Perceptions of Professors and Students towards Moodle

With the current digital age, academic institutions are responsible for providing the latest technology for professors and students. The open source course management system Moodle, which a great number of organizations worldwide have adopted, is designed to help instructors deliver course materials to their students from a social constructivist perspective. The aim of this research is evaluate the acceptance and use of Moodle as an open source application from the viewpoint of both professors and students at the American University of Beirut. The theoretical framework for this study is drawn from the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) to investigate user intentions toward Moodle. The participants were 189 professors and 1,867 students who completed an online survey, evaluating a set of 30 items on a scale of five that reflected the UTAUT constructs applied to Moodle. An exploratory factor analysis was employed and generated five factors: community influence, satisfaction, service quality, learnability and technical quality. Repeated measures ANOVA showed community influence as the highest rated by participants, followed by satisfaction, service quality, learnability and technical quality. Also, two open-ended questions were included to solicit comments from users about various features that should be integrated into this free open source application.

A Model for an Adaptive Hypermedia Learning System Based on Data Mining Technique

Since the learning style of each learner is different. Adaptive hypermedia learning system (AHLS) must fit different learner's needs. A number of AHLS have been developed to support learning styles as a source for adaptation. However, these systems suffer from several problems, namely: less attention was paid to the relationship between learning styles and learning performance. This paper proposes an AHLS model based on learning styles and learning performance. On one hand, the developed prototype will assist a learner in accessing and using learning resources which are adapted according to his/her personal characteristics (in this case his/her learning style and level of knowledge). On the other hand, it will facilitate the learning content teacher in the creation of appropriate learning objects and their application to suitable pedagogical strategies.

Development of a Scale to Measure Attitudes toward Information Technology

Educators, and business, and political leaders are increasingly recognizing that computing is a new basic skill necessary for economic opportunity and social mobility U.S. President Obama has announced a new initiative, “Computer Science For All” to empower a generation of American students with the computer science skills they need to thrive in a digital economy (2016). Employers seek technical computer specialists who can write software and invent new applications, but American universities are only training enough students to fill about 40% of the projected 1.1 million technology and computing jobs expected by 2024 (National Center for Women and Information Technology, 2016). Moreover, a lack of gender parity within the U.S. technology industry has long been viewed as a critical problem, detracting from innovation and prosperity. Pursuit of information technology (IT) majors depends, to a great extent, on students' attitudes toward IT. This study developed an Attitude toward IT Scale with a gender subtext to measure certain attitudes toward IT, held by college students. The norm group consisted of mostly freshmen enrolled in 2011 (N = 373), at a large four-year public university in Illinois. Reliability and validity of the 30-item Scale were examined by using Cronbach's alpha and a principal components factor analysis with orthogonal rotation using varimax with Kaiser normalization; the rotation converged in seven iterations. Results of data analyses showed that overall reliability is high (0.85), and factor analyses revealed five orthogonal factors with high coefficient alphas—factors that represented relevant attitude constructs. This Scale may be used by educators at the senior high school and college levels to evaluate the effectiveness of different teaching/learning strategies in promoting positive student attitudes toward IT, and in improving learning among students. The Scale is unique in that it includes attitudes toward gender equality of opportunity in IT.

The (Revised List of) Top 10 Technologies for 21st Century Instruction

Volume 9, Issue 3 of the IJICTE (July-September 2013), Top 10 Technologies for Designing 21st Century Instruction, offered a first look at classroom technologies recommended to advance teaching and learning in the classroom. In this revised chapter, as with the original paper, we persist in seeking answers to important questions: “How does technology fit into my teaching?” How can I teach my students to become technologically literate?” “How do I infuse technology into as many levels of my curriculum as possible?” This chapter examines more contemporary technologies that readers should consider in preparing and delivering classroom instruction. We have attempted to rank order the technologies according to their broadest application across curriculum, offering a priority for how important these technologies might be in the classroom. Included in the coverage of each technology is a description of the technology, its primary features, advantages and disadvantages, and additional resources that bear witness to how they actually impact teaching and learning.

Collaborative Learning on Decentralized Ubiquitous Environments

The application of technologies in the improvement of education strategies is called Ubiquitous Learning. This chapter discusses the collaborative learning and proposes the integration between two models dedicated to support ubiquitous learning environments, called Global and CoolEdu. CoolEdu is a generic collaboration model for decentralized environments. Global is an infrastructure designed to create ubiquitous learning environments. Global provides software agents that perform tasks common to ubiquitous learning processes. By extending these agents or adding new ones, a system can be specialized to support ubiquitous learning environments. The CoolEdu/Global integration created a collaborative and decentralized ubiquitous learning environment. The resulting environment was evaluated through a simulated scenario dedicated to explore its functionalities. The results showed the potential of deploying the environment in real situations.

Instructional Videos as ICT for Teacher Professional Development

Information Communication Technologies have had a major impact in education today. Various ICT tools have been used to produce very favorable outcomes in terms of student learning. One such tool is YouTube which has had a dynamic influence on teaching and learning and is widely used by teachers in the classroom. The focus of this study is to examine how teachers would respond to the use of ICT tools, namely YouTube, as a form of delivery for their own staff development training. In this study, we surveyed teachers to assess their feelings on this form of training. Our findings showed a favorable response to this form of training using YouTube and demonstrated a rationale supported by a list of themes related to their rationale for favoring this choice.

Technology-Infused Education

Technology can be a useful tool to educate students. Online courses take advantage of these tools and provide students with the flexibility to complete the courses remotely. However, student perceptions of online classes will not be the same as they complete the course remotely, rather than interacting with other students and the instructor in a traditional classroom. This study seeks to better understand the factors of the online course environment and examines the impact that various online environmental factors have on student satisfaction. This study identifies factors that affect students' satisfaction toward the online class. These findings should help instructors teaching online classes concentrate more on factors that are considered to be important to their students.

The Influence of Clickers Use on Metacognition and Learning Outcomes in College English Classroom

Use of Clickers in classroom teaching and learning has become growingly popular in USA. This study aims to identify whether use of Clickers in college English class can improve learners' English proficiency and enhance students' awareness of metacognition compared with traditional multimedia aided pedagogy in Malaysian contexts. By comparing the data obtained from three questionnaires and an IELTS test instructed via Clickers and traditional multimedia at the end of corresponding semesters, it is found that Clickers pedagogy can give rise to better learning outcomes and higher metacognitive levels than traditional multimedia. Limitations of this study are also discussed, coupled with recommendations for future research.

Pre-Service Teachers' Motivation to Use Technology and the Impact of Authentic Learning Exercises

In this quasi-experimental study, the authors explored the impact of authentic learning exercises on pre-service teachers' motivational beliefs to integrate technology, as well as the ability of those beliefs to predict intentions to integrate. A questionnaire was used to assess 104 pre-service teachers' motivational beliefs, namely intrinsic and extrinsic goal orientations, task value, self-efficacy, and control of learning in relation to technology integration. Results indicated authentic learning exercises might have enhanced motivational beliefs, particularly self-efficacy and intrinsic goal-orientation. Also, motivational beliefs predicted their intentions to integrate technology into future instruction, with task value predicting significantly. The chapter concludes with implications for practice.

Social E-Learning Tools

The growth of technology and the inclusion of “digital natives” as students in the education world have created a demand pull for the use of Social learning technologies in education. Dominant among these tools have been wikis, blogs and discussion boards. Distance education experts view the use of these tools as key differentiators when compared to traditional education methods. However, the research in this area has yet to provide clear guidelines on usage. In this chapter, the aim is to provide a theory-driven model to outline the application and impact of these technologies in education. The focus is on the education tasks and technologies' characteristics to evaluate the underlying fit. The chapter outlines the extant research to substantiate our model and provide practitioner guidelines.