Hird, Anne (2000).  Learning from cyber-savvy students: How Internet-age kids impact classroom teaching.  Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing.

CH 1: INTRODUCTION: CHILDREN, ADULTS, AND THE THINKING MACHINE

QUOTE: “…children can traverse the globe on the Internet before they are allowed to leave the back yard on a bicycle.” p.1

The Internet is changing commerce, the workplace, entertainment—and possibly, schools.  Schools are lagging behind banks, libraries, retailers, and medical centers in their utilization of the Internet.

Many educators were (and remain) skeptical about the Internet.  After all, microcomputers have been around more than a decade without transforming instruction.

Theme

The Internet is permeating children’s lives outside school: playing and trading computer games, meeting in chat rooms, emailing…what happens when these cyber-savvy kids enter the classroom?

Introduction

For a year, the author searched for a technologically-advanced school, and finally found one—a private, independent school that serves 130 students in grades 4-8. This school is a recognized leader in computer use and exceeds the norm in infrastructure, training and tech support, and integration of computers into classrooms.

Subjects

• Participants were 34 8^th-grade students in two interdisciplinary social studies classes: 42% African American, 27% Caucasian, 11% biracial, 10% Latino, and 10% Asian American.

• This school (we’ll call it “Cityview”) has an acceptable use policy regarding its computers.

• Students learn about the computers in a variety of ways: trial and error, collaboration, online help, printed manuals, and asking teachers.

• Computers are just a part of their busy lives: most of these students go online no more than 3 times per week.

 Methodology

• Interviews
• Online Discussion Board
• Students’ research papers and web sites

CH 2: NEW POSSIBILITIES FOR LEARNING: THE PROMISE OF THE INTERNET

With the first wave of computers in the classroom, they weren’t connected: “…it became common to find a $2000 computer installed in a classroom that still lacked a $25 telephone.”

Why did educational television and radio fail to transform the classroom?  The author thinks it’s because they were one-directional (broadcast only) media.  By contrast, the Internet, at least in its infancy, was designed specifically to encourage collaboration among academics at major research institutions.

Within the next 10 years, Internet technology should improve to the point that students can become more “lead actors” than passive observers.

The Internet may also enable Artificial Intelligence tools, currently the province of advanced researchers, to be brought into the classroom.  Such tools can be used to explore complex problems.

The Internet can provide a safe environment to try out new roles or learn new life skills.

The Internet can define communication spaces according to common interests and shared information rather than geographic location.

Initial Internet surfers were content to view information; now, people expect to be able to DO things online.

The Internet blurs the distinction between school and home, work and play. It transcends time.

What is Constructivist Learning?

1. Authentic problem solving
2. Collaboration
3. Active engagement
4. Multiple perspectives
5. Multiple modes of representation
6. Reflection on the learning process

--(Honebein, 1996; Savery & Duffy, 1996)

• In the constructivist view, learning isn’t something given by teachers to students and passively absorbed, but rather an active, social and creative process by which students construct learning.

• In the constructivist approach, the teacher abdicates center stage to the students, who help define problems and projects and then take more responsibility for their decisions.

• In the constructivist approach, learning tends to be more “real-world relevant”.
• Learning does tend to be “messier” with the constructivist approach.

The Internet has some features that support constructivist learning:

• A vast information repository, constantly updated, letting topics be researched that formerly would have had to have been abandoned for lack of research resources
• Information from diverse perspectives
• Information in a variety of media (text, pictures, audio, video, maps)
• The possibility of intraclass, interclass, even worldwide collaboration
• The possibility of posting one’s one work on the Internet

CH 3: PATTERNS OF RESPONSE TO INNOVATION: SCHOOLS AND TECHNOLOGY

Historically, schools have been by turns highly resistant to new technology (they’ve also been susceptible to overblown promises about the “next big thing”).

Educational technology is expensive, not only in the initial purchase of hardware but in ancillaries (e.g., ISP bills), training, and maintenance costs.

Historically, teachers have only been interested in those technologies that help them do what they would have done in the classroom anyway---the day-to-day routines in most classrooms have remained constant.  These routines largely support the delivery of information to students by teachers.

Schools are also set up to promote uniformity:  the same learning goals, the same texts, standardized testing.  The more creative the technology use, the more such uniformity may be disrupted.

The Internet Also creates challenges:

• Since computers promote collaboration, they bring up new challenges such as how a system predicated on individual accountability can assign individual grades for collaborative projects.
• The Internet has contributed to an exponential explosion of information.
• The hyper-linked structure of the Internet can be disruptive to sequential learning.
• Computer skills are now necessary in many (if not most) endeavors, so teachers, regardless of their academic discipline, are now in a sense computer trainers.
• Computers change very quickly, so skills must be constantly updated lest they become outdated.

Typically, the first way to use a new technology is to do what has already been done, but better.  Innovation comes later.  Most instructional web sites are in this initial stage, delivering the same notes and quizzes that were given on paper.

Do new technologies foster change in teachers, or is it just that new technologies are more apt to be used by teachers who are already innovative teachers in their classroom teaching?

The Internet could make paper textbooks obsolete.

The Internet could shift students’ roles from passive observers to active manipulators of software simulations. Simulations also:

• Provide a safe environment for learning new life skills.
• Are capable of modeling complex phenomena.

Computers have already made it possible for a person to access huge amounts of data. The next step in the evolution of computers might be to use artificial intelligence to help find patterns in that data.

The Internet has facilitated creation of knowledge spaces defined by interests rather than geographical location.

The Internet redefines time; e.g., it can blur the distinction between work time and free time.

CH 4: ONLINE AND OFFLINE: IT’S ALL REAL

Beginning with curiosity aroused by giving computers to his twin daughters, the author spent months investigating how teens were using the Internet.  He was struck by how they did not distinguish between online and offline activities and relationships.   Unless he asked, teens tended not to point out that one friend was a “face-to-face” friend while another friend was exclusively online.   

Most students are less interested in their computer’s hardware and capabilities and more interested in what they can do with it.

CH 5: FUN, BUT NOT ALL GAMES: LIVING AND LEARNING ONLINE

Not surprisingly, teens visit sites related to their interests: e.g., sports, entertainment, celebrity fan sites, funny sites.  They really like sites that meld communication with content (e.g., when a movie star’s web site has chat rooms and discussion boards).

Teens also get news from the web, liking it because they can choose what to view instead of having someone else choose (as with TV news).

Teens use the communication features of the Internet to augment rather than replace face-to-face communication.  They also seem to use it just a few hours per week.

Well, hopefully that’s enough to give you the flavor of the book. Here’s a listing of the other chapters: 

• CH 6: INFORMATION AND MISINFORMATION: STUDENTS’ ONLINE RESEARCH

• CH 7: MEETING THE REAL PERSON FIRST: STUDENTS’ ONLINE RELATIONSHIPS

• CH 8: BUT IS IT SAFE? STUDENTS’ ONLINE CONDUCT

• CH 9: THE INTERNET GENERATION IN SCHOOL: USING TECHNOLOGY IN THE CLASSROOM

• CH 10: CATCHING UP TO KIDS: WHAT SCHOOLS CAN DO