EDUCAUSE Quarterly Articles and Instructional Design

A faculty development survey analyzed what faculty want and need to be successful teaching online.

The default design of commercial course management systems limits instructional creativity and pedagogical approaches, particularly for novice users.

Many university faculty create their own websites or use a course management system to upload course materials for online instruction. Course content and files are mostly organized and presented in a linear structure and placed in a series of folders and subfolders. An alternative approach to navigate, organize, and sequence Web-based content is to use a computer generated mind map – an E-Map. With its unique storage and organizational capacity, E-Maps not only provide a user-friendly e-learning structure, but also can effectively manage knowledge in a much more efficient manner than using a linear approach to navigate and access Web-based content.

The purpose of this article is to examine how E-Maps can be used as a graphical interface for presenting and organizing Web-based course content and files online. Explored in this article is a brief overview of mind maps , mind mapping software, how using E-Maps as a graphic organizer can facilitate learning, and some instructional application examples of using E-Maps for Web-based instruction.

The instructor’s inclusion of authentic activities improves the quality of student interaction and learning in online classrooms.

A formal review of online courses measures their quality in key areas and reveals changes needed for improvement, if any.

Formative evaluation strategies helped identify a solution to a learning dilemma.

In the edited collection, Interactive Learning: Vignettes from America's Most Wired Campuses, reviewed by Victoria L. Cross, vignettes from a variety of university settings are offered on the topic of incorporating technology into the classroom. The second review, on Designing for Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity, remarks on the book's discussion of usability and simplicity in creating Web sites and the importance of this for better serving the academic community.

Interviews with two leaders and three practitioners shed light on the convergence of ideas in instructional technology as the field evolves.

E-Personality is a pedagogical technique designed to let an instructor's skills and ability shine through when teaching online courses. This article discusses using this technique to move from "distance learning" to "presence learning".