This study investigates the different learning opportunities enabled by text-based and video-based synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC) from an interactionist perspective. Six Chinese-speaking learners of English and six English-speaking learners of Chinese were paired up as tandem (reciprocal) learning dyads. Each dyad participated…

A synchronous blend of online learning and "face-to-face" teaching is becoming a feasible instructional approach in higher education with the advent of technology. Although this learning mode is not new in higher education, little research has been done to contextualise social presence experiences in which effects of interactions were…

This article details the results of an action research study which investigated how teachers used online learning community spaces to develop and support their teaching and learning of the Jewish Court of All Time (JCAT), a web-mediated, character-playing, simulation game that engages participants with social, historical and cultural curricula.…

This article attempts to shed some light on the possible learning benefits for language acquisition and intercultural development of authentic social interaction with expert peers through computer mediated communication (CMC) tools. The environments used in this study are video communication and the 3D virtual world "Second Life." For…

This study investigated 28 graduate students' knowledge construction and attitudes toward online synchronous videoconferencing collaborative learning environments. These students took an online course, self-selected 3 or 4 group members to form groups, and worked on projects across 16 weeks. Each group utilized Elluminate "Live!" for the…

This study explores students' choices of verbal and text interaction in a synchronous Live Virtual Classroom (LVC) environment that mixed onsite and online learners. Data were collected from analysis of recorded LVC sessions and post-course interviews with students in two different offerings of a graduate instructional design course that used…

Virtual worlds have become an invaluable space for online learning and the exploration of digital cultures. Communication departments can benefit from using these spaces to educate their students in the logistics of virtual worlds and as a way to better understand how the process of interpersonal and global communication functions in both online…

This work approaches the concept of social media engagement through a lens of participation theory. Following the work of Goffman (1981) and others, this dissertation uses the concepts of the participation framework and the participant role to explore engagement as a function of participation in interaction. The purposes of this dissertation are…

This paper describes a TeleTandem language exchange project between English speaking Spanish students at Georgia College, USA, and Spanish speaking English students at Universidad de Concepción, Chile. The aim of the project was to promote linguistic skills and intercultural competence through a TeleTandem exchange. Students used Skype and Google…

This paper reports research on the implementation of a web-based videoconferencing tool (Interwise) for synchronous learning sessions on an industrial technology course offered through a university in northern Taiwan. The participants included undergraduate students from the same course offered in two different semesters. We investigated students'…

Collaborative learning, particularly in the context of team-based, project-based learning, is common in undergraduate engineering education and is associated with deeper learning and enhanced student motivation and retention. However, grouping students in teams for project-based learning sometimes has negative outcomes, which can include lowered…

Librarians who provide virtual reference services often perceive that their patrons self-identify to some degree, even when transactions are anonymous. They also develop a sense of patrons' greatest research-related needs over time. In this article, two librarians analyze two years' worth of virtual reference transcripts to determine what patrons…

Research has shown that task-based computer-mediated communication (CMC) can foster attention to linguistic form in ways that may promote language learning (c.f., Blake, 2000; Smith, 2003, 2005). However, relatively little research has investigated how differences in the way that tasks are used in CMC settings influence learning opportunities…

Great diversity exists in the way English is being used in the world today. It is now not uncommon to hear a Korean and a Brazilian do business in English, or a Syrian and a Norwegian debating politics in an English-speaking chat room. As opportunities to use English increase and evolve, researchers are left with the difficult challenge of…

The present study approaches the Internet as a social space, where university students make use of computer mediated communication (CMC) applications, i.e. e-mail, instant messaging and social network sites, in order to satisfy social and academic needs. We focus on university students, because they represent one of the most avid groups of CMC…