Innovations of "E-teaching ties" on learner performance and faculty development

Abstract

In Japan we face the serious problem of students' declined learning performance and lack of intellectual motivation. Many universities have heavily invested in Information Technology (IT) such as e-Learning, e-Portfolio, mobile learning, social media, and cloud computing to motivate students and engage in more proactive learning. However, casual observation suggests that the use of IT remains limited and that its effect seems mixed as a solution to the problems. One of the reasons for its lack of clear effect is that we often ignore the issues associated with faculty development. That is, instructors need to be motivated and learn how to use IT effectively in their teaching before expecting students to perform better. The purpose of this paper is to provide practical solutions to the challenges in motivating both students and instructors by illustrating some instructor-centric technologies and to discussing their impacts on faculty development.