A selective analysis of empirical findings in networked learning research in higher education: Questing for coherence

In this paper, we have attempted two ambitious tasks. We have undertaken a wide-ranging survey of the Network learning (NL) literature, and tried to identify the emerging themes of this work. We have selected three of these themes, and in each case tried to identify the main theoretical perspectives in use, the main directions of the studies, and the key ideas being addressed and researched. We have also tried to indicate where the main research effort might be directed in order to help to ‘fill in the gaps’ and achieve some coherence for the theme. Our second major task has arisen from our assertion that the field of Networked Learning research is theoretically fragmented. We have argued that this situation arises because Networked Learning research is a new field, and is drawing upon a wide range of theoretical perspectives. However, unless we can achieve some synthesis of these perspectives we may find it difficult to establish a coherent research programme in the field. We argue that one way of developing some coherence is to make theory and praxis interact explicitly, in other words, to ‘converse’ with each other in our research. By this we mean, to use theory to interrogate praxis, and use praxis to modify and develop theory, thus moving towards perspectives that are changing theory, modifying and improving it. As part of this argument, we have briefly surveyed the current level of Theory–Praxis Conversation, either explicit, or implicit, in the thematic research we have described. It is clear that some outstanding work is being done to make theory work, and to modify it in the light of research into praxis. However, it is also the case that much current Networked Learning research does not interrogate the theory that it uses to contextualise it. We see Theory–Praxis Conversation as a way of thinking explicitly about how we might make the work of interrogating theory in our research more explicit and systematic. In this way, our ‘Quest for Coherence’ may, we hope, help Networked Learning research to climb up to the higher ground, and give us a wider ranging view of learning in networked environments.     

我国特殊教育学校体育现状与发展对策研究

通过对国家12省市特殊教育学校体育现状调查发现,我国特殊教育学校体育现状发展不容乐观,同普通中小学校体育和特殊学校教育自身比较有相对滞后现象,影响着我国特殊教育学校整体的发展。提出了对我国特殊教育学校体育课程建设、体育师资队伍建设、体育设施条件和特殊体育教育科学研究等问题的发展对策。     

职业院校计算机基础课程教学模式研究与探索

针对目前计算机基础教学过程中存在的问题,结合实际教学情况提出了具有职业教育特色的教学改革方法和手段,总结出基于“基础＋专业＋教学考证结合”的教学模式,建立了多元化教学评价体系,对如何发挥学生主观能动性、提高教学效果进行了积极有效的探索研究。     

The Application of an Adaptive Web-Based Learning Environment on Oxidation–Reduction Reactions

The World Wide Web is increasingly being used as a vehicle for flexible learning, where learning is seen to be free from time, geographical, and participation constraints. In addition to flexibility, the Web facilitates student-centered approaches, creating a motivating and active learning environment. The purpose of this study is to set up an adaptive learning environment on Internet and to experiment with the most suitable methods and applications. Our goal is to provide a better solution with regard to the related distance learning research. All the resources and background are from current relevant documents on the theory of asynchronous distance education. We set up an adaptive Internet learning system based on learning theory and related learning models. Our research targets are those students who took the ‘Life Chemistry’ course for the asynchronous distance education environment at Providence University at Taiwan. The students were divided randomly into two groups: the experimental group, which was in an adaptive learning environment and the controlled group, which was in a non-adaptive one. We used the American Chemistry Society Test Bank as our research tool and used SPSS to analyse the data we obtained. Results show that the experimental group in the adaptive learning environment out-performs the controlled group. In addition, those students who are field independent learning types, have higher pre-knowledge, are male, in science departments and have a longer study time span in an adaptive learning environment show much greater achievement levels than those in the opposite situations.     

Forum: dialogue about dialogue—cogeneration, research and science education

This forum discussion focuses on seven themes drawn from Sonya’s fascinating paper: the terminology of “cogenerative dialogues,” the roles of participants and their power relations within such dialogues, the use of metaphor and analogy in the paper, science and science education for all students, the ways in which students’ expectations about learning change in innovative classrooms, teacher research and the “theory-practice gap,” and the tension between conducting cogenerative dialogues with individual students or with whole classes. These themes by no means exhaust the ideas in Sonya’s paper, but we feel that they have allowed us to explore the classroom research she reports, and to extend our discussion beyond the paper to explore some of these themes more broadly.     

The eye-mind of processing written feedback: Unraveling how students read and use feedback for revision

This research aims to promote our understanding of feedback engagement processes in writing tasks using a combination of online and offline measures, including eye-tracking, thinking-aloud, and text-analyses. Study 1 explored how sixteen students read, evaluate, and use feedback for revision. Results revealed three feedback processing strategies: (1) superficial processing (n = 6), which is characterized by reading feedback in a linear way, without critically rereading or revising the text, (2) local processing (n = 6) in which students switched between reading the comments and the commented text, and (3) deep processing (n = 4) in which students integrated the feedback with both commented and uncommented parts of the text and made more substantial revisions. In Study 2, we investigated the local and deep feedback reading strategy in more detail with 41 students using a within-subject design with different types of feedback. Results demonstrated the same strategies among students, but also that the focus of feedback affected students' revision behavior, above and beyond an individual feedback processing strategy. This finding is in line with previous research that emphasized the effects of feedback characteristics on students’ use of feedback. By triangulating various process measures, this research is one of the first that provides empirical evidence for different feedback processing strategies among students. These novel insights in individual feedback engagement processing can be used to extend and refine current theories on how, when, and why feedback works and for whom.     

Three theses on teaching and learning in higher education

In our article, we explore the possibility of formulating theses about teaching as one way to use research as a basis for educational action. The theses are formulated from current educational research on teaching and learning in higher education. We also explore the potential for action and the consequences derived from the theses. With our theses, we criticise less complex ways of using research for educational purposes. Through theses we can suggest directions for action without prescribing certain methods or procedures and provide answers without reducing the teachers' possibilities for choice or diminishing their responsibility for their actions. Our exploration is an invitation to a collaborative exploration of theses on teaching and learning in order to broaden and deepen our shared basis for educational action.     

架构河南电大现代远程教育技术支撑体系

本详细阐述了河南电大为适应现代远程开放教育而建立相应的硬件平台过程。从1999年开始建立至今，该系统为促进电大系统的远程教育发展发挥了重大作用。其中的经验对于推动我国电大教育的改革和创新有着重要的现实意义。     

Multimodal Learning Analytics research with young children: A systematic review

Learning Analytics and Multimodal Learning Analytics are changing the way of analysing the learning process while students interact with an educational content. This paper presents a systematic literature review aimed at describing practices in recent Multimodal Learning Analytics and Learning Analytics research literature in order to identify tools and strategies useful for the assessment of the progress and behaviour of children under 6 years old in respect of their learning. The purpose is to provide guidance for Multimodal Learning Analytics research with children under 6 years old to assess their engagement in a task, their emotions, attention, understanding and achievement of a goal. The current state of knowledge on Multimodal Learning Analytics research suggests how performance analytics, face and speech recognition systems, eye tracking, Kinect analytics and wristbands could be used with children. The results show the complexity of collecting data using non-invasive methodologies with children under 6 years old. Ethical implications related to multimodal data from audio, visual, biometric and quantitative measures of child behaviour are discussed.     

Tertiary education: an investigation of location selection criteria and preferences by international students – The case of two Australian universities

This paper identifies and analyzes factors that influence international student selection of universities and the role that education marketing plays in the process. The research for the paper was inspired by work done by Canterbury on education marketing, published in the Journal of Marketing for Higher Education. The study empirically tests key constructs in service marketing. According to Canterbury it is time that higher education marketing theoreticians and practitioners alike looked beyond our similarities to other applications of service marketing to understand how some of our markets and our services might differ. To this end, the current study examines the views of international students undertaking their studies in two universities, one on the east coast and the other on the west coast of Australia. It reports the findings of international students’ choice factors in selecting an Australian university environment.     

论高深知识与高等教育

Advanced knowledge is the basis for higher education, but less research on higher education deals with it. The essay elaborates on the major point in several ways: first, the practice-oriented higher education research tends to ignore advanced knowledge; secondly, higher education shall never turn a blind eye to advanced knowledge due to their close relation; thirdly, the paper presents a tentative discussion over the external and internal characteristics of advanced knowledge. The research on advanced knowledge can not only provide better support for the reform of higher education, but also has great significance in perfecting the present theoretical system of higher education. __________ Translated from Beijing Daxue Jiaoyu Pinglun 北京大学教育评论 (Peking University Education Review), 2006, (4): 2–8     

Conflict,education and the global south: New critical directions

This paper seeks to provide a starting point for a broader discussion on the development of a critical research agenda in the field of ‘Education and Conflict Studies’. We begin the paper with a brief overview of the field of Education and Conflict drawing on a series of recent ‘overviews’ of the field and locate this within the context of the changing geo-political situation that emerged in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s. This is followed by explaining what we understand by a critical research agenda and why we think it necessary. Thirdly, we explore a series of potentially interesting areas of inquiry that are currently absent or undeveloped within the field and which relate particularly to its ‘global’ dimension. Finally, we conclude by making some more reflective comments on our approach, its potential for making a positive contribution to both theory and practice within the field of Education and Conflict, and the need for more critically informed, but policy relevant research in this emerging area of inquiry.     

European research on media and technology in education: current status and future directions

This chapter surveys a number of developments in media and mass communication research and presents results that are important for educational research on teaching and learning. In many European countries, disparate research areas have investigated questions which focus on learning from both mass media and ‘instructional’ media use in schools and in the community. Our emphasis in this chapter will be on current examples drawn primarily from the German context but which we feel are typical of general European perspectives on media research which is oriented toward the new ‘cognitive’ psychology of learning. After an overview that describes many directions and theories, a specific example of studies from our own laboratory will be presented.     

Traditional governance structures ‐ current policy pressures: The academic senate and Canadian universities

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to identify current policy pressures in Canadian higher education and explore their implications for academic decision‐making bodies based on data we obtained in our national study on university senates. We describe two inter‐related sets of public policy pressures that have emerged in recent years in Canada including on‐going financial restraint and a renewed interest in university research. We conclude by reviewing a number of important implications for Canadian university governance in the context of contemporary policy pressures.     

教师测评素养国外研究述评

教师测评素养是教师教育和教师发展的重要组成部分。通过对国外有关教师测评素养研究文献的梳理和分析,其研究内容主要包括教师测评素养的构成、现状及培训需求、测量工具的开发和验证、测评素养发展途径和影响因素等。这些研究对我国开展教师测评素养相关研究有一定的参考价值,同时也启示我们可以在研究对象、研究方法和研究内容上进一步拓展,要基于我国国情,开展教师测评素养及其测量测量工具的本土化研究。     

自然主义教育思想视域中我国当前人的教育

西方自然主义教育思想的核心观点是关注对人的教育,其中对儿童个性研究和心理发展研究最为重视。在当前我国各种教育问题的面前,自然主义教育思想将会发挥自身的优势,引导教育者重视学生的个性差异;强调发挥学生的主体性;重视体验,促进学生的内化和自正。     

Faculty Productivity Barriers and Supports at a School of Education

All programs in a midwestern university recently embarked on a path to help increase the scholarly productivity of faculty. The effort to develop a research emphasis within the School of Education required determining the needs of tenure-track faculty regarding meeting the new requirements. The purposes of our study were to investigate these needs and identify the individual, environmental, and leadership factors that affect faculty productivity. Findings revealed a need to transform the School’s service and teaching culture to a culture of research and scholarship. Recommendations for helping other schools of education to become more research-oriented are provided. While the study focuses on data from a particular School of Education, the implications may generalize to faculty productivity within other institutions, particularly within professional schools. Susan A. Santo  received a Ph.D. in Instructional Technology from the University of Virginia and is currently an Associate Professor of Adult and Higher Education at the University of South Dakota. Her research interests include faculty productivity in higher education and improving distance learning. Mary E. Engstrom  received an Ed.D. from the University of South Dakota in Curriculum and Instruction. She is currently the Associate Director of Extended Learning Services at the University of Montana. Her research interests include instructional design for online learning and professional development for educators. Linda Reetz  received an Ed.D. from the University of North Dakota in Teacher Education and serves as the Associate Dean of the School of Education at the University of South Dakota. Her research interests include higher education practices for teacher education programs and mild disabilities. William Schweinle  received a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Arlington in Psychology and serves as an Assistant Professor at the University of South Dakota. His research interest area is in statistics. Kristine Reed  received a Ph.D. from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln in Curriculum and Instruction/Administration and serves as a faculty member in Curriculum and Instruction, University of South Dakota. Her research emphases include multicultural education and rural education.