The development of web-based technologies in recent decades has provided ready access to a wealth of on-line educational resources, and despite concerns that availability of on-line recorded lectures impacts on-campus attendance, we believe there needs to be more focus on the learning resources students engage with, along with why and how they use…

Aim/Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of five factors on the user acceptance of Three-Dimensional Virtual Worlds (3DVWs) in higher education. Another objective of the study was to investigate the effects of the application of 3DVWs on five variables relevant to positive outcomes for higher education students. Background:…

Based on a three-semester design-based research study examining learning and teaching in a web-conferencing environment, this article identifies types of synchronous collaboration competencies and reveals their influence on learning processes. Four levels of online collaborative competencies were observed--operational, interactional, managerial,…

Surveyed 47 students in an online business course at an Australian university to determine their attitudes toward, and use of, the online course delivery system. Identified three critical success factors: (1) the technology; (2) the instructor; and (3) previous use of the technology by the student. (SLD)

This paper describes an attempt to take a snapshot of the latest generation of students entering tertiary education. The higher education sector is one of the largest consumers of information technology in Australia. Universities invest massive amounts of money on technology based on what they believe students need, want, and already have.…

Skills.net is a 3-year program providing free or affordable Internet access and training to local Victorian (Australia) communities. It is especially aimed at those who would normally miss out on such access, such as the unemployed, women, people with disabilities, people from non-English speaking backgrounds, Aboriginals, and communities in…

On October 20, 2008, the New Media Consortium announced the release of a white paper produced in conjunction with the Economist Magazine and in collaboration with Apple, Inc. This paper reports the results of a study of nearly 300 CIOs and technology leaders inside and outside of education to gain deeper insight into the wider impact of technology…

As part of a study examining continuing medical education, computer usage was investigated among medical practitioners in rural and remote Queensland (Australia). Surveys of 131 rural doctors showed that they used computers more than their urban counterparts and more than previously estimated. A majority of respondents considered Internet delivery…

Describes a preservice teacher education course dealing with rural education, based on contemporary learning theories and delivered through telematics at an Australian university. Students learned about teaching and learning with telematics through being taught with telematics and through independent learning activities. Outcomes and findings…

This paper describes computer and distance-education technologies in the South Western Educational Region of Queensland (Australia). The South Western Region is characterized by isolation, small schools, high teacher and principal turnover, teacher and principal inexperience, student mobility, pockets of social and economic deprivation, and many…

A key element in the completion of study by off-campus students is support during their learning. The nature of off-campus study renders nearly impossible the face-to-face contact which provides expansion of lecture material, direct answers to problems, guidance on procedures, and immediate responses to learning difficulties. Electronic mail…

This report discusses the major issues addressed at a two-day conference of Australian and Canadian library and information science educators. Topics include education for the future; core competencies; institutional accreditation; trends in professional education; distance education; economic factors; management education; practical experience;…

During 1985 the Education Department installed two-way radios in 44 remote secondary schools in Victoria, Australia, to improve turn-around time for correspondence assignments. Subsequently, teacher supervisors at Melbourne's Correspondence School sought ways to further augument audio interactivity with computer networking. Computer equipment was…

As the World Wide Web becomes an integral part of higher education, universities must determine the viability of using the Internet for their student evaluation systems. This chapter highlights important online-student-rating issues raised in this volume and in other research through a case study of Murdoch University's (Perth, Australia) online…

This paper discusses the design and implementation of a task-oriented collaborative learning (and training) experimental project that was carried out with future language teachers. More specifically, a class of sixteen French students enrolled in a Masters of Education course were asked to create multimedia resources for a group of Australian…