Dale S. Niederhauser

The authors, working from a new literacies studies perspective, suggest that educators can better teach their students if they develop their own knowledge of the purposes, types, and language conventions students use in their informal out-of-school literacy practices. The purpose of this study was to identify the literacy practices used in a classroom-based social network site and determine how these practices reflect digital literacies. By connecting differences in the literacy practices of three fifth-grade girls to the instructional moves made by classroom teachers, the authors were able to identify and describe how classroom teachers unintentionally marginalized the kinds of digital literacies that are valued in the larger society. Findings point to the importance of creating online identities for establishing relationships in a social networking site and a need for teachers to model ways to shift language use when engaging in different writing contexts.

In this paper we describe student use of a series of connected online problem-solving activities to remediate atmospheric carbon budget misconceptions held by undergraduate university students. In particular, activities were designed to address a common misconception about conservation of mass when students assume a simplistic, direct relationship between atmospheric CO2 concentrations and carbon emissions. This particular misconception was challenged through an instructional intervention applying constructivist learning theory principles in an effort to prompt cognitive dissonance and induce conceptual change. This study is based on 1 y of data collected from a survey completed by introductory physical geology students (n = 176), divided into a control group (n = 127) and an experimental group (n = 49). The students in the experimental group worked on an instructional intervention targeting identified misconceptions during a laboratory session. Both the control group and the experimental group w...

Many regions around the world are experiencing a gradual paradigm shift away from information technology (IT) use that complements traditional teaching and towards embedded IT use in E‐learning that is ubiquitous and pervasive. This has been conceptualized in this article using a framework depicting the affects of these shifts on learning environments that may change schooling and impact society. These trends provide new challenges for educational researchers at national and international levels, requiring attention to the interrelationships among the various components in an educational system. New evidence, which builds on earlier claims of an increasing digital divide between developing and developed countries, has shown that this phenomenon is much more complex than was previously thought. We suggest that a promising way to maximize the knowledge and impact of researching IT in education is to establish longitudinal programmatic research sustained through the establishment of E‐learning observatories, which can bring together expertise across a range of disciplines. A major challenge in forming a clear and coherent strategy for researching IT in education lies in the fact that there are multiple stakeholders with differing aims, goals and objectives. Therefore, reciprocal relationships are needed in which practice informs research and research informs practice with support and guidance from policymakers.