Beginning - Seeking Help From the Virtual Office

Character

Dialogue

Teacher:

MathWorlds worked pretty well for me with my students the first few weeks after my institute. But now I am wondering what else it can do and what other people have done. So I am going to venture out of my virtual office to look at the MathWorlds website and see whether I can figure that out. Maybe I will run into someone useful, too.

(Teacher navigates to MathWorlds room in TAPPED IN, clicks around and mumbles aloud in private speech about not finding stuff right away as he had hoped to answer his questions)

Mentor:

Hello there.

(audio line clicks on as the teacher explores the MathWorlds room from TAPPED IN)

Teacher:

Dr. Math!

Mentor:

 I have noticed you're browsing the MathWorlds part of the Math Forum site. Is there anything that I can help out with?

Narrator:

TPD is a crucial element of education reform, and successful approaches to TPD offer highly collaborative learning experiences including summer institutes and teacher collaboratives.

Virtual environments make sense for supporting teachers because even successful TPD activities find it difficult--as teachers themselves report--to provide ongoing support throughout the change process, to offer quick access to high-quality and relevant teaching resources, to scale to large numbers, to sustain teacher discourse, to tailor content to local school and district initiatives, and to coordinate with national and state standards and other regional efforts. Virtual environments can contribute to fulfilling teachers' wishes that they might overcome isolation from peers and experts, share their experiences, resources and techniques in a safe and supportive environment, and receive recognition for their achievements.