Compares the ways teaching material is designed in two European distance universities, the German FernUniversitaet (a classical university operating at a distance) and the Dutch Open Universiteit (an open/flexible institution). Outlines the pedagogical and methodological issues involved and shows how institutional constraints have affected…

Discusses distance education programs in higher education and describes the Eastern Mediterranean University (Cyprus) Learning Management System which was developed while the online program was offered to on-campus students. Explains functions of the system, including user enrollment, course management, lectures, quizzes, announcements,…

Describes scientific collaboratories as environments where researchers can perform their research without regard to physical location, interacting with colleagues, accessing instrumentation, sharing data and computational resources, and accessing information in digital libraries. Focuses on an evaluation study that compared undergraduates working…

Disconfirmation models of online service measurement seek to define service quality as the difference between user expectations of the service to be received and perceptions of the service actually received. Two such models-inferred and direct disconfirmation-for measuring quality of the online experience are compared (WebQUAL, SERVQUAL). Findings…

Analyzes modes of interaction in interdisciplinary education, distinguishing between interactions that address internal and external imperatives. Describes four levels of interaction, ranging from borrowing tools from other disciplines to connecting disciplines on conceptual levels. Provides examples of interactions addressing external imperatives…

Presents a study of outcomes of three methods of vocabulary instruction (i.e., the use of contextual cues, the use of definitions, and a mixed approach) when supplemented by computer-assisted instruction (CAI) using a mixed approach. Reports that CAI was effective with contextual only, definition only, and mixed approaches. (50 citations) (AJL)

Draws on findings of U.S. Department of Education's 1999 National Survey of Post-Secondary Faculty to profile full-time community college faculty respondents in 11 disciplinary groups. Asserts that understanding disciplinary variations may lead to a more accurate picture of the differences in faculty work between the two-year and four-year…

Discusses curricular changes in Dutch teacher training colleges and analyzes current instructional design activities of teacher trainers using a repertory grid technique. Their actual approaches are compared to instructional systems design approaches and related to innovative teacher roles, and suggests that more attention needs to be placed on…

To demonstrate that some methods used to assess item fit can be applied to assess person fit and vice versa, performance of a chi-squared item-fit statistic was compared with that of a likelihood-based person-fit statistic for examinees and items under Monte Carlo conditions. (SLD)

Responses to questionnaires were compared between 106 students in nursing homes with those of 171 students in hospitals to evaluate interview and physical examination instruction for medical students. The nursing home was assessed as an appropriate alternative site for teaching the medical interview and physical diagnosis. (GLR)

This study examined effectiveness of an instructional program designed to teach learning-disabled adolescents (N=70) to make better personal decisions. A pretest/posttest comparison design found that following instruction students showed better ability to both identify general schema for decision making and apply schema to novel problem…

Describes a stereotype measurement suitable for classroom demonstration. Illustrates C. McCauley and C. L. Stitt's diagnostic ratio measure and examines the validity of the "kernel of truth" hypothesis. Uses this as a starting point for class discussion. Reports results and gives suggestions for discussion of related concepts. (Author/NL)

A system of reconstructive elaborations was developed to adapt to different levels of concreteness of information and different levels of meaningfulness to the learner. Content information was taught with or without this model to 30 mildly mentally handicapped junior high and high school students. Implications for instruction are discussed. (SLD)

Reviews current educational software evaluation methods, highlights problems, and describes the York Educational Software Evaluation Scales (YESES), an alternative criterion based model. Panel evaluation used by YESES is explained and YESES results are compared with evaluations from the Educational Products Information Exchange (EPIE) to indicate…

This study compared use of trainer demonstrations and use of visual cues across varying difficulties of task, by 20 mentally retarded secondary-aged students. Results found that photographs and line drawings were more effective with mildly/moderately retarded students than demonstrations when working with complex tasks. No differences were found…