Improving hypermedia teaching resources – new designs for e-learning environments

Abstract

This study aims to offer a set of empirically-based guidelines for the design of hypermedia teaching resources used in computer-mediated educational environments. These criteria are: incorporating additional tools to guide and aid navigation; limiting the use of hypertext structures; the intensive use of various formats (multimedia) and the integration of two editions of the material adapted to two different contexts of reading and study (online and offline). The suitability of these criteria is then determined by developing an integrated set of hypermedia teaching materials based on them and testing the materials in a real e-learning context. The results indicate that the students perceive the new educational material based on the proposed criteria more favourably than the existing teaching resources used in the same learning environment.

What leads people to keep on e-learning? An empirical analysis of users' experiences and their effects on continuance intention

“…For instance, the literature provides some evidence about resource designs and teaching strategies that might go against e-learning continued acceptance. This is because they lead users to either feel lost among all the content and advice presented (Burbules & Callister, 1996;Rodríguez-Ardura, Jiménez-Zarco, Ammetller-Montes, & Pacheco-Bernal, 2009) or to end up completing relevant study activities outside the virtual education environment (Ryan, Valverde, & Rodríguez-Ardura, 2001). What is more, red flags have been raised about instructors' difficulties to meet the diversity of incoming users' requirements (Martí-nez, Miláns del Bosch, Pérez Herrero, & Sampedro Nuño, 2007); and those users who feel isolated tend to abandon the e-learning programmes prematurely (Joo, Lim, & Kim, 2011).…”