This is the first study in Cyprus aiming to gain insight into the factors responsible for the low attainment of ethnic minority students observed in earlier studies. Teachers from different schools and cities on the island participated in a focus group discussion. Identified factors related to the child, parents, home environment, teachers,…

Students often voice computations during group discussions of mathematics problems. Yet, this type of private speech has received little attention from mathematics educators or researchers. In this article, we use excerpts from middle school students' group mathematical discussions to illustrate and describe "computational private…

Images, diagrams, and other forms of visualization are playing increasingly important roles in molecular life science teaching and research, both for conveying information and as conceptual tools, transforming the way we think about the events and processes the subject covers. This study examines how upper secondary and tertiary students interpret…

Sociocultural theories of learning and sociocultural theories of technology are explored as a way to view and to map the complex interactions that can occur in online professional discussions. The case of synchronous online moderation meetings are used as an example of the combination of variables that can impact on the development of shared…

Discussion forums are a widely used activity in online courses. However, knowledge construction within online discussion rarely reaches higher levels. Therefore, it is important to understand which aspects of online discussion encourage learning and increase knowledge construction. This paper investigates the effect three Structured Divergent…

Many researchers argue that students must be meaningfully engaged in the learning resources for effective learning to occur. However, current online learners still report a problematic lack of attractive and challenging learning resources that engage them in the learning process. This endemic problem is even more evident in online collaborative…

This report describes the approach that REL Northeast and Islands (REL-NEI) used to guide its eight research alliances toward collaboratively identifying a shared research agenda. A key feature of their approach was a two-workshop series, during which alliance members created a set of research questions on a shared topic of education policy and/or…

Knowledge elaboration plays a critical role in promoting knowledge acquisition and facilitating the retention of target knowledge in online collaborative discussions. Adopting a key-term-based automated analysis approach, we proposed an indicator framework to measure the level of knowledge elaboration in terms of coverage, activation, and…

Identifying how students can manage the psychological complexity of receiving assessment feedback is important to gain maximum learning and for teachers to facilitate empowering online learning environments. This study discursively explores how a group of students, learning online, psychologically process assessment feedback. Data comprised 29…

The purposes of this study were (1) to develop a teacher training program that integrates knowledge management (KM) and blended learning and examine its effects on pre-service teachers' professional development in creativity instruction; and (2) to explore the mechanisms underlying the success of such KM-based training. The employed KM model was…

This article draws from an evaluative case study of a group work approach--Support Groups--designed by the author to support pupils perceived as having Social and Emotional Behavioural Difficulties within a Secondary school situated in an area of multiple deprivation in Scotland. The study, which is principally qualitative, draws from the accounts…

The purpose of this study was to examine students' experiences using Facebook as a learning management system during a course. The study participants were 18 junior education faculty students attending a compulsory distance education undergraduate course delivered by the Computer Education and Instructional Technology Department at a university in…

With increasing class sizes, faculty have increasingly been using online homework software (OHS) and in-person discussion groups as the classroom evolves. We sought to determine the effect of online homework software and in-person discussion groups on student engagement. Specifically, we posited that expectations influence this relationship, and…

Online education and in particular Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are often regarded as a way to solve global educational challenges. In this article, we highlight the students' uptake of such a 'digital solution'. Presenting initial findings from a research project in Germany, we situate our investigation in the specific context of digital…

Online learning critically relies upon good communication between engaged parties in order to convey ideas, meanings, and values. Emerging technologies in collaborative virtual environments are providing new affordances in establishing greater online presence and, in turn, greater abilities to communicate and learn. This study examines how…