Analysis and improvement of teaching processes and environments with Internet-related tools

Abstract

Nowadays, universities and colleges seek e-learning solutions to permit students to learn at different places and times from the usual classes, and e-teaching tools to assist teachers to handle their increasing numbers of students. Inexpensive and platform-independent tools are useful to professors who want to cope with their teaching without more work and with limited resources such as people, machinery, and Internet bandwidth. To improve work processes in the educational environment, particularly in teaching quantitative, problem-solving subjects, the development, dissemination and use of Internet-related tools would be welcomed. Several Internet-related tools or projects are ongoing under Professor John C. Nash in the School of Management at the University of Ottawa. The E-tutor project to date has shown the merit of the concept of a "watch the student work" teaching method that can be (in part, at least) implemented using WWW-type tools running at low bandwidth with more than 100 students. These tools are, however, not yet organized perfectly. It is also important that their advantages and weaknesses be analyzed and placed in context with other solutions that are being developed and implemented.