Discussion of the paradigm shift regarding the instructor's role as facilitator focuses on an action research conducted in a graduate course in which the presenter employed teaching strategies that encouraged students to learn collaboratively and independently from the instructor. Explains the use of computer-based applications, including Web page…

Investigates the integration of Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) into the curriculum for occasional use, for independent study, for developing particular skills, and as the focus of a course. (Author/VWL)

Discusses information literacy, independent learning, and social responsibility standards developed by the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) and Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT), focusing on independent learning: general techniques and methods for encouraging independent learning, independent reading,…

This paper reports a critique of the literature of problem-based learning (PBL) in medical education. The objective of the review was to examine the various meanings that medical teachers attribute to concepts of adult learning and self-directed learning within the context of PBL. The critique found that there are assumptions about the meanings of…

This paper describes a Web-based and distributed system named QSIA that serves as an environment for learning, assessing and knowledge sharing. QSIA--Questions Sharing and Interactive Assignments--offers a unified infrastructure for developing, collecting, managing and sharing of knowledge items. QSIA enhances collaboration in authoring via online…

The author reports how a handful of California districts hire teachers in Mexico to tutor migrant students during the pupils' extended winter breaks in the land of their heritage. Dubbed the Binational Support Teacher Project, the apparently unique arrangement is one of the more creative solutions to an issue schools across the United States…

This study examines the role of self-regulated learning (SRL) in facilitating students' shifts to more sophisticated mental models of the circulatory system as indicated by both performance and process data. We began with Winne and colleagues' information processing model of SRL (Winne, 2001; Winne & Hadwin, 1998) and used it to examine how…

This study examined how to propel the independent learning process of young adults through the development of learning awareness and personal commitment to improvements in reading. Preservice middle and secondary teachers enrolled in an undergraduate literacy course provided one-on-one tutoring for seventh-grade struggling readers from an urban…

As the Internet becomes a resource in the classroom, students must learn to glean maximally from that information using skills that enhance their understandings. Students engage in activities involved with Internet searching to the degree that they are skilled and motivated. This article reports on a research study that demonstrates that the model…

A multimethod evaluation procedure was used to evaluate "The Power of Positive Parenting" (Alvy, 1999): pretests and posttests with open-ended questions and satisfaction surveys (n = 99), five focus groups (n = 70), and follow-up phone calls (n = 72). After reading the booklet, parents reported being more confident, showed significant increases in…

Drawing on learners' course diaries, this paper explores Chinese EFL learners' perceptions of difficulties and constraints in EFL learning and their responses to the perceived difficulties and constraints. The diary data appear to indicate that the students' learning difficulties lay mainly with their linguistic competence, but a closer scrutiny…

Supporting students to be self-directed learners in classrooms is currently more important than it has ever been in the past. The rapidly changing nature of society, the demands of the "new economy" and the contemporary understanding of life long learning have combined to highlight the need for students to be increasingly independent learners.…

Developments in higher education are taking place in the wider context of globalisation, the Lisbon strategy and within the framework of the Bologna Process. Designing and developing Bologna programmes by taking into account the needs of the economy is a tool for successful quality assurance in higher education and for close cooperation with the…

One of the most important reasons to investigate human metacognition is its role in directing how people study. However, limited evidence exists that metacognitively guided study benefits learning. Three experiments are presented that provide evidence for this link. In Experiment 1, participants' learning was enhanced when they were allowed to…

This article explains how a learning contract helps Mr. Watson, a sixth grade middle school teacher find solutions to his problems regarding his student, Samantha's lack of motivation and self-confidence. A learning contract is a written agreement between teacher and learner in which the learner undertakes to complete mutually agreed upon tasks in…