Collaborative trails in e-learning environments

This deliverable focuses on collaboration within groups of learners, and hence collaborative trails. We begin by reviewing the theoretical background to collaborative learning and looking at the kinds of support that computers can give to groups of learners working collaboratively, and then look more deeply at some of the issues in designing environments to support collaborative learning trails and at tools and techniques, including collaborative filtering, that can be used for analysing collaborative trails. We then review the state-of-the-art in supporting collaborative learning in three different areas – experimental academic systems, systems using mobile technology (which are also generally academic), and commercially available systems. The final part of the deliverable presents three scenarios that show where technology that supports groups working collaboratively and producing collaborative trails may be heading in the near future

Talking about routines in the field: the emergence of organizational capabilities in a new cellular phone network company

No abstract availabl

Pragmatism and the pragmatic turn in cognitive science

This chapter examines the pragmatist approach to cognition and experience and provides some of the conceptual background to the “pragmatic turn” currently underway in cognitive science. Classical pragmatists wrote extensively on cognition from a naturalistic perspective, and many of their views are compatible with contemporary pragmatist approaches such as enactivist, extended, and embodied-Bayesian approaches to cognition. Three principles of a pragmatic approach to cognition frame the discussion: First, thinking is structured by the interaction of an organism with its environment. Second, cognition develops via exploratory inference, which remains a core cognitive ability throughout the life cycle. Finally, inquiry/problem solving begins with genuinely irritating doubts that arise in a situation and is carried out by exploratory inference

Is there language teaching after global English?

This study documents a case of language education decline, and the role that distance-teaching expertise, allied with Information and Communication Technology (ICT) experience, can play in alleviating the problem. In the United Kingdom a number of factors have led to a crisis in the teaching and learning of European Languages Other Than English (ELOTE). One of the main determiners is the dominance of English as a lingua franca for Continental Western European countries, and another the political reluctance of the part of British governments to engage fully with the European Union. In the country where English is the mother tongue, the position of ELOTE is particularly critical. After quantifying the decline in demand for these languages, I will look at different ways in which language-teaching professionals have attempted to fight back, and I will focus on the benefits that may be derived from a strategy that combines ICT capacity with distance-learning methodologies, using the UK Open University (UKOU) as an example. The lessons drawn by that institution in different discipline areas over two decades will be applied to languages

Handbook for Learning-centred evaluation of Computer-facilitated learning projects in higher education

This handbook supports a project funded by the Australian Government Committee for University Teaching and Staff Development (CUTSD). The amended project title is “Staff Development in Evaluation of Technology-based Teaching Development Projects: An Action Inquiry Approach”. The project is hosted by Murdoch University on behalf of the Australasian Society for Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education (ASCILITE), as a consortium of 11 universities. The rationale of the project is to guide a group of university staff through the evaluation of a Computer-facilitated Learning (CFL1) project by a process of action inquiry and mentoring, supported by the practical and theoretical material contained in this handbook

Towntology & hydrOntology: Relationship between Urban and Hydrographic Features in the Geographic Information Domain

This article describes the relationship between Urban Civil Engineering and other domains, specifically the hydrographic domain. The process of building HydrOntology and the portion of the model relating to urban features are described. This ontology emerges with the intent of settling as a framework in the GI domain, very closely interrelating to Towntology