My research interests in Distance Education revolve around the issues of how new technologies can be used and developed to support interesting forms of pedagogy, and how that compares with methods used in traditional teaching. I’m mostly focussed on teaching at the undergraduate and especially the graduate level. I have been teaching masters level classes that were part of online degrees since 1990, first through the department of Educational research at Lancaster University within their Advanced Learning and Technology group, and then since 1997 through the LEEP programme here at UIUC. I'm particulary interested in the challenges of teaching technological courses at a distance, addressing ways of teaching programming and other computer-based concepts using CSCW technologies to solve the problems that we normally address by a hands-on lab class. The kinds of collaborative learning that take place in a lab also need to be supported when the participants are scattered geographically, and may be in different time zones.
Recently, along with Karen Ruhleder, I’ve written a paper looking at the use of music masterclass techniques and their implications for technology teaching.
I’m also thinking about the broader impacts of this technology on Universities
and educational practice, including comparing it with earlier changes,
like the
invention of printing.