Papers in PDF format

A different communication mode allows users to send messages to the lists directly from a web page, so that
they can use the same interface for all their didactic activities; a list-server forwards messages to all the
members of the list.
The learning environment is based on asynchronous communication modes and therefore one of the main
advantages is the opportunity to involve people who would normally be too busy to undertake traditional
classroom lessons; in our case we have involved experts from major Italian Tribunals to serve as on-line guest
lecturers in the classroom. Students from several Italian Law Universities can easily have access to the trial
documentation, actively participate in the sessions and join public and private e-mail discussions on topics
generated during the lectures.
During the first months of this experience, we have limited the number of students to a small group and we
have focused our attention on the communication environment, adding some functions to simplify the use of the
web and analysing problems and interaction modes among students and teacher. For the next academic year we
are planning to associate this course with the traditional one, at the University of Palermo. This will allow to
better evaluate the effectiveness of this new approach.
Conclusions
Through the two trials on the Net, we have given, for the first time, the possibility to follow a trial during its
evolution, through the analysis of the original legal documentation, newspapers articles and experts’
explanations. Indeed, the Net has become the source for news about high-profile Mafia trials in Italy.
Thousands from around the World had log on, downloading on their PCs everything from the opening
arguments to the latest comments by public prosecutors to stories by even the smallest of Sicilian newspapers.
We have reached some important results; firstly, the Web technology has allowed to spread news about Sicily's
facts all around the World, in such a way to create a very strong anti-mafia movement; secondly, we allowed
Italian people leaving abroad to be a bit closer to their country, by breaking the space barriers; finally, we
allowed people to debate on public matters in a very efficient way.
In addition, we have developed a CMC-based course on a real trial in progress, by using the original
proceedings of the trials available on two Web sites set up at our Institute as lecture material and exploiting the
communication advantages of the Web.
The use of the World Wide Web as a tool to implement the educational environment has proved to be effective;
it allows to create new opportunities for teaching, in particular for learning environment based on real in
progress cases that help students to complete their learning process.
References
[Andrews et al, 95]. Andrews, K., Kappe, F., Maurer, H., Schmaranz, K. (1995). On Second Generation Network
Hypermedia Systems. Proc. of ED-MEDIA 95, Graz, AUSTRIA.
[Berners-Lee et al, 94]. Berners-Lee, T., Cailliau, R., Luotonen, A., Nielsen, H.F. & Secret, A., (1994). The World-Wide
Web. CACM, 37 (8).
[Bilotta et al, 95]. Bilotta, E., Fiorito, M., Iovane, D., Pantano, P. (1995). An Educational Environment Using WWW.
Proceedings of the Third International Conference on WWW, 95, Damstaud, Germania, pub. Elsevier Science.
[Frivold 1995]. Frivold, T.J. (1995). Extending WWW for Synchronous Collaboration. SRI International
[Hughes 1994]. Hughes, K. (1994). Entering the World-Wide Web: A Guide to Cyberspace. World Wide Web document,
URL: http://www.hcc.hawaii.edu/guide/www.guide.html