A 3D multi-user virtual environment holds promise to support and enhance student online learning communities due to its ability to promote global synchronous interaction and collaboration, rich multisensory experience and expression, and elaborate design capabilities. Second Life[R], a multi-user virtual environment intended for adult users 18 and…

Purpose: This paper seeks to argue that global change calls for training in intercultural, interdisciplinary and interparadigmatic professional behaviour. Thus a concrete web-based five-level training procedure "Surfing global change" (SGC) is to be proposed that includes reflection of game players' own knowledge, views and values. Rules…

This study examines proposals made during planning talk--a speech act that has received little attention in previous literature--to determine the applicability of the stages of second language (L2) pragmatic development posited by Kasper and Rose (2002). Although Kasper and Rose suggest that formulas play a prominent role in L2 pragmatic…

Recent college graduates are entering a competitive workforce that demands strong communication, teamwork, and problem-solving skills. However, many recent surveys and reports describe college graduates as deficient in these skills. For two courses at separate institutions, we each framed a course as a job, playing the role of a supervisor or…

A growing literature exploring large-scale, identity-based political violence, including mass killing and genocide, debates the plausibility of, and prospects for, early warning and prevention. An extension of the debate involves the prospects for creating educational experiences that result in more sophisticated analytical products that enhance…

This article describes the development and implementation of AxeCorp, a fictional consulting company incorporated into a first-year business communication course. Based on student response, course evaluations, and instructor observation, AxeCorp was successful in improving student learning. Given that the participating students were likely among…

Online role-playing games such as World Of Warcraft represent new participatory cultures in which today's students engage every day. They are appealing to players largely because of the social aspects of game play. Some features of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) can be incorporated into classroom culture to create more…

Using a critical inquiry curriculum is about teaching children to read the word and the world. Early childhood teachers apply this theory by helping children question events and texts they interact with in their communities. For example, teachers can help children understand why certain events happened, including whose voices may have been…

The emergence of new technologies such as three-dimensional virtual worlds brings new opportunities for teaching and learning. We conducted an action research approach to the analysis of how teaching and learning of computer programming at the university level could be developed within the Second Life virtual world. Results support the notion that…

Testing of second language pragmatic competence is an underexplored but growing area of second language assessment. Tests have focused on assessing learners' sociopragmatic and pragmalinguistic abilities but the speech act framework informing most current productive testing instruments in interlanguage pragmatics has been criticized for…

Despite the current press to improve school leadership, little scholarly attention focuses on building problem-solving skills in university leadership preparation programmes. This paper reports on two qualitative case studies that examined educational leadership students' probing of school problems through the arts. Fieldwork was used to derive…

Teaching BSW and MSW students beginning interviewing and relationship-building skills is essential in order to prepare them for practice with clients. In social work methods courses, role plays are commonly-used instructional strategies for helping foundation-level students acquire these initial practice skills. Despite the popularity of this…

Qualitative research has moved significantly in the last decade or so in its validation and acceptance of avenues of knowing and explaining which span alternative modes of research dissemination than those more traditionally expected of the academy. The use of performance constructs and conventions in the interpretation of qualitative research has…

One goal parents and educators should have is to help children become assertive and emotionally intelligent individuals. In furthering this goal, it helps to have an understanding of the three basic communication styles: (1) passive; (2) aggressive; and (3) assertive. Because communication is most effective when a message is delivered assertively,…

Community of practice provided the theoretical frame to study the Old Bedford Village crafts persons as they reproduced lifestyles of a Southern Alleghenies rural village from 200 to 300 years ago in early America. This study sought the "how" and "why" Old Bedford Village crafts persons engaged in learning processes as…