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20 février 2013 - « Flipped classrooms, blended learning, social media applications, distance learning. A survey of current best practices and future applications for online learning tools and programs will be at the heart of an upcoming conference. The e-Scape conference will be held April 3, 4 and 5 in various locations of the Sir George Williams Campus. »

« A study of university students found that those who brought drinks, especially water, with them as they sat their exams performed up to 10 per cent better than those who did not. »

23 avril 2012 - « New technologies in schools, such as web-based applications that demonstrate scientific concepts, have sparked expectations that they will revolutionise learning. Karlsson's thesis shows that there is no evidence that supports the assumption that instructional technologies in themselves can improve students' understanding of a scientific concept. On the contrary, according to the study, there is a risk that the students - if they are left alone to make their interpretations - may not reach the learning targets. »

« While much about being a university professor has remained unchanged for centuries, the way today's academics research, teach and fulfil administrative duties has changed dramatically, as a result of technological change and a cultural shift in what the public expects of academia. » "

« This paper reports on the use of action research in a case study involving two iterations of an online workshop implemented at two universities in late 2007 and early 2009 to prepare teaching staff for using wikis for student group work and assessment. »

«The purpose of this study was to assess the self-efficacy of nursing faculty and students related to their potential use of mobile technology and to ask what implications this technology has for their teaching and learning in practice education contexts. We used a cross-sectional survey design involving students and faculty in two nursing education programs in a western Canadian college. In January, 2011, 121 faculty members and students completed the survey. Results showed a high level of ownership and use of mobile devices among our respondents. The median mobile self-efficacy score was 75 on a scale of 100, indicating that both faculty and students were highly confident in their use of mobile technologies and prepared to engage in mobile learning.»

«Interaction is crucial to student satisfaction in online courses. Adding synchronous components (virtual classroom technologies) to online courses can facilitate interaction. In this study, interaction within a synchronous virtual classroom was investigated by surveying 21 graduate students in an instructional technology program in the southeastern United States. The students were asked about learner-learner, learner-instructor, learner-content, and learner-interface interactions. During an interview, the instructor was asked about strategies to promote these different forms of interaction. In addition, the academic, social, and technical aspects of interactions were examined in three course archives using Schullo's (2005) schema. Participants reported that the Wimba interface was easy to use and that various features, such as text chat and the webcam, facilitated interaction among the students and with the instructor in the virtual classroom. The importance of students' ability to receive immediate feedback and their experience as presenters was highlighted across the various kinds of interaction. The instructor's teaching style and visual presence were instrumental in engaging students with the content. The results suggest that student interaction, and hence learning, was aided by the live communication that occurred through the virtual classroom. This study has implications for those who are considering adopting virtual classroom technologies for their online or blended teaching.»

«The June-July issue of The Teaching Professor newsletter highlights a study in which MBA students were given weighting choices and doing so increased their interest in the course and in taking subsequent courses, as compared with MBA students not given a choice. It would seem sensible to assume that "interest" in a course means more time devoted to study and that should result in more learning. However, in this particular study, the grades of students with choice about assignment weights were virtually identical to the grades of those students without the choice. »

«With the growth of online courses and programs in higher education, considerable concerns emerge about student feelings of isolation and disconnectedness in the online learning environment. A research study was conducted to develop and validate an instrument that can be used to measure perceptions of connectedness of students enrolled in online programs or certification programs in higher education. The instrument consists of 25 items and has four scales: (a) community, (b) comfort, (c) facilitation, and (d) interaction and collaboration. One hundred and forty-six online learners who were enrolled in courses at a Turkish university completed the online questionnaire. Results of a factor and reliability analysis confirmed that the instrument is a valid and reliable measure of students' perceived connectedness in an online certificate program.»

«E-learning has become an increasingly important teaching and learning mode in educational institutions and corporate training. The evaluation of e-learning, however, is essential for the quality assurance of e-learning courses. This paper constructs a four-phase evaluation model for e-learning courses, which includes planning, development, process, and product evaluation, called the PDPP evaluation model. Planning evaluation includes market demand, feasibility, target student group, course objectives, and finance. Development evaluation includes instructional design, course material design, course Web site design, flexibility, student-student interaction, teacher/tutor support, technical support, and assessment. Process evaluation includes technical support, Web site utilization, learning interaction, learning evaluation, learning support, and flexibility. Product evaluation includes student satisfaction, teaching effectiveness, learning effectiveness, and sustainability. Using the PDPP model as a research framework, a purely e-learning course on Research Methods in Distance Education, developed by the School of Professional and Continuing Education at the University of Hong Kong (HKU SPACE) and jointly offered with the School of Distance Learning for Medical Education of Peking University (SDLME, PKU) was used as a case study.»

«Geoscience assistant professor Anne Egger took a class as an undergraduate at Yale University that examined how pure science connects to society. Not only did the class draw her in more dramatically than other classes had, it helped determine how she would engage future generations of students. [...] A course module she created, entitled Seismicity and Relative Risk, introduces students to real scientific data from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and asks them to consider questions in which they have personal interest. Because of its effectiveness at bringing students into the world of real science and leading them to formulate questions stemming from their own curiosity, Egger's module has won the Science Prize for Inquiry-Based Instruction (IBI).

«Arizona State University, in coordination with Leuphana University in Germany, has launched an educational pilot project which will lay the groundwork for an intensive institutional collaboration in undergraduate education. Funded by a $900,000 award from the Mercator Foundation, the ASU-Leuphana program will focus on the topic "Sustainable Cities: Contradiction of Terms?" The program will utilize virtual conferencing using the technology of Vidyo, a revolutionary video conferencing platform, intensive writing assignments and student writing workshops, online exhibits, peer-to-peer mentoring, and in-person international exchange. This "global classroom" model tests traditional teacher-student roles, advances new, blended approaches to curriculum and teaching, and redefines the rules tying interdisciplinary liberal arts and sciences education to "place."»

«Faculty members are far less excited by, and more fearful of, the recent growth of online education than are academic technology administrators, according to a new study by Inside Higher Ed and the Babson Survey Research Group. But professors are hardly the luddites many still assume them to be. Nearly half of the 4,564 faculty members surveyed, three-quarters of whom are full-time professors, said the rise of online education excites them more than it frightens them.»

«It doesn't seem surprising that someone who can set goals, visualize paths to achieve them, and summon the motivation to start down those paths would be more likely to succeed than someone who can't do those things. But measuring the potential effect of those characteristics - which together compose the characteristic of "hope" - is starting to become more clear. A growing (but still small) body of research is finding that students with high levels of hope get better grades and graduate at higher rates than those with lower levels, and that the presence of hope in a student is a better predictor of grades and class ranking than standardized test scores.

« This paper analyses the role of "disruptive" innovative technologies in higher education. In this country and elsewhere, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) have invested significant sums in learning technologies, with Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) being more or less universal, but these technologies have not been universally adopted and used by students and staff. Instead, other technologies not owned or controlled by HEIs are widely used to support learning and teaching. According to Christensen's theory of Disruptive Innovation, these disruptive technologies are not designed explicitly to support learning and teaching in higher education, but have educational potential. »

« In this article, we discuss the impact of reinvigorating two courses where the use of Mobile Web 2.0 (MW2.0) tools was embedded within the learning process with an aim of enabling learner-generated content and context. Students and staff in this collaborative project, from two different courses, were equipped with iPhone 4s and iPad 2s for the duration of the course »

« Reducing school failure pays off for both society and individuals. It can also contribute to economic growth and social development. Indeed the highest performing education systems across OECD countries are those that combine quality with equity. »

«Universities should be at the cutting edge. They should develop their capacity for anticipation so that they are able to respond to the trust placed in them by society, acting as a compass that guides society's progress and wellbeing. Universities should have a long-term vision, nurture innovation and foster creativity. Universities of this type do not need to pause to institute reform, nor do they need a new academic leader, because reform and innovation come naturally to them.»

« To achieve the goal of having and making the best use of a highquality pool of skills, the Strategy suggests that a country must consider three policy levers: those that improve the quality and quantity of skills; those that activate the skills for the labour market; and those that ensure that skills are used effectively on the job. »