The Development and Validation of an Instrument to Collaborative Teaching Assessment under the Impact of COVID-19 through the SECI Model
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear Editor,
Dear Author,
Thank you for trusting me to review this good paper. This study uses the theoretical framework of the SECI model to explore whether collaborative teaching was effective in TNHE during COVID-19.
Below you can find my comment to revise improve this manuscript.
Abstract section: what is the implication? what is the recommendations for another researchers, teacher, university stakeholders according the findings?
Introduction section is well written
Literature review section: author need to redraw figure 1.
Methodology section: line 191 I think this paper use convenience sampling method? because the sample in this study was taken from 8 joint programs. Besides, please explain more about the program in detail. what program? When? What is the purpose of the program?
demographic information likes ages, gender, major and another information in needed. Most of the non-Chinese respondents are interesting and need to be explained in detail.
line 207: why author use 6-point likert scale must be explained and add some citations.
Line 210: what is invalid responses? Please explain that the data not complete or?
In data analysis section, it is necessary for researchers to explain the steps of processing EFA and CFA using AMOS. why use AMOS? is there no other software? I know that R language is better than AMOS in analysis EFA.
Results and discussion section:
Based on Y. Zhou, L. Gan, J. Chen, T. Tanu, and Y. Li, “Development and validation of a higher-order thinking skills assessment scale for pre-service teachers,” Think. Ski. Creat., vol. 48, no. November 2022, p. 101272, 2023, doi: 10.1016/j.tsc.2023.101272. Besides AVE and CR, author need to added Results of convergent validity tests of the full model (estimate, P-value, and Cronbach’s Alpha).
This manuscript less references. please added more references. The number of references proves author have been read a lot of literature and have a basic knowledge in this field. below I suggest some paper about technology teaching tools for you to cited and analyze.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
First of all, we would like to express our heart-felt thanks for your specific and constructive comments. These comments are very valuable and helpful for improving the manuscript. We have seriously discussed about all the comments. According to your comments, we have modified our manuscript in accordance with the requirement of Sustainability. In this revised version, changes to our manuscript are marked up. Point-by-point responses to the your comments are listed in the attached word file. The revised manuscript was edited by MacBook. So the line number in this word file may be different when displayed by Windows laptop. In case of this, we have also added the revised sentences in every point for your convenience. In the end, thank you again for giving us this opportunity to submit a revised draft.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The title of this manuscript is not appropriate since this paper is actually about the validation of an instrument (that is based on the SECI model) for assessing collaborative teaching (assisted by technology) in transnational higher education.
“scale validation” and “transnational higher education” should be added as keywords.
The research questions (“How and to what extent do collaborative teaching team members create and transfer their knowledge during COVID-19 with ICT utilization?” and “How do the four factors of the SECI model influence knowledge creation and transfer within TNHE during the COVID-19 pandemic?”) were not answered. Also, it is more appropriate to use research questions regarding instrument validation.
The section Research methodology (3) lacks the demographic information of participants.
It is not clear why the authors performed both the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The results of these analyses are not related to the research questions at all. Also, the M and SD values of items were not reported in Table 3.
The Discussion section (4.3) is very confusing. For example, the authors wrote “We also found that young faculty members are more knowledgeable about technology utilization in teaching than experienced teachers.”, but there are no results of statistical tests to support this claim. Also, I don’t know what this sentence should mean “Using the items identified in the EFA and CFA, this research found that TNHE partners are motivated by acquiring and transferring knowledge through collaborative teaching.”
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
First of all, we would like to express our heart-felt thanks for your specific and constructive comments. These comments are very valuable and helpful for improving the manuscript. We have seriously discussed about all the comments. According to your comments, we have modified our manuscript in accordance with the requirement of Sustainability. In this revised version, changes to our manuscript are marked up. Point-by-point responses to the your comments are listed in attached file. The revised manuscript was edited by MacBook. So the line number may be different when displayed by Window laptop. In case of this, we have already added the revised sentences point by point for your convenience. In the end, thank you again for giving us the opportunity to submit a revised draft.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Manuscript has well improved.
I believe that manuscript ready to accepted now.
Well Done.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
We sincerely appreciate all your previous valuable comments and suggestions, which helped us in improving the quality of the manuscript. We would also like to express our thanks to you for taking the necessary time and effort to review the manuscript. Your comments helped us refocus our motivation for further development.
Best regards,
Authors
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors made changes in the manuscript based on my comments and suggestions. The paper is improved, but there are still some issues, for example:
1. Word “teaching” is missing in the first research question (page 2, line 68, between the 11th and 12th word).
2. In Table 1 (pages 5 and 6) cumulative percentages for “Years in TNHE” are not accurate.
3. Add additional clarifications regarding the used 6-point Likert-type scale (page 6, 3.2. Questionnaire design). Is it from 0 to 5 or from 1 to 6? What is the meaning of the lowest and highest value?
4. In Table 2 (page 7), the p-value cannot be 0, you should report like this < .001.
5. In Tables 3 and 4 (page 7), you have Factor 4 after Factor 1.
6. On page 16 (line 448) there are three doi numbers.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
We sincerely appreciate all your valuable comments and suggestions, which helped us to improve the quality of the manuscript. Our responses to your comments are described below in a point-to-point manner. Please see the attached file for a description of how we addressed your comments.
We look forward to hearing from you regarding our submission and to respond to any further questions and comments you may have.
Sincerely,
Authors
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
