Scientific collaboratories in higher education: exploring learning style preferences and perceptions of technology

Scientific collaboratories hold the promise of providing students access to specialized scientific instruments, data and experts, enabling learning opportunities perhaps otherwise not available. However, evaluation of scientific collaboratories in higher education has lagged behind their development. We conducted a repeated‐measures study that provided data regarding social interaction learning styles and perceptions of a scientific collaboratory system from 40 university science students working face‐to‐face and remotely. Students with a strong competitive learning style preference or who worked with a student with a strong competitive learning style reported a slightly more positive perception of the relative advantage, compatibility and complexity of the collaboratory system. Students with a strong individualistic learning style preference or who worked with a student with a strong individualistic learning style reported a more negative perception of the observability of the system. No relationships were found between students’ cooperative learning style preference and their perceptions of the system after using it face‐to‐face or remotely.     

Connecting distance learning communities to research via virtual collaboratories: a case study from library and information science

This case study reports on patterns of participation in a virtual collaboratory organised around goals associated with the involvement of graduate students in research and writing projects. Traditionally, distance learning classrooms have been devoted to teaching content matter (in a virtual context) yet this case study reports on the use of synchronous learning contexts to support research and professionalisation on the part of graduate students in library and information science. Focus is placed on discussing virtual collaboratories as a form of learning design that modifies the use of existing (synchronous) distance learning classrooms.     

Linking Mind,Brain, and Education to Clinical Practice: A Proposal for Transdisciplinary Collaboration

It has been suggested that the field of Mind, Brain, and Education (MBE) requires a stable infrastructure for translating research into practice. Hinton and Fischer (2008) point to the academic medical center as a model for similar translational work and suggest a similar approach for linking scientists to research schools. We propose expanding their model to include a formal role for clinicians. Including clinicians who work with children with learning problems brings an important perspective to the translational work. For example, the integration of the concept of “differential diagnosis,” a core precept in clinical medicine, would bring needed diagnostic specificity to the field of MBE. We describe a virtual infrastructure for collaboration, or “collaboratory,” consisting of research scientists, educators, and clinicians, linked to an academic institution. We anticipate that MBE graduates can play a critical role in the collaboratory model. With additional training, they can become “neuroeducators” capable of moving comfortably among the disciplines, building linkages, fostering communication, and facilitating collaboration.     

The electronic campus: Technotreachery: Play infiltrates school

Eric Crump is the learning technologies coordinator for the University of Missouri-Columbia Learning Center. He is working on a number of projects, all exploring ways to use computer networks to create new learning environments and to complement conventional learning environments. His pet projects at the moment are the Online Writery, an online community of student writers; Rhetnet, an experimental scholarly cyberjournal on rhetoric and writing, and the MU Institute for Instructional Technology, a mechanism for effecting technological and pedagogical change on campus. If you would like to contact Eric to inquire about the nuts and bolts of on-line learning or about his views on learning and the academy, you can send e-mail to him at wleric@showme.missouri.edu.     

The electronic mirror and emotional growth

Abstract

The article examines the use of information and communication technology to enhance the educational achievement of a group of students evidencing a variety of EBD in a mainstream school setting. It is believed that ICT will have just as important a part to play in the education of students with EBD as it will with other sensory or physical special educational needs. The article examines within-child factors which make a cognitive-behavioural approach potentially powerful. It suggests that ICT can enhance the educational experience of EBD pupils if careful attention is paid to the creation of a therapeutic teaching environment and the interaction of the student/curriculum and teacher/student interfaces. The article discusses the implementation of an integrated learning system in an inner London comprehensive school and its effects on those pupils presenting with emotionally disordered learning difficulties.     

Using electronic portfolios

The digitized collections of artifacts known as electronic portfolios are creating solutions to a variety of performance improvement needs in ways that are cost‐effective and improve both individual and group learning and performance. When social media functionality is embedded in e‐portfolios, the tools support collaboration, social learning, collection and sharing of best practices, and coaching. By eliminating the constraints of time and geography, electronic portfolios can support organizations' performance management and talent management strategies.     

The effect of electronic performance support systems on self-regulated learning skills

Electronic performance support systems (EPSSs) are the software programs commonly used in commercial environments since the early 1990s. These software programs are generally called performance-based systems and focus on the complete job rather than providing individual development. For that reason, the usage of these systems in learning environments has not been sufficiently investigated. In this empirical study, availability of using EPSS software for learning processes was investigated in order to contribute to the literature. An EPSS software was developed for undergraduate students to use in programming language courses and the effects of the software on students' self-regulation based learning skills were investigated. During the treatment process, while the experimental group was supported with EPSS, traditional teaching continued in the control group. The results of the study showed that there was no statistically significant difference between the groups in terms of motivational beliefs; however, there were significant differences in terms of cognitive, metacognitive, and resource management strategies.     

Designing electronic collaborative learning environments

Electronic collaborative learning environments for learning and working are in vogue. Designers design them according to their own constructivist interpretations of what collaborative learning is and what it should achieve. Educators employ them with different educational approaches and in diverse situations to achieve different ends. Students use them, sometimes very enthusiastically, but often in a perfunctory way. Finally, researchers study them and—as is usually the case when apples and oranges are compared—find no conclusive evidence as to whether or not they work, where they do or do not work, when they do or do not work and, most importantly, why, they do or do not work. This contribution presents an affordance framework for such collaborative learning environments; an interaction design procedure for designing, developing, and implementing them; and an educational affordance approach to the use of tasks in those environments. It also presents the results of three projects dealing with these three issues.     

Participatory evaluation: implications for improving electronic learning and teaching approaches

This paper examines the participatory approach used by a group of academic support staff in evaluating an academic professional development resource designed to support e‐learning and teaching. The resource, titled Designing Electronic Learning and Teaching Approaches (DELTA), showcases examples of electronic learning and teaching approaches developed at Monash University, Australia. The evaluation included individual and collective reflection, dialogue and action, drawing on the features of participatory action research. This paper explores the value of this critically reflective, participatory approach for evaluation to improve the use of new learning technologies, demonstrating how it provided a clear decision‐making framework for iterative improvement of the DELTA site by identifying consensus items for action and recording other items for later consideration, while also contributing to team members’ own professional development.     

Reconceptualizing electronic field trips: a Deweyian perspective

Electronic field tripping is a relatively new form of large‐scale distance education that attempts to provide contextually rich learning materials embedded within a coherent educational content base. Using Dewey’s (1943 Dewey, J. 1943. The child and the curriculum: the school and society, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.  [Google Scholar]) framework for the natural learning impulses of children, we describe the potential pedagogical benefits afforded by electronic field trips (EFTs). We outline a shift in distance education from a techno‐centric focus on hardware and logistics to the inherent features of children’s desires to explore their world, which represents an alteration of perspective and purpose in understanding computer technologies in classroom settings. Finally, we demonstrate that while each independent element of the EFT experience promotes one or more of Dewey’s impulses, bringing together all the resources provided for EFTs fosters deeper connections, more engaged learning, and contextualized distance learning true to the spirit of live field trips.     

基于ActionScript的电子技术实验CAI制作

采用现代教育技术手段可拓展学生的学习空间,提高学生学习的效果和自主性。以电子技术实验项目为例,介绍了基于Flash软件ActionScript的电子技术实验CAI课件制作方法。     

Emergent patterns of teaching/learning in electronic classrooms

Novel patterns of teaching/learning have emerged from faculty and students who use our three teaching/learning theaters at the University of Maryland, College Park. These fully-equipped electronic classrooms have been used by 74 faculty in 264 semester-long courses since the fall of 1991 with largely enthusiastic reception by both faculty and students. The designers of the teaching/learning theaters sought to provide a technologically rich environment and a support staff so that faculty could concentrate on changing the traditional lecture from its unidirectional information flow to a more collaborative activity. As faculty have evolved their personal styles in using the electronic classrooms, novel patterns of teaching/learning have emerged. In addition to enhanced lectures, we identified three common patterns: (a) active individual learning, (b) small-group collaborative learning, and (c) entire-class collaborative learning.     

Sustainable development and African local government: can electronic training help build capacities?

A recent study carried out by European and African organizations into the potential for electronic distance training (EDT) on sustainability in African local governments concluded that EDT was both ‘useful and feasible’. This article reflects on some of the theoretical and practical implications of that study. It focuses on the connection between learning and sustainability and how EDT programmes might be designed and promoted. The paper argues that, while resource issues and poor access to Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) create considerable constraints and point to the need for policies to improve access, in general the most important factors for successful capacity building relate to the design of learning programmes that take account of the work contexts and skill and capability requirements of those targeted as learners. ‘Useful’ and ‘feasible’ depend on (i) how work‐based and work‐related learning processes are understood and (ii) the conditions to promote learning within African local government.     

Promoting scientific understanding through electronic discourse

This paper illustrates the on-going efforts of an innovative science program called “Kids as Global Scientists” to take full advantage of Internet technology for better learning and teaching. We analyzed electronic communication between students and scientists on the Message Board and the development of students’ scientific understanding through electronic communications. Our research shows that the Internet has great potential to foster the development of students’ scientific understanding, which is difficult to achieve through traditional instruction alone. Despite increasing interest in the use of the Internet in the classroom, research on the educational benefits of the Internet on learning and teaching are still limited. This study will serve in this continuing research base in order to help expand our understanding by opening a discussion around the following questions: What are the characteristics of new learning opportunities and interaction patterns that students experienced? What new classroom dynamics and challenges are introduced as a result of the use of our technological innovations?     

专业实验室为电子竞赛服务的实践

电子设计创新实验室具有专业、设备、人才、项目的综合优势。在为电子竞赛服务的实践中,体现出教学内容丰富、教学过程生动、教学效果显著的特点。依托其教学、科研、培训三位一体的功能性优势展开实践性教学,推动了实验教学内容和教学方法的改革,促进了实验室管理方法和观念的转变,带动了教师和实验技术人员专业技能学习的积极性,为创新人才的培养起到了极其重要的作用。     

The role of facilitators in Virginia's electronic classroom project

Abstract

Although distance education is experiencing rapid growth in the United States, there is little research that measures the beliefs of certified public accountants (CPAs) toward the use of distance education in obtaining continuing professional education (CPE). This study examined the beliefs of CPAs in the state of Georgia concerning the effectiveness of distance education in providing CPE. The basic findings indicate that CPAs in the state of Georgia believe distance education to be an effective mode of learning. In addition, they indicate that the technological capabilities necessary to participate in distance education are available to them. However, with the exception of print‐based distance education, the percent of professional learning received via distance education is minimal. The results of this study may provide information beneficial to program planners of CPE.     

Cooperative learning across classrooms in electronic Learning Circles

This paper discusses electronic Learning Circles on the AT&T Learning Network¹ in the light of cooperative learning theory. Findings reported for students in cooperative learning settings were also found for teachers who participated in Learning Circles on the Learning Network. Teachers acquired knowledge, developed new instructional strategies, increased their self-esteem and developed professional and personal relationships with their peers. Computer networking provides a mechanism for developing cooperative learning among students in distant locations and at the same time provides a vehicle for the professional development of teachers within the classroom environment.     

Learning English with electronic textbooks on tablet PCs

Previous studies on electronic textbooks were all survey studies of college students in the U.S.A. Their main findings revealed that using electronic textbooks and using print textbooks showed no statistical differences in learning achievements. As mobile devices became popular in classrooms, the present study was intended to confirm the competitive nature of electronic textbooks on mobile devices in an experiment. The differences of the present experiment from previous survey studies included its involving teenage learners of English and its examining their learning with electronic textbooks on mobile devices. This experimental study recruited adolescent learners to participate in a mobile-assisted English learning program requiring them to study with their electronic textbooks on mobile devices exclusively. Their counterparts used print textbooks as usual. The findings presented no significant differences in various achievements between the two groups. The mobile group furthermore approved their studying English on their mobile devices with satisfaction and perceived its usefulness and ease of use. Endorsing the competitiveness of electronic textbooks on mobile devices, the teenage English learners also highlighted the strengths characterized by mobile technologies.     

Developing Networked Learning within Higher Education: a case study of an electronic forum for university staff

Abstract

This paper presents a case study on an electronic forum to enable university staff to discuss networked learning. The paper begins by describing networked learning and argues that its implementation will require rethinking approaches to teaching and new relationships between staff carrying out different roles within higher education institutions. The paper goes on to describe how an electronic forum was set up to enable staff to share their understanding and experiences of networked learning at a local university. This forum was valued by participants as it gave them the opportunity to contribute to a discussion and reflect on different approaches. However, the level of sharing was less than many would have liked due in the main to the high threshold to the discussion and time pressures on the participants.     

The effect of users' attitudes on electronic performance support systems implementation

Performance support (PS) platforms, also known as electronic performance support systems (EPSS), offer real‐time learning and performance enhancement. In 2008, Tel Aviv University and an Israeli telecommunication firm began researching implementation success factors. Preliminary findings and conclusions were discussed in an earlier Performance Improvement article (Gal & Nachmias, 2011). The current article focuses on the effects of users' attitudes on implementation issues and suggests a model for incorporating EPSS in organizations.