Despite the perception that face-to-face classrooms provide speaking opportunities, studies by Fassinger (1995), Nunn (1996), and Weimer (2013) have conveyed that there is limited interaction in a traditional college lecture setting. Social media networks such as Twitter provide an opportunity for instructors to utilize popular mobile technology…

With the excessive use of social media in the 21st century, attempts to integrate social media within higher education have also increased. In this area, research has been particularly focused on the aspects of students, rather than the instructors. This study puts the emphasis on the instructors with the aim to explore their use of social media…

The authors in this study seek to inform academia about international students' experiences and challenges while attending universities in Small Town USA. Despite their eagerness to study in the United States (U.S.), international students are faced with setbacks that many universities fail to recognize or realize. The researchers conducted…

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to introduce a virtual collaborative learning setting called "Net Economy", which we established as part of an international learning network of currently six universities, and present our approach to continuously improve the course in each cycle. Design/ Methodology/Approach: Using the community of…

This article analyses how education is positioned in the current concerns about security and extremism. This means firstly examining the different meanings of security (national, human and societal) and who provides security for whom. Initially, a central dilemma is acknowledged: that schooling appears to be simultaneously irrelevant to the huge…

Learning is most effective when intrinsically motivated through personal interest, and situated in a supportive socio-cultural context. This paper reports on findings from a study that explored implications for design of interactive learning environments through 18 months of ethnographic observations of people's interactions at "Hack The…

This study builds upon work in task-based language teaching and literary studies to explore the use of fan fiction as a pedagogical tool in a technology-enhanced university foreign language class. A task-based fan fiction project, The Blogging Hobbit, modelled on blog-based role-play storytelling found in online media fandoms, was carried out in a…

The development of socio-interactive web technologies such as social media necessitates the exploration of how they can be effectively appropriated and implemented in educational contexts. In an effort to respond the need, the present study examines the use of a synchronous multimodal tool in higher education context. By applying the Community of…

Purpose: The emergence of Education 2.0 enabled technology-enhanced learning, necessitating new pedagogical approaches, while e-learning has evolved into an instrumental pedagogy of collaboration through affordances of social media. Social learning networks and ubiquitous learning enabled individual and group learning through social engagement and…

"Unconferences" are a non-traditional form of professional activity defined by the absence of many conventional conference structures. One example of the unconference model is the "Edcamp," a voluntary, participant-driven form of grassroots educator professional learning. More than 600 of these events have been held worldwide…

This study uses Critical Discourse Analysis and Social Network Analysis to examine an online peer mentoring site created to unite first-year and third-year preservice teachers enrolled in an undergraduate teacher education program. The peer mentoring site was developed to provide both first-year preservice teachers and more experienced peers the…

Based on detailed empirical analyses, we paint a layered picture of emerging steering dynamics. Inspired by Foucault, we put the focus on roles stakeholders define both for themselves and others, how they give sense to policy, how they work together in policy elaboration and implementation, and the subtle and sometimes deceitful function of soft…

This study explores, describes and analyzes the utilization of smartphone apps by four Japanese university students to support learning English as a Foreign Language (EFL). Findings indicate that intermediate language learners use apps to access content and communicate on SNS and are not keen on studying discrete language parts. Participants…

Parental choice of school is an under-researched area in the Australian educational literature. Moreover, research in this area tends to focus on school choice with respect to government policy and market influences. This paper presents the findings from doctoral research which explored the ways in which parents living in rural and remote areas…

This article examines the use of Twitter as a learning tool in a middle grades science classroom. Relevant research, the direct experience of the teacher leading this unique initiative, and the invaluable perspectives of his middle level students are included to inform interested stakeholders. Following a discussion of open versus closed digital…