Please summarize the main points made in the paper and your reaction to them.  You can use any form that you are comfortable with (i.e., prose, outline, verse, . . . whatever).  We are interested in your ability to isolate the major ideas presented (remember, I have to read 50 of these things!!) and to reason about and/or with them. We have also included specific questions we would like you to answer about each required reading.

All the papers are online, and can be read that way, but we would strongly advise printing them out and saving them in your portfolio, together with your summary/critique.

Your critiques can be submitted online from the pages that describe them (and which you can access through the links given below).  You can type, copy or attatch them to the "Create Assignment" space given therein.  Summary/critiques will be worth 3 points.

If you don't have a particular skill, you will need to acquire it, and then provide the required evidence.  You may go about this anyway that works for you -- a little help from your friends, a little help from us, a printed text, or you could try any of the tutorials linked to each skill/evidence item.

You should use the "Create Assignment" buttons at the bottom of the Telecommunications and Tutor Practicum pages to submit your evidence for those sections.  Evidence for the Tool and Tutor Practicums, however, can be completed using a variety of software packages, some of which we might not have.  It should be printed out, therefore, and handed or mailed in.

Links to the Practicum sections of each module are provided below:

For each of the four course modules, you will be required to create a lesson plan that details how you might use computers (for telecommunications, as tutor, as tool, as tutee) to teach something you are familiar with.  The idea is to create lesson plans that you might actually use in your teaching.

Some things to remember in creating your lesson plans:

Be sure the lesson focuses on learning in a subject area other than "computers." That is, for example, don't create a lesson on "Using a Word Processor" for the Tool module, or "Surfing the WWW" for the Telecommunications module.  Your lessons should use things like word processors and the WWW to teach something else, preferably a subject you normally teach.  (If you normally teach "computers," a little leeway is possible here.)
Be sure the lesson and any software involved with it fits with the curriculum for the grade level and subject area you choose.  Although this assignment is artificial, we would like you to try to fit computer use to the lesson not the lesson to a particular "cool" computer thing you know about.
Be sure to develop a detailed plan for evaluating students' work (so they will know you value it).
Be sure to include worksheets and/or off-line activities (to encourage the transfer of learning across media).
Be sure to print a copy of your lesson plan to include in your portfolio.

The outline which follows details each category of the lesson plan form you will be asked to fill in to add your lesson plans to the database.  You will probably want to print this page and have it handy as you think about your lesson plan.

TECHNOLOGY AREA -- choose Telecommunications, Tutor, Tool, or Tutee

LESSON PLAN TITLE --

DISCIPLINE -- choose Art, Foreign Language, Health, Language Arts, Mathematics, Music, Physical Education, Science, Social Studies, or Technology; or fill in the blank for Other

TARGET POPULATION
Grade Level: -- choose Pre K and Kindergarten, Primary (1-3), Upper Elementary (4-6), Junior High (7-9), High School (10-12), or Post-Secondary
Population Characteristics: -- describe the characteristics of the learners
Lesson Groupings: -- choose Individual, Pairs, Small Groups, or Whole Class

TOPIC -- give the specific topics to be covered by the lesson (shouldn't be more than a few lines)

CURRICULUM LINKS -- tell how this lesson fits with the rest of the unit and/or curriculum, what goes before it (and how will you link to this prior knowledge), what comes after it (and how will you link it to what follows)

OBJECTIVES -- what are the main concepts, skill, behaviors, values, attitudes, etc. you want students to get from the lesson; objectives should be stated in terms of what students will be able to do AFTER completing the lesson, DO NOT tell what students will do DURING it (that's scope & sequence)

MATERIALS -- what stuff will you need to teach this lesson

TIME -- the amount of time (in 45 minute periods) it will take to complete the lesson

SCOPE & SEQUENCE -- outline of lesson itself; what you will teach and in what order; include the major points you want to make, all the activities students will undertake, and the products they will deliver at the lesson's end

SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIALS -- off-line worksheets and/or activities designed to transfer learning from computers to other media

EVALUATION OF STUDENTS -- how you will grade or otherwise evaluate students' participation in this lesson; please specify requirements for differential "grading" (remember it is very important to value computer-based learning in the economy of your classroom for it to be valued by the students and integrated into the culture of  the classroom)

EVALUATION OF THE LESSON -- how you will judge whether or not the lesson was successful; this should relate back to its objectives

When you have finished filling out the lesson plan form, choose "Submit for Class" (choose "Private Save" if you haven't finished working on it) at its end, then click on the "Save or Submit Lesson Plan" button.  The "Reset" button clears the form so you can create another lesson plan.
Return to Typical Module

You should read and post to the discussions weekly. we really mean weekly -- remember these messages are dated.  There is no way we will evolve a meaningful discussion if everyone waits until the end of the course to make their required postings. You should have at least three postings for each of the four sections of the course.  Of course you can always do more for extra credit.
 
Your postings can discuss the readings, your experiences doing the tutorials, your work on your projects, or anything else that relates to the topic at hand. They can be replies to other postings, comments, questions. Because you are supposed to be reading everyone else's contributions, they should reflect the tenure of the ongoing discussion.  For each section, we would like to see:

a comment on one of the issues we have posed
a response to another student's comments
an original comment or question.
 You might print out particularly meaningful (to you) parts of the discussion and include them in your portfolio.

Issues you might explore for each module are summarized in the first listing of its Discussion section.  To post an original comment or question, click on the "Create Assignment" button on this general discussion page.

Click on the highlighted questions on the general discussion page to go directly to the pages around which responses to those questions are organized, or access these pages directly from the course outline.  Click on the "Respond" button at the bottom of these pages to enter your response.

To respond to someone else's questions or comments, use the "Respond" button at the bottom of the page on which their message appears.

(TA's: Rick Parkany and Linda Polhemus)

We will respond to each of your postings.  Our responses will be separate documents attached to yours, and (God willing and the creeks don't rise) they will be found in the Learning Journal section of each module.

It is very critical that you post a reflection every week for the cumulative reflections to record progress/changes over time.  Even if you do nothing but post to the discussion, post to your journal.  Remember, you will never again know as little as you know now and it might be useful to remember how it feels.  You should have at least three postings for each section of the course.  You may do more for extra-credit.

Click on any of the Learning Journal links below to go directly to the module sections indicated or access the Learning Journal sections for each course module through the course outline.  Once you have reached the appropriate Learning Journal page, click on "Create Assignment" to submit each of your three Learning Journal entries for that module.  Be sure to choose "Save for Professor" when you submit them.