Education on the Internet
Number 20: 27th February, 2002
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 18,166 subscribers to the newsletter.
All reviews are added to our web directory. There are sections on Primary Education, English, Mathematics, Science, Modern Languages, History, Geography, Design & Technology, Business Studies, Media Studies, ICT, Sociology, Music, Politics, Economics, Photography, Art & Design, Theatre Studies, Physical Education and Religious Studies.
John Simkin
US High Schools Online: Over half of high schools in the United States now offer online courses or are planning to do so. A study by Interactive Educational Systems Design found that over 40 percent of high schools already offer online courses or plan to during this school year. A further 17 percent plan to offer them in the future. Thirty-two percent of public school districts will adopt online learning for the first time this year. The main reasons cited by high schools for turning to online learning are cost effectiveness, providing educational equity and resolving scheduling conflicts.
Fulcrum Analytics: According to Fulcrum Analytics traffic to adult education sites has increased by 60 percent since 1997. These educational websites provide training, preparation for standardized tests, seminars, and graduate degrees, among other services. Fulcrum Analytics says that visitors to these sites spend more time online than the average Internet user (15.3 hours per week compared with 11.5 hours). Furthermore, adult education sites have used the Internet for an average of 4.5 years, in comparison with the average Internet user, who has been online for 3.7 years.
ICT in Schools: A report published last year for the education department by Becta, the British government's lead agency for ICT in education, found a strong link between high standards across the secondary school curriculum and good technology provision. The report also showed that the more widely a school used ICT across the curriculum, the better its examination results. The impact of the technology was found to be even greater when good resources were combined with good teaching. However, Stuart Millar, in this article in this week's Education Guardian, argues that: "behind the alphabet soup of initiatives, national averages and soundbite-size statistics, there remains a yawning gulf between the politicians' vision of ICT in theory and the majority of schools' experience of ICT in practice." Millar quotes from a recently published Ofsted report "good practice remains uncommon"; levels of LEA support "vary greatly but are often too low to meet schools' needs"; training for teachers has increased their use of computers "but only rarely to the pedagogic expertise to help them make the most effective use of ICT in their lessons".
Teaching History Online: Teaching History Online is a free monthly email journal for anyone interested in using the internet to teach or study history. The journal includes online news, reviews of websites and articles on ICT history. Members will also be able to submit information for inclusion in the newsletter. In this way Spartacus Educational hopes to bring people together who are involved in using the internet to teach history. You can subscribe to Teaching History Online by sending an email to IwantHistory@keepAhead.com.
Modern World History: This site is designed for pupils aged 14 to 16 studying the topic to exam level. Topics covered are the Treaty of Versailles; League of Nations; Weimar Germany; Nazi Germany; the Russian Revolution; the era of Stalin; America in the 1920's; the New Deal; Italy 1900 to 1939; the causes of World War Two; World War Two; the Cold War and the use of evidence in History. There is also a link page to other valuable sites.
American Labor Unions:Helen Marot (1865-1940) worked as a librarian in Wilmington, Delaware, before moving to Philadelphia to open her own private library on social reform. In 1903 Marot joined with Mary Kenney O'Sullivan, Jane Addams, Mary McDowell, Margaret Haley, Agnes Nestor, Florence Kelley and Sophonisba Breckinridge to form the Women's Trade Union League (WTUL). She is today best remembered for her book American Labor Unions. This pioneering work on the early history of the trade union movement in the United States is now available from the BoondocksNet Editions website.
Modern Languages
LinguaCentral is a website dedicated to learners and teachers of French, Spanish and German. Italian, Russian and Japanese are also featured. There are hundreds of links to online language-learning material for specific skills practice or broader language and vocabulary learning. Most content is created by LinguaCentral but other websites are linked from the LinguaCentral web pages. The emphasis is on purposeful and motivating resources giving rise to real progress in the learning of the language. Resources available are varied but all are focused on enjoying the learning process.
ICT4LT: The Information and Communications Technology for Language (ICT4LT) website contains a rich bank of ICT training materials for teachers of modern foreign languages. The development of the site was funded under the SOCRATES Programme of the Commission of the European Communities from September 1998 to December 2000. During this period an international team of experts and practising teachers and teacher trainers produced a set of 15 training modules. These modules are being continually updated and added to. There is also a Resources Centre and a comprehensive glossary of terms relating to ICT and modern foreign languages. The site has been produced in four languages - English, Italian, Finnish and Swedish - and contains over 700 links to language-related websites. A 16th addition to the 15 modules (in English only at present) has just been completed: Module 4.1 on Computer Aided Assessment (CAA). The ICT4LT site has been given the stamp of approval by the UK National Grid for Learning (NGfL) and attracts an average of over 400 visitors per day.
Physical Education
Skills of Curling: The Firoda National school website tries to give the reader the opportunity to sample the day to day life of the pupils in this school in Ireland. It also gives a good insight into life and customs of people living in the area. There are some historical projects and information in easy to view format but possibly the best section is the comprehensive guide to the "Skills of Hurling". This section contains instructions and short video clips on how to play this great game - the fastest field game in the world.
History of Football: The Association of Football Statisticians have produced a detailed history of football on its impressive website. Starting with its beginnings in the Middle Ages, when over 500 people could be involved in any one game and the football field was the length of a town, it moves onto the 20th century with a detailed account of how the United States defeated England in 1950.
Photography
Farm Security Administration-Office: The images in the Farm Security Administration-Office of War Information Collection are among the most famous documentary photographs ever produced. Created by a group of U.S. government photographers, the images show Americans in every part of the nation. In the early years, the project emphasized rural life and the negative impact of the Great Depression, farm mechanization, and the Dust Bowl. In later years, the photographers turned their attention to the mobilization effort for World War II. The core of the collection consists of about 164,000 black-and-white photographs. This American Memory website provides access to over 160,000 of these images.
History of Photography: This website is not designed to be a course on the history of photography such as a resource to explore. In addition to pen-portraits of many of the most important photographers, it contains information on some of the most significant processes used during the early days of photography. This work is intended to be of general interest, but it may also be a useful starting-off point for students preparing for courses which include a brief study of the history of photography.
Science
Kosmoi: Worlds of Science, Nature, and Technology: This site offers hundreds of pages on a wide range of scientific and technical topics, from Astronomy to Zoology, complemented by recommended books, posters, videos, and software. The home page grabs the attention quickly, with a daily quote and feature article summary, followed by a Top 20 and a site map. There's a lot to explore, and anyone with an interest in science should find it a treasure trove of fascinating articles and tidbits. The author has degrees in physics and mathematics, and has worked with scientists in Europe and the USA, programming systems for international research projects such as a nuclear fusion device, a synchrotron, Hubble, etc. He established one of NASA's first web servers and founded WDVL.com.
Scientific American: The magazine, Scientific American, has provided readers with the latest news and information on science and technology for more than 150 years. As well as recent issues, the Scientific American website includes readers' favourite articles. Other features include Nano Technology, Exhibits, Explore, Today's Trvia, Ask the Experts, Quick Poll and the opportunity to subscribe to a free newsletter.
Geography
Atapedia: Atlapedia Online contains full colour physical and political maps as well as key facts and statistics on countries of the world. The Countries A to Z section, provides facts, figures and statistical data on geography, climate, people, religion, language, history, economy & more. The World Maps section, provides full colour physical and political maps for regions of the world. There is also a Resources section that contains additional school or homework material for Teachers & Students.
Geography Pages: A Secondary Geography website produced by a teacher from Norfolk. Has over 800 external links: most of them with a brief review, and organised into logical Key Stage 3, GCSE, AS & A2 areas. The website also has a Top Ten, and details on a research project currently being undertaken by the website author. Feel free to download the questionnaire and send it back - further details in the BPRS section of the site. There are lesson plans, lecture notes and digital images of coastal fieldwork on the Norfolk coast. An ever expanding site, with regular updates.
Reader's Letters
The Hawaii Division of the United Nations Association is helping to introduce computers and the Internet to schools in Pacific Island countries. One of the serious problems is that the countries are so small that they do not have critical mass to get things moving on their own (Tonga has about 100,000 people, and Samoa about 165,000, but Tuvalu has only 10,000 and Nauru only 6,000) so we are working on a regional level.
We have established a model computer lab at Samoa College (a secondary school) and will bring representatives from the education departments of 12 of the island countries to Samoa later this year to familiarize them with the Internet and with the use of computers in schools. At the meeting we plan to have the participants spend most of one day on a hands-on exercise that will give them some idea of the scope and potential of computers and the Internet as teaching and learning tools. Your site has a host of such exercises, but it is a question finding something suitable. Can you recommend one or two computer based teaching exercises that might be effective in this demonstration to a group of middle aged government officials who have limited experience with the Internet? Ideally the programs would have some relevance to the Pacific Islands.
Dr. James F. McDivitt
1909 Ala Wai Blvd., #1110
Honolulu, HI 96815
Tel: 808 942 2914
E-mail HISOPAC@aol.co
Do you want to have your website listed in our web directory? If so, send a brief description (about 150 words) and the URL to spartacus@pavilion.co.uk.
