Wikis are believed to be a powerful tool assisting the development of constructivist learning environments, as their very nature supports collaboration. However, not much research has been done into the types of collaborative interaction that take place in wikis when used for learning. The main purpose of this study is to explore the factors that…

This article examines key issues in how new technologies are impacting upon how we teach, learn and collaborate, and uses an educational research project called GRAIL (Graduate Researcher's Academic Identity Online) under development to illustrate some fundamental issues in adopting new technologies. A significant challenge to the effective use of…

This paper explores the feasibility of using a blended approach to postgraduate research-degree supervision. Such a model could reduce research supervisors' workloads and improve the quality and success of Masters and Doctoral students' research output. The paper presents a case study that is based on a framework that was originally designed for…

In the context of hybrid instruction, this study was designed to explore whether gender has an influence on learners' preferences for synchronous or asynchronous modes of computer-mediated communication, and whether this decision impacts learners' self-efficacy (SE) towards knowledge acquisition. The participants were 180 teacher-education…

This article described the experiences of an inservice professional development program for teachers with a focus on online synchronous discussions. Transcripts of six online synchronous discussions containing 3600 messages from an online teacher professional development course were analyzed. In addition, the researchers interviewed 10…

Computer literacy has evolved from writing simple BASIC programs to using desktop productivity applications. The shift from mainframe to personal computer brought about the need to rethink computer literacy courses to introduce basic skills and familiarity using desktop productivity applications. While these skills remain important, the recent…

Intellectuals in many fields have long argued that, as the distance between people increases, the possibility for genuine empathy between them decreases. In this article, the author argues that distancing has as-yet unexplored pragmatic consequences in online education. As he has argued elsewhere (Russell 2004), distancing can be understood as…

Groups are a fundamental part of the business world. Yet, as companies continue to expand internationally, a major challenge lies in promoting effective communication among employees who work in varying time zones. Global expansion often requires group collaboration through computer systems. Computer-mediated groups lead to different communicative…

This study uses a quasi-experiment to evaluate the effectiveness of Internet videoconferencing technology. The instructor used a laptop, webcam, high-speed DSL connection, and Polycom[TM] Viewstation to teach a course unit of introductory sociology from a remote location to an experimental group of students in a large multimedia classroom. The…

Julie Foertsch and Morton Ann Gernsbacher present the results of an evaluation of an online undergraduate course in psychology that adheres to the seven widely accepted principles of effective online teaching and suggests an eighth principle: using the unique benefits and constraints of online communication to prompt critical thinking about…

The objective of the research presented here was to study the influence of two types of instruction for using an argumentation diagram during pedagogical debates over the Internet. In particular, we studied how using an argumentation diagram as a medium of debate compared to using an argumentation diagram as a way of representing a debate. Two…

Students have various motivations for participating and engaging in courses offered by distance education technologies over the Internet. While many of these courses have traditionally been Web-based asynchronous offerings, enhanced technology and reduced costs of IP-enabled teleconferenced synchronous course sections are encouraging more…

This paper reports an action research case study in which a traditional lecture based, face to face "Network Management" course at the University of Lapland's Faculty of Social Sciences was developed into two different course versions resorting to case based teaching: a face to face version and an online version. In the face to face…

This paper discusses an innovative blended learning strategy which incorporates online discussion in both in-class face to face, and off-classroom settings. Online discussion in a face to face class is compared with its two counterparts, off-class online discussion as well as in-class, face to face oral discussion, to examine the advantages and…

This article sets out to identify key competencies which language tutors need to develop in order to manage synchronous online teaching. In order to aptly monitor interactions with distant learners, it is proposed that three types of regulation pertaining to socio-affective, pedagogical and multimedia aspects are required. On the one hand, this…