Introduces the concept of abductive reasoning; discusses its importance for instructional designers in education; and describes the development of a computer program called the Abductive Reasoning Tool (ART) that helps students learn and understand abductive logic. Highlights include abduction and creativity, and field-testing ART with…

This survey questioned instructional designers about the increasing use of automated instructional design software to develop computer-based training (CBT). While these automated tools compact the complicated production process, educators complain that the resulting software often presents lock-stepped, linear instruction that neglects the…

The Mechanical Engineering Department at the U.S. Naval Academy is currently evaluating a new teaching method which uses computer software. Utilizing the thermodynamic-based software CyclePad, Intelligent Computer Aided Instruction is incorporated in an advanced energy conversion course for Mechanical Engineering students. The CyclePad software…

Instructional designers and researchers are attempting to identify the factors that determine which type of graphic visuals to employ in a specific situation as well as how best to utilize available resources. The use of three-dimensional graphics in a variety of media formats is addressed, including a discussion of specific instructional…

This paper presents an analysis of papers delivered at the ICALT 2004 conference, in order to understand the current research issues relating to Learning Objects (LOs). The major research results are summarized, and the papers are classified according to the definition of LO used and the approach taken (technical, pragmatic or pedagogic). The…

The American education system and its rigorous accountability and performance standards continually force educators to explore new ways to increase student achievement. The improvement in computer technology and intelligent computing systems may offer new tools for student learning and higher academic achievement. These systems have the potential…

This article presents a study that aims at constructing a teaching framework for software development methods in higher education. The research field is a capstone project-based course, offered by the Technion's Department of Computer Science, in which Extreme Programming is introduced. The research paradigm is an Action Research that involves…

The Nielsen/Net report Ratings 2000, reported that in 2002, online usage at work jumped 17 percent year-over-year, driven by female office workers. Nearly 46 million American office workers logged onto the Web, the highest peak since January 2000. It was also predicted that the number of students using the Internet was expected to reach 13.5…

The last decade has brought about a major change in higher education. Course design has developed from a craftsmanship-like process to a structured production, which involves interdisciplinary teams and requires more complex communication skills. This conceptual article introduces E[superscript 2]ML--Educational Environment Modeling Language--a…

In the first 24 months of the project, KP-Lab members were highly dedicated to dissemination and were engaged in various dissemination activities that contributed to the prime objective of the KP-Lab dissemination efforts which is "to make the project widely known to a variety of prospective users and, at a later stage, to promote the…

Although protocol analysis can be an important tool for researchers to investigate the process of collaboration and communication, the use of this method of analysis can be time consuming. Hence, an automatic coding procedure for coding dialogue acts was developed. This procedure helps to determine the communicative function of messages in online…

This deliverable has been produced in the context of the Knowledge-Practice Laboratory (KP-Lab) project. KP-Lab focuses on innovative practices of working with knowledge in higher education, teacher training, and workplaces. Participants of WP10 are University of Helsinki, University of Oslo and Poyry Forest Industry representing both researchers…

This study investigates the application of voice recognition technology to online lectures focusing on the efficacy of the text component of a multimedia presentation. Specifically, participants were provided with online access to multimedia instructional packages comprising an image of the lecturer with accompanying computer slides, plus…

This paper presents the implications of an ongoing project on the design and development of multimedia instructional material for teaching and learning computer science topics at both graduate and undergraduate levels. Important pedagogical requirements that CAI software should satisfy include: (1) animation of the changes in tree topologies; (2)…

This report describes an application of the Instructional Systems Design (ISD) process to a product knowledge training project for Spectrum Healthcare Solutions, Inc., including the steps and substeps in the phases of analysis, design, development, implementation, and evaluation. The training project was designed to address the need for increased…