Questia online library overview

http://www.questia.com/

Overview:

Questia is the first online library that provides 24/7 access to the world's largest online collection of books and journal articles in the humanities and social sciences, plus magazine and newspaper articles. Its resources are selected by professional collection development librarians. Undergraduate, high school, graduate students, and Internet users of all ages have found Questia to be a valuable online resource.

Questia Offers:

• The world's largest online collection of complete books, journals and articles, searchable by word, phrase, title, author, or subject.
• Scholarly, high-quality books and journal articles from over 300 acclaimed publishers in the humanities and social sciences
• Unlimited use of the books and articles in the collection no matter how many others are reading the same materials .
• Tools to write notes in the margins and highlight passages as if you were working with actual physical books.
• Easy-to-use tools to create footnotes and bibliographies.
• Hyperlinking of footnotes and bibliographies across titles for instant access to other related titles.
• high-tech customer service.
• Available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (The library is never closed)
  
  This online library provides many different e-resources such as:
  
• Book Profiles
• FREE Encyclopedia
• Journals
• Magazines
• Newspapers
• Contributors List
• FREE BOOKS
  
  Users can easily subscribe to this service for a reasonable monthly fee or tri a free trial for 72 hours and receive newsletters in their e-mail about every thing new in the library in addition to writing tips, searching strategies and brain tests and quizzes. Some resources are provided for free ( Questia Reading Room) and some require a fee.
  
• It has many categories to choose from such as:
• Art and Architecture
• Communication
• Economics and Business
• Education
• History
• Law
• Literature
• Music and Performing Arts
• Philosophy
• Politics and Government
• Psychology
• Religion
• Science and Technology
• Sociology and Anthropology

Questia provides many features for its users such the ability to read online and as a subscriber to Questia, you get your own personal workspace which enables the subscriber to:

•Create and Manage Projects
•Track Your Research
•Review Your Work
•Produce Instant Bibliographies

Also, Questia library provides Questia Facebook that enables users to interact with other people in their life.

Questia Requirements:

• Operating System Version:
  
• PC: Microsoft,
  MAC: Microsoft Windows(Vista, XP, 2000, NT)
• browser: IE 8.0 ,Mac Microsoft Internet Explorer(Version 6.0, 7.0)Mozilla Firefox(Version 2.0+)
  Microsoft WordOpen Office (Free)Word Perfect**
• Word Processor:
  Mac: Microsoft WordOpen Office (Free)Word Perfect, Microsoft WordApple Works.

Customer Support:

In addition to online help services, If the users encounter any problems the FAQ can't solve, they can turn to the Customer Support team to help which is Available all week days except Saturday through online chat, e-mail or telephone, Questia team is dedicated to ensure customers get the best possible Questia experience.

Literature Review

Teaching in a Web Based Distance Learning Environment:
An Evaluation Summary Based on Four Courses

The problem:
The Center for Research on Learning and Technology at Indiana University conducted an evaluation on four online courses offered by another university to provide criticism concerning strengths and areas where the university can focus efforts to improve its online courses.

Questions:
What are the key strengths of the four online courses offered by the university?
What are the areas of weaknesses of the four courses? And how to overcome them?

Methodology:
The evaluation was done on four online courses offered by another major university (which is not specified) other than Indiana University. The evaluation of the courses was based on the Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education (Chickering & Gamson 1987) and the human computer interface (HCI) designs evaluation was based on Consistency of web page layout and design, Clear organization and presentation of information, Consistent and easy to use web site navigation, aesthetically pleasing design and graphics. The evaluation was conducted by four doctoral students from the Center for Research on Learning and course evaluations were supervised by Prof. Thomas Duffy, in which each evaluator had the lead responsibility in evaluating one different course in terms of understanding the course from a learner’s perspective. The instruments used to do this were:

• Reading all of the course online materials available including the communication threads in the asynchronous conferencing forums
  
• Occasional meetings: throughout the evaluation process, the whole team would meet to exchange notes, discuss their analyses, and identify trends in the data.
  
• interviews: in three of the four cases, a couple of evaluators Interviewed the instructors in person in order to help answer some questions aroused during the evaluation process as well to understand the design and structure of the course from the instructor’s perspective.
  
  Results:
  The four courses strength points were in:
  
• Encouraging Active Learning: the four courses provided authentic real-world assignments.
  
• Encouraging Student-Faculty Contact: by encouraging students to contact them via email and phone.
  
• Respecting Diverse Talents and Ways of Learning: by encouraging students to convey their points of view in the courses in addition, they included learning exercises filled with real-life examples which represented varied perspectives.
  
  Areas that needed improvement in the four courses:
• Encouraging cooperation among students: the interaction between students seemed to some extent. It was recommended to follow the guidelines for asynchronous conferencing to help overcome this problem.
  
• Giving prompt feedback: the feedback became progressively delayed as the semester progressed. It was recommended to give feedback to students within a week of an assignment submission date.
  
• HCI Design: one course in particular required a lot of enhancements to the interface in order to make it more usable (user-friendly) for the students. In addition, the majority of courses could use some improvements in breaking up heavy text pages with appropriate formatting and images.

Some general recommendation for improving the online courses:

• The university should provide chances for and encourage instructors to share their practices and experiences with each other through faculty development workshops, seminars, etc. and offer awards and recognition for motivation.
  
• Instructors and students should be aware on the importance of asynchronous conferencing tools by using them more effectively in their courses.
  
• Encourage instructors to implement course management strategies that do not compromise the quality of the instruction.
  
• Give access to development resources to all School faculty members who are teaching online courses for decreasing their dependent on their own HTML coding skills to develop online materials.