Commentary on "A Review of e-Learning in Canada"

Richard Schwier; Richard Schwier

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 32, No. 3 (Oct 15, 2006)

Research on Formal Virtual Learning Communities in Higher Education

Richard Schwier

International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning Vol. 6, No. 2 (Jul 01, 2005)

Pursuing the Elusive Metaphor of Learning Community In Formal and Non-Formal Settings

Richard Schwier

EdMedia: World Conference on Educational Media and Technology Vol. 2009, No. 1 (2009)

Much of what we understand about the notion of online learning communities and how they develop, grow and die away is based on examinations of formal online learning environments — primarily on post-secondary courses managed by institutions of...

Project Management for Computer-Based Training Development

Richard Schwier

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 15, No. 3 (Dec 31, 2017)

This article deals with the management of instructional developmentprojects for computer-based training (CBT), and is primarily aimed at project managers working with a team of instructional developers for a corporate client. Two issues are...

Authenticity in the process of learning about Instructional Design

Jay Wilson; Richard Schwier; Richard Schwier

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 35, No. 2 (May 11, 2010)

Authentic learning is touted as a powerful learning approach, particularly in the context of problem-based learning (Savery, 2006). Teaching and learning in the area of instructional design appears to offer a strong fit between the tenets of...

Content and Community Redux: Instructor and Student Interpretations of Online Communication in a Graduate Seminar

Mary Dykes; Richard Schwier; Richard Schwier

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 29, No. 2 (Jun 15, 2003)

The experiences of an instructor and teaching assistant who employed online communication strategies in a graduate seminar are examined in this paper. This paper expands on the findings reported in an earlier article on virtual learning communities...

A Model of Authentic Learning Processes in Instructional Design

Jay Wilson; Richard Schwier

Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference 2012 (Mar 05, 2012) pp. 1285–1289

Abstract: The purpose of this paper it is to stimulate discussion around a model of authentic learning developed and employed in instructional design and evaluation courses in the Educational Technology and Design graduate program. Our approach to...

A Taxonomy of Interaction for Instructional Multimedia

Richard A. Schwier

This paper rejects the hardware-based "levels of interaction" made popular in interactive video literature to describe human-machine interaction in favor of a new taxonomy of learner-media interaction based on the type of cognitive engagement...

A Comparison of Participation Patterns in Selected Formal, Non-formal, and Informal Online Learning Environments / Comparaison des modes de participation dans des environnements formels, non formels et informels d'apprentissage en ligne

Richard Schwier; Jennifer Seaton

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 39, No. 1 (Feb 22, 2013)

Does learner participation vary depending on the learning context? Are there characteristic features of participation evident in formal, non-formal, and informal online learning environments? Six online learning environments were chosen as epitomes...

Considerations in the Construction of Technology-Based Virtual Learning Communities

Eugene Kowch; Richard Schwier

Canadian Journal of Educational Communication Vol. 26, No. 1 (1997) pp. 1–12

Discusses the construct of learning community for educators and examines issues concerning the theory and practice of constructing learning communities using communication technologies (virtual learning communities). Topics include possible future...

A Consideration of Learning Processes in Virtual Learning Communities

Ben Daniel; Richard Schwier

World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, and Higher Education 2009 (Oct 26, 2009) pp. 2494–2499

How do we understand and support learning in virtual learning communities? The main goal of this research was to take the first steps toward instantiating a model describing the fundamental processes of learning in virtual communities. We...

The Struggle for Community and Content in Virtual Learning Communities

Richard Schwier; Mary DyKes

World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 2004 (2004) pp. 2976–2982

This paper reports a three-year case study of online communication strategies in a graduate seminar and extends preliminary findings from the first two years of the study (Schwier & Balbar, 2002; Dykes & Schwier, 2003). It discusses how different...

Topics: Communication

Engagement and knowledge sharing in a virtual learning community

Ben Daniel; Richard Schwier

World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 2007 (Jun 25, 2007) pp. 639–646

The notion of knowledge sharing in virtual learning communities is critical but hardly researched. This paper identifies the process involved in sharing knowledge and the types of knowledge sharing objects that are exchanged in virtual learning...

Topics: Learning Objects, Community

Catalysts, Emphases, and Elements of Virtual Learning Communities: Implications for Research and Practice

Richard A. Schwier

Quarterly Review of Distance Education Vol. 2, No. 1 (2001) pp. 5–18

Examines theoretical and conceptual issues around promoting the growth of virtual learning communities and considers issues around using communication technologies in formal and informal learning environments. Highlights include: the theoretical...

Building Learning Communities with Technology

Eugene Kowch; Richard Schwier

National Congress on Rural Education 1997 (1997)

Learning communities are collections of autonomous, independent individuals who are bound together by natural will and a set of shared ideas and ideals, and who are engaged by influencing each other within a learning process. This definition depends ...

Turning Learning Environments into Learning Communities: Expanding the Notion of Interaction in Multimedia

Richard A. Schwier

World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 1999 (1999) pp. 282–286

Emerging approaches to developing rich learning environments combine multimedia, computer mediated communication, and a host of interactive strategies to connect people in varied and robust ways. But traditional understandings of learning...

Topics: Interaction, Information Communication Technologies, Communication, Virtual Environments

Pursuing the Elusive Metaphor of Community in Virtual Learning Environments

Richard A. Schwier

World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 2009 (Jun 22, 2009) pp. 3072–3082

Social networking software sites are often mistakenly called learning communities, betraying a significant lack of agreement or concern for what actually constitutes a community. However, social networking sites are being used by teachers to engage...

Connections and Contexts: The Birth, Growth and Death of Online Learning Communities

Richard A. Schwier

World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, and Higher Education 2011 (Oct 18, 2011) pp. 1–10

Much of what we understand about the notion of online learning communities and how they develop, grow, and die away is based on examinations of formal online learning environments— primarily post-secondary courses managed by institutions of higher...

Interactive Media Audit Trails: Approaches and Issues

Earl R. Misanchuk; Richard Schwier

This discussion of uses for audit trails in instructional research begins by pointing out that interactive media provide the learner with the opportunity to shape the program, and consequently, the learning experience. The paper focuses on one of...

Analytical Tools and Research Issues for Interactive Media

Richard Schwier; Earl R. Misanchuk

Contrasting traditional linear media (in which all learners proceed through the instructional materials in an essentially fixed sequence) with interactive technologies and hypermedia (in which two learners may take different paths through the same...

An Investigation of the Change Agency and Professional Identity of Instructional Designers

Richard Schwier; Katy Campbell; Richard Kenny

World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 2004 (2004) pp. 2455–2459

Instructional designers play an important role in the design and development of instructional products and programs. Instructional designers are also significant agents in changing the way traditional colleges and universities implement their...

Topics: Instructional Design, Change

Effects of Postquestions on Learning and Learning Efficiency from Fixed-Pace, Fixed-Sequence Media

Deane K. Dayton; Richard A. Schwier

Educational Communication and Technology: A Journal of Theory, Research, and Development Vol. 27, No. 2 (1979) pp. 103–13

Junior high school and college students participated in three experiments that explored the effects of postquestion treatments on learning from slide/tape presentations. Results seem to indicate that inserted postquestions can increase the learning...

Instructional Designer Disciplinary-Based Formation of Self

Heather Kanuka; Katy Campbell; Richard A. Schwier

Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association 2009 (April 2009)

The purpose of this study is to gain a better understanding of teaching (teacher perspectives) and learning (student perspectives) across the disciplines in ways that can better prepare instructional designers to work with research-teachers in...

Instructional designers' observations about identity, communities of practice and change agency

Richard Schwier; Katy Campbell; Richard Kenny; Richard Kenny

Australasian Journal of Educational Technology Vol. 20, No. 1 (Jan 01, 2004)

We presume that models and theory in instructional design inform professional practice, but theory has not been consistently built from the professional experiences of instructional designers. This study draws on the observations of five...

Language: English

Agency of the instructional designer: Moral coherence and transformative social practice

Katy Campbell; Richard Schwier; Richard Kenny; Richard Kenny

Australasian Journal of Educational Technology Vol. 21, No. 2 (Jan 01, 2005)

In this paper we propose a view of instructional design practice in which the instructional designer is an agent of social change at the personal, relational, and institutional levels. In this view designers are not journeymen workers directed by...

Language: English

Designing Multimedia for the Hypertext Markup Language

Richard A. Schwier; Earl R. Misanchuk

Annual Meeting of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology 1996 (February 1996)

Dynamic discussions have begun to emerge concerning style of presentation on world wide web sites. Some hypertext markup language (HTML) designers seek an intimate and chatty ambience, while others want to project a more professional image....

The Mythology of Colour in Multimedia Screen Design: Art, Science, and Connoisseurship

Earl R. Misanchuk; Richard A. Schwier

Canadian Journal of Educational Communication Vol. 24, No. 1 (1995) pp. 3–26

Summarizes the results of literature on color use in multimedia screen design for instructional purposes. Discusses problems and the lack of guidance for instructional designers. Suggests renewed research and the development of a connoisseurial...

The multivariate nature of agentic instructional design: Self as moral actor

Katy Campbell; Rick Schwier; Richard Kenny

World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 2007 (Jun 25, 2007) pp. 15–21

This paper presents the results of three years of exploratory work culminating in an emerging, descriptive "agentic model of practice" as an interpretive lens on instructional designers' daily practice in universities and four-year colleges. We...

Interplay of Content and Community Redux: Online Communication in a Graduate Seminar on Theory in Educational Technology

Mary E. Dykes; Richard A. Schwier

Association for Media and Technology in Education Annual Conference 2002 (2002)

This paper summarizes the experiences of an instructor and teaching assistant who introduced online communication strategies in a graduate seminar. This paper drew on the findings of a previous paper (Schwier & Balbar, 2002), and examined how to...

The Interplay of Content and Community in Synchronous and Asynchronous Communication: Virtual Communication in a Graduate Seminar

Richard Schwier; Shelly Balbar; Shelly Balbar

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 28, No. 2 (Jun 15, 2002)

A group of graduate students and an instructor at the University of Saskatchewan experimented with the use of synchronous communication (chat) and asynchronous communication (bulletin board) in a theory course in Educational Communications and...

The Effect of Interaction and Perceived Need for Training on Learning and Time Spent Learning from Computer-Based Instruction

Richard A. Schwier; Earl R. Misanchuk

Canadian Journal of Educational Communication Vol. 17, No. 3 (1988) pp. 147–58

Describes study that examined the effects of embedded questions and review frames on learning from computer-based instruction as well as the effect of perceived need for training on performance. Experimental and control group treatments for...

Benefits and Pitfalls of Using HTML as a CD-ROM Development Tool

Earl R. Misanchuk; Richard A. Schwier

Journal of Interactive Instruction Development Vol. 8, No. 4 (1996) pp. 3–14

Discussion of HTML (HyperText Markup Language) focuses on its use for developing CD-ROMs. Topics include the World Wide Web; cross-platform compatibility; the incorporation of text, graphics, audio, and video; learner control over display...

The Art and Science of Color in Multimedia Screen Design, Part II: Science, Myth, and Legend

Earl R. Misanchuk; Richard A. Schwier

Annual Convention of the Association for Educational Communication and Technology 1995 (1995)

This paper summarizes the results of an analysis of literature on color use in screen design. Fundamental problems with the information base are identified as follows: (1) advise becomes obsolete as newer equipment becomes available; (2) the nature...

Intentional and Incidental Discourse Variables in a Virtual Learning Community

Ben Daniel; Richard Schwier; Heather Ross

World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, and Higher Education 2005 (October 2005) pp. 1953–1965

Learning in virtual learning communities is receiving considerable attention in current literature. Research on virtual learning communities focuses on building, supporting and sustaining virtual learning communities. Despite growing research into...

A Review of What Instructional Designers Do: Questions Answered and Questions Not Asked

Richard Kenny; Zuochen Zhang; Richard Schwier; Katy Campbell; Katy Campbell

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 31, No. 1 (Feb 15, 2005)

The purpose of this literature review was to determine what evidence there is that instructional designers apply ID Models, as well as to establish what other activities and processes they might use in their professional activities. Only ten...

Conversation as Inquiry: A Conversation with Instructional Designers

Katy Campbell; Richard A. Schwier; Richard F. Kenny

Journal of Learning Design Vol. 1, No. 3 pp. 1–18

Instructional designers regularly engage in a process of professional and personal transformation that has the potential to transform the culture of institutions through faculty-client relationships. Instructional designers promote new ideas and...

The Critical, Relational Practice of Instructional Design in Higher Education: An Emerging Model of Change Agency

Katy Campbell; Richard A. Schwier; Richard F. Kenny

Educational Technology Research and Development Vol. 57, No. 5 (October 2009) pp. 645–663

This paper offers an emerging interpretive framework for understanding the active role instructional designers play in the transformation of learning systems in higher education. A 3-year study of instructional designers in Canadian universities...

Challenges in the Design of a Hypertext Book in HTML: Lessons Learned

Earl R. Misanchuk; Richard A. Schwier; Elizabeth Boling

EdMedia + Innovate Learning 1999 (1999) pp. 1219–1220

This document is a very brief summary of a larger paper and presentation. It is not possible to discuss the issues presented two pages, so we will restrict ourselves to providing an annotated outline of the topics here, and invite you to download...

Topics: Instructional Design, Multimedia, Developmental Stages

A Preliminary Investigation of Self-Directed Learning Activities in a Non-Formal Blended Learning Environment

Richard A. Schwier; Dirk Morrison; Ben K Daniel

Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association 2009 (April 2009)

This research considers how professional participants in a non-formal self-directed learning environment (NFSDL) made use of self-directed learning activities in a blended face-to-face and on line learning professional development course. The...

Discourse on Designing an Illustrated Hypermedia Book

Earl R. Misanchuk; Richard A. Schwier; Elizabeth Boling

Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia Vol. 9, No. 3 (2000) pp. 223–251

Large-scale hypertext implementations designed to provide information are common enough (especially as websites); however, large-scale instructional equivalents are, at this juncture, rarer. This article discusses: l the design and development of a...

Topics: Instructional Design, Developmental Stages

Synthesis of the Process of Learning through Discourse in a Formal Virtual Learning Community

Ben K. Daniel; Richard A. Schwier; Heather M. Ross

Journal of Interactive Learning Research Vol. 18, No. 4 (October 2007) pp. 461–477

This article reports on the analysis of online discussions among graduate students studying the theoretical and philosophical foundations of educational technology, with the aim of understanding the process of learning through discourse in these...

Topics: Research Methods, Virtual Environments, Information Communication Technologies, Collaboration, Communication, Computers, Community

Participant Engagement in a Non-Formal, Self-Directed and Blended Learning Environment

Richard Schwier; Dirk Morrison; Ben Daniel; Jaymie Koroluk

World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, and Higher Education 2009 (Oct 26, 2009) pp. 1948–1956

Novice professors representing seven disciplines participated in a year-long course on teaching in higher education that featured online self-directed learning opportunities and regular face-to-face group meetings. This study examined how...

Visual Design for Instructional Multimedia

Earl R. Misanchuk; Richard A. Schwier; Elizabeth Boling

EdMedia + Innovate Learning 1999 (1999) p. 1621

This poster session provides a public demonstration of the HTML-based CD-ROM "Visual Design for Instructional Multimedia." The work takes the position that creating instructional materials in multimedia requires different strategies and tactics in...

Topics: Instructional Design, Multimedia, Instructional Materials

Social Capital in Virtual Learning Communities and Distributed Communities of Practice

Ben Daniel; Richard Schwier; Gordon McCalla; Gordon McCalla

Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology / La revue canadienne de l’apprentissage et de la technologie Vol. 29, No. 3 (Oct 15, 2003)

Abstract. Social capital has recently emerged as an important interdisciplinary research area. It is frequently used as a framework for understanding various social issues in temporal communities, neighbourhoods and groups. In particular,...

Designing an Incentive-Based Online Education System to Encourage Student Collaboration

Jennifer Seaton; Joanne Traves; Gordon McCalla; Richard Schwier

World Conference on Educational Media and Technology 2013 (Jun 24, 2013) pp. 1364–1371

Student motivation has proven to be an obstacle to the success of online courses. We have developed NECSUS, an incentive-based system designed to encourage social interaction between students, which was incorporated into an existing short...

Implications for ID practice of Instructional Designers' Cultural Identities

Katy Campbell; Richard Schwier; Heather Kanuka; Abtar Kaur; Okhwa Lee; Zoraini Wati Abas; Rozinah Binti Jamaludin; Zehra Ozdilek; Siew-Mee Barton; Denis Berthiaume; Moketsi Sesemane; Meifeng Lui

World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, and Higher Education 2009 (Oct 26, 2009) pp. 1549–1552

Are there social and political purposes for design that are culturally based? A growing body of research is concerned with the design of culturally-appropriate learning resources and environments, but the emphasis of this panel is on the...