9. Issue July 2013

Summary

Issue 9 presents an investigation of barriers to a wider utilization of a Learning Management System in a Swedish university. Furthermore, an approach for enabling high-quality learning within oversized courses by e-flashcards, which enable active learning and individual facilitation within large-scale university courses, is presented. Finally, an overview on mobile learning from an educational perspective is presented.

Zusammenfassung

Ausgabe 9 präsentiert eine Untersuchung der Barrieren einer weitergehenden Nutzung eines LMS an einer schwedischen Universität. In einem weiteren Beitrag werden Erfahrung mit e-Flashcards vorgestellt: Sie sollen auch in überlaufenen Kursen die Qualität des Lernens steigern und aktives Lernen mit individueller Förderung ermöglichen. Schließlich wird ein Überblick über mobiles Lernen aus einer pädagogischen Perspektive gegeben.

Editorial

While adoption of e-learning is increasing, and new methods of improving the quality of e-learning are developed, the design of e-learning environments remains a complex task. Especially, when facing rapid technology development, such as in mobile and adaptive learning systems. In this issue, some interesting developments in the above areas are discussed:

Ramón Garrote investigates in his article barriers to a wider utilization of a Learning Management System in a Swedish university. He argues that the main barrier to a wider utilization of LMS is the lecturers’ fear of additional demands on their time, and that, in addition to support and training, incentives for lecturers are needed.

The issue of improving the quality of e-learning is in this issue addressed in three contributions: Inga Saatz and Andrea Kienle present in their article an approach for enabling high-quality learning within oversized courses by e-flashcards, which enable active learning and individual facilitation within large scale university courses. The project report by Meike Wocken presents a process management cycle to establish eLearning in university teaching. Using the project “eLearning QMM”, the practical approach of this management method is shown and costs and benefits are discussed. Finally, the book “E-Learning, E-Teaching und E-Assessment in der Hochschullehre” of Jürgen Handke and Anna Maria Schäfer is summarized, which presents a guideline for realizing quality and capacity improvements as well as reduction of efforts within a complex e-education system.

The design of e-learning environments is addressed in two dissertations and a project report: Christian Lehr presents in his dissertation “Web 2.0 in der universitären Lehre - Ein Handlungsrahmen für die Gestaltung technologiegestützter Lernszenarien” a framework for the design of technology-supported learning scenarios. Alfred Klampfer shows in his dissertation „E-Portfolios als Instrument zur Professionalisierung in der Lehrer- und Lehrerinnenausbildung“ how e-portfolios can be used to professionalize the education of teachers. Finally, the project report “A Simple Computer Game for Learning Mathematics” by Abejide Olu Ade-Ibijola, Adebayo Olusola Adetunmbi and Boniface Kayode Alese shows the design and implementation of a simple PC math game that teaches rudimentary topics in mathematics.

In the area of technology development, mobile learning and intelligent, adaptive systems are looked at close in this issue. In their article “Mobile Learning – Bringt das auch was?” Regina Parzl and Maria Bannert provide an overview on Mobile Learning from an educational perspective. It discusses terminology problems present in this interdisciplinary field, introduces relevant didactical models and theories, and presents a framework used to situate current research and to identify open issues. The book “Intelligent and Adaptive Educational-Learning Systems” of Alejandro Peña-Ayala is summarized, which deals in four parts with the modeling, presentation of content, use of virtual environments, and concrete applications of this type of system.

Regarding the competencies required by the German labour market, the project report on “IT-KompetenzBarometer” by Frank Bensberg and Daniel Vogel presents interesting results from an analysis of 40.000 job advertisements. The results can be used to better adapt education to the requirements of the labour market. The book „Visual Worlds & Interactive Spaces“ by Regina Franken-Wendelstorf, Elisabeth Lindinger, and Jürgen Sieck points to an interesting work offering deep insight in fundamental theories as well as in best practice applications of information, communication, interaction and visualization in virtual spaces within a specific cultural context. Finally, the project report on the CampusSource Congress at FernUniversität in Hagen on April 25th, 2013, makes available the contributions and presentations concerning Liferay, Lecture2Go, Hochschulapps, OERs-MOOCs, Open IDM, e-Identity, and the CampusSource White Paper Award.

Let me conclude this editorial with expressing my deepest gratitude to Bernd Krämer, who served as editor-in-chief from the beginning. I am glad, that Bernd continues to support eleed as a member of the editorial board. I am happy to announce that eleed will undergo a major renovation over the next two years regarding both, its user interface and appearance as well as the functionality provided to the community. We expect to make an improved web presence available in 2014, the 10th anniversary of eleed, and we hope to receive your feedback to better serve our readership.

Joerg M. Haake
Editor-in-Chief, eleed