Group items tagged

showcases Idée's ground-breaking visual search technologies.

WorldImages provides access to the California State University IMAGE Project. It contains over 60,000 images, is global in coverage and includes all areas of visual imagery. WorldImages is accessible anywhere and its images may be freely used for non-profit educational purposes. The images can be located using many search techniques, and for convenience they are organized into some 600 portfolios which are then organized into subject groupings. NOTE: Conditions of Use: You are free to use these images for non-profit educational purposes, but we ask that you give credit to the copyright holders who retain rights to the images. These works are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

British Journal of Educational Technology Vol 37 No 5 2006 761-783 doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2006.00560.x Blackwell Publishing Ltd.Oxford, UKBJETBritish Journal of Educational Technology0007-1013British Educational Communications and Technology Agency, 20052005375761783Articles Developing a comprehensive metric British Journal of Educational Technology Developing a comprehensive metric for assessing discussion board effectiveness Robin H. Kay Assistant Professor, Faculty of Education, University of Ontario Institute of Technology, Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. Email: Robin.Kay@uoit.ca Abstract The use of online discussion boards has grown extensively in the past 5 years, yet some researchers argue that our understanding of how to use this tool in an effective and meaningful way is minimal at best. Part of the problem in acquiring more cohesive and useful information rests in the absence of a comprehensive, theory-driven metric to assess quality and effectiveness. Based on an extensive review of the research, the following variables were used to assess traditional discussion board use: thread, location of message within thread, author (student vs. educator), subject line clarity, time of posting, response time from previous message, number of times message was read, number of words, primary purpose, message quality, difficulty level of topic, knowledge level, processing level and use of external resources. These variables proved to be effective in assessing 12 key areas of discussion board use. It is argued that this kind of metric is essential if we wish to advance our understanding of online discussion boards for both educators and researchers. Overview The use of online discussion boards has grown extensively in the past 5 years (Cooper, 2001). While this tool is viewed as revolutionary by some researchers (Hara, Bonk & Angeli, 1998; Li, 2003), others argue that our understanding of how to use online discussion in an effective and meaningful way is limited (Blignaut &

My Wordle for online Teaching module Robin Kay's Abstract 'Developing a comprehensive metric for assessing discussion board effectiveness'