Evaluations suggest that, within construction related professional courses, technical aspects are the most difficult to teach. This is particularly evident in the teaching of architectural students as many fail to make the link between Construction Technology and the main thrust of architectural education: the Design Studio. The teaching of Construction Technology has, until now, been very much an instructor centred, didactic exercise with little interaction among students or between students. In sharp contrast, Design Studio is dependent on the visual and graphical processes and occurs in settings where students interact informally with their peers and design tutors. If Design Studio can be managed in a student centred and hands on environment, why can't courses in Construction Technology / Tectonics be delivered in a similar atmosphere? This was the challenge faced by the project team as they undertook a project in changing practice through innovative teaching in Construction Technology at The University of Hong Kong. This paper reports on the process and progress of this project where there has been an attempt to shift the pedagogical practices in Tectonics. Changes in students' learning of Tectonics, the issues associated with collaboration between instructors and students, between instructors & instructors and across departments are discussed.
[Copyright of Australian Society for Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education (ascilite) at http://www.ascilite.org.au]

Web-based leaching opens new opportunities for international collaboration in offering courses to students. It also allows students to attend courses offered by instructors situated outside their own country. This paper presents the lessons learned from one such course offered by instructors located in Texas and Hong Kong to students residing in Shanghai studying in a collaborative Master of Social Service Management Programme (MSSM) between HKU and Fudan University. The course, titled 'Information and Communication Technology for Social Service Organizations,' was offered twice in the past two years using an Internet-based class chat room supported by a course website and other web based tools. While the offering was successful based on student evaluations, many problems and issues had to be addressed. The course background, learning outcomes, lessons learned, and future recommendations are presented. In addition, an analysis of the Shanghai student IT applications is provided to help understand the current state of human services IT in China.
[Copyright of Journal of Technology in Human Services is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1300/J017v25n01_04]