature? 2. Which moderators influence these associations? 3. What is the methodological quality of the included meta-analyses? Methodology After preregistration, a systematic literature search was conducted. During several screening rounds, we identified 24 appropriate meta-analyses that included approximately meta-analytic 130 effect sizes for over one million students. From these meta-analyses, we extracted effect sizes on the association between teacher-student relationships and academic, behavioral, socio-emotional, motivational, and general cognitive student characteristics. We summarized the results for research questions 1 and 2 and developed a narrative overview. For research question 3, we assessed the quality of the meta-analyses using the AMSTAR-2 scale (adapted to correlational studies in psychology and education research; Shea et al., 2017). Findings and their significance Looking at the teacher-student relationship aspect of school climate, a variety of outcome variables were analyzed. The strongest associations were shown for negative teacher-student relationships with student behavior problems (r = .35 bis .57; Nurmi, 2012). Positive teacher-student relationships showed the strongest association with school involvement (r = .26 bis .34; Roorda et al., 2011), prosocial, externalizing, and internalizing behaviors (r = .25; Endedijk et al., 2021), and learning motivation combined with student involvement (r = .23; Wang et al., 2020). Age and grade level were the most frequently examined moderators, with partially contradicting findings. Gender differences, on the other hand, were found less frequently. At the same time, an informant effect was frequently examined, that is, whether and in what ways teachers, student peers, or the students themselves rated the teacher-student relationship. For research question 3, we discuss differences in reporting and the quality range of meta-analyses. With this preregistered systematic review of meta-analyses, we summarize the research landscape on correlates of the teacher-student relationship aspect of school climate. Following our findings and the bioecological theory, teachers should be made aware of the impact of teacher-student relationships and how they could contribute to a positive school climate via relationship building. Some interventions to improve these important relationships have already been meta-analytically studied with promising results (Kincade et al., 2020). Next, we need experiments to causally confirm positive teacher-student relationships as an effective strategy for improving academic, behavioral, socio-emotional, motivational, and cognitive student outcomes and school climate at large. Finally, future research should structure the broad range of conceptualizations of teacher-student relationships and review the variety of theories to explain their impact on student outcomes. References Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development: Experiments by nature and design. Harvard university press. Cooper, H., & Koenka, A. C. (2012). The overview of reviews: Unique challenges and opportunities when research syntheses are the principal elements of new integrative scholarship. American Psychologist, 67(6), 446–462. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0027119 Endedijk, H. M., Breeman, L. D., van Lissa, C. J., Hendrickx, M. M. H. G., den Boer, L., & Mainhard, T. (2021). The Teacher’s Invisible Hand: A Meta-Analysis of the Relevance of Teacher–Student Relationship Quality for Peer Relationships and the Contribution of Student Behavior. Review of Educational Research, 003465432110514. https://doi.org/10.3102/00346543211051428 Kincade, L., Cook, C., & Goerdt, A. (2020). Meta-Analysis and Common Practice Elements of Universal Approaches to Improving Student-Teacher Relationships. Review of Educational Research, 90(5), 710–748. https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654320946836 Nurmi, J.-E. (2012). Students’ characteristics and teacher–child relationships in instruction: A meta-analysis. Educational Research Review, 7(3), 177–197. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2012.03.001 Roorda, D. L., Koomen, H. M. Y., Spilt, J. L., & Oort, F. J. (2011). The Influence of Affective Teacher–Student Relationships on Students’ School Engagement and Achievement: A Meta-Analytic Approach. Review of Educational Research, 81(4), 493–529. https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654311421793 Shea, B. J., Reeves, B. C., Wells, G., Thuku, M., Hamel, C., Moran, J., Moher, D., Tugwell, P., Welch, V., Kristjansson, E., & Henry, D. A. (2017). AMSTAR 2: A critical appraisal tool for systematic reviews that include randomised or non-randomised studies of healthcare interventions, or both. BMJ, j4008. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.j4008 Vandenbroucke, L., Spilt, J., Verschueren, K., Piccinin, C., & Baeyens, D. (2018). The Classroom as a Developmental Context for Cognitive Development: A Meta-Analysis on the Importance of Teacher–Student Interactions for Children’s Executive Functions. Review of Educational Research, 88(1), 125–164. https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654317743200 Wang, M.-T., & Degol, J. L. (2016). School Climate: A Review of the Construct, Measurement, and Impact on Student Outcomes. Educational Psychology Review, 28(2), 315–352. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-015-9319-1 Wang, M.-T., L. Degol, J., Amemiya, J., Parr, A., & Guo, J. (2020). Classroom climate and children’s academic and psychological wellbeing: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Developmental Review, 57, 100912. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dr.2020.100912 [less ▲]

Roundtable "War, Communication and Media Resilience in Europe"

Scientific Conference (2023, August 24)

Roundtable ‘War, Communication, and Media Resilience in Europe’ with Gabriele Balbi, Christian Schwarzenegger, Valérie Schafer, Marie Cronqvist and Martin Lundqvist Chair: Rosanna Farbøl (Lund University)

The Impact of Multilingualism on Children’s Reading/Writing Skills and Scholastic Performance

Scientific Conference (2023, August 23)

While research on multilingualism has shown both, positive (e.g. inhibition; Coderre et al., 2013), and negative (e.g. vocabulary; Bialystok et al., 2008) effects on cognition and language proficiency ... [more ▼]

While research on multilingualism has shown both, positive (e.g. inhibition; Coderre et al., 2013), and negative (e.g. vocabulary; Bialystok et al., 2008) effects on cognition and language proficiency, its influence on scholastic achievement appears to be largely negative (Hoffmann et al., 2018; Martini et al., 2021). Children in Luxembourg are educated in a multilingual educational system. In Kindergarten, the main teaching language is Luxembourgish. This switches to German for literacy acquisition in elementary school, with French taught as a second language. Despite its small size, Luxembourg is also highly multi-cultural, boasting 170 nationalities (The Government of the Grand Dutchy of Luxembourg, 2023). Thus, many of the children in the school system do not speak the language(s) of instruction at home. Data from the Luxembourgish national school monitoring program reveals significant differences in German reading comprehension in grade 3 depending on the language spoken at home. Because Luxembourgish is linguistically close to German, Luxembourgish-speaking children generally perform better than children who do not speak Luxembourgish at home (Hoffmann et al., 2018; Martini et al., 2021). Furthermore, the language-based differences in children’s scholastic performance complicate the diagnostic process of children with potential learning disorders, such as dyslexia and/or dyscalculia. In Luxembourg, the language in which children are screened and diagnosed for potential learning disorders is usually identical to the main language of instruction at school, which at time of diagnosis (typically grade 3) is German. It is therefore difficult to distinguish poor performance based on potential difficulties with reading/writing or mathematics from poor performance based on low language proficiency in the test language. Furthermore, the diagnostic tools currently employed in Luxembourg are developed in countries with primarily one language of instruction, challenging the validity of the diagnostic process in a multilingual population (Ugen et al., 2021). We have thus developed a comprehensive reading/writing test battery adapted to the Luxembourgish educational curriculum and multilingual environment. Children’s potential language proficiency differences in the test language (German) are taken into account using simplified instructions with reduced language load, multiple examples, varying degrees of difficulty of the test materials, as well as the construction of distinct language-group norms, depending on the language(s) spoken at home. This helps avoid over-diagnosis of reading and writing disorders in children who do not speak the language(s) of instruction at home and underdiagnosis of children who do. The developed test battery assesses children’s performance in key domains relevant for reading and writing comprising phonological skills, (non)word and text reading (fluency and accuracy), reading comprehension, writing, and vocabulary. Furthermore, we link children’s performance in the newly developed test battery to their performance in the Luxembourgish national school monitoring program. Methodology, Methods, Research Instruments or Sources Used We have tested 214 children during the pre-test phase of the project (February – June 2022; age 8 – 12; M = 9.59; SD = 0.68; 95 girls) and will test approximately 735 children during the validation and norming phase (February – June 2023). All children attend grade 3 in public primary schools in Luxembourg. The distribution of classes participating in the project covers all 15 regions of the country, resulting in a representative sample of the Luxembourgish school population. Children complete the 9 sub-tests of the novel reading/writing test battery, which includes precursor skills: Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN), non-word phoneme segmentation, non-word phoneme deletion; reading skills: word and non-word reading, text reading and comprehension; writing skills: gap dictation and text dictation; as well as a receptive vocabulary task. The vocabulary and writing skills are assessed in a group setting (all children complete the tasks together in the classroom), the precursor and reading skills are assessed individually in a quiet room in the school. The total testing time (group test + individual tests) does not exceed 90 minutes per child. All tests are conducted by trained test administrators following a standardised procedure. The pre-test data were analysed per sub-test using Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance with language group as the between-subject factor and results of the sub-test (per category where applicable) as the within subject factor. Significant main effects of language group were explored using post-hoc pairwise-comparisons (Bonferroni corrected t-tests). Four language groups were created based on the frequencies of the reported language(s) spoken at home: Luxembourgish/German monolingual, Luxembourgish/German bilingual, Romance language (e.g., French, Portuguese, Spanish) mono- and bilingual, Other language (e.g., English, Slavic) mono- and bilingual. The results of each sub-test of the novel reading/writing test battery were also correlated with children’s performance on German listening and reading comprehension in the Luxembourgish national school monitoring programme (Bonferroni corrected Pearson correlations). Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or Findings The results of the pre-test phase show that children, who speak Luxembourgish or German at home outperform children who speak a Romance or Other language at home. Particularly, significant differences between language groups were observed for: word reading accuracy (F(3,190) = 4.94, p = .003); word reading fluency (F(3,190) = 4.59, p = .004); text reading accuracy (F(3,190) = 8.73, p < .001); text reading fluency (F(3,190) = 11.50, p < .001); text comprehension (F(3,190) = 12.45, p < .001); gap dictation (F(3,180) = 10.52, p < .001); text dictation (F(3,180) = 18.22, p < .001). The significant main effects of language highlight the need for separate language group norms for screening and diagnostic purposes. The lack of main effects of language for non-word phoneme deletion, non-word phoneme segmentation, and non-word reading indicate that the sub-tests using non-words were successfully constructed to account for language proficiency effects. Significant Pearson correlations between the school monitoring results of German listening (.28 < |𝜌| < .59) and German reading comprehension (.24 < |𝜌| < .65) and the majority of the newly developed sub-tests of the reading/writing test battery were also observed. These correlations provide a measure of construct validity, illustrating the significant link between children’s scholastic performance and performance in the novel reading/writing test battery. We expect to replicate these initial findings with a larger sample of children during the validation and norming phase of the project and supplement our data analyses with more detailed results highlighting the distribution of scores per sub-test based on language spoken at home and its effect on scholastic performance as assessed by the Luxembourgish national school monitoring program. References Bialystok, E., Craik, F., & Luk, G. (2008). Cognitive Control and Lexical Access in Younger and Older Bilinguals. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning Memory and Cognition, 34(4), 859–873. https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.34.4.859 Coderre, E. L., van Heuven, W. J. B., & Conklin, K. (2013). The timing and magnitude of Stroop interference and facilitation in monolinguals and bilinguals. Bilingualism, 16(2), 420–441. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728912000405 Hoffmann, D., Hornung, C., Gamo, S., Esch, P., Keller, U., & Fischbach, A. (2018). Schulische Kompetenzen von Erstklässlern und ihre Entwicklung nach zwei Jahren. In T. Lentz, I. Baumann, & A. Küpper (Eds.), Nationaler Bildungsbericht (pp. 84–96). University of Luxembourg & SCRIPT. Martini, S., Schiltz, C., Fischbach, A., & Ugen, S. (2021). Identifying Math and Reading Difficulties of multilingual children: Effects of different cut-offs and reference group. In M. Herzog, A. Fritz-Stratmann, & E. Gürsoy (Eds.), Diversity Dimensions in Mathematics and Language Learning (pp. 200–228). De Gruyter Mouton. The Government of the Grand Dutchy of Luxembourg. (2023, January) Society and culture – Population Demographics. https://luxembourg.public.lu/en/society-and-culture/population/demographics.html Ugen, S., Schiltz, C., Fischbach, A., & Pit-ten Cate, I. M. (2021). Lernstörungen im multilingualen Kontext. Diagnose und Hilfestellungen. Melusina Press. https://doi.org/10.26298/bg5s-ng46 [less ▲]

Early Childhood Education and Care in Luxembourg and Language: Performance Closing the Gap between different Language Backgrounds?

Scientific Conference (2023, August 21)

Achievement gaps between students of different family backgrounds have been found in many countries (e.g. Stanat & Christensen, 2006). They are not only based on socioeconomic status or immigration ... [more ▼]

Achievement gaps between students of different family backgrounds have been found in many countries (e.g. Stanat & Christensen, 2006). They are not only based on socioeconomic status or immigration background, but also on home language: If children do not speak the language of instruction at home, they are often disadvantaged in school and perform worse in school performance tests than students speaking the instruction language at home (e.g. Van Staden et al., 2016). Low SES increases the risk that children with an L2 instruction language are disadvantaged (Cummins, 2018). With rising numbers of global migration (Edmond, 2020), these disparities in educational systems can be expected to become more distinct in the future. Luxembourg is a trilingual country with an already highly diverse student population in terms of nationality and language background, with 67 % of elementary school students not speaking the first instruction language Luxembourgish at home (MENJE & SCRIPT, 2022). It is therefore a prime example to study these educational challenges ahead of time. In addition to the “super-diversity” of Luxembourg, students of different language backgrounds have to deal with a highly demanding language curriculum at school, in which the instruction language switches first from Luxembourgish to German and then to French in secondary education. In consequence, many students face challenges in acquiring language and literacy skills (e.g. Hornung et al., 2021) – leading to distinct gaps between students of different language backgrounds. One possible way to decrease such disparities might be an early and extensive participation in early childhood education and care (ECEC). Participation in ECEC, that is “any regulated arrangement that provides education and care to children from birth to compulsory primary school age” (European Commission, n.d.), has been shown to have positive effects on language development and other cognitive abilities. These effects differ between age groups. For young children from age 0 to 3, a Norwegian study found that scaling up early ECEC improved early language skills at the age of seven (Drange & Havnes, 2015). However, a review also indicated research on this age group was scarcer and produced more varied findings (Melhuish et al., 2015). For children between the ages 3 and 6, effects on language and other cognitive skills were more consistently positive (Melhuish et al., 2015). In children with differing home language backgrounds, this association was stronger than in those who spoke the majority language at home (Ansari et al., 2021). This study aims to investigate if these findings hold in the multilingual and diverse school context of Luxembourg and to analyze the effects of ECEC attendance on language performance, differentiated by the student’s home language background and the particular type of ECEC (non-formal daycare vs formal early education). Based on the presented literature, we hypothesize that (1) participation in ECEC, formal and nonformal, is associated with higher listening comprehension in Luxembourgish (i.e. the first instruction language) in grade 1, that (2) the associations are moderated by the children home language background where greater associations are expected for children who do not speak the instruction language at home and that (3) participation in formal ECEC explains more variance than participation in nonformal ECEC. Methodology, Methods, Research Instruments or Sources Used To answer our research questions, we draw on a large-scale dataset of n = 5.952 first graders from the Luxemburg school monitoring programme ÉpStan (Épreuves Standardisées) in 2021. The ÉpStan includes questionnaires and written competence tests in key school areas that are implemented every year for all Luxembourgish students in grades 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9. Its aim is a.o. to objectively assess the long-term performance of the Luxembourgish school system. For our study, we focus on Luxembourg listening comprehension in grade 1, which is assessed with different text formats, such as dialogues, short stories or radio broadcasts presented on CDs. The test is measuring different sub-skills, defined by the national curriculum, such as understanding one’s interlocutor, locating, understanding and interpreting information, and applying listening strategies (recognition of noises and voices). Information on ECEC participation is assessed retrospectively in parent questionnaires for crèches (non-formal ECEC targeted at 0-4 year olds) and for précoce (formal ECEC, targeted at 3 year olds). Home language background is assessed by self-report in the student questionnaire and categorised into five groups: a) Luxembourgish, b) French, c) Portuguese, d) bilingual Luxembourgish / French and e) bilingual Luxembourgish / Portuguese. After checking whether the prerequisites for the analyses are met, we calculate a multivariate regression model with the two ECEC types as binary predictors and other family background variables as control for hypothesis (1). For hypothesis (2), we test whether home language background moderates the association between ECEC and language performance by adding interaction terms of home language group with each ECEC type to our regression model. For hypothesis (3), we compare the incremental variance explained by each ECEC type. Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or Findings We expect our outcomes to show that attendance in both ECEC types have positive associations with Luxembourgish listening comprehension in first grade, in line with many findings on the topic. Additionally, attendance in formal ECEC is expected to explain more variance in Luxembourgish listening comprehension than attendance in nonformal ECEC as Luxembourgish is the main instruction language in formal ECEC. In nonformal ECEC institutions, language policies are usually less rigid and more plurilingual. We also expect significant moderations of this effect by home language background: We do not expect a strong effect of both formal and nonformal ECEC on listening comprehension for children who speak only Luxembourgish at home, as they are expected to have developed these skills at home. Children who do not speak Luxembourgish at home are, on the other hand, expected to benefit more from ECEC attendance. This would then indicate that more time spent in ECEC institutions fostered their basic skills in the instruction language and helped gain better listening performance. Being competent in the instruction language is essential for further learning. Without the language skills, children are unable to connect to the school’s input (Schleppegrell, 2001). All in all, the findings might help to understand the effects of two different ECEC types in Luxembourg for children of different language backgrounds – indicating for whom ECEC attendance should be explicitly encouraged. It might also give us valuable hints towards characteristics of ECEC that are especially helpful to further language skills and thus, later school performance. Implications on possible policy decisions with the goal of closing achievement gaps and furthering educational equality will be discussed. References Ansari, A., Pianta, R. C., Whittaker, J. E., Vitiello, V., & Ruzek, E. (2021). Enrollment in public-prekindergarten and school readiness skills at kindergarten entry: Differential associations by home language, income, and program characteristics. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 54, 60–71. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2020.07.011 Cummins, J. (2018). Urban Multilingualism and Educational Achievement: Identifying and Implementing Evidence-Based Strategies for School Improvement. In P. Van Avermaet, S. Slembrouck, K. Van Gorp, S. Sierens, & K. Maryns (Eds.), The Multilingual Edge of Education (p. 67–90). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-54856-6_4 Drange, N., & Havnes, T. (2015). Child Care Before Age Two and the Development of Language and Numeracy: Evidence from a Lottery. Discussion Papers. Statistics Norway. Research Department., 808. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2582539 Edmond, C. (2020, January 10). Global migration, by the numbers. World Economic Forum. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/01/iom-global-migration-report-international-migrants-2020/ European Commission. (n.d.). Early childhood education and care initiatives. Retrieved 23rd May 2022, from https://education.ec.europa.eu/node/1702 Hornung, C., Wollschläger, R., Keller, U., Esch, P., Muller, C., & Fischbach, A. (2021). Neue längsschnittliche Befunde aus dem nationalen Bildungsmonitoring ÉpStan in der 1. und 3. Klasse. Negativer Trend in der Kompetenzentwicklung und kein Erfolg bei Klassenwiederholungen. In LUCET & SCRIPT (Eds.), Nationaler Bildungsbericht Luxemburg 2021 (p. 44–55). LUCET & SCRIPT. Melhuish, E., Ereky-Stevens, K., Petrogiannis, K., Ariescu, A., Penderi, E., Rentzou, K., Tawell, A., Leseman, P., & Broekhuisen, M. (2015). A review of research on the effects of early childhood education and care (ECEC) on child development [Technical Report.]. MENJE & SCRIPT. (2022). Education system in Luxembourg. Key Figures. edustat.lu Schleppegrell, M. J. (2001). Linguistic Features of the Language of Schooling. Linguistics and Education, 12(4), 431–459. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0898-5898(01)00073-0 Stanat, P., & Christensen, G. (2006). Where Immigrant Students Succeed—A Comparative Review of Performance and Engagement in PISA 2003. https://www.oecd.org/education/school/programmeforinternationalstudentassessmentpisa/whereimmigrantstudentssucceed-acomparativereviewofperformanceandengagementinpisa2003.htm Van Staden, S., Bosker, R., & Bergbauer, A. (2016). Differences in achievement between home language and language of learning in South Africa: Evidence from prePIRLS 2011. South African Journal of Childhood Education, 6(1), 10. https://doi.org/10.4102/sajce.v6i1.441 [less ▲]

Historical-Domain Pre-trained Language Model for Historical Extractive Text Summarization

Scientific Conference (2023, August 04)

In recent years, pre-trained language models (PLMs) have shown remarkable advancements in the extractive summarization task across diverse domains. However, there remains a lack of research specifically ... [more ▼]

In recent years, pre-trained language models (PLMs) have shown remarkable advancements in the extractive summarization task across diverse domains. However, there remains a lack of research specifically in the historical domain. In this paper, we propose a novel method for extractive historical single-document summarization that leverages the potential of a domain-aware historical bidirectional language model, pre-trained on a large-scale historical corpus. Subsequently, we fine-tune the language model specifically for the task of extractive historical single-document summarization. One major challenge for this task is the lack of annotated datasets for historical summarization. To address this issue, we construct a dataset by collecting archived historical documents from the Centre Virtuel de la Connaissance sur l’Europe (CVCE) group at the University of Luxembourg. Furthermore, to better learn the structural features of the input documents, we use a sentence position embedding mechanism that enables the model to learn the position information of sentences. The overall experimental results on our historical dataset collected from the CVCE group show that our method outperforms recent state-of-the-art methods in terms of ROUGE-1, ROUGE-2, and ROUGE-L F1 scores. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work on extractive historical text summarization. [less ▲]

Novel deep learning approaches for learning scientific simulations

Scientific Conference (2023, August)

Impact of Disentanglement on Pruning Neural Networks

Scientific Conference (2023, July 19)

Deploying deep learning neural networks on edge devices, to accomplish task specific objectives in the real-world, requires a reduction in their memory footprint, power consumption, and latency. This can ... [more ▼]

Deploying deep learning neural networks on edge devices, to accomplish task specific objectives in the real-world, requires a reduction in their memory footprint, power consumption, and latency. This can be realized via efficient model compression. Disentangled latent representations produced by variational autoencoder (VAE) networks are a promising approach for achieving model compression because they mainly retain task-specific information, discarding useless information for the task at hand. We make use of the Beta-VAE framework combined with a standard criterion for pruning to investigate the impact of forcing the network to learn disentangled representations on the pruning process for the task of classification. In particular, we perform experiments on MNIST and CIFAR10 datasets, examine disentanglement challenges, and propose a path forward for future works. [less ▲]

Symposium: Creativity and technology: exploring new possibilities with our minds and bodies

Scientific Conference (2023, July 17)

Technology has many roles to play in human cognition. As new forms of artificial creative aids gain momentum and become accessible, it is time to ponder on the relationship between humans and technology ... [more ▼]

Technology has many roles to play in human cognition. As new forms of artificial creative aids gain momentum and become accessible, it is time to ponder on the relationship between humans and technology and explore the affordances of new technology with respect to the human creative process and learning. How can new technology augment or hinder human creativity? How could we use new technological tools as a medium for artistic expression? What are the consequences of extensive overreliance on technology? This symposium aims to critically reflect on the impact of new technologies on our minds and bodies and outline ways we can be creative with artificial tools and build a healthy technological partnership. [less ▲]

Towards User Empowerment: Bridging the Gap in Health Misinformation Protection on Social Networks

Scientific Conference (2023, July 11)

Health misinformation in social networks requires immediate attention due to its severe consequences, as exemplified by the COVID-19 pandemic response on social media. However, the existing solutions ... [more ▼]

Health misinformation in social networks requires immediate attention due to its severe consequences, as exemplified by the COVID-19 pandemic response on social media. However, the existing solutions designed to combat misinformation generally overlook the unique characteristics of health misinformation domain. Through a review of relevant literature and a critical analysis of current anti-misinformation solutions, we have identified significant user-side issues that undermine the effectiveness of existing approaches in addressing health misinformation. To tackle these issues, we put forth several strategies to empower users in combating health misinformation. Our research contributes to understanding the challenges associated with health misinformation correction on social networks. [less ▲]

Surmonter les obstacles d'une source par l'interdisciplinarité. Etudier le pouvoir d'une gouvernante au prisme de sa correspondance (Marie de Hongrie, 1531-1558)

Scientific Conference (2023, July 07)

Marie de Hongrie gouverne durant vingt-cinq années (1531-1555) les anciens Pays-Bas en l’autorité de son frère Charles Quint, alors souverain légitime d’un empire composite universel placé sous l’égide ... [more ▼]

Marie de Hongrie gouverne durant vingt-cinq années (1531-1555) les anciens Pays-Bas en l’autorité de son frère Charles Quint, alors souverain légitime d’un empire composite universel placé sous l’égide d’une unique famille, les Habsbourg. Ce territoire, pivot stratégique de l’empire, s’organise sous la configuration d’un dominum politicum et regale : système de gouvernement faisant le compromis entre monarchie et assemblées représentatives au sein duquel les villes disposent d’un espace de négociation permanent. Réputée pour sa complexité, la fonction de dirigeant y est constamment prise en tenaille entre les pressions de puissances voisines et les revendications internes. À une période où le pouvoir féminin reste indu, Marie de Hongrie réussit à préserver cet ensemble au plus fort des guerres, des dissensions religieuses, des catastrophes sanitaires/naturelles et des difficultés économiques. Les coulisses de ce pouvoir féminin peuvent aujourd’hui s’appréhender par le biais d’une source de premier ordre : la correspondance, appui essentiel de l’exercice du pouvoir et de la royauté rythmant le déroulement quotidien des affaires de l’État et de la vie curiale au XVIe siècle. Véritables dialogues inter absentes, les lettres sont un rouage essentiel de l’empire, assurant communication, information et coordination de la politique. En outre, ces écrits sont aussi un support de l’intimité, un média censé réduire la distance séparant les membres liés d’une même famille. Plus encore pour l’historien, ce témoignage direct dévoile la véritable expression féminine et illustre le rôle politique joué par les femmes, si difficiles à saisir ailleurs, puisque souvent tributaires d’une littérature prescriptive à voix masculine. Toutefois, sans les précautions requises, par analogie au prisme déviant les rayons lumineux de leur trajectoire naturelle, la correspondance peut fausser notre reconstruction historique des réalités du passé. S’y opère en effet un « phénomène de diffraction par lequel le réel est passé au crible de l’écriture et de la configuration sociale ». Loin d’être anodine ou spontanée, la rédaction d’une lettre est ainsi régie par de multiples conventions et conditions d’énonciations définies par un « pacte épistolaire » inconscient passé entre scripteur et destinataire, condition sine qua non de l’échange. Face à ces embûches, l’historien peut cependant puiser des ressources sortant de ses sphères de connaissances habituelles, empruntant de cette manière aux linguistes, aux littéraires, aux anthropologues ou encore aux spécialistes du genre, leurs outils de travail censés lever l’opacité des stratégies subversives et des jeux de masques performatifs habitant la lettre. Entre autres, en mesurant toute l’importance du choix des mots et du langage (ex : recours à des procédés discursifs/rhétoriques divers) dans le sillage du linguistic turn, en considérant la modulation d’un soi en confrontation avec un autre dans le sillage du performative turn et de l’anthropologie littéraire ou encore en reconnaissant l’impact du genre sur le discours (ex : subversion, agency). En somme, des ouvertures issues d’une rencontre entre disciplines, indispensables à la pratique d’une « lecture entre les lignes », seule capable de nous renseigner plausiblement sur les arcanes d’un pouvoir féminin. [less ▲]

Can openness to diversity be taught in the family?

Scientific Conference (2023, July 04)

We live an increasingly globalized world. Whilst culture contact is perceived as a threat by some, others welcome the opportunity to learn about different perspectives and to broaden their horizon. Can ... [more ▼]

We live an increasingly globalized world. Whilst culture contact is perceived as a threat by some, others welcome the opportunity to learn about different perspectives and to broaden their horizon. Can this openness towards diversity be taught? Research into the benefits of intercultural exchanges for students exists, yet these studies usually focus only on the student perspective. In our qualitative study we investigate if and how parental values regarding openness can be passed on to children. We analyze both, the perspective of the parents who value intercultural exchanges and that of their children. We carried out an in-depth case study with a family with four children (two sons and two daughters, now aged between 17 and 23) who each participated in long-term exchanges aged between 7 and 10 in France, and a second exchange as teenagers (aged 13 and 16) to an English-speaking country. The family also hosted several guest children. We developed an interview guide, with adapted versions for parents and children, to obtain an in-depth understanding for the parental values, their parenting style, and the motivation of the children to go on these exchanges and their (lasting) experiences thereafter. Each family member was interviewed separately after obtaining informed consent. Whilst all children appreciated the opportunity and agreed that the experience fostered independence and self-efficacy, they also differed regarding how these exchanges affected them – both, whist being away and on return. The parents emphasized the importance of trust in the process – both in trusting their children as well as in the host families. They also observed that only families with a larger number of children participated in the exchanges at a young age, – noting that the notion of sharing is already established. These findings will be discussed – also against the background of the emerging phenomenon of helicopter parenting. [less ▲]

Finite Mixture Models for an underlying Beta distribution with an application to COVID-19 data

Scientific Conference (2023, July 04)

The longitudinal impact of student characteristics, school composition and track placement on mathematics performance: Intre- and cross level intersectionality

Scientific Conference (2023, June 29)

In recent decades, much sociological inquiry has focused on whether and to what extent education systems are capable of compensating for and equalizing social inequalities. While earlier studies have ... [more ▼]

In recent decades, much sociological inquiry has focused on whether and to what extent education systems are capable of compensating for and equalizing social inequalities. While earlier studies have mainly focused on educational inequalities and their relationship with individual students’ characteristics (e.g., Boudon, 1974; Bourdieu, 1984); or school-level factors, particularly school composition and segregation (e.g., Jencks, 1974), few studies have been concerned with the intersectionality of individual and school-level factors and their impact on the performance of students within and across levels of education (Gross et al., 2016). The present study aims to investigate the intersectional impact of students´ academic and socio-demographic characteristics, school composition and school tracks on students’ mathematics performance in Luxembourg. It draws on data collected as part of the Luxembourg school monitoring programme “Épreuves Standardisées” (ÉpStan; Fischbach et al., 2014) and included all students enrolled in public education Grade 3 (November 2013) matched with data from the same students in Grade 9 (November 2017-2021) including those repeating once or twice (N≈3600). Results of multilevel mixed effects regression analysis show that math achievement in Grade 9 is affected by student gender, SES, migration background and prior achievement, as well as by the school track and school composition (i.e., percentage of Low SES families in school). In addition, a robust cross-level gender x school track interaction effect was found. Results show that after controlling for prior performance and other individual characteristics, the institutional placement of students into different school tracks and school composition in Grade 3 influence test results in Grade 9. The cross-level interaction effect indicates that the boy-girl achievement gap is even more pronounced in the higher (academic) than in the middle (more technical) track. Results support earlier findings that both individual and school composition variables, and especially their intersectionality, contribute to differences in educational outcomes. [less ▲]

Combined Effects of Students´ Gender and Ethnicity on Teachers´ Stereotype-Based Expectations: A Systematic Review

Scientific Conference (2023, June 29)

Whilst student populations become increasingly heterogeneous, (inter)national large-scale studies report educational inequalities based on shared characteristics of different groups of students. Although ... [more ▼]

Whilst student populations become increasingly heterogeneous, (inter)national large-scale studies report educational inequalities based on shared characteristics of different groups of students. Although differences in educational pathways may be related to interindividual differences in ability and achievement, these inequalities may also be affected by teachers´ beliefs and expectations. Research has demonstrated that teachers´ beliefs and expectations vary as a function of specific student characteristics, whereby teachers have lower expectations for the academic achievement of ethnic minority students (for a review, see Wang et al., 2018). In addition, teachers may have different expectations for boys and girls, especially in regard to domain specific achievement (i.e., mathematical and language proficiency; e.g., de Boer et al., 2010; Holder & Kessels, 2017) and classroom behavior (Arbuckle & Little, 2004; Glock, 2016). Although students present themselves with more characteristics that can activate stereotypical beliefs, most research has focused on a single characteristic and little is known about the effect of the intersection of characteristics. To this extent, one could argue for a cumulative effect of ethnicity and gender, whereby stereotype-based expectations concerning ethnic minority students are amplified by the students´ gender (Ghavami & Peplau, 2012), an interaction effect, whereby different characteristics interact (Purdie-Vaughns & Eibach, 2008) or an inhibition effect, whereby one salient characteristic dominates over the other (Pratto et al., 2006). To investigate these differential effects, we conducted a systematic review on the combined effect of student gender and ethnicity on teacher expectations. Results provide support for an interplay of gender and ethnicity, rather than a cumulative or dominance effect, on teacher expectation of student academic proficiency and behavior. That is, certain combinations of gender and ethnicity create (dis)advantages for subgroups of students. These results will be discussed in terms of theory and future research as well as their implications. [less ▲]

A Transient And Highly Resolving Multiphase Approach For Blast Furnaces Based On The XDEM Technology

Scientific Conference (2023, June 22)

Understanding multiphase flow with its complex transfer mechanism of mass, momentum and heat between individual phases is of critical importance for design, operation and meeting environmental challenges ... [more ▼]

Understanding multiphase flow with its complex transfer mechanism of mass, momentum and heat between individual phases is of critical importance for design, operation and meeting environmental challenges. A blast furnace is a key reactor in the steel making industry and consumes large amounts of energy and produces app 70 % of the CO2 emissions of a steel plant. Thus, small improvements can have a large impact on production costs and the carbon footprint. In order to support improvements, a novel and innovative numerical approach based on the Extended Discrete Element Method (XDEM) [1] is applied to resolve the complex physics and phase interactions in a blast furnace. For this purpose, independently developed functionality of XDEM [2,3,4] has been integrated into a homogeneous modelling framework for the first time to treat the complex physics of a blast furnace. While the particulate phase i.e. coke and ore particles are treated as discrete entities, the gas and liquid phases i.e. liquid iron and slag are described by a multiphase Euler approach in OpenFoam. The classical Discrete Element Method (DEM) predicts the descend of particles in the blast furnace and the solution differential conservation equations yields the thermodynamic state of each particle such as coke oxidation, drying, reduction and melting of ore particles. This is accompanied by an intensive exchange of momentum, energy and mass between the discrete and continuum phases. An exchange of momentum e.g. drag force describes the flow resistance for the fluid phases and generates an corresponding pressure drop over the height of the blast furnace. Heat transfer between the particles and mainly the gas phase and to a lesser extent with the liquid phases heats up the coke and iron particle for which the resulting temperature is the driving force for chemical reactions. The latter are reactions that form CO (C+1/2 O2 → CO) as a reducing agent through oxidation of coke and though the Boudouard equilibrium (C+ CO2 ↔ 2 CO). The corresponding reaction rates rely heavily on the mass transfer of oxygen and carbon dioxide between the particles and the gas phase. Carbon monoxide transferred to the ore particles causes a reduction of the iron oxides according to: 3 Fe2O3 + CO → 2 Fe3O4 + CO2 Fe3O4 + 3 CO ↔3 FeO + CO2 FeO + CO ↔ Fe + CO2 Once, the ore particles reach the melting temperature of iron and slag, both constituents start melting and the formed liquid phases are transferred to the appropriate continuum phases of the Euler framework that is shown in fig. 1. The left figure depicts the layered distribution of carbon monoxide resulting from the reduction of iron oxide. The centre figure shows the surface temperature of each individual particle that supplies energy for the coke particles to produce carbon monoxide as a reducing agent, to reduce iron oxides with the formed carbon monoxide and to melt reduced iron and slag. The latter are transferred to the multi-phase CFD solver and appear as volume fractions depicted in the right figure and identifying uniquely the location of the cohesive zone. The results agree well with blast furnace operation and promise to shed light on the internal physics of a blast furnace in particular and similar reactors in general. [1] B. Peters, M. Baniasadi, M. Baniasadi, The eXtented Discrete Element Method (XDEM): An Advanced Approach to Model Blast Furnace, ISBN 978-953-51-5824-0. [2] M. Baniasadi, B. Peters, Preliminary Investigation on the Capability of eXtended Discrete Element Method for Treating the Dripping Zone of a Blast Furnace, ISIJ international, 58 (2018), 25-48. [3] Mehdi Baniasadi, Maryam Baniasadi, Gabriele Pozzetti, and Bernhard Peters. A numerical study on the softening process of iron ore particles in the cohesive zone of an experimental blast furnace using a coupled cfd-dem method. Chemical Engineering Science , 2018 [4] Mehdi Baniasadi, Maryam Baniasadi, and Bernhard Peters. Simulation of the softening and melting behaviours of several layers of iron ore particles through a multiphase cfd-dem approach. Chemical Engineering Science , 2018 [less ▲]

Augmented Reality: der Stellenwert digitaler Medien in Methoden der Mehrsprachigkeitsdidaktik

Scientific Conference (2023, June 16)

History and the Paradoxes of Digitisation: A Global Perspective

Scientific Conference (2023, June 14)

History in the digital present currently faces a paradoxical situation. When seen from a global perspective, the current state of cultural heritage digitisation is highly uneven and inequities in access ... [more ▼]

History in the digital present currently faces a paradoxical situation. When seen from a global perspective, the current state of cultural heritage digitisation is highly uneven and inequities in access abound. Global North/South divisions play a key role, yet are neither immutable nor the sole explanation as the existence of digital Norths in the South and digital Souths in the North shows. Moreover, while postcolonial legacies can reinforce global power and knowledge assymetries and impact local heritage digitization efforts in adverse ways, digitization can also function as a means to address some of those legacies. This paper will discuss the global dimensions of the politics of digitisation with concrete examples from Europe and Africa. While doing so it will simultaneously ask how they feed into selection for digitisation processes and thereby shape “history in the digital present”. [less ▲]

The Gender Gap in Adolescents' life satisfaction

Scientific Conference (2023, June 09)

Navettes transfrontalières de longue distance entre Lorraine et Luxembourg

Scientific Conference (2023, June 08)

L’objectif de la présente communication est d’étudier les navettes domicile-travail de longue distance dans la région Grand Est, qu’elles aient lieu en France ou vers l’étranger. La longue distance est ... [more ▼]

L’objectif de la présente communication est d’étudier les navettes domicile-travail de longue distance dans la région Grand Est, qu’elles aient lieu en France ou vers l’étranger. La longue distance est appréhendée ici par le biais de la navette domicile-travail quotidienne (au moins une fois par semaine pour rester dans la définition du travail frontalier du règlement UE 883/2004), ce qui la distingue du caractère généralement occasionnel entendu pour la mobilité de longue distance dans la littérature. La comparaison des déterminants individuels et territoriaux de ces navettes permettra de mieux comprendre leur organisation et les impacts sur les marchés locaux du travail. Qu’est ce qui distingue les navetteurs de courte distance des navetteurs de longue distance ? Les déterminants à ces navettes diffèrent-ils ? y a-t-il des différences si la navette a lieu en France ou vers l’étranger ? [less ▲]

Mentorship for early career scholars in web archive studies

Scientific Conference (2023, June 06)

This session aims to create a space for open discussion and networking for early career scholars (PhD students and postdoctoral researchers). Organised by three advanced scholars with strong expertise in ... [more ▼]

This session aims to create a space for open discussion and networking for early career scholars (PhD students and postdoctoral researchers). Organised by three advanced scholars with strong expertise in web archives, this 90-minute session will focus first on the role and place of web archives in research, including how case studies, close and distant reading, and different tools and methods may be used, refined, and presented in research. Questions about access, ethical and legal issues will also be addressed, based on concrete needs (copyright, anonymisation of research results, FAIR Data, and so on). The session will then move on to more general questions related to academic careers, strongly keeping in mind the research areas of participant scholars in web archive studies. The topics to be considered will include: opportunities for funding; relevant journals and strategies for publication; avenues for promoting and disseminating research to both academic and public audiences, participation of the general public, including social networks, the main conferences related to web archives, and other forums; issues of inclusivity and diversity facing researchers in the field, etc. Collectively, the organisers of this session combine a wide range of disciplinary and professional perspectives, knowledge of different national and international contexts, and diverse skillsets and expertise. They have also had varying career trajectories, and in particular have come to working with web archives via different routes and with differing but complementary motivations. Consequently, the session will be of relevance to researchers and practitioners from within and outside Europe; from the humanities, social and computer sciences; and from both universities and the cultural heritage sector. The session will strongly focus on the needs and adapt to the requests of participants, in order to align closely with the challenges that early career scholars face in our area. With this first session of mentorship, we hope to set a precedent which might lead to the establishment of a regular session at the RESAW conference. It will also facilitate the development of a peer network among the attendees, who may develop their research and build their professional networks alongside each other in future years. [less ▲]

Flirting and the Web: The Case Study of Luxusbuerg

Scientific Conference (2023, June 05)

A new R package for Finite Mixture Models with an application to clustering countries with respect to COVID data

Scientific Conference (2023, June 02)

Efficient Content Caching for Delivery Time Minimization in the LEO Satellite Networks

Scientific Conference (2023, June 01)

Next-generation multi-spot beam satellite systems open a new way to design low earth orbit (LEO) satellite communication systems with full flexibility in managing bandwidth, transmit power, and spot beam ... [more ▼]

Next-generation multi-spot beam satellite systems open a new way to design low earth orbit (LEO) satellite communication systems with full flexibility in managing bandwidth, transmit power, and spot beam coverage, enabling the adoption of spatial multiplexing techniques to meet the unprecedented demand for future mobile traffic. However, conventional spatial multiplexing techniques perform poorly in satellite systems due to high correlation between the satellite channels, resulting in inefficient mitigation of inter-user interference. In this paper, we exploit the flexibility of multi-spot beam LEO satellites and consider the geographic distribution of users to improve the performance of LEO satellite-assisted edge caching systems. Our goal is to jointly optimize the beam coverage, bandwidth and transmit power and minimize the cache delivery time. In particular, the spot beam coverage is optimized by using the K-means algorithm applied to the realistic user demands, followed by a proposed successive convex approximation (SCA)-based iterative algorithm for optimizing the radio resources. Simulations shows that our optimal approach outperforms the conventional precoding-based approach and also shows a significant improvement in the minimization of the maximum content delivery time. [less ▲]

Crises et défis dans un espace transfrontalier. L'exemple de la Grande Région SaarLorLux

Scientific Conference (2023, June)

The objective of this paper is to discuss the impact of the border, or more precisely the discontinuities introduced by the border in a cross-border region. It will focus on the numerous challenges linked ... [more ▼]

The objective of this paper is to discuss the impact of the border, or more precisely the discontinuities introduced by the border in a cross-border region. It will focus on the numerous challenges linked to various crises (health, energy, demographic or economic) by asking whether the border constitutes a resource that allows us to activate levers and to face them together, or whether on the contrary, it increases these discontinuities even more. The health crisis, for example, is rich in lessons, especially regarding the organization of work in a crossborder context in the face of the sudden return of borders, after years of erasure. [less ▲]

Examining variables of the job context as predictors of nurses’ demand appraisals

Scientific Conference (2023, May 26)

Research goals: The present study examined whether (a) time-related factors of the job context, namely working time and job tenure, predict nurses’ challenge/hindrance appraisals alongside job demands ... [more ▼]

Research goals: The present study examined whether (a) time-related factors of the job context, namely working time and job tenure, predict nurses’ challenge/hindrance appraisals alongside job demands themselves, and whether (b) both factors might act as boundary conditions of nurses’ workplace stressor appraisals. Theoretical background: Based on the transactional theory of stress (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984), studies have so far examined employees’ subjective evaluations of workplace stressors as challenging and/or hindering and their associations to different well-being outcomes (e.g., Webster et al., 2011). Although these studies have helped us to get a more nuanced insight into work-related demands and how they may affect employees, little is known on the question of whether the job context itself might shape how employees experience certain workplace stressors (LePine, 2022). Yet, knowing whether contextual factors of the job might impact employees’ stress appraisal may help us to handle the negative effects of such job stressors (LePine, 2022). Thus, the current study aimed to investigate the role specific contextual variables of the job play as regards to nurses’ subjective appraisals of job demands as challenges and/or hindrances. Design/Methodology/Approach/Intervention: The current study was conducted as part of a broad scientific project on nurses’ working conditions in Luxemburg. Cross-sectional data was collected via an online survey (French/German). The effective sample consisted of 460 nurses (76.9 % female, n = 352; Mage = 39.40, SDage = 9.95). Statistical analyses were performed using IBM SPSS (version 25) and the PROCESS macro for SPSS (Hayes, 2018). To examine the associations between job demands, contextual variables and appraisals, a total of four simple moderation analyses (Model#2; Hayes, 2018) were conducted with challenge and hindrance appraisal as the criterion variables. Per criterion variable we performed two moderation analyses (i.e., one including time pressure as predictor, one including emotional demands as predictor). Working time and job tenure were specified as the moderator variables and were jointly introduced into the regression models. Predictor and moderator variables were mean centered prior analysis. Results: Regression analyses showed that time pressure and emotional demands significantly related to their challenge (for time pressure: b = -.19, p < .001; for emotional demands: b = -.11, p < .05) and hindrance appraisals (for time pressure: b = .33, p <.001; for emotional demands: b = .32, p < .001). Moreover, job tenure significantly predicted nurses’ appraisal of time pressure as challenging (b = -.001, p < .05). In other words, an increased job tenure went along with a decreased perception of time pressure as challenging. Yet, working time did not significantly predict nurses’ appraisals of job demands (i.e., time pressure, emotional demands). Furthermore, we did not detect significant interaction effects. Limitations: The current study focused on two time-related factors of the job context (job tenure and working time) as predictors of nurses’ appraisals. Yet, other contextual factors of the job (e.g., shift work, breaks) might affect how employees appraise certain demands. Moreover, we implemented a cross-sectional design precluding a causal interpretation. Conclusions: The current research identified time-related, contextual factors of the job, which contribute to how nurses appraise specific job demands. Results suggest that nurses with a higher job tenure experience time pressure at work as less of a challenge. This might suggest that they may be better at coping/dealing with time pressure at work than their colleagues with fewer years working in nursing. Note, however, that nurses’ self-reported working time was unrelated to their challenge and hindrance appraisals of job demands. These findings suggest that scholars might need to adopt a more differentiated perspective when conducting research on time-related, contextual factors of the job and their role within the stress appraisal process. [less ▲]

Quel modèle de coopératives comme support des plateformes coopératives ?

Scientific Conference (2023, May 24)

Specific learning disorder in mathematics in a multilingual education context - Diagnosing with language in mind

Scientific Conference (2023, May 22)

In the diagnostic process of specific learning disorder in mathematics, individual weaknesses and strengths are identified to provide adequate support and hence minimize the impact on children’s ... [more ▼]

In the diagnostic process of specific learning disorder in mathematics, individual weaknesses and strengths are identified to provide adequate support and hence minimize the impact on children’s scholastic achievement. In general, diagnostic tools use language to give instructions and present tasks and thus, test language proficiency is prone to impact student’s test performance, especially in linguistically diverse contexts. In Luxembourg, for instance, most children’s home languages differ from the language of math instruction, which is used in the diagnostic process. In addition, given that linguistic heterogeneity is generally not considered in currently used diagnostic instruments, difficulties arising from low language skills need to be disentangled from problems resulting from an underlying learning disorder. To optimize the diagnostic process, we have developed a test battery in mathematics for third-grade children, tailored to a multilingual education context. Based on diagnostic guidelines and neurocognitive models of number processing, we devised a total of 17 subtests addressing different key domains, with reduced language load both in the instructions and within the items. Results from the pilot study (N=211) show significant performance differences based on linguistic backgrounds in three tasks (number naming, number writing, and verbal counting), in favor of children most familiar with the test language. Moreover, we compared general performance in the test battery of a sub-sample (N=116) with the mathematics score of the same children in the Luxembourgish school monitoring program. A significant interaction between test and language profile revealed that differences in performance based on student’s language background profiles were less pronounced in the new test battery than in the monitoring tasks. These findings (a) highlight the importance of considering test language proficiency when diagnosing specific learning disorders and (b) provide first evidence of the new tool’s suitability in a multilingual education setting. [less ▲]

I Congreso International Historia Publicay Divulgacion , Festival la Historia un bien publico

Scientific Conference (2023, May 22)

EMI lecturer training: what and how?

Scientific Conference (2023, May 21)

his paper presents a survey of English medium instruction (EMI) lecturer training worldwide in order to inform decisions by practitioners tasked with its design and delivery (Deroey, 2023). The survey ... [more ▼]

his paper presents a survey of English medium instruction (EMI) lecturer training worldwide in order to inform decisions by practitioners tasked with its design and delivery (Deroey, 2023). The survey encompassed 25 articles containing information about EMI lecturer training in 18 countries, including China. These were analysed for their components, delivery, challenges and recommendations. This analysis revealed four main content components: language, communication, pedagogy and EMI awareness. Most programmes were delivered face to face but some were blended with a substantial amount of online and independent work. Delivery methods were group classes, individual support and peer learning. Microteaching with reflection, feedback and observation was a widely recurring and highly rated activity. Recurring challenges were contextualisation, group heterogeneity, lecturer confidence and incentivisation. Recurring recommendations were various. First, training should focus on more than language alone. Second, given the multi-faceted nature of EMI training, its potential transfer to L1 teaching and the internationalisation agenda, it could be integrated into professional development programmes involving collaborations between language, didactic, EMI and disciplinary experts and reflecting a ‘multilingual and multicultural vision of teaching and learning’ (Dafouz, 2021, p. 34). Third, training should be adapted to the local context. Fourth, we should not overlook affective factors such as lecturers’ self-image, confidence, and sense of self-efficacy (Tsui, 2018). Fifth, real life outcomes should occur and be documented. Finally, lecturers also need to be able and motivated to participate (Chen & Peng, 2019). I conclude with a lecturer training framework. References Chen, Y., & Peng, J. (2019). Continuing professional development of EMI teachers: A Chinese case study. Journal of Education for Teaching, 45(2), 219-222. Dafouz Milne, E. (2021). Repositioning English-Medium Instruction in a broader international agenda: insights from a survey on teacher professional development. Alicante Journal of English Studies, 34, 15-38. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.14198/raei.2021.34.08 Deroey, K. L. B. (2023). English medium instruction lecturer training programmes: content, delivery, ways forward. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 62(1), 101223. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jeap.2023.101223 Herington, R. (2020). Observation as a tool to facilitate the professional development of teaching faculty involved in English as a Medium of Instruction: trainer and trainee perspectives. In M. L. Carrió-Pasto (Ed.), Internationalising Learning in Higher Education (pp. 65-82). IGI Global. Tsui, C. (2018). Teacher efficacy: a case study of faculty beliefs in an English-medium instruction teacher training program. Taiwan Journal of TESOL, 15(1), 101-128. [less ▲]

Determination University of Luxembourg of Reaction Rate Parameters in Heterogeneous Particulate Systems

Scientific Conference (2023, May 19)

Installing Scientific Software on HPC with EasyBuild

Scientific Conference (2023, May 19)

Dispositif réflexif pour l’essor des compétences enseignantes

Scientific Conference (2023, May 16)

Personalising a writing course with a flipped classroom approach

Scientific Conference (2023, May 13)

We present a writing course that uses a flipped classroom approach for personalised learning (Deroey & Skipp, 2023). The student-centred course design has at its core non-instructor-led activities and ... [more ▼]

We present a writing course that uses a flipped classroom approach for personalised learning (Deroey & Skipp, 2023). The student-centred course design has at its core non-instructor-led activities and allows us to accommodate linguistically and disciplinary heterogeneous groups of PhD students. It considers practical issues such as PhD students’ busy schedules (Casanave, 2010), their ability to work independently and limited staff resources. The course has been very successfully delivered several times, both fully and partly online. This writing course provides insight into the structural, stylistic and rhetorical features of research articles as well as the writing and publication process. Students first submit an ‘independent learning task’ in which they apply theory from the book to their writing. Teachers use this output to illustrate key theory points and to provide further practice in the subsequent workshop. Additionally, students submit article drafts with their reflections (Yasuda, 2011) and receive feedback through peer review and consultations (Cho & MacArthur, 2010). Our course design has several advantages. First, it allows personalised learning and differentiated teaching. Second, it limits the number of workshops and maximises their value. Third, it stimulates novice research writers to become writing researchers, promoting continuous learning. References Casanave, C. P. (2010). Dovetailing under impossible circumstances. In C. Aitchison, B. Kamler, & A. Lee (Eds.), Publishing pedagogies for the doctorate and beyond (pp. 47-63). Routledge. Cho, K., & MacArthur, C. (2010). Student revision with peer and expert reviewing. Learning and Instruction, 20, 328-338. Deroey, K. L. B., & Skipp, J. (2023). Designing and delivering an online research article writing course for doctoral students in Luxembourg during Covid-19. In B. Fenton-Smith, J. Gimenez, K. Mansfield, M. Percy, & M. Spinillo (Eds.), International perspectives on teaching academic English in turbulent times (pp. 81-94). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003283409-10 Yasuda, S. (2011). Genre-based tasks in foreign language writing: Developing writers’ genre awareness, linguistic knowledge, and writing competence. Journal of Second Language Writing, 20(2), 111-133. [less ▲]

Can Social Media help reconnect with the past? The case of party.lu

Scientific Conference (2023, May 11)

Décroissance : qu’en disent les juristes ?

Scientific Conference (2023, May)

Let’s Talk it through, anew: Promises and Pitfalls of Customisable Conversational Reflection Support

Scientific Conference (2023, April 28)

As modern lifestyles are becoming increasingly stressful and ever more hectic with multiple stimuli constantly competing for our attention, Affective Disorders (ADs) such as anxiety and depression are on ... [more ▼]

As modern lifestyles are becoming increasingly stressful and ever more hectic with multiple stimuli constantly competing for our attention, Affective Disorders (ADs) such as anxiety and depression are on the rise. Consequently, due to the burgeoning demand for counseling and therapeutic services, many people who suffer from ADs are struggling to timely access the professional support that they require. To address this problem, voice-enabled Conversational Agents (CAs) have been recently proposed as tools for supporting self-reflection and providing assistance in managing a range of ADs through synthetic voices. However, despite their therapeutic potential, CAs offer a very limited choice when it comes to selection and personalisation of synthetic voices used. The goal of this paper is two-fold: (1) it discusses the potential benefits that a CA’s voice customisation can bring to enhance user engagement and promote long term self-reflection, and (2) it offers reflection on the corresponding challenges associated to this approach. [less ▲]

Thermodynamic integration via Replica Exchange Hamiltonian Monte Carlo for faster sampling and model comparison

Scientific Conference (2023, April 24)

Deconstructing a writing course through independent, personalised learning

Scientific Conference (2023, April 20)

We present a research article writing course that departs from traditional models in using a flipped classroom approach based on independent, personalised learning (Deroey & Skipp, 2023). This student ... [more ▼]

We present a research article writing course that departs from traditional models in using a flipped classroom approach based on independent, personalised learning (Deroey & Skipp, 2023). This student-centred approach has at its core non-instructor-led activities. The number of classes is limited in favour of tasks using an in-house e-coursebook designed for self-directed learning; peer review; and information gathering from corpora and disciplinary informants. Course design considers practical issues such as PhD students’ busy schedules (Casanave, 2010), their ability to work independently and limited staff resources. The course has been successfully delivered both fully and partly online to several mixed-discipline cohorts of doctoral students. We will explain how this independent, personalised approach works and formulate recommendations based on course evaluations and lecturer experiences. The aim of the course is to improve insight into the structural, stylistic and rhetorical features of research articles as well as the writing and publication process. To maximise personalised learning through independent work, the course is ‘deconstructed’ into five interlocking components: independent learning tasks, workshops, peer review, writing and reflections, and consultations. Learner autonomy and continuous learning are further promoted through corpus work (Charles, 2018), writing reflection, and analysis of disciplinary texts (Yasuda, 2011). Peers and disciplinary experts are important additional learning resources (Cho & MacArthur, 2010; Zhu, 2004). Prior to a workshop, students complete an independent learning task by reading the relevant chapter from the e-coursebook and completing exercises. These exercises include working with writing from their discipline through corpus searches and text analysis as well as applying learning about structure, style and rhetoric to their own texts. This work is submitted before the workshop, allowing us to illustrate key points and design activities with examples from their tasks. Students also submit article drafts with reflections on how course learning has informed their writing. Peer review happens without an instructor present but using a template to guide feedback. Writing consultations with the lecturer enable participants to get further personal feedback from a writing expert. This course design has several advantages. First, it stimulates budding research writers to become writing researchers, which promotes continuous, independent learning. The course tools and analytical frameworks help them explore answers to their personal disciplinary, genre and language questions. Second, it maximises the added value of the workshops: prior independent work with e-book theory and exercises means we can limit theoretical explanations and use their task output to personalise workshops. Third, on an organizational level, students can manage their time better by being less bound to attend more workshops on our central campus. A fully online version of the course is also offered. However, we continue to look for ways to meet the challenges of our course approach. The personalisation of workshops and monitoring task completion constitutes a considerable workload for lecturers. We conclude by opening a discussion about how to manage independent, personalised learning. References Casanave, C. P. (2010). Dovetailing under impossible circumstances. In C. Aitchison, B. Kamler, & A. Lee (Eds.), Publishing pedagogies for the doctorate and beyond (pp. 47-63). Routledge. Charles, M. (2018). Corpus-assisted editing for doctoral students: More than just concordancing. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 36, 15-25. Cho, K., & MacArthur, C. (2010). Student revision with peer and expert reviewing. Learning and Instruction, 20, 328-338. Deroey, K. L. B., & Skipp, J. (2023). Designing and delivering an online research article writing course for doctoral students in Luxembourg during Covid-19. In B. Fenton-Smith, J. Gimenez, K. Mansfield, M. Percy, & M. Spinillo (Eds.), International perspectives on teaching academic English in turbulent times (pp. 81-94). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003283409-10 Yasuda, S. (2011). Genre-based tasks in foreign language writing: Developing writers’ genre awareness, linguistic knowledge, and writing competence. Journal of Second Language Writing, 20(2), 111-133. Zhu, W. (2004). Faculty views on the importance of writing, the nature of academic writing, and teaching and responding to writing in the disciplines. Journal of Second Language Writing, 13(1), 29-48. [less ▲]

The impact of cognitive characteristics and image-based semantic embeddings on item difficulty

Scientific Conference (2023, April 14)

Today’s educational field has a tremendous hunger for valid and psychometrically sound items to reliably track and model students’ learning processes. Educational large-scale assessments, formative ... [more ▼]

Today’s educational field has a tremendous hunger for valid and psychometrically sound items to reliably track and model students’ learning processes. Educational large-scale assessments, formative classroom assessment, and lately, digital learning platforms require a constant stream of high-quality, and unbiased items. However, traditional development of test items ties up a significant amount of time from subject matter experts, pedagogues and psychometricians and might not be suited anymore to nowadays demands. Salvation is sought in automatic item generation (AIG) which provides the possibility of generating multiple items within a short period of time based on the development of cognitively sound item templates by using algorithms (Gierl, Lay & Tanygin, 2021). Using images or other pictorial elements in math assessment – e.g. TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science (TIMSS, Mullis et al 2009) and Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA, OECD 2013) – is a prominent way to present mathematical tasks. Research on using images in text items show ambiguous results depending on their function and perception (Hoogland et al., 2018; Lindner et al. 2018; Lindner 2020). Thus, despite the high importance, effects of image-based semantic embeddings and their potential interplay with cognitive characteristics of items are hardly studied. The use of image-based semantic embeddings instead of mainly text-based items will increase though, especially in contexts with highly heterogeneous student language backgrounds. The present study psychometrically analyses cognitive item models that were developed by a team of national subject matter experts and psychometricians and then used for algorithmically producing items for the mathematical domain of numbers & operations for Grades 1, 3, and 5 of the Luxembourgish school system. Each item model was administered in 6 experimentally varied versions to investigate the impact of a) the context the mathematical problem was presented in, and b) problem characteristics which cognitive psychology identified to influence the problem solving process. Based on samples from Grade 1 (n = 5963), Grade 3 (n = 5527), and Grade 5 (n = 5291) collected within the annual Épreuves standardisées, this design allows for evaluating whether psychometric characteristics of produced items per model are a) stable, b) can be predicted by problem characteristics, and c) are unbiased towards subgroups of students (known to be disadvantaged in the Luxembourgish school system). The developed cognitive models worked flawlessly as base for generating item instances. Out of 348 generated items, all passed ÉpStan quality criteria which correspond to standard IRT quality criteria (rit > .25; outfit >1.2). All 24 cognitive models could be fully identified either by cognitive aspects alone, or a mixture of cognitive aspects and semantic embeddings. One model could be fully described by different embeddings used. Approximately half of the cognitive models could fully explain all generated and administered items from these models, i.e. no outliers were identified. This remained constant over all grades. With the exemption of one cognitive model, we could identify those cognitive factors that determined item difficulty. These factors included well known aspects, such as, inverse ordering, tie or order effects in additions, number range, odd or even numbers, borrowing/ carry over effects or number of elements to be added. Especially in Grade 1, the chosen semantic embedding the problem was presented in impacted item difficulty in most models (80%). This clearly decreased in Grades 3, and 5 pointing to older students’ higher ability to focus on the content of mathematical problems. Each identified factor was analyzed in terms of subgroup differences and about half of the models were affected by such effects. Gender had the most impact, followed by self-concept and socioeconomic status. Interestingly those differences were mostly found for cognitive factors (23) and less for factors related to the embedding (6). In sum, results are truly promising and show that item development based on cognitive models not only provides the opportunity to apply automatic item generation but to also create item pools with at least approximately known item difficulty. Thus, the majority of developed cognitive models in this study could be used to generate a huge number of items (> 10.000.000) for the domain of numbers & operations without the need for expensive field-trials. A necessary precondition for this is the consideration of the semantic embedding the problems are presented in, especially in lower Grades. It also has to be stated that modeling in Grade 1 was more challenging due to unforeseen interactions and transfer effects between items. We will end our presentation by discussing lessons learned from models where prediction was less successful and highlighting differences between the Grades. [less ▲]

Benefits of Using Cognitive Models Within a Mathematics Large-Scale Assessment

Scientific Conference (2023, April 13)

For several decades, researchers have suggested cognitive models as superior basis for item development (Hornke & Habon, 1986; Leighton & Gierl, 2011). Such models would make item writing decisions ... [more ▼]

For several decades, researchers have suggested cognitive models as superior basis for item development (Hornke & Habon, 1986; Leighton & Gierl, 2011). Such models would make item writing decisions explicit and therefore more valid. By further formalizing such models, even automated item generation with its manifold advantages for economic test construction, and increased test security is possible. If item characteristics are stable, test equating would be rendered unnecessary allowing for individual but equal tests, or even adaptive or multistage testing without extensive pre-calibration. Finally, validated cognitive models would allow for applying Diagnostic Classification Models that provide fine-grained feedback on students’ competencies (Leighton & Gierl, 2007; Rupp, Templin, & Henson, 2010). Remarkably, despite constantly growing need for validated items, educational large-scale assessments (LSAs) have largely forgone cognitive models as template for item writing. Traditional, often inefficient item writing techniques prevail and participating students are offered a global competency score at best. This may have many reasons, above all the focus of LSAs on the system and not individual level. Many domains lack the amount of cognitive research necessary for model development (e.g. Leighton & Gierl, 2011) and test frameworks are mostly based on didactical viewpoints. Moreover, developing an empirically validated cognitive model remains a challenge. Considering the often time-sensitive test development cycles of LSAs, the balance clearly goes against the use of cognitive models. Educational LSAs are meant to stay, however, and the question remains, whether increased effort and research on this topic might pay off in the long run by leveraging all benefits cognitive models have to offer. In total, 35 cognitive item models were developed by a team of national subject matter experts and then used for algorithmically producing items for the mathematical domain of numbers & shapes. Each item model was administered in 6 experimentally varied versions to investigate the impact of problem characteristics which cognitive psychology identified to influence the problem-solving process. Based on samples from Grade 1 (n = 5963), Grade 3 (n = 5527), Grade 5 (n = 5291), and Grade 7 (n = 3018), this design allowed for evaluating whether psychometric characteristics of produced items per model are stable, and can be predicted by problem characteristics. After item calibration (1-PL model), each cognitive model was analyzed in-depth by descriptive comparisons of resulting IRT parameters, and using the LLTM (Fischer, 1973). In a second step, the same items were analyzed using the G-DINA model (Torre & Minchen, 2019) to derive classes of students for the tested subskills. The cognitive models served as basis for the Q-matrix necessary for applying the diagnostic measurement model. Results make a convincing case for investing the (substantially) increased effort to base item development on fine-grained cognitive models. Model-based manipulations of item characteristics were largely stable and behaved according to previous findings in the literature. Thus, differences in item difficulty could be shaped and were stable over different administrations. This remained true for all investigated grades. The final diagnostic classification models distinguished between different developmental stages in the domain of numbers & operations, on group, as well as on individual level. Although not all competencies might be backed up by literature from cognitive psychology yet, our findings encourage a more exploratory model building approach given the usual long-term perspective of LSAs. [less ▲]