Special Interest Group

Project Proposal

 Group Members:  David Rausch, Lisa Mulka, Aaron Moran and Elizabeth Buckhold

Subject Matter: A focus on teacher and student perspectives of effective technology concerning communication and collaboration in a distance learning setting.

Focus in 4 Common Places of Education

1. Teacher: This part of our project will showcase how the teacher can use effective technology to enhance communication and collaboration among students in online or hybrid courses.  This section will include tutorials for teachers and research on what types of technology will work best for increased communication. 
2. Student: The student section of the project will look at technology in distance learning from a student perspective to determine what student needs are in communication and collaboration and how those needs can be met.
3. Subject Matter: We will focus on understanding effective communication and collaboration technology tools that work for both the teacher and the student.  We will examine the teacher and student perspective by demonstrating research, providing lesson plans and examples to illustrate useful technology.
4. Context: We will each explore a different technology tool used for communication or collaboration from both the student and teacher perspective to better situate technology that appeals to the needs of both users.

Emphasis Areas:

1. David: Discussion Forums as an technological tool to support active learning (student engagement via asynchronous communication) while promoting reflection
2. Lisa: Sychronous communication/collaboration through shared whiteboard
3. Aaron: synchronous commuication via instant messaging 
4. Elizabeth:Virtual Worlds, such as Whyville, have much potential in Education by providing fun, highly motivating, places for collaboration. In these virtual worlds new snippets are constantly being added that provide additional functionality to the system. This environment provides ample opportunity for social skills development and writing/reading skill development through a fun, non-intimidating manner.

 Major Categories of Research and Resources

• Different technologies used for communication and collaboration purposes
• Resources from a teacher perspective of communication/collaboration
• Resources from a student perspective of communication/collaboration
• Research articles, tutorials, sample lesson plans, etc.
• Evaluate and analyze case studies

Here is a sample video demonstrating how teachers can use and set up Google Docs for classroom purposes