This is a dynamic document. Any printed copy may be obsolete. Check the online version regularly.

The course is designed to teach you the skills to determine for yourself what are the best uses and future directions of educational technology and how they might intervene in the classroom to try such approaches.

When you leave this course, we want you to have the skills to...

Read academic articles about educational technology (and related fields) and think about them critically.

Conduct a small research study in educational technology. We want you to be able to uncover empirical evidence in educational technology, to make a stab at doing research in the manner of the social sciences and perhaps to implement some changes in your classroom based on your new-found knowledge (i.e, action research).

Understand some of the ideas of the educational philosophy of constructionism.

Thus, this is a course in the art of exploration - a drive to discover new things, creating new realities and building new connections. It's a course where surprises abound, where "explorers" thrive on knowing that just around the corner there is something new that they are going to have to learn and react to. The ultimate effect is not just a matter of recombination, which often happens within a single field, but of creative encounters, of one discipline fertilizing another, one thought triggering another.

Students love schedules (we've spent our lives around schedules), love knowing the order of subjects and the satisfaction of ticking off one requirement after another, one chapter after another, class after class, week after week. Exploration and learning happens best, conversely, by accident, serendipitously (Even the word, serendipitously, has a carefree lilt about it, doesn't it?), not by following a rigid schedule down a track. In that sense, this online environment is not like a face-to-face classroom. You, the learner, have to take charge and not wait for someone to tell you what to do. There is no hand-holding here. You, ultimately, are responsible and accountable for your learning.

Learning to look around sparks curiosity, encourages serendipity. Amazing connections get made that way, questions are raised - and sometimes answered - that would never be otherwise. Any explorer sees things that reward not just a bit of scrutiny but a bit of thought over the years. Put things in spatial context or arrange them in time, and they acquire value immediately.

You will, in the spirit of open-ended play, be able to experiment, to try new combinations and to take risks often not available in print culture. This will generate some surprisingly new, complex intellectual combinations. We need to learn, to challenge ourselves, to invent new patterns, new paradigms. The fun of creating and using the web to create our image text will give you the opportunity to change work into play. Play is what we do for our own sake, yet it is a spur to our most creative, most significant work. You will act as a creator not a consumer of knowledge; you are in charge.

Because this course will be conducted with no required face-to-face contact, you will work on developing, exploring, enhancing, and learning new computer skills: web page construction, FTP, telnet, E-mail etiquette and software. Reading material will be read from the text or from your computer. A bibliography and electronic links are also provided and perusal is highly recommended. In fact, probably the best approach to your learning might be accessing a combination of web sites and printed material. Threaded class discussions will take place regularly using Blackboard threaded discussion.

Attendance and participation are required. Peer evaluations will take place using E-mail. You'll swap URLs and provide feedback to your team members. You will post your work (projects) to your web page which is like an artist's portfolio;we'll call it a webfolio. Most individual questions will be handled using E-mail and Blackboard. In addition, I will be available by E-mail most days and for one-on-one workshops by appointment if necessary.

All threaded discussions will take place in the Blackboard arena.

During the semester you will look at the changes resulting from scientific and technological advances in the personal computer, software and communication with particular emphasis on education. You will also research the cultural, social, political, literary, literacy and economic changes that have resulted from any increase/decrease in our ability to communicate (write) and build knowledge with a personal computer. Because this course is being offered online, it will take place in Cyberspace, where, throughout the semester, you will play (work) both alone and with your peers ( asynchronously ) to enhance your understanding of the topics and experience a glorious explosion of newly recognized meanings.

Essentially then, our goal is to look at the computer and see what we can do with it that we couldn't do without it. We don't want to merely replicate the existing paradigm. This technology, to maximize the costs, requires some new looks, new approaches and could quite possibly change the way we (you, me, our students) learn.

TCP/IP protocol coinventor Robert Kahn remarks of "the evolution of the Internet is similar to that of electricity. First, technologies emerged that replaced services and products. Then new concepts were introduced." Kahn goes onto explain that it's time for new Internet ideas to come forth especially in the area of the Internet for education.

How can we use this technology to improve the way we and our students learn? That's what this course is about!

A Final Word about Web Pages.

This is not a web design course (though some get bogged down in this process). It's more like learning how to ride a bike without training wheels, drive a car, bake a cake or how to type, it goes with the territory. Once learned, it becomes second nature and an avenue to new adventures - a means to an end. Do you think about the process of driving or the process of typing? It's to your benefit to learn how to function in this technological age. It can be initially stressful for some, but I'll do everything to help ease the pain.

To that end I will host one voluntary workshop (TBA) in Harriman Hall (Dept Computer Lab)on the Stony Brook campus:

The workshop will cover the basic construction, and uploading of web pages to the University server. You must register, if you wish to attend, for one, the other or both through the Questionnaire

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