Volume 16, Number 2, April 2015

EN:

Open Educational Resources (OER) is terminology that refers to educational resources (content and software) distributed through the Internet, free of charge and freely accessible, expanding learning opportunities for adult learners. This terminology first appeared around 2002, although its roots can be traced to the open architecture of the Internet. Until recently, OER development has focused more on quantity of contents rather than quality. In this study, we have examined the factors influencing the learning intention of adult learners in the OER context. Based on the relevant literature, we have identified a number of factors influencing a learner’s intention to use e-learning content. We have also developed a questionnaire for conducting a survey on such influencing factors. The survey results show that ease of use and relation to immediate workplace needs affect the intention of adult learners in using OER. The findings of this study can inform those developing and designing a learning environment that employs OER while also providing general guidance for developers and educators on how to design OER content.

EN:

Open Educational Resources (OER) emerged within the context of open education which is typically characterized by the sharing of knowledge and resources and the exchange of ideas. Unisa as a mega open distance learning (ODL) university has publicly communicated its intention to take part in the use and creation of OER. As global and local university research on OER is limited, this prompted an investigation to gauge the uptake of OER at Unisa, by staff, with the purpose of institutional information gathering for decision making and planning in this area. During 2014, a survey was undertaken for this reason. The survey examined knowledge of OER, Intellectual Property (IP) Rights and Licensing, participation in OER, barriers to OER and OER in the Unisa context with a view to determining the stage at which the institution is in terms of adopting and engaging with the OER initiative. The results indicated that although there is knowledge and understanding of OER, this has not been converted into active participation. It further highlighted the barriers that are prohibiting the operationalization of OER and resulted in recommendations for planning and activities in respect of OER. The constructs investigated and the results thereof might not be generalizable to other contexts, although commonalities are likely. The insights should prove useful to a variety of contexts. The paper illustrates the need for institutions, irrespective of context, to take stock of the impact of initiatives and in this case evaluate how the institution and staff mature through various phases in the uptake of OER in order to guide effective planning, decision making and implementation.

EN:

Since Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are accessible by anyone in the world at no cost, they have large enrollments that are conducive to educational research. This study examines students in the Coursera MOOC, Introductory Human Physiology. Of the 33,378 students who accessed the course, around 15,000 students responded to items on the pre-course survey about their age, educational background, proficiency in English, and plans for participating in the course. We categorized students who completed the pre-course survey into groups based on the number of exams completed and corresponding course achievement level. We used Chi-square goodness of fit tests to analyze the distribution of students’ responses on the pre-course survey and associated achievement level. Of the students who responded to the pre-course survey and passed with distinction, a larger percentage self-identified as fluent in English while a smaller percentage self-identified as beginners. Students with graduate degrees were more likely to pass the course or pass with distinction than students with only some college experience or a bachelor’s degree. Students who completed either some or all exams were more likely to self-report intention to complete all course activities than students who did not take any exams. A greater proportion of students who passed the course or passed with distinction posted two or more times on the course discussion forum. Understanding MOOC students and the characteristics that lead to their success will enable modification to courses for increased student achievement and may also inform teaching in the traditional classroom.

EN:

In the past few years, there has been an increasing interest in Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) as a new form of Technology-Enhanced Learning (TEL), in higher education and beyond. Recognizing the limitations of standalone MOOCs, blended MOOCs (bMOOCs) that aim at bringing in-class (i.e. face-to-face) interactions and online learning components together have emerged as an alternative MOOC model of teaching and learning in a higher education context. In this paper, we present the design, implementation, and evaluation details of a bMOOC course on “Teaching Methodologies” at Fayoum University, Egypt in cooperation with RWTH Aachen University, Germany, provided using the bMOOC platform L2P-bMOOC. In order to gauge the usability and effectiveness of the course, we employed an evaluation approach based on Conole’s 12 dimensions rubrics, ISONORM 9241/110-S as a general usability evaluation, and a custom effectiveness questionnaire reflecting the different MOOC stakeholder perspectives.

EN:

With continued development of related technologies, Web 2.0 has become an important site of learning innovation. In particular, social networking sites such as Facebook, which have become popular, have the potential to function as an educational tool enabling peer feedback, interaction, and learning in a social context. Preparing appropriate environments for learners with different needs is essential to learning in general and online learning in particular. Yet, in order to create such learning environments, educators must understand differences in students’ learning styles. Although some research focuses on the effects of individual differences such as age and gender on the use of social networking sites, experimental research related to students’ learning styles is still limited. This study used Kolb’s Learning Style Model to investigate differences in student learning outcomes and satisfaction using mobile Facebook for learning, according to learning style. Results showed that participants with “Assimilating” and “Diverging” learning styles performed better than those with “Accomodating” and “Converging” learning styles did and had higher self-efficacy, observational modelling and habit strength toward learning in mobile Facebook. The paper also makes suggestions for integrating mobile Facebook into class and recommendations for future research.

EN:

Mobile learning (mLearning) in the open and distance learning landscape, holds promise and provides exciting new opportunities. In order to understand and embrace these opportunities within various contexts and circumstances it is imperative to understand the essence of the phenomenon. In this regard, we first need to understand the core fundamentals of mLearning and gain insight in what mLearning entails. Using critical reflection, this paper clarifies what mLearning is by invalidating myths and misperceptions related to mLearning. Acknowledging the lessons learnt through past experience, the authors then explore the opportunities that mLearning provides. mLearning challenges and risks are discussed to assist those who are keen to embrace these opportunities, in avoiding unnecessary risks and pitfalls. The paper concludes by sharing a few thoughts on the future of mLearning. These perspectives on mLearning seek to provide an overview of what mobile learning entails, recognise the achievements of mobile learning to date, and stimulate an appetite to embrace the opportunities in open and distance learning, while minimising the potential negative effects of technological, social and pedagogical change.

EN:

A total of 2,338 students at German universities participated in a survey, which investigated media usage patterns of so-called traditional and non-traditional students (Schuetze & Wolter, 2003). The students provided information on the digital devices that they own or have access to, and on their usage of media and e-learning tools and services for their learning. A distinction was made between external, formal and internal, informal tools and services. Based on the students’ responses, a typology of media usage patterns was established by means of a latent class analysis (LCA). Four types or profiles of media usage patterns were identified. These types were labeled entertainment users, peripheral users, advanced users and instrumental users. Among non-traditional students, the proportion of instrumental users was rather high. Based on the usage patterns of traditional and non-traditional students, implications for media selection in the instructional design process are outlined in the paper.

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The popularity of online programs that educational institutions offer is continuously increasing at varying degrees, with the major demand coming from adult learners who have no opportunity to access traditional education. These adult learners have to be sufficiently ready and competent for online learning, and have their own varied expectations from the online learning process. Hence, this mixed method study is conducted to explore the participants’ readiness and expectations at the beginning and their satisfaction levels at the end of an online learning experience. An e-readiness scale and an e-satisfaction scale was administered as quantitative measures, with open-ended questions gathering qualitative data. Participants of the research were registered to different e-learning programs at Ankara University Distance Education Center, Turkey, during the 2013-2014 academic year. Analysis of both quantitative and qualitative data revealed facts about online learners, which should prove useful to both e-instructors and e-program administrators.

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This study offers a new method to measure navigation disorientation in web based systems which is powerful learning medium for distance and open education. The Needleman-Wunsch algorithm is used to measure disorientation in a more precise manner. The process combines theoretical and applied knowledge from two previously distinct research areas, disorientation and string-matching. String-matching algorithms provide a more convenient disorientation measurement than other techniques, in that they examine the similarity between an optimal path and learners’ navigation paths. The algorithm particularly takes into account the contextual similarity between partly relevant web-pages in a user’s navigation path and pages in an optimal path. This study focuses on the reasons and the required steps to use this algorithm for disorientation measurement. Examples of actual student activities and learning environment data are provided to illustrate the process.

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The aim of this study is to examine validity and reliability of Community of Inquiry Scale commonly used in online learning by the means of Item Response Theory. For this purpose, Community of Inquiry Scale version 14 is applied on 1,499 students of a distance education center’s online learning programs at a Turkish state university via internet. The collected data is analyzed by using a statistical software package. Research data is analyzed in three aspects, which are checking model assumptions, checking model-data fit and item analysis. Item and test features of the scale are examined by the means of Graded Response Theory. In order to use this model of IRT, after testing the assumptions out of the data gathered from 1,499 participants, data model compliance was examined. Following the affirmative results gathered from the examinations, all data is analyzed by using GRM. As a result of the study, the Community of Inquiry Scale adapted to Turkish by Horzum (in press) is found to be reliable and valid by the means of Classical Test Theory and Item Response Theory.

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Perceived usability affects greatly student’s learning effectiveness and overall learning experience, and thus is an important requirement of educational software. The System Usability Scale (SUS) is a well-researched and widely used questionnaire for perceived usability evaluation. However, surprisingly few studies have used SUS to evaluate the perceived usability of learning management systems (LMSs). This paper presents an empirical evaluation of the SUS questionnaire in the context of LMSs’ perceived usability evaluation. Eleven studies involving 769 students were conducted, in which participants evaluated the usability of two LMSs (eClass and Moodle) used within courses of their curriculum. It was found that the perceived usability of the evaluated LMSs is at a satisfactory level (mean SUS score 76.27). Analysis of the results also demonstrated the validity and reliability of SUS for LMSs’ evaluation, and that it remains robust even for small sample sizes. Moreover, the following SUS attributes were investigated in the context of LMSs evaluation: gender, age, prior experience with the LMS, Internet self-efficacy, attitude towards the Internet and usage frequency of the LMS.

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Mining social web data is a challenging task and finding user interest for personalized and non-personalized recommendation systems is another important task. Knowledge sharing among web users has become crucial in determining usage of web data and personalizing content in various social websites as per the user’s wish. This paper aims to design a framework for extracting knowledge from web sources for the end users to take a right decision at a crucial juncture. The web data is collected from various web sources and structured appropriately and stored as an ontology based data repository. The proposed framework implements an online recommender application for the learners online who pursue their graduation in an open and distance learning environment. This framework possesses three phases: data repository, knowledge engine, and online recommendation system. The data repository possesses common data which is attained by the process of acquiring data from various web sources. The knowledge engine collects the semantic data from the ontology based data repository and maps it to the user through the query processor component. Establishment of an online recommendation system is used to make recommendations to the user for a decision making process. This research work is implemented with the help of an experimental case study which deals with an online recommendation system for the career guidance of a learner. The online recommendation application is implemented with the help of R-tool, NLP parser and clustering algorithm.This research study will help users to attain semantic knowledge from heterogeneous web sources and to make decisions.

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The creation of online platforms that establish new learning environments has led to the proliferation of institutions offering online learning programmes. However, the use of technologies for teaching and learning requires sound content specialization, as well as grounding in pedagogy. While gains made by constructivism and observational learning are well documented, research addressing online practices that best encourage constructivist and observational learning in Open and Distance Learning (ODL) contexts is limited. Using a phenomenological methodological approach, this research explored the lived experiences of online learning programme facilitators at an Open and Distance Learning higher education institution. The findings of this research study revealed that facilitators did not use constructivist and observational learning pedagogies to a large extent in their interaction with students. It is concluded that during the curriculum planning phase, facilitators should decide on methods and media to arouse the students’ attention and stimulating constructivist and observational learning amongst students during online courses. This also implies a more reasonable facilitator-student ratio because large numbers of students per facilitator proves not feasible in online learning. The paper concludes by providing guidelines for the facilitation of interactive online learning programmes.

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Curriculum development for distance education (DE) practitioners is more and more focusing on practical requirements and competence development. Delphi and DACUM methods have been used at some universities. However, in the competency-based development area, these methods have been taken over by professional-task-based development in the last decade, which has not been applied in the open and distance education area so far. Is the professional-task-based curriculum development approach suitable for open and distance education? This study aims to develop a Master Degree curriculum for DE practitioners in China based on professional tasks. Design-based research (DBR) was used and two cycles of DBR were conducted. Interviews and observations were used to collect data. In the first round of DBR, the authors find that professional-task-based development is feasible and could direct more closely to practical requirements of competencies, and that meanwhile, this approach has some disadvantages and limitations. In the second round of DBR, the approach was revised and results showed that the revised approach was much more suitable and reasonable for DE practitioners. Results of this study include: 1) professional-task based curricula for DE practitioners in China; 2) a curriculum development approach for open and distance education revised from professional-task-based development.

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The internet has developed into an important source of knowledge in recent times. It is used not just for engaging and entertaining users, but also for promoting language learning, especially for English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL and EFL) learners spending long hours using internet, 85% of all web pages are in English. This experimental research investigated EFL learners’ experiences of vocabulary learning while surfing and text processing. In this small-scale study, two homogeneous groups of EFL learners (N=19), after taking a vocabulary test to ensure that their vocabulary knowledge differences were not significant, were randomly assigned to attend Interchange 3 class in two different groups – one as the Experimental and the other as the Control Group. Each session, there was a free discussion on special topics; while the Experimental Group surfed the internet, processed the online texts, shared and discussed their findings and beliefs on the internet, the Control Group did not use the internet and simply shared their opinions and discussed their personal beliefs. The results of the vocabulary pre- and post-tests indicated that the “internet users” significantly outperformed the “non-internet users”, that is, the Control Group. Based on the findings, internet creates a stimulating environment which helps learners effectively boost their vocabulary knowledge.

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This article reports on an exploratory study of giving medals as part of a peer rating system in a question-and-answer (Q&A) study group on Python, a programming language. There are no professional teachers tutoring learners. The study aimed to understand whether and how medals, awarded to responses in a peer-based learning environment, can work as a mechanism to assess the value of those responses when traditional markers of expertise are not always clearly defined and identifiable. Employing a mixed-method approach, the analysis examined (a) the content of the answers that were awarded medals and their perceived immediate value and (b) the nature of the networked relationships resulting from participants’ interactions. The findings suggest that the peer rating system makes visible what the participants find immediately valuable and allocates a form of recognition that extends the “legitimation code”, which refers to the credentials that make someone competent and worthy of recognition.