Web-Mediated Education and Training Environments: A Review of Personalised Interactive Learning.

This chapter reviews the concept of personalised eLearning resources in relation to integrating interactivity into asynchronous learning. Personalised eLearning resources are learning resources which are selected to suit a specific student or trainee’s individual learning requirements. The affordance of personalised eLearning would provide educators with the opportunity to shift away from eLearning content that is retrieved and move towards the provision of personalised interactive content to provide a form of asynchronous learning to suit students at different degree levels. A basic introduction to the concept of ePedagogy in online learning environments is explored and the impacts these systems have on students learning experiences are considered. Issues, controversies, and problems associated with the creation of personalised interactive eLearning resources are examined, and suggested solutions and recommendations to the identified issues, controversies, and problems are reviewed. Personalised interactive asynchronous learning resources could potentially improve students’ learning experiences but more research on the human computer interface of these authoring tools is required before personalised eLearning resources are available for use by non-technical authors

Challenges Encountered in Creating Personalised Learning Activities to Suit Students Learning Preferences

This book chapter reviews some of the challenges encountered by educators in creating personalised e-learning activities to suit students learning preferences. Technology-enhanced learning (TEL) alternatively known as e-learning has not yet reached its full potential in higher education. There are still many potential uses as yet undiscovered and other discovered uses which are not yet realisable by many educators. TEL is still predominantly used for e-dissemination and e-administration. This chapter reviews the potential use of TEL to provide personalised learning activities to suit individual students learning preferences. In particular the challenges encountered by educators when trying to implement personalised learning activities based on individual students learning preferences

A Review of Personalised E-Learning: Towards Supporting Learner Diversity

The realisation of personalised e-learning to suit an individual learner’s diverse learning needs is a concept which has been explored for decades, at great expense, but is still not achievable by non-technical authors. This research reviews the area of personalised e-learning and notes some of the technological challenges which developers may encounter in creating authoring tools for personalised e-learning and some of the pedagogical challenges which authors may encounter when creating personalised e-learning activities to enhance the learning experience of their students. At present educators who wish to create personalised e-learning activities require the assistance of technical experts who are knowledgeable in the area. Even with the help of an expert the creation of personalised e-learning activities still remains a complex process to authors who are new to the concept of tailoring e-learning to suit learner diversity. Before the successful utilisation of adaptive authoring tools can be realised, academic authors need to learn how to effectively use these tools. All learners come to education with a diverse set of characteristics; educators need to decide which learner characteristic(s) they wish to focus on addressing through the use of personalised e-learning activities. Further investigation, evaluation and analyses of authoring tools is required before personalised e-learning to support learner diversity can be achieved by many academics. Research members of the AMAS (2013) project team are currently involved in developing an authoring tool for adaptive activities for e-learning

Evaluating Approaches to Participation in Design: The Participants' Perspective.

Landscape architects and other designers rely on users for feedback about their needs, concerns, and reactions to potential solutions. While these well-intended efforts often fail to meet their goals, evaluations of the effectiveness of design participation from the participants’ perspective is lacking. Drawing on the Reasonable Person Model as a conceptual framework, the three studies reported here evaluated participants’ understanding of design options, engagement, and sense of meaningful participation. The first two studies, in the context of a design project for nature trails at a medical campus in Midwest U.S., used design sessions and a photoquestionnaire. The third study followed a more systematic approach to compare the effectiveness of different types of design drawings. Participants found the design sessions engaging and their input meaningful. However, the differences in understandability for the different designs are attributable to presentation format, organization, and design graphics. Furthermore, the more difficulty participants had understanding the design presentation, the less they liked the design option presented. This study also found that the photoquestionnaire compared favorably to the design presentations. The photoquestionnaire, the focus of the second study, showed that this approach performed particularly well in promoting a sense of meaningful participation for the participating visitors and employees. It also revealed the importance of offering multiple avenues for people to express their concerns so they feel that they have been heard. The third study found photorealistic and perspective drawings to be more understandable and engaging and to promote greater confidence in discussing the design than plans and sections. Notably, some plans and sections, characterized as simple, neat, coherent, legible, and using colors that matched common perceptions, performed better than some photorealistic and perspective drawings. Simplification in the representation of design features also enhanced understandability in some cases. This research reveals ways designers can facilitate a participation process that meets the cognitive and psychological needs of participants and leads to reliable, useful feedback. It empowers designers by helping them see they can make a difference in creating an effective participation process.Ph.D.Natural Resources and EnvironmentUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/86328/1/bosworth_1.pd