Keynote Speakers

• Associate Professor Judy Sheard
  Monash University

  

  Title: Academic integrity in computing education: strategies to guide students and educators through the maze

  Abstract:
  

  Biography:
  Dr. Judy Sheard is Head of the Caulfield School of Information Technology, Monash University, and an internationally known University academic with over 20 years experience in IT education. She teaches programming and interface design, and her research interests are focussed on the use of educational technology and computing education. Specialties: Pedagogical and epistemological issues in the use of educational technology. Determining learner behaviour through user modelling and data modelling of online interactions. Use of Web 2.0 in teaching - issues for assessment and academic integrity. History of computing.

• Associate Professor Ming Fai Pang
  The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China

  

  Title: What is critical to the development of domain-specific “learning-to- learn” capabilities?

  Abstract:
  

  To enhance the global competitiveness of citizens, increasingly more economies recognise the importance of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education and prioritise the development of appropriate educational programmes at different levels to enhance students’ competence in these areas. Many governments have invested huge amount of resources on some new initiatives, such as making coding a mandatory part of the primary/elementary school curriculum, promoting the learning of robotics among young school children, scaling up the use of information and communication technology in education, etc. To formulate a successful policy on STEM education, it is important to gain a deeper understanding of whether the programmes in schools and universities are effective and to scrutinise how it works in various educational settings.

  In particular, it is important to find out what aspects of learning and teaching are critical, not only for better learning but also for better continued, lifelong learning. Given today’s increasingly complex and fast-changing world, no teacher can clearly specify the situations that students will face in the future and thus help them learn how to make sensible and well-informed decisions in each and every instance. Instead, students need to be equipped with a “lens” which will empower them discern and focus on the critical aspects of each situation and to learn from the novel situations encountered. By drawing upon the findings of a research project on developing financial literacy which was funded by the Hong Kong Research Grants Council, this presentation will critically examine the nature of domain-specific “learning-to-learn” capabilities and identify what it takes to succeed in helping students develop the capabilities.

  Biography:
  Ming Fai Pang is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Education of the University of Hong Kong. His research interest is on disciplinary learning and teaching, with research expertise in phenomenography, variation theory of learning and lesson study/learning study. Over the years, he has led a number of externally-funded research projects, such as “the use of learning study to enhance domain-specific generic capability”, “improving learning through systematic use of variation and invariance” and “effects of similarities and differences between examples chosen to facilitate learning”. Currently, he is the Editor of the journals ‘Educational Research Review’ by Elsvier and ‘International Journal of Lesson and Learning Studies’ by Emerald. He also serves as the Editorial Board Member of the journals ‘Vocations and Learning’, and ‘International Review of Economics Education’. He was the holder of the Carl and Thecla Lamberg’s Visiting Professorship of the University of Gothenburg, Sweden in 2009-10 and the recipient of the Gambrinus Fellowship of TU Dortmund University, Germany in 2015-16.

  Professor Baharuddin bin Aris
  Faculty of Education, UTM, Malaysia.

  

  Abstract:
  

  Biography:
  Dr. Baharuddin bin Aris serves as Dean of the Faculty of Education, and Professor of Multimedia and Internet-based Learning at the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. He specialises in research on Computer Science Education - Learning Computer Science, Information and Multimedia Technology Using Information and Communication Technology (ICT); Human-Computer Interaction (HCI); Integrating Andragogy in the Design, Development and Evaluation of Multimedia Courseware and E-learning. He is included as one of the top 20 e-learning academics on the e-business website, “E-business: Who's Who”, a database of researchers in the field of E-business, since 2005.