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This article takes the perception of ethnography as not being generalisable and questions whether such an understanding is not only correct but also a helpful attitude in developing formative approaches to educational technology research. The article explores how an ethnographic approach to exploring the failure of technology interventions to have the effect on education hoped for by their developers might provide some guidance to others. It looks at research on technology in education institutions and how such studies might be improved through the use of ethnographically generated design principles. The aim of the article is to encourage discussion about ethnography as a tool for technology researchers, where institutions are treated as a socio-technical system. It will be argued that such studies require localised understanding prior to interventions being developed, but that mutable design principles can provide a generalised starting point for formative research projects.

This article explains the general background to my research study and lays out the groundwork for developing a systems theory approach to studying quality improvement activity - subsequent articles add more detail and a model approach to take

The collection of electronic course templates suggested in this article results from collaborative investigation between instructional support staff and academic staff users of the virtual learning environment (VLE) at two institutions, one in the United Kingdom and the other in the United States. The particular VLE in use at both institutions was Sakai, although the experience described here can be applied to the design process and workflow using any VLE that allows the selection and some configuration of standard tools.

We applied the lattice model of Hill, Fresen and Geng (2012) to design and build a set of six course site templates, which are used as the basis on which site owners can easily build new sites in the VLE. As the ultimate goal of template provision is to underpin pedagogy, academics are free to use a template or build a site from scratch, based on their own teaching context, and they may adapt any template according to the pedagogical purpose and nature of the course. The underlying assumptions are that academic staff retain full control over the content, tools and permissions in their new site. The templates are not mutually exclusive – that is, aspects from any template may be incorporated, where applicable, into another one.

We conclude that it is helpful for the VLE support team to take the lead in proposing a set of templates according to the predominant teaching and learning models in use at a particular institution, which may contribute to consistency across course sites and ultimately result in an improved student learning experience.

Lecturers in higher education often consider the incorporation of web technologies into their teaching practice. Partially structured and populated course site templates could aid them in getting started with creating and deploying web-based materials and activities to enrich the teaching and learning experience. Discussions among instructional technology support staff and lecturers reveal a paucity of robust specifications for possible course site features that could comprise a template. An attempted mapping from the teaching task as understood by the instructor to the envisaged course website properties proves elusive. We conclude that the idea of an initial state for a course site, embodied in a template, remains useful and should be developed not according to a formula but with careful attention to the context and existing pedagogical practice. Any course template provided for the use of lecturers should be enhanced with supporting instructions and examples of how it may be adapted for their particular purposes.

This paper reports on the re-design of the Advanced Certificate in Education (ACE) programme, which is offered by the University of Pretoria through distance education (DE) to teachers in rural South Africa. In 2007, a team re-designed the programme with the goal of promoting access, quality, and student support. The team included an independent body, the South African Institute of Distance Education (SAIDE), and various education specialists. Training workshops for academics and a comprehensive internal and external review process contributed to the quality of the re-designed programme. Interactive web-based technologies were not included because of poor Internet connectivity; however, the authors note the use and potential of cell phone technology for DE programmes. Student support was enhanced by an additional short contact session, a capping assignment, a CD-ROM, and decentralised tutoring at contact venues. The programme was re-evaluated and approved in 2008, and the re-design methodology now guides similar projects.

The term e-learning embraces the use of a variety of electronic delivery media to facilitate and enhance learning. Examples of various delivery media are online (web-supported), stand-alone multimedia, interactive television, virtual classrooms, video conferencing, etc. This paper focuses on web-supported learning (WSL) , as a subset of e-learning. The term web-supported learning is preferred over web-based learning (WBL) or online