Wikis Educativos

This article discusses course design factors affecting the success of asynchronous online learning, with a speciŽ c focus on the social development of learning communities through online discussion. It reports on an empirical investigation of correlations between 22 course design factors and student perceptions of satisfaction , learning, and interaction with instructors and classmates using data collected from 73 courses offered through the State University of New York Learning Network (SLN) in the spring 1999 semester. Data analyses revealed that three factors were signiŽ cantly related to student perceptions-clarity and consistency in course design, contact with and feedback from course instructors, and active and valued discussion. An explanation for these Ž ndings may center on the importance of creating opportunitie s for interaction in online learning environments. In this vein, preliminary Ž ndings from research on the development of community in online course discussions is presented. Drawn from content analyses of asynchronous discussions in an online graduate course in education, this research examines the ways in which course participant s use verbal immediacy indicators to support the development of online community. Findings support an equilibrium model of social presence in online discussion which suggests that as affective communications channels are reduced, discussion participant s use more verbal immediacy behaviors to support interaction among classmates. Taken together, the Ž ndings support the importance of interaction for online teaching and learning.

Though interaction is often billed as a significant component of successful online learning, empirical evidence of its importance as well as practical guidance or specific interaction techniques continue to be lacking. In response, this study utilizes both quantitative and qualitative data to investigate how instructors and students perceive the importance of online interaction and which instructional techniques enhance those interactions. Results show that instructors perceive the learner-instructor and learnerlearner interactions as key factors in high quality online programs. While online students generally perceive interaction as an effective means of learning, they vary with regard to having more interaction in online courses. Such variations seem to be associated with differences in personality or learning style. The present study also shows that instructors tend to use technologies and instructional activities that they are familiar with or have relied on in traditional classroom settings. When it comes to learning more sophisticated technologies or techniques, instructors vary significantly in their usage of new approaches.

At Release 1.0, we've been writing about social software for decades, albeit under a variety of names. It comes in lots of guises, but the underlying principle has been that software should somehow strengthen and enhance human connections rather than impede them. That could not happen broadly until now, with the achievement of three necessary preconditions: First, people feel comfortable enough with technology to focus on the people at the other end rather than on the technology. Second, enough technology is now "standards-based" to enable new capabilities like social software to be adopted within (rather than apart from) a user's existing environment of software and data. And third, at least in the US business context, almost everyone a user could want to interact with is also on the Web - a fact that both produces the critical mass of users needed for social software to deliver and contributes to the ubiquity of standards.

AJET 23(2) Sheung On Choy and Kwok Chi Ng (2007): Implementing wiki software for supplementing online learning

A collection of technologies termed social computing is driving a dramatic evolution of the Web, matching the dot-com era in growth, excitement, and investment. All of these share a high degree of community formation, user level content creation, and a variety of other characteristics. We provide an overview of social computing and identify salient characteristics. We argue that social computing holds tremendous disruptive potential in the business world and can significantly impact society, and outline possible changes in organized human action that could be brought about. Social computing can also have deleterious effects associated with it, including security issues. We suggest that social computing should be a priority for researchers and business leaders and illustrate the fundamental shifts in communication, computing, collaboration, and commerce brought about by this trend.

This paper is focused on exploring the inter-relationship between two key trends in the field of educational technologies. In the educational arena, we are increasingly witnessing a change in the view of what education is for, with a growing emphasis on the need to support young people not only to acquire knowledge and information, but to develop the resources and skills necessary to engage with social and technical change, and to continue learning throughout the rest of their lives. In the technological arena, we are witnessing the rapid proliferation of technologies which are less about 'narrowcasting' to individuals, than the creation of communities and resources in which individuals come together to learn, collaborate and build knowledge (social software). It is the intersection of these two trends which, we believe, offers significant potential for the development of new approaches to education. At the heart of agendas for change in education are a number of key themes which relate to questions of how knowledge, creativity and innovation are generated in the practices of the 'information society'. Recent commentators have argued that our relationship with knowledge is changing, from one in which knowledge is organised in strictly classified 'disciplines' and 'subjects', to a more fluid and responsive practice which allows us to organise knowledge in ways that are significant to us at different times and in different places. At the same time, we see changes in the 'spaces' of knowledge, from its emergence within discrete institutional boundaries, to its generation in virtual and cross-institutional settings. Moreover, the ways in which we engage with knowledge are increasingly characterised by 'multi-tasking', engaging with multiple and overlapping knowledge streams. There are also changes in our understanding of practices of creativity and innovation - from the idea of the isolated individual 'genius' to the concept of 'communiti

Learning effectiveness depends on a large range of parameters. Learners' activity has an important impact on long-term learning and comprehension of difficult concepts [1]. Collaboration is also an important parameter for learning efficiency. Collaboration does not work per se [2]; an appropriate Script is a capital factor for succeeding. We will describe our engagement in scripting advises based on the use of a Wiki. The creation of a hypertext is an integrative part of our collaborative script. A Wiki is a powerful tool for constructivist learning environments because it facilitates collaboration. The workshop aims to describe approaches to improve collaborative learning. We will give advice how to conduct

Role of the educator in social software initiatives in further and higher education: A conceptualisation and research agenda Shailey Minocha1,*, Andreas Schroeder2, Christoph Schneider3 Article first published online: 21 SEP 2010 DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8535.2010.01131.x © 2010 The Authors. British Journal of Educational Technology © 2010 Becta Issue

Remember when the Internet was about opening up access to information and breaking down the barriers between content creators and content consumers? Think back to when spam was just a meatlike substance. To those heady days when Timothy Leary was predicting that the PC would be the LSD of the nineties. Before the DMCA. Before eBay. Back when the Web was supposed to be a boundless Borgesian "Library of Babel" and not a global supermarket. Forget that the dotcom era ever happened-if you were an investor or working for stock options back then, maybe you already have.

This paper reports on a failed experiment to use Wiki technology to support student engagement with the subject matter of a third year undergraduate module. Using qualitative data, the findings reveal that in an educational context, social technologies such as Wiki's, are perceived differently compared with ordinary personal use and this discourages student adoption. A series of insights are then offered which help HE teachers understand the pitfalls of integrating social technologies in educational contexts.