An American exchange student at the monarch sanctuary
in Mexico emails updates on the butterflies to
Minneapolis-based Journey North, sponsor of
an interactive science project on monarch migration.
(from 24 Hours in Cyberspace at http://www.cyber24.com/
photo by Peter Stone)
WELCOME TO ETAP 426/526, COMPUTING IN EDUCATION
"The purpose of culture is to empower human expression and
a fully computer-based education will do that;
enabling people to use the tools of expression to form conviction,
to empower action, to sustain reflection, to nurture hope"
-- Robbie Mclintock, (1988)

Welcome to ETAP 426/526, Computing in Education. If you have not already done so, please complete the SLN Tutorial so you will know how to use the software supporting this course.

This course was written by Dr. Karen Swan and will be taught by Rick Parkany and Linda Polhemus. All grading will be done by them, thus you should contact one of them concerning grades.

In Computers in the Schools, Robert Taylor (1980) described three ways in which computers could be used in classrooms:

as tutors, to deliver instruction, explicate subject matter, and provide practice in diverse skills;
as tools, to automate certain lower level tasks and so (theoretically) extend thinking and learning in a variety of educational enterprises;
as tutees, to be programmed by students that they might explore the structure of knowledge in a many domains, problem solving in general, and, (theoretically again) their own thinking. These categories have tended to blur in practice, more so as computing technologies have evolved to incorporate diverse media. And today, to the list must be added the use of computers for telecommunications, to communicate with people and sources of information around the world. With this addition, the categories remain a useful way of thinking about computers in the schools, a set of functional lenses, if you will, through which we can view educational computing.

ETAP 426/526, at its most basic, is concerned with the pedagogically sound integration of computing technologies into educational activities, wherever and whenever they take place. It provides an overview of the range such usage currently takes (by function as above) and asks you to consider how it might be changing the ways in which we engage and conceive the educational enterprise.

Each category of potential use of computers in schools -- telecommunications, tutor, tool, and tutee -- is represented as a section in these pages. Each section contains (in varying configurations of linked pages):

an overview of the topic;
scholarly readings to be critiqued;
practical skills to be demonstrated (practicum) or learned (tutorials);
an application project (lesson plan) to complete; and
ideas and issues to be reflected on (personal journal) and discussed with your classmates. At a meta-level, ETAP 426/526 explores educational computing in practice. We believe this course should be online because it is only through struggling with the design (me) and the completion (you) of this course that we can begin to understand how the unique characteristics of this new medium might support (and constrain) teaching and learning.

That is why ETAP 426/526 emphasizes personal reflection and class discussion. You will be required to make weekly postings to both your personal journals and the class discussion. We urge you to take these assignments seriously and to follow the discussion conscientiously.

Many have argued that the most important thing about the academe is the culture of thinking and learning it fosters. A major question for us will be whether and how we can evolve a virtual culture of the academe online.

All cultures are essentially social. A place to begin building the ETAP 426/526 culture, our culture, might be by Meeting Your Classmates, and introducing yourself to them. We suggest you do that now and then return to this Orientation section and carefully finish reading all the documents in it.

We would also like to study the progress of this class. We are particularly interested in asynchronous learning and how people use hypertext. We are, therefore, interested in your progress within ETAP 426/526, in the way the class discussion evolves, and in your reflections on the entire experience.

We would like to collect and study the assignments you complete here.

Your identity will be kept confidential throughout this enterprise, as well as in any reporting of our findings. You do not, of course, have to allow us to collect your work, and your decision will in no way affect your participation in the course. All students must complete the same assignments, and no one involved with it should be able to distinguish between students who have allowed us to study their work and those who haven't. Your decision is completely voluntary.

IF YOU DO NOT WANT YOUR WORK INCLUDED, SEND EMAIL TO KAREN SWAN STATING THAT.