ED-MEDIA 1999 Proceedings Book - Association for the ...

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High-tech Learning Environments for Low-tech Classrooms Jeff Morrow Lead Designer, Web-based Integrated Science Environment Project Graduate School of Education, University of California at Berkeley, USA jmorrow@alum.mit.edu James D. Slotta Director, Web-based Integrated Science Environment Project Graduate School of Education, University of California at Berkeley, USA slotta@socrates.berkeley.edu As increasing numbers of classrooms throughout the United States and the world become Internet-ready, educational content providers must be aware of the particular technological issues faced in these classrooms. In many cases, the result of recent upgrades is a well-connected classroom full of low- to mid-range computers. However, many content providers appear to be proceeding under the assumption that with good connectivity comes good client-side technology. In our own work developing Internet-based learning environments, we have come face to face with this conundrum. For example, one urban middle school excitedly approached our project, not long after their Net Day celebration, to announce that they were fully wired, connected, and ready to use our curriculum. Unfortunately, when we arrived to consult them on implementing our approaches, we were greeted by a roomful of computers with insufficient memory to run the latest Internet browsers! In addition, increases in classroom Internet capacity have often been outstripped by even greater increases in Internet demands resulting from modern Web site design. Heavy use of graphics and Java within Web pages can render the Internet capacity of some classrooms obsolete before students even have a chance to go online. This presentation will address five important problems with the assumptions made by educational content providers: the problems of graphics, Java, data processing, bandwidth, and scalability. It will then review our own case history in the Web-based Integrated Science Environment (WISE) Project, reviewing our adopted solutions to these real problems. The presentation will evaluate the effectiveness of our solutions and how we revised them over the course of our first year of development. What is WISE The Web-based Integrated Science Environment, or WISE, is an NSF-funded research project whose goal is to harness the wealth of existing Internet resources, the power of Internet technology, and the insight of prior educational research in designing new technology and curriculum for integrated science. Based on prior research in the Knowledge Integration Environment (Bell, Davis and Linn, 1995; Slotta and Linn, in press), WISE curriculum provides students with knowledge integration activities where they critique existing materials drawn from the Web, create designs, and compare theories of controversial science topics. Our project incorporates existing Internet materials to bring exciting new science activities to middle and high school classrooms in accordance with an established pedagogical framework of Scaffolded Knowledge Integration (Linn, 1992). WISE technology is completely Web-based, meaning that its interface runs completely within the Web browser. The decision to serve all our functionality from a central server was made in response to the issues encountered in previous versions of our technology that included some clientside software, resulting in many unanticipated problems. The Problem of Graphics - The ability to transmit and display graphical content is one of the most fundamental strengths of the World Wide Web. However, as anyone with a 14.4 kilobits-per-second modem can tell you, overeager use of graphics can quickly frustrate even the most patient Web user. In an average Web page download, graphical content accounts for the vast majority of total download time. Thus, content providers must deliberately plan graphical content in a way that provides the desired look and feel while minimizing data traffic. The Problem of Java - The Internet is replete with information about Java ranging from serious technological discussion to pure marketing hype. Although Java's promises of easy development and crossplatform support are becoming more realistic, educational content providers must be aware that the use of
Java can significantly increase the minimum system requirements for their sites. In most cases, the use of Java will increase the minimum system requirements for acceptable performance even if the theoretical minimum system requirements remain the same. The Problem of Data Processing - Internet content providers of all types are quickly realizing that a major hurdle to overcome is the selection of methods for organizing, storing and retrieving large amounts of data. Relational databases such as Oracle, Sybase, MySQL, and Microsoft SQL have become the rage among content providers due to their flexibility and speed in dealing with arbitrarily large and diversely organized data sets. The choice of a database engine, however, results in additional constraints and choices to be made. Specifically, content providers must create mechanisms for client communication with the database. Many sites choose a CGI-based approach, but this is often insufficient. The major drawback of CGI programs is that each client request involving a CGI causes a new program to be launched and run on the server. Even if the CGI programs themselves are small and fast, the overhead involved in launching them is quite high. The Problem of Bandwidth - Bandwidth is a measure of how much data can be transferred over the path that exists between a server and a client. The problem of bandwidth is related to both data processing and graphical content. However, whereas control of data and graphics resides primarily with the content provider, control of bandwidth does not. Unfortunately, the nature of the Web is such that insufficient client-side connectivity can reflect poorly on the content provider, even if no server-side bottlenecks exist. The Problem of Scalability - A scalable system is one that can handle higher traffic by straightforward means such as purchasing new or additional hardware rather than more complicated means such as major software redesign. This is one of the foremost concerns of all Internet content providers, especially since the number of users approaching the Internet is increasing at a phenomenal rate. These issues have been at the forefront of many technological decisions we have made in the design of our Web-based Integrated Science Environment. Our experiences have shown that if classroom bandwidth is sufficient, the end users' experiences can be positive even on classroom machines that are five years old or older. Our presentation will discuss how this has been achieved in the WISE Project, focusing on the five problem areas mentioned above. The presentation will also show that with proper server-side preparation, it is possible to balance desired functionality against technological limitations for a very wide range of client machines. Finally, it will touch upon the necessary trade-offs between server-side performance and cost. The purpose of this presentation is not only to share our experiences in implementing a high-tech learning environment, but also to invite discourse among others who have had similar experiences. References Bell, P., Davis, E. A., & Linn, M. C. (1995). The knowledge integration environment: Theory and design. Proceedings of the Computer Supported Collaborative Learning Conference (CSCL '95: Bloomington, IN), (pp. 14-21). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Linn, M. C. (1992). The Computer as Learning Partner: Can Computer Tools Teach Science In K. Sheingold, L. G. Roberts, and S. M. Malcolm (Eds.),Technology for and Learning. Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science. Slotta, J. D. & Linn, M. C. (in press). How do students make sense of Internet resources in the science classroom In Jacobson, M. J. & Kozma, R. (Ed.), Learning the Sciences of the 21st Century. Hilldale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum & Associates. Acknowledgements The WISE Project is funded through NSF Grant #REC 98-05420.
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Designing an Interactive Learning E
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develop an educationally meaningful
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2. Functionality of the BSCW System
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3. First empirical findings During
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of the users as participating actor
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2. Other Characteristics of the Pro
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education resources are being produ
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y using a drop-down menu: Informati
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Results Computing ability and expos
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instructional designs while introdu
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Global Educational Multimedia Serve
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Assured Access/Mobile Computing Ini
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The University has set up a secure
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* Changes in educational paradigms
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Using Computer Imagery and Visualis
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Publishing an imej Journal for Comp
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In summary, we offer the following
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Discussion Forums and Peer Review F
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Languages and Statistics: Solutions
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Kelly and Leckbee (1998) indicate,
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A Wide Array of Uses: Inquiry and I
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Effects of Question-Based Learning
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The EFFECTS of TRAINGING METHOD on
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3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY A 10-day ex
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prototype for futuristic learning e
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Designing a Course Web-Site to Supp
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International Collaborative Learnin
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Facilitation frameworks Bostrom et
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From table 2 it can be seen that te
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Learning in Safety and Comfort: Tow
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Networking The Nation Noel Craske S
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Norfolk Stations. Schools of Distan
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one-on-one with Teaching Assistants
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Java. One of them is already an exp
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• Personal study room management
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As has already been discussed in th
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On-line Support of On-Campus Educat
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Page 77 and 78: How the Construction & Analysis of
Page 79 and 80: Yet, still we ask ourselves: How do
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Page 87 and 88: Actually, when a particular author
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Page 91 and 92: Figure 5: Saving an Educational App
Page 93 and 94: To address this problem Webfuse dra
Page 95 and 96: Cognitive tools can act as structur
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Page 109 and 110: exchange information with other cla
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Page 119 and 120: Slavin R.(1994), Small group method
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Page 123 and 124: Apart from utilising the functional
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Page 131 and 132: adapted tests to assess the student
Page 133 and 134: Architecture of HEZINET The system
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Page 155 and 156: Toward a framework for instruction
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Page 163 and 164: Multimedia Cases in Teacher Educati
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Page 169 and 170: Conclusion The project is still und
Page 171 and 172: An Investigation into Faculty Attit
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Designing and Implementing Web-Base
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