First steps towards an integration of a Personal Learning Environment at university level

Ebner, M., Schön, S., Taraghi, B., Drachsler, H., & Tsang, P. (2011). First steps towards an integration of a Personal Learning Environment at university level. In R. Kwan et al. (Eds.), ICT 2011, CCIS 177 (pp. 22–36), Springer-Verlag Berlin: Heidelberg 2011.Personalization is seen as the key approach to handle the plethora of information in today’s knowledge-based society. It is expected that personalized teaching and learning will address the needs of the learners more efficiently. The education of the future will change by the influence of Web 2.0 contents and the steadily increasing amount of data. This means that the students of tomorrow will regularly have to deal with sharing and merging contents from different sources. Therefore, mashup technology will become a very important means to focus on individual learning needs and to personalize the access to particular information. The following article describes the challenges of Personal Learning Environments at higher education institutions. In the first section, the concept of Personal Learning Environments is presented, while the second section discusses the new challenges that arise for learning with the help of Personal Learning Environments. The third section of the article describes the technical background of Personal Learning Environments and the widget standard in general. In section four, a first prototype of a personal learning environment will be presented, which is integrated into the Technical University of Graz. A detailed description of the available widgets for the prototype, along with a first expert evaluation, will be provided. Finally, the conclusion of the article will sum up the main points of this paper and present the plans for future research together with the prospective developments.NeLLL AlterEg

Short pediatric Crohnʼs disease activity index for quality improvement and observational research:

Practical and objective instruments to assess pediatric Crohn’s disease (CD) activity are required for observational research and quality improvement

Prevalence and epidemiology of overweight and obesity in children with inflammatory bowel disease 12:

Obesity is a significant public health threat to children in the United States

Australia's National Bowel Cancer Screening Program: does it work for Indigenous Australians?

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Despite a lower incidence of bowel cancer overall, Indigenous Australians are more likely to be diagnosed at an advanced stage when prognosis is poor. Bowel cancer screening is an effective means of reducing incidence and mortality from bowel cancer through early identification and prompt treatment. In 2006, Australia began rolling out a population-based National Bowel Cancer Screening Program (NBCSP) using the Faecal Occult Blood Test. Initial evaluation of the program revealed substantial disparities in bowel cancer screening uptake with Indigenous Australians significantly less likely to participate in screening than the non-Indigenous population.</p> <p>This paper critically reviews characteristics of the program which may contribute to the discrepancy in screening uptake, and includes an analysis of organisational, structural, and socio-cultural barriers that play a part in the poorer participation of Indigenous and other disadvantaged and minority groups.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A search was undertaken of peer-reviewed journal articles, government reports, and other grey literature using electronic databases and citation snowballing. Articles were critically evaluated for relevance to themes that addressed the research questions.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The NBCSP is not reaching many Indigenous Australians in the target group, with factors contributing to sub-optimal participation including how participants are selected, the way the screening kit is distributed, the nature of the test and comprehensiveness of its contents, cultural perceptions of cancer and prevailing low levels of knowledge and awareness of bowel cancer and the importance of screening.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our findings suggest that the population-based approach to implementing bowel cancer screening to the Australian population unintentionally excludes vulnerable minorities, particularly Indigenous and other culturally and linguistically diverse groups. This potentially contributes to exacerbating the already widening disparities in cancer outcomes that exist among Indigenous Australians. Modifications to the program are recommended to facilitate access and participation by Indigenous and other minority populations. Further research is also needed to understand the needs and social and cultural sensitivities of these groups around cancer screening and inform alternative approaches to bowel cancer screening.</p