This article discusses the planning and initial research behind the design of an online support community for pre-service teachers. This community is initially being designed to support pre-service teachers with their technology integration efforts during their student teaching experiences, but may also grow to serve special teaching cohorts in…

Purpose: The paper's aim is to describe the first experiences of, opinions and attitudes toward, continuing education using the internet of a group of Puerto Rican pharmacists after an online course. Design/methodology/approach: This is a descriptive study using a focus group of practicing pharmacists who participated in continuing education using…

Research suggests that difficulty in making connections among three levels of chemical representations--macroscopic, submicroscopic, and symbolic--is a primary reason for student alternative conceptions of chemistry concepts, and computer modeling is promising to help students make the connections. However, no computer modeling-based assessment…

A science methods instructor intentionally encouraged cell phone use for class work to discover how cell phones can be used as research tools to enhance the content and engage the students. The anecdotal evidence suggested that students who used their smartphones as research tools experienced the science content and pedagogical information…

This column describes multimedia resources available to teachers on the Smithsonian Folkways website. In addition to massive collections of audio and video recordings and advanced search tools already available through this website, the Smithsonian Global Sound educational initiative brought detailed lesson plans and interactive features to the…

Reading skill is a cognitive process in which the words are perceived, given a meaning, comprehended and then interpreted. The last year in primary education is a critical period when this skill is changed into a habit. As reading attitudes are important for an individual throughout the life, it is necessary to determine according to which…

The role of technology in education has mystified the contributors to "Theory Into Practice" ("TIP") during its 50-year history. In the first issue of "TIP," Guba (1962) was confident that "teaching machines are here to stay" and would help education, but raised various practical concerns, such as costs,…

It is still unclear on what and how tool and learner characteristics influence tool use and consequently performance in computer-based learning environments (CBLEs). This study examines the relationships between tool-related characteristics (tool presentation: non-/embedded tool and instructional cues: non-/explained tool functionality) and…

One of the most common problems in autistic children is split attention. Split attention prevents autism children from being able to focus attention on their learning, and tasks. As a result, it is important to identify how to make autistic individuals focus attention on learning. Considering autistic individuals have higher visual abilities in…

This paper presents a new methodology to develop remote laboratories for systems engineering and automation control courses, based on the combined use of TwinCAT, a laboratory Java server application, and Easy Java Simulations (EJS). The TwinCAT system is used to close the control loop for the selected plants by means of programmable logic…

The open educational resources (OER) movement has gained momentum in the past few years. With this new drive towards making knowledge open and accessible, a large number of OER repositories have been established and made available online throughout the world. However, the inability of existing search engines such as Google, Yahoo!, and Bing to…

The purpose of the study was to determine whether undergraduate students receiving web-based instruction based on traditional, key character, or classification instruction differed in their performance of insect identification tasks. All groups showed a significant improvement in insect identifications on pre- and post-two-dimensional picture…

There are many factors for teachers to use computer technology in their classrooms. The goal of this study is to identify some of the important factors contributing the teachers' use of computer technology. The first goal of this paper is to discuss computer self-efficacy. The second goal is to explain teaching experience. The third goal is to…

This article is intended to highlight peer response discourse trends and to initiate a dialogue about the ways in which educators, and designers of educational environments, can play a central role in creating more democratic discourse in classrooms. We report on a research and development project involving education experts, computer engineers,…

This paper demonstrates how teacher accreditation requirements can be responsibly aligned with a scholarly impetus to incorporate digital literacies to prepare pre-service teachers to meet changing educational needs and practices. The assessment initiatives introduced in the newly constructed four year undergraduate Bachelor of Education program…