(Purpose) This article describes the basis for effective educational technology leadership and a few of the current initiatives and impacts that are a result of the aforementioned effective leadership. (Findings) Topics addressed in this paper include: (1) the role of the educational technology leader in an educational setting; (2) an examination…

This article showcases a virtual interactive participatory design activity for building a digital entomology lab. Conceptualized as a virtual complement to a general entomology course at Kansas State University, the lab would allow learners to explore morphological aspects of insects--their various forms and functions--in order to understand…

The V-SPACE project equipped English teachers with iPads as tools to create and maintain virtual spaces for their students. Teachers learned effective ways to integrate technology with English content while strengthening technological knowledge and pedagogical skills. In a summer institute, 29 high school teachers were trained, using their iPads,…

Purpose: This paper seeks to identify and develop an exploratory framework for conceptualising how teachers might use the affordances of Web 2.0 technologies to support their own professional learning. Design/methodology/approach: The paper draws on a large corpus of literature and recent research evidence to identify the principal elements and…

For the first time in history, an entire statewide public institution of higher education is extending all of its 16 campuses into the online virtual world of Second Life and is creating one of the largest virtual collaborative learning communities in the world. There are three levels of assessment and research for this initial-entry project: (1)…

This paper presents a pre-orientation program for incoming college students, Active Citizenship through Technology (ACT), that engaged students in civic dialogue early in their academic experience while fostering a long-term peer support network. It leveraged youth's interest in Internet technologies to engage them in civic discussions and…

This paper explores and discusses arguments for the use of virtual environments and interactive avatars in supporting the achievement of student learning goals within conventional educational contexts. It describes and evaluates arguments promoted by some authors (eg, van den Brekel, 2007; Deuchar & Nodder, 2003; Dickey, 2003; Facer, 2004; de…

This paper proposes extensive applications of virtual collaborative space in order to enhance the efficiency and capability of Digital Campus. The usability of Digital Campus has been experimented in different learning environments and evaluated by questionnaire as that the presence technology and a sense of solidarity influence the participants'…

Original research and content creation in the university environment have historically been the domain of faculty and their graduate students. Nowadays, however, undergraduate programs at universities across the country are putting undergrads in the center of the action. This article describes some of these programs--at Duke University (North…

User-created virtual worlds, such as Second Life, are a hot topic in higher education. Thousands of educators are currently exploring and using Second Life, and hundreds of colleges and universities have purchased and developed their own private islands in Second Life, including the University of Kansas Medical Center (KUMC). Because it is so easy…

This paper describes and reflects on the development of the Schome Park Programme (SPP), which was established with the specific aim of extending our thinking about schome, which aims to be the optimal educational system for the 21st century. In an earlier stage of the Schome Initiative, it became clear that people find it almost impossible to…

This study reports on the pedagogic rationale, didactic design and implications of an AHRC-funded doctoral training scheme in collaborative and digital multimedia in the humanities. In the second part of this article we discuss three areas of provision that were identified as particularly significant and/or controversial. These include (1) desktop…

This article presents the results of a three-year study of "Gamestar Mechanic" (www.gamestarmechanic.com), a flash-based multiplayer online role-playing game developed for the MacArthur Foundation's digital media learning initiative by the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Gamelab in New York. The game's objective is to help children…

The University of Illinois' National Center for Supercomputing Applications, a cooperative effort of the National Science Foundation, University of Illinois, the state, and industry, offers training and support services in the use of technologically advanced computing for scientific research. The computers simulate physical phenomena that are…

Efforts to integrate technology into elementary and secondary education will not succeed without the involvement of higher education. The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga has programs to train inservice teachers in technology, a space flight simulator for hands-on education, and connections to schools that will assure new teachers'…