Grading essays and research papers can be the most trying part of any writing instructor's job. Fitting corrections, suggestions, and notes between double-spaced lines of text and into margins often creates a legibility problem, which only worsens when grading stacks of papers to meet deadlines. This essay describes electronic grading, a method…

Laptop computers and Type II applications can provide powerful tools for elementary classrooms, especially if they are combined with authentic instruction. This article provides information and lessons learned from a laptop initiative in an urban elementary school. The goal of the initiative was to develop lesson plans and document techniques that…

This note describes a method for evaluating the sums of the m -th powers of n consecutive terms of a general arithmetic sequence: { S[subscript m] = 0, 1, 2,...}. The method is based on the use of a differential operator that is repeatedly applied to a generating function. A known linear recurrence is then obtained and the m-th sum, S[subscript…

This article reports on our experiences in providing interoperability between the ARIADNE knowledge pool system (KPS) (Duval, Forte, Cardinaels, Verhoeven, Van Durm, Hendrickx et al., 2001) and several other heterogeneous learning object repositories and referatories.

When most academic technologists tackle computing, their time is occupied by laptops and servers--relatively small-scale stuff. A couple of blades here, a couple of blades there. Generally, even for network managers, the processing power rarely stacks up to anything awe-inspiring. Sometimes, however, computing can be bigger and broader than many…

Stephen Downes visits Robin Good's Master NewMedia, a Web site dedicated to Web 2.0 in both thought and deed. The site both utilizes the design principles and technologies central to the concept of Web 2.0--relentless referencing, cross-referencing, and linking to a wide variety of articles from across the Web; a fluid and often chaotic…

Educators are becoming increasingly interested in alternatives to learning management systems (LMS) Blackboard and WebCT. Stephen Downes's column Places to Go turns to one internationally popular open source LMS--Moodle. Downes takes the reader through Moodle's Web site, which is simultaneously a Web site about its LMS and an example of what its…

This article explores the uses of a simulation model (the two bucket story)--implemented by a stand-alone computer program, or an Excel workbook (both on the web)--that can be used for deriving bootstrap confidence intervals, and simulating various probability distributions. The strengths of the model are its generality, the fact that it provides…

In this paper, we present an interactive teaching approach to introduce the concept of optimal design of experiments to students. Our approach is based on the use of spreadsheets. One advantage of this approach is that no complex mathematical theory is needed nor that any design construction algorithm has to be discussed at the introductory stage.…

In teaching undergraduate time series courses, we have used a mixture of various statistical packages. We have finally been able to teach all of the applied concepts within one statistical package; R. This article describes the process that we use to conduct a thorough analysis of a time series. An example with a data set is provided. We compare…

The way in which computer algebra systems, such as Maple, have made the study of physical problems of some considerable complexity accessible to mathematicians and scientists with modest computational skills is illustrated by solving the multiple pendulum problem. A solution is obtained for four pendulums with no restriction on the size of the…

Some students show a lot of artistic talent. Astounding sketches of a Mini Cooper done with a pen in an English-composition spiral-bound notebook scream talent and success. But teachers, parents and guidance counselors want to help artistically talented kids avoid the macaroni-and-cheese existence common to aspiring artists--working just to make…

With new and inexpensive computer-based methods, measuring the speed of light and the Earth's radius--historically difficult endeavors--can be simple enough to be tackled by high school and college students working in labs that have limited budgets. In this article, the author describes two methods of estimating the Earth's radius using two…

Helping students understand the general nature of scientific models is increasingly regarded as an important goal of the middle and high school science curriculum (e.g., J. K. Gilbert & C. Boutler, 1998. "International Handbook of Science Education"; Kluwer, London; A. G. Harrison & D. F. Treagust, 2000. "Science Education," 352-381). In addition,…

Intelligent learning systems (ILSs) have evolved in the last few years basically because of influences received from multi-agent architectures (MAs). Conflict resolution among agents has been a very important problem for multi-agent systems, with specific features in the case of ILSs. The literature shows that ILSs with cognitive or pedagogical…