[[alternative]]Curriculum Presentation with the Hierarchical Hyper Concept-Map System

[[abstract]]The purpose of this study was to develop a web-based hierarchical hyper concept-map (HHCM) system and provide the curriculum developer a computer-networked environment for instructional material and distant learning. The learning effect of the HHCM instructional material were compared with the linear text material and the hypermedia material with global navigation map. The major findings are as following: Concept map is suitable for presenting and designing the structure of hypermedia material. The HHCM instructional material have the following characteristics: (a) offering the linkage between curriculum structure and curriculum content; (b) facilitating the combination of curriculum design and curriculum content presentation; (c) presenting the content with two kinds of navigational structure; (d) being able to present the majority of currently applied document formats; and(e) can be easily used by teachers without professional computer skills. The HHCM material combine hypermedia with the global navigation and concept-map navigation within each node. The experiments about the learning effect of computer hardware concepts for junior high school students revealed that the HHCM material resulted in better learning effect than the linear text material, and had the same effect with the global navigation-map material. The reason that the HHCM material had better learning effect than the linear text material may be due to the design of global navigation device. The hypermedia material with both the global navigation and the concept map navigation produced better reading performance than the global navigation hypermedia material and the linear text material. Most of the subjects in this study expressed positive attitude after learning with the HHCM or the global navigation material. The learning effect of subjects with different cognitive style(field-independent or field-dependent) are not affected by different kinds of course presentation. Subjects with different cognitive styles show no significant difference on their attitudes toward the usability and acceptance of the HHCM system.