Information Retrieval has become a very active research field in the 21st century. Many from academia and industry present their innovations in the field in a wide variety of conferences and journals. Companies transfer this new knowledge directly to the general public via services such as web search engines in order to improve their information seeking experience.

In parallel, teaching IR is turning into an important aspect of IR generally, not only because it is necessary to impart effective search techniques to make the most of the IR tools available, but also because we must provide a good foundation for those students who will become the driving force of future IR technologies.

There are very few resources for teaching and learning in IR, the major problem which this book is designed to solve. The objective is to provide ideas and practical experience of teaching and learning IR, for those whose job requires them to teach in one form or another, and where delivering IR courses is a major part of their working lives.

In this context of providing a higher profile for teaching and learning as applied to IR, the co-editor of this book, Efthimis Efthimiathis, had maintained a leading role in teaching and learning within the domain of IR for a number of years. This book represents a posthumous example of his efforts in the area, as he passed away in April 2011. This book, his book, is dedicated to his memory."

'n Versameling van 47 literere tekste, spesifiek uitgesoek deur onderwysers wat Frans as vreemde taal aanbied. Die tekste in hierdie bundel – verteenwoordigend van die Franse en Frankofoniese letterkunde vanaf die 16de eeu tot vandag – behoort die leerder ’n goeie oorsig te gee oor die diversiteit van die Franse taal en sy uiteenlopende sprekers en gebruikers.

This book explores approaches to developing and using postdigital humans and the impact they are having on a postdigital world. It presents current research and practices at a time when education is changing rapidly with digital, technological advances. In particular, it outlines the major challenges faced by today's employers, developers, teachers, researchers, priests and philosophers. The book examines conceptions of postdigital humans and studies the issue in connection with ethics and employment, as well as from perspectives such as philosophy and religion.

The use of technology can significantly enhance educational environments for students. It is imperative to study new software, hardware, and gadgets for the improvement of teaching and learning practices. The Handbook of Research on Mobile Devices and Smart Gadgets in K-12 Education is a pivotal reference source featuring the latest scholarly research on the opportunities and challenges of using handheld technology devices in primary and secondary education. Including coverage on a wide variety of topics and perspectives such as blended learning, game-based curriculum, and software applications, this publication is ideally designed for educators, researchers, students, and technology experts seeking current research on new trends in the use of technology in education.

There is intense interest in computer games. A total of 65 percent of all American households play computer games, and sales of such games increased 22.9 percent last year. The average amount of game playing time was found to be 13.2 hours per week. The popularity and market success of games is evident from both the increased earnings from games, over $7 Billion in 2005, and from the fact that over 200 academic institutions worldwide now offer game related programs of study. In view of the intense interest in computer games educators and trainers, in business, industry, the government, and the military would like to use computer games to improve the delivery of instruction. Computer Games and Instruction is intended for these educators and trainers. It reviews the research evidence supporting use of computer games, for instruction, and also reviews the history of games in general, in education, and by the military. In addition chapters examine gender differences in game use, and the implications of games for use by lower socio-economic students, for students' reading, and for contemporary theories of instruction. Finally, well known scholars of games will respond to the evidence reviewed.

Computer simulation, a powerful technological tool and research-proven pedagogical technique, holds great potential to enhance and transform teaching and learning in education and is therefore a viable tool to engage students in deep learning and higher-order thinking. With the advancement of simulation technology (e.g., virtual reality, artificial intelligence, machine learning) and the expanded disciplines where computer simulation is being used (e.g., data science, cyber security), computer simulation is playing an increasingly significant role in leading the digital transformation in K-12 schools and higher education institutions, as well as training and professional development in corporations, government, and the military. Teaching, Learning, and Leading With Computer Simulations is an important compilation of research that examines the recent advancement of simulation technology and explores innovative ways to utilize advanced simulation programs for the enhancement of teaching and learning outcomes. Highlighting a range of topics such as pedagogy, immersive learning, and social sciences, this book is essential for educators, higher education institutions, deans, curriculum designers, school administrators, principals, IT specialists, academicians, researchers, policymakers, and students.

This book brings together international research on school teachers', and university lecturers' uses of digital technology to enhance teaching and learning in mathematics. It includes contributions that address theoretical, methodological, and practical challenges for the field with the research lens trained on the perspectives of teachers and teaching. As countries around the world move to integrate digital technologies in classrooms, this book collates research perspectives and experiences that offer valuable insights, in particular concerning the trajectories of development of teachers' digital skills, knowledge and classroom practices.

This book examines the topic of learning design from a human, interactive, and collaborative perspective. A variety of pedagogic and instructional modalities are thoroughly investigated as methodologies for creating functional and effective designs for students. The book is appropriate for all levels of teaching and learning, but special attention is paid to the special requirement of higher education, graduate education and post-graduate classrooms. Within the research chapters are embedded numerous examples, case studies, and implementation guides. The book is a scholarly yet practical guide to learning design and everyone from educational researchers in all areas of educational technology to instructional designers and instructional technologists will find it useful and inspiring at once.

This book introduces the concept of multimedia in education, and how multimedia technology could be implemented to impart digital education to university students. The book emphasizes the versatile use of technology enabled education through the research papers from distinguished academicians and researchers who are specifically working in this area. It benefits all those researchers who are enthusiastic about learning online and also for those academicians who are interested to work on various aspects of learning and teaching through technology.

This book presents some of the results from the second stage of lEA's study of Computers in Education (CompEd). lEA, the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement, conducts international comparative studies focussing on educational achievement, practices, and policies in various countries and education systems around the world. It has a Secretariat located in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. lEA studies have reported on a wide range of topics, each contributing to a deeper understanding of educational processes. The CompEd study is a project that sheds light on the way computers have been introduced in education and on how they are being used across the world today. The study proceeded in two stages with data collected for stage 1 in 1989 and for stage 2 in 1992. Results from both stages have been published in a variety of publications. This book reports about a special part of the study. Student achievement and school processes come into being in the context of the structure and the policies of national (or regional) education systems. The variety found in the CompEd results led us to ask how much might be explained by differences in these national or regional contexts. That is the reason the CompEd study took the initiative to invite the countries participating in the study, as well as some other countries that have had interesting developments in the domain of educational computers, to write a chapter describing their policies and practices regarding computers in education.

Recent years have witnessed an explosion of technological advances, which has transformed virtually every aspect of human existence. Prominent among these advances are assistive technologies, which have been employed to improve the quality of life for individuals with disabilities. In this volume, recent advances in technological applications for individuals with learning and behavioural disabilities are described and discussed, in a collection that includes reviews of research, and original research reports. Technologies in this area have provided a multiplicity of uses, from advances in tools for basic research to text and content-enhancements to promote learning and behaviour change in educational environments. Discussed in this volume are technologies for improving our understanding of eye movements in learning from text, as well as technological applications in reading and literacy development. These technologies are employed to promote learning within classrooms, and also to connect learners with mentors outside the classroom. Beyond text, the use of virtual reality has been employed to promote understanding of complex concepts in physics. In many cases, these technologies have been employed effectively with students with emotional or behavioural disorders. Also discussed are issues in technological applications, including considerations of the most effective and appropriate uses of technology, where research is or should be heading, and teachers' understandings of the uses of technology with students with learning and behavioral disabilities. Also included in this volume are discussions of issues in learning disabilities, including discussions of significant issues in discrepancy models, and strategic coherence of individuals with learning difficulties. Overall, the ten chapters in this volume aim to provide some of the most current thinking and applications in learning and behavioural disabilities.

This volume provides a comprehensive and contemporary depiction of the swift evolution of learning technologies and the innovations that derive from their deployment in school education. It comprises cases studies, research focused on emergent technologies and experiments with existing tools in a wide range of scenarios. The studies included in this volume explore the conceptual and practical aspects of technologies that are used to support learning, with a multidisciplinary approach that encompasses all levels of education. The three sections of this volume emphasise the use of digital technologies from the viewpoint of different fields of expertise, explore multiple educational settings where technology was implemented to support the various stages of the learning process, and underline strategies, tools and technologies that play a crucial role in the professional development of teachers.

Education has a substantial impact and influences on almost all sectors in modern society. Different computer-supported educational systems have been developing for many decades to support and make easier teaching and learning processes on all levels of education. Influences of rapid development of Information Communication Technologies and other related disciplines on design and implementation of intelligent, sophisticated educational systems are evident. Nowadays intensive development and wide applications of Artificial Intelligent techniques significantly affect the development of intelligent tutoring systems, smart learning environments that incorporate virtual and augmented reality and robots. Artificial Intelligence has the potential to address some of the biggest challenges in education today, but also in the future in order to establish innovative teaching and learning practices facilitated by powerful educational datamining and learning analytics. This book presents a collection of 17 chapters that bring interesting aspects of the state-of-the-art of application of intelligent techniques in different educational processes and settings. We believe that the works presented in the book will be of great interest to readers and that will motivate them to try to enhance presented approaches and propose better and more advanced solutions.

This book conceptualizes ecopedagogies as forms of educational innovation and critique that emerge from, negotiate, debate, produce, resist, and/or overcome the shifting and expansive postdigital ecosystems of humans, machines, nonhuman animals, objects, stuff, and other forms of matter. Contemporary postdigital ecosystems are determined by a range of new bioinformational reconfigurations in areas including capitalism, imperialism, settler-colonialism, and ontological hierarchies more generally. Postdigital ecopedagogies name a condition, a question, and a call for experimentation to link pedagogical research and practice to challenges of our moment. They pose living, breathing, expanding, contracting, fluid, and spatial conditions and questions of our non-chronological present. This book presents analyses of that present from a wide spectrum of disciplines, including but not limited to education studies, philosophy, politics, sociology, arts, and architecture.

Given the exponential growth of Artificial Intelligence (AI) over the past few decades, AI and its related applications have become part of daily life in ways that we could never have dreamt of only a century ago. Our routines have been changed beyond measure by robotics and AI, which are now used in a vast array of services. Though AI is still in its infancy, we have already benefited immensely. This book introduces readers to basic Artificial Intelligence concepts, and helps them understand the relationship between AI and daily life. In the interest of clarity, the content is divided into four major parts. Part I (AI Concepts) presents fundamental concepts of and information on AI; while Part II (AI Technology) introduces readers to the five core AI Technologies that provide the building blocks for various AI applications, namely: Machine Learning (ML), Data Mining (DM), Computer Vision (CV), Natural Languages Processing (NLP), and Ontology-based Search Engine (OSE). In turn, Part III (AI Applications) reviews major contemporary applications that are impacting our ways of life, working styles and environment, ranging from intelligent agents and robotics to smart campus and smart city projects. Lastly, Part IV (Beyond AI) addresses related topics that are vital to the future development of AI. It also discusses a number of critical issues, such as AI ethics and privacy, the development of a conscious mind, and autonomous robotics in our daily lives.

This book promotes student-centered approaches to the learning process, allowing students to develop skills and competences that traditional, passive learning methods cannot foster. In turn, supporting active learning with digital technology tools creates new possibilities in terms of pedagogical design and implementation. This book addresses the latest research and practice in the use of technology to promote active learning. As such, on the one hand, it focuses on active pedagogical methodologies like problem-based learning, design thinking and agile approaches; on the other, it presents best practice cases on the use of digital environments to support these methodologies. Readers will come to understand and learn to apply active learning methodologies, either by replicating the best practices presented here, or by creating their own methods.

Proceedings from the 2013 LTEC conference in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. The papers examine diverse aspects of Learning Technology for Education in Cloud environments, including social, technical and infrastructure implications. Also addressed is the question of how cloud computing can be used to design applications to support real time on demand learning using technologies. The workshop proceedings provide opportunities for delegates to discuss the latest research in TEL (Technology Enhanced Learning) and its impacts for learners and institutions, using cloud technologies.

In a context in which explicit attention to the curriculum has been sidelined in universities' strategy, this book makes an argument for why curriculum matters, both in understanding the effects of unbundled online learning and more broadly. It takes up two particular curriculum issues which are amplified in an unbundled context: differences in the formulation of curriculum between disciplines and professional fields, and the extent these are recognised in university strategy; and the push for constructivist pedagogies, and its effects on curriculum construction. Since the onslaught of MOOCs in 2012, unbundled forms of online learning offered via partnerships with external online program management and MOOC providers have grown significantly across the university sector. There has been much debate about the implications of these partnerships but the focus has predominantly been on the engagement of students and their learning. This book takes a different and novel approach, looking instead at the effects on curriculum and knowledge. Drawing on selected case studies, the book reflects on how university leaders and academics engaged with MOOCs and other forms of unbundled online learning in the early 2010s, and the effects of these reforms on curriculum practice. It captures in detail the complex and difficult work involved in university curriculum making in a way rarely seen in discussions of higher education. And it generates new in-sights about some of the critical problems manifest in the ongoing moves to embrace unbundled online learning today.

This book makes the case that the changes brought about by the connectivity of the Internet have so transformed the nature of post secondary learning that we need to view it differently. Both the content and the processes of learning have been profoundly altered because of the accessibility of information and the multi-way interactivity provided by the Internet. We call this new phenomenon 'the Connecticon' - which encompasses the paradigm created by the infrastructure, the content, the multiple connection devices of the Web, as well as by the hyper-interactivity of the connected generation for whom attention is the new ourrency. It is the aim of this book to identify and document the Connecticon - its nature, its impact and its implications. We will do this in the broad domain of learning, though a similar study could be carried out in commercial, social or political fields.

Children today are going through a lot-they are busy with school, involved in extracurricular activities, and trying to navigate the world of COVID and other concerns. Teachers and parents are busy too-with work, school, and parenting activities. How will they have the time to teach valuable skills such as manners and respect to children? These are "soft skills"; the skills necessary to work with others and be a respected and valuable citizen in the workplace of tomorrow. Soft Skills for Kids: In Schools, at Home, and Online, 2nd Edition, focuses on ways that teachers and parents can work together to teach soft skills to the children in their lives. This book is not a curriculum program or set of lessons to help children, but rather a series of "teachable moments" in which adults teach strategies to children as they happen. Finally, as the education of children has changed recently due to the pandemic with an increased number of children learning online, this book will be a great resource for how adults can work together to help children learn soft skills-in schools, at home, and online.

This book is to explores a variety of facets of online learning environments to understand how learning occurs and succeeds in digital contexts and what teaching strategies and technologies are most suited to this format. Business, health, government and education are some of the core sectors of society which have been experiencing deep transformations due to a generalized digitalization. While these changes are not novel, the swift progress of technology and the rising complexity of digital environments place a focus on the need for further research and novel strategies. In the context of education, the promise of increased flexibility and broader access to educational resources is impelling much of higher education's course offerings to online environments. The 21st century learner requires an education that can be pursued anytime and anywhere and that is more aligned with the demands of a digital society. Online education not only assists students to success-fully integrate a workforce that is increasingly digital, but it helps them to become more comfortable with the use of technology in general and, hence, more prepared to be prolific digital citizens. The variety of settings portrayed in this volume attest to the unlimited opportunities afforded by online learning and serve as valuable evidence of its benefit for students' educational experience. Moreover, these research efforts assist a more comprehensive reflection about the delivery of higher education in the context of online settings.

This book offers an important overview of technology-enhanced education in Southern Africa. With original research from Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania and Zimbabwe, this book provides in-depth scientific scholarship focused on the dynamic multimodal learning environments in the region. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the world has largely had to adjust to remotelearning. Hence, the editors and contributors pull together important research on digital pedagogies and assessment to demonstrate how technology can be effectively employed for multimodal learning environments within the Southern African context. This book will be of interest and value to scholars of digital education, multimodal learning and education within Southern Africa and beyond.