Emergence and Innovation in Digital Learning: Foundations and Applications

Educational systems worldwide are facing an enormous shift as a result of sociocultural, political, economic, and technological changes. The technologies and practices that have developed over the last decade have been heralded as opportunities to transform both online and traditional education systems. While proponents of these new ideas often postulate that they have the potential to address the educational problems facing both students and institutions and that they could provide an opportunity to rethink the ways that education is organized and enacted, there is little evidence of emerging technologies and practices in use in online education. Because researchers and practitioners interested in these possibilities often reside in various disciplines and academic departments the sharing and dissemination of their work across often rigid boundaries is a formidable task. Contributors to Emergence and Innovation in Digital Learning include individuals who are shaping the future of online learning with their innovative applications and investigations on the impact of issues such as openness, analytics, MOOCs, and social media. Building on work first published in Emerging Technologies in Distance Education, the contributors to this collection harness the dispersed knowledge in online education to provide a one-stop locale for work on emergent approaches in the field. Their conclusions will influence the adoption and success of these approaches to education and will enable researchers and practitioners to conceptualize, critique, and enhance their understanding of the foundations and applications of new technologies.

PART 1. Foundations. The defining characteristics of emerging technologies and emerging practices in digital education Complexity, mess, and not-yetness: teaching online with emerging technologies Theories for learning with emerging technologies Emerging technology integration models Multiple learning roles in a connected age: when distance means less than ever. PART 2. Applications. Educational data mining and learning analytics: potentials and possibilities for online education The emergence of practice: two case studies of Moodle in online education Issues in research, design, and development of personal learning environments Designing for open and social learning The phenomenal MOOC: sociocultural effects of a marginal learning model Arts-based technologies create community in online courses Concluding Thoughts List of Contributors Index.