This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the International Conference on ICT in Teaching and Learning, ICT 2012, held in Hong Kong, China, in July 2012. The 19 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. They explore the use of information technology to improve learning and teaching and showcase innovative pedagogical practices. The papers are organized in topical sections on the construct of student engagement and the applications of ICT; emerging pedagogies through ICT; applications of ICT in teaching and learning; research/case studies on ICT in engaged learning; and finally three papers on open textbooks, which address the current problems with conventional textbooks in Hong Kong.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the International Conference on ICT in Teaching and Learning, ICT 2012, held in Hong Kong, China, in July 2012. The 19 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from numerous submissions. They explore the use of information technology to improve learning and teaching and showcase innovative pedagogical practices. The papers are organized in topical sections on the construct of student engagement and the applications of ICT; emerging pedagogies through ICT; applications of ICT in teaching and learning; research/case studies on ICT in engaged learning; and finally three papers on open textbooks, which address the current problems with conventional textbooks in Hong Kong.

The major purpose of this book is to present and discuss current thinking, theories, conceptual frameworks, models and promising examples of engaged learning with emerging technologies. Contributions come from distinguished academics in the USA, Canada, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, China, Korea and Singapore. Following from a constructivist orientation, coupled with social cultural dimensions of learning, this volume documents how emerging learning technologies are appropriated into meaningful and engaged learning and instructional situations. The field of learning technologies is grounded on the theoretical constructs of the learning sciences and thus the chapters in this book balance between theory and practice and prepositions and solutions.

This book discusses the development of the next generation learning spaces with emerging technologies. These spaces result from the combined needs of classroom stakeholders, such as instructors and learners, with classroom elements, such as tools and technologies, pedagogy and content. The book presents discussions and studies on issues, possibilities and implications of these changes for next generation education. Novel ideas, and studies on these all-encompassing, blended roles of technologies in next generation learning spaces are clearly presented. Suggestions on how the benefits they offer can be maximized are also discussed. Engaging learning technologies have remained central in education for assisting instructors to teach and learners to learn, more effectively. However, recent technological growth is creating a system in which previous divides between key classroom concepts and stakeholders are getting progressively blurred. This is giving rise to next generation learning spaces where elements and stakeholders are blended into one. The book addresses the future of learning environments based on these perspectives.

Gerry Stahl Drexel University, Philadelphia, USA The theme of engaged learning with emerging technology is a timely and important one. This book proclaims the global relevance of the topic and sharpens its focus. I would like to open the book by sketching some of the historical context and dimensions of application, before the chapter authors provide the substance. Engagement with the world - To be human is to be engaged with other people in the world. Yet, there has been a dominant strain of thought, at least in the West, that directs attention primarily to the isolated individual as naked mind. From classical Greece to modern times, engagement in the daily activities of human existence has been denigrated. Plato (340 BC/1941) banished worldly engagement to a realm of shadows, removed from the bright light of ideas, and Descartes (1633/1999) even divorced our minds from our own bodies. It can be suggested that this is a particularly Western tendency, supportive of the emphasis on the individual agent in Christianity and capitalism. But the view of people as originally unengaged has spread around the globe to the point where it is now necessary everywhere to take steps to reinstate engagement through explicit efforts. Perhaps the most systematic effort to rethink the nature of human being in terms of engagement in the world was Heidegger’s (1927/1996). He argued that human existence takes place through our concern with other people and things that are meaningful to us.

This book explores the technologies that can be used in curricula to make education “smarter” and more adaptive in order to better meet the needs of today’s learners. The main emphasis is based on the theory and best practices of incorporating emerging technologies into curricula so as to educate learners in the 21st century. The book provides valuable insights into the future of education and examines which pedagogies are most suitable for integrating emerging technologies. It will help educators and stakeholders design and implement curricula that effectively prepare learners for the challenges of tomorrow.

Highlighted are the pedagogical, organizational, cultural, social, and economic factors that influence the adoption and integration of emerging technologies in distance education. Advice is offered on how educators can launch effective and engaging distance education initiatives, in response to technological advancements, changing mindsets, and economic and organizational pressures.

This book provides contemporary examples of the ways in which educators can use digital technologies to create effective learning environments that support improved learning and instruction. These examples are guided by multiple conceptual and methodological traditions evolving from the learning sciences and instructional technology communities as well as other communities doing important work on learning technologies. In particular, the book provides examples of technology innovations and the ways in which educators can use them to foster deep understanding, collaboration, creativity, invention, and reflection. Additional examples demonstrate the ways in which emerging mobile and networked technologies can help extend student learning beyond the confines of the classroom wall and support student-directed learning and new media literacies.

"The authors examine how social studies teachers can use web 2.0 tools to augment instruction in their classrooms, using a pedagogical framework SOURCES to enable students to engage in historical inquiry with primary sources in an informed and scaffolded fashion. SOURCES is an acronym to identify the steps ofhistorical inquiry: Scrutinizing the fundamental sources; organizing thoughts; understanding the context; reading between the lines; corroborating and refuting; establishing a plausible narrative; summarizing final thoughts. The use of Web 2.0 tools, such as social networks and blogs, are omnipresent among students, and their integration into the learning experience is intended to increase motivation, collaboration, and visualization of student work, as well as "providing opportunities and venues for sharing work and solutions globally." Per the authors, "this book will provide a detailed collection and rationale for the implementation of a wide array of emerging technological applications into the teaching and learning process, their role in supporting each phase of the SOURCES pedagogical framework, and varied examples of the merging of technological and pedagogical applications in the social studies classroom""--