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Advances in geospatial technology, web map interfaces, and other Web 2.0 tools provide new opportunities for educators to engage students in critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaborative skills. Although little attention has been given to learning from maps in higher education, knowledge of space is critical to attitudes and decision making as global citizens. Additionally, the ability to easily create multimedia maps offers new educational affordances for students at a distance and has the potential to link geographic and cultural understanding within the context of a variety of disciplines. We discuss the development of a mapping and blogging interactive learning environment, MapBlog, as a visual platform for representing information spatially. In this chapter, the MapBlog will be discussed as an interactive learning environment and as a visual platform for representing information spatially. We present and discuss four MapBlog categories: external content, student-created content, static content, and thematic.

Contemporary societies face serious environmental and social challenges that require decisive action. In the 1970s, Environmental Education (EE) was conceived as an important method for raising awareness and bringing about the needed changes in social practices that can lead to environmental protection and more recently sustainable development (transforming EE to Education for Sustainability (EfS)). Since then, many EE/EfS programmes have been implemented and some change has been observed despite the persisting problems. EE/EfS – especially when aiming to change behaviours – has been akin to critical pedagogy which aims to prepare independent and critical thinkers and empowered citizens that can effectively address social problems. What pedagogical approaches and educational methods are more effective in bringing about changes in attitudes and social practices? What instructional design and practices facilitate this transformation? What are the challenges? These are questions that have troubled environmental educators and are worth reflecting on in the present context of knowledge societies and Higher Education that is significantly impacted by a neoliberal ideology.

This chapter aims to contribute to the ongoing discussions around these questions, via a dialogue between theory and practice. A discussion of critical theory and pedagogy and of EE/EfS is counterposed with theoretical reflections and insights from the author's more than three decades of teaching experience (primarily in Greece). A discussion of the instructor's key pedagogical influences and the evolution of her (my) instructional practices follows, with the aim to identify instructional practices that have a transformative potential, within the context of the challenges and the facilitating parameters of contemporary societies and educational contexts. The instructor's self-reflections and students' qualitative comments are used in a variety of research methods: a self-study research approach drawing on the author's self-reflections as instructor and an analysis of students' qualitative comments in course evaluations and other informal evaluative situations.

This chapter provides guidelines and strategies for higher education faculty and faculty developers who wish to implement inquiry-based teaching models online. The chapter focuses on two specific inquiry-based (IB) instructional models: guided and open inquiry as these two models are considered more relevant to higher education students. The chapter will present validated processes for implementing IB teaching models and consider how these processes can be authentically replicated in online learning environments. The chapter will also examine issues and challenges involved in implementing IB teaching models online. Grounded in the challenges that faculty face in translating their instructional practice in online environments, the chapter suggests strategies and interactive tools to scaffold and model IB learning in online environments.

In recent years, we have seen a paradox. No matter how much the government strives to incorporate technology into classrooms as a learning resource for students, both national and international reports prove that this is a difficult aim to achieve purpose. Training both preservice and in-service teachers is vitally important for technology to become part of everyday school life. But to achieve this, we must move away from the techno-centric focus of technology. This chapter analyzes the importance of focusing on implementing technologies in the learning activities that teacher-trainers design to prepare preservice teachers. We describe seven types of activities: assimilative, informative management, applicative, communicative, productive, experiential, and evaluation. All of these technology-based learning activities, organized in learning sequences, potentially help teachers to come to terms with technological knowledge in their pedagogical content area.

The ability for learners to interact online via their avatars in a 3-D simulation space means that virtual worlds afford a host of educational opportunities not offered by other learning technology platforms, but their use also raises several pertinent issues that warrant consideration. This chapter reviews the educational use of virtual worlds from a design perspective. Virtual-world definitions are explored, along with their key educational characteristics. Different virtual-world environments are briefly contrasted, including Second Life, Active Worlds, Open Sim, and Minecraft. A wide variety of virtual-world uses in schools and universities are examined so as to understand their versatility. Key educational benefits of virtual worlds are distilled from the literature, such as the ability to facilitate 3-D simulations, role-plays, construction tasks, and immersive learning. Emergent issues surrounding the use of virtual worlds are also analyzed, including cognitive load, safety, and representational fidelity. One higher education and one school level vignette are provided in order to offer more detailed insight into the use of virtual worlds in practice. Recommendations for learning design and implementation are presented, based on the thematic analysis of contemporary virtual-worlds research.

This chapter is about the production, diffusion and use of knowledge seen in an economic perspective. Fundamental distinctions between tacit and explicit knowledge and between know-how, know-why, know-what and know-who are related to distinctions between public/private and local/global knowledge. It is argued that the idea of the economy as being knowledge based is misleading and that we have moved into a learning economy where interactive learning is a key to economic performance of firms, regions and nations. This is one reason why a narrow economic perspective is insufficient. When it comes to understand industrial dynamics in the learning economy it is necessary to bring in other disciplines than economics in the analysis.

This chapter presents a case study of the ways the Phoebe pedagogic planner assists faculty to design and select e-learning technology because “it's not the technology, but the [quality] of the educational experience that affects learning” (Seltz, 2010, p. 1). Faculty applied guidance from Phoebe to evaluate various interactive media options for undergraduate psychology courses to enhance student learning and engagement. The authors discuss the application of instructional technology in Introduction to Psychology, Cross-cultural Psychology, and Human Motivation and Emotion courses. These projects were prompted by earlier work (Hager & Clemmons, 2010) that explored collaboration to promote integration of technology in traditional courses. The new technologies include discussion forums; online simulations, cases and assessments; text-to-poll; and the Moodle learning management system (LMS). Current theories of e-learning are applied to analyze and critique these projects, concluding with recommendations for future research, practice, and faculty development to incorporate learning technologies. The authors demonstrate how learner-centered collaboration among faculty, researchers, and administrators can shape and improve student engagement and develop institutional cultures of e-learning.

Nipissing University in North Bay, Ontario, Canada, working in partnership with leading health science centers in Toronto, Ontario, has developed a unique second-degree entry Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BScN) program called the Scholar Practitioner Program. This program is a response to the increasing demand for nursing programs which builds on prior university learning.

The program uses an educational model based on narrative inquiry and cognitive apprentice pedagogies. Narrative inquiry pedagogy is the overarching philosophical framework of the program, which embraces values that connect teachers and learners. A spirit of inquiry is cultivated in every student and a research culture embedded in the student’s practice.

The six-semester two-year full-time program occurs in a learner-driven environment which shapes how specific semester program objectives are met. A strong emphasis is placed on experiential learning within the Toronto-based academic health sciences centers.

A continuous interactive process involving teachers and learners encourages self-directed learning and participant accountability. Application of knowledge and skills in a professional, caring, and holistic manner is expected. This type of undergraduate learning environment which includes immersion in the employment milieu enables the future scholar practitioner to be relevant in the evolving profession of nursing.

Health profession education has evolved to incorporate didactic instruction and experiential learning opportunities over time. Constructivism and interprofessional education are essential theoretical concepts that have shaped modern health profession education. However, transformative active learning is an approach that is particularly well suited to the needs of healthcare professionals. By integrating theoretical knowledge with practical skills, transformative active learning helps prepare students for the complex challenges they will face in their future careers and encourages them to become agents of change committed to improving healthcare practice. Saudi National Institute of Health (Saudi NIH) is one of the Ministry of Health's initiatives in the National Transformation Program 2020 to achieve the Kingdom's Vision 2030, as it supports biomedical research in the health sector in Saudi Arabia. One of the mandates of Saudi NIH is to build the research capacity through well-designed educational and training programs through the directory of education and research skills adopting active learning strategies. This chapter aims to communicate the methodological framework of the Education and Research Skills Directory of the SNIH for integrating active learning in the various training programs and initiatives aiming to promote the core learning capabilities with excellence, diversity, diversity, uniqueness, competency, and efficiency values.

This chapter provides a comprehensive review of research and developments relating to the use of Web 2.0 technologies in education. As opposed to early educational uses of the Internet involving publication of static information on web pages, Web 2.0 tools offer a host of opportunities for educators to provide more interactive, collaborative, and creative online learning experiences for students. The chapter starts by defining Web 2.0 tools in terms of their ability to facilitate online creation, editing, and sharing of web content. A typology of Web 2.0 technologies is presented to illustrate the wide variety of tools at teachers’ disposal. Educational uses of Web 2.0 technologies such as wikis, blogs, and microblogging are explored, in order to showcase the variety of designs that can be utilized. Based on a review of the research literature the educational benefits of using Web 2.0 technologies are outlined, including their ability to facilitate communication, collaborative knowledge building, student-centered activity, and vicarious learning. Similarly, issues surrounding the use of Web 2.0 tools are distilled from the literature and discussed, such as the possibility of technical problems, collaboration difficulties, and plagiarism. Two case studies involving the use Web 2.0 tools to support personalized learning and small group collaboration are detailed to exemplify design possibilities in greater detail. Finally, design recommendations for learning and teaching using Web 2.0 are presented, again based on findings from the research literature.