Higher Education in the Digital Age

With the rapid development of technology and the Internet today, the traditional way of education is increasingly lagging behind the modern approaches and the so-called e-learning. Computers and computer software are now an integral part of many areas of human activities, specifically the area of education. Many e-learning software programs have been developed in recent years, which either assist the traditional way of learning or aim to completely replace it. E-learning is a term that describes the learning that takes place anywhere and at any time the computer is connected to a particular network. E-learning is a web-based environment used by all individuals who want to learn and expand their knowledge. Different e-learning materials are available in several formats, such as text, audio, video, photos, presentations, and online tests. Due to its characteristics and unique features in the acquisition of new knowledge, it is a generally accepted opinion that e-learning has the same values as the conventional classroom learning. Instructional design for e-learning improved over the years, by using established principles of teaching which in turn brings enormous benefits for students. As a result, a number of colleges, universities, business organizations and other institutions around the world started offering fully accredited digital study curricula to their students. Evaluation of student performances while acquiring new knowledge online is an important process to justify the many advantages of e-learning. Many research studies have been performed to compare students’ results in both traditional and online learning systems, leading to important findings and best practice recommendations. This book edition covers different aspects of the digital education, including distance education, education technologies in the 21-st century, students’ performances in online learning systems, as well as several case studies about practicing higher education in the digital age in different countries around the world. Section 1 focuses on technology-assisted learning, describing virtual world as a creative technology to support student transition into higher education, two digital environments that support teaching and educational innovation, videography in the 21st century higher education, interactive digital games for geography teaching, and toolkits for real time digital audio signal processing teaching laboratory. Section 2 focuses on distance education in the 21-st century, describing higher education leadership distance Ph.D. program, wikis and blogs in the distance education, collaborative peer assessment processes in higher distance education, information environment of distance learners, and distributed intelligent tutoring system architectures. Section 3 focuses on improving students’ performances in the digital age, describing pedagogical implications of implementing new technologies to enhance student engagement, enhancing student engagement via digital storytelling, methods and tools for increasing the effectiveness of e-learning, and improvement of library information services in higher education facilities. Section 4 focuses on case studies from different countries, describing virtual collaborative learning environments with a telepresence platform in Columbia, implications of distance education for Ghana’s under-served high schools, e-learning evolution and experiences at the University of Zaragoza, and advanced pedagogical approaches at Slovak universities.