Faculty Profile: Dr. Xi Lin

Name: Xi Lin

Title: Assistant Professor

Department: Interdisciplinary Professions

Hometown: China

Colleges attended and degrees: Auburn University, PhD in Adult Education

Years working at ECU: Since 2018

What do you love about ECU?

I love my colleagues at ECU. They are very supportive and sweet, making me feel like staying with a family, especially when I am thousands of miles away from my hometown.

What are your research interests?

My research focuses on online and distance learning. I am especially interested in seeking ways to engage students in online courses, increase their interaction with the instructor and their peers, as well as enhancing their sense of community in online learning environments.

What is your favorite course you have taught/currently teach?

I enjoy teaching ADED 6240 Effective College Teaching, and I teach this course during spring and summer semesters. Students in this course usually have teaching experiences. Therefore, it is a great way for them to share and learn from each other towards teaching effectively.

What drew you to IDP and, in particular, the Adult Education area?

Because the Adult Education program in IDP aims to develop professional adult educators who are reflective practitioners. Meanwhile, I am passionate to prepare future adult educators in both research and industry fields. Additionally, this program focuses on the diversity of adult learners, which is one of my research areas. We are a good match. 

What is the most interesting element to you about teaching Adult Education?

Learning from my students is the most interesting element to me about teaching adult education. In our program, most of the students are adult learners and many of them are older than me. They usually share their life and/or job experiences in the discussion board, and I find it enlightening to learn from their stories.

What are your current research projects?

One of my recent projects is to investigate adult learners’ self-generated quiz activity on their online learning. This quiz activity aimed to engage students to think about their learning goals while actively interacting with the learning content and performing from an instructor’s perspective with the assessment tools they created. Furthermore, completing the activity was also intended to support the learners in the online class and evaluate their learning performance. Findings show that the quiz activity promotes learners’ active learning and motivates them to think and use questions for assessing their peers’ learning. Self-generated quizzes can enhance learners’ engagement with the learning content and improve their cognitive processes to gain knowledge. Finally, findings indicate that adult learners benefit from creating an assessment tool as practical skills in online learning for their future career and current work settings as educators. This study has been accepted by Distance Education.

Outside of work, what are your favorite hobbies or interests?

I love playing video games. I have been playing both console games and online games. My favorite game type is role-playing games. One thing I am proud of is that I published three scholarly articles regarding applying games in teaching and learning. I look forward to continuing combining my favorite hobby (playing video games) with my favorite job (teaching and research).