The design of instructional text is an important consideration when attempting to design a successful learning environment. With the rising involvement in online distance education, it is becoming even more important to adhere to good principles of text design. The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework of possible instructional systems…

Today society has become a multimedia society, turned towards new forms of communication, ready for changes and the new communicational challenges. The students, surrounded by PCs, mobile phones and ever so sophisticated software, videos, wireless sets and TVs, DVDs, satellite transmissions and "the media above all other media"--the…

Handheld devices, most familiar to educators today in the form of graphing calculators, are rapidly improving their interface, computational, and communication capabilities. Communication capabilities allow participants to rapidly share mathematical objects among their handhelds, potentially contributing to improved classroom discourse. We have…

Increased emphasis is being placed on working and learning through teams, especially online. While technical aspects of this process have largely been the focus of researchers and practitioners, the emotional dynamics of online teams has received considerably less attention. In this study of online, problem-based learning teams, membership evoked…

The birth of modern continuing education as a structured university enterprise has been given impetus by the development of distance education. Instruction through and with a mix of technologies is a permanent and critically important part of distance education. Because of the heterogeneous quality of the adult student population, the introduction…

Sustainable development, biological diversity and conservation of tropical forests are only a few of the hot environmental and political topics where the actors involved have started to make use of the world-wide computer networks. The Internet (as a transport medium of information exchange) and the World Wide Web (as the favorite service to…

The rapid growth over the last few years of online services designed to appeal to a mass market audience in the United States encouraged many of the companies operating these services to consider launching them in Europe. This paper concentrates primarily on the European market of online services. The services fall into three categories: United…

Based on survey data from college and university distance learning programs in the United States and Canada, this report gives higher education administrators hard data to make decisions on the financing, scope, and development of distance learning efforts. It also profiles some of the leading practitioners such as Johns Hopkins, California State…

The growing popularity of focus group measurements can be traced to any one of four factors: (1) the economics associated with focus groups; (2) the speed at which data can now be collected; (3) the need to understand customer motivations; and (4) the desire to improve subsequent qualitative research activities and programs. Market researchers are…

In computer-mediated communication, genres are the means through which community is established; it is through genres that students construct their knowledge and express their positions. This paper presents and illustrates an analytical method based on genre and social semiotic theory, which can be used to investigate the development of student…

This study evaluated the relationship between psychological traits of campus-based undergraduate students and their preference for face-to-face (FtF) or computer-mediated communications (CMC), investigating the validity of transferring CMC instructional strategies from distance education to traditional classrooms. Thirty-eight students (80%) of…

This study discusses the capabilities of preservice teachers to engage in a daily dialog with other preservice teachers as well as university supervisors, which has been shown to be an effective means to enhance the student teaching experience. In this study, students who utilized technology daily for communication with one another and with their…

MOOs (Multi-User, Object-Oriented Environments), which were designed originally as spaces for online social interaction, are increasingly recognized today for their value as educational tools. This book brings together a diverse group of experts whose contributions help answer questions and dispel myths surrounding MOOs and their use in education.…

One of the major goals of mathematics education reform efforts is for students to become more confident in their abilities. This paper suggests that computer conferencing provides a way to change classroom practice so that students can work together in a self-paced manner that builds self-esteem and confidence in mathematics. A pedagogical…

On-line learning presents significant new challenges for faculty, students, and the colleges and universities where they teach and learn. The overriding challenge for all parties is to ensure that technology is used to enhance, not degrade teaching and learning. DePaul University, Illinois, which grew from two to six campuses, expanded the role of…