The widespread availability of high-quality Web-based content offers new potential for supporting teachers as designers of curricula and classroom activities. When coupled with a participatory Web culture and infrastructure, teachers can share their creations as well as leverage from the best that their peers have to offer to support a collective…

This paper reports research on the implementation of a web-based videoconferencing tool (Interwise) for synchronous learning sessions on an industrial technology course offered through a university in northern Taiwan. The participants included undergraduate students from the same course offered in two different semesters. We investigated students'…

While the potential of social networking sites to contribute to educational endeavors is highlighted by researchers and practitioners alike, empirical evidence on the use of such sites for formal online learning is scant. To fill this gap in the literature, we present a case study of learners' perspectives and experiences in an online course…

Interaction plays a critical role in the learning process. For online course participants, interaction with the course content (learner-content interaction) is especially important because it can contribute to successful learning outcomes and course completion. This study aims to examine the relationship between learner-content interaction and…

Online interaction is considered to be a key aspect of effective e-learning and improved academic achievement. However, few studies have examined how effectiveness varies with the degree of interaction intensity. Using data for 17,090 students from three Catalan universities, in this paper we study the productivity associated with five different…

This paper reports the findings of three studies within a program of research designed to better understand the factors contributing to the academic achievement of students in online courses and the contributions of interaction to online learning. The first study compared the academic achievement of students in the online and face-to-face (F2F)…

Emergent learning describes learning that occurs when participants interact and distribute knowledge, where learning is self-directed, and where the learning destination of the participants is largely unpredictable (Williams, Karousou, & Mackness, 2011). These notions of learning arise from the topologies of social networks and can be applied to…

Japanese distance education has been slow to utilize the Internet, and mainly depends on the mail system and, to a lesser extent, television broadcasting as its mode of delivery. Since 2001, however, regulations have been relaxed to allow students to complete all course requirements for a university degree via online distance learning. This…

Distance education and information and communication technologies (ICTs) have been marketed as cost-effective ways to rescue struggling educational institutions in developing countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). This study uses classroom video analysis and follow-up interviews with teachers, students, and local tutors to analyse…