Education on the Internet
Number 122: 26th May, 2004
Introduction
Introduction
Education on the Internet is published by Spartacus Educational every week. The newsletter includes news, reviews of websites and articles on using ICT in the classroom. Members of the mailing list are invited to submit information for inclusion in future newsletters. In this way we hope to create a community of people involved in using the Internet in education. Currently there are 51,520 subscribers to the newsletter.
All reviews are added to our web directory. There are sections on Internet Services, Online Seminars, Primary Education, English, Mathematics, Science, Modern Languages, History, Geography, Design & Technology, Business Studies, Special Needs, Media Studies, ICT, Sociology, Music, Politics, Economics, Photography, Art & Design, Theatre Studies, Physical Education and Religious Studies.
John Simkin
Online Seminars
Selection, Streaming and Setting: Andy Walker's seminar is intended to stimulate discussion of the controversial issues of selection, streaming, setting and banding in schools and to explore the educational and sociological implications of these common practices. It may well also extend out to cover related issues concerned with increasing specialization in schools and the right of specialist schools to select on entry. The subject area is deliberately wide as the author's opinion is that all these practices are based on an outdated and discredited ideological commitment to the grammar/secondary modern approach: a commitment which continues to blight the British educational system. Participants draw on an extremely wide range of experience, some still live and work in areas where the Tripartite system still thrives (people from Kent rather than time travellers!), whilst many work in "comprehensive" schools.
News and Articles
School Safaris: Demos, the influential UK think-tank, has just published a report urging schools to organize weekly “safaris” for its pupils. The report’s authors, Gillian Thomas and Guy Thompson argue: “Out-of-classroom learning should not just be about one-off excursions to museums or galleries, though these are clearly also of value. School safaris should occur on a weekly basis in all schools, and could involve children learning about trigonometry by going on fun-fair rides, or doing a geography lesson within an airport arrivals lounge.” This report comes at a time where formal school visits and field trips in the UK have declined in popularity as a result of increased insurance premiums and union advice to teachers to avoid them because of fears of accidents and litigation.
Al-Rowwad Center: Aida Refugee Camp accommodates about 4,000 people (around 650 families) who took refuge to it in 1948 and later in 1967 from 35 different villages in Palestine as the result of the two Arab-Israeli wars. This camp, like the other 21 camps in west bank and the 8 camps in Gaza strip, as well as the other camps in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria, was established with tents as an emergency and temporary camp, but have been transformed to a permanent stage of refuge. Al-Rowwad Center is an Independent Center for artistic, cultural, and theatre training for children in Aida Camp trying to provide a "safe" and healthy environment to help children creativity and discharge of stress in the war conditions they are forced to live in. The camp provides access to computer training.
Ekumfi Schools Project: During August 1997, 12 Newcastle University Civil Engineering undergraduates began the construction of a library/resource centre for the village of Ekumfi-Atakwa in the Central Region of Ghana. The building was designed by Kate Eldon, Master of Engineering student specialising in Structural Engineering as part of her 4th year dissertation. The students helped raise funds for the project by undertaking presentations at Tyneside schools. £25,000 was raised which was sufficient to purchase the construction materials in Ghana. Right now, a double decker London bus is taking children from the 47 primary schools in the Ekumfi District to the John Knapton Library in Ekumfi Atakwa.
Primary Education
KidStory: Established in Sweden, KidStory works with children, educators, and researchers from various disciplines in the development process by building an interdisciplinary, intergenerational, international design team. KidStory develops the currently available technology to inherently support social learning experiences while concurrently developing novel technologies that can be used in the learning environments of tomorrow. The third year of the project is now completed.
Through The Glass Wall: Popular culture offers little outside-of-school support for children's mathematical learning. Computer games are a potential exception. These games exert a tremendous pull on some children. While many games purport to be educational and even to promote children's mathematical learning, there is little research to support these claims. Researchers are beginning to get a handle on the conditions under which students learn mathematics in school, yet almost nothing is known about how computer game-playing can support and extend children's knowledge of mathematics. For many girls, the computer's screen seems to be a kind of glass wall. They are allowed to glimpse its worlds from a distance, but are not invited inside. This issue is explored in this research being carried out by TERC in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Science
The Black Death: Professor Christopher Duncan and Dr Susan Scott of Liverpool University have argued that the Black Death, which killed 23m people in the middle ages, could be lying dormant and could strike again. Their claim is based on the theory that the pandemic was triggered not by bubonic plague but by another virus. "We believe this virus is merely lying in wait, ready to strike again," said Professor Duncan. The Black Death is thought to have caused the deaths of up to 200m people worldwide over the past 1,500 years. However, DR Michael Smith, a leading expert on plague, is not convinced: "For many years, there have been queries about whether the bubonic plague was responsible for the Black Death. However, much of the clinical descriptions certainly fit bubonic plague. A paper, published by French researchers recently, based on DNA tests on the remains of two people who died during this time also found evidence that it was bubonic plague."
Influenza Pandemic of 1918: The influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 killed more people than the Great War (1914-18), at somewhere between 20 and 40 million people. It has been cited as the most devastating epidemic in recorded world history. More people died of influenza in a single year than in four-years of the Black Death Bubonic Plague from 1347 to 1351. Known as "Spanish Flu" or "La Grippe" the influenza of 1918-1919 was a global disaster. In the fall of 1918 the Great War in Europe was winding down and peace was on the horizon. The Americans had joined in the fight, bringing the Allies closer to victory against the Germans. Deep within the trenches these men lived through some of the most brutal conditions of life, which it seemed could not be any worse. Then, in pockets across the globe, something erupted that seemed as benign as the common cold. The influenza of that season, however, was far more than a cold. In the two years that this scourge ravaged the earth, a fifth of the world's population was infected. The flu was most deadly for people ages 20 to 40. This pattern of morbidity was unusual for influenza which is usually a killer of the elderly and young children.
Design and Technology
IST Design Technology: This is a school based department resource. It covers many areas of Design Technology (DT) education from the beginning of KS3, through IGCSE and on to the International Baccalaureate at post 16. The aim is to offer students, parents and colleague's insight into what this multi-faceted subject is about. Many, I believe, misunderstand it. There are colleagues already involved in delivering aspects of DT education around the globe but there are also those who are looking for some basic guidance on the philosophy and approach to delivering DT education. The best way to develop is by seeing what others do and being inspired through different ideas and methods of approach.
Resistant Materials: This new addition to Design and Technology Department was developed to help GCSE students study for their Resistant Materials examination paper. It offers a revision guide on Health and Safety including Finishes, Ergonomics and Anthropometrics, Scale of Production, One-off production, Batch production, Mass-production, Flow or continuous production, Injection moulding, Vacuum forming, Jigs, Moulds, Thermoplastic, Thermosetting plastics, Hardwoods, Softwoods and Performance Specification. This is a must for any student revising for a GCSE or As/A level in Product Design or Resistant Materials.
Geography
Zoom: From June until November 2003, children aged 4-10 years old from all over Europe are asked to make a symbolic journey to the Ninth Climate Change Conference in Milan. For one week they explore their daily journeys through fun and movement, and learn about sustainable mobility through play. More than 80,000 children from all over Europe collected half a million Green Footprints to protect the global climate as part of the Zoom campaign. ‘Zoom – Kids on the Move to Milan’ brought together children from fifteen countries, who collected a total of 544,008 Green Footprints to protect the global climate. A Green Footprint was awarded for each journey made using a sustainable means of transport – on foot, by bike and scooter, or by bus or rail. Zoom is financially supported by the European Commission's Directorate General for the Environment.
Our Own Voice: Launched in March 2000 as a 3-year project jointly implemented by Plan Haiti, Radio Nederland Training Centre (RNTC) and the Panos Institute. "Our Own Voice" is a component of a wider programme, of Plan entitled "Child Rights and Participatory Media in Civil Society," which currently involves children from El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras and Nicaragua. Through this programme, groups of child journalists in various local communities produce regular radio magazines, which are being broadcast through local radio. Children are trained as reporters and assisted in their covering events of interest to community development or child rights. They are further expected to carry out awareness campaigns on child rights issues and produce comic books and posters.
ICT
Content Generator: In future anyone will be able to purchase and download these advanced programs to generate their own Flash games. These interactive games have been a major part of the success of Andrew Field's multi award-winning educational websites SchoolHistory and Revise ICT. These interactive games are easy to create and are perfect for starter, plenary, revision and recap activities. Adding an element of fun competition will enliven any lesson or training session. Games are based on a minimum of 20 questions with no maximum number - questions are chosen randomly each time the game is played.
Bloke on the a Bike: Drew Radford, is packing up his computing gear, priming up the engine of the Bavarian and donning his leathers. Once again he is preparing to launch into the unknown – the Australian outback. He will be digging up and presenting radio and TV stories about people and the environment in regional Australia. He’d like you to have a go too, as he can’t visit every cool place in Australia. As “Junior Journos”, in the outback Drew wants you to get out into your local community and then link up with a school in another part of Australia and together prepare an online report about how technology has, is or could change life in the Australian outback.
Book Section
Internet Art: When the Internet emerged as a mass global communication network in the mid-1990s, artists immediately recognized the exciting possibilities for creative innovation that came with it. This groundbreaking book considers the many diverse forms of Internet art and the tools and equipment used to create them, while discussing the wider cultural context and historical importance of the work. The book covers email art, websites, artist-designed software, and projects that blur the boundaries between art and design, political activism and communication. (Rachel Greene, Thames & Hudson, ISBN 0 500 20376 8, £8.95)
