This thesis follows the trail of a perennial problem in the written work of pupils studying GCSE French, and suggests a CALL solution. The motivation for the research lies in the decline of grammatical accuracy, particularly in verb use, in the French produced by mixed-ability pupils and university students alike. Theories of language acquisition are assessed and a limited amount of guidance emerges. French GCSE Examiners' Reports then provide a firm foundation for research with their suggestion that the rise in oral work has affected written standards. A review of the literature reveals a wide range of barriers to verb learning. These can be classified as linguistic, psycholinguistic and pedagogic. One of the most impenetrable barriers is the redundancy of many verb endings. Empirical evidence from written and interview data is presented to show the startling kinds of misconceptions held by many pupils about verbs,and the complex of systems learners devise to solve problems. The thesis then proposes an explicit grammar-teaching approach based on principles of pedagogical grammar. Current Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) approaches to verb teaching offer admirable formal practice for able pupils but do not cater for the difficulties experienced by less able learners, who may therefore be disenfranchised. Detailed proposals are given for the creation of 'mixed-ability CALL' for verb learning, followed by a description of the design and production processes of three new programs aimed at less able pupils. Further empirical work is undertaken with GCSE pupils in order to assess the effects of tutorial, game and 'cognitive' CALL approaches. The quantitative data show that written performance can improve after using these programs. However, the most striking result of CALL intervention is the transformation of weak pupils' spoken metalanguage from restricted grammatical expression to accurate verb articulation within a short space of time.

This thesis details the derivation and implementation of a Computer Based Learning (CBL) design and development model UDRIPS, UDRIPS stands for Universal picture; Definitions; Rules; Illustrative examples; Problem solving; Summary. The need for the model was highlighted as a result of involvement in the Teaching and Learning Technology Programme, Phase Two (TLTP-2) project W.I.S.D.E.N. (Wide-ranging Integrated Software Design Education Network). Courseware produced within the consortium covered several topics within the area of software design and development. The model was constructed by combining principles from the software engineering and pedagogic areas. This allowed courseware to be built which adhered to basic software engineering principles but which was also pedagogically valid. The model was designed to be an addendum to existing CBL development methods and is intended primarily to enhance the instructional design phases of those methods. This can be seen to be a mirror of the types of techniques enjoyed by software engineers and which are inherent in the software design and development methods in that field. To test the model, CBL courseware was developed in a topic of Structured Methods, Entity-Relationship Modelling. This courseware formed the basis for a number of usability and learning effectiveness evaluations. Based on the results of the evaluations and further research both the material and the model were refined. UDRIPS, the refined CBL design and development model, was distributed to the members of the consortium involved in the W.I.S.D.E.N. project and their reactions and use of the model observed and noted. The courseware produced by the members was also evaluated with respect to its usability and effectiveness.

This work sets out to establish principles for the design and evaluation of a computer-based vocabulary-learning strategy for foreign language learners. The strategy is intended to assist non-beginner learners who are working on their own, to acquire new words in such a way that they will be available when needed in subsequent communicative situations. The nature of vocabulary-learning is examined from linguistic, psychological and educational perspectives, and a strategy for autonomous learning is derived which emphasizes the processes of: selection of new items from text, mental lexicon- building through the association of items on the basis of their lexical-structural features, and practising productive recall of items by activating the same associations as were used to build the mental network. This strategy is considered from the point of view of the support it would need from a computer-based interaction, and the field of Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) for vocabulary is reviewed for examples of system design which meet the strategic and interactional requirements. Specifications are produced, based on general principles for the design of computer-assisted learning, and on current technological capability to integrate large text-databases and on-line lexical tools such as dictionaries etc., within an interface which facilitates learner control and exploration. Questions of evaluation are considered, in the light of the computer's ability to record interaction data, and a psycholinguistic model of word production is proposed as a basis for assessing the learner's performance in terms of processes as well as quantitative 'end product'. A general model of deep and surface approaches to learning is then adduced to provide a way of interpreting learner subjective data, and an independent means of evaluating the quality of the learning outcome. A system implementing the strategy is tested with learners of Spanish and English, and the quantitative and qualitative data on learning process and outcome is analyzed in depth. The system is shown to support the learning objectives for learners who adopt a deep approach, or whose approach complements the assumptions of the design in some way, and the general design principles are therefore considered as validated. Some aspects of the strategy related to lexicon-building, however, are shown to be inadequately supported, as is the capability of the system to help learners remediate surface approaches. The main conclusion of the study is that, whilst learner exploration of powerful lexical information resources is essential for autonomous vocabulary-learning, on-line tutorial help of the kind that will encourage deep rather than surface approaches, is needed to optimise the quality of the learning outcome.

This research focuses on the complex processes of inertia and change achieved through a case study approach. The innovation in question is the use made by secondary school geography departments of computer assisted learning. This longitudinal study (between 1983 and 1989) studies a selection of schools in two local education authorities. Particular emphasis is placed on the enabling and constraining roles of a range of 'actors' and 'environments'. 'Actors' include geography teachers, heads of department, advisers and heads. 'Environments' include departments, schools, local education authorities and Microelectronics Education Programme (M EP) regions. The structure of the thesis is as follows: The researcher's personal interests and involvement in curriculum development and IT and geography education are outlined; the literature on innovation, change and IT and geography education is reviewed; this is followed by the focus and related research design; the wider context of the nineteen eighties is portrayed both as 'educational' and 'IT' environments before the core and peripheral data is analysed via 'portraits' and 'themes'; existing theoretical models are applied to the data and then new models are developed to help describe and explain the data; the research is concluded by pointing out its limitations, making some personal (the authors) observations and suggesting opportunities for further research.

No description available.

No description available.

The research described in this thesis is concerned with the design of hypertext-based learning systems. More specifically, it is concerned with investigating the effects of visualising semantic relations between nodes on learning in hypertext-based learning systems. One of the most commonly cited problems with hypertext is the distraction that stems from the high level of learner control in hypertext systems. This might partly be responsible for the fact that there are few evaluations of hypertext in education which have shown the strength of hypertext over other media in terms of learning outcomes. In order to ease the problem of distraction so as to improve the application of hypertext in education, an approach employing visible link-types is proposed. It is hypothesised that labelling links explicitly with semantic relations between nodes can lower the learner's cognitive overheads in making navigational decisions so as to improve learning. It is also hypothesised that this kind of labelling can make the conceptual model of the knowledge domain intuitively clearer to the learner and thus facilitate learning. A set of three empirical studies has been conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach in different situations, using different methodologies. The results found from these studies demonstrate that visualisation of semantic relations between nodes has potential for improving the use of hypertext for learning.

Education does not take place in a vacuum, it is a terrain where conflicting ideologies compete and relations of power are inscribed. Despite, however, the accumulation of studies illustrating the social and political nature of schooling, sociological work concerned with educational computing is in short supply; with few exceptions, sociologists of education have not directly addressed educational computing. The development of IT in education in the last two decades has been largely uncritical and the field has been dominated by technocentric approaches. This thesis is an effort to develop a sociological language for understanding educational computing and suggests that the introduction and use of IT in education should be situated within its social, political and cultural context. Appropriating ideas from the sociology of education, sociology of technology and cultural studies, the thesis uses a cultural circuit analysis of Logo progran1I11ing language as a case-study in the sociology of culture in order to illustrate some of the ways in which the introduction of new technologies in education may interplay with the maintenance and/or transformation of existing power relations. The first part of the thesis raises questions that strive to situate technological products -and particularly computers in education- within a sociological paradigm. It establishes four main arguments that run through the whole study: • that most existing accounts of IT in education are inadequate; • that sociology of education and cultural studies can -and should- add to our social perspectives on the use of IT in education; • that technological artefacts used in education are socially constructed and can be analysed in terms of a "circuit of cultural production"; • that we could demonstrate the utility of such a model by running it through the development and implementation of a major IT phenomenon, that is Logo. In the second part of the thesis, analysis is divided in five parts (five analytically distinct "moments"). Through reconstructed accounts of participants and secondary sources, analysis of "moment" 1 (production) demonstrates the contingent and unstable nature of Logo as constantly changing and developing technology in the context of the decision-making processes. Analysis of "moment" 2 (text) discusses Logo as a "text", its "philosophy" for education, and the embodiment of its epistemological principles in the technical design of the language. Analysis of "moment" 3 (marketing/economics) discusses the role of marketing, politics, and economics in the development and evolution of Logo; it illustrates that the activities of mediators like government departments and the microcomputer industrial lobby were crucial to the modification and redevelopment of Logo beyond the context of its initial development. Analysis of "moment" 4 (context) situates the introduction of Logo to mainstream schools within its social and political context suggesting that the disintegration of "progressive" education largely constituted the context for the "decline" of Logo during the process of restructuring of formal education in the late 1970s and 1980s. Against this background, analysis of "moment" 5 (consumption) discusses the ways in which Logo was received in the educational arena and was implicated in the politics of educational innovation, looking into the place that Logo occupied within the institutional and organisational cultures of mainstream schools. Finally, based on the discussion of Logo as a case-study and the findings thereof, the thesis summarises the main analytic and methodological messages and points to directions for further research.

No description available.

No description available.