------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Internet's Potential for Teaching and Learning Keynote speech for the Second Hong Kong Web Symposium 96 27-28 August 1996 The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong by John December (johndecember@gmail.com) ======================================================================== Abstract The Internet and World Wide Web provide the connections, communities, and contexts for an educator to tap into the potential of the online world. The Web's technologies support a spectrum of possibilities for communication, information, and interaction. Educators employing these technologies can provide learning environments for students as well as support systems for teachers. **** The Internet's Role in Education Internet technology changes rapidly--each month brings a new set of tools and resources that have potential to play a role in meeting the needs of educators and students. Within this expansion of new opportunities on the Internet, an educator may feel swamped. With a wealth of books, journals, magazines, professional conferences, multimedia products, software, and training courses already available, why would an educator look to the online world for still more resources and activities? Turning to the Internet may seem like overkill to an already information-overloaded education professional. But the main reasons for using the Internet for education aren't about information at all. Instead, the Internet's potential benefit to educators lies in its connections, communities, and contexts. Connections on the Internet are often intensely personal. Arising from a shared interest, one-to-one electronic mail communication is often the most frequently-used channel on the Internet for many people. There are more effective ways to retrieve and sift through information than electronic mail, but the interpersonal contacts that educators gain while participanting in discussions on the Internet produce a circle of colleagues who can support and enrich professional lives. Communities on the Internet form the web of the many interpersonal and group communication activities. Approaching common concerns or tasks, online communities develop around online communication, interaction, and information-gathering. Like communities of people based on physical space, online communities developed a shared sense of culture, practices, etiquette, obligation, and purpose. Contexts on the Internet arise when people in communities develop artifacts (such as World Wide Web sites or other publications or archives) that have some meaning for them. Contexts shed light on and frame the meaning for activities and resources online. Without context, online activities could be considered to be just disparate packages of information that have no relation to each other. Questions of usefulness, authority, accuracy, and many others can often be answered by understanding the context of an online resource or activity. The Spectrum of the Web's Functionality The Web supports a range of uses which can all be broadly classified as "communication." These uses range from largely one-way communication contexts of one-to-many information dissemination to more interactive contexts of one-to-one and many-to-one exchanges. Each of the Web's technologies play a role in this spectrum of functionality. Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) supports a range of communication: from hypermedia display to a high degree of user selectivity. Common Gateway Interface (CGI) programming supports computation as well as a higher degree of responsiveness in user interactivity. Java, the computer programming language developed by Sun Microsystems, provides a still richer level of interactivity in Web communication. Advances such as Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML) and the mixture of Java with VRML, provide even richer ways for information to be displayed to users and for users to interact with that information. The Potential of the Web to Support Education The World Wide Web can support the needs of educators and students in a variety of ways. Educators can use the Web to disseminate resources, support teaching and learning, facilitate distance learning, and teach cyberspace literacy. There are a wide variety of online resources that provide educators with resources to support their work. I maintain a list of resources used for education on the Internet as part of my Computer-Mediated Communication information sources list. See the file http://www.december.com/cmc/info/applications-education.html for a list of good starting points. These online resource collections based at established organizations and usually having some financial backing for their continued development and all provide a wealth of content. Because they each also have a well-chosen sets of links to related sites, any one of these general collections may serve as an educator's "launching point" to still more resources. Besides just resource dissemination, an educator can use the Web for supporting teaching. Course information systems are now used at many institutions to provide a syllabus, references to online readings, and links to related online information. By sharing these course webs in collections such as the World Lecture Hall (http://www.utexas.edu/world/instruction/), educators around the world can share ideas in how to provide information for their students. In addition to course information deployed on the Web, educators can create tutorial modules to assist in learning. For example, there is a virtual frog dissection kit that allows students to see what a frog looks like in various stages of taking it apart. Other tutorials, some written in Java, give students exposure to lessons in physics, mathematics, computer science, and many other areas. Again, the worldwide sharing of these tutorial modules through the Web enables a global, collaborative effort toward teaching students. Students can also use the Web as a learning environment itself. The Web presents a rich store of information, unique opportunities for communication, and an emerging forum for interaction. These uses can help a student learn about a topic, share their ideas, and even contribute to collections of information and knowledge. Because of its global reach, the Web supports distance learning well. Both for the support of courses as well as for their delivery, the Web is an excellent delivery mechanism, particularly to a geographically-distributed set of students. The Web also provides unique opportunities to teach a new kind of literacy--one based in cyberspace rather than just printed works on paper. Web communication gives people a way to take part in information dissemination as well as interaction. The process of learning how to be literate in this environment itself is a new area of knowledge that educators will need to give to students. Using a process of developing information, educators can communicate with students or colleagues worldwide. I've outlined my methodology for web Development in my writings and on at my site (http://www.december.com/web/develop/). My methodology includes six phases: planning, analysis, design, implementation, promotion, and innovation. In brief, you can approach web development as a continuous interplay of the processes of planning, analysis, design, implementation, promotion, and innovation. Most significantly, the Internet and Web can be used to provide interactivity. The Java programming language opens the way to give immediate and continuous feedback to a user. The potential of Java to enrich the role of an educator is very great. Simulations, virtual scientific instruments, and collaborative forums can be created using Java. Besides creating information a student needs to find and use information. A student needs to learn to navigate information and learn searching, surveillance, and coping skills. Then, a student needs to know how to retrieve, evaluate, and use information once found. Because of the Internet's more diverse nature as an information space, a student needs a strong set of critical skills for judging the value and appropriateness of information found on the Internet. And because the Internet provides an avenue for interaction, a student also needs to gain literacy in the social and technical aspects of interaction online. The Web supports communities and participation in these communities requires a respect for the evolving community norms for behavior. Conclusion The Internet enables educators as well as students to connect to a great global "conversation." Most important in this conversation is its human aspects--the rich interpersonal connections and communities which arise out of shared interests. Using the technologies of the Web, educators can support education through rich repositories of knowledge and innovative teaching resources. We are, in many ways, at an unprecedented in time in history. It takes a village to raise a child, an African proverb advises. Perhaps a global village based on Internet communication can also enrich what educators strive to do. Question and Answer **** See http://www.december.com/present/apwww96.html for online information about this talk. John December (johndecember@gmail.com, http://www.december.com) is president of December Communications, Inc. and the publisher of Computer-Mediated Communication Magazine and several widely used and frequently accessed World Wide Web-based reference publications about the Internet and the Web. An experienced Internet writer, teacher, software developer, and author, he holds an M.S. in Computer Science and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing and is a PhD Candidate in Communication and Rhetoric at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He is co-author of the books, "The World Wide Web Unleashed" and "HTML & CGI Unleashed," and author of "Presenting Java" all published in 1995 by Sams.net, an imprint of Macmillan Computer Publishing. ========================================================================