Class Assignments

Week 1: Introduction -- From Surfing to Serving

To do by Sept 4	Post information about yourself into Welcome conference of WebBoard http://webboard.webtech.uiuc.edu:8080/~edpsy387 .
	Go through the Global Schoolhouse Harnessing the Power of the Web site.
	1. Find an exemplary educational web site (a web site with the goal of helping somebody learn something). 2. Find an exemplary personal web site (a web site created by a person to describe themselves). Post in WebBoard details about both of these exemplary web sites. In your WebBoard posting, include the name, URL, a short description, and why you think it is exemplary (support your argument based on either the readings or other sources).
	Read Michelle Hinn's Alternative Web Design Guide Skim through the Yale Style Guide.
To do throughout the semester	Keep a log of technical problems you encounter. You can use this MS Word file to keep track on paper. For each problem, note the date, a description of the problem, and what you did to deal with it.

Weeks 2-3: Instructional Design with technology

To do by Sep 11
To do by Sep 11	Create an eportfolio web page for yourself, or if you already have such a web page, improve it based on the exemplars you and others in the class have found. ePortfolio template. Post on Webboard its URL and describe how and why you created or modified it. Post the WebBoard URL in C-Base.
To do by Sep 18	Read Bruce & Levin Taxonomy of Educational Uses of Technology
	Read Bruce & Levin "Roles for New Technologies in Language Arts: Inquiry, Communication, Construction, and Expression" (login as "guest" with password "guest") Enter at least one comment on at least one part of this "interactive paper". You may want to start with the comments "linked" so you can read the paper, then swith the comments to "inline" before making your own comment.
	In WebBoard, respond to these two papers, especially focusing on the potential of the taxonomy to provide guidance for generating innovative uses of technology (the section titled "Using the Taxonomy to Look Ahead"). Are the kinds of uses generated there (Language Construction Set and Language Workbench) plausible? Can you generate other innovative uses using the taxonomy? Paste the WebBoard URL of your reaction posting into C-Base.
	Take the exemplary educational web site that you posted in WebBoard. Reply to your own posting, saying where that use fits in the Bruce & Levin taxonomy (it could fit more than once place), what learning goals it could be used to achieve and what technology resources it requires.

Week 4: The big picture: A taxonomy of educational uses of technology

To do by Sept 25

Read one of these visions of the future of education:

Learning Spaces in the Networld of Tomorrow:
Future Learning Spaces: A VIP Experience at MBARI by Margaret Riel
Come the Millennium, Where the University? by Gerhard Casper President, Stanford University.

Respond to at least two other classmembers' postings in the "Bruce & Levin" WebBoard conference.

Week 5: Visions of Education in the future

Do before Oct 2	Post in WebBoard your proposal for a major project. Post the URL for that posting into C-Base. If you're having difficulty writing your proposal, give the Project Proposal Prompter a try.
	Respond to my vision of education in the year 2020 posted in WebBoard. Post your own vision of education in the year 2020 in that same "2020 Vision" conference. Post the URL to your vision in C-Base. Respond to at least two other visions.

Weeks 6 and 7: Highly interactive learning environments using web-based databases, JavaScript and Java Applets

Do by Oct 9

Go through the "highly interactive learning environments" Powerpoint.

Go through Jim Peterson's Plug -n- Play Java Integration and Design

Skim through JavaScript for the Total Non-Programmer. (If you don't like this tutorial, search for one you like better, and let me know.)

Go through examples of Javascripts and Java applets.
Skim through Andy's Introductory JavaScript Tutorials (or look through one at HTML Goodies (recommended by Terry Sullivan - thanks Terry). Look at Jim Peterson's introduction to Java applets (or look through a Java Applet tutorial at HTML Goodies (also recommended by Terry).

Look at the Javascript archives at Javascript Source and/or Website Abstraction.

or

look in one or more of these Java applet libraries for a Java Applet that would be useful for you: Sun's Java applet library, Interactive Mathematics Miscellany and Puzzles, Educational Object Economy site, and/or Java Boutique

Respond in WebBoard to at least two major project proposals of others that do not already have two responses.

What do you like best?
What do you like least?
What improvements would you suggest?

Do by Oct 16

Pick either a Java applet, a Javascript, or a web-enable database use to integrate into one of your web pages (ideally one that's part of your major project). Post a description of what you did and the URL of your web page with the use on WebBoard in the "Highly interactive web" conference and in C-Base.

Week 8: Multiple methodologies for evaluating computer uses in education

Do by Oct 23

Go through the Digital Video PowerPoint. (Note: the last 2 minutes are a blank slide and silence, so you can stop at 48:18. The sound from 39:15 to 39:58 is messed up - just ignore that 43 seconds of sound and read the Powerpoint slides at that point.) Look through the "Digital Video in Instruction" web site. Post any questions you have in WebBoard.

Week 9: Digital Video in Instruction

Do by Oct 30

Read through the College of Education's Human Subjects website
Read through the UIUC Human Subject website. Post any questions you have in WebBoard in the Human Subjects Concerns conference.

Weeks 10 and 11: Ethical & social issues in educational uses of technology

Do by Nov 6	Skim through the seven CTER White papers: Access Credibility Free Speech Privacy Commercialism Intellectual Property Computer Crime/Technology Misuse
	Choose one to comment on and post your answers in WebBoard: how is this white paper relevant to an educational issue you have encountered? In what ways does the white paper provide you with resources for dealing with this issue? In what way does it need strengthening? Then post the URL for your responses in C-Base.
	Post in WebBoard a progress report on your major project and post the URL for that posting in C-Base.
Do by Nov 13	Fill out the Student Coursework Research Project Form, which is available as a PDF form at: http://www.ed.uiuc.edu/ber/documents/pdf/Studnt_Coursewk_ResProj_rev.pdf Return the completed form to Sonda Gabriel, Bureau of Educational Research, 236C Education Building, 1310 S. 6th St., Champaign IL 61820. If you have questions about filling out this form, post them in the WebBoard conference "Human Subjects Concerns"
	Respond to the commentary of at least two other responses to the White Papers that don't already have responses
	Establish an account in TAPPED IN, go to the CTER room, leave a message on the whiteboard. Use the TAPPED IN registration instructions.
	Read the following papers about educational uses of networked communities: "Affordances of a VR World as a Place for Learning: Discourse Patterns and Contextualization Cues Framing Learning Experiences for Adults in a Real-time, Text-based, Virtual Reality Setting" by Linda Polin, Pepperdine University "CTER OnLine: Evaluation of an online master of education focusing on curriculum, technology and education reform" by Sandy Levin, Jim Levin, & Greg Waddoups. Skim through the papers linked from the "Guidelines for Educational Uses of Networks" site and read one of the papers there.
	Respond in WebBoard to at least two major project progress reports of others that do not already have two responses. What do you like best? What do you like least? What improvements would you suggest?

Week 12: Network-based learning communities

Do by Nov 20

Update your technical problem solving logs at http://lrsdb2.ed.uiuc.edu:591/trouble/ . (You can search for your own entries or others at the troubleshooting search page at http://lrsdb2.ed.uiuc.edu:591/trouble/search.htm .)

Post in WebBoard a description of an exemplary resource you found in TAPPED IN. Also post in the same message your reflection on the use of networked learning environments like TAPPED IN, in light of your explorations of TAPPED IN and the three papers you've read about these environments.

Week 13: Understanding and troubleshooting of technology

Do by Dec 4	Go through the Trouble Shooting PowerPoint. (This is an audio-narrated Powerpoint that is "streamed", so you'll need to have RealPlayer installed. Go to the "Real" web site if you need to download the free version of the Player (called RealPlayer 8 Basic).
	Reflect in WebBoard how the process of trouble shooting reflected there does or does not describe your own problem solving as described in your own trouble shooting logs, and post that URL into C-Base.
	Look at the reflections of others, and comment on at least two that don't have responses already, commenting on the similarities and differences from your own problem solving
	Post in the "Memorable Technology Troubleshooting Stories" system one or more of your most memorable trouble shooting episodes.
	Read Levin & Kauwell Visualization of Web Based Information and Sense Making

Week 14: Advanced educational technologies

Do by Dec 9	Prepare a major project report web site (a set of pages that describes your major project, presents the evaluation, draws conclusion). Post the name and URL of the project in WebBoard and C-Base.
Do by Dec 11	Give feedback to other major project reports.

Week 15: Summary

Do by Dec 16

Modify your major project presentation web site based on the feedback you get.

Final project reports & presentations

On Dec 19

Final Project Report: face-to-face oral major project presentation on Thursday, December 19, 9am-noon, Room 37 Education Building

Last updated: 14 Nov 2002
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