Guidelines for Reviewers

Dear Reviewer,

This is a short guide to support the process of reviewing articles for RBIE. If you still have questions after reading it, please contact the RBIE Editorial Team.

Editorial Team contact

Editors-in-Chief

• Dr. Newarney Torrezão da Costa, Instituto Federal Goiano (IF Goiano), Brazil
• Dr. Rodrigo Silva Duran, Instituto Federal de Brasília (IFB), Brazil

The full list of associate editors is available on the Editorial Team page.

General guidance

RBIE is a young and growing journal. This set of guidelines is intended to support reviewers. We believe these recommendations can be useful for RBIE's continuous growth and for strengthening the community. We present here a set of recommendations that help establish quality standards and support authors in the process of revising and improving their articles.

Before accepting to review an article, keep in mind three key aspects: (1) conflicts of interest; (2) the delivery deadline; and (3) the quality of the review. Regarding conflicts of interest, check whether your information is up to date in the RBIE system (institution, topics of interest, etc.). If you still detect a possible conflict, we suggest declining the review and letting us know. Regarding the deadline, please commit to completing the review by the set date; if that is not possible, it is best to talk to the assigned associate editor and decline the review, so we can quickly find another reviewer — feel free to suggest new reviewers. Although RBIE is recent, we are multidisciplinary and believe there are many researchers from other areas who could contribute with us.

Please bear in mind that some submissions are written by graduate students and early-career researchers in Computers in Education. If you consider that a work is not yet ready to be accepted, please provide constructive criticism to help the authors advance their research.

More than reviewing and selecting the best works, we strive to give authors feedback that offers new insights and helps them improve their research. Critical and constructive feedback benefits everyone, and we count on you to achieve this important goal!

Confidentiality and use of artificial intelligence (AI)

The manuscript received for review and all of its content are confidential. Do not share, redistribute, or retain copies of the work, and do not use its information for any purpose other than the review.

In accordance with the SBC Code of Conduct, the use of generative artificial intelligence tools to produce the review is prohibited, as is submitting the manuscript (or excerpts of it) to any language model (LLM), whether free or paid. Doing so may expose confidential content and compromise the confidentiality and integrity of the review.

The use of non-generative assistive tools (e.g., spelling and grammar checkers) to refine the wording of your own review is acceptable, provided that the manuscript content is not submitted to generative models.

By accepting the invitation to review, you declare that you are aware of and agree to these conditions.

Questions to guide the review

Here are some questions to support your review process:

• What is the problem of this research and what is its objective? What is the objective stated in the article? What problem does it try to solve (or advance our ability to solve)?
• Why was the research carried out? Is the objective relevant to the national or international Computers in Education community? Who has worked on the same or similar problems? Does the text explain why the problem is not yet satisfactorily solved? Is the article's position in the literature clear? Are there important references missing (and, if so, which)?
• How was the research carried out? Is the methodology clearly described? Does the text adequately address the objectives and research questions? Was it well conducted? What did it arrive at? Are the results clearly described? Do these results follow from the research carried out?
• Is the research well grounded and do the results hold up? What are the authors' claims? Does the work present sufficient evidence to support each claim? Are there important omissions? What is new? Are the results original? How do they compare or relate to existing work?
• Are the impacts, contributions, and limitations of the work clear? Is the impact clearly indicated? Are the contributions new, significant, and relevant to the national or international Computers in Education community? Do the conclusions reflect the work carried out? Does the work present its limitations or threats to validity?

Please consider the statements below when deciding on your review.

Review criteria

Relevance

• The relevance of the problem is clearly expressed.
• The relevance of the problem is well justified in the context of existing work (i.e., the document provides adequate motivation to address the problem).
• The problem is relevant to the national or international community.

Originality and importance of the contribution

• The results are well situated in relation to (or compared with) relevant related work.
• The originality of the results is clearly demonstrated.
• The contribution is relevant to the national or international community or to society at large.

Foundations

• The work has an adequate theoretical foundation.
• The problem is well characterized.
• The proposed solution/approach/discussion is clear and justified.
• The proposed solution is aligned with the work's foundations.

Methodology

• The methodology is clearly described.
• The methodology is adequate to solve the stated problem.
• The results are clearly described.
• The results are consistent with the methodology.

Quality of presentation

• The article's title reflects the text of the article.
• The abstract indicates the main point of the work. It is suggested that it contain the context (problem to be addressed), objectives, methodology, and results achieved.
• The structure of the article is logical and supports its main point (it is clear how each section contributes to the work's argument).
• The sections are expressed clearly and concisely.
• Non-textual elements, such as figures and tables, are legible and adequately described in the text.
• The references are complete and in accordance with the publication format.
• The document contains no grammatical or typing errors.
• There are no layout problems.

Final tips for the review

• If the article is not accepted, always justify why it did not meet expectations.
• Be consistent: do not say an article is weak and recommend acceptance, nor say it is excellent and recommend rejection.
• Review your assessment: it is inconsistent to have a high level of demand on the article and present a poorly written or poorly done review.
• If in doubt, contact the editors.

Important references

1. Maillard, P. J.; Pimentel, M.; Siqueira, S.; Bittencourt, I. (Eds.). Metodologia de Pesquisa em Informática na Educação (CEIE/SBC Book Series). Available at: https://ceie.sbc.org.br/metodologia/. The series comprises three volumes: Research Design (v. 1); Quantitative Research (v. 2); Qualitative Research (v. 3).
2. Bittencourt, I.; Isotani, S. Informática na Educação baseada em Evidências: um manifesto. RBIE, v. 26, n. 3, 2018. Available at: http://www.br-ie.org/pub/index.php/rbie/article/view/7826/6022.
3. Smith, Alan Jay. The task of the referee. IEEE Computer, v. 23, n. 4, p. 65–71, 1990. Available at: http://www.jmlr.org/reviewing-papers/smith-advice.pdf.
4. Benos, Dale J.; Kirk, Kevin L.; Hall, John E. How to review a paper. Advances in Physiology Education, v. 27, n. 2, p. 47–52, 2003. Available at: https://www.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/advan.00057.2002.