Executive SummaryWeb 2.0 technologies are becoming popular in teaching and learning environments. Among them several online collaborative writing tools, like wikis and blogs, have been integrated into educational settings. Research has been carried out on a wide range of subjects related to wikis, while other, comparable tools like Google Docs and EtherPad remain largely unexplored in the literature. This work presents a case study investigating education students' perceptions of collaborative writing using Google Docs and EtherPad. Both tools provide opportunity for multiple users to work on the same document simultaneously, have a separate space for written metacommunication, and are promoted by software designers to be fairly intuitive to adopt without prior training. The work investigates if perceptions depend on factors such as gender, age, digital competence, interest in digital tools, educational settings, and choice of writing tool, and examines if the tools are easy to use and effective in group work. This paper focuses on quantitative results of survey questionnaires. Further qualitative analysis will be presented in a later paper.The theoretical framework is drawn from two learning theories, the social-constructivist learning theory and the community of practice, and their relationships to collaborative tools. Related research literature is characterized by a number of issues: positive elements of use, advantages of using Web 2.0 technologies, critical issues regarding the pedagogical value of Web 2.0, and the role of the teacher in using these technologies.The case study participants were 201 education students who just began their four-year initial teacher education at two study programs with a total of six classes at the university Teacher Education Unit. They were assigned a collaborative writing task and asked to take an on-line survey on completion. When the survey closed, a total of 166 students (83.6%) had participated. The results were analyzed based on frequency distributions.The hypothesis that students with high digital competence and a positive attitude towards digital tools are more positive than average seems to be confirmed. Also gender does not play any particular role. As for younger students being more positive than older, the population of older students was so low that no conclusion can be drawn. The work does not validate that EtherPad users are more positive than Google Docs users, but this may be explained by EtherPad being unavailable for some time during the students' collaborative writing period.Material published as part of this publication, either on-line or in print, is copyrighted by the Informing Science Institute. Permission to make digital or paper copy of part or all of these works for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that the copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage AND that copies 1) bear this notice in full and 2) give the full citation on the first page. It is permissible to abstract these works so long as cre...

Objective: To study whether service of a free school lunch has an impact on weight development and food intake among pupils at a lower secondary school, and to assess the association between self-perceived school behaviour and food intake. Design: A controlled intervention study involving service of a free healthy school lunch to 9th grade pupils took place over 4 months, from January to May 2007. Weight and height were measured before and after the intervention. The pupils also completed a short FFQ and a questionnaire concerning self-perceived school behaviour and the classroom environment before and after the intervention. A healthy food score was calculated using the FFQ data. Setting: All 9th graders at three different lower secondary schools in southern Norway were invited to participate. One school was randomly selected as the intervention school. Subjects: Fifty-eight pupils (91 %) from the intervention school and ninety-two pupils (77 %) from the control schools participated.

Google Docs and EtherPad are Web 2.0 tools providing opportunity for multiple users to work online on the same document consecutively or simultaneously. Over the last few years a number of research papers on the use of these collaborative tools in a teaching and learning environment have been published. This work builds on that of Brodahl, Hadjerrouit, and Hansen (2011) expanding its case study. The theoretical framework is the same as the one underlying Brodahl et al. (2011), drawing on two learning theories, the social-constructivist learning theory and the community of practice, and their relationships to collaborative tools. The literature review is extended to cover the recent research work in the field, related to Web 2.0 technologies in higher education.The case study of Brodahl et al. (2011) involved 201 education students who had just begun their four-year initial teacher education. However, 24 students are omitted in the current work, and the result tables from Brodahl et al. (2011) accordantly updated. Disregarding particular groups of students was due to their specific local dispersion, as they conducted their entire assignment and collectively reflective essay paper at the same physical location and, with respect to this, reported the use of collaborative tools as superfluous and unwanted in their setting.Partly based on the same survey, this work presents a case study investigating education students' perceptions of collaborative writing reflective essay papers. However, where Brodahl et al. (2011) presented a solely quantitative study derived from closed-ended questions, this work incorporates the survey's open-ended questions in a qualitative analysis. The analysis also draws on the students' written reflections on their experiences.The qualitative analysis supports the conclusion of Brodahl et al. (2011) that technical problems were a major issue, mostly related to EtherPad. All but one complaint about technical difficulties stemmed from EtherPad users during a limited period of time. Other major negative feedback concerned group size; several groups pointed out difficulties with organizing the work, problems of Material published as part of this publication, either on-line or in print, is copyrighted by the Informing Science Institute. Permission to make digital or paper copy of part or all of these works for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that the copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage AND that copies 1) bear this notice in full and 2) give the full citation on the first page. It is permissible to abstract these works so long as credit is given. To copy in all other cases or to republish or to post on a server or to redistribute to lists requires specific permission and payment of a fee. Contact Publisher@InformingScience.org to request redistribution permission.Education Students' Use of Collaborative Writing Tools keeping track when editing simultaneously, and failure to produce a unified document. Positive issues frequently m...

Presentation software is an important tool for both student and professorial communicators. PowerPoint has been the standard since it was introduced in 1990. However, new "improved" software platforms are emerging. Prezi is one of these, claiming to remedy the linear thinking that underlies PowerPoint by creating one canvas and permitting the presenter to zoom in and out as each element is introduced. Users can move back and forth to display the separate elements and reflect how they fit into a larger context. As these new tools are introduced, there may be different responses to them depending on the cultural background of the user. In order to understand one such interplay, Prezi was introduced to students in a class in Norway and in the same way to a class in the U.S. The mixed method study compared the introduction of this new software tool to two undergraduate classes in Spring 2012. The two professors used the same introduction to the tool. The output was the final project presentation for the class done using the Prezi tool. Students evaluated each other's presentations on 10 attributes and answered two open-ended questions about the presentations. They also completed an 8-question self-evaluation of their or their team's presentation. The instructor/researchers also used the same questions to evaluate her class. An additional 13 questions were added to the instructor instrument. Each instructor/researcher also viewed videos of the presentations from the other class and evaluated these presentations using the same set of questions.Results showed that both sets of students used the new tool well despite minimal direct instruction. Most made their presentations less linear than they would have been in PowerPoint. They generally used the Prezi technique of grouping elements and constructing a pathway between groups. Most inserted multimedia such as photos, videos, and links. Some especially appreciated the Prezi feature of more than one user being able to work on a presentation at the same time.Peers liked each other's presentations and found them engaging. However, open-ended comments were more directed to actual content than use of Prezi. In student feedback the answer to the first attribute, being engaging, appeared to create a halo for most of the other attributes.In evaluating their peers' presentations, the U.S. students were significantly Material published as part of this publication, either on-line or in print, is copyrighted by the Informing Science Institute. Permission to make digital or paper copy of part or all of these works for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that the copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage AND that copies 1) bear this notice in full and 2) give the full citation on the first page. It is permissible to abstract these works so long as credit is given. To copy in all other cases or to republish or to post on a server or to redistribute to lists requires specific permission and payment of a fee.

ICT training courses have recently undergone some important changes. These changes are made possible by new pedagogical approaches to ICT training. As a result, the focus has changed from memorizing, recall and reproduction of knowledge to conceptual understanding of the underlying software. One of these approaches is the Herskin's understanding-oriented ICT training method. This paper assesses students' learning when confronted with the task of implementing this method. More specifically, it addresses critical factors of success and potential obstacles when implementing the ICT training method in upper secondary schools. It also presents teacher students' common misconceptions and simplifications when practicing the method for the first time. Finally, the article outlines a framework for rethinking ICT training within constructivist learning environments.