One of the biggest challenges facing distance education programs is attrition. One potential way of reducing attrition is to foster a sense of community among students. Students who are emotionally and intellectuality invested in each other and in their program are more likely to prosper in a multi-year distance program. This paper briefly…

In this paper, five doctoral students at California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS), calling themselves the New Technology Group (NTG), describe their research on online communication as a method of inquiry. The focus of the inquiry is to contribute to the formal knowledge base of adult online learning, the impact and possible benefits of…

This paper examines the controversy of e-mail privacy in the workplace. Once an employee uses an e-mail system that belongs to the employer, according to recent case law, their privacy rights are forfeited. Employers will now have to start creating policies to safeguard themselves from expensive litigation, and employees will have to be more…

This paper reports the results of a five-year case study of the use of online tools: Internet, e-mail, and the World Wide Web, within a Graduate School of Education. The conceptual framework was independently developed, but because of the striking parallel with activity theory, activity theory became the overall framework for interpreting…

This paper addresses some of the central questions currently related to 3-Dimensional Inhabited Virtual Worlds (3D-IVWs), their virtual interactions, and communication, drawing from the theory and methodology of sociology, interaction analysis, interpersonal communication, semiotics, cultural studies, and media studies. First, 3D-IVWs--seen as a…

As more courses in higher education move to an on-line format, a major concern that has arisen is the lack of personal interaction between the professor and student. The literature provides evidence that often on-line courses are configured and delivered in a style more often associated with independent study or correspondence work, i.e., students…

In this paper, research about mediated communication is used to shed light on questions that have arisen in relation to behavioral telehealth about the relative merits of different modes of distance communication for the transaction of behavioral telehealth services. The paper is in two parts. The first part contains a presentation of questions…

In spite of the growing interest in interaction design, there remains a large user population that needs special interest: users with special needs. These users can dramatically benefit from software that better responds to their interaction needs, not to mention the fact that designing software that takes into account the special needs of such…

Most educational institutions lag far behind business and industry in the adoption and use of technology. This paper explores the applications of technologies that are currently being used in business and industry, to education. The following technologies are reviewed: virtual learning, wireless networking, collaboration tools, digital video,…

This booklet presents two activities that received awards in the First Contest of Internet Application to Educational Activities in Japan. The first paper describes CHaTNet (Children Homes and Teachers Network) at the Tamagawa Gakuen school, winner of the Prime Minister's Award. CHaTNet is a network of 4,500 participants, including parents,…

The culminating course in the Human Biology core sequence at Stanford University, California, is a course that considers the relationship between the social and natural sciences and the development of wise public policy. A Web-based forum was developed to facilitate weekly debate on policy challenges presented in this course, and this forum was…

The "Pratiques exemplaires en technologies de l'information et de la communication" series for francophone and immersion schools is an initiative of French Language Services Branch, in cooperation with the Stakeholder Technology Task Group of Alberta Learning. The series has a dual purpose: to provide information on aspects of…

The objective of this paper is to review and analyze several aspects of computer mediated learning and how future communication research questions will be explored. Some of the questions addressed in the paper are: Does this format affect learning performance? Is there enough verbal interaction in a cyberspace class? How are communication…

Teams working in distributed projects go through the same stages and encounter the same problems as typical face-to-face teams. The main difference when the environment is moved to a distributed setting is that some problems become more complex, other problems become less noticeable, and some new obstacles occur. One of the main problems with…

A number of projects over the past decade, in a range of educational contexts, have sought to link forms and patterns of communicative interaction to improvements in knowledge, conceptual understanding and reasoning skills. These initiatives have produced dialog models, methodologies for developing these in ways that lead to the design of…