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Citation - WoS: 137
Citation - Scopus: 187
Improving Programming Skills in Engineering Education Through Problem-Based Game Projects With Scratch
(Pergamon-elsevier Science Ltd, 2018) Topalli, Damla; Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil
Nowadays, programming skills are receiving widespread attention for different age groups alongside occupational education programs to better prepare individuals for their future careers. However, introducing programming concepts in an appropriate manner is a challenge in higher education. The main assumption of this study is that enhancing the classical introduction to programming courses through real-life problem-based game development with Scratch programming environment potentially improves the learners' programming skills and motivation. Accordingly, in this study, during one academic semester period, the Introduction to Programming course for engineering students is enriched up to a certain level through real-life game development projects with Scratch. The students are followed within a four-year period starting from freshman until their graduation. The progress of the students who have taken the Introduction to Programming course in enriched or classical form in the fourth year Senior-project course are evaluated. The results show that by slightly improving the course curriculum through real-life game development projects in the Scratch environment, students' performance on the graduation projects improved significantly. As a conclusion, game-based learning, problem-based learning, visual programming and projects are technologies that can potentially help learners to perform better in the introduction to programming course, in turn affecting their performances in projects.
Citation - WoS: 70
Citation - Scopus: 82
The Effect of Uncertainty on Learning in Game-Like Environments
(Pergamon-elsevier Science Ltd, 2013) Ozcelik, Erol; Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil; Ozcelik, Nese Sahin
Considering the role of games for educational purposes, there has an increase in interest among educators in applying strategies used in popular games to create more engaging learning environments. Learning is more fun and appealing in digital educational games and, as a result, it may become more effective. However, few research studies have been conducted to establish principles based on empirical research for designing engaging and entertaining games so as to improve learning. One of the essential characteristics of games that has been unexplored in the literature is the concept of uncertainty. This study examines the effect of uncertainty on learning outcomes. In order to better understand this effect on learning, a game-like learning tool was developed to teach a database concept in higher education programs of software engineering. The tool is designed in two versions: one including uncertainty and the other including no uncertainty. The experimental results of this study reveal that uncertainty enhances learning. Uncertainty is found to be positively associated with motivation. As motivation increases, participants tend to spend more time on answering the questions and to have higher accuracy in these questions. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Citation - WoS: 24
Citation - Scopus: 42
Using Learning Styles Theory in Engineering Education
(Taylor & Francis Ltd, 2008) Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil
Studies have shown that, while learning different concepts, people sometimes take different approaches (learning styles). Accordingly, their performance reflected differently in their academic studies. With the effect of globalisation to the educational environments, the influence of individual learning styles on educational performance is getting more significant. In this study, a learning style assessment tool was used to examine the relationship between students' learning styles and their performance in engineering education programmes. At the beginning of the programme, 285 students' learning styles were measured using a learning style assessment tool. Four years after the engineering education, their performance in the programme was compared with their individual learning styles. This study shows that most of the students are assimilators. Divergers and convergers follow the assimilators. The number of accommodators is very limited. The relationship between engineering students' learning styles and their performance is found: assimilators and convergers performed better than the divergers and accommodators. The performance difference between assimilators and divergers is statistically significant. The results of this study show that the learning style theory is a potential tool for guiding the design and improvement of courses and helping students to improve their individual performance.
Citation - WoS: 15
Citation - Scopus: 21
Software Engineering Education: Some Important Dimensions
(Taylor & Francis Ltd, 2007) Mishra, Alok; Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil; Kilic, Ozkan
Software engineering education has been emerging as an independent and mature discipline. Accordingly, various studies are being done to provide guidelines for curriculum design. The main focus of these guidelines is around core and foundation courses. This paper summarizes the current problems of software engineering education programs. It also proposes some important dimensions as integral parts of software engineering education: interdisciplinary skills, practice experience, communication, skills on continuing education and professionalism. In the current guidelines and studies these dimensions are not addressed specifically. Although there could be other dimensions to be considered in software engineering education, we believe that the proposed ones are very crucial as software engineering is evolving more rapidly than any other engineering discipline. This study also provides a survey of some major universities' undergraduate software engineering programs to evaluate these dimensions.
Citation - WoS: 9
Citation - Scopus: 7
The Underlying Reasons of the Navigation Control Effect on Performance in a Virtual Reality Endoscopic Surgery Training Simulator
(Taylor & Francis inc, 2019) Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil; Ozcelik, Erol; Berker, Mustafa; Dalveren, Gonca Gokce Menekse
Navigation control skills of surgeons become very critical for surgical procedures. Strategies improving these skills are important for developing higher-quality surgical training programs. In this study, the underlying reasons of the navigation control effect on performance in a virtual reality-based navigation environment are evaluated. The participants' performance is measured in conditions: navigation control display and paper-map display. Performance measures were collected from 45 beginners and experienced residents. The results suggest that navigation display significantly improved performance of the participants. Also, navigation was more beneficial for beginners than experienced participants. The underlying reason of the better performance in the navigation condition was due to lower number of looks to the map, which causes attention shifts between information sources. Accordingly, specific training scenarios and user interfaces can be developed to improve the navigation skills of the beginners considering some strategies to lower their number of references to the information sources.
Citation - WoS: 10
Citation - Scopus: 12
Distinguishing Intermediate and Novice Surgeons by Eye Movements
(Frontiers Media Sa, 2020) Menekse Dalveren, Gonca Gokce; Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil
Surgical skill-level assessment is key to collecting the required feedback and adapting the educational programs accordingly. Currently, these assessments for the minimal invasive surgery programs are primarily based on subjective methods, and there is no consensus on skill level classifications. One of the most detailed of these classifications categorize skill levels as beginner, novice, intermediate, sub-expert, and expert. To properly integrate skill assessment into minimal invasive surgical education programs and provide skill-based training alternatives, it is necessary to classify the skill levels in as detailed a way as possible and identify the differences between all skill levels in an objective manner. Yet, despite the existence of very encouraging results in the literature, most of the studies have been conducted to better understand the differences between novice and expert surgical skill levels leaving out the other crucial skill levels between them. Additionally, there are very limited studies by considering the eye-movement behaviors of surgical residents. To this end, the present study attempted to distinguish novice- and intermediate-level surgical residents based on their eye movements. The eye-movement data was recorded from 23 volunteer surgical residents while they were performing four computer-based simulated surgical tasks under different hand conditions. The data was analyzed using logistic regression to estimate the skill levels of both groups. The best results of the estimation revealing a 91.3% recognition rate of predicting novice and intermediate surgical residents on one scenario were selected from four under the dominant hand condition. These results show that the eye-movements can be potentially used to identify surgeons with intermediate and novice skills. However, the results also indicate that the order in which the scenarios are provided, and the design of the scenario, the tasks, and their appropriateness with the skill levels of the participants are all critical factors to be considered in improving the estimation ratio, and hence require thorough assessment for future research.
Citation - WoS: 16
Citation - Scopus: 16
Using Eye-Movement Events To Determine the Mental Workload of Surgical Residents
(int Group Eye Movement Research, 2018) Dalveren, Gonca Gokce Menekse; Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil
These days, eye-tracking is one of the promising technologies used in different fields such as aviation, arts, sports, psychology and driving for several purposes. Even though it is being used for health purposes, studies involving eye-tracking are rare in the field of endo-neurosurgery. This study aims to use this technology to promote our understanding of the effect related to computer-based instructional materials on mental workload of endo-neurosurgery residents. Four computer-based simulation scenarios are developed based on skill development requirements of endo-neurosurgery residents. Two of them were designed as general models and the other two as simulated surgical models. During these surgery procedures, in real settings, surgical residents need to use their both hands simultaneously to control the endoscope and the operational tool in a coordinated fashion. Therefore, to shed light on the participants' behaviors, these scenarios are performed with dominant-hand, non-dominant hand and, finally with both-hands using haptic interfaces. Twenty-three residents volunteered in this study. Their eye-movements were recorded while performing the scenarios. According to the results of this study, when performing the simulated surgical models, an increase in the participants' mental workload was recorded when compared to the other scenarios. Accordingly, it can be concluded that the eye-movements of surgical residents can provide insights about the anticipated level of difficulty about the skill-based tasks. This information might be very critical to properly design and organize instructional materials for endo-neurosurgery, and also to better guide and evaluate the progress of trainees in computer simulation-based skill training environments.
Citation - WoS: 11
Citation - Scopus: 17
Student Engagement Research Trends of Past 10 Years: a Machine Learning-Based Analysis of 42,000 Research Articles
(Springer, 2023) Gurcan, Fatih; Erdogdu, Fatih; Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil; Cagiltay, Kursat
Student engagement is critical for both academic achievement and learner satisfaction because it promotes successful learning outcomes. Despite its importance in various learning environments, research into the trends and themes of student engagement is scarce. In this regard, topic modeling, a machine learning technique, allows for the analysis of large amounts of content in any field. Thus, topic modeling provides a systematic methodology for identifying research themes, trends, and application areas in a comprehensive framework. In the literature, there is a lack of topic modeling-based studies that analyze the holistic landscape of student engagement research. Such research is important for identifying wide-ranging topics and trends in the field and guiding researchers and educators. Therefore, this study aimed to analyze student engagement research using a topic modeling approach and to reveal research interests and trends with their temporal development, thereby addressing a lack of research in this area. To this end, this study analyzed 42,517 peer-reviewed journal articles published from 2010 to 2019 using machine learning techniques. According to our findings, two new dimensions, "Community Engagement" and "School Engagement", were identified in addition to the existing ones. It is also envisaged that the next period of research and applications in student engagement will focus on the motivation-oriented tools and methods, dimensions of student engagement, such as social and behavioral engagement, and specific learning contexts such as English as a Foreign Language "EFL" and Science, Technology, Engineering and Math "STEM".
Moocs and Economic Disadvantage: a Path Analysis of 3.5 Million Mitx Learners
(Routledge Journals, Taylor & Francis Ltd, 2025) Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil; Toker, Sacip; Cagiltay, Kursat
Massive Online Open Courses (MOOCs) are offered by universities and companies to provide quality education to anyone, anyplace and at any time. The impact of economic disadvantage on these courses has not been fully explored despite several studies. This study aimed to investigate the impact of country's income level on the success of 3,523,692 learners from 204 countries enrolled in 174 MITx MOOCs. The countries were classified as low- and lower-middle-income (L&LM) or high- and upper-middle-income (H&UM). A structural equation modelling with multigroup analysis conducted. The findings revealed that learners in the L&LM group performed better academically. Completion rates were 66% for L&LM and 25% for H&UM, and certification rates were 95% for L&LM and 99% for H&UM. This shows that L&LM learners may be more motivated because they believe MOOCs might help their careers. These results are essential for creating MOOCs that fit diverse learner demographics.
Citation - WoS: 6
Citation - Scopus: 6
Understanding the Effect of Handedness on Both-Handed Task Performance: an Experimental Study Based on a Haptic-Controlled, Simulation-Based Surgical Skill Training Scenario
(Taylor & Francis inc, 2019) Topalli, Damla; Eyuboglu, Burak Gokberk; Cagiltay, Nergiz Ercil
Understanding the performance on both-handed tasks, such as endoscopic surgery, is critical to better organize and develop appropriate instructional systems to improve the necessary skills of surgeons. However, in the literature, only a limited number of studies have investigated the effect of handedness on both-handed task performance. This study aimed to provide an understanding of the participants' performance differences while performing both-handed tasks through a haptic user interface in a simulated virtual environment specifically developed for surgical training purposes. Twenty-four surgeons attending a medical school in Turkey voluntarily participated in the study. The duration, accuracy, and collision measures were automatically recorded by software. The results revealed that the left-handed participants performed the both-handed tasks (camera: nondominant hand, tool: dominant-hand) in a significantly shorter time than the right-handed participants. This study also showed that haptic-controlled simulation-based surgical skill training systems can potentially provide measures for better understanding the individual behaviors and deliver alternative training environments specific to individual requirements.

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