A critical task for tutors is to provide learners with suitable reading materials in terms of difficulty. The challenge of this endeavor is increased by students' individual variability and the multiple levels in which complexity can vary, thus arguing for the necessity of automated systems to support teachers. This chapter describes…

Mobile applications (apps) are used in higher education (HE) in a variety of ways, including as learning tools, study organisers, for marketing, and recruitment of new students. Purposed with easing student transition into university life, organiser apps have a capacity to assist students with various aspects of university experience, freeing up…

In recent years, a number of models concerning problem solving systems have been put forward. However, many of them stress on technology and neglect the research of problem solving itself, especially the learning mechanism related to problem solving. In this paper, we analyze the learning mechanism of problem solving, and propose that when…

Learning object repositories are a shared, open and public space; however, the possibility and ability of personal expression in an open, global, public space is crucial. The aim of this study is to explore personal spaces in a big learning object repository as a facilitator for adoption of Open Educational Resources (OER) into teaching practices…

Since soil plays a crucial role in all aspects of global environmental change, it is essential that post-secondary institutions provide students with a strong foundation in soil science concepts including soil classification. The onset of information technology (IT) and web-based multimedia have opened new avenues to better incorporate…

Schools are more and more encouraged to write a school-based information and communication technology (ICT) policy plan. In such a plan, a school describes its expectations, goals, content and actions related to the future role of ICT in teaching and learning. Although this is encouraged by researchers and policy makers, the literature on ICT…

The National Science Education Standards prescribe that an understanding of the importance of classifying organisms be one component of a student's educational experience in the life sciences. The use of a classification scheme to identify organisms is one way of addressing this goal. We describe Conifer ID, a computer application that assists…

This article reviews the research and evidence about multi-touch tables to provide an analysis of their key design features and capabilities and how these might relate to their use in educational settings to support collaborative learning. A typology of design features is proposed as a synthesis of the hardware and physical characteristics of the…

The effective integration of technology into the teaching and learning of mathematics remains one of the critical challenges facing contemporary tertiary mathematics. This article reports on some significant findings of a wider study investigating the use of technology in undergraduate mathematics. It first discusses a taxonomy developed to…

Instructional designers and educators recognize the potential of mobile technologies as a learning tool for students and have incorporated them into the distance learning environment. However, little research has been done to categorize the numerous examples of mobile learning in the context of distance education, and few instructional design…

In this paper, a dropout prediction method for e-learning courses, based on three popular machine learning techniques and detailed student data, is proposed. The machine learning techniques used are feed-forward neural networks, support vector machines and probabilistic ensemble simplified fuzzy ARTMAP. Since a single technique may fail to…

YouTube is an Internet phenomenon, a video sharing Web site where individuals can upload videos to be viewed by anyone visiting the site. The purpose of this study was to search for and categorize videos related to disability on YouTube and explore the educational potential of the site for the disability community. A seven-day time period in…

An emerging trend in classrooms is the use of networked visual argumentation tools that allow students to discuss, debate, and argue with one another in a synchronous fashion about topics presented by a teacher. These tools are aimed at teaching students how to discuss and argue, important skills not often taught in traditional classrooms. But how…

This case study investigated university members' use of and resistance to a communication information technology system in a higher education organization. This case study utilized the technology enactment framework to examine structure enactment in university members' technology use and resistance. We found that the following structures were…

The objective of this study was to identify the methodological approaches employed in a sample of Brazilian distance education scientific literature and compare with similar publications in the United States. Brazilian sample articles (N = 983) published in several journals and meetings were compared with a sample of articles published in…