In contrast with traditional academic disciplines, online educators do not have a generally accepted list of scholarly journals, which is in part a result of the multidisciplinary nature of the field, the relative infancy of online learning, and the view of online pedagogy as an instructional modality rather than a discrete academic discipline.…

This paper presents a case study of a blended programme for adults and discusses findings from a mixed-methods investigative study of learners' and tutors' experiences of the programme. The programme employs a set of flexible online resources, which are activity-based and designed to provide choice in study routes and modes of learning. Our…

This paper describes an online image analysis tool developed as part of an iterative, user-centered development of an online Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) called the Education through Virtual Experience (EVE) Portal. The VLE provides a Web portal through which schoolchildren and their teachers create scientific proposals, retrieve images and…

In this paper we examine the transferability of the Jigsaw and Fishbowl collaborative learning techniques to the Second Life platform. Our aim is to assess the applicability of Second Life for collaborative learning by developing virtual tools and metaphors and exploiting the representational richness of this novel medium. In order to enhance the…

In this paper, we review past empirical research studies on the use of three-dimensional immersive virtual worlds in education settings such as K-12 and higher education. Three questions guided our review: (1) How are virtual worlds (eg, "Active Worlds", "Second Life") used by students and teachers? (2) What types of research methods have been…

Schools and school systems throughout the nation are increasingly experimenting with using various instructional technologies to improve productivity and decrease costs, but evidence on both the effectiveness and the costs of education technology is limited. A recent report published by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute sets out to describe "the…

Teachers' influence on students' learning motivation is a well-researched topic. Nevertheless, the majority of such studies are situated in the conventional learning context despite the rapid growth of distance language learning. This study set out to investigate tutors' influence on students' learning motivation in the Chinese distance language…

This study investigated the relationship between the use of a three-dimensional Virtual Reality Learning Environment for Field Trip (3DVLE[subscript (ft)]) system and the achievement levels of senior high school earth science students. The 3DVLE[subscript (ft)] system was presented in two separate formats: Teacher Demonstrated Based and Student…

Many have argued that interactive 3D virtual environments have great educational potential due to their ability to engage learners in the exploration, construction and manipulation of virtual objects, structures and metaphorical representations of ideas. Although learning benefits have been demonstrated in research settings, and substantial usage…

Current technology enables schools to provide remote or virtual computing labs that can be implemented in multiple ways ranging from remote access to banks of dedicated workstations to sophisticated access to large-scale servers hosting virtualized workstations. This paper reports on the implementation of a specific lab using remote access to…

This article explores the potential learning benefits of three-dimensional (3-D) virtual learning environments (VLEs). Drawing on published research spanning two decades, it identifies a set of unique characteristics of 3-D VLEs, which includes aspects of their representational fidelity and aspects of the learner-computer interactivity they…

Technologically-mediated learning environments are an increasingly common component of university experience. In this paper, the authors consider how the interrelated domains of policy contexts, new learning cultures and the consumption of information and communication technologies might be explored using the concept of technography. Understood…

With the increased interest in using Immersive Virtual Worlds (IVWs) such as Second Life to augment and amplify teaching or to develop communities of practice, the author engaged graduate students, all current K-12 teachers, in a qualitative study to examine their attitudes about communicating for the first time in a virtual setting represented by…

Universidade Aberta (UAb), being a distance teaching university, is particularly suited to tackle some of the recommendations concerning the assurance of accessibility to education expressed in the "Education and Training 2010" goals. Meanwhile, the University's strategic plan for 2006/2010 decided to implement a fully virtual innovative…

Virtual communities of practice (VCoP) have been advocated for some time as a promising means of taking professional development to teachers in widely distributed locations. However, geography, and indeed education literature as a whole, contains very few examples where this has been achieved. This paper reports on two VCoP professional…