This study investigated how middle school students' comprehension was impacted by reading social studies texts online with a pop-up dictionary function for every word in the text. A quantitative counterbalance design was used to determine how 129 middle school students' reading comprehension test scores for the pop-up dictionary reading differed…

This article reports research from an innovative university-secondary school partnership, the Web Pen Pals Project, which pairs preservice English teachers in online chat rooms with local middle school students to talk about young adult literature. The analyses reported here center on the type of dialogue that results during such online…

This paper reports a three-year study of Praxis Inquiry based developments in teacher education undertaken by an international consortium of university colleagues who have worked in Australia, Iceland, Latvia, and the United Kingdom. Our study suggests that the attainment of inclusive community responsive pedagogies--in schools and in teacher…

The turbulent business environment requires business expertise from ever-larger personnel groups. The required business know-how is a combination of knowledge and several different skills, and it should provide the learners with an overall view of the functioning of a business organization as a whole. Moreover, while work is increasingly becoming…

Despite the growing popularity of robotics competitions such as FIRST LEGO League, robotics activities are typically not found in regular K-12 classrooms. We speculate that, among other reasons, limited adoption is due to the lack of empirical evidence demonstrating the effect of robotics activities on curricular goals. This paper presents a mixed…

The purpose of this paper is to report the results of a comparative and descriptive study that examined the relationship and effects of incorporating students' learning styles in the design of instruction and the outcome of students' learning, including their attitude and satisfaction. The paper will first explain how the literature on learning…

Although computers are now commonplace within our lives, integration within schools is much less ordinary. While access and training are no longer considered significant barriers, attention has turned to the potential influence of teachers' beliefs. In response, problem-based learning (PBL) has been proposed as an effective approach for changing…

This paper uses the framework of distributed cognition to discuss benefits and constraints of technology adoption and use in social-constructive language learning scenarios. The purposes of this paper are (a) to describe how the open-ended knowledge construction and communication tools TEE (The Electronic Exercise) and EF-editor (Exercise Format…

In this study, we discuss the scaffolded design of ODRES (Observe, Discuss, and Reason with Evidence in Science), a computer tool that was designed to be used with elementary school children in science, and report on the effects of learning with ODRES on students' conceptual understandings about light, color, and vision. Succinctly, dyads of…

Virtual environments are able to extend the space of interaction beyond the classroom. In order to analyze how distributed cognition functions in such an extended space, we suggest focusing on the architecture of intersubjectivity. The Euroland project--a virtual land created and populated by seven classrooms supported by a team of…

This study investigates the process of collaborative knowledge construction when technology and pictorial knowledge representations are used for visualizing individual and groups' shared ideas. The focus of the study is on how teacher-students contribute to the group's collaborative knowledge construction and use each other's ideas and tools as an…

This study examined relationships between students' perceptions of course-related interaction and their course satisfaction within the learner-centered paradigm in distance education. A Students' Perceived Interaction Survey (SPIS) instrument was developed to examine nine separate hypotheses about the nature of course-related interaction. A…

Research suggests effective classroom ICT integration occurs through needs-based, collaborative professional development (Chandra-Handa, 2001; Cuttance, 2001; Figg, 2000; Gibson, Oberg, & Pelz, 1999; Gross, 2000; Haughey, 2002). A community of practice (CoP) (Wenger, 1998; Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder, 2002) can be an effective mode of such…

This study examined the implementation and outcomes of a laptop program initiative in a predominantly low-income, minority school. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected, analyzed, and compared with students in non-laptop classrooms within the same school. Results of the study revealed that in the hands of well prepared teachers,…

Online learning is rapidly becoming a permanent feature of higher education. In a preponderance of instances, online learning is designed using conventional educational practices: lecture, grades, group discussion, and the like. Concerns with traditional pedagogy instantiated by course management systems raise questions about the quality of…