Technology Education

When designing a collaborative project; you must consider the following questions:

1. Do the goals of the project incorporate knowledge and application of content as well as process skills such as cooperation and specific communications?
2. What activities would best facilitate students to demonstrate the achievement of these goals?
3. Are the resources suitable in completing the project?

Collaborative learning helps students achieve:

• good interpersonal skills
• knowledge of group dynamics
• flexibility to work in teams
• the ability to lead
• to problem-solve
• communicate effectively; and
• foster teamwork.

Dr Judy Harris is highly regarded for her current work in the field of educational technology.

Harris became acquainted with Logo (early computer program) during her tenure as a sixth grade school teacher.  The program helped her students develop computer skills and problem-solving strategies.

The program notified Dr Harris of the powerful role that computers could play in helping to cultivate the crucial faculties of her students.

Partners of Learning Circles assist students to develop important interpersonal skills.  It also encourages interaction between teachers providing a different model for professional development.

Learning Circles are created by a team of 6-8 teachers and their students. They are united in a virtual space of an electronic classroom.  For 3-4months, the classes collaborate on projects based on the curriculum and on a selected theme.

The success of Learning Circles seems to occur from the regular changes of partners so that teachers and students gain from new experiences.

Susan Silverman is commonly known for her many triumphant collaborative Internet projects; but many people don’t know is that she was once scared of computers.

 Silverman has spent much of her life travelling around the world. She would  bring  trinkets from her travels into the classroom, and use them in creative ways for units of work. Her interest for bringing the world into the classroom naturally stirred her into developing the Internet into her lessons.

The Internet opened up opportunities to collaborate with the global community.

Spotlight explored some of the issues from an evaluation of two experimental research projects which were concerned about the use of ICT in the primary classroom.

Superhighways in Scotland

• refers to a ‘broadband’ electronic communications network
• the quality of video communications is considerably enhanced by broadband technology, and making it more attractive medium for distance teaching and learning

Superhighways in Rural Scotland

• the project was developed to evaluate how schools could do without extensive resources
• intended to encourage students to develop problem-solving; critical; and creative thinking skills.

Online learning projects “aim to capitalise on the information and communications promises of the internet” (Susan Harriman, 2003)

Problem-based learning 

In online learning projects; students work in collaborative groups and the activity is sustained over a long period of time.

These activities are excellent for students as they link to the world outside of the classroom.

The Internet is an excellent learning tool; but like anything it has its positives and negatives.

The Internet has ready-to-access resources, which is key in supporting high standards of education.

Webquests are a basic strategy for teachers to supply students with specific questions and URLs to assist in finding answers on the Internet.

 Soloway, E; Norris, C; Blumenfeld, P; Fishman, B; Krajcik, J; and Mary, R. Log on Education K-12 and the Internet online.uts.edu.au/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_1273_1%26url%3D copyright 2000. Retrieved 5 March, 2008.

Fundamental change will occur in the future, resulting from participation in education by a greater community of people who the Internet brings together.

The site “New Design in Connected Teaching and Learning” by Margaret Riel discusses the four effective learning environments;

• Learner-centred: the learner is actively engaged in the process of knowledge construction.
• Knowledge-centred: the teacher plays a significant role in setting the “course” of learning.
• Community-centred: more people should be an active part of the learning processes that take place in schools.
• Assessment-centred: it is important that we know what students are learning and what they need to know is important for designing learning environments.

Dave Sackett, a member of a research team in the US; said that “most teachers see the Internet merely ‘ as a kind of electronic library’ and not a place to get ideas or communicate with their colleagues.”

There are 18 different types of telecollaborative activities that have been identified to date (Harris,1998).

They can be sorted into three mainstream genres of online activity.

• Interpersonal exchanges
• Information collection and analysis
• Problem solving