I have combined a
literature review and research study summary into one article for
reference. The literature review , an in-depth research into existing
research, focused on studies for incorporating technology and the Internet
in the classroom and is from May, 2001. Since technology has moved at such a swift pace the
amount of existing, quality research, especially at that time, has not been able to keep up. This
presented quite a challenge when it came to justifying the use of
technology through documented research.
The research study ,critiqued and summarized, relates directly to teachers
creating web pages. I received an email from the authors giving me
permission to quote the study and they indicated a follow-up study was
near completion.
Elementary Websites and Technology: A Literature Review
© Douglas W.
Hinton, 2001, all rights reserved
A review of
literature for incorporating the Internet and technology into the
classroom has been conducted. An overview of the literature supports
technology use in the classroom where adequate support is available and
where a sufficient technology infrastructure is in place to support
constructivist practices on the part of teachers. (Becker, Ravitz, 1999)
New technologies support and enhance many skills associated with
higher order thinking skills and meaningful learning such as metacognition,
problem solving, and critical thinking. (Chambers, 1999)
Incorporating multimedia in the classroom is not just for
higher-level teaching and students. Computer-based
cooperative learning activities provide opportunities for individualizing
intervention opportunities for the at-risk students in the classroom.
These students also contribute more to the classroom when working together
on computers with other students, thereby increasing self-confidence and
motivation for learning. (Gan, 1999)
Incorporating
technology in the classroom poses several challenges that can be addressed
by designing an effective and interactive website that previews and
organizes information as well as providing communication opportunities
requested by parents (Yasmine, 1999) for families at home. Since even
middle-school and high-school students use websites more effectively when
they know subject material ahead of time (Peet, et al., 2000), the
organization of previewed website links for elementary students is
imperative to avoid skimming and missing information.
The constant maintenance of these links is important as the
shelf-life of web-page links is fairly short. (Clariana, 2000) And even
after all of this organization of Internet resources is established,
creating application-level assignments is necessary, not just for better
learning, but to avoid the ease and complication of choosing inappropriate
web resources to complete assignments. (Grimes, Boening, 2001)
Summarizing
a Research
Study on Elementary Websites
STUDY AUTHORS:
KAREN S. IVERS; ANN E. BARRON
TITLE:
The Presence and Purpose of Elementary School Web Pages
SOURCE:
Information Technology in Childhood Education 1999
181-91 1999
CRITIQUED
Douglas W. Hinton 2001
Karen
S. Ivers and Ann E. Barron (1999) have conducted a worthwhile study that
is relevant for teachers in the beginning phase of developing a web site
for their classroom. According
to the authors and as of the date of publication of this article, there
are over 8000 K-12 schools connected to the Internet in the United States,
half of which are elementary schools.
In July 1996, 1106 schools had registered on Web66 for Internet
access. It is (was) predicted
that 95% of all public schools would be online by the year 2000. This
study examined trends in elementary schools’ presence on the web.
Findings suggested that most educators primarily use the web to display
information about their school rather than taking advantage of the Web’s
presence for increasing students’ communications skills, motivation
toward writing, organizing and synthesizing skills, cultural
understanding, and authentic learning experiences.
Ivers
& Barron (1999) cite research demonstrating that telecommunications
enhance students’ understanding and respect for cultural differences,
provide students with authentic learning experiences, increase students’
inquiry and analytical skills, improve students’ communication and
processing skills, and increase the quality of student writing. Ivers
& Barron (1999) also cite that benefits for educators include
increased collaboration and communication with their peers, alternative
instructional strategies, and “finger tip” access to research, online
experts, and an abundance of curriculum resources. (Gersh, 1994;
U.S.Congress, 1995; Honey & Henriquez, 1993; Reed, 1996; Cohen &
Riel, 1989; Wright, 1991;)
Further
justification by Ivers and Barron (1999) is provided,
“No longer just consumers of the Web, educators are beginning to
design their own school Web pages. This
new form of communication affects the culture, context, and policies of
the school environment and raises many issues and concerns regarding
student safety and privacy, pedagogical practices, and faculty roles.”
A
Critique
The
Presence and Purpose of Elementary School Web Pages (Ivers and Barron,
1999) is a relevant and informative study. The researchers worked over a
two-year span and critiqued a large enough sample size to provide a
credible study.
Ivers
and Barron (1999) state in the abstract that, “This study examines the
trend in elementary schools’ presence on the web. Findings suggest that
most educators use their web presence to display information about their
schools. Few educators take advantage of their school’s Web presence for
increasing students’ communication skills, motivation toward writing,
organizing and synthesizing skills, cultural understanding, and authentic
learning experiences.”
Various
web sites and sources include the higher level strategies mentioned by
Ivers and Barron (1999), but how a teacher web site would incorporate
these strategies can remain a mystery. Communication skills and
opportunities are important (Yasmine, 1999), but what would a teacher
offer on his or her web site that would encourage and enable this
activity? Motivation toward writing exists on the web (Gan, 1999), but
again, what part of a teacher web site would encourage this? Providing
links to the correct sources on the Web is the single answer to providing
all of the components mentioned, but this is a very simple method that
does not seem to meet the criteria the researchers are looking for.
Cultural
understanding and authentic learning experiences are cited (Gersh,
19994),(U.S.Congress, 1995) by Ivers and Barron (1999) as not being
included in teacher web sites. However, their use of this cited research
hints that the mere presence and use of the Web itself is increasing these
types of opportunities for students. It can be challenging to envision the
inclusion of specific components into an elementary teacher website to
provide these opportunities.
One
possible answer to all of these situations would include the creation of
technology activities or assignments. While creating web quests or web
scavenger hunts, for example, would indeed move in the direction of higher
order
thinking
skills (Mathison, 1999), a teacher web site would be hard pressed to
include many of these activities. A web site could certainly contain these
opportunities, but the creation of successful technology projects requires
as much or more time than the creation of the web site itself. Teachers
could slowly accumulate and organize within the web site, but to evaluate
a web site on the absence of these may be unrealistic.
The
Purpose of the Study was clearly stated.
The data collection is consistent with the Purpose of the Study
and the Findings section is
detailed and relevant as well to the stated purpose of the study. Ivers
and Barron (1999) provide detailed analysis of each of the tables of
numbers in the Discussion section.
The
Conclusion and Recommendations mentions a lack of web sites
displaying student work, a relevant point. However, Ivers and Barron
(1999) then state, “Very few schools take advantage of the Web’s
potential.” A list of web sites that, “…appear to be taking
advantage of their presence on the web…” is then provided. The
last section of the Conclusion and
Recommendations section discusses schools possibly putting students at
risk by not maintaining anonymity
and
the importance of districts establishing plans, guidelines and policies.
Implications
and Suggestions
Implications
for this study for teachers beginning to implement an elementary web site
or maintaining an already established web site depends on the part of the
study a teacher focuses on reading. If looking at the actual purpose and
results of the study, teachers can realize a starting point and apply
information from what others in the field are primarily focusing upon.
However,
if teachers focus on the narrative in the abstract and discussion of Ivers
& Barron’s study (1999), they may find themselves challenged to
think beyond the ordinary and most often used applications for elementary
teacher web sites. This discussion of such a direction should help
teachers, administrators, and technology coordinators to begin dialogue on
extending elementary web sites beyond the typical classroom newsletter.
Suggestions for
further study would be to conduct similar studies that would ask questions
about higher order thinking skills. The implications of such in
Ivers & Barron (1999) are enough to conduct many specific or broad
studies. Defining, finding,
and providing examples of higher order applications would be highly
beneficial in the field of technology, especially when incorporating
elementary teacher web sites.
Research
Study Data
The stated
purpose of this study was to examine the content, design, and purpose of
existing elementary school Web pages. The researchers investigated the
following questions:
1.
What kind of
information is posted on elementary school Web pages?
2. Who is responsible for creating and maintaining elementary school Web
pages?
3. What types of links are included in elementary school Web pages?
4. What multimedia and programming elements are being incorporated into
the design of elementary
school Web pages?
A hypothesis for this study was not
identified or stated.
Method
Data was recorded over a two
year period to examine possible trends in the content, design, and purpose
of elementary Web pages. The first set of data reflected 55 randomly
selected U.S. elementary school Web sites from Web66. The 55 schools
represented five percent of the total number of elementary Web sites
registered on Web66. The second set of data represented 107 randomly
selected sites in 1998, two years after the first set of data was
recorded.
Information was noted on each
site using the following criteria:
-
Content:
information about the school, student work, classroom pages,
teacher pages, local information, staff addresses, update notices, and
calls for collaboration.
-
Designers:
gender, role
-
Links:
local, government, educational, search engines
-
Media
and Programming Elements: digital photographs, animation, audio,
video, image maps, mailto, counters, guestbooks, forms, frames, Java.
Results
The data suggests there is a
growing trend to use elementary Web sites for communication. The
percentage of staff email addresses almost doubled, and the number of
registered elementary schools showing evidence of collaborating with
others went from 5% to 27%. More teachers also began providing information
about themselves.
Fewer
sites provided information about their schools, displayed student work,
provided classroom pages, displayed updated notices, or furnished users
with information about the community in the 1998 data than in the 1996
data.
The study
indicates more media specialists, librarians, and technology
coordinators are taking on the responsibility of creating and maintaining
the elementary school Web sites with identified authors.
In 1996, 25% of the sites were created in this manner, 48% in 1998.
Females responsible for creating and maintaining elementary schools’ Web
sites with identified authors increased from
35% to 54% over the two years. However,
this does not represent all of the surveyed sites because not all of the
sites identified the authors. 78%
(June 1996) and 65% (March 1998) of the surveyed sites did identify an
author.
The focus and
target of links appear to have changed from local emphasis to educational
resources and search engines. Links to local information dropped from 69%
to 47%. Web sites with links
to educational resources remained at 65% while 39% of the surveyed sites
had links to search engines, up from 31%.
The use of
digitized photos remained the prevailing use of media and programming
elements, rising from 82% to 84% of the Web sites over the two-year
period. The use of animation rose dramatically from 11% of the Web sites
to 46%. The authors cited this as a possible result of available libraries
of animated gifs. The use of
audio increased from 4% to 11%, mailto increased from 82% to 86%, and
forms increased from 4% to 6%. The
use of video and counters decreased, video from 2% to 1%, and counters
from 35% to 21%.
References
Ivers,
K.S., Barron, A.E. (1999) The Presence and Purpose of Elementary School
Web Pages. Information Technology in Childhood Education, 1999,
181-91.
Becker, H.J.,
Ravitz, J. (1999) The Influence of Computer and Internet Use on
Teacher’s Pedagogical Practice and Perceptions. Journal of Research
on Computing in Education, 31, no4, 356-84.
Clariana,
R. (2000) Change in Instruction Related Web Sites in an 18-month Period. British
Journal of Educational Technology, 31, no3, 251-3.
Grimes,
G.J., Boening, C.H. (2001) Worries With the Web: A Look at Student Use of
Web Resources. College & Research Libraries, 62, no1, 11-23.
Chambers,
P. (1999) Information Handling Skills, Cognition, and New Technologies. British
Journal of Educational Technology, 30, no2, 151-62.
Gan, S.L., (1999)
Motivating At-risk Students Through Computer-based Cooperative Learning
Activities. Educational Horizons, 77, no3, 151-6.
Wilkinson, K.
(1998) Internet and Traditional Homework Activities. Delta Pi Epsilon
Journal, v.40, no4, p.214-30.
Land, S.M.,
Greene, B.A. (2000)
Project Based Learning with the World Wide Web: A Qualitative Study
of Resource Integration.
Educational Technology Research and Development, 48, no1,
45-67.
Hackbarth, S.
(2000) Changes in Student’s Computer Literacy. Tech Trends, 44,
no4, 30-3.
Niederhauser,
D.S. (2000) Teacher’s Instructional Perspectives and Use of Educational
Software. Teaching and Teacher Education, v.17, no1, p.15-31.
Svensson,
A.K. (2000) Computers in School: Socially Isolating or a Tool to Promote
Collaboration? Journal of Educational Computing Research, v.22,
no4, p.437-53.
Kafai, Y.B (1999)
Elementary School Students’ Computer and Internet Use at Home. Journal
of Educational Computing Research, v.21, no3, p.345-62.
Mathison, C.
(1999) An Internet-based Exploration of Democratice Schooling Within
Pluralistic Learning Environments: Webquest Project. Educational
Technology, v.39, no4, p.53-8.
Marcowitz, D.M.
(2000) Students and Support for Technology in the Elementary Classroom. Computers
in Schools, v.16, no3/4, p.213-25.
Mumtaz, S. (2001)
Children’s Enjoyment and Perception of Computer Use in the Home and the
School. Computers and Education, v.36, no4, p.347-62.
© Douglas W.
Hinton, 2001, all rights reserved
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