CIT Infobits - January 2005
ISSN 1521-9275
Turning Learning Over to Students
Student Perceptions in Web-Based Courses
Copyright and Learning
Will the Web Change Standards for Literature Reviews?
Technology and Postsecondary Education Access Report
Recommended Reading
Infobits Subscribers -- Where Are We in 2004?
TURNING LEARNING OVER TO STUDENTS
"A common report from anecdotal writing over many generations of educators is that it is the teacher who usually learns the most during the process of gathering content materials, designing, teaching and evaluating student performance." According to Terry Anderson and Norine Wark, in "Why Do Teachers Get to Learn the Most? A Case Study of a Course Based on Student Creation of Learning Objects" (e-JIST, vol. 7, no. 2, 2004), this can be remedied by "the creation of innovative, flexible instructional course designs aimed at creating active learning communities in which the students take on the major roles of constructing, sharing and teaching the course content." Anderson and Wark's developed an instructional design that encourages collaboration by groups of students in online classes. Their assessment of their study indicates that such a design can "reduce instructor workload, provide opportunity for students to acquire new skills while increasing their subject content knowledge, and create a lasting legacy of re-usable learning objects."
The paper is available online at http://www.usq.edu.au/electpub/e-jist/docs/Vol7_no2/FullPapers/WhyDoTeachers.htm.
e-Journal of Instructional Science and Technology (e-JIST) is a
peer-reviewed electronic journal published by the Distance and
e-Learning Centre, University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba,
Queensland 4350, Australia; Web: http://www.usq.edu.au/dec/.
Current and back issues of e-JIST are available at no cost at
http://www.usq.edu.au/electpub/e-jist/.
STUDENT PERCEPTIONS IN WEB-BASED COURSES
In "Measuring Student Perceptions in Web-Based Courses: A Standards-Based Approach" (Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, vol. VII, no. IV, Winter 2004), authors Joe Jurczyk, Susan N. Kushner Benson, and John R. Savery present a "method that instructors and administrators can use to measure student perceptions in a distance learning environment using a set of standards from the Institute of Higher Education Policy (IHEP)." Using their experience with a graduate course in social science research methods, the authors illustrate how to apply their assessment method. Their paper is available online at http://www.westga.edu/%7Edistance/ojdla/winter74/jurczyk74.htm.
The Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration is a free, peer-reviewed quarterly published by the Distance and Distributed Education Center, The State University of West Georgia, 1600 Maple Street, Carrollton, GA 30118 USA; Web: http://www.westga.edu/~distance/jmain11.html.
The IHEP standards were designed to establish best practices benchmarks for higher education distance learning courses. The benchmarks are organized into the following categories: institutional support, course development, teaching and learning process, course structure, student support, faculty support, and evaluation and assessment.
IHEP's mission is "to foster access and success in postsecondary education through public policy research and other activities that inform and influence the policymaking process." For more information about IHEP, go to http://www.ihep.com/.
"Like evil trolls guarding the gates, the copyright controllers are trying to hold sway over our actions and create walled gardens around knowledge repositories so that they can maintain full control over who uses applications or accesses content and when, where, and how they use it."
In "Stealing the Goose: Copyright and Learning" (IRRODL, November 2004) Rory McGreal calls for taking back education's "fair use" and "fair dealing" rights that are in jeopardy as some intellectual property owners seek to tighten control and maximize profits. The article is available online at http://www.irrodl.org/content/v5.3/mcgreal.html.
International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning (IRRODL) [ISSN 1492-3831] is a free, refereed ejournal published by Athabasca University - Canada's Open University. For more information, contact Paula Smith, IRRODL Managing Editor; tel: 780-675-6810; fax: 780-675-672; email: irrodl@athabascau.ca; Web: http://www.irrodl.org/.
WILL THE WEB CHANGE STANDARDS FOR LITERATURE REVIEWS?
In the twentieth century, many scholars saw such explosive growth of publication in their disciplines. To maintain even a semblance of keeping up, scholars became more selective in their reading, often concentrating on only a narrow field of interest. Now that more and more journals are available on the Web [as evidenced by postings in such services as NewJour] we see another growth spurt with scholars having access to publications ostensibly outside their fields, but nonetheless relevant to their interests. In "Digital Libraries and Multi-Disciplinary Research Skills" (LIBRES, vol. 14, issue 2, September 2004) Mike Thelwall discusses the current situation and outlines how digital libraries are changing literature reviewing. He calls for better searching skills to get the best results from literature searches: ". . . the most effective researchers of the future will have a different skill set than those of today. Perhaps there is an advantage to be gained by the scholars who recognise this first and particularly for universities that incorporate training on how to critically evaluate research from a wide range of fields into their doctoral research methods courses." The article is available online at http://libres.curtin.edu.au/libres14n2/index.htm.
LIBRES (Library and Information Science Research) [ISSN 1058-6768] is
published by the Department of Media and Information, Curtin University
of Technology, Perth, Western Australia. Current and back issues are
available at http://libres.curtin.edu.au/index.htm.
LIBRES is an international refereed electronic journal devoted to new
research in Library and Information Science. Libres is distributed
through a listserver and an FTP site. Listserver subscribers are
notified of new issues through the distribution of a table of contents
to LIBRES, LIBREF-L, and any other e-conferences requesting the
service.
NewJour, the New Journal and Newsletter Announcement List for new serials on the Internet announces newly planned, newly issued, or revised electronic networked journals or newsletters and announces the availability of paper journals and newsletters as they become available on electronic networks. NewJour is produced by Ann Shumelda Okerson (Yale University) and James J. O'Donnell (Georgetown University). Operations are managed from the Lauinger Library of Georgetown University and the archive is provided courtesy of the University of California at San Diego Libraries.
To search the NewJour archive or to receive NewJour announcements, go to http://gort.ucsd.edu/newjour/.
TECHNOLOGY AND POSTSECONDARY EDUCATION ACCESS REPORT
"How Does Technology Affect Access in Postsecondary Education? What Do We Really Know?" reports on a National Postsecondary Education Cooperative research designed to "examine the relationship between technology and access to postsecondary education. The resulting study identified four basic themes: technology and access to postsecondary education in general; access to technology-based learning; preparation for using technology; and the effectiveness of technology in learning." Some of the study's findings include:
-- "Technology is opening up new markets of potential students without significantly diminishing the number of students who would enroll in traditional colleges and universities."
-- "Internet-based distance education appears to be evolving its own pedagogy with the introduction of more audio and video and broadband access. Online courses have characteristics that are unique to the technology, which allows the exploration of new and richer pedagogical models."
-- "In spite of the considerable number of computers available to teachers in elementary and secondary schools, some analysts assert that since teachers are not trained to use technology or given opportunities to develop creative uses for technology, computers are merely used as glorified typewriters."
The report is available online at http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2004831.
The National Postsecondary Education Cooperative (NPEC) is a voluntary partnership of postsecondary institutions, associations, government agencies, and organizations. NPEC receives funding from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), U.S. Department of Education. For more information go to http://nces.ed.gov/npec/.
"Recommended Reading" lists items that have been recommended to me or that Infobits readers have found particularly interesting and/or useful, including books, articles, and websites published by Infobits subscribers. Send your recommendations to kotlas@email.unc.edu for possible inclusion in this column.
Infobits subscriber Arun-Kumar Tripathi (tripathi@amadeus.statistik.uni-dortmund.de) recommends his article in a recent issue of Ubiquity:
"Technologically Mediated Lifeworld"
Ubiquity: An ACM IT Magazine and Forum, vol. 5, issue 41, December
23-31, 2004
http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/views/v5i41_tripathy.html
"As humanity and its technologies have progressed, they have also become more intertwined -- until the contemporary notion of self extends far beyond bone and sinew, into outer space and cyberspace. Technology has become an essential part of who we take ourselves to be, influencing our beliefs and desires, our plans and goals, our visions of what we are, have been, and might yet become."
INFOBITS SUBSCRIBERS -- WHERE ARE WE IN 2004?
Each January issue of Infobits includes an annual subscriber tally listing the countries represented by our subscribers. As of January 12, 2005, there were 7,255 subscribers. Here are some brief statistics about our current subscribers.
The majority of the subscribers we could identify by country are in the United States (3,660) and other English-speaking countries: Canada (443), Australia (259), and the United Kingdom (171).
Each of the following countries has between eleven and sixty subscribers: Belgium, Brazil, Colombia, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, and Sweden.
Each of the following countries has 10 or fewer subscribers: Afghanistan, American Samoa, Argentina, Austria, Bolivia, Brunei, Cayman Islands, Chile, China, Cuba, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, Estonia, Fiji, Finland, France, Gabon, Greece, Hrvatska (Croatia), Hungary, Iceland, Indonesia, Ireland, Korea, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Micronesia, Mongolia, Morocco, Namibia, Norway, Pakistan, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Trinidad, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Yugoslavia.
In addition to subscribers whom we can positively identify by a geographic location, 1,712 subscribers are from commercial sites, 201 subscribers are from .org sites, 654 are from .net sites and 59 are from the U.S. government.
Many thanks to all the subscribers for your support in 2004!
