Teaching and learning in virtual worlds: is it worth the effort?

Educators have been quick to spot the enormous potential afforded by virtual worlds for situated and authentic learning, practising tasks with potentially serious consequences in the real world and for bringing geographically dispersed faculty and students together in the same space (Gee, 2007; Johnson and Levine, 2008). Though this potential has largely been realised, it generally isn’t without cost in terms of lack of institutional buy-in, steep learning curves for all participants, and lack of a sound theoretical framework to support learning activities (Campbell, 2009; Cheal, 2007; Kluge & Riley, 2008). This symposium will explore the affordances and issues associated with teaching and learning in virtual worlds, all the time considering the question: is it worth the effort

Transforming pre-service teacher curriculum: observation through a TPACK lens

This paper will discuss an international online collaborative learning experience through the lens of the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework. The teacher knowledge required to effectively provide transformative learning experiences for 21st century learners in a digital world is complex, situated and changing. The discussion looks beyond the opportunity for knowledge development of content, pedagogy and technology as components of TPACK towards the interaction between those three components. Implications for practice are also discussed. In today’s technology infused classrooms it is within the realms of teacher educators, practising teaching and pre-service teachers explore and address effective practices using technology to enhance learning

Co-browsing the Greenstone digital library collection

Context: Social interaction is an important aspect of a successful web page. Social network sites attract many people worldwide. The social interaction aspect is missing from digital libraries, including the Greenstone Digital Library. Objectives: This study investigates how two distant users exchange information while in front of the computer and browsing the same Greenstone Digital library collection, in real time, and identifies the features that support their needs. Methods: To answer the research questions, an observation methodology is applied to gain more insight into users’ information-seeking behaviour for an online DL. Two recording elements were used to gather data from a sample of eight pairs of university students (n=16). The two elements were video camera (with audio) and screen capture. Further, a questionnaire was used to collect data about the workload during the session. Results: The data obtained was analysed using conversation and content analysis methods. The findings of this user study related to the metadata presentation, referencing information and search box activities. A Co-browsing GDL system is proposed based on the requirements derived from findings from the user study and also the related works. Evaluation: A usability test is used to evaluate the effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction of the proposed system. Think aloud and questionnaire methods are used to gather the data of this usability test. Results: The result of this study “debug” the proposed Co-browsing GDL system and explore issues related to communication and private works, with it having become apparent through the study that improvements can be made to some parts of the system presentation. Conclusions: The findings of the thesis research have been used to provide recommendations for future work to develop and implement a Co-browsing Greenstone digital library (GDL) system

Combining relevance information in a synchronous collaborative information retrieval environment

Traditionally information retrieval (IR) research has focussed on a single user interaction modality, where a user searches to satisfy an information need. Recent advances in both web technologies, such as the sociable web of Web 2.0, and computer hardware, such as tabletop interface devices, have enabled multiple users to collaborate on many computer-related tasks. Due to these advances there is an increasing need to support two or more users searching together at the same time, in order to satisfy a shared information need, which we refer to as Synchronous Collaborative Information Retrieval. Synchronous Collaborative Information Retrieval (SCIR) represents a significant paradigmatic shift from traditional IR systems. In order to support an effective SCIR search, new techniques are required to coordinate users' activities. In this chapter we explore the effectiveness of a sharing of knowledge policy on a collaborating group. Sharing of knowledge refers to the process of passing relevance information across users, if one user finds items of relevance to the search task then the group should benefit in the form of improved ranked lists returned to each searcher. In order to evaluate the proposed techniques we simulate two users searching together through an incremental feedback system. The simulation assumes that users decide on an initial query with which to begin the collaborative search and proceed through the search by providing relevance judgments to the system and receiving a new ranked list. In order to populate these simulations we extract data from the interaction logs of various experimental IR systems from previous Text REtrieval Conference (TREC) workshops

Promoting Critical Reading using Google Tools – a Community of Inquiry Approach

Creating a community of learning can enhance critical reading in a classroom environment. Task design plays a critical role in the effectiveness of this process. This paper presents a case study of a face-to-face literature course that used a host of Google tools to create such a community. The Community of Inquiry (CoI) principles of teacher presence, cognitive presence, and social presence have been applied to analyze the task design using Google tools. Data collected from coursework, surveys, and interviews provide evidence that tasks using Google tools can promote community building and critical reading

Promoting Critical Reading using Google Tools – a Community of Inquiry Approach

Creating a community of learning can enhance critical reading in a classroom environment. Task design plays a critical role in the effectiveness of this process. This paper presents a case study of a face-to-face literature course that used a host of Google tools to create such a community. The Community of Inquiry (CoI) principles of teacher presence, cognitive presence, and social presence have been applied to analyze the task design using Google tools. Data collected from coursework, surveys, and interviews provide evidence that tasks using Google tools can promote community building and critical reading

Slow EdTech: Pedagogical principles, collaborative explorations, and persistent challenges

This article describes two “Slow EdTech” initiatives, using this label to denote a focus on learning and the development of capacities for learning along with a mindful approach to the uptake of new digital tools that become available. One initiative, dating from 2001, is a set of guidelines about specific situations and specific ways in which specific educational technologies are of significant pedagogical benefit. The other, dating from 2013, is online Collaborative Explorations (CEs) for moderate-sized open online collaborative learning. The tools and processes used in CEs for inquiry, dialogue, reflection, and collaboration are designed to be readily learned by participants so they can translate them into their own settings to support the inquiries of others. Reflection on both initiatives points to the deeper source of challenges for Slow EdTech, namely, the political, economic and cultural context in which U.S. education is embedded

Designing personalised, authentic and collaborative learning with mobile devices: Confronting the challenges of remote teaching during a pandemic.

This article offers teachers a digital pedagogical framework, research-inspired and underpinned by socio-cultural theory, to guide the design of personalised, authentic and collaborative learning scenarios for students using mobile devices in remote learning settings during this pandemic. It provides a series of freely available online resources underpinned by our framework, including a mobile learning toolkit, a professional learning app, and robust, validated surveys for evaluating tasks. Finally, it presents a set of evidence-based principles for effective innovative teaching with mobile devices

Research-Informed Teaching in a Global Pandemic: "Opening up" Schools to Research

The teacher-research agenda has become a significant consideration for policy and professional development in a number of countries. Encouraging research-based teacher education programmes remains an important goal, where teachers are able to effectively utilize educational research as part of their work in school settings and to reflect on and enhance their professional development. In the last decade, teacher research has grown in importance across the three i’s of the teacher learning continuum: initial, induction and in-service teacher education. This has been brought into even starker relief with the global spread of COVID-19, and the enforced and emergency, wholesale move to digital education. Now, perhaps more than ever, teachers need the perspective and support of research-led practice, particularly in how to effectively use Internet technologies to mediate and enhance learning, teaching and assessment online, and new blended modalities for education that must be physically distant. The aim of this paper is to present a number of professional development open educational systems which exist or are currently being developed to support teachers internationally, to engage with, use and do research. Exemplification of the opening up of research to schools and teachers is provided in the chapter through reference to the European Union-funded Erasmus + project, BRIST: Building Research Infrastructures for School Teachers. BRIST is developing technology to coordinate and support teacher-research at a European level