Describes a project-based distance learning course design in an open university course. Discusses approaches to course design in distance learning and suggests that students are not as easily manipulated by instructional devices as course designers may think. (CFR)

Reports on a case study of formative evaluation of the materials and procedures used in a distance-learning French-language course. Identifies and evaluates key teaching design features of the draft audiovisual and print packages. Discusses teaching design in relation to revisions made to the course materials. (CFR)

Addresses one of three major challenges facing distance education--its claimed overreliance on behaviorist approaches to teaching and learning. Maintains that distance learning encourages students to review their own learning approaches and to be more proactive about their study methods. (CFR)

Maintains that open and distance education represents contemporary education forms that respond to the shift to late-modernity, especially in educational technology and student-teacher relationships. Drawing on the work of Anthony Giddens, uncovers relationships among distance education, late-modernity, and the self. (CFR)

Reviews the current literature concerning prior knowledge in an attempt to clarify problems with the terminology. Identifies the three main problems: lack of definition or vagueness, nominal versus real definitions, and different names/same constructs or same name/different constructs. Includes a conceptual map of prior knowledge terminology. (MJP)

Utilizes questionnaires to examine Carugati and Mugny's assertion that social representations of intelligence are organized both by social identity and unfamiliarity. Discovers a consensus concerning representations of intelligence organized by social identity. Includes a copy of the questionnaire, breakdown of the responses, and other statistical…

Shows the effects of a tutorial program for college students using process-oriented instruction. Process-oriented instruction combines domain-specific knowledge with teaching thinking strategies. Tutorials included a diagnostic learning style instrument and learning guides. Evaluation questionnaires and exam scores both indicated improved study…

Presents the results of two studies where children were taught to identify textual cues, syntactic and semantic, in order to locate main ideas. The children also built graphic representations of these structures and were taught relevant questions to ask regarding comprehension. Results showed significant improvement, especially with older…

Describes a long-term project where middle school students were taught to visually represent key text ideas through idea-mapping techniques. Instruction was inserted in the content area curriculum along with regular textbooks and supplementary material. Positive effects were found in recall, comprehension, and learning. (MJP)