The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) has had a significant impact on various fields, including education. This study investigates the emotional effects of learning English as a second language using AI tutoring tools in comparison to traditional classroom methods. The research focused on students from Shiraz University and used the Achievement Emotions Questionnaire to measure eight distinct emotions: enjoyment, hope, pride, anger, anxiety, shame, hopelessness, and boredom. The study discovered that students using the Praktika AI-based app reported notably lower (...) levels of negative emotions (anger, anxiety, shame, and hopelessness) and higher improvement of hope and enjoyment compared to those in traditional classroom settings. The personalised feedback and interactive nature of AI tools contributed to these emotional benefits, suggesting that AI can effectively support second language acquisition by creating a more emotionally supportive learning environment. The implications for educators and policymakers are significant, indicating the potential for AI tools to enhance student motivation and emotional well-being, resulting in improved learning outcomes. Despite the promising results, the study acknowledges limitations such as a small sample size and the focus on short-term emotional impacts. Future research should investigate long-term effects, include diverse populations, and use comprehensive metrics to fully understand the role of AI in language learning. (shrink)

Research has shown that “no use” drug education programs, with the objective of scaring or shaming youth into abstinence, have not been effective in addressing problematic substance use. The ineffectiveness of such scare tactic approaches has led program developers to focus on prevention and harm reduction associated with drug use, or in general, health literacy promotion. While significant ‘discussion-based’ drug education programs have been developed over the past decade and has encouraged students to be expressive and critical thinkers regarding drug (...) use, their effective implementation has been a challenge. This paper introduces Engaged Philosophical Inquiry as a pedagogical approach in order to promote drug literacy. The EPI approach is used both as the content and means of professional development for high school teachers to address the significant role of teachers in these programs. Its goal is to help teachers become aware of and re-evaluate their biases, beliefs and behaviors, before they are able to facilitate a non-stereotyped, open, and thoughtful discussion on drug use related topics. The overall idea of this paper is based on an in-progress research project sponsored by Mitacs organization. It discusses the significance of the project by first presenting the existing methods and theoretical approaches to drug education. On that basis, it shows how EPI can contribute to traditional drug education approaches. It then describes how the methodology and phases of the project are rooted in a dialogical process that aim for a close collaboration with teachers. (shrink)

Source: Author: Mani Ghadamkheir, Mahboubeh Mahmoudzadeh This study employs Foucault's views on the strategies of power to analyze that the institutional world of Bleak House makes a disciplinary structure. The intrusion of these institutions in all strata of society in the novel, from the aristocratic Dedlocks to the poor area of Tom-All-Alone shapes a panoptic structure in which everyone is visible through a permanent and omniscient gaze. Under the matrix of various institutions almost all the characters in the novel, (...) directly or indirectly, are trapped and engaged. This study shows the modernity of Dickens views on power relations in society and gives readers new maps to read Bleak House and new perspectives from which to view it. ]]>. (shrink)

This article interprets design not merely as a technical activity but as a site for the realization of ethical life in Hegel’s sense. Its theoretical framework builds on Hegel’s tripartite ethical model, right (recht), morality (moralität), and ethical Life (sittlichkeit), to show how design experience, when situated in institutional roles, mediation of value tensions, and practices of mutual recognition, contributes to the actualization of freedom and responsibility in the social sphere. Methodologically, the study adopts an interpretive–analytical approach, drawing on a (...) close reading of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right and major commentaries, brought into dialogue with contemporary literature on design ethics. Findings indicate that the legal and institutional structuring of design, while necessary as the formal ground of freedom, remains insufficient unless complemented by the internalization of responsibility at the individual level and its further embedding within social and professional institutions. Only through this progression can design approach what Hegel conceptualized as “freedom realized in the world of human institutions.” The analysis further reveals that ethical tensions, arising from conflicting stakeholder demands or gaps between individual ideals and institutional realities, are not peripheral but constitutive drivers of moral reflection in design practice. Yet the same institutional structures that enable recognition and accountability may also impose constraints that limit the scope of freedom’s realization. The study concludes that design can serve as a formative arena of ethical life, where freedom, duty, and mutual recognition are historically and socially shaped and reinterpreted. This reframing provides a conceptual foundation for future research on how design experience both reflects and shapes moral life within diverse institutional contexts. (shrink)

Understanding the beliefs held by the learners about learning a language, and the way they utilize their thoughts about knowledge and learning seem essential for planning a constructive language program. Following this line of research, this paper aims at testing a hypothetical model of the relationship between epistemic beliefs and subscales of language-learning strategies through the mediating role of learners' self-efficacy. To this end, a sample of 300 Iranian high school students, taking regular courses, completed three survey questionnaires. At this (...) stage, correlational analysis and structural equation modeling were employed to probe the interconnections, analyze the model, and outline the conceptual framework. The results revealed that the LSE framework can adequately account for the learners' LLSs. In particular, the results indicated that efforts, persistence, and imitation positively and significantly influenced LLSs. However, EBs with the mediating role of LSE were known to be a significant factor in demoting the LLSs. Notably, knowledge and learning agents were the negative predictors of LLSs. This paper suggests that LSE has higher explanatory power than EBs in predicting LLSs. The findings of this study suggest that teachers and material developers should pay serious attention to the learners' self-efficacy as they were known to influence LLSs. (shrink)