CILT2000 Submissions

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ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2026 5-minute presentation Are We Working Together? Using Handhelds to Assess Student Collaboration Handheld devices have the potential to function as "equity computers" (Tinker, 1999) because of their low-cost and portability across a wide range of settings where students learn-schools, after-school programs, and home, for example. The affordances of handheld devices for field investigations in environmental science have been well-documented by CILT researchers (Soloway, et al, 1999, Staudt & Hsi, 1999). The current research explores the potential of handheld devices to be used to assess small-group collaboration in the context of inquiry-based or project-based learning. To develop these assessments, researchers reviewed educational and psychological research on the social and cognitive dimensions of collaborative learning. Assessment items and rubrics were developed based on this research, and teachers select items for assessment via a Web-based authoring environment. Questions are downloaded to a Palm-OS based device and imported into a commercially-available survey tool. Teachers and students then assess small group collaboration on the handheld device, upload results, and discuss similarities and differences between teachers' and students' ratings. Results of an initial pilot showed that students rated monitoring one another's understanding of the task at hand as more important after using the handheld assessment tool in class. The initial pilot also revealed important limitations to usability of the device and point to the importance of using teacher-friendly categories of student actions, such as "discussing text" or "analyzing data," rather than researcher-identified collaboration processes as beginning points for the assessment. Implications for a re-design are discussed, and an HTML mock-up of a new Palm-OS-based environment will be presented.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2040 5-minute presentation Causal Influence Diagrams as Pedagogical and Assessment Tool Advances in educational technology have led to interest in providing meaningful support for learning about complex domains (Alessi, 2000; Spector & Davidsen, 1997; Sterman, 1994). Complex domains are characterized as those with many interrelated components, with non-linear and fuzzy relationships that may change over time, with delayed effects, and with uncertainties due to dependency on human perceptions about some aspects of the system. Simple domains are less dynamic and have predominantly linear relationships among components and variables. It is well established that humans have difficulty in understanding complex systems (Dörner, 1996; Seel, 2000). There are no well-established methods to assess learning outcomes in complex domains. As a consequence, it is difficult to argue that one approach is more effective than another in supporting learning in and about complex domains. The purpose of this paper is to present a method based on causal influence diagrams that can be used to determine progress of learning for complex domains. The assumptions of the method are: (1) learning can be characterized in part as the acquisition of expertise; (2) those considered expert in a complex domain tend to produce similar causal influence diagrams for problem situations in that domain; (3) those new to a complex domain tend to produce varied causal influence diagrams for such problems that are noticeably different from those of experts; and, (4) different pedagogical methods will be more or less effective in producing desired learning outcomes. System dynamicists have used causal influence diagrams as a pedagogical tool to support the acquisition of a holistic view of a complex and dynamic system. We describe how such a tool can be used to determine how new learners think about problems in a domain and how their patterns of thinking change as they progress through a curriculum of instruction.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2072 5-minute presentation Equity Impacts from Formative Assessment Using a Classroom Communication System (CCS) in 3rd through 5th Grades Networked handheld wireless devices hold great potential for improving formative assessment in a remarkably wide range of educational settings. When operated in the context of a classroom communication system (CCS), they also tend to promote pedagogies that are more knowledge-centered, learner-centered, and community-centered. We briefly describe how these effects come about in classrooms, and their impact on increasing equity in learning opportunities for disadvantaged elementary school children.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2097 5-minute presentation Performance Based Assessment A model has been established to evaluate critical thinking and problem solving abilities of middle school students in the area of general science (life, earth, and physical). The model identifies 53 elements of critical thinking and problem solving skills and links subsets of these elements to each step in the solution of a problem. A bank of 55 problem sets have been developed that covers almost all of the concepts in general science for middle school. Each problem set requires between 15-45 minutes for students to complete, depending upon the skill of the student and the nature of the problem. The problems have between 10 and 30 steps required to complete the problem. Upon completing the problem, the student score is portrayed as a profile of proficiency for a subsdet of the critical thinking elements. This profile is used to identify areas of strengths and weaknesses. The diagnostic is then used to assign tutorial items to provide practice on areas of weakness. The cycle for gaining skill in critical thinking and problem solving is: 1. Assign a problem or a task; 2. Analyze the strength and weakness of the students; 3. Debrief with the students and provide guidance in terms of appropriate approaches to master skills that are identified as weak; and 4. Prescribe the appropriate problem to provide practice of needed skills. The system is available for delivery by CD-ROM or by the Internet. Video quality on Internet delivery can be a problem due to the capacity of the Internet. This is obviated by a hybrid system which uses a CD-ROM to deliver the video in the resident computer while the delivery of other information associated with the items is delivered online. The great advantage of the online system is the collection and distribution of aggregate test results to the designated site. This presentation will feature examples of test items, the teacher utility, and the diagnostic and prescriptive features of the system. Collaborators: WestEd; National Science Foundation; Rand; Dan Ochs; Doug Reynolds. Seeking Collaboration with State of Nevada and pilot testing collaborations.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2015 5-minute presentation Gauging Cooperative Learning in the Virtual School: Positive interdependence in Computer-Mediated Group Science Projects The shift in emphasis from rote learning and lecture in science classrooms to active-learning pedagogies such as cooperative learning entails a shift in evaluation strategies away from exclusive reliance on standardized outcome measures. Cooperative learning, for example, focuses attention on interaction-oriented processes. We are researching methods for judging and assessing student and group performance in cooperative learning. Behaviors that contribute to effective and high-achieving cooperative groups are well documented in the literature. Cooperative learning researchers have summarized many of these behaviors in terms of characteristics of a property known as positive interdependence. Computer-mediation also adds a number of challenges to classroom assessment and monitoring. The introduction of computers as collaboration tools in science classrooms can greatly impinge on traditional modes of monitoring and interacting with students. The Learning in Networked Communities (LiNC) project developed network collaborative learning software called the Virtual School and investigated cooperative learning in science projects involving the technology. Innovative methods of documenting distributed computer-mediated group work allowed easy and efficient compiling of comprehensive time-coded transcripts of collaborative group activity. Video observations were transcribed and collated with computer logs to form a rich and comprehensive script of the collaborative activity. Content analysis describing indicators of positive interdependence in the text revealed differences in cooperative interdependence among groups. Investigators related these differences most directly to variation in the structure of the tasks involved in the different projects and to implications of the structure of tasks on different types of students and group dynamics. This research suggests that computer logs and transcripts can help document indicators of positive interdependence and thus may be beneficial to teachers and researchers looking for signs and measures of cooperative learning in computer-mediated collaborative groups.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2018 5-minute presentation Engagement, Assessment & Epistemological Reconciliation in a Technology-Supported Learning Environment A new NSF-funded study builds on prior research of a genetics learning environment known as GenScope to consider how motivation and learning are impacted by new formative assessment practices and by the practices associated with accountability-oriented reforms. Secondary biology teachers in higher-achieving and lower-achieving schools will implement the GenScope computer software within a curricular context that is consistent with contemporary views of learning and instruction (such as outlined in the recent National Research Council report, How People Learn). Within this context, students in different classes will be presented with increasingly explicit learning standards and increasingly salient recognition and/or rewards for performance on a set of formative assessments. Following the framework advanced by Greeno, Collins and Resnick in the 1996 Handbook of Educational Psychology, engagement and learning in each class will be examined using three competing models of knowing & learning (behavioral/empiricist, cognitive/rationalist, and situative sociohistoric). This will be accomplished by having three different researchers (Laura Fredrick, Dan Hickey, and Ann Kruger, respectively) head up three parallel investigations. The results should provide comprehensive evidence regarding new and controversial assessment practices--when employed in contemporary curricular contexts. More broadly, the results will be used to compare different approaches for reconciling competing models of knowing and learning. This is expected to help clarify the relations between competing perspectives and practices, particularly concerning engagement and the motivation—a key prerequisite for developing models of motivation that are relatively consistent with contemporary instructional perspectives. A key aspect of our investigation is studying curricular manipulations that reflect the realistic instantiation of plausible assessment and accountability policies. Another key aspect is the use of research methods that reflect plausible instantiations of different and potentially competing epistemological perspectives. As such, we are particularly interested the input of other researchers regarding the plausibility of both aspects.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2085 5-minute presentation Assessment of Metacognitive Skill within a Scaffolded Learning Environment As part of an ongoing effort to explore new uses for assessment, we have developed a prototype embedded assessment module: a computer-based learning environment for AP Statistics. As with most learning environments, our ultimate goal is for the system to monitor student learning and provide feedback to students and instructors. Unlike most other systems, we seek to assess metacognitive performance - specifically studentsí success in monitoring their own learning - to gain additional insight into student progress and allow for more focused feedback. We are currently developing measures of ìon-lineî knowledge monitoring and comparing those measures to a more established measure, Everson and Tobiasís (1998) Knowledge Monitoring Assessment (KMA) approach. This approach consists of administering a specially designed test twice: first, students are asked to make a rapid judgment as to their ability to answer a question; second, students provide their solutions to each question. Knowledge monitoring success is a function of the consistency between a studentís predicted performance and his/her actual performance. We collaborated with Everson and Tobias in developing a KMA in the domain of statistics (referred to as Stat KMA). Fifteen students in an AP Statistics course completed the Stat KMA as well as several hypothesis-testing problems in our scaffolded learning environment. Our talk will focus on the relationship between knowledge monitoring ability as measured by the KMA with behaviors during problem solving that might reflect knowledge monitoring performance. Collaborators: Malcolm Bauer, Anandi Nagarajan We are interested in collaborating with educators and educational researchers who have observed students' knowledge monitoring. Such collaborations would lend further insights into how knowledge monitoring skill might be automatically detected and, how we might alter our scaffolded learning environment to elicit and detect knowledge monitoring behaviors. For equity, we hope this measure will help students who have traditionally needed more metacognitive support.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2032 5-minute presentation On-line Assessment in Teacher Certification Programs The CalStateTEACH Technology Enhancement Project is a federally funded program designed to infuse technology throughout the California State University System's on-line and field-based teacher credentialing program. A significant component of the project's work centers on using technology to assess intern teacher's proficiency as measured by the California Standards for the Teaching Profession. The project is currently developing on-line, performance-based assessment tools to evaluate and document intern teacher's progress toward reaching these standards.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2029 5-minute presentation Digital Portfolios: A Richer Picture of Student Achievement In many states, the standards movement has transformed into a high-stakes testing movement. In Rhode Island, a group of districts connected with the Rhode Island Skills Commission is attempting to create an alternative method of demonstrating student achievement against standards. A pilot project, begun in the 1999-2000 school year, allows high school students to earn a "certificate of initial mastery" by demonstrating standards in English Language Arts, Mathematics, and "Applied Learning." Students submit information from state-wide assessments, portfolios of class work, and performances on "on-demand" and "extended" tasks (adminstered across all of the pilot districts). This overall set of information is used to determine if the student has met all of the standards, and thus should receive a certificate. This presentation will describe how technology - specifically, web-based portfolios and data collection systems-- is supporting this assessment process. Additional information (at http://www.ideasconsulting.com after 7/31) will describe the issues involved in using such portfolios for large-scale assessment, and the implications for schools that want to use digital portfolios as a lever for school reform. We are looking for collaborators who can particularly help with the technical issues of assessment - such as establishing validity and reliability on performance assessments. We are also looking to learn from folks connecting assessment to changes in school culture. Finally, we might be interested in creating political alliances to demonstrate to policy makers that high standards does not inevitably mean high-stakes standardized testing. Equity: The districts involved with the Skills Commission are urban, suburban, and rural. However, the issue of equity most obviously addressed by the pilot was not demographic, but of educational experience. Students in a "general track" can still demonstrate work that is "on standard"; students who do not test well have other opportunities to demonstrate their abilities.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2060 5-minute presentation Assessing Multimedia-Supported Project-Based Learning: Exploring the Social Life of Rubrics The Challenge 2000: Multimedia Project has had as its goal the dissemination of an exemplary model of student-directed project-based learning that culminates in the development of a multimedia presentation shared with an authentic audience. Supported by funds from a five-year federal Technology Innovation Challenge Grant, the Multimedia Project has been successful in transforming teaching and in improving students' design and communication skills (Penuel & Means, 2000). Part of what has made the project successful has been the role that ongoing assessment has played in the project. Early in the project, a rubric was developed that was initially used to score a small subset of student multimedia products for purposes of program accountability. This rubric has been transformed and re-used in different settings for different purposes in subsequent years. Among the purposes to which this rubric has been put have been: (1) bringing together a mentor-teacher learning community focused on helping peers implement high-quality projects and (2) serving as a document in the classroom that serves as the basis for negotiation between teachers and students about project quality. The use of this rubric in the Multimedia Project illustrates the ways that documents can serve as the means to make and maintain social groups and not just the means to determine and convey results (Brown & Duguid, 1995). Access to documents themselves is not enough to ensure that people can participate in their social life. Access to social practices and the networks in which these documents are used is also necessary. Students and teachers need access to networks and communities of learners where assessments are actively used to negotiate the quality of student work at frequent intervals.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2122 5-minute presentation Designing WISE Assessments that accommodate teacher customizations Collaborator: Marcia Linn How can we bridge the barrier between research innovations and their wide adoption in science classrooms while at the same time improving science instruction? We urge a refocusing of science education research, instructional design, and professional development to support customization in the complex settings where science instruction takes place. Too often, educational research demonstrates exciting learning gains for local students but never scales to schools outside the initial research partnership. We have designed a science learning environment that amplifies the effectiveness of teachers by enabling them to customize our curriculum to state standards, prior student experiences, time commitments, and available resources. We will describe how customization can bridge the gap between educational research and classroom practice using the Web-based Integrated Science Environment (WISE). We will focus on how our WISE assessments are designed to measure student learning gains while also reflecting differences in teacher practice. We designed WISE so that teachers can easily customize projects to help their students without compromising the careful instructional design that underlies its success in our research studies. To encourage students to integrate rather than isolate science ideas, WISE allows teachers and schools to add connections to prior instruction, incorporate personally-relevant problems, link to local science museums or environmental issues, and even customize guidance and assessments. We will present classroom research that contrasts several teachers who each customized the same WISE curriculum project. We describe the customizations and practices employed by these teachers, and evaluate how the WISE technology and curriculum was able to accommodated these different approaches. We then describe how the assessments used in this project were sensitive to teacher differences, but still reflected student learning. These findings will have implications for professional development research, where success of training should be measured according to students' conceptual understanding.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2101 5-minute presentation Supporting Assessment-Intensive Pedagogy: The Design of INFACT -- the Interactive Networked Facet-based Assessment Capture Tool First we describe a new style of pedagogy in which the instructor is primarily occupied with diagnostic assessment of students' understanding of conceptual material. In this method, students work in groups of 4-6 to solve problems, holding online discussions. Teachers and TAs use our software to mark up the students' writing, populating a database with assessment information. By using special visualization tools, teachers can spot trends in the data and apply appropriate interventions to improve their students' understanding. Then we present the design of INFACT, a software suite that supports this pedagogy. INFACT stands for "Interactive Networked Facet-based Assessment Capture Tool." INFACT includes a tool INFACT-FORUM for online student writing, an automated markup rule-editing tool, a manual markup editing tool INFACT-MARKUP, a visualization tool suite INFACT-VIS, and an intervention tool INFACT-ADVISE. INFACT supports the collection of relatively large amounts of assessment data about each student through an unobtrusive process. Students do not respond to "assessment questions" at all, unless a teacher or TA specifically requests that a student resolve some nagging ambiguity in one of her/his assessment records. The archive of student postings serves as the grist for INFACT, and each assessment record references a selection from a posting as evidence for the judgment made. Each record also references a particular "facet" or alternative understanding (or misunderstanding) of a concept, and there are additional fields in the record for assessor certainty, identity, and date and time of assessment. Our experience with INFACT to date, indicates that the new pedagogy that it supports is an important alternative to the traditional presentation-intensive form of teaching. Collaborators: Adam Carlson, David Madigan, Earl Hunt, James Minstrell, Jennifer Wright. Programmers: Adam Carlson, Jeff Phillips, Johann Ammerlahn, Josef Larsson, Justin Husted. Seeking Users. Implications for equity: The pedagogy will support both homogeneous and diverse groups. The text-based interaction can hide skin color, gender, and other superficial characteristics of students. The automated markup tools base their results purely on the inputs they are given.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2079 5-minute presentation Learning by Ambush The phrase "learning by ambush" is internal jargon (thankfully!) of the science center community, applied to a methodology by which a new exhibit or program is made so appealing and fun that a child doesn't realize they've learned the inherent concept, perhaps even when they're done. First question: if a child is having fun, do they need to know they're learning? The Internet offers a quantum leap in the potential of learning by ambush. First, essentially all children are fluent and friendly with computer- and television-based games and interactives, providing a more equitable and familiar medium for both learning and testing. Second, every keystroke and pause can be recorded to provide real-time input to an individual child's performance. Third, dynamic publishing allows a child's learning experience to be modified on the fly based on performance, preferences and curriculum objectives (for example: personalization, remedialization, translation to a more successful learning style, etc). And fourth, a learning profile can be integrated with online services to support and optimize a child's 24x7 education through the variety of media that increasingly connect their lives. These potentials can be realized unconsciously during a child's engaging, immersive experience. Question two: if a child is having fun, do they need to know that they've learned something and in the process thereof been assessed, reported, personally guided and advanced? The author, together with Brainium.com and corporate and institutional partners, has been developing such "embedded learning systems" (safer but less catchy than "learning by ambush"!) within online multimedia interactives for 8 years. Dr. David Vogt holds the David Robitaille Chair in Technology Applications for Mathematics and Science Education at the University of British Columbia and is actively pursuing applied research in the emerging fields of adaptive pedagogy, mass personalization, ubiquitous computing and online teacher training.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2089 5-minute presentation Different Approaches to Online Assessment of Students' Web Research Skills Co-presenter - Dan Zalles The World Wide Web is a tremendous information source for student research. For many students, school is the only place where they can learn how to do Web research. To teach Web research skills effectively, educators need a better understanding of students' searching strengths and weaknesses. We would like to describe two online assessment tools we developed and piloted to evaluate the quality of middle and high school students' Web research skills. We also would like to use CILT to pursue future collaborations to refine our online assessment of Web research skills. One effort focused on navigation of the Web information space and selection of pages relevant for a school report. We found that certain constructs underlie the search process: orientation, query formation, information selection, and attitude toward the Web. Students took an average of nearly five search steps per minute and they held generally uncritical views of Web information. They turned in average performances in the selection of relevant pages and tended to use keywords rather than complex Boolean queries. The other research effort focused on how well students could respond to the information needs of a specific audience in selecting, critiquing, comparing, and communicating information. Most students demonstrated that they could select relevant information, but fewer demonstrated high levels of skill in the other areas. As would be expected, variances were observed between the middle- and high school cohorts. Both studies suggest that students tend to do well at superficially navigating through the Web and finding at least some relevant information, but they need assistance to persist in critically filtering and synthesizing the information.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2087 Demo Demonstration of a Scaffolded Learning Environment for AP Statistics The embedded assessment team at ETS is developing assessments to help teachers and students learn. We are currently developing an assessment module for hypothesis testing within the context of an AP statistics curriculum. We have worked through several prototypes with substantial involvement from AP teachers and students. Feedback has taken the form of interviews, demonstrations, pilot studies, usability tests, and field trials. Our current version is a web-delivered system that can be run on several different platforms, and has the following components: A scaffolded learning environment that supports learners of a domain. Learners solve problems and seek help (scaffolding) as needed. As learners improve, they naturally rely less on the scaffolding until they can solve problems on their own. Metacognitive prompts that encourage learners to reflect on strategies that they use to solve problems and explain their reasons for using those strategies. Self-assessment activities that allow learners to compare their solutions and explanations with those of experts, providing additional opportunities for self-explanation. This assessment activity encourages learners to internalize evaluation criteria (Lavigne & Lajoie, 1996). We expect this activity will help teachers to better diagnose and remediate student work via these assessments. Systems like the one we are developing can be used by students in either a classroom or distance learning environment or as a teacher training aid for preservice and beginning teachers. In terms of equity, these types of embedded assessments may help the AP program reach many new schools and students. Main Collaborator: Irv Katz. Additional collaborators currently include several AP statistics teachers and researchers in the field of statistics education. We are interested in collaborating with people with expertise in teacher training, metacognition in the service of learning, and scaffolded learning environments.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2126 Demo Online Assessment: Pushing the limits - Exploring and Exposing Conceptual Frameworks How can online interactions leverage learning by providing new assessment options? Through the INTEC Project, The International Network Teacher's Enhancement Coalition, an NSF funded project, highly innovative and effective forms of net-based assessment were designed and implemented. As part of INTEC's focus on inquiry, teachers, and then students after viewing a segment of a "Private Universe" video, took online assessments called "conceptual probes". These conceptual probes shared a similar structure to the protocols of the PU instruments. They were open ended and slightly unformed. This incompleteness invites, even demands, for any sense making response, that the student reveal his or her assumptions involved in their interpretation of the problem posed. All answers are submitted anonymously, encouraging the revealing of real reasons for responses and lessening any fear of embarassment. The format of the question consisted generally of a three or four option radio buttons followed by an open response in which the reason for the answer is requested. Responses are sorted by answer selected and printed out for study and comment by individual students, teams of students, and the teacher. Patterns in the responses are sought out. What assumptions are revealed? What do respondents take as the meaning of the terms in the question? How are right answers arrived at by faulty assumptions? From our data of several thousand entries on eight different conceptual probes, along with teacher commentary, we feel confident that this method of online formative assessment presents a new and powerful method of teaching and assessing learning.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2022 Demo Formative and Summative Assessment of Teachers' Technology Integration Skills Only about a third of all teachers feel confident in their ability to fully integrate the technology resources available to them with their instructional practices. Thus the need for adequate technology-related professional development is clear. Assessment serves as a key component of any such professional development. Working with an advisory committee of experts from national testing organizations and technology groups, Teacher Universe has developed a multi-tiered assessment system for teachers. First, teachers complete a Web-delivered, computer-adaptive diagnostic assessment that determines specific areas of weakness to be targeted by the professional development. Second, during their professional development training, teachers complete a portfolio that includes a technology-rich lesson plan and sample projects/activities. The portfolio thus provides an authentic performance measure of ability to integrate technology within instruction and ability to use various software applications in an educational setting. Third, upon completion of the training the teachers take the Web-delivered, computer-adaptive post assessment to quantify their learning gains and to determine possible areas for future growth. In this way, the Teacher Universe assessment system is designed to function as assessment in the service of learning, and to ensure that precious teacher professional development time and funds are wisely spent. Our goal in this session will be to share what we have learned in the assessment development process, and to seek input from others wrestling with the same challenges in using technology to deliver assessments to students and/or teachers. The session will include a brief demonstration of the assessment, as well as a description of future modifications that will be made.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2004 Demo Personal Learning Plan/Portfolio (PLP) The National Institute for Community Innovations (NICI) has been developing and piloting a web-based Personal Learning Plan/Portfolio (PLP) toolkit for inservice and preservice teachers, administrators, and teacher education faculty. The PLP guides educators in (1) identifying their priorities for professional development in response to (a) their institution's reform goals (e.g., "improving students' literacy results" or "implementing Everyday Mathematics"); (b) professional standards (preparation program graduation requirements, state licensure or recertification standards, National Board certification, etc.) and (c) personal learning aspirations. (2) using a "file bin" for each personal professional development priority to store multimedia (video, audio, text and graphic) files providing evidence of the user's growing mastery of each topic; and (3) inviting user-selected individuals (faculty, advisor, peer coach, mentor, recertification board member, school instructional leader, etc.) to participate in threaded conversation with the user to assess the user's learning goals and portfolio work samples. We seek partners interested in incorporating the PLP into the services they provide for educators.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2073 Demo Schools Around the World: Using Student Work to Support Changes in Teacher Assessment Practices This work is being done by CCT in collaboration with the Council for Basic Education (CBE) and nine countries, including the United States. Science teachers at the 4th, 8th and 10th grade levels from participating districts in these nine countries develop student cases and upload student work (digital images, audio or video)into an international database. The database is available on the web or on CD-ROM for use by teachers as part of online courses that look at assessment practices, student and teacher expectations, and curricula interactions. The work also highlights the capabilities of ICT to increase the scope of what artifacts or samples of student learning are available for assessment. In the coming year, this work will be extended to mathematics. The project grew out of the TIMSS work and the need to go beyond country-by-country ranking in looking at how science is learned and assessed in different countries. The database system allows comparisons in student work on the same topic between countries or between grade levels. It can be used by teachers to generate the discussions necessary to developing performance rubrics.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2116 Demo Adaptivity and Online Professional Development - Innovative Solutions for Time-Starved Teachers "Not enough time." A familiar statement to anyone who knows the life of a teacher. Today's time-starved teachers are expected to create curriculum that aligns to standards, integrate technology, increase student achievement, and improve their skills through professional development, in addition to managing a full classroom. Effective training, technology, and assessment systems can improve classroom practice, quality of life and student achievement. Yet, studies show that only one third of our nation's teachers feel prepared to integrate educational technology into classroom instruction. "Make learning efficient." Online courses allow teachers to access professional development virtually anytime, anywhere with an Internet connection. But just putting courses online is not enough to meet the needs of busy teachers. Teacher Universe believes that adaptivity and assessment are keys to efficient learning and that significant investments of time, talent and money in technology demand effective assessment and accountability. Efficient learning means curriculum customized to the needs of individual learners. It means identifying the skills and learning needs of each educator, engaging them with the right content at the right time, and providing feedback on individual progress. "Things I can use in the classroom tomorrow." Making learning efficient also means making it practical, immediately useful for teachers. We have found online professional development to be more successful when it is set in relevant classroom scenarios. Demystifying standards, building technology-rich lesson plans, viewing classroom tips - if learning occurs within this familiar context, it better meets the immediate needs of teachers. Our goal is to demonstrate the adaptive capabilities of our online professional development system, and seek input and experiences from others who are interested in adaptivity and personalized learning.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2078 Poster Using technology to embed assessments in inquiry learning opportunities This poster session describes the concept of technology-supported embedded assessments with Pedagogica, a prototype toolkit. Technology-supported assessment of student learning is neither a new idea nor a unique one. However, situating such assessments as integral, transparent components of studentsí technology-supported learning experiences is an idea whose time has come. Nationally, we have embraced inquiry and "learning to think" by all students, particularly in science. In effect, science education is becoming reconceptualized as a form of understanding and active knowledge construction, moving beyond the passive accumulation of facts or information. Although pedagogical and technological reforms have successfully promoted more active learning, they have not resulted in more active assessment. The science inquiry approach is particularly disconnected from traditional assessment practice because it does not support "teaching to the test." What results? Students of teachers who have adopted active learning practices are penalized when they are evaluated by a test they have not been "taught to." There appears to be a mismatch then, between innovations in science education and more traditional ways of measuring learning. Moreover, pedagogies that value learning to think also value associated processes and skills that students must develop in learning to thinkñprocesses that are not captured by traditional assessments. Our approach is to use technology to support both pedagogical and assessment reforms. Using Pedagogica, we have designed assessments in an effort to capture studentsí thinking and learning in situ i.e., as it occurs and in the modality in which it occurs. For both theoretical and practical reasons, which will be explained in the poster session, we believe this approach may serve much needed reform in science learning opportunities and assessment of studentsí science learning. In short, technology-supported embedded assessments can support measurement of student learning, particularly with respect to science inquiry, in ways that motivate students; produce further learning; and inform instructional design, teacher practice, and education research.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2037 Poster Using 'Knowledge Forum' to Develop Argumentation Skills The presentation reports results on 11 year old pupils’ argumentation patterns and epistemic reasoning. The context is a 2-week unit on “Exercise for a Healthy Heart” by the American Heart Association (AHA). Pupils participate in the taking of a pulse and gathering of pulse data and in “Knowledge Forum” (KF) conversations. KF is a computer program that supports knowledge building and revision activities. In a ‘chat room’ type environment, pupils can post, read, build-on, and make collections of notes. Scaffold tools in KF help guide pupil’s in the construction of arguments. In this study, KF engaged pupils in argumentation about what counts as good and accurate data. Students were directed to agree/disagree and give a reason for each of the statements: It matters: where you take a pulse; when you begin to take a pulse after exercising; how long you take a pulse (6, 10, 15, or 60 seconds); who takes a pulse. Next, pupils were directed to develop a position for the range of a normal heart rate. Finally, pupils were directed to make collections of notes that reported (1) similar arguments and (2) the best arguments. Again, pupils were directed to provide reasons and cite evidence. Using KF as a tool and context for conducting formative assessments of students scientific argumentation is novel. So, too, is the analysis of pupils arguments using presumptive reasoning schemes. Walton’s (1996) argumentation schemes for presumptive reasoning guided the analysis of pupils’ argumentation discourse. We will present sample patterns of argumentation and evidence that emerge from our analysis of the data. We share implications for the design of learning environment that seek to develop pupils’ epistemic reasoning and enhance teachers’ abilities to engage in formative assessments on students argumentation. Collaborators: Kirsten Ellenbogen, King's College London; Susan Goldman and Susan Williams, Vanderbilt Seeking Collaborations with inquiry-based science programs Educational Equity - Teaching students how to construct and evaluate sound arguments is an important cognitive tool for reasoning.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2016 Poster A Pragmatic Framework for Evaluating Innovative Science Learning Environments This presentation describes an assessment & evaluation framework that is consistent with contemporary views on learning and instruction that is being refined in collaboration with Janet Kolodner and colleagues within an evaluation of an innovative middle school science learning environment known as Learning by Design. Results from two prior implementation cycles will be used to illustrate the framework. It employs public domain assessment tools obtained from the WWW, and could be readily used by others. The framework organizes assessment tools around the three views of knowing and learning described by Greeno, Collins, & Resnick (1996). Specifically, lower-level associations concerning content knowledge are assessed with released TIMMS and NAEP items, while more general conceptual understanding is assessed with performance assessments obtained from SRI’s Performance Assessment Links in Science website. Finally, inquiry-oriented rituals are assessed by scoring the participatory activity captured in videotapes of groups of students completing additional PALS performance assessments. In order to reconcile the competing conclusions from the different types of evidence, results are interpreted within the “competitive” framework advanced by Greeno & Moore (1993). This framework views patterns of both behavior and information processing as special cases of a broader forms of human activity best explained within a situative/sociohistoric framework. Specifically, scores are interpreted through an ethnographic lens that views test-taking as participation in a form of situated human activity—albeit in a context featuring somewhat peculiar constraints and affordances. The broader program evaluation framework is akin to the pragmatic model advanced by Pogrow (1998), in that it focuses on differences across strong/full & weak/partial implementations, and acknowledges the limitations of experimental/control comparisons. Reflecting contemporary assessment perspectives, formative feedback is provided on the individual and group performance assessments. Subsequent concerns regarding evidential and systemic validity are addressed following the framework presented in Hickey, Wolfe, & Kindfield (2000).
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2106 Poster The Impact of Student Interactive Assessment on learning and teaching in secondary science classrooms This paper describes the results of a study which examined the impact of interactive assessment practices on science teaching and learning at the secondary level. Interactive assessment, in the context of this paper, consists of students taking quizzes/tests at a computer, and receiving immediate feedback and mastery information. Situated in a longitudinal (8 year), collaborative action research project, the Technology Enhanced Secondary Science Instruction (TESSI) project, the study examined the use of interactive assessment procedures and documented the impact of these procedures from both the studentsí point of view and the teachersí. Teachers from the classrooms currently participating in the TESSI project viewed the implementation of interactive assessment as an essential and enabling element of their student-centered, variable paced, instructional practices. Students viewed interactive testing procedures as a means for assessing their own learning, frequently commenting on the usefulness of the formative feedback they received. The studyís results indicate that the use of interactive assessment promotes student self-monitoring, goal setting, time management, responsibility and mastery learningóskills that will aid our graduates in being successful life-long-learners. Particularly noteworthy is that these results are gender neutral: both women and men students in these classrooms appear to benefiting equally from the use of interactive assessment. This study supports the notion that changes in student assessment should accompany, and be congruent with, changes in educational practice. It also demonstrates how such congruency can be achieved, and the benefits thereof. Presenters: Jolie Mayer-Smith, Associate Professor Janice Woodrow, Professor Emerita Department of Curriculum Studies Faculty of Education University of British Columbia Vancouver, B.C., CANADA
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2019 Poster Bridging the Digital and Education Divides The Equity through Distributed Education Network (EDEN) is a project of the Center for Language Minority Education and Research (CLMER) at California State University, Long Beach. Project EDEN is funded by the U.S. Department of Education's Preparing Tomorrow's Teachers initiative. The premise of EDEN is that we cannot simply integrate technology into teacher preparation as usual if we are to meaningfully address both the Digital AND Education Divides. Technology use must also support diversity-responsive teacher preparation. To support this goal, Project EDEN is developing "EDENStandards" - principles, support and guidance for integrating technology use into diversity-responsive teaching, learning and teacher preparation practices. Further, Project EDEN is helping to create a national network of equity-minded faculty and teacher preparation personnel to develop shared ideas, resources, assessment tools and strategies. Project EDEN builds upon the diversity-responsive focus of the Pacific Southwest Regional Technology in Education Consortium (PSRTEC) also funded by the U.S. Department of Education and for which CLMER also serves as lead agency. The director of both the PSRTEC and Project EDEN is Kevin Rocap. Other collaborators from the project include Dr. Maria Quezada, Dr. David Ramirez and Sheila Cassidy.
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING 2045 Poster Objectively Assessing Student Problem-Solving with Technology IMMEX (Interactive Multi-Media Exercises) is a dynamic, computer software-based assessment tool designed to strengthen content absorption, meta-cognitive thinking, and problem-solving strategies at all levels of education. IMMEX presents an authentic curriculum-based problem environment on stand-alone computers or over the worldwide web offering numerous educational stakeholders an inexpensive and unobtrusive way to assess student learning and problem solving strategies. Within this problem environment, students negotiate different menus items of information gathering enough data to reach an informed solution. The software records exactly what categories of information they sought and in what order the student applied it to solve the problem. From these records, a visual map, demonstrating student understanding (or lack thereof), of course concepts, is created. We have collected and analyzed the maps of thousands of students and this presentation details the results found by comparing a college introductory Chemistry class to high school AP and regular Chemistry students. Each cohort was taught by a different teacher allowing us to conduct within group analysis (to control teacher effect) and to analyze the differences in strategies between these groups. Using this approach we have been able to identify strategies that are common to students at all levels, strategies that are more context or ability dependent, strategies that seem to "trap" students, and strategies that students refine over time with relative ease. A comparison of different strategies also suggests instructional interventions that might help students become better problem solvers (formative assessment) and teachers, better instructors. Initial research suggests that, unlike data generated by many current assessment tools, these results are not biased by socio- economic status, parent educational level or gender. Researchers are seeking collaboration with primary, secondary, and post-secondary educators willing to develop and/or use IMMEX problems and the resulting data for authentic assessment in their courses.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2083 5-minute presentation Some observations about collaboration, communication and collaborative tools Raymond Hainer made the following relevant comments:: ÑCollaboration is not a prescriptive term; . . it does not exist prior to the development of an effective interdependent relationship. A collaborative relationship cannot be established on the basis of injunction; it involves closeness and trust and mutual confidence . . . One form of collaboration is the so-called community of practice, a concept developed at the Institute for Research on Learning described in the following comments by Etienne Wenger of IRL: It is through our membership in communities of practice that we come to know and to be empowered by what we know. . . The learning potential of information systems lies as much in the connections that they open up among people, and in the collaboration they support, as in the information they deliver. Many of the interactions among members of a community of practice arise through narrative -- the stories people tell about their adventures and misadventures. Boland has found that electronic communication suffers from limitations in the exchange of narrative and argument. These observations illuminate the prior need for building trusting interdependent relationships on the way toward designing or using information tools.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2035 5-minute presentation The Internet Learning Forum: Fostering and Sustaining Knowledge Networking To Support A Community Of Science And Mathematics Teachers This NSF-KDI funded research has involved the design and evaluation of the salient features of an electronic knowledge network, the Internet Learning Forum (ILF), to support a virtual community of pre-service and in-service mathematics and science teachers, allowing them to share and improve pedagogical practices (see http://ilf.indiana.edu). The ILF design centers around the vision of a community in which teachers can virtually visit each other's classrooms to observe and discuss approaches to teaching mathematics and science topics and to share artifacts. The ILF supports a distributed group of teachers in making the tacit knowledge involved in their teaching explicit so that it can be shared with others and, in turn, to aid teachers in using that explicit knowledge as a tacit part of their practice. The research goal of this project is to understand the principles for fostering, sustaining, and scaling communities of practice in which the value to participants of sharing their practice and entering in the dialogue outweighs the "costs" of participation (e.g., time, technology access; the concerns of letting others view one's teaching). While the effective use of technology in supporting a community of practice is a focus of this research, it is clear that technological environments are only one component of an overall community strategy. Thus, the research looks at the variety of variables that impact the dynamics of the social networks through which teachers seek to improve and share their pedagogical practices. The research issues, converging at the intersection of pedagogy, technology, social informatics, and learning theory, have important implications for each. In terms of partnerships we are looking for others also building online communities of practice. Current funding is Indiana based, we are looking for collaborators in other states to allow us expand and truly take advantage of the opportunities the internet provides. We are also looking for others with experience in videotaping K-12 classrooms, especially supporting teachers as they try to videotape their own classrooms in a manner that will provide video and audio that can then be shared over the web. Last, we are looking for partners with experience in developing collaborative spaces for building curriculum. Currently, this feature is not available and we hope to have some support tools in place by the end of the year.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2107 5-minute presentation Community and Collaboration: Internet Environments that Connect Classrooms The mission of Classroom Connect is to bring the resources and tools of the Internet to teachers and students. We attempt to wrap the context of curriculum around the content and community of the Internet to create engaging classroom environments for integrated learning. We look forward to these discussions to further our thinking about new ways to use the Internet to enhance learning for all students. Two product highlights: With Quest Expeditions, students become "virtual" explorers as they use the Internet to travel great distances, make discoveries and share their findings. We send a team of experts to remote locations, where, through the Internet, students guide the journey, read daily reports from the team, and debate on-going dilemmas. Each Quest is easily about connecting communities: classrooms connected to remote communities and expert scientists. American students connected to their own heritage as they follow the team through a foreign culture. Next, we seek to improve the collaboration aspects of this experience and we hope ideas from this group will be applied to future development. ClassroomToday provides dynamic, current content that naturally links the Internet to classroom curriculum topicsótopics such as Ancient Egypt and Endangered Species. Engaging questions provide the framework for student research using the ClassroomToday Library of web sites and moderated forums for sharing ideas. We create ìpartner topicsî for ClassroomToday, such as Launching the Shuttle, developed with NASA. We look forward to other such partnerships. All students need to acquire 21st century skills. The national goal to provide connectivity is a major effort. Classroom Connect hopes to support that effort by designing experiences that engage all learners and connect them to the world community. This is a great challenge and we look to communities such as this conference for support.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2053 5-minute presentation Video Cases: Designing Constellations, a Perspectivity Digital Video Data Analysis Tool According to Tim Koschmann (1999), a new form of research, computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL) focuses “on participants’ talk, the artifacts that support and are produced by a team of learners, and the particpants’ own accounts of their work” (p. 15.) One could say that digital video technology on the desktop is the consummate CSCL environment as it encourages the participation of learners engaged in making new video artifacts and discussing their works to build deeper interpretations. Digital video cases have currently tweaked the excitement of researchers, educators, and learners (Goldman-Segall, 1989; Kosma, 1991; Stigler et al, 1999) because traditional boundaries are crossed between research practices when new media representations are made, and this seems to coincide with the shift from moderity to postmodernity that has filtered through academia. No longer does the line between fact and story (or, quantitative and qualitiative methods) seem as impenetrable as before. Suddenly, a reseacher, a teacher, and a student learner is confronted with empirical evidence for a theory that also seems to be open to many interpretations and points of viewing (Goldman-Segall, 1998). The notion of finding the truth, the master story, or the best answer becomes much less interesting than interacting with others about the data to collaboratively create artifacts and new theories. What role does perspectivity play in our reaching conclusions about video cases? In this presentation, I will discuss the development of a revised generic digital video analysis tool, Constellations (aka WebConstellations), for online video case analysis. Constellations is a what I am calling a new generation of perspectivity technologies, technologies which encourage users to add their views and construct their stories. Perspectivity technologies promote a fundamentally different way of teaching, learning or conducting research—one which is socially constructionist in nature and which honors the learning of each member of the community as she invents and reconfigures new cultural and personal knowledge. In the process of defining the perspectivity theory (see Goldman-Segall, 1998; and, Stahl, 2000), I show how distinctions between researchers, educators, and learners are reduced. A community of practice is established where the community works as a design team, creating new and useable knowledges for others to explore. My thesis is that these communities develop more quickly with digital video. People like to see each other and discuss each other’s practices. Digital video has become not just a luxury item but a learning tool for group processes. Goldman-Segall, R., (1989). Thick description: A tool for designing ethnographic interactive video discs. SIGCHI Bulletin, 21( 2), 118-122. Goldman-Segall, R. (1998). Points of viewing children’s thinking: A digital ethnographer’s journey. Mahwah, New Jersey: LEA. with interactive web site Koschmann, T. (1996). Paradigm shifts and instructional technology: An introduction. In T. Koschman (Ed.),CSCL: Theory and practice. Mahwah, New Jersey: LEA. Kozma, R. (1991). Learning with media, Review of Educational Research, 61(2), 179-211. Stahl, G. (2000). A model of collaborative knowledge building. Proceedings of the International Conference of the Learning Sciences, LEA, 70–77. Stigler, J.W., Gonzales, P, Kawanaka, T., Knoll, S. and Serranao, A. (1999). Research and development report: The TIMSS videotape classroom study. National Center for Educational Statistics, NCES 1999-074.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2150 5-minute presentation Student-Centered Collaborative Learning: Experience with Web-based TEAMthink This presentation will highlight 2 recent applications in courses at Duke University School of Engineering and Stanford University School of Engineering of the inquiry-based learning system, TEAMthink. TEAMThink is a collaborative learning platform that includes a structured, question-based learning and assessment process. Students learn by creating, discussing, refining, and answering questions as members of learning teams. This web-based asynchronous process, currently being used by universities, corporations, and government organizations, can readily be applied to 9 through 14 learning environments. With TEAMthink students are enabled to: take responsibility for their own learning and for others in the community; actively participate in and nurture collaborative learning; demand and display respect for the diverse ideas and skills of others; develop communication skills through structured on-line discussions; construct explanations; create and defend argumentation; develop chains of evidence of content comprehension and context; build new content based on understanding of existing content; draw relationships between lab experimentation and theoretical investigation; expand risk-taking and creative and critical thought processes. This presentation will focus on learning process issues and is organized as follows: Review of the Structure for Student-Centered Learning How Peer to Peer Learnng is Promoted Assessment of Learning Defining the instructor's role Re-use of student generated content Scaling the process to large groups Future developments in web-based collaboration learning methods. Media Used: Power point slides plus web demonstration from actual courses. Require data projector for PC laptop, Internet connection, & screen.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2055 5-minute presentation Design-based research methodologies for education and technology Research on educational technology poses difficult methodological questions related to representativeness, replicability, generalizeability, and usefulness. Design methods transcend some of these difficulties. Can principled design be merged with research to yield valid, applicable, and empirically based research findings on educational technology that are fair to the student populations as well as the technologies? I am seeking collaborators to explore these issues, especially in the area of collaborative learning and socio-technical systems. This builds on prior work on using technology to shift group behavior through changes in affordances for individual action in a distributed cognition framework.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2061 5-minute presentation Coordinative Structures My focus of late has been on: What it means for a workplace to be well organized for workflow. How agents dynamically restructure their workspace to minimize cognitive effort How individuals and groups use coordinative structures to improve their distributed cognition and help reduce their metacognitive burdens. To research these issues I have been working with my colleagues at UCSD, Ed Hutchins, Jim Hollan, Aaron Cicourel and Saadi Lahlou of EDF in France, and Christian Licoppe of France Telecom, to design a set of ethnographic and experimental studies. We have been concerned with how people react to interruptions, how they cope with cognitive overload, how they try to coordinate their activity between themselves and others by using annotations, and how they create external representations that serve to coordinate activity. All these topics bear on learning because individuals learn through interacting with their environments. They do not live in a single workspace, but rather create and move through many different ones, each with its own constraints, affordances and opportunities. The common thread through these environments is that learners create external representations, they create external structures and they attempt to manage their environments by a variety of methods that are found outside the learning context as well. Students annotate; they make schedules and lists, they use their notebooks to take notes and to mark down assignments and requirements. When they take an exam they rely on metacognitive strategies, such as monitoring evaluating, planning and preparing. Since our conception of metacognition needs to be revised in a more interactive manner, our understanding of how students mange their learning activities also needs reevaluation.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2005 5-minute presentation Networked Notetaking: Instant Success for ESL Students Project InTime's Collaborative Networked Notetaking System has just finished its third pilot-year of a federally funded grant to adapt and test this computer-based system for providing portable realtime and wireless bi-lingual notetaking assistance for migrant students who are in regular content-area classes at the secondary level. Students in Oregon secondary schools have laptop computers with an infra-red networking device on their desks. The student's computer is wirelessly connected a computer on the desk of a bilingual notetaker, who is sitting in the back of the room in classes where information (lectures, films, and discussion) are delivered in English. Via this network, the student is unobtrusively connected to a knowledgeable and supportive bilingual-notetaking partner, who is able to type keyword information in Spanish, conversational English or Spanglish in order to link meaning to the classroom lectures as well as to provide notes for later studying. Synchronous, groupware software provides an electronic environment in which both the notetaker and the student can see the other's writing simultaneously in the case where students take their own notes. A chat box window provides an optional third question-and-answer window for additional communication between the notetaker and student. In this way collaborative, student support services are provided within the context of the regular classroom in a way that is minimally disruptive and models good academic notetaking behavior in real time. OBJECTIVES The primary objective of this paper is to discuss case studies from Project InTime as they illuminate: (a) results that indicate the usedfulness of this approach to achieve equity in education; (b) network, hardware, and software implementations; and (c) collaborative notetaking strategies appropriate for different students and different classes.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2038 5-minute presentation The Shadow netWorkspace' Learning Systems Project The Shadow netWorkspace‘ Learning Systems Project brings a vision of Open Source development and the powers of internet based technology to bear on the work of school reform and improvement. Specifically the project has developed a netWorkspace software system and is building a community of developers committed to open source licensing and the Shadow netWorkspace‘ Learning system. Shadow netWorkspace‘ is a system for enabling a learning community and is designed to be installed and operated within the local school setting. In this way the school or community "owns" the Shadow implementation. They create the rules and policies, establish membership, add software applications, customize the implementation, and make it their own. Shadow is being developed as an Open Source application. This means that users will not have to pay to use Shadow. The Shadow networkspace‘ operates on a Linux-based server and utilizes the Apache web server, MySQL, and Sendmail. The server-side application programming interfaces and applications are written in Perl. The hardware requirements for setting up and running this server will cost schools less than $1000 and most schools may simply repurpose an older pentium-class computer. Our development model is to create a substantial and sufficient implementation of Shadow for schools and to build a community of developers who will extend Shadow, probably in ways that we cannot even envision today. Since Shadow is being developed as an Open Source application, developers who adhere to the Open Source agreement can freely add components to Shadow or develop new implementations. Open Source is a way of developing and licensing software that has great power for making computing both expansive and inexpensive. If we are successful in initiating a developer community around open source software for education we may well change the framework for using technology in schools.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2028 5-minute presentation BRIDGING THE DISCONNECT: AN E-LEARNING MANIFESTO This presentation is a product of a collaborative grant from CILT99.Our purpose of our work this past year was to create an E-Learner's Manifesto that asserts learners' needs, calls for equitable access and guides developers toward the development of an ethical, nurturing, learning environment via the Internet. BRIDGING THE DISCONNECT: AN E-LEARNING MANIFESTO is a collaborative effort among educators, private sector high-tech leaders, and policy makers to comprehend how the Internet is changing the way people communicate and learn and to promote uses of the Internet that enhance personal learning as well as community and societal growth. Our goals are pragmatic: to describe how technologies are impacting information-sharing and knowledge-building and to propose new practices for maximizing the value of the Internet for supporting learning and growth. The Manifesto establishes a vision for the future, enumerates guiding principles and culminates in a list of best practices to be used by those who develop learning opportunities for the Internet. It is hoped that the document will be used in a variety of forums for discussion, adaptation and distribution. During the presentation, our presentation team (Janine Boire, Kirsten Hanson, Melodee Landis, David Niguidula, Kallen Tsikalas, Arthur VanderVeen) will briefly overview the tenets and best practices proposed in the draft document, then seek input from the group on how the document can be improved, disseminated and applied. Follow-up interaction during the conference could occur during a poster session. The document will be provided to CILT in HTML format for posting on the CILT Web site, thus allowing for ongoing input from conference attendees and others who visit the CILT site.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2115 5-minute presentation Outward Bound: Preparing students for active investigations through rivers The Interactive Communications & Simulations (ICS) Group is embarking on an interdisciplinary project with the city of Izumo, Japan, to develop, implement, and research on-line activities centered on the theme of "rivers." The project will involve activities and materials that connect students around the world with their peers as they study history, culture, ecology, geography, politics, and art related to rivers. Prototype activities will be implemented this fall for various grade levels. In this project students will be challenged to explore and explain the significance of rivers in their home area to peers around the world. Student explorations will take on many different forms, from water quality studies to explanations of cultural myths. Student discussions will center on the participant-created exploration artifacts to be posted on the Rivers Project website, supplemented by material created by content experts, teachers, and university student mentors. These mentors will provide content and strategy expertise, as well as bilingual language abilities to participating classes. Anticipated outcomes of these activities include students identifying and articulating a diverse set of connections between rivers around the world and negotiating common understandings of the significance of these rivers. Educational equity is an important part of the Rivers Project. We are actively exploring three facets of the program that will attend to equity: the use of multiple representations, mentor moderation and the global view. Students will be challenged to explore the rivers in personally motivating ways, which allows for diverse learning styles. Mentor moderating of student explorations can be used to engage students to encourage all to be active participants. Finally, the global emphasis of the project will ensure that language is not a barrier to student learning. Collaborations that would be especially beneficial to our research would be discussions with other groups who use and research mentor moderation as a means to effect equal representation and ongoing engagement and challenge in student participation and discussions.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2021 5-minute presentation Creating a K-12 Internet Portal: The Miami-Dade Experience This presentation will provide an overview of Miami-Dade County Public Schools' efforts to create a K-12 educational portal. Topics covered will include the use of web-based technologies to support the educational process in the 4th largest urban school district in the United States.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2071 5-minute presentation CSCL Tools for Teacher Education: Affordances and Constraints in the Context of Practice The last decade has witnessed phenomenal growth in network technologies for teaching and learning. Despite the invention of highly innovative tools that support representation and enhanced visualization, communication, collaboration, and scaffolding of cognition, many educators seem to be using new computer supported tools to support traditional teacher-centric pedagogies. My current study focuses on the use of two computer-supported collaborative learning tools by preservice teachers within the context of a larger NSF-supported study of the technology appropriation of preservice teachers. The secondary science education majors used a tool originally developed specifically for the teacher education program -- the Interactive Shared Journaling System. The secondary English and language arts majors used a web-board that is part of a commercially-developed tool widely used across many campuses--BlackBoard's CourseInfo. My analysis of case studies of students in these two cohorts is based on field observations, interviews, and logs of their online communications over the past three years in the teacher development program. Preliminary analysis suggests that it is not so much the features of the tools themselves, but the demands and incentives presented in the context of actual practice that make the greatest difference in students' appropriation of these technologies and their ability to use them for communication, collaboration, and community building. In sharing this work, I am seeking collaboration with others who are studying the use of CSCL tools to support communication, collaboration, and community building among preservice and inservice teachers. What patterns of communication are necessary for building and supporting an online learning community? Are there differences in the ways these tools are used by teachers in different disciplines? What can we learn from these cases to help us more effectively implement tools that support communication and collaboration and provide opportunities for teachers to engage in ongoing communities of practice?
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2043 5-minute presentation Using a Multimedia Digital Library for Community Building in The Maryland Electronic Learning Community The Maryland Electronic Learning Community (MELC) is being developed around a multimedia digital library. For instance, there are weekly video conferences and an email chat group that combine discussions about the digital library with other technology-related discussions. The multimedia digital library (www.learn.umd.edu) offers a collection of educational resources for middle school teachers in Baltimore to use as they develop their interactive lesson plans. Currently, it has approximately 6,200 titles of text documents, audio files, video segments, still images, and Web sites covering social studies, science areas, mathematics and language arts. We are experimenting with new tools to promote a closer cooperation among teachers and eventually among students. In particular we will report on the Quick Indexing Tool, the Lesson-Plan Workbench, and Open Bookshelves. While the Digital Library contains many high-quality materials, the teachers have been particularly enthusiastic about using materials of local relevance such as digital pictures of a local sugar refinery. The Quick Indexing Tool (QIT) allowed teachers to add new resources to the Digital Library. The tool, which takes the form of a web-based indexing template, is derived from the indexing scheme that has been refined to capture of the teachers’ aspects of concern when they assess educational materials. This specially designed template includes description fields that encourage teachers to provide the information on how they envision the use of submitted materials. Because the QIT allows teachers to post content of mixed quality to the Library, we are building a Lesson-Plan Workbench that will, among other features, identify the sourceof materials when the teachers are developing lesson plans. The third feature we will discuss is the Teacher Bookshelf. This provides functionality by which a teacher can store and organize the items that he/she has selected from the digital collection for his/her own teaching purposes. With this feature, a teacher will be able to add remarks or suggestions about the use of the learning materials based on his/her experiences. We have also found that teachers are enthusiastic about materials used by their colleagues. Therefore, the bookshelves will be public and other library users can browse them.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2014 5-minute presentation Stone Soup:A Distributed Collaboratory Using Software Agents A collaboratory is an online community where members share ideas, information and digital resources. It is a type of digital library where community members build the collection. Because of this, a collaboratory has three advantages over a digital library: The interests of the community determine the content of the collection. The collection can be built faster by the collective actions of members. The cost of the building and maintaining a collection is distributed among the community members. The central challenge in building a collaboratory is achieving a critical mass of participating members. Studies have found Computer Supported Cooperative Work systems, such as a collaboratory, that reach a state of critical mass are likely to succeed. Critical mass is defined as threshold of individual actions that must be reached in order to produce a public good. For the collaboratory to become a public good it must reach a state where its value increases with use while the cost of its operation does not. In order to accomplish this, I propose two strategies: 1.Encourage pro-social behaviors within the collaboratory community. 2.Add value to the collaboratory every time members use it. Twenty-three activities providing methods for implementing the two strategies are suggested herein. The capabilities needed to support one of the activities is explored in depth matching these capabilities with the functionality socially intelligent software agents provide. Using software agents to automate activities is a way to keep the cost of the collaboratory constant as usage increases. Many of the strategies addressed in this paper are currently being implemented on the Inquiry Page, a collaboratory for K12 teachers. The Inquiry Page exists to draw together teachers interested in exploring inquiry-based learning. Visit the Inquiry Page at: http://inquiry.uiuc.edu.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2092 5-minute presentation Seeing Math Telecommunications Demonstration Project: Video Case Studies for Teacher Professional Development The Seeing Math Telecommunications Demonstration Project is the first step in a coordinated, large-scale national effort to improve mathematics teaching through innovative, standards-based professional development. The project will be developed and disseminated by an outstanding public-private consortium. Seeing Math was created by The Concord Consortium, a nonprofit telecommunications entity, on behalf of a consortium of three private and public partners who have extensive experience in telecommunications and mathematics education. In cooperation with state educational agencies, local educational agencies, and the NCTM, the project will use the Internet, a publicly funded telecommunications infrastructure, to deliver integrated video, voice, and data to prepare teachers in the use of new standards-based curricula materials and learning technologies. Our key innovation will be six highly interactive online digital video case studies available free to teachers and parents. The case studies will provide vivid mathematics teaching exemplars linked to resources related to Standards 2000 content and process standards. To stimulate productive and intense dialog among teachers about improved mathematics teaching, the case studies will be used in two moderated online, graduate credit mini-courses and linked to moderated online teacher learning communities of discourse. To ensure that Seeing Math resources are well-utilized and integrated into local teacher professional development programs, the project will offer a staff developer program based on online courses. This strategy will enable the project to provide personalized teacher professional development opportunities to a large number of teachers.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2093 5-minute presentation Issues in Development of an Online Education Teaching Certification There has been a tremendous increase in online education courses and programs. There are however only a small number of instructors who have experience and understanding of the differences between face-to-face instruction and online education. As a result, some of the more progressive schools of education are developing programs that will provide a certification for online instructors. The presenters are in the process of developing an online certification program at the University of Virginia. They will report on the program design, and the institutional issues that they have addressed as well as the issues that have been identified, but not yet resolved. This session should be helpful for anyone charged with developing an online certification program or considering enrolling in one. Co-presenter: Zahrl Schoeny, Curry School, University of Virginia
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2033 5-minute presentation Technology and Equity in Mathematics Education This work is part of a project called "Weaving Gender Equity into Mathematics Reform," whose overall goal is to assist teachers in recognizing and dealing with equity concerns while they are learning new ways to teach mathematics – instead of as two different topics. One of the project’s approaches has been to develop 2-hour workshop sessions that are available to any math professional development organization that weave these two together. In designing these sessions, we realized that the use of technology in math education both poses an additional equity challenge and provides a possible way to address equity issues. In particular, the use of technology for data analysis can actually be a force for equity in mathematics since data-focused activities are an opportunity for students to choose the subject and content of their work. In fact, boys and girls tend to be interested in different data sets, especially as they reach the end of elementary school, and appropriate data analysis activities can allow them the structure and flexibility to make such choices. The presentation will include an overview of a 2-hour session we developed that investigates the relationships among technology, mathematical thinking (data analysis) and equity. It poses the following three questions: ß What kinds of technology effectively support mathematical thinking? ß How can data analysis activities support equity in a math classroom? ß What are the important issues to consider around technology and equity with respect to gender? Ethnicity? Socioeconomic status? We will briefly summarize the data activity and the technology used in the workshop session as an illustration of the ways these interactions play out. This presentation would be an important consideration at the role of relatively simple technology into widespread mathematics curriculum and its relationship to equity.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2008 5-minute presentation Sharing discussions from different platforms There are a number of knowledge-building environments currently under development or refinement - each with its own data structure that is incompatible with the other systems. To promote collaboration among researchers in educational technology, we decided to address the problem of sharing data from student discussions in the various environments. This is a first step toward comparing successes, gradually introducing standards into the research community, and eventually being able to trade software components that could work together. In the past year, under a CILT seed grant, we have developed an approach to capturing data from several discussion forum technologies into a standard format. We have written algorithms that work either within a given application or that parse html output from the application and export the data as XML. We have defined two versions of an XML DTD capable of encoding the data from various discussion forum technologies -- a recursive encoding of notes and a non-recursive linking of notes. A conversion routine translates between the two versions. This work aims at promoting the sharing of data among different research groups. We would like to work with other researchers in adapting this software to export from and import into their knowledge-building software systems. Ultimately, the proliferation of discussion and knowledge-building media that can exchange data will allow all people to express their ideas within communities of their choosing and combine ideas from different sources with which they interact.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2082 5-minute presentation Creating and sharing representations of scientific phenomena: A Proposal for a video-based meta-exhibit to connect informal learning centers and schools We* propose to discuss an extension to a study conducted in a science museum involving the production of video clips that facilitated reflection by visitors on their experience with exhibits (Stevens & Hall, 1997). In this study, we videotaped interactions between visitors and an exhibit and then had conversations with these visitors about puzzling aspects of the phenomenon represented in their taped interaction. The conversations were conducted while watching the recording of the initial visit and, as we argued in the paper, the capacity to freeze, slow, and rewind images provided unique affordances for reflection. The extended design we propose now involves building a stand-alone version of this "meta-exhibit" in which visitors themselves video tape an interaction and then overlay this clip with an audio annotation. Clips can then be collected for activities both within and outside the museum. Within the museum, a library of annotated clips could reside on a museum floor and provide a novel collection of peopleís representations of and questions about scientific phenomena from which others could learn. Outside the museum, collections of annotated clips could be used in schools to bring representations of scientific phenomena into classrooms where expensive equipment is unavailable. The core idea is to enable the creation and sharing of representations of phenomena, because this is critical to how people learn together. Also, the experiment requires only inexpensive VCRs in schools and therefore arguably represents a way to achieve objectives usually associated with expensive computers and network infrastructure. The collaborators we seek are of two kinds: technically-adept designers to help us to build the stand-alone meta-exhibit and informal learning centers (in addition to the Exploratorium) where the meta-exhibit can be used and studied. The practices we currently wish to support involve inquiry and science, but the system also may be more general. Stevens, R. & Hall, R. (1997). Seeing Tornado: How Video Traces mediate visitor understandings of (natural?) spectacles in a science museum, Science Education, 18(6), 735 * with Rogers Hall, University of California, Berkeley
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2048 Demo Museum-Related Virtual Environments for Teaching and Learning Middle School Science Our NSF-funded research project is creating and evaluating multi-user virtual environments (MUVEs) that use digitized museum resources to enhance middle school students’ motivation and learning about science. Graphical MUVEs enable multiple simultaneous participants to access virtual architectures configured for learning, to interact with manipulable digital artifacts, to represent themselves through visual "avatars," to communicate with other participants and computer-based agents, and to enact collaborative activities of various types. This extends current MUVE capabilities in order to study the science learning potential of interactive virtual museum exhibits and participatory historical situations. Harvard University’s Technology in Education program, George Mason University’s Virtual Environments Lab, the Division of Information Technology and Society in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History (NMAH), the NSF-funded Multimedia and Thinking Skills project, and teachers from participating school districts are co-designing these MUVEs. In its first year, this study centers students’ learning experiences on curriculum standards for seventh grade life sciences. Learners can collaboratively help a simulated city throughout its history to aid with various environmental and health challenges. In addition to science content, the experiences emphasize learning complex investigative skills. Our research on how MUVEs extend students’ science knowledge may provide insights into new ways museums and schools can collaborate to foster formal and informal learning. Also, this project is studying how the design characteristics of these learning experiences affect students’ motivation and education outcomes, as well as ways to enable strong learning outcomes across a wide range of individual student characteristics. Our initial, culturally diverse student population has many ESL students (mostly Spanish speakers); many are at-risk for science and math, coming from poor families that have a relatively low parent-education level. We are interested in collaborations with content experts, researchers interested in MUVEs, museum personnel, and vendors developing virtual environments for learning.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2102 Demo Knowledge Forum Knowledge Forum, a second-generation version of CSILE (Computer-Supported Intentional Learning Environments), is a collaborative, knowledge-building facility that operates over local area and wide area networks. Students of all ages (grade 1 through post-secondary) use the software to explore a wide variety of different subject areas. Learners interact with one another by constructing multimedia notes and linking them to other peopleís notes in a shared, central database. To fully exploit the potential of Knowledge Forum, teachers must work to foster a climate of intentional learning and collaboration in their classrooms. Learners begin by posting problems of understanding in the Knowledge Forum database, and then work with their peers to make intellectual advances. Knowledge Forum provides a wide range of supports for high-level cognitive operations including multiple ways to link notes, a flexible scaffolding system, supports for summarizing, advanced note searching, and a graphical View facility that allows notes to simultaneously exist in many different knowledge building structures, and against different backdrops. The demonstration will highlight some of the more innovative knowledge-building supports that have been added to the software over the past year. Knowledge Forum is being developed by Marlene Scardamalia, Carl Bereiter, and a team of researchers at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education / University of Toronto.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2030 Demo Scaffolded use of a simulation to support the development of inquiry skills This work, in collaboration with Roger Day, involves the use of a professonal modeling tool to help medical students learn inquiry skills.The Oncology Thinking Cap (OncoTCap) provides a comprehensive modeling workbench for cancer researchers. This tool is versatile and can be used to model clinical trials, but its functions and operation may impose excessive cognitive load for the novice user. Moreover, novices may have little knowledge of the kinds of experimental designs used in the cancer domain. There are well-defined sets of designs for clinical trials of new drugs, used at different stages of testing and for different purposes. As Baker and Dunbar (1996) note, the expert scientist often has a schema for the slots of an experimental design that need to be filled. Work on software-realized scaffolding suggests that communicating the design process is one way that learners can begin to construct these schemas. In this demo, we will show how the scaffolding was implemented in the form of the Clinical Trial Wizard. As well, we will demonstrate how multiple representations are used to allow learners to see effects at the level of individual cell, patient, or population levels. At the present time, this system has only been used with medical students, but I would be interested in taking this to other levels of education and to add tools to support reflection.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2075 Demo The Knowledge Loom: What Works in Teaching & Learning Web Resource for Professional Development and School-based Decision-making Learn about The Knowledge Loom (http://knowledgeloom.org), a free web-based resource that provides a large searchable collection of best practices resources on educational topics that align with national goals for improving education. From this collection, The Knowledge Loom "spotlights" selected topics of particular importance to K-12 educators (e.g., professional development, early literacy, mathematics, and technology leadership). While the larger database provides a one-stop portal to help educators find best practices resources developed and tested by researchers, technical assistance organizations, and schools, the spotlights provide in-depth content where educators can: --Review research that identifies best practices related to a theme. --View success stories about these practices in actual schools/districts. --Discover supporting organizations and resources. --Learn to replicate the success of these practices in their own organizations. The site offers innovative opportunities for teachers to collaborate and participate in professional development as a routine school-year activity. Interactive tools provide ways to add stories/tips, respond to questions about pedagogy, "Ask An Expert", and participate in online discussions. An interactive module for how to use the site for local professional development will launch in the fall. Regional labs are using this resource to provide ongoing technical assistance to underserved populations. The site is being developed by the Northeast and Islands Regional Educational Laboratory (LAB) at Brown University for the U.S. Department of Education. Content is provided by nationally-recognized partner organizations with selected expertise, including: Appalachia Educational Laboratory, Blue Ribbon Schools, National Institute for Literacy, National Model Professional Development Awards Program, National Partnership for Excellence and Accountability in Teaching, National Staff Development Council, and the Equity Assistance Center at the Education Alliance. The LAB seeks other content-providing partners such as universities, technical assistance organizations, and individual schools and districts interested in disseminating their work as part of a collaborative teaching and learning community.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2042 Demo KidCode: A community tool to support collaborative learning among diverse learners Babette Moeller, Education Development Center; Judith Cohen; Michelle Baker & Beau Morley, Umbanet, Inc. KidCode is an innovative interactive software system designed to facilitate collaborative learning activities for young children (age 5 to12). As such, it is among the first software offerings for young children that takes advantage of emerging networking technology. A prototype of the KidCode software, developed with funding from NSF, consists of a sequence of two-person learning activities that are set within the context of an electronic mail system. The purpose of these activities is to help young children develop an understanding of symbolic representation in its many manifestations, an important prerequisite for developing competence in reading and mathematics. Ideas for the development of KidCode activities grew out of research studies on symbolic representation and math understanding in young children, and are based on national standards. Formative research has accompanied the development of the KidCode software from the initial design phases. A major focus in our research was to insure the feasibility of conducting collaborative learning activities among diverse learners—learners who differ in their backgrounds, experiences, learning styles, and developmental levels. The purpose of this presentation is to demonstrate the KidCode prototype and teacher resource materials, and to highlight features of the design and uses of the online learning activities that help to insure their accessibility to diverse learners. Umbanet, Inc. and EDC are interested in new collaborations with content developers to develop additional activities that utilize the KidCode software platform to broaden the types of communication activities that are available for young children online and to learn more about how to effectively create such activities. Our long-term goal is to develop design guidelines and software tools that support designers and content developers in creating further KidCode games and activities. Technology, if well designed, has great potential to provide access to high quality education all students. Our work contributes to the knowledge base about how online learning environments need to be designed to make it possible for diverse learners to collaborate with each other in the pursuit of standards-based learning outcomes.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2007 Demo TAPPED IN Online Community Workplace for Education Professionals TAPPED IN (www.tappedin.org) is an on-line teacher professional development community designed to meet the needs of a large and diverse community of education professionals. The online venue that supports the community is a Web-based multi-user virtual environment that enables synchronous and asynchronous collaboration online. The environment is designed around the familiar metaphor of a conference center with private rooms for individual groups and open areas for public gatherings and events. TAPPED IN is a fully extensible and customizable environment with webpage and text document sharing capabilities that facilitate dialogue and sharing of information. Since the virtual doors of TAPPED IN opened, it has become the online home to a rapidly growing community of over 8,000 K-12 teachers, librarians, teacher education faculty, professional development staff, researchers, and other education professionals. TAPPED IN also supports the online activities of more than 20 professional development programs, pre-service and master's degree programs, and state and local education agencies, and scores of small groups. We invite both organizations that work with educators and individual educators to join the community. We are also interested in content and technology partners.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2119 Poster Communities of interpretation within the Telelearning Professional Development Schools In our fourth year of TeleLearning Professional Development Schools we are tackling increasingly substantive issues about both technologies and pedagogies, and about how we can build understandings of their inter-relations. We posit that the TL-PDS community can develop as a community of interpreters, engaging in activities that will provide joint definitions of what constitutes the center and what constitutes the periphery in a classroom renewed by digital networks and reformed by advanced pedagogies. As communities of interpretation, we will elaborate on such epistemological issues as: the nature of our inquiry, the scope of our data sources, the definition of analysis procedures and methods, what constitutes evidence, and how to define and explain results obtained in the TL-PDS as a research project. Within the TeleLearning Network of Centres of Excellence (TL-NCE) Canada led by Linda Harasim, Therese Laferriere is Theme Leader of the research strand, entitled Educating Educators, and Alain Breuleux is Director of Integration. We are taking advantage of network technologies to accelerate capacity-building in university-school partnerships (access and scaling up issues), and to reach across scholars, research teams, school-based educators, classrooms, institutions, and cultures. As co-chairs of the Theme Els mitjans de comunicacio i les noves tecnologies en líambit educatiu for the Education Program of the Universal Forum of Cultures to be held in Barcelona (2004), we are seeking collaborators that would help instrument participating classrooms to become interconnected learning communities. With SchoolNet as our key partner in Canada (1996), the vision of interconnected learning communities was put forward, and as classrooms get connected we face the pedagogical challenges of reconceptualizing the classroom as a networked learning community. Whereas we look for tools that a Gabon or a Peru classroom could access, the ìtechneî we want to help build are tools that primarily addresses pedagogical challenges. We will point to specifics at the poster session.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2081 Poster Building Sustainable Online Networks The purpose of this presentation is to share our collaborative design work in which a corporation (ActiveInk) and an university (Indiana University) collaborated to build an online e-learning environment. We begin with defining the theoretical and pedagogical commitments that guided our design work, both in terms of our e-learning curriculum and the technical portal that we developed to support our curricular experiences. Building an online environment that was collaborative and project-based, and that supports a use scenario with over 300 different classrooms and 40,000 students across the nation has been a challenging, educational, and rewarding process. This environment takes advantage of new and emerging technologies to provide engaging formats that immerse students within contexts that challenge, ground, and, ultimately, extend their understandings. Students can come together to investigate real-world, environmental science issues and develop solutions that are grounded in actual data and in local conditions, not simply commonsense hunches. We have developed a technological interface to ensure that learners can easily share and reflect on their own and their peersí work in the network. We have developed problems and scenarios that engage and motivate students, and that contextualize the science skills and concepts they are learning. We view this collaboration as indicative of the potential of university-corporate partnerships to build educationally rich contexts for learning that are grounded in educational theory, that are nationally disseminable to large numbers of users, and that have long-term sustainability. We are looking for corporate partners interested in using the technology portal that we have developed, for K-12 teachers interested in integrating the curriculum units in their classrooms, for university teachers interested in using the units in their pre-service preparation classes, and for university researchers interested in taking their projects porting them into the ActiveInk portal so that they can impact large numbers of users.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2063 Poster TOPOS: A space for joint reflective practice and inquiry inquiry into K-14 design activities Co-Authors: Janet Blatter, McGill University, Faculty of Education; Alain Breuleux, McGill University ^^ TeleLearning NCE We observe increasing interest in classroom activities involving students engaged in Web design. We also notice a lack of tools and processes for practitioners and researchers to co-construct interpretations of these rich activities and their outcomes. We are presenting a shared "space", TOPOS, for a community of interpreters of K-14 videotaped activities of students constructing Web-based projects. The space is a socio-technical arrangement of tools and processes supporting the collaboratorsî joint construction of interpretations of objects of interest in their inquiry into classroom-based practices. One focus of the collaboration is an XML project that has teachers and researchers co-develop the meta-data needed to define the document structure for annotating video analysis. Supporting this activity are a socio-cognitive model of collaborative visual design and a networked database of video and multimedia resources built around the model. The model, based on authentic classroom activities, provides the orientation for the participants investigating classroom design activities. The database co-evolves with the model as both are continuously regenerated through the participantsí declared and annotated topics of interest. TOPOS is based on two TeleLearning NCE and FCAR- funded, on-going projects in constructionist classroom activities and teacher professional development. We are building evidence concerning two issues: 1) the original model and database provides a principled yet flexible scaffold to on-going interpretations of participatory design; 2) XML document structuring provides an opportunity for both reflective and shared practices in a co-evolving community of interpreters and producers of knowledge. Our research is situated at the junction of collaborative representation and network improvement. A workspace as developed in TOPOS is considered critical in ensuring real equity: 1) its participatory design involves the authentic input of its stakeholders and is founded on the principles of equal participation of diverse K-14 practices, inquiry, and reflection; 2) it provides a mechanism for the continual renewal of the lexicon of issues and topics of inquiry into classroom practices. These characteristics augment possibilities for more meaningful - deeper and wider - access to networked knowledge construction.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2070 Poster Trust development via computer-mediated communications When is technology an acceptable replacement for 'being there'? This is a problem currently facing both education and business institutions. At the same time that poor and rural school districts are deciding whether to buy distance-education access to advanced or specialized courses, giant multi-national corporations struggle to manage work teams separated by distance and time. A fairly extensive line of research has sought to examine experimentally what kinds of tasks can be effectively done via different forms of computer-mediated communication. One key difficult is development of trust between distant collaborators. and sometimes even impossible Previous experimental research has demonstrated the potential difficulties of developing trust via communication channels such as email. But what about intermediate communication channels such as text chat, phone conferencing, and video conferencing? The Collaboratory for Research on Electronic Work at the University of Michigan is currently running a series of experiments to test trust development in new conditions. We are also examining related issues such as, can participants detect lying over a video conference? Does knowing biographical information about collaborators affect trust development? And are there inter-cultural differences between American and Chinese students in trust and negotiation online? Preliminary results from at least two of these studies will be ready by CILT 2000, and I would enjoy having the chance to discuss these results, and particularly try to examine their educational implications, with CILT attendees. Reference Olson, G.M. & Olson, J.S. (in press). Distance Matters. Human-Computer Interaction.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2124 Poster Creating A Dynamic Set Of Interconnected Learning Communities: Strategies For Using Online Discussions To Achieve Different Pedagogical Goals This poster exhibits the work of the CILT seed grant "Establishing A Shared Set Of Criteria & Dimensions For Analyzing Online Discussions." The seed grant identified five types of activities where online discussions are used to achieve different pedagogical goals: 1. Brain-storming & Peer Review 2. Collaborative Knowledge Building Activities 3. Professional Development 4. Science Inquiry 5. Theory Debate Summaries were developed for each of these discussions to answer the questions: (a) Why is this type of activity hard for students? (b) How can discussions help students succeed in this type of activity? (c) What types of challenges do teachers and students face when discussing topics related to the activity? (d) How can a teacher assess discussions from an individual and a group perspective? The poster provides examples of the different discussions along with an overall framework for designing and assessing learning communities. We define learning communities as networks of personal relationships that enable the exchange of resources and the development of a common framework for critique. Our approach has four goals for progressively involving people in communities: (a) support the actual practices and daily tasks of the participants (b) collect experiences and represent them in an accessible and equitable manner (c) provide a framework to guide the learning process (see Linn & Hsi, 2000) (d) represent the identities of the community members. How can we structure relationships and resources within electronic communities to elicit ideas, develop shared understanding, and promote the integration of a diverse set of ideas? And how can we encourage community members to share their ideas, build on each other's views, and gain more sophisticated understanding? To answer these questions, we study how the relationships between community members and the available resources influence ways in which communities exchange and develop resources.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2121 Poster Designing Instructional Web Sites to Support Inclusive Problem-Based Learning Converting large, impersonal undergraduate lecture courses into problemñbased learning (PBL) communities that include all students is a design problem we will address in this poster session. We have restructured a lectureñstyle undergraduate course in educational psychology, turning it into a PBL experience in which cohorts of preñservice teachers collaborate to (1) study videoñcases of instruction, (2) formulate hypotheses about the case that will prompt investigation into the learning sciences, (3) develop models of the interaction between cognition and instruction, and (4)(re)design instruction based on this model. This process is supported by an instructional website containing video cases and a densely interñlinked network of Learning Science concepts and other resources. Rather than developing tools to scaffold synchronous collaboration while it occurs, we designed a webñbased system to adequately prepare individuals for collaborative work, following with collaborative activities in an asynchronous environment conducive to reflective guidance of group interaction. Preparing for group discussion is accomplished through an interface that scaffolds individuals through activities that emulate the stages of PBL. Notepad tools provide individuals space in which to record, revise and synthesize their thinking, producing artifacts that can be evaluated by the instructors and TA's, who give formative, individualized feedback. After individuals gain experience with the flow of activities in PBL and are thinking deeply about the case, their collaborative work begins. Groups "meet" online within an asynchronous discussion environment that is designed to scaffold students as they organize their task then synthesize, post and critique the results of their deliberations. Our concern for equity is reflected in design studies that examine whether the social knowledge construction during PBL is fully inclusive, and how this inclusiveness is shaped, supported and improved by the procedures, technologies and social norms being built into our system.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2111 Poster Adoption of online community tools in mainstream K-12 classrooms - a successful incremental approach to innovation based on connecting to current practice Many positive, new educational experiences are difficult to introduce to K-12 teachers, often due to the innovative nature of the new technologies and uncertainties about how to integrate the experience into a real classroom. With careful consideration to connect with current teaching techniques and goals, technology tools that support online communities can be successfully embraced by teachers who are not usual early-adopters of innovative educational technology. Success is built by associating the online community experience with substantial curriculum content and a close point of contact with the teacher's already established method of including technology experiences in the classroom. By introducing online experiences which are closely based on existing critical thinking products designed to generate discussion and collaboration within the classroom, Tom Snyder Productions has successfully brought data-sharing and distributed discussions into mainstream classrooms. The paradigm shift toward extending the classroom walls to include collaborators and data from other schools is less intimidating or remarkable to the teacher due to the continuity and quality of the curriculum material and the consistent of the goals of the classroom experience. Based on this successful adoption model, we will present ideas for further inclusion of innovative online experiences into classroom offerings that are rooted in a group-based pedagogy, which is familiar to many teachers. We are interested in finding partners to who have introduced new tools for learning communities and who would like to find ways for K-12 teachers to comfortably migrate their practice to include these new experiences.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2065 Poster Virtual communities of practice in teacher education: Assessing reflection in computer-mediated Communication environments As technology become more important in schools, computer-mediated communication (CMC) is increasingly viewed as a means of providing opportunities for busy teachers to discuss and reflect upon their efforts. Although reflection has a long history in teacher education research, little is known about how the supporting and constraining features of CMC influence reflection in electronic communities. Consequently, the use of CMC for teacher reflection remains an unpredictable phenomenon. This study used a theoretical framework based upon the literature of reflection, computer-mediated communication, and social cognition to identify some of the essential supports and constraints of teacher reflection in CMC environments. Over a threeñyear period, the framework was used to restructure an asynchronous webñbased conference used by intern teachers, with the goal of facilitating deeper levels of reflection. The webñbased conference messages produced by the interns were the primary data source for analysis, with interviews and transcriptions from classroom discussions used to provide context and enrich the study. There were four recurring themes that shaped the kinds of issues discussed and the depth of thinking expressed in the web-based conferences. Successful reflective online communities had: (a) A focused and clearly articulated purpose for discussions, (b) tightly framed expectations for participation, (c) a mixture of experienced and beginning teachers, and (d) a method for establishing and nurturing trust among the members through efforts to build community and encourage feelings of ownership. Significant differences in reflection were found when these issues were addressed in successive versions of the conference. Web-based conferences are delicate social constructions that appear to be sensitive to relatively light pedagogical and social pressures. With the correct balance, conferences can support beginning teachers in ways that impact significantly upon their thinking. This paper highlights several important considerations for creating web-based conferences that support beginning teacher reflection.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2076 Poster Fostering the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Through the Use of Online Collaboration Technologies and Multimedia The Knowledge Media Laboratory of The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching is supporting K-16 educators in their development of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning through the use of online collaboration technologies and multimedia. In order to enable these educators to make their teaching practice public, subject it to critical review, and improve it by learning from one another's work, our current research and development focus on: - Facilitating the efforts of teachers who are attempting to use multimedia in order to present their investigations. - Developing online collaboration environments for educators who are documenting their teaching and sharing what they are learning with others. - Developing resources in a variety of electronic formats that promote the understanding and pursuit of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. In many respects, these tools and resources provide ideal opportunities for the development and pursuit of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning that are not normally available to many educators in their own schools. For instance, - They provide a means for teachers to make some of the work that they normally do in isolated classrooms, behind closed doors, accessible to others. - They provide a forum in which teachers can get feedback from peers beyond their local campuses. - They enable teachers to refer to, use and build on the activities, projects, rubrics, and examples of student work of their peers. However, our work is confronted with the same challenges faced by many groups and projects that are concerned with supporting teachers who are documenting and reflecting on their practice including limits on time and lack of appropriate incentives. They also include some of the well-known challenges of working in online environments including issues of access, technical expertise, information filtering, intellectual property, and building critical mass. Future development of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning will depend on a growing network of educators at all levels. We hope that our work fosters substantive connections among individuals and groups that are interested in advancing collective understandings of teaching and learning.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2091 Poster Design Considerations to Promote Synergy of Electronic and Classroom Discourse The purpose of this study is to understand how electronic discourse can be supported by classroom discourse. When 6th grade students were participating in an Internet ñ enhanced science curriculum, they studied weather phenomena using real-time data and telecommunication with peers and scientists from all over the world. Yet, their science class was still structured similar to a traditional science class where teacher's instruction played a significant part of classroom activities. In this learning environment, the researcher was interested in the characteristics of scientific understanding students exhibited on the Message Board (as a form of electronic discourse) with the help of classroom discourse. In general, the classroom teacher provided more procedural scaffolding than conceptual scaffolding in the computer lab. Groups of students who received more conceptual scaffolding than others were able to exhibit more conceptually elaborated understandings on the Message Board. This suggests that when technology is introduced in a classroom, teachers need to provide conceptual scaffolding besides procedural scaffolding to promote studentsí scientific understanding. In addition, the communication tool (the Message Board) and the curriculum need to be designed to alleviate procedural complexity of technology, so that teachers and students should be able to focus on conceptual understanding besides procedural understanding. At the same time, the communication tool and the curriculum should be designed to provide additional conceptual scaffolding besides one from classroom teachers. For example, carefully designed participant structure on the Message Board such as on-line content specialists will be able to provide unique conceptual scaffolding which is hardly available in a traditional classroom. Some of collaborators for this work include educators in science education and educational technology, science content specialists, and computer programmers. Note any collaborations you are seeking: I am looking for new on-line communication technology (both hardware and software) which can more easily provide procedural, conceptual, and customized scaffolding. Discuss the implications of your work for educational equity: Previous studies show that students have more and equal opportunities for participating in on-line communication than in a traditional classroom discussion. On-line communication of this study allowed students to collaborate with diverse participants including peers and scientists in other locations. Thus, every student could contribute their ideas and experiences as a local expert, share their knowledge, and develop ownership of their learning.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2098 Poster Online Moderating: Supporting Learning in Virtual Communities The learning that takes place in online discussion groups depends critically on the skills of the group leader, or moderator. Restrained but effective intervention can be crucial for guiding group learning. This poster will present a set of learnings based on our experience moderating online teacher professional development courses. Our experience with two major online education projects, Concord Consortiumís NSF-funded INTEC professional development netcourse which has brought increased understanding of inquiry to over 800 teachers, and the Technology Innovation Challenge Grant Virtual High School (VHS) which prepared over 300 teachers to create and teach high school courses online has made it clear that moderating in a virtual community to support learning is a skill. It requires a different perspective. We developed an approach to prepare the online moderators for their roles. That training is described in ìFacilitating Online Learningî published by Atwood Publishers, and is the basis for a 13 week online course, Moving Out of the Middle. The approach presents a set of conceptual tools to help the moderator interpret the communications and respond. One participant has said; ìThese conceptual tools are so deep -- it's like someone telling me, ëOK, you've been using 3 eating utensils your whole life ... that's so limited ... here's 18 more ñ start using them.í" The goal of our approach is to move the moderator out of the middle and have dialog and hence the learning move between the students rather than through the moderator. Another participant has said about the approach: ìClearly, having the learning go from student to student rather than through the instructor takes great skillÖ your course provided the strategies for knowing how.î When a moderator learns the skills in our meta-talk approach they change their mental model for online instruction. ìThe readings and the postings are recharting my mental map of teaching and learning ...The experience of crafting interventions of dialogue elements is astonishingly powerful. I'll never go back.î Co-Presenter: Sarah Haavind, Concord Consortium
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2034 Poster The ChemSense Knowledge Building Environment Co-author/Presenter - Anders Rosenquist The ChemSense project (chemsense.org) at SRI International aims to help students investigate complex chemical systems by making the underlying chemistry more visible, and making students' thinking more visible and open to inspection. We have completed several small studies focused on the role of chemistry representations on student understanding. Preliminary analyses suggest that visual representations encourage conceptual elaborations that give students the basis for more thorough and sophisticated discussion of their chemical ideas, and students who construct their own representations outperform those who are asked to select from ready-made representations. We are currently planning a set of studies to better explore the benefits of epistemological scaffolding and intra- and inter-class collaboration. A fall 2000 study will examine first-year chemistry undergraduates at the University of Michigan who will design, conduct, and peer-review classmates' experiments on the structure-reactivity relationship of organic halides. One or more high school studies planned for spring 2001 will build on our findings. In support of our research, we are developing a server-based Knowledge Building Environment (KBE) version of ChemSense that combines and extends aspects of existing asynchronous KBE tools (e.g., CSILE, SpeakEasy, Belvedere). The ChemSense KBE will support the sharing, viewing, and editing of a variety of chemistry representations including text, images, 2D and 3D molecule drawings, and animations. The user interface will reflect a focus on these "knowledge objects" as well as operations that can be performed on them. Users will be able to annotate and specify relationships between objects, and browse various views of the knowledge space. At CILT, we will present our findings and illustrative screenshots of the system. We have collaborated with members of the CILT Seed Grant "Interoperability among Knowledge-Building Environments" and offer the ChemSense KBE as a prototype that implements an extensible mark-up language to represent the data captured in such systems.
COMMUNITY TOOLS 2024 Poster Multiple literacies, interdependent interaction, and the opportunities of non-foundational, interdependent, and collaborative learning with CMC environment This contribution will report on experiences of integrating computer mediated communication (CMC) into language learning and teaching curricula. I will focus on theoretical and experiential components, looking at two years of experience in teaching culture, language, and language pedagogy courses in a collaborative CMC environment. I will focus my presentation on some components of multiple literacies which are present and necessary for collaborative learning in the CMC environment. Some of these literacies are: o literacies in various languages; o literacies in various cultures, from ethnic and geographic cultures to the cultures of gender and individual cultures; o technological literacies (using the technology as a resource for developing other sources of literacy and language use); o a literacy of interdependence, including the collaborative groups of learners and teachers immediately involved in the courses; o ethical literacies, including issues of the authority of knowledge and power in the classroom context, issues of intellectual property and shared knowledge in a collaborative environment; o instructional literacies, including the skills, techniques, and attitudinal aspects of foundational and non-foundational models for teaching and facilitating learning; o epistemological literacies, including a critical and open view of various ways of knowing, individual learning styles and preferences, and investigations of the power and authority of knowledge in various L1 and L2 contexts. I am looking for collaborators who are interested in approaches to research in this complex realm that increase our understanding, both holistically and in the smallest details, of the socialand learning settings as complex adaptive systems. We need to explore new paradigms not only for learning and teaching in this type of environment, but also new paradigms which address this real world of complex adaptive systems, in which many people and circumstances act and interact.
SYNERGY 2050 5-minute presentation Interactive Video Network, A Missed opportunity In the interest of strengthening the quality of the teaching of Science, Mathmatics, and Technology and improving the quality and accessibility of these disciplines , I approached the Mississippi Science Teachers' association (MSTA) with what I determined to be " the answer ". In 1996 the National Science Teacher's Association launched a most innovative , national award -winning science education reform program....the mission was to ensure that every school building in the country would have a science Point of Contact , and receive a copy of the National science standards .The obvious next step, to me, was to include the Math and Technnology. Then, of course, implementation of those national standards..., not piece meal, but simultaneously using Interactive Video network .The presentations/ labs were to be given given by skilled, inquiry based, nationally known consultants, teachers, or presentors.The work was richly rewarding. It is that work that I desire to share with you today.The beginnings have local and national implications.
SYNERGY 2128 5-minute presentation Hands On Physics: Assessment in a Pilot of two units, Magnetism and Motion In addition to greater understanding of concepts in physical science we are hoping that the hands-on approach embodied in Hands On Physics Project supports the wider goal of preparation for future learning. The design of HOP approaches this goal in three ways: 1. Dispelling persistent misconceptions or alternate frameworks. 2. Developing inquiry and problem solving skills. 3. Providing a technology rich environment and improves facility in use of technologies. Looking at all of inquiry and problem solving is a tall order. We chose to look at student questions in their oral and written communications as windows onto their thinking. We also seek to examine how explanations of outcomes reveal increases in sophistication the increase in use of expert language, and language indicating ownership of ideas. A second line of investigation explores any changes in attitude toward science and scientists as students experience scientific inquiry. To measure gains in the three above goals we employ traditional assessments such as the VASS instrument and elements of Hestenes' MBI as well as elements of DIRECT, an electronics assessment. Two other instruments designed by the HOP CC staff investigate question and explanations. These instruments measure student questions along dimensions of complexity, and level of engagement with ideas, and category of questions asked as informational, classificatory, inferential, or an application of ideas beyond conclusions. We intend to refine the new tests and evaluate their usefulness combined with traditional instruments for content as ways in which in inquiry into preparation for future learning can be measured.
SYNERGY 2031 5-minute presentation State Policies Matter: In-service Teacher Professional Development in Technology I propose to present findings from my research in Vermont and Kentucky on the role of state education agencies in supporting in-service teacher professional development in technology within the context of their equity-based reforms. The research compared the effects of different policy, governance and finance systems on the provision of in-service teacher professional development in technology as a tool for standards based teaching and learning. This implementation study involved interviews with policy makers and educational practitioners at every level of the policy system, from state houses to classrooms.
SYNERGY 2080 5-minute presentation Online Learning: The LearnFromUs Project The popularity and pedagogical validity of online learning presents challenges to colleges who present distance learning through broadcast telecourses. WHYY, Philadelphia's major public broadcaster, has been working with a consortium led by Camden County College, Community College of Philadelphia, and Delaware County Community College, along with other institutions, to provide college credit courses through telecourses. As a central resource in the region of technological expertise, WHYY seized the opportunity to facilitate the consortium institutionsí move towards completely online or web-enhanced courses derived from the licensed telecourse curricula. Specifically, the project combines the strengths of the WHYY consortium with the large investment in content by the PBS Adult Learning Service, especially the Annenberg/CPB collection of telecourse videos, and an advanced digital streaming media technology center under development by the Seattle Community College District. To provide course management, WHYY entered into a licensing arrangement with courseware developer WebStudy, Inc., a Philadelphia area developer. The lead institutions in the consortium adopted the title ìLearnFromUsî as the title of the repositioning project. The project is in the beginning stages of developing online courses with streaming video as an essential content component. In addition, the project partners are developing a wrap-around component of learner support and services to help student success. The consortium institutions have agreed that student support services to distance learners is the element most absent from the tremendous emergence of on line offerings. The student support piece includes attention to tutorial needs, needs in the area of information literacy and student technical issues. As one looks towards the future, WHYY and PBS are also interested in developing next-generation courses, based on the Learn From Us project, which will use digital television as the delivery technology. As a federal mandate for all broadcasters, digital television promises the same wide availability and accessibility that analog television offers today. The presentation will present the projectís conception, development, early experience in delivering advanced technology courses using the Internet, and future goals.
SYNERGY 2086 5-minute presentation Visualization and Model-based Reasoning Using Groundwater Groundwater Computer Models: Science Teacher Protocols We are in the process of identifying and supporting ten or more scientifically varied science teacher enhancement projects on our campus (or on one of our partner campuses) initially over a five-year period. The common denominator of all identified projects is that the project leaders have designed and are using computer models to explain natural phenomena. Thus, the scientists and engineers are engaged in model-based reasoning. The main purpose of each project is to develop science teacher expertise in using model-based reasoning and scientific computer models. An important part of the project will not only be the education of teachers but the transfer of their knowledge to classroom application. Special emphasis will be given to teacher assessment of student reasoning. We anticipate drawing from diverse regions of Texas, both through funded projects which provide stipends and graduate courses and from extensive distance learning opportunities allowing teachers from El Paso to Beaumont--and their students--to work with the project leaders on our campuses and with each other. Two critical components of this project are the issues of equity and issues of the natural integration of science and mathematics through the use of information technology. The equity issue is dealt with by an established partnership with community colleges and border universities in our system as well as by leadership from several bilingual/multicultural experts. The math/science integration issue will be a natural part of all projects by the nature of the science being learned and by the leadership team coming from science, mathematics, engineering, as well as science and mathematics education. The example we will briefly discuss deals with a complex computer model of the many parameters needed to understand what affects groundwater for the Savannah River area (developed by mathematician and Dean of Science, Richard Ewing and several geologists/geophysicists). Right now, a few team members are working with some teachers in a pilot to determine the steps needed to move towards the actual computer models scientists use. The "learning curve" of teachers, in terms of the mathematics as well as the science concepts, will help us establish a protocol for all projects to assure new teachers feel welcomed, yet challenged, and see a way that what they are doing in the lab can be used in their classroom in meaningful ways. Collaborators are numerous but are led by (besides C. Loving, science education); Jane Schielack, math ed; Andrew Strickler, computer and information technology; Carol Stuessy, science ed; Larry Peck, chemistry; Rafael Lara, bilingual/multicultural ed., Dale Whittaker, ag engineering; Gerry Kulm, math ed; Overall project leaders include Profesor Ewing and Jane Close Conoley, ed psych; Joe Newton, mathematics; and Jon Denton, technology education. We definitely seek others who are using information technology to enhance teacher and student model-based reasoning through models and visualization.
SYNERGY 2088 5-minute presentation Apple Learning: Helping educators leverage technology for learning In my work as a senior product marketing manager at Apple I am engaged in developing ways to bring innovative uses of technology to a broad educational audience. Specifically, we are looking for opportunities to provide a combination of face-to-face and online professional development, access to powerful technology tools (ideally tools that work well with Apple hardware) and online environments that provide significant enhancements to learning. Through our current series of Apple Learning offerings we believe we provide significant support for educators looking to implement proven, effective practices for leveraging technology to enhance learning. Apple Learning includes Apple Learning Professional Development (workshops, programs, and online courses for teachers, technology specialists and administrators), the Apple Learning Series (software and online curriculum bundles) and the Apple Learning Interchange. However, we donít want to stop here. We are looking to help create and promote new practices, new approaches to learning, new innovations made possible through technology. We are also attempting to innovate in the area of combining different modes ñ face-to-face, online, and CD-based software, to provide enhanced learning opportunities for both teachers and students. We are very open to exploring collaborative relationships, as well as seeking information about approaches to teaching and learning leveraging technology that have been, through research, proven to be more effective than traditional teaching methods.
SYNERGY 2084 5-minute presentation Teaming as a Means to Sustainability LivingText, LLC, is a for-profit enterprise established as an incubator for education projects not-quite-ready for the publishing world. LivingText has built the necessary infrastructrure and expertise to help prepare research-grade software and curriculum for wider publication through commercialization. It is our expectation that a teaming of science and technical curricula and applciations will be more attractive to the publishing world as a package rather than piecemeal. This model has the added advantage of allowing the authors to maintain guidance over the implementation of their tools and, if desired, to continue research with reduced expense (or even profit) for its implementation.
SYNERGY 2002 Demo Grabbing Hold: Teachers as their own Internet Service Provider The Education Network of Ontario is a telecommunications corporation creating a network for and by Ontario's 130,000 education community. When educators register with ENO, they receive full industry-standard Internet and Intranet services in English and French. ENO/REO works from school or home. Teachers voluntarily use ENO to work with their colleagues. To date, 80000 teachers are involved. They access the Internet or related services and resources through over 14000 logins a day for a total of 10000000 minutes of online time. On a particularly busy day, we route 100000 mail or news messages. Our five years of experience have taught us that 'just-in-time' collaborative learning is the greatest benefit of telecommunications and interaction on-line. Teachers are creating a centralized resource of activities for teachers and administrators of northern schools who have no outside student recess for as long as six weeks in mid-winter. Others create a file of model parent letters and report cards for middle school students during a period of education reform. The network has a forum for school administrators in which teachers who wish to be administrators are mentored in effective career paths. Groups of teachers experiment with emerging technologies and how they relate to the classroom. One set of colleagues is creating a web resource to document their establishment of a full Internet radio station; a second is using narrow band videoconferencing to support co-operative education; a third, a leadership and administrative group, is working with us to establish ways of working using Ethernet telephones and integrated desktop for ease and economy. Our research partnerships have led to leadership roles with a national corporation of education researchers. In a research environment, we create cadres of teachers who now understand the need for and use a sophisticated variety of applications and content to support and motivate students in the online environment. We are widening our scope with these researchers in the creation of an agent-based professional development portal. By becoming our own Internet Service Provider, we have created a continuously evolving 'bootstrap' model to support teachers at every level of skill and with a tremendous diversity of interests. We seek other such networks for cross-collaboration.
SYNERGY 2096 Demo InTime: A PT3 and Renaissance Group Project InTime (Integrating New Technologies Into the Methods of Education) is a $2,397,594 Catalyst Grant from the United States Department of Education and a part of its Preparing Tomorrow's Teachers to Use Technology (PT3) project. InTime involves five collaborative Renaissance Group universities, such as Eastern Michigan University, Emporia State University (KS), Longwood College (VA), and Southeast Missouri State University. The three-year InTme project addresses deficiencies in teacher education programs in preparing preservice teachers to use technology effectively in the PreK-12 classroom. The purpose of InTime is to provide the necessary resources for methods faculty to revise their courses, model technology integration, and require preservice teachers to integrate technology, along with the components of quality of education, in their lessons and units. This project is intended to produce change in teacher education programs in three ways. First, this project will generate new learning resources on the web to support new teaching and learning processes in education methods courses. New learning resources will include development of video scenarios of PreK-12 teachers effectively integrating technology, along with the components of quality of education, in a variety of grade levels and content areas. These videos will be stored on a video server already in place at the University of Northern Iowa and made accessible on-line nationwide. Second, methods faculty will revise their courses to model technology integration using the video scenarios and online discussion forum, require students to apply technology, and implement the Preservice Teacher Technology Competencies as exit criteria for their courses. Finally, other faculty involved n the grant through the Faculty Online Discussion Forum and nation-wide through print and web publications of their findings as well as presentations at national conferences.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2156 Mobile Inquiry Technology Projects Mobile Inquiry Technology is a grant from the Massachusetts Department of Education to the Hudson Public Schools and the Concord Consortium, who are working with 4th-6th grade and developers of such exemplary curricula as FOSS, Insights, STC, Investigations, and CMP to develop mobile computing and scientific probe-based activities to support mathematics and science inquiry. Development and field testing have resulted in a bank of 30 activities that are exemplars of cognitively powerful uses of technology to support mathematics and science learning. The Mobile Inquiry Technology Project is based on four principles: 1. Access: In order to take advantage of the power of technology to enhance students’ learning they must have access to the tools. The Mobile Inquiry Technology project will test a classroom implementation model using class sets of 13 computers and sets of scientific probes in each classroom, enabling pairs of students to collaborate on investigations and share the computers for writing purposes. Teachers will have access to the tools as well. 2. Equity: The Mobile Inquiry Technology project is committed to making use of low-cost, durable, and mobile technology. 3. Cognitively powerful solutions: Our goal is to develop activities that support, enhance, and enrich research-based successful learning activities exemplified by NSF-funded, standards-based curriculum projects. 4. Instructional efficiency: We will develop technology-based inquiry activities that can easily be implemented in the classroom. Examples of project activities will be demonstrated at the conference. We have developed grades 4-6 mathematics and science activities that utilize newly developed "smart" probes linked to laptop computers, as well as extensive integration of spreadsheet and graphing applications. The curriculum has been developed in an HTML environment in order to incorporate gifs for students to clarify technical operations of probes and computers.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2158 Palms to Support Students' Science Learning in Inquiry-Based Classrooms Ann Rivet Elliot Soloway Joseph Krajcik We report our experiences using Palm computers with thirty sixth-grade students in an urban middle school. These students used the Palms to support their investigations in a project-based science unit about mechanical advantage. Each student used their own Palm to construct and share concept maps, using a software application called PiCoMap. The Palms were also used to record individual observations, which were pooled and discussed as a whole-class data set. We will present our initial results of this study, discuss the software applications, and suggest further uses of Palm computers in the classroom.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2157 Value and status of ubiquitous classroom tools What are the opportunities and limitations of the single-purpose appliance in contrast the multiple-use computer? Is the hand-held Palm the salvation? Does low-cost mean second-class citizenship? I do see the sexiness of the innovative handheld devices to the not-so-cool traditional laptops. Is there a distinction to be drawn between ubiquitous computing and ubiquitous computers? We're seeing classroom changes, similar to those that Becker and Anderson find in schools with high computer access, changes that clearly support constructivist teaching and independent learning. Yet the vehicle is a standard laptop business machine.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2155 DigitalBackpack and NetTrekker: Portable learning ASP tools for students and teachers Two new tools -- Digitalbackpack & netTrekker -- are being introduced nationally to students and educators at secondary schools nationwide. DIGITALBACKPACK digitalbackpack, like a student's physical backpack, contains gear for school and life. It delivers our targets' three most popular Internet activities -- communication, entertainment and academic research -- all through a Web browser. As a contextual ASP, we deliver threshold technologies including a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation tool, and file storage. Through multi-layered calendaring, students can be served school-related info, assignments, and schedules. Finally, through our proprietary on-the-fly preference engine, students completely customize their digitalbackpack from a content and design perspective. NETTREKKER netTrekker revolutionizes the way both students and educators use the Internet for academic research. By previewing and organizing the best web sites through a proprietary review and indexing scheme, netTrekker provides the fastest and easiest way to do academic research. netTrekker is the first product to integrate all these links in the taxonomy of the national curriculum. Additional tools such as saved searches, a virtual highlighter, and a bibliography builder make this resource the first choice for school-related searches.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2069 5-minute presentation Visualizing heat and temperature using handheld computers and RF-linked sensors. Stephen Bannasch, Concord Consortium Paul Horwitz, Concord Consortium Carolyn Staudt, Concord Consortium At the Concord Consortium we are creating a system to support research in our NSF-funded Models and Data project with middle-school students investigating heat and temperature. Our work involves exploring these phenomena through both multi-sensor and model-based visualizations. We have a wired system now in which 8 temperature sensors are connected to an interface which is connected to a laptop. This system connects to simple visualization software. Associated models currently run as Java-based simulations in AgentSheets. We have been testing the technology and associated learning activities in local 6th grade classrooms. Our next version of the measurement systems will use low-power wireless RF technology to integrate with tiny, high precision temperature sensors. Our vision is of a cooperative group of kids who have arranged a suite of temperature sensors around one or more experiments. Each student monitors the results on a handheld while a larger computer displays various aggregate information on a larger color screen. Our work encourages richer investigation of difficult to understand phenomena such as heat and temperature and in the future inexpensive and easily applied portable probeware. Our presentation at CILT will report on the status of this work and provide a demonstration of the technology. [note: this could also easily go in the ubiquitous computing section]
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2047 5-minute presentation Learning with Digital Manipulatives\|New Frameworks to Help Elementary-School Students Explore "Advanced" Mathematical and Scientific Concepts Learning with Digital Manipulatives New Frameworks to Help Elementary-School Students Explore "Advanced" Mathematical and Scientific Concepts Mitchel Resnick, Bakhtiar Mikhak and Diane Willow MIT Media Laboratory Michael Eisenberg University of Colorado Robbie Berg MIT Media Laboratory and Wellesley College In the spirit of Fröbel’s first kindergarten in 1837, many of today’s kindergartens and early-elementary classrooms are full of physical objects and physical activity. Walk into a classroom, and you are likely to see a diverse collection of "manipulative materials" such as Cuisenaire Rods and Pattern Blocks – current-day analogues of the "gifts" that Fröbel designed for his kindergarten. As children build and experiment with these manipulative materials, they develop deeper understandings of mathematical concepts such as number, size, and shape. But many important mathematical and scientific concepts are very difficult (if not impossible) to explore with traditional manipulative materials. For example, traditional manipulatives do not help children learn about dynamic processes – how things change over time, how patterns form, and how behaviors arise. Such concepts are typically taught through more formal methods, involving abstract mathematical formalisms not accessible to elementary-school children. But, in our view, these "advanced" concepts are not inherently too complex for young children. Rather, the core problem is that traditional representations of these concepts are inaccessible. The challenge is to create new representations that make these concepts more "manipulable" by young children. It is here that computational technologies can play a major role. By adding computational capabilities to manipulative materials, we believe we can greatly expand the range of concepts that children can explore through direct manipulation of physical objects. In this new project, we aim to: - Extend theories on the role of manipulatives in children’s learning – and develop principles for the design and assessment of digital manipulatives - Rethink elementary math-science curricula to place greater emphasis on concepts related to dynamic processes – and develop a deeper understanding of children’s mental models of these knowledge domains. In support of these goals, we have begun to develop a collection of new "digital manipulatives" by embedding computational power in traditional children’s toys such as blocks, beads, and balls. These new manipulatives are being designed to support children’s explorations of important concepts (especially ideas related to dynamics and change) that were previously seen as "too advanced" for elementary-school students. For example, we are investigating how children might use digital manipulatives to learn about dynamic processes, focusing particularly on the concept of emergence, which underlies the workings of many dynamic systems. We are also seeking to develop new ways for children to learn through dynamic processes, proposing a dynamic-process approach to the concept of functions, focusing on the ways that "outputs" vary dynamically as "inputs" change.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2003 5-minute presentation Wireless Computing in Education New technologies for nomadic computing, such as inexpensive powerful laptops and fast wireless networks, have the potential to greatly enrich collaboration while simultaneously decoupling location and function, allowing the classroom to be the library or the dorm room to be the lecture hall. These technologies are bringing about fundamental changes in the ways that the university creates and disseminates ideas, knowledge, and understanding. In this study, we examined the impact of nomadic technologies on the process of instruction and learning in upper-level computer-mediated communication course. This project demonstrates that mobile computing can have a significant impact on students use of communication and collaboration tools, and hence on the quality of their education. However, we found that this impact is heavily influenced by the social contextual features of particular learning environments. In addition we report on computing behavioral differences as a function of the context (in or out of class), and the kinds of search and navigation correlated with better overall class performance. We couch these findings within an Activity Theory framework, and provide suggestions for how current curricula might incorporate these findings and expand upon them in the future
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2006 5-minute presentation One-to-One Computing Tools for Life In the pioneering one-to-one computing schools, every student has a laptop that accompanies him or her throughout the school day and home in the evening, with an anytime-anywhere connection to the school network and the Internet. The results are proving to be dramatic. Student achievement is on the rise, attendance is up, and students who have dropped out are back in school. Teachers are becoming facilitators in the learning process. Parents are getting involved in their children's education and going back to school themselves. The Elements of One-to-One Computing: One-to-one computing is built on five basic elements. First, if each student is to have a computer, the computer must be portable, durable and wireless. This is not as expensive as it sounds, when the space, power, and wiring costs are factored into the total cost of ownership. The computers must go home every day to make the desired impact on student learning. Second, all computers must function as part of a large, "mission-critical" system to be effective. This broadly covers everything from a wireless LAN infrastructure to the systems software that manages a complex computing environment. Third, students, parents and teachers must receive thorough training, with technical and instructional support onsite to ensure a smooth transition. Experience has shown that training and support must be delivered over a yearlong period to be fully effective. Fourth, the system must be comprehensive; it must integrate an Internet-based curriculum into everyday studies with an emphasis on teacher-driven lessons and student-driven learning. Finally, the system must provide continuous broadband connectivity for every student and teacher, in order to foster the ad hoc use of the Internet and facilitate on-demand learning. Broadband connectivity also provides DSL-like speed to the desktop in support of the next generation of Internet applications.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2120 5-minute presentation Learning in the Palm of Your Hand Not since the PC has there been a lower-cost, more widely-adopted computing platform than the handheld computer. According to Merrill Lynch, the ratio of students to PCs was approximately 7:1 between 1997-1998. With handheld computers priced as low as $125 per device, the opportunity exists to create a 1:1 ratio between students who are already familiar with this form factor and the handheld devices that represent a new platform for delivering educational technology. Like other educational technologies, the handheld computer can be used to enhance the learning experience not only by appealing to different learning styles but also engaging the learner in higher-level thinking skills through interactivity and feedback. Through the use of an authoring tool designed for the handheld platform, the presenter will explain and show several examples of educational applications for the handheld platform including: * Self-Paced Learning * Supplemental Learning * Collaborative Learning * Cooperative Learning * Field-Based Learning With enabling technologies like authoring tools for the handheld platform, teachers and students alike can easily create and distribute interactive learni> Transfer interrupted! uter and expand the realm of learning well beyond the classroom environment.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2068 5-minute presentation Pervasive Learning Environments: An "open source" approach to leveraging ubiquity. Affordable portable digital devices combined with globally shared resources are an excellent example of possible change agents within traditional schools. By enabling individuals to ìownî their information access and management tools, these devices provide a vehicle for both personal empowerment and customized learning amidst the anonymity often present in large educational institutions. One of the most compelling reasons to use affordable portables is to resolve the growing disparity between students who do and don't have access to such resources. Economies of scales and total cost of ownership issues dictate very little chance of equipping and supporting all students with computing devices until these devices are portable for both school and home, network ready, priced under $500.00, simple to use, and inexpensive to support Iíve attempted to synthesize these ideas around a larger concept of Pervasive Learning Environments. Pervasive Learning Environments (PLE) would have structural characteristics that are uniquely enabled by the combination of ubiquitous computing devices and wireless network access. These two technologies are not simply a logical progression of existing educational technologies, but a powerful synergy that provides opportunities for radically redefining how school space and time are organized. A critical complimentary component to PLEís is a personalized information space for each learner and/or groups of learners. By leveraging ìopen sourceî collaborations, schools can now cost-effectively build a searchable knowledge base for all learners within the organization. (example: http://spusd.net ) I am interested in partnering with individuals and/or organizations to develop ìopen sourceî solutions for both Linux-based portable devices and Knowledge Management portals as powerful and affordable solutions for learning communities. Curtis Lee is Director of Instructional Technology for South Pasadena Unified School District and is a doctoral student in Educational Technology at Pepperdine University.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2049 5-minute presentation Palms Together: Collaborative Use of Multiple Baby-faced Displays Our project investigated a new interaction paradigm for handheld computing: using multiple interconnected devices to form a shared workspace. Handheld computers have many advantages for Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) in the classroom. Children can have rich face-to-face interactions by being physically co-located while maintaining control over their environment by each having access to a computing device. Disadvantages of using handheld computers include the small screens and viewing angles for collaborating around a single display. Using interconnected handheld computers to visualize information across a number of displays addressed addresses the these drawbacks while maintaining the desired attributes of mobility, access, and control for all participants. Our initial investigation was conducted in an elementary school to observe how children use handheld computers. Based on our observation results, we ran a number of Participatory Design (PD) sessions with the school children to build prototypes of the interface of the interconnected devices of a collaborative educational application. We extended an application called Geney, an application originally written by a team at Simon Fraser University, that is designed to help children learn genetics. Our developed application allowed version of Geney allows up to four of the Geney game participants to investigate potential game outcomes by visualizing information shared across their handheld computers. Together, these small groups of children can collaboratively decide how to progress in the game. Soon, we will evaluate our new interaction paradigm with children ages 9 through 11 at a computer summer camp. Results of the study will be discussed at the presentation. Our interaction paradigm provides a unique opportunity for children to obtain a larger shared view of a collaborative information space and provided access for all children while also allowing each child to interact and manipulate the shared environment. This work was completed with Kori Inkpen (Simon Fraser University) and James Landay (UC Berkeley) as a part of a CILT 1999 Seed grant.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2067 5-minute presentation THE CONSTRUCTION KIT CONSTRUCTION KIT In our most recent project, our goal has been to give educational practitioners, researchers and designers the opportunity to design and build their own tools, envision and create their own activities, with a new collection of computational and digital tools that are designed to allow them to focus of their learning objectives rather than engineering and other technical details. In this session, we will present the design of construction kit, for building computational devices, called MetaCricket. MetaCricket consists of a set of hardware modules and the integrated software, which runs both on a development computer and within the MetaCricket hardware. MetaCricket provides a flexible interactive development environment for trying out new hardware and behaviors. The underlying architecture makes it easy for designers to expand the basic construction kit themselves with minimal engineering effort. Through a few examples, we show how designers, enabled by MetaCricket to be engineers of their own tools, are rethinking and transforming the very character of design principles in the digital age. We will in particular show how we are using this kit to develop a collection of "Digital Manipulatives", designed to support children's exploration of important concepts (especially ideas related to dynamics and change) that were previously seen as "too advanced" for elementary-school students. MetaCricket was originally designed for use by children, but has been adopted by professional designers who are not professional engineers. We believe that MetaCricket has the potential to become a rapid-prototyping tool for educators in many disciplines, going beyond only mathematics, science and engineering education. Collaborators: Fred Martin Brian Silverman Robbie Berg Mitchel Resnick Diane Willow
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2059 5-minute presentation Ubiquitous Images Seed Grant Report Digital imaging technologies are becoming easier to use and more readily available. Thus, they appear to be appropriate and useful tools for students to use in classrooms. However, in what ways do students use digital images as part of their learning? This question was explored by the Ubiquitous Images seed grant project. For this project, collaborators from the University of Michigan and the Concord Consortium worked at two different sites to explore the ways in which students use digital cameras and images to support their learning of scientific concepts. Ann Rivet, Rebecca Schneider, and Joe Krajcik from the University of Michigan worked with students in a Midwest middle school, where the students used their own pictures to predict the results of water quality tests, created web pages with the photos that integrated ideas from their year-long study of their local stream. Stephen Bannasch and Carolyn Staudt from the Concord Consortium coordinated the use of digital images with probes and hand-held computers used by fifth-grade students in the Northeast. During the school year these students focused on the environmental condition of a study area and created annotated sketches as part of their analysis. In the CILT research, students took digital pictures of the area and annotated directly on the images. The annotated digital images were then compared to their earlier annotations. Overall each site found that students easily and successfully used the cameras to gather images, and given appropriate classroom support, were able to use the images in a thoughtful manner to illustrate or develop understanding of various scientific ideas. In this presentation, we will give an overview of our methods and our findings from this initial research. We also will share our conclusions and recommendations to industry about imaging technologies, and directions for further research.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2114 5-minute presentation Kids And PalmS (KAPS) Janice Gobert - Concord Consortium Carolyn Staudt - Concord Consortium Kids And PalmS (KAPS) researchers at the Concord Consortium are working with teachers throughout Massachusetts in second through fifth grades with hand held computers and portable data logging devices. The purpose of this study was to investigate how the use of the note-taking and sketching on the Palm with attached data loggers impacted the studentsí prior knowledge about energy. Student investigations varied based on the age of the student and included inside and outside the classroom activities for each grade level. Special focus will be on the fifth grade class that investigated a pond over the entire school year. Discussion will include the design approach of the research including pre- and post-tests with selected student interviews and the instructional skills addressed during the study.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2151 5-minute presentation Overcoming the Data Barrier The PASCO scientific community believes that through attention to the context in which technologies are used, including: v the realities of schools, v the people in the school communities, v the research on teaching and learning, v the adopted and enacted curricula, and v the standards, PASCO can bring appropriate technologies to both teachers and students that will significantly improve the teaching and learning of K-12 math and science. Conscientious context-sensitive development and design work lowers barriers to entry thereby increasing access to technological resources and the opportunities they represent. PASCO scientific manufactures computer interfaces, sensors, and software for all science content areas (physics, chemistry, biology, earth science, etc.), as well as mathematics. PASCO provides hands-on computer-based data acquisition solutions designed to comply with the latest national standards. Teachers use PASCO's materials to design learning environments and experiences that allow students to do science. Students are able to collect, store, and graphically analyze real-time data from their own experiments in the classroom or in the field.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2117 5-minute presentation Participatory Simulations: New activity design for an era of ubiquitous, wireless, networked, classroom computing Traditional education has seen one-on-one interaction between teacher and student as a kind of ideal. Moving out from this, one-on-two is less ideal, one-on-three even less so, and so on, until we get to the ratios found in most classrooms of one-on-twenty, one-on-thirty or even more. At this point the style of call-and-response interaction associated with one-on-one tutorials is so completely overwhelmed by the structural realities of this number of students, that one would have thought we would have given up on this mode of interaction in classrooms a long time ago. Yet the reality in most classroom is that this one-on-one-like mode of interaction is maintained in spite of its manifest shortcomings in a group settings. Moreover, as new technologies are introduced into the classroom they are being asked to fit-in with or help support this tutorial-like mode of interaction. In an era of ubiquitous, wireless, networked computing (with projection capabilities) we feel it is essential to start over and ask the question: What might the classroom experience be like if we designed the activities and the technology from the ground up both with a group setting in mind and with a significant learning outcome ñ systems thinking for all ñ as a target? The NSF-funded Participatory Simulation Project, in cooperation with our commercial partner, Texas Instruments, has been working hard to populate and investigate learning in just such a space of activity design and technology innovation. We will show QuickTime clips of students engaged in participatory simulations as they act out the roles of individual system elements (e.g. traffic lights in a simulated city) and then see how the behavior of the system as a whole (e.g. gridlock) emerges from these individual behaviors. The emergent behavior of the system and its relation to individual participant actions and strategies then become the objects of collective discussion and analysis.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2041 5-minute presentation The Electronic Guidebook: wireless networks and handheld computers at the Exploratorium The Exploratorium, in partnership with the Concord Consortium, has spent the past year creating and exploring prototypes for the use of wireless networks and handheld computers to both enrich the existing exhibit experience, and extend the museum experience into outdoor environments. The motivating vision for this work has been the possibility of delivering media-rich content to the user at the exhibit, guided by that user's interests, and limited only by their curiosity. In addition, a record of the visitor's experience can be created, including exhibits visited, notes taken, and and favorite resources "bookmarked", to produce a personalized post-visit web page, which the visitor can access from home, school, or office. Supported by two grants, (one from CILT to prototype outdoor applications, the other from NSF to develop a working indoor system) we have been able to test and evaluate different wireless network technologies and different handheld device form factors and operating systems. Working with the Concord Consortium, we have created a web database system which delivers on-demand exhibit-related content to the user at the exhibit, with differing levels of media-richness appropriate to the capabilities of the handheld device. In our presentation, we will discuss our work to date, including our experiences with various wireless network models, handheld devices, visitor feedback, web content creation, and our visions for the future of this work.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2104 Demo Enhancing Science Curriculum with Electronic Measurement Labs PASCO scientific will show you how using our e-measure system has helped students raise test scores and increase science enrollments. We will show you several quick and easy e-measure applications for middle school through university science. Our e-measure system includes standards-based experiments, hardware, and software to complement your science department's existing curriculum. Find out why teachers say e-measure labs increase student engagement, excitement, and success-in short, that e-measure works!
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2066 Demo EdnTop.com - a forthcoming portal for wireless handheld PDAs Curriculum Associates will soon deploy EdnTop.com ó a new portal for wireless handhelds on WWANs using ultra low bandwidth Marbles SkyFire(tm) technology to deploy an unlimited number of applications of arbitrary size and complexity with high security to any PDA over any WAN supporting TCP/IP. We are seeking partners who wish to deliver administrative and/or instructional services to wireless PDAs.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2044 Demo The Hand-Held Solution Hand-held computing devices are the newest technolgy to be introduced into the classroom. Casio offers two hand held devices that allow students to explore the world via the web and e-mail, but also allow for them to take a computing device to places they would have never thought of before. Imagine pulling out your computer and typing a term paper in the lunch room or on the bus. Work on your geometry homework using Key Curriculum's Geometry Sketchpad while waiting for your mom to pick you up from swimming lessons. Casio has an affordable solution to schools that either do not have the space to set up full computer labs or the money to do so. Students who do not own home computers can now take their hand-held computer home from school and do the same things their friends are doing on theirs. The Casio demo will include ways of incorporating hand-held technolgy into the classroom for both the students and the teacher.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2127 Demo A Data Visualizer for Every Backpack ImagiWorks (www.imagiworks.com) will demonstrate a variety of ways in which learners can represent and explore complex data on their Palm devices. The presentation will focus on a range of data display and data inspection techniques that augment approaches introduced in ImagiProbe 1.0. In addition, ImagiWorks will show their latest ImagiGrapher product and discuss how the product provides students with a flexible, easy way to explore complex mathematics concepts. Special emphasis will be placed on the user interface, examining how each product invites and sustains interaction and therefore, increases opportunities for understanding.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2099 Demo Handheld Computing in Teaching & Learning A demonstration of the range of education solutions emerging for students and faculty. Also, statistics on projections of the use of handheld technology and a glimpse into future technologies that are being developed to serve schools.
UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING 2125 Not specified I Dream of Geney: Designing an Educational Application for t This project explores the development of handheld educational applications for children. The goal of the project is to investigate a collaborative learning application for childrenís use of handheld computers in a school environment. Geney is a collaborative problem solving application designed help children learn about genetics. Geney simulates the breeding of fish across a distributed population (i.e. distributed handheld computers). The goal of the game is to use knowledge of genetics to breed a fish with a specified set of genetic characteristics. Geney helps encourage students to collaborate, both with the sharing of knowledge and the sharing of fish to successful achieve the goal of the game. A user-centred, iterative design process was used to develop Geney. The design methodology involved mock-ups of representative tasks and scenarios, pre-design meetings with target users, prototype development, and the use of a think aloud protocol for feedback sessions with target users. The results of this work provide important insights into the design of handheld applications for children and illustrate the necessity of user-centered design. Geney won the Grand Prize in the Center for Innovative Learning Technologies Handheld Design Awards for Education. At the conference, Geney can be presented either as a demo, poster or short presentation. Our poster describes the design process involved in the development of Geney. Our demo format would allow participants to play an accelerated version of the Geney game (although the game would be limited by the number of handheld computers available). Our short presentation would discuss the design aspects of Geney and lessons learned.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2009 5-minute presentation A hypermedia environment to explore and negotiate students' conceptions: Animation of the solution process of table salt This presentation will report how a Hypermedia environment was used to explore a group of grade eleven chemistry students' conceptions of table salt dissolving in water. It will also present how the Hypermedia was used by students to negotiate meaning for two conceptualizations about the process of dissolving table salt in water: (a) the transformation of solid to liquid; and (b) the chemical combination of solute and solvent. This presentation will trace the nature of students' conceptions for the solution process of table salt. The findings of this study indicate that a Hypermedia environment can be used to explore, negotiate, and assess students' conceptions of the sub-microscopic aspects of solution chemistry. Further, this pre discussess the successes and difficulties pertaining to the learning of solution chemistry in a Hypermedia environment and presents an account of an imporved version for future study. I wish to collaborate with science education researchers who are engaged iin similar studies. Because of the characteristics and values of Hypermedia for learning chemistry, the study implies that educational equity may be enhanced in school science.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2051 5-minute presentation MAKING THINKING VISIBLE: PROMOTING STUDENTS' MODEL-BUILDING AND COLLABORATIVE DISCOURSE IN W.I.S.E. Here, we combine research on model-based reasoning and science learning environments (W.I.S.E.) to design, test, and refine tasks for middle and high school students for the domain of plate tectonics. The notions of making thinking visible and helping students learn from each other underlie the pedagogical framework. In terms of making thinking visible, students are engaged in drawing tasks and use their models as artifacts for reiterative cycles of discourse and model-revision. Additionally, students are provided with dynamic, runnable prototypes of plate tectonic phenomena so that they can visualize dynamic, causal, and temporal processes and use this "experiential" knowledge to critique and revise their models. In terms of helping students learn from one another, students are engaged in collaborative discourse about the evolution of the theory of plate tectonics using prompts such as, "What was Alfred Wegener’s evidence when he proposed his theory of Continental Drift?" and "Why was this not considered a theory at that time?" Secondly, east coast and west coast students are engaged in discourse about plate tectonic-related phenomena using questions about the geological phenomena in each geographical area such as "Why are there so many earthquakes in California compared to the Northeast part of the United States?" Outcomes of this project include: findings about students’ model-based learning and reasoning, the affordances made by "visualizing" the runnable prototypes and insight into how technology can support this reasoning. Regarding our collaborative discourse tasks, outcomes include the types of explanations students construct and how meaning is co-constructed. Further outcomes of this research will be a set of flexible WISE units for middle and highschool students which utilize model-based tasks, visualization, and collaborative discourse. Collaborators include; Marcia Linn, Jim Slotta, Ricky Tang, and Jessica Epstein.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2052 5-minute presentation Visualization And Sense Making In Learning:\|The Impact Of Using the Visualization of Internet information Tool (VisIT) On Knowledge Construction Visualization And Sense Making In Learning: The Impact Of Using the Visualization of Internet information Tool (VisIT) On Knowledge Construction James Levin, Daniel Kauwell, Young-Jin Lee, Hwan-Jo Yu, Jeff Ellen, & Yi Cui University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign There is a plethora of information on the Internet available for learners. This information is represented in various media, written from multiple perspectives and geared to differing levels of expertise. Often we expect students with little or no training to conduct research amidst this engulfing volume of data, news and lore. Our research has led us to develop a tool for the visualization of Internet-based information (VisIT). Instead of lengthy lists of search results, VisIT presents the user with a graphical spatial representation of the search space where each website is represented as an object and all of the sites returned by a search engine are clustered based on a set of heuristic rules for determining what is relevant for the user. Perceptual cues are used to convey information to the user, including arrows that show which pages in the search space are referencing other pages and color intensity that indicates relevancy weighing. Since VisIT's displays can be saved, the user can edit the search space by deleting sites, grouping them, annotating pages, and labeling sites, to convert a search space into a user's knowledge representation. We will present a summary of research studies of VisIT users searching the Internet in order to learn. We will examine how experts differ from novices in their search skills, both with conventional text interfaces and with the VisIT graphical interface. We will present data on how searches are conducted and relevant information highlighted by users when creating and modifying the "search spaces" of web sites. We will determine the impact of multiple perspectives on learning in complex domains expressed by different graphical search spaces. This research will explore the importance of visualizing search results and the value of viewing information from multiple perspectives.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2023 5-minute presentation Science inquiry in explorable virtual environments Our work focuses on the use of a restricted class of exploratory simulations to support science inquiry learning in elementary schools. "Virtual ambients" are configurable, simulated phenomenaria within which learners may navigate (spatially and temporally), make observations (assisted in some cases by simulated instrumentation), raise questions, and develop support for hypotheses. Unlike conventional simulations, learners do not explicitly control independent variables; rather, like observational scientists, they must find differential conditions within the environment as the basis for causal predictions. By providing designers with access to simulation parameters (e.g., selection and positioning of phenomena within the environment) we support learning activities across the K-6 spectrum. The virtual ambients are made available to learners via a large-format display accommodating 3-4 students at a time. A typical instructional sequence involves a mix of whole class, small group, and individual activities surrounding an extended exploration of the virtual ambient. Typically, a small group of students makes an initial "scouting expedition" into the space, reporting back to the whole class. Then, in a whole class setting, we collectively establish a question/problem/challenge and plan the investigation, including division of labor, establishment of common vocabulary, and design of data collection forms. Small teams then explore (their section of) the ambient, collecting data. Later, in a whole class setting, the groups aggregate their data and look for patterns bearing on the original question. As inconsistencies and additional questions arise, learners may return to the virtual ambient to gather additional data. Virtual ambients offer children access to environments and phenomena which they might not otherwise be able to experience. "Authentic" learning experiences ought not to limit kids to their physically accessible environs; this is especially important for low-income kids who may not have experience beyond their immediate neighborhood. My principal collaborator in this work is my colleague Andy Johnson.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2090 5-minute presentation Connecting Simulations to the Real World CURRENT WORK: AgentSheets is an easy to use, versatile tool to author simulations for all kinds of subject areas including biology, sociology, science, and math. AgentSheets is used internationally in elementary, middle, high schools and college level education. Simulations built can be instantly turned into Java applets in order to communicate complex ideas as interactive simulations on the web. Simulation components can be shared through the web to enable collaborative simulation building. SIGNIFICANT COLLABORATORS: University of Colorado, Center of LifeLong Learning & Design, AgentSheets Inc., Apple Computer Inc., SRI International, Fraunhofer Institute(Germany), and PFU International (Japan). SEEKING COLLABORATIONS: We would like to collaborate with people who either have data or software tools that could be connected to simulations in order to create rich learning environments. Collaboration examples: 1) Connect Simulations to real world. Any kind of real data including USGS maps, live sensors to experiments/machines/exhibits could be connected to simulations. Collaboration would explore what it takes to establish connection (technical goal) and would explore pedagogical value. If your organization has gathered a substantial amount data but you donít know how to make this data useful to education connecting it to simulations may hold some answers. 2) Connect software tools: If you have existing software tools for data analysis lets explore connecting them to the AgentSheets simulation tool (feasible interfaces: JavaBeans, XML, AppleScript, TCP/IP) EDUCATIONAL EQUITY: There is a huge amount of information accessible through the web but its value may be limited if we donít know how to process it. Through its end-user programmable interface AgentSheets can help with specific information processing needs. For instance, interaction technologies including speech recognition and speech output built in to AgentSheets could be employed to make existing or new information relevant to the visually impaired. More information on AgentSheets: http://www.agentsheets.com/showcase.html
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2108 5-minute presentation Using computer modeling tools to foster elementary school teachers’ and students’ understanding of scientific modeling My work has focused on using computer modeling tools coupled with classroom inquiry and reflection to foster elementary school studentsí and teachersí understanding about scientific modeling. In one study I conducted with the ThinkerTools Scientific Inquiry and Modeling project, we developed, taught, and tested an eleven-week curriculum and software to develop seventh grade studentsí understanding of scientific modeling. We created the computer software so that students could choose among alternative laws of force and motion (many of which were non-Newtonian) and could observe the ramifications of alternative laws in the resultant microworlds. In addition, we engaged students in model-oriented activities such as evaluating their models with criteria (like accuracy and plausibility), and reflecting on the nature of models. In my second study, I used model-oriented tools and techniques to teach pre-service elementary school teachers about the nature of scientific modeling within my general science course. In addition to using a portion of the ThinkerTools inquiry and modeling physics curriculum previously described, I used the astronomy simulation software Starry Night to help students gather data and observe phenomena related to moon phases and seasonal changes in the sky. Students also created physical models of the earth/moon/sun system and reflected on the nature of models as well as the strengths and limitations of those models. Students left both classes with some sophisticated understanding of the scientific modeling process. I am interested in creating partnerships with research groups and software developers that have created scientific modeling and simulation tools for elementary school students and their teachers. The goal of these partnerships would be to help elementary school teachers seamlessly integrate scientific modeling tools into their instruction so that they can involve their students in engaging in and reflecting upon the scientific modeling process. Further, I find that it is important to consider equity in designing effective environments for learning about scientific modeling. The modeling process and software must be relevant to the teacher and student while addressing different kinds of learning. I continue to investigate these issues.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2152 5-minute presentation Representing Real-Time Data Clearly, technology should not be the focus of learning in science or math classrooms; rather, it should be viewed as a tool to explore mathematical and scientific concepts through a variety of representations of real-world, real-time data. PASCO scientific's suite of technologies simplifies data gathering, affording more time for emphasis on data analysis, data display and interpretation, as well as conceptual development. PASCO scientific manufactures computer interfaces, sensors, and software for all science content areas (physics, chemistry, biology, earth science, etc.), as well as mathematics. PASCO provides hands-on computer-based data acquisition solutions designed to comply with the latest national standards. Using DataStudio, students are able to collect, store, represent, and analyze real-time data from their own experiments in the classroom or in the field. This robust software offers a place where representational competence and epistemological thinking are promoted. The sensors allow students to conduct authentic experiments. Teachers use PASCO's materials to design learning environments and experiences that allow students to do science.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2109 5-minute presentation Participatory Simulations: Connecting Learner Experience to Computational Simulations Uri Wilensky & Walter Stroup This project brings together two lines of researchóthe study of complex dynamic systems and the use of participatory simulations as a powerful way into systems modelingóboth of which can be enabled and advanced through emerging network technologies. The study of dynamic systems is not just a narrowly focused research tool or new content area to be studied by a small group of research scientists. The study of dynamic systems stands as a new form of literacy for all, a new way of describing, viewing and symbolizing phenomena in the world. The language of the present mathematics and science curriculum employs static representations. Yet, our world is, of course, constantly changing. This disjunct between the world of dynamic experience and the world of static school representations stands as one source of student alienation from the current curriculum. The theoretical and computer-based tools arising out of the study of dynamic systems can describe and display the changing phenomena of science and the everyday world. Participatory simulations, as implemented and supported by the use of networked technologies, can support new forms of classroom interaction, provide new points of entry into systems learning, and can serve to catalyze the engagement with dynamic systems modeling as a core feature of the education of all students. We have been working closely with a major commercial partner to iteratively develop and study, in urban middle schools and high schools, the use of a new networked technology -- HubNet -- that supports classroom-based participatory activities. We have focused on the use of this HubNet system to investigate the effectiveness of participatory simulations as providing a powerful way into dynamic systems modeling. HubNet consists of a network of handheld computing devices connected to an "upfront" computer (the "hub") that serves as the computing substrate for participatory simulation activities designed to give students direct experience of the dynamics of systems. The goal of this research and development is to be catalytic in introducing and advancing systems thinking for ALL students throughout much of their schooling and across the full breadth of their scientific, mathematical and technological studies. We seek collaborations with other modelers and developers of aggregate modeling tools.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2011 5-minute presentation From the Rings of Saturn to the Streets of London: Applications of VR and Scientific Visualization to Teaching Earth Science and Astronomy We present a new and powerful tool for learning Earth Science and Astronomy. The major component of this program is a 3D model of the solar system with virtual reality (VR) features, which is based on state-of-the-art scientific visualization techniques. Virtual Reality in this sense is a medium where a user can operate within a realistic representation of three-dimensional space in real time. It is a non-immersive platform and does not entail the use of gloves or masks. The user enters a virtual model of the solar system, journeys through it, and changes his viewpoint and perspective, as the objects continue to behave and operate in their usual manner. The model facilitates the mental construction of 3D space, where objects are varied and different but share common features. A unique component enables the user to zoom-in on various planetary landscapes and to perform virtual "flights" above their surfaces. This visualization of "fly-over-terrain" is based on high-resolution satellite and spacecraft images. In certain selected locations, the resolution is so high that the user can actually observe the streets of London or Jerusalem, and recognize familiar landscapes and sites. The Moon, Mars and especially Earth can thus be studied in great detail from a very close range, and common topographical features can be discovered. The 3D-VR model holds substantial pedagogical advantages that can be used as an effective tool in astronomy teaching, as it creates a powerful learning experience. Space and astronomy are central to modern research and children are naturally drawn to these scientific fields. The new model enables them to explore space as if flying in their own spaceship: they decides by themselves where to go, what to watch and from what distance and angle. Complex planetary motions are made simple when observing, for example, the Earth rotating as it revolves around the sun. The model enables the learner to discover the relation between distance, motion and time. The user can explore the physical laws governing the universe by observing planetary motions, and to deduce their uniformity ("Day and night occur on other planets, too"). Finally, it offers a tool that may help to overcome the inherent geocentric concept of the universe, thus ensuring the transition to a scientific, heliocentric view of the solar system
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2054 Demo WorldWatcher and My World: Geographic data visualization and analysis tools for learners Geographic data visualization and analysis technologies offer tremendous promise for education. Just as visualization technologies enable people to capitalize on the powerful human visual system to identify patterns in data, geographically indexed data can allow people to use their natural spatial reasoning capabilities to identify spatial relationships within data. In addition, one of the most exciting things about geographic data is that it has applications across the curriculum, including social studies, science, and mathematics. However, there are a number of significant challenges to bringing geographic data into classrooms. First and foremost is the fact that most tools for visualization and data analysis were developed for use by professionals with substantial training in both the technology and the application domain. If teachers and students are to use these technologies, they must be adapted for them. Through a multi-year research effort, we have developed WorldWatcher, a visualization and analysis environment for gridded (raster) geographic data for learners. WorldWatcher combines the power of experts’ tools with the support required to make sophisticated investigations accessible to learners with minimal training. WorldWatcher is not just a set of investigation tools, but an authoring environment for creating digital libraries of data, curriculum resources, and reference materials. WorldWatcher has been in use since 1996 in a variety of classrooms from middle school through college. Recently, we have begun applying the insights gained in developing WorldWatcher to a new visualization and analysis environment that incorporates all forms of data found in conventional geographic information systems (GIS). This GIS tool for the classroom, called "My World", works with any data in the industry-standard shapefile format for geographic data. In this demonstration, we will be showing WorldWatcher and My World together with the curricula that we have developed to take advantage of their capabilities.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2039 Demo Investigating Regrowth in El Yunque Rainforest through Visualization and Modeling In this prototype students study the impact of Hurricane Georges on the coquí frog in El Yunque rainforest in Puerto Rico. A visualization of the rainforest serves as an interface to QuickTime VR images of the rainforest as well as other investigation resources. We are collaborating with scientists at the University of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Forest Service. We are seeking collaborators for the simulation component of the environment. Since the program appears in English and in Spanish, we will be addressing a number of issues related to equity for Limited English Proficient students.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2020 Demo The EarthPulse Center: Putting Students in Touch IInteractively with Their Changing World With the creation of The EarthPulse Center, students’ experience of the Worldwide Web has been dramatically enhanced to promote a new level of information inquiry for the 21st century. In September of 1999, when hurricane Floyd was threatening the eastern coastline of the United States, students in classrooms from Florida to Maine were online, working at virtual desks in the Hurricane Lab of the EarthPulse Center. They were, for example, observing the progress of Floyd in almost real time – its changing path and intensity. They were plotting their predictions for Floyd’s future progress and saving these predictions so they could compare them with real information on subsequent days. They were studying paths of past hurricanes for clues as to Floyd’s future behavior. They were deciding what communities should be warned and how much in advance these warnings should be given. The EarthPulse Center is the first of a new generation of web-based learning environments that combines the rich information resources of the web with highly interactive visual tools that let students interactively explore and understand this information. Because the project is freely available on the Riverdeep.net web site, it makes available to all students an unusually rich opportunity to participate in doing real science. This presentation will demonstrate how students use the EarthPulse Center to explore and understand hurricanes and how the same approach is being applied to earthquakes and volcanoes. Collaborators with Riverdeep in using this technology have been the Jason Project and two projects at TERC: the Data Visualization Project and the Science – athon project (both with Eric Hilfer). Riverdeep is interested in collaborations of this kind with researchers exploring data visualization.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2064 Demo Landscapes, Soundscapes, and Mindscapes for Informal Science Education As its informal science outreach focus, the Cornell Theory Center (CTC) is developing SciCentr, an interactive hands-on science museum featuring computational research and based on the Internet client/server technology of Active Worlds. We will demonstrate three early prototype exhibits: a musical fountain that functions as an online multi-user musical instrument with real time visualizations, an annotated landscape generated from financial risk analysis data, and a space age plant breeding facility that allows users to selectively breed tomatoes to suit their environments. We will also present content contributed by youth in the first SciFair afterschool program from a small, rural, disadvantaged high school in Central New York. SciFair worlds provide youth with creative environments in which to build and present their knowledge bases related to exhibit content. In addition, youth gain technical skills required to create virtual environments through mentoring from peers, college students, and professionals. In the first prototype SciFair activity, youth are building their own virtual greenhouses and related Web content about tomato diversity, culture, and processing that they will use to guide their breeding experience. SciCentr can be accessed free of charge via the Internet. The SciFair program is intended to encourage and support participation by youth from a wide range of backgrounds and with a variety of talents/interests. The next group to join is an after school program for urban youth at the regional science museum. These first two groups represent underserved youth with limited Internet access, through SciFair, they will have the opportunity to share and work together online and to interact with their online mentors. Funding for prototype development has come from USDA and CTC. We are seeking partners to expand this program and to conduct research and formative evaluation of the educational impact of the exhibits in SciCentr and methods used in SciFair.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2153 Not specified Modeling as the standard for measuring the representational validity of computer visualizations: The case of chemistry As scientific visualization tools continue to gain impetus in science and math education, it is essential that we develop, test and adopt ways in which the scientific concepts and phenomena are evaluated and measured in terms of their validity. There are many representational techniques and approaches; each with its advantages, complexities and limitations. We do not have well defined procedures to ascertain how meaningful is the learning done by the students and how consistent are the computer visualizations with the mental visualizations of the learners. Based on prior studies in the area of visualization in chemistry, we are exploring using the underlying scientific knowledge encoded in the modeling as the standard for measuring the representational validity. We are focusing on two keys areas: understanding and trust. Understanding refers to the degree to which a learner actually grasped the underlying relationships of the visualizations and how used them in a related context. Trust refers to what degree the learner realizes the limitations of the visualizations. We will present initial results from previously collected data and from a student survey. All the data that will be presented comes from the NSF funded project "Visualizations in Chemistry" (ChemViz). The main point of visualizations in the ChemViz project is to let the learner understand intuitively the abstract concepts and processes of atomic and molecular bonding. A common assumption made is that the learner has the knowledge to extract useful useful information and relationships. While the students can navigate the visual learning enviroment we have not been able to clearly prove our assumption. Results from the ChemViz implementations indicated that students were able to work through the visualizations on a topic that is very complex but there was not evidence of the depth of understanding and trust of the model of the atom, Schrodinger’s quantuum model, encoded in the visualizations. This finding has lead us to take a critical look at validity and the implications of visual tools and learning environments and to take a closer look at the nature of the interaction between learners and visualization tools
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2046 Poster Using Technology to Teach Students How to Reason with Models For several years now, the Modeling Center at the Concord Consortium has been experimenting with the use of various kinds of technology to teach scientific reasoning through the formation of mental models. The technology we use includes both hardware and software, and the projects cover a wide variety of topics in physics and biology. In the course of our work, we have created a powerful software tool called Pedagogica, which enables us to rapidly implement a series of on-line activities that use an underlying computer-based model to pose problems to students in a particular domain. Pedagogica, which can be readily adapted for use with any properly structured Java-based model, keeps track of what students are doing so that a curriculum developer can decide what action to take -- e.g., providing hints, moving to a new problem, or storing and analyzing data for assessment purposes. Pedagogica isolates knowledge of the domain, which is contained in the model, from knowledge of pedagogy, which is more general and applies to many models. We seek collaborators who are interested in putting Pedagogica to use in new and innovative ways. Our software runs on both Macs and PCs, and most of our research has been performed in inner-city schools. Thus far, we have observed no barriers to the use of our technology by minority or disadvantaged students.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2001 Poster Representations, Reasoning, and Red Squirrels Our projects for the last several years have involved applying basic research in reasoning with external representations, including language, to education. We have studied the acquisition of specialised language in a new domain and how the process of 'vicarious learning' can be used to bootstrap this process, not only in face-to-face groups, but for distance learners. We have also looked at how high school students, college-bound and not, work with complex representations. We have identified individual differences in representational ability and found that these skills are fairly rudimentary in many young adults, though they seem to be critical for flexible thinking and are correlated in intriguing ways with other measures of reasoning. My current interest, and the project on which I am seeking collaborators, is to extend our efforts out of the classroom and into informal learning arenas. This has the potential to bring these powerful tools to members of a community who might not have interest or access otherwise. In particular, I am hoping to start a project this autumn with the Scottish Seabird Centre, the Edinburgh Zoo and the Highland Wildlife Park that will utilise handheld computing and Web resources to teach about the environment. I am concentrating on Geographical Information Systems because of the potential to: 1) create highly visual presentations and activities, 2) tie the teaching closely into the community by using examples from local areas (hence, the red squirrels), and 3) make the 'post-visit experience' more personal by providing 'take-home' information about local ecological activities. Other contributors to these projects were: John Lee, Keith Stenning, Terry Mayes, Tom Conlon, Richard Cox, Padraic Monaghan, Carol Small, Finbar Dineen, Jonathan Kilgour and Richard Tobin. The projects were funded by grants from the McDonnell Foundation Cognitive Studies into Education Practice, the Economic and Social Research Council, and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2154 Poster Building Bridges to Help Students Connect Phenomena to Scientific Principles This seed grant focuses upon building bridges that use technology to help college students, especially minorities, learn to make valid connections between phenomena and the underlying scientific principles in SMET courses. Traditionally, phenomena are studied in laboratory sections, while scientific principles are taught in the corresponding lecture sections of a course. Students have great difficulty linking these two separate processes together into a coherent integrated mental structure. The Louis Stokes Louisiana Alliance for Minority Participation, LS-LAMP, is an organization composed of eleven universities and community colleges. It is dedicated to the dual goals… of enhancing learning experiences for students and to increasing the number of minority students who major in science, mathematics, engineering, and technology (SMET) programs. Three categories of technology-based instruction can be used to accomplish both of these goals. A microcomputer-based laboratory (MBL) allows student real time exploration of a phenomenon while simultaneously providing its graphical and symbolic representations that lead to the underlying scientific principle. A computer-simulated experiment (CSE) can extend the range of MBL experiments to include those that use dangerous materials, a lengthy process, or a costly apparatus. A CSE also gives students more flexibility in making decisions that modify conditions, redoing the experiment, and designing new experiments. A multimedia learning module (MLM) can visuallypresent problems that require the application of scientific principles within a real-world context. In addition the MLM provides cues to guideattention, immediate/diagnostic feedback, and multiple, interactive learning pathways. Some LS-LAMP campuses have independently developed prototypes for each ofthese categories of technology-based instruction. We propose tosystematically develop a set of prototypes for found in each SMET disciplineand to make use of existing high-quality software. Ultimately we plan toseek the NSF funding needed to synchronize and systematize our efforts and resources.
VISUALIZATION AND MODELING 2077 Poster Using Cognitive Research to Develop Design Principles for Visualization Tools: Feature of the Blue Skies: College Edition Software. Ioanna Vekiri and Perry Samson Blue Skiesô: College Edition is an Internet-activated CD-ROM that is intended for college students who study meteorology. The tool enables students to explore and appreciate the dynamic world of atmospheric science using live weather information (weather maps). A unique superimposition capability, allowing one or more overlays on a basic map, enables students to physically integrate information represented separately in basic weather maps and overlays (e.g. temperature, atmospheric pressure, wind speed and direction). Students can not only observe information about a single weather factor but also explore patterns and relationships among various weather factors (e.g. how wind direction and speed relate to atmospheric pressure differences). This approach is unique from the flat-map imagery available at many web-based weather sites as overlay fields can be included or removed interactively. We have conducted 2 studies (with undergraduate students who were using the Blue Skies software during their introductory meteorology course) to investigate how this superimposition feature of the Blue Skies software may affect studentsí reasoning about science phenomena and how it may interact with learner characteristics. Our hypothesis is that using the superimposition feature may enable students to identify more relations and to include more weather factors in their explanations and predictions about weather phenomena as compared to using regular weather maps. Our studies are guided by two design principles that are based on current cognitive research. The first principle is that the superimposition feature makes patterns among features of different maps visible and easy to process. This is because identification of these patterns relies more on visual perception processes and less on complex cognitive processes that would require students to compare and mentally transform information from different maps. The second principle is that the superimposition feature may decrease cognitive load by physically integrating information from various maps and making it available at the same time. We collected video and verbal data from students while they were using two different sets of maps (integrated maps on the software and maps on the Internet that could not be superimposed) to complete weather prediction and map interpretation tasks. Our analysis so far shows that, as a result of lower cognitive load, when students used the software they used map information more accurately and made weather predictions that included more weather factors into account. The next step in the data analysis will be to examine how learnersí prior knowledge and visuospatial ability may interact with the superimposition feature of the software. Understanding the role of individual differences in how students reason with visualizations is important in order to design tools that address the needs of learners with different characteristics.

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