ImpacT2 project: preliminary study 1: establishing the relationship between networked technology and attainment

This report explored teaching practices, beliefs and teaching styles and their influences on ICT use and implementation by pupils. Additional factors explored included the value of school and LEA policies and teacher competence in the use of ICT in classroom settings. ImpaCT2 was a major longitudinal study (1999-2002) involving 60 schools in England, its aims were to: identify the impact of networked technologies on the school and out-of-school environment; determine whether or not this impact affected the educational attainment of pupils aged 816 years (at Key Stages 2, 3, and 4); and provide information that would assist in the formation of national, local and school policies on the deployment of IC

Browsing while reading: effects of instructional design and learners' prior knowledge

One of the key reasons that multimedia, and particularly hypertext systems, are gaining in importance is that they inspire hopes of optimizing learners' processes of knowledge construction. The present study is concerned with the respective influence of individual learner variables (i.e. particularly domain‐specific prior knowledge) on the use of different design attributes. Thirty‐six university students worked through a hierarchically structured two‐part hypertext about the psychology of memory under two experimental browsing conditions (reduced versus free browsing). Results show that deeper‐level comprehension (i.e. structural knowledge) was predicted by the interaction of experimental condition and prior knowledge, but that simply retaining facts was not. Participants with low prior knowledge performed better on the comprehension test if they had worked on the version with reduced access. Moreover, the version with reduced access helped to reduce feelings of disorientation. The measure of disorientation also appeared to be closely linked with the individual's computer experience, self‐concept of computer ability and subject‐related interest. The main implications for educational practice relate to the design of an adaptive multimedia and hypertext learning system and the successful learning with it

Rich environments for active learning: a definition

Rich Environments for Active Learning, or REALs, are comprehensive instructional systems that evolve from and are consistent with constructivist philosophies and theories. To embody a constructivist view of learning, REALs: promote study and investigation within authentic contexts; encourage the growth of student responsibility, initiative, decision making, and intentional learning; cultivate collaboration among students and teachers; utilize dynamic, interdisciplinary, generative learning activities that promote higher-order thinking processes to help students develop rich and complex knowledge structures; and assess student progress in content and learning-to-learn within authentic contexts using realistic tasks and performances. REALs provide learning activities that engage students in a continuous collaborative process of building and reshaping understanding as a natural consequence of their experiences and interactions within learning environments that authentically reflect the world around them. In this way, REALs are a response to educational practices that promote the development of inert knowledge, such as conventional teacher-to-student knowledge-transfer activities. In this article, we describe and organize the shared elements of REALs, including the theoretical foundations and instructional strategies to provide a common ground for discussion. We compare existing assumptions underlying education with new assumptions that promote problem-solving and higher-level thinking. Next, we examine the theoretical foundation that supports these new assumptions. Finally, we describe how REALs promote these new assumptions within a constructivist framework, defining each REAL attribute and providing supporting examples of REAL strategies in action

Revisiting the link between teaching and learning research and practice: Authentic learning and design-based research

It has often been argued that research in teaching and learning has only a weak link to practice. Much educational research is criticised for having little relevance to the day-to-day learning experience of students in K-12 and higher education. This criticism is particularly relevant in relation to educational technology research. In this field, many researchers conduct studies that are designed to test the effectiveness of the delivery medium—to prove that one medium is better than another—rather than exploring ways to improve instructional approaches and tasks. With the current proliferation of exciting and innovative technologies that are likely to become more and more common in classrooms (such as cell phones, tablets, and other mobile devices), research needs to move beyond simple comparisons of these devices with each other or with the ‘traditional’ approach. In this presentation, I argue that educational technology research has largely failed to change educational practice and outcomes because of the predominant aim of such research to prove rather than improve. Online and mobile technologies afford the design and creation of truly innovative authentic learning designs, where the technology is both a tool and a platform for presentation of genuine products, and the focus is on learning with technologies rather than from them. Instead of comparative research, a more powerful and appropriate approach is design-based research, where researchers and practitioners work hand in hand to iteratively refine innovations until they get the results they seek. A description of the characteristics of design-based research is given, together with an argument for the more widespread adoption of this approach to enhance the quality and impact of research in teaching and learning

Assessment in mathematics: A multimedia resource for preservice teachers

It is commonly accepted that teachers teach the way they were taught and that innovation is difficult to achieve. In this project, the theoretical framework of situated cognition or situated learning has been used to design an interactive multimedia resource that allows preservice teachers to become aware of different assessment strategies in mathematics education, and how to apply them. The resource enables users to encounter the authentic use of a range of assessment strategies and to view their interpretations from multiple perspectives which include the teacher's decision-making processes, the child's thinking, expert opinion and written documentation

Factors shaping the evolution of electronic documentation systems

The main goal is to prepare the space station technical and managerial structure for likely changes in the creation, capture, transfer, and utilization of knowledge. By anticipating advances, the design of Space Station Project (SSP) information systems can be tailored to facilitate a progression of increasingly sophisticated strategies as the space station evolves. Future generations of advanced information systems will use increases in power to deliver environmentally meaningful, contextually targeted, interconnected data (knowledge). The concept of a Knowledge Base Management System is emerging when the problem is focused on how information systems can perform such a conversion of raw data. Such a system would include traditional management functions for large space databases. Added artificial intelligence features might encompass co-existing knowledge representation schemes; effective control structures for deductive, plausible, and inductive reasoning; means for knowledge acquisition, refinement, and validation; explanation facilities; and dynamic human intervention. The major areas covered include: alternative knowledge representation approaches; advanced user interface capabilities; computer-supported cooperative work; the evolution of information system hardware; standardization, compatibility, and connectivity; and organizational impacts of information intensive environments

A comparison of structured and unstructured navigation through a CBT package

The advent of hypertext has opened up new possibilities in computer-based training. The design of courseware without any predetermined structure could make the designer's task easier, and allow greater flexibility for the trainee to structure the learning environment to suit their own learning style, This investigation was concerned with the exploration of performance differences in structured and unstructured training environments. In the structured condition, subjects encountered presequenced training and practice modules. For the unstructured condition, subjects determined their own sequence of modules. It was proposed that performance may be better in the unstructured condition. The findings indicate that this depends upon individual differences in cognitive style, some styles seemingly better at exploiting the unstructured learning environment than others

The implementation of learning strategies in the design of an on-line medical course supplement

Given the charge of integrating technology in the medical school curriculum, faculty members are faced with the challenge of designing new materials for their courses. Often, these materials become on-line resources such as hypermedia and electronic communication. Strategies may assist students who are unfamiliar with on-line materials to use such materials more effectively. This study investigated the elaborative interrogation strategy used in conjunction with on-line materials to promote more efficient processing of difficult material. Twenty second-year medical students volunteered to participate in the study. The course in which they were enrolled required the use of an on-line lecture supplement. The elaborative interrogation intervention consisted of a written page of instruction for including why questions in their independent study process. The control students were instructed to simply record their study behaviors during the intervention period. Results indicated no significant differences between groups with or without strategy instruction. It is likely that as advanced students, medical students have existing strategies that were as effective as the strategy used during the intervention. As an auxiliary study of the overall effects of using on-line materials, exam scores of the current students were compared to the exam scores of a cohort group from the previous year who did not use on-line materials. The students from the previous year performed significantly better than the students from the current year on a similar examination of content knowledge. It is possible that volunteers in the current study were particularly anxious about using on-line materials due to the timing of the introduction of the strategy and lack of computer experience. Qualitative analysis of student feedback supports these assumptions. Future research should address the issues of timing of the presentation, more effective strategy training, and embedding the strategy instruction to increase student participation

Multimedia effectiveness in the learning environment : A review of literature

Multimedia Effectiveness in the Learning Environment: A Review of Literature examines some of the research and academic literature related to the use of computer-assisted instruction, hypertext, hypermedia and multimedia in the learning environment. Contemporary views of media psychology and learning styles are also discussed, as well as the impact of multimedia on teachers, students and learning. The author concludes by suggesting that the progressive teacher knows the importance of quality instructional design and will look for every opportunity to integrate appropriate multimedia into the learning environment