Open access publications provide scholars with unrestricted access to the "conversation" that is the basis for the advancement of knowledge. The large number of open access journals, archives, and depositories already in existence demonstrates the technical and economic viability of providing unrestricted access to the literature that is the…

The purpose of this study is to analyze the relationship between the grade performance of 128 students in an introductory micro-economics course and the average number of hours per week these students report spending on the Internet. The literature review offers a "priori" arguments supporting both positive and negative relationships.…

Penich-Thacker points to the increasing digital presence of the U.S. military, not only on official dot.mil sites but also on commercial social networking sites, and suggests that the interactions and intersections of military and civilian personnel online challenge the notion of "fundamental differences" between these populations.

This article shares some personal reflections on several years of integrating educational technology into mathematics courses while retaining the direct interaction strengths of the traditional classroom.

Web sites about sexual health lack the interactivity, humor, and "viral" nature required to attract young adults. The Midwest Teen Sex Show (www.midwestteensexshow.com) is an interactive, humor-based Web site that provides sexual health information to young adults. One episode from the Web site was shown to six focus groups of young women, ages…

Blogs, short for Weblogs, began to show up in the late 1990s, based on online discussion boards centered on threaded topics. Currently, a blog typically refers to a Web site in which an individual posts entries and then allows for commentary from the readers. If scholars look to some educational theory, both novice and experienced bloggers can use…

When Matthew Slaughter stood before a roomful of staff, community members, and former and current students at Minnetonka High School to receive the Distinguished Alumni award, the honor was not only his, but belonged in part to the effectiveness of a coordinated, integrated, multi-pronged online communication strategy. He reconnected with this old…

Open source software is poised to make a profound impact on K-12 education. For years industry experts have been predicting the widespread adoption of open source tools by K-12 school districts. They're about to be proved right. The impact may not yet have been profound, but it's fair to say that some open source systems and non-proprietary…

In this paper, I suggest that it is perhaps time to consider the pedagogy of popular music in more extensive terms than conventional rock band practices have to offer. One direction in which this might lead is the expansion of the informal pedagogy based on a "garage band" model to encompass various modes of digital artistry wherever this artistry…

Death and bereavement are human experiences that new media helps facilitate alongside creating new social grief practices that occur online. This study investigated how people's postings and tweets facilitated the communication of grief after pop music icon Michael Jackson died. Drawing on past grief research, religion, and new media studies, a…

This article investigates contemporary research on the use of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) in language education. The development and key features of these games are explored. This is followed by an examination of the theories proposed as a basis for game-based learning, and the claims made regarding the value of…

Recent developments and new directions in education have emphasised learners' needs, profile and pedagogical aspects by focusing on learner-centered approaches in educational settings. e-Learning, on the other hand, guarantees learners the opportunity of learning in their own way, and leads to new considerations in course design. e-Learning is…

Virtual communities for those who self-injure (SI) are increasingly popular and involve Internet communication technologies including e-message boards. The social and emotional support of an accepting virtual community may facilitate individual recovery from SI. Via self-report data, this study describes individuals who participate in virtual…

Because video on the web has spread almost virally, video crafted out of an amateur aesthetic has contributed to a disruption of professional communication economies as it prompts us to ask: Can we use digital video to make work-related communication cool? Professional writing pedagogies are beginning to respond to new student expectations about…

This article examines how Moodle, as an open-source Learning Management System, can be made more interoperable. The authors tested two software standards, LAMS and RELOAD, compatible with socio-constructivism norms. The analysis showed that pedagogic activities created with the LAMS-IMS Learning Design Level A Format are useable with Moodle but…