Search

With an increase in technology to mediate learning and a shift to more student-centred approaches, open-ended online assignment tasks are becoming more common in higher education. Open-ended tasks offer opportunities for students to develop their own interpretations of the requirements, and online technologies offer greater flexibility and afford new types of interactions with teachers and other students. This paper presents a study of students' task interpretation and self-set goals in the context of five open-ended online assignment tasks. The findings presented in this paper demonstrate the importance of a high-quality task understanding for goal setting and suggest practical implications for task design and support.

It is now well accepted that graduating teachers need the capacity to integrate Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in ways which harness their learning affordances and develop students' digital literacies. However, effective ICT integration in the classroom is challenging because it requires complex application of technological, pedagogical and content knowledge. A key challenge for teacher educators is the provision of learning experiences at university and on professional placement that will allow pre-service teachers to develop these capacities. Understanding the learning process of pre-service teachers in relation to ICT integration is essential if this teacher education challenge is to be addressed. This article reports on a study in which a group of 11 pre-service Primary school teachers were interviewed at stages through their program with a focus on their preparedness to use ICTs in their teaching. The study used a model developed by Taylor (2004), which defines three stages of teacher ICT capacity development (uncritical and accepting, beginning to problematise, and reflection and theorisation), as an analytic lens. Using this model, preservice teachers were positioned against the stages in the model at six points during their four year program, and factors contributing to their movement through the phases were identified.

This paper reports on a study involving 74 third and 17 fourth year student teachers enrolled in a Bachelor of Education (Primary) course at an Australian regional, multi-campus university. These pre-service primary teachers completed the single semester, compulsory subject Managing the Learning Environment, which involves the application of behaviour management theory and research into the primary school classroom. The aim of the study was to investigate the experiences of student teachers using blogs whilst on professional placement and more specifically, the effectiveness of blogs to facilitate reflection on behaviour management. Data were drawn from focus group interviews and blog postings. There were mixed responses to the use of blogs as a learning tool; those who found it useful saw its utility in developing behaviour management strategies, venting emotions and supporting each other, while others considered blogs a time imposition and questioned the usefulness of peer advice. While blog postings demonstrated some evidence of reflection and aligning theory and practice, they were overwhelmingly used for the sharing of behaviour management "tips".

This article presents the outcomes of a pilot study investigating factors that supported and constrained collaborative learning in a blended reality environment. Pre-service teachers at an Australian university took part in a hybrid tutorial lesson involving a mixture of students who were co-located in the same face-to-face (F2F) classroom along with others who were participating remotely via their avatars in a three-dimensional virtual world. Video and sound recording equipment captured activity in the classroom, which was streamed live into the virtual world so the remote participants could see and hear their instructor and F2F peers; the in-world activity was also simultaneously displayed on a projector screen, with the audio broadcast via speakers, for the benefit of the F2F participants. While technical issues constrained communication and learning in some instances, the majority of remote and F2F participants felt the blended reality environment supported effective communication, collaboration and co-presence. Qualitative analysis of participant evaluations revealed a number of pedagogical, technological and logistical factors that supported and constrained learning. The article concludes with a detailed discussion of present and future implications of blended reality collaborative environments for learning and teaching as well as recommendations for educators looking to design and deliver their own blended reality lessons.

This article reports on a qualitative case study which examined the development of six Australian pre-service teachers' Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK), through a series of six semi-structured interviews, over the duration of their four-year teacher preparation programme. Consistent with the research design employed, detailed description is used to provide an insightful picture of the knowledge and skills gained. The results indicate a clear progression in the development of TPACK in these pre-service teachers. For some this was more pronounced than for others, a range of identified aspects of their preparation experience impacting on their development. The extent of ICT use on professional placement, expectations and practice of supervising teachers, school culture and resourcing were major identified influences. A range of aspects of university preparation including an ICT skill and pedagogy subject, assignments and lecturer modelling also had an evident effect on the growth of the pre-service teachers' TPACK.

Technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) has been well accepted as a framework to understand and describe types of knowledge required by teachers to teach specific content with technology effectively. However, limited studies have used the framework in analysing the complexity of technology integration in mathematics classrooms. This study investigates, through examining critical instructional events, the most influential TPACK constructs in understanding and shaping teachers' pedagogical practices using digital technology. This case study was conducted in an early secondary mathematics classroom in Indonesia that used a web-based resource to support students' understanding of fractions. The finding suggests that the qualitative examination of the four intersected TPACK constructs assists in understanding the challenges and the opportunities to teachers when utilising an exploratory-based technology. It demonstrates that the combination of pedagogical stances and choice of technology significantly influence the visibility of other TPACK constructs. Implications of this study include the need of thoughtful planning prior to using web-based resources and the importance to utilise critical events in developing and assessing teachers' TPACK.

The use of journals by students while on placement is a well-accepted strategy for encouraging reflection on practice, with the use of online blogs for this purpose potentially providing additional benefits through shared reflection and peer support. The aim of this study was to explore the effectiveness of an online blogging activity by teacher education students while on professional placement in schools. Data were drawn from focus group interviews, questionnaires and blog postings. Findings reflected substantial diversity in student responses with some highlighting the value of peer engagement and reflection on practice, and others questioning the value of the activity and showing reluctance to provide feedback to peers. Possible reasons emerging for these diverse responses included: nuanced technical issues; lack of peer feedback received by some students; variability in the perceived need for online support due to availability of conventional support networks; and apparent resistance by some students to peer and learning community engagement. Recommendations include careful framing of assessment requirements, awareness of professional placement demands, learning community development strategies and ongoing technical support.

Blended synchronous learning involves using rich-media technologies to enable remote and face-to-face students to jointly participate in the same live classes. This article presents blended synchronous learning designs from seven case studies that were part of a project funded by the Australian Government Office for Learning and Teaching and articulates principles for implementation as espoused by the teachers who enacted them. A wide range of technologies (including video conferencing, web conferencing and virtual worlds), tasks (namely collaborative evaluation, group questioning, class discussion, problem solving and collaborative design) and levels of student interaction (from lightweight to tightly coupled) were present within the designs. The main issues that teachers confronted when facilitating blended synchronous lessons were those relating to communication and those relating to cognitive overload caused by split attention. Key pedagogical principles for enactment as identified by the lead teachers included the need for extensive preparation, clear instructions, composure, flexibility, advance preparation of students and savvy utilisation of support staff.

Discovery-based learning designs incorporating active exploration are common within instructional software. However, researchers have highlighted empirical evidence showing that "pure" discovery learning is of limited value and strategies which reduce complexity and provide guidance to learners are important if potential learning benefits are to be achieved. One approach to reducing complexity in discovery learning is limiting the range of possible actions for the learner to ensure that they do not undertake exploratory activities leading to confusion. This article reports on a study in which the learning outcomes from two learning conditions using computer-based simulations were compared. One condition allowed exploration through manipulation of simulation parameters, while the other allowed observation of simulation output from preset parameters, the latter condition designed to limit the complexity of the task. Learning outcomes for the 158 university student participants were assessed via pre-tests and post-tests of conceptual understanding. Students' exploration activities were recorded and their strategies subsequently coded as either systematic or unsystematic. The results showed that when compared with observation, systematic exploration resulted in learning benefits, while unsystematic exploration did not. These results have implications for the design of discovery learning tasks and instructional guidance within computer-based simulations.

Web 2.0 technologies are becoming more popular in the everyday lives of students. As a result, teachers and designers have begun to explore their use in formal education. This paper presents evaluation findings from a collective case study of six Web 2.0 implementations in Australian higher education. The research was undertaken as part of a larger study that sought to understand how today's students use information and communication technologies to support their learning. Conducted across three universities, the research included a range of disciplines, class sizes and year levels. A common evaluation strategy was used in order to collect comparable data from which commonalities and differences could be identified. This paper provides an overview of the study, describes the methodology used, summarises the implementation experiences of staff and students involved and presents the key findings. The results suggest that most students had little prior experience with relevant technologies and that many struggled to see the value of using Web 2.0 technologies for learning and teaching, both of which have important implications for the design of appropriate learning tasks. While the argument can be made for improving the design through better task-technology alignment, this study also highlights inherent tensions between Web 2.0 and educational practices. (Contains 1 table.)

In this paper, we examine students' reflections about the value of two photo-sharing activities that were implemented in undergraduate Biology and Chemistry subjects. Both activities aimed, broadly, to provide support for authentic and meaningful learning experiences in undergraduate science. Although the activities were similar--both required students to capture and share images as part of an independent inquiry activity--students in the Biology case study were more positive, overall, than the Chemistry students in their evaluation of the activity. In this paper, we examine the findings from the two case studies in parallel to provide insight into our understanding of meaningful learning in undergraduate science. The results suggest that, for meaningful learning to occur, the learning activity needs to be well aligned with students' individual learning goals and with the objectives and characteristics of the course. In the two case studies examined in this paper, this alignment was successful for the Biology case study but less successful in the Chemistry case study. (Contains 1 figure and 3 tables.)

This article describes the research design of, and reports selected findings from, a scoping study aimed at examining current and planned applications of 3D immersive virtual worlds at higher education institutions across Australia and New Zealand. The scoping study is the first of its kind in the region, intended to parallel and complement a number of studies conducted in other parts of the world. Results from a sector-wide questionnaire administered as part of the scoping study, portions of which are presented in this article, appear consistent with international trends, especially in terms of the platforms chosen and the dramatic increase in usage seen in recent years. Higher education teaching staff in Australia and New Zealand are using 3D immersive virtual worlds with their students in a variety of ways, for both assessable and non-assessable tasks and in face to face, fully online/distance as well as blended-mode subjects, although use in face to face and blended contexts appears to be most common. The results also provide some insight into the demographics (e.g. age) of staff who have adopted 3D immersive virtual worlds in their teaching, as well as into the academic disciplines in which the technology is being employed. (Contains 6 figures.)

This paper reviews existing methods used to address questions about interactivity, cognition and learning in multimedia learning environments. Existing behavioural and self-report methods identified include observations, audit trails, questionnaires, interviews, video-stimulated recall, and think-aloud protocols. The limitations of these methods are examined, highlighting the problems with using behavioural information to speculate about the cognitive activity that is occurring; the difficulties posed by relying on the correct interpretation of questions or accurate recall of past events; and the potential for the data collection methods to have an impact on cognition as it is occurring. Functional brain imaging techniques offer a complement to the existing methods, but possess a number of inherent methodological constraints. The specific constraints emerging from a recent pilot study carried out by the authors are discussed in detail, including: limitations on learner-computer interaction because of the need to use MRI compatible input devices; activation from motor tasks potentially confounding the results of comparisons between cognition occurring during interactive and non-interactive resources; visual differences between multimedia conditions potentially confounding the results due to activation associated with the visual processing; and problems with the provision of "baseline" or "rest" conditions for comparison purposes during holistic problem-based tasks. Despite these constraints it is argued that the use of functional imaging techniques within this field of research has significant potential. (Contains 4 figures.)

This paper reports qualitative findings from a study that investigated Australian university staff and students' perceptions and use of current and emerging technologies both in their daily lives and in teaching and learning contexts. Forty-six first-year students and 31 teaching and support staff from three Australian universities took part in interviews and focus groups. This paper examines how students and staff reported on their use of new technologies in their daily lives, their stated reasons for using those technologies, and their beliefs about the benefits and limitations of using technologies as teaching and learning tools. The findings question assumptions that have been made about a "digital divide" between "digital native" students and their "digital immigrant" teachers in higher education today, suggesting we need to develop a more sophisticated understanding about the role technologies play in the lives of both students and staff. A better understanding of student and staff perspectives will allow for more informed decisions about the implementation of educational technologies in today's higher education institutions. (Contains 2 tables.)

This article explores the potential learning benefits of three-dimensional (3-D) virtual learning environments (VLEs). Drawing on published research spanning two decades, it identifies a set of unique characteristics of 3-D VLEs, which includes aspects of their representational fidelity and aspects of the learner-computer interactivity they facilitate. A review of applications of 3-D VLEs is presented, leading to the identification of a series of learning affordances of such environments. These affordances include the facilitation of tasks that lead to enhanced spatial knowledge representation, greater opportunities for experiential learning, increased motivation/engagement, improved contextualisation of learning and richer/more effective collaborative learning as compared to tasks made possible by 2-D alternatives. The authors contend that the continued development of and investment in 3-D games, simulations and virtual worlds for educational purposes should be considered contingent on further investigation into the precise relationships between the unique characteristics of 3-D VLEs and their potential learning benefits. To this end, they conclude by proposing an agenda or "roadmap" for future research that encompasses empirical studies aimed at exploring these relationships, as well as those aimed at deriving principles and guidelines to inform the design, development and use of 3-D virtual environments for learning.

This article describes the findings of a qualitative study investigating teacher perspectives on the impact of interactive whiteboards (IWBs) on their classroom teaching practice, using intensive case studies focusing on six primary and secondary teachers from two rural schools. The study found that all teachers were enthusiastic, had seen improvements in student engagement, and were able to develop and evolve their IWB teaching strategies through explicit reflection. However, there was considerable diversity both in the ways in which the IWB was used and in the degree to which teachers changed their classroom teaching practices. Whereas some (Glover and Miller, 2001; Kennewell, 2006) have been critical of IWB adoption without clear pedagogical transformation or without utilisation of all IWB features, we argue that one of the IWB's key benefits is that it can be used initially without requiring a big shift in pedagogy but that it may gradually afford more major pedagogical changes over a longer period of time. These findings are important for the design of professional development in schools because with such a diversity of perceived IWB affordances, effective professional development is more likely to take the form of informal practice sharing than of specific hardware or software training.

Many have argued that interactive 3D virtual environments have great educational potential due to their ability to engage learners in the exploration, construction and manipulation of virtual objects, structures and metaphorical representations of ideas. Although learning benefits have been demonstrated in research settings, and substantial usage has occurred in workplace training contexts, there are few published evaluations of applications of such environments within university contexts. This article reports on studies exploring the effectiveness of a virtual environment based on a chemistry laboratory as a tool to prepare university chemistry students studying at a distance for their on-campus residential schools, in response to evidence suggesting that many of these students experienced a lack of confidence and a sense of anxiety approaching these sessions. In an experimental study it was found that the environment was able to be effective as a tool for familiarising students with the laboratory. However, when the resource was provided to distance students, less than half of the students chose to use it, possibly due to the fact that use of the resource was not required for the assessment in the subject. Questionnaire and interview data suggested that most of those who used the resource found that it was a valuable preparatory tool and would recommend its further use. For many students, however, a lack of familiarity with the laboratory was not seen as the major source of their anxiety and therefore a resource allowing them to become familiar with the laboratory did not have a major impact on their learning experience. Given that the ability to apply mathematical techniques and chemistry concepts within the practical sessions emerged as a major source of students' anxiety, it is suggested that the incorporation of instruction or scaffolding for these aspects of the task can be provided, and would make a valuable enhancement to the virtual environment. (Contains 14 tables and 2 figures.)

The effective teaching of fire investigation skills presents logistical challenges because of the difficulty of providing students with access to suitable fire damaged buildings so that they can undertake authentic investigation tasks. At Charles Sturt University (CSU), in the subject JST415, "Fire Investigation Cause and Origin Determination", the novel approach of providing students with a CD based virtual environment based on the scene of a burned down house, as an alternative to having them undertake investigation of a real fire scene, has been implemented. This paper describes a quantitative and qualitative study exploring the effectiveness of this teaching resource. A key finding from this study was that students felt that the virtual fire investigation task had important advantages over undertaking a real investigation task, even though there were some limitations in the overall degree of realism of the experience. The results also suggested that students found that the visual fidelity and navigation capabilities provided within the environment were quite adequate for carrying out their fire investigation activity. Importantly, students also felt that the ability to revisit the virtual scene as many times as they wanted, at a time convenient to them, gave it advantages over a real investigation task if they were to be provided with only one or the other. (Contains 6 tables and 1 figure.)

Modern information technology and computer science curricula employ a variety of graphical tools and development environments to facilitate student learning of introductory programming concepts and techniques. While the provision of interactive features and the use of visualization can enhance students' understanding and assist them in grasping fundamental ideas, the real difficulty for many students lies in making the transition from relying on the graphical features of these tools, to actually writing programming code statements in accordance with a set of plain English instructions. This article opens with a systematic review of the literature on alternative approaches to teaching object-oriented programming (OOP) to novice programmers. It then describes the rationale behind an "objects first, class user first" approach to introducing OOP, arguing for the use of interactive GUI-based visualization tools such as BlueJ as cognitive tools to allow learners to represent and manipulate their mental models or schemas. Finally, it reports on a study involving a cohort of students undertaking an introductory OOP unit in Java. The study investigated the effectiveness of: (i) the graphical features of BlueJ as a cognitive tool while performing coding tasks as part of a test; and (ii) the use of screencasts (video screen captures) of BlueJ to provide scaffolding during learning, which involves the provision of temporary support structures to assist learners in attaining the next stage or level in their development. The screencasts were used in conjunction with a series of structured exercises by providing an intermediate stepping stone to ease the transition to the writing of program code. The study found no significant effect of screencasts during the learning phase of the study, and no significant effect of BlueJ during testing. This result runs counter to theoretical predictions and consequently is important both for researchers focusing on the pedagogy associated with learning programming as well as those interested in the broader applications of animated instructional resources and cognitive tools. In the article, the authors postulate a number of reasons for the lack of significant effects to support their hypotheses. Firstly, it is possible that some, or perhaps many, participants who had access to BlueJ during the testing phase did not actually use it to assist them in answering the test questions. Secondly, since the screencasts and BlueJ were intended to ease students' transition to code, the data collection was conducted immediately following the participants' initial exposure to code statements. This gave rise to the possibility that they may not have been ready to attempt the questions framed at a high level of abstraction, which accounted for a majority of the test marks. The authors had hypothesized that the most benefit in providing the screencast-based scaffolding and the use of BlueJ as a cognitive tool was likely to be gained in assisting students with writing code for English instructions at this high level of abstraction; however, at this point in the semester they may not have been adequately prepared to undertake these types of questions, which required them to interpret the high-level task requirements and decompose them into individual object and class operations that would achieve the desired outcome (object state). Further research will need to be carried out to determine whether these hypothesized reasons for the lack of an identifiable difference between conditions can be supported, whether other factors are responsible, or whether in fact neither BlueJ screencasts nor the use of BlueJ as a cognitive tool actually enhance learning. One possible approach to a follow-up study would involve using a smaller number of students, but carrying out intensive observation during the experiment in order to determine the degree to which, and ways in which, BlueJ is used. This may include an oral component incorporating think-aloud protocols (Ericson & Simon, 1993) and/or follow-up interviews to gain deeper insight into and understanding of the participants' thought processes as they attempt the various questions in the test, as well as to identify gaps in their understanding in relation to the test questions. In addition to informing on the value of screencasts and cognitive tools for the learning of programming, such a study would also reveal in greater depth the nature of the cognitive stages involved in learning to write object-oriented program code from English instructions. (Contains 1 figure and 8 tables.)

This paper describes two empirical studies which investigated the importance for spatial learning of view control and object manipulation within 3D environments. A 3D virtual chemistry laboratory was used as the research instrument. Subjects, who were university undergraduate students (34 in the first study and 80 in the second study), undertook tasks in the virtual laboratory and were tested on their spatial knowledge through written tests. The results of the study indicate that view control and object manipulation enhance spatial learning but only if the learner undertakes authentic tasks that require this learning. These results have implications for educational designers making a choice between video or animation and interactive 3D technologies. The results are discussed within the framework of Piaget's theories on active learning and Gibson's ecological theory of perception and action. (Contains 3 tables and 4 figures.)

Analyzes technological capabilities of the Web as a delivery platform for highly interactive learning resources, consistent with a constructivist view of learning. Shows that all of the required software capabilities can be implemented by Web technology and discusses barriers to use of the Web as a medium for such resources, including bandwidth. (Author/LRW)

Discusses changes in accepted approaches to teaching and learning, shifts in psychological and pedagogical theory towards a constructivist view of learning, and the consequences of these theoretical shifts for computer assisted learning. Explains a classification scheme for constructivism that provides a framework for looking at constructivist approaches to computer assisted learning. (Author/LRW)