Activity structures: Basic frameworks for classroom activities that can be easily adapted to fit a wide range of course variables. Dr. Judi Harris describes these.

Asynchronous: Occurring at different times. In the context of communication, the label asynchronous is used with technologies such as email and threaded discussions where users communicate with no expectation of receiving an immediate response from other communicators.

CMC: Computer Mediated Communication. Communication between two or more people that is conducted using computers. A variety of different CMC methods, such as email, text-based-chat, and videoconferencing, exist and more are being created.

Communicating: For the purposes of this module communicating is a category of activities in which students engage in a learning environment. Communicating activities are characterized by their purpose, directionality of information flow, and in some cases their placement in the course of study. Communicating activities are undertaken to help students use and test ideas they are formulating, expand their scope of inquiry, build relationships with others, and to learn more about a subject. Communicating activities usually have some degree of bi-directional information exchange. Finally, communicating activities occur throughout the unit of study and are not considered summative in nature.

Computer Mediated Communication: Communication between two or more people that is conducted using computers. A variety of different CMC methods, such as email, text-based-chat, and videoconferencing, exist and more are being created.

Desktop video conferencing: Technology that permits users to communicate via voice and video over phone lines or the network.

Email: Electronic mail. A technology that allows the user to send (usually) text-based messages via a computer network.

Face-to-face: Synchronous communication between two or more people that occurs in real time with all parties being in the same location.

Flame: An attack on a person via a communications media such as email. Flames are sometimes very personal and harsh.

Group-to-group: communication that takes place between a group of people and another group of people. Technologies that support group-to-group communication include chat and conferencing.

Instant messaging: A person-to-person chat environment that allows two users to communicate using (usually) text based messages. Instant messaging is usually thought of as a synchronous communication technology.

Interpersonal exchange: A broad category of activity structures as described by Dr. Judi Harris. Interpersonal exchanges are activity structures feature individuals or groups communicating directly with each other.

Jean Lave: One of the researchers known for situated learning theory.

Jean Piaget: A Swiss scholar who worked in several fields including genetic epistemology and developmental psychology, Piaget developed a stage-based theory of child development that is still taught today.

John Dewey: An American philosopher and educational leader born in 1859 whose work on experiential learning is influential today through constructivism.

Lev Vygotsky: A theorist who developed Social Development Theory. Born in 1896 and living until 1934 his work has been re-discovered following the warming of relations between the old Soviet Union and the United states in the post cold-war world.

Media richness theory: Media Richness Theory is based on the assumption that face-to-face communication is the richest form of human communication because of the ease with which information is transmitted. The information that is transmitted includes the actual message contained in the words of the speaker, and the information about the message, and about the speaker that are contained in cues such as tone of voice, facial expressions and body language. Media Richness Theory holds that all forms of communication have different abilities to carry both types of information and that these characteristics are important to consider when choosing a communication method.

One-to-group: Communication that takes place between one person and a group of people. Technologies that are most often used for one-to-group communication include conferencing and chat.

One-to-one: Communication that takes place between two people. Technologies that support one-to-one communication include email, instant messaging, chat, and conferencing.

Scaffolding: Assistance given by a teacher or coach to a learner that helps them take risks and achieve at a higher level than the learner could on their own.

Situated Learning: A theory of learning that focuses on the contextual nature of learning and the need for creating learning environments that are situated in both physically and socially. Situated learning theory holds that it is difficult to transfer learning from one environment to another.

Social Learning Theory: Vygotsky's theory of development that emphasizes the social nature of learning through language. Vygostky believed that cognitive development in children depends on social interactions during a finite length of time he termed the Zone of Proximal Development.

Social presence theory: A theory that attempts to explain why people experience different degrees of the salience of another person in an interaction.

Synchronous: Occurring at the same time. In the context of communication, the label synchronous is used with technologies such as chat and conferencing, which occur in near real-time. Users in the communication environment send and receive messages with very little lag time.

Text-based chat: Synchronous communication system that lets users type messages to each other.

Text-based discussions: Typically asynchronous interchanges between people using technologies such as bulletin boards or threaded discussions.

Video conferencing: Technology that permits users to communicate via voice and video over phone lines or the network.

Voice-enabled chat: Chat environments that include the capability for participants to use sound capabilities of their computers to hear each other speak in near real-time.

Webcasting: Transmitting a video and/or audio signal via the Internet. Webcasting can be near real-time and synchronous or asynchronous.

Zone of Proximal Development: This is Lev Vygotsky's term for the time between which a child can solve a certain problem only with help from another and the time when the child can solve the same problem on their own. Vygotsky believed that the ZPD was a crucial time for full social engagement of the child in order to achieve maximum learning.