This paper reports on the evolution of a software environment called ClassACT (Class Annotation and Collaboration Tool) from a simple multimedia annotation program to a multi-domain archival database management system. ClassACT was developed at Northwestern University (Illinois) for instructional use, and, although its original goal was to solve a…

In January 1999, an interdisciplinary seminar of doctoral students from cognitive, educational and computational sciences was organized to study theoretical texts that might provide insight into how to support collaborative learning with perspectives-based software. The seminar uses a Web-based tool called WEBGUIDE to mediate and structure…

The connection between higher education attainment and higher incomes has become increasingly more pronounced in recent years as the United States has moved toward a knowledge economy. What is less apparent or understood is higher education's contribution to the collective wellbeing of the nation and the world. Given humanity's growing…

Educational Research Information Center (ERIC) Trends are analyses of higher education literature contained in the ERIC database describing major concerns in institutional practice. Literature on teaching and learning has grown within the higher education literature base over the last decade. However, the themes are basically still the same as…

This paper provides a checklist of suggestions, hints, and competencies needed to take an online course from ideas to reality. The introduction addresses the pedagogical potential of the World Wide Web. Migrating the course to the online environment is discussed in the first section, focusing on the following considerations: determining course…

This paper provides a background of the development of hypermedia technology and describes a hypermedia system that could be used to teach probability and statistics through a web-based interface. (Contains 30 references.) (Author/WRM)

Japanese education, including preservice teacher education, is incorporating instructional technology as an effective, systematic way to enhance planning, teaching, and learning. Japanese researchers developed a framework for using instructional technology to develop lesson plans for autonomous learning. Preservice teachers in Japan tend to hold…

This guidebook is based on the belief that e-business applications will transform academia and academic support experiences, with learners participating in distributed learning environments that mix physical and virtual learning resources in many combinations, and it offers insights into the strategies and planning needed to develop a college…

The Wake County Public School System, North Carolina, conducted the High School Student Survey of students in grades 9 through 12 during the 1998-99 school year. The return rate for the survey was 80.4%. Students responded to a variety of questions related to homework, technology use, fairness, safety, support, and future plans. A majority of the…

This paper proposes a context-driven model of instructional design incorporating constructivist-oriented methods and strategies for structuring meaningful, purposeful learning environments into the framework of a traditional systematic approach. An evaluation study is also presented that investigated the effects of implementing the context-driven…

Ranger Rick's NatureScope is a creative education series dedicated to inspiring in children an understanding and appreciation of the natural world while developing the skills they will need to make responsible decisions about the environment. The topic of this issue is "Astronomy Adventures." Contents are organized into the following…

In the current education literature, the World Wide Web, a subset of the Internet, has an image of freedom and liberation based on its capacity to transcend the conventional notions of time and space and its potential to offer unlimited educational opportunities. This paper suggests that the use of the Web in education tends to reproduce…

Despite the ever-increasing number of higher education institutions offering online courses, there are still a lot of controversial debates and a strong sense of confusion about how well the concept of Web-based distance learning is being implemented. This paper summarizes the 10 primary steps toward the assessment, planning, design,…

This document presents the comments of the president of the North Carolina Community College System regarding economic and workforce development issues facing the community colleges. He states that North Carolina is a leading manufacturing state today in an economy that is increasingly being refocused on information-based services. From an…

This report is an informed observer's interpretation of the discussions that took place at the 1998 annual meeting of the Aspen Institute's Forum on Communications and Society (FOCAS). It summarizes the inquiry made by FOCAS members into the many issues surrounding information literacy, including what information literacy is, why we need an…