Innovate
Innovate, Journal of Online Education. Innovate is a bimonthly, peer-reviewed online periodical (ISSN 1552-3233) published by the Fischler School of Education and Human Services at Nova Southeastern University. The journal focuses on the creative use of information technology (IT) to enhance educational processes in academic, commercial, and government settings.
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- Online Teaching and Classroom Change: The Trans-Classroom Teacher in the Age of the Internet (Volume 4, Issue 3, February/March 2008)
Online and face-to-face courses are often viewed and studied as two distinct worlds, but the social field of the teacher who teaches them may well include both, and both the teacher and the courses he or she teaches may be transformed by the movement from one environment to the other. Susan Lowes explores this two-way interaction between face-to-face and online teaching, addressing two important questions: Do teachers who move between face-to-face and online classrooms transfer ideas, strategies, and practices from one to the other? If so, which strategies and practices do they transfer? Particularly, Lowes focuses on the constraints and affordances of the online environment itself and how these affect face-to-face classroom practice. - Let Me Learn with My Peers Online!: Foreign Language Learning Through Reciprocal Peer Tutoring (Volume 4, Issue 3, February/March 2008)
Rayenne Dekhinet, Keith Topping, David Duran, and Silvia Blanch describe a pilot project on the use of Internet-assisted reciprocal peer tutoring in foreign-language learning. The eight-week project connected Spanish-speaking English-language learners at a primary school in Catalonia with English-speaking Spanish-language learners at a Scottish primary school. Children were matched in pairs and acted as language tutors in their own mother tongue to their peers. Each week, the children wrote or corrected a text, depending on their role for that week, and sent messages to their peers. During and after the intervention, data were collected in the form of observations, participant and teacher interviews, and analysis of student writing in the target languages. The results of this study show how Internet technology can be leveraged with reciprocal peer tutoring to enhance language learning. - Learning at a Distance: Engaged or Not? (Volume 4, Issue 3, February/March 2008)
In this study, Pu-Shih Chen, Robert Gonyea, and George Kuh compare the engagement of distance learners in educationally effective activities with that of their campus-based counterparts and compare the engagement of older distance learners relative to younger online students. Although distance learning is the fastest growing segment of postsecondary education, questions remain about the quality of distance education; a key unresolved issue is the degree to which online learners are engaged in effective educational practices. These results indicate that distance learners are generally as engaged and often more engaged than other students in most educational practices, with the exception of active and collaborative learning activities. Older distance learners report greater gains and are more likely to use higher-order mental processes (e.g., analysis and synthesis) than younger distance learners. Chen, Gonyea, and Kuh discuss the implications of these results for colleges and universities and indicate directions for future work. - When the Medium Illustrates the Content: Exploiting the Unique Features of Online Communication (Volume 4, Issue 3, February/March 2008)
Julie Foertsch and Morton Ann Gernsbacher present the results of an evaluation of an online undergraduate course in psychology that adheres to the seven widely accepted principles of effective online teaching and suggests an eighth principle: using the unique benefits and constraints of online communication to prompt critical thinking about various facets of human communication, psychology, sociology, or human-computer interface design. Formative evaluation of this new course, carried out by Foertsch over three semesters, showed that it benefited from an illuminating association between its content--the cognitive and social experiences of people with autism--and its online delivery method, in which students communicated with each other and the professor in asynchronous and synchronous forums that removed the nonverbal social cues present in face-to-face communication. By applying the seven principles to the design of this course, Gernsbacher created a learning environment that 87% of 105 upper-division students rated as "extremely" or "very" useful in developing their critical thinking skills and a course that a number of students described as one of the best they had ever taken. - V-Learning: How Gaming and Avatars are Engaging Online Students (Volume 4, Issue 3, February/March 2008)
Len Annetta, Marta Klesath, and Shawn Holmes describe how avatars in virtual learning environments (VLEs) can contribute to the learning experience by giving students a sense of social presence and investment in the learning community that may otherwise be difficult to access. VLEs have the potential to become the next generation of instructional tools for online learning. By allowing students to simulate the campus experience online, VLEs offer rich, flexible class environments without compromising their reach to diverse students desiring online courses. Describing studies carried out in the WolfDen VLE, Annetta, Klesath, and Holmes examine how gaming and avatars are engaging online students and the role personality may play in a student's selection of an avatars. - Experiential Work-Integrated Online Learning: Insights from an Established UK Higher Education Program (Volume 4, Issue 3, February/March 2008)
Lydia Arnold explores how work-based learners can embrace technology-enabled ways of learning. The case study of the BA (Honours) Learning Technology Research (BA LTR) program at Anglia Ruskin University, United Kingdom , shows how a unique learning blend that combines online social learning, work-based learning, inquiry-led learning, and high degrees of personalization can be used to enable and empower learners. Additionally, Arnold illustrates the unique characteristics of the BA LTR program and the role that these play in enabling work-based learners to participate fully in learning. The article explores the role of the work-based context as both a source of motivation and an authentic learning environment for BA LTR learners. - Perspective on Certainty-Based Marking: An Interview with Tony Gardner-Medwin (Volume 4, Issue 3, February/March 2008)
In this edition of Perspectives, Reid Cornwell discusses certainty-based marking (CBM) with Tony Gardner-Medwin, professor emeritus of physiology at University College London (UCL), which adopted a simple, theoretically sound version of CBM in its medical education program. CBM has been shown to encourage thinking, reflection, improved analysis, and synthesis and to improve both the reliability and validity of students' exam data in measuring partial knowledge. However, CBM has been adopted in very few places and is sometimes regarded with skepticism. The UCL initiative has used computer technology to produce empirically convincing results. A comparison of CBM scores with conventional (correct/incorrect) scores revealed marked improvements in standard measurements of reliability. Gardner-Medwin describes the CBM system used by UCL and its philosophical, methodological, and pedagogical underpinnings, as well as the qualitative and quantitative advantages of CBM more generally. - Next-Generation Bibliographic Manager : An Interview with Trevor Owens (Volume 4, Issue 2, December 2007/January 2008)
James Morrison's interview with Trevor Owens explores Zotero, a free, open-source bibliographic tool that works as a Firefox plug-in. Previous bibliographic software, such as EndNote or Refworks, worked either online or offline to collect references and citations. Zotero leverages the power of the browser to allow users to work either online or offline and integrates citations with other research materials in a way that promises to reshape the way research is done. Zotero 2.0, due out in early 2008, will expand the potential of Zotero by providing server-side functions that allow for the sharing of bibliographies and accompanying annotations. - Collecting, Organizing, and Managing Resources for Teaching Educational Games the Wiki Way (Volume 4, Issue 2, December 2007/January 2008)
Recognizing the pedagogical value of gaming, academics along with game designers and educational content developers have begun producing resources to improve educational game design and make instructional games more accessible to teachers wanting to incorporate them into their classes. However, the rapid growth of such resources has made it difficult for educators and other interested parties to find what they need. As a first step towards addressing this problem, Shelley Henson Johnson, Brett Shelton, and David Wiley discuss the creation and proposed expansion of the Teaching Educational Games Resources wiki. They first created the wiki as part of a session at the Games, Learning and Society 2006 conference. Panelists and participants contributed to the wiki before, during, and after the conference session, creating an online space that incorporates syllabi and readings for educational game design, lists hundreds of online resources, and includes links to conferences and multimedia resources. After outlining the creation of the wiki, the authors suggest that its incorporation into an online self-organizing social system could facilitate its growth and the emergence of an online community of game designers, researchers, and educators interested in educational gaming. - A Model for Enhancing Online Course Development (Volume 4, Issue 2, December 2007/January 2008)
In order to meet the growing demand for quality online education, Park University has adopted a model that provides a common framework for all of its online courses. Evelyn Knowles and Kathleen Kalata discuss the circumstances leading to the current system and describe the university's implementation of a course development process that ensures quality and consistency in both content and instructional design. In this model, academic departments select which courses they want to have developed into online courses and the subject matter expert who will act as course developer. The course developer works with an instructional designer to create the online course. The course development process is described in detail, from initiating the contract through consultation with the instructional designer to quality standards review. - The Fusion of Learning Theory and Technology in an Online Music History Course Redesign (Volume 4, Issue 2, December 2007/January 2008)
Teaching today's students requires an integration of learner-centered pedagogy with innovative technological resources. In this article, Blase Scarnati and Paula Garcia describe the redesign of a junior-level music history course guided by learner-centered principles and driven by a fusion of stimulating technology-based learning tools and experiential teaching methodology. The redesign responded to learners by engaging the study of jazz in reverse chronological order, allowing students to begin by studying music they are likely to know, and perhaps enjoy, already and by incorporating activities that require student involvement in their own learning and multiple opportunities for interaction. Technological resources included a large collection of audio and video materials, interactive instructional games, and rigorous online discussions. This unique course redesign was developed through a partnership between faculty members and graphic and technical staff employed by the university to support online course development. Student survey results indicated that most students appreciated the innovations and reported deepened learning and understanding of course content. This paper describes the context of the redesign, the learner-centered methodology that guided it, the technical assistance that made it possible, and student perceptions of the changes. - Fair Use Education for the Twenty-First Century: A Comparative Study of Students' Use of an Interactive Tool to Guide Decision Making (Volume 4, Issue 2, December 2007/January 2008)
Christine Greenhow, J. D. Walker, Dan Donnelly, and Brad Cohen describe the implementation and evaluation of the University of Minnesota's Fair Use Analysis (FUA) tool, an interactive online application intended to educate users and foster defensible fair use practice in accordance with copyright law by guiding users through a robust, fact-specific, four-factor analysis. After examining the FUA tool's ability to improve both student understanding of the four factors involved in fair use analysis and the quality of student reasoning with those factors, Greenhow, Walker, Donnelly, and Cohen suggest that students still find certain aspects of fair use law particularly difficult to comprehend and offer recommendations for educators and administrators seeking to design or disseminate similar tools to promote informed instructional practices. - The Loophole Generation (Volume 4, Issue 2, December 2007/January 2008)
Increasingly, faculty members who teach online are encountering students who prefer to find loopholes rather than complete their coursework. In this article, Jennifer Summerville and John Fischetti explore four common personality types among loophole-seeking online students and provide suggestions for dealing with the various issues that arise in the classroom and online. - Perspectives on Communicating with the Net Generation (Volume 4, Issue 2, December 2007/January 2008)
Lynn Zimmerman and Anastasia Trekles Milligan examine technological communication from the perspectives of two instructors, one a digital immigrant and the other a digital native. Today's students are digital natives, reared in a world permeated by interactive technology; as a result, they are used to a model of communication that is significantly different from that of digital immigrants, who came to e-mail, blogs, wikis, and other interactive media as adults. As a result, college instructors are sometimes taken aback by communication styles that are appropriate to their students' uses of these technologies but may seem unconventional, overly informal, and even rude to those educated in a more formal mode of communication. There is frequently a decided disconnect between educators' perceptions of appropriate communication practices and their students' ideas about or awareness of these issues. Zimmerman's and Milligan's separate reflections on these issues culminate in advice for instructors to facilitate communication across the divide. - The Rice University Press Initiative: An Interview with Charles Henry (Volume 4, Issue 1, October/November 2007)
In this interview Charles Henry, publisher of the Rice University Press (RUP), discusses RUP's rebirth as a fully digital university press. Henry addresses the circumstances that led to this decision, and he further outlines the RUP business model whereby the press will publish its own titles--both digitally and in print-on-demand--while collaborating with other presses to publish works that would otherwise have been deemed too expensive to print. Henry proposes that the digitization of academic publishing will provide more cost-effective ways of disseminating valuable scholarship while simultaneously opening vital new venues for academic writers to reach readers. In describing Connexions, RUP's open-source technological platform, Henry also explains how other presses may adopt this technology if they are willing to allow free and open access to their titles under a Creative Commons license. After commenting on the need for universities to abandon the privileging of print media, Henry discusses the response the RUP initiative has received in the academic community, and he provides further information on upcoming developments at the press.
