The NSF CISE/EHR Workshop on a Computer Science Research Agenda for Educational Technology will take place from September 29 through October 2 in Washington, D.C. The workshop is being organized by Rick Weingarten of Computing Research Association and Mark Guzdial of Georgia Institute of Technology. Kris Stewart, SDSC senior fellow and SDSU associate professor of mathematical sciences, has been invited to attend this workshop and requests that anyone with feedback about the topic of this workshop--research agenda for a new educational technology research program--contact her at stewart@cs.sdsu.edu.
The goal of this workshop is to set a research agenda for computer science research in educational technology and produce the following:
The workshop will be modeled after the successful NII Research Agenda Workshop (whose agenda and report can be found at http://cra.org). Following is the tentative agenda:
Plenary Session: Opportunities and Challenges in Educational Technology.
Tracks/Break-out Groups (20-30 people in each group. Chairs run the group and are responsible for their section of the paper.)
Designing for Learners
Chair: Elliot Soloway, U. Michigan
The prevailing design paradigm in HCI is "user-centered system design": Create interfaces that support users (typically experts) to use tools to achieve tasks. Students are not expert, often don't know their task (and tasks change dramatically from class-to-class and assignment-to-assignment), and may not be familiar with any tools. Further, the underlying assumption of being a "student" is that learning is going on: About the domain, the tasks, and the tools. The focus must shift from "ease of use" to "ease of learning." What does this imply for design requirements and practices? How should educational software differ from other kinds? For example, how should programming/modeling languages, spreadsheets, and network search tools differ from what's current if the focus is on "ease of learning" rather than "ease of use"?
Supporting Teachers in Changing Roles
Chair: Jan Hawkins, EDC
Teachers have tough jobs: as managers of 30-some students, as instructors, as inventors of lessons and curricula, and as evaluators and graders. Technology has, to a great extent, been Yet Another Thing to learn and to deal with. What role can technology play in *supporting* the teacher, in improving the teacher's job and performance? For example, how can technology help teachers in dealing with portfolio assessment (a complex multimedia activity requiring qualitative analysis and use of heuristics), communicating with parents, coordinating with other teachers, and other complex activities of their jobs? Further, the teacher's role is going to change due to the technology (to that of a facilitator, mentor, etc.). How can technology serve to support that change of role? Some possible examples: CSCW for teacher support including sharing of lessons and multimedia materials, AI to help with evaluation and for coaching teachers in new roles, databases (multimedia case libraries) of classroom activities to serve as examples and starting points.
Integrating Learning and Working
Chair: Chris Dede, George Mason U.
In today's society, more knowledge is needed to perform job functions well than can be taught in school. Rather, educational systems try to provide basics and the meta-cognitive skills of learning how to learn. The learning which is needed on the job needs to be picked up outside of school, and as jobs rapidly change, additional learning is required. How can technology support the process of lifelong learning? How can we connect worker-learners with the learning opportunities they need when they need them? Potential roles for technology: Multimedia content on-demand at home or office or on PDA, intelligent coaches and guides that help in identifying learning needs and where to meet those needs, and telecommuting from the classroom as well as from home.
Facilitating Use of the Network-Classroom Use
Chair: Louis Gomez, Northwestern U.
How do we support use of network resources by teachers and students? For example, teachers don't have the time or expertise to "surf" for information. How can we use digital library technologies (for one) to support teacher and student activities? How do we support creation of network resources by teachers and students? Current standards and practices may not make sense in an educational context. For example, coding HTML can't be the standard method for creating network-based media compositions -- one can't expect students who are learning to write to also learn a mark-up language. Creating effective supports for the creation and sharing of multimedia documents will cross a number of CS fields such as networking, HCI, and CSCW.
Facilitating Use of the Network-Integrating School, Home, Industry,
Community
Chair: Margaret Riel, AT&T
Educational researcher Dewey encouraged schools to integrate themselves with their communities. Networked connections between schools, homes, museums and other informal learning settings, libraries, and other parts of the community makes that kind of integration possible in a new and significant way. The benefits are enormous: Motivating the student, providing mentors where time and space makes face-to-face contact difficult or impossible, connecting home and school to learning resources, connecting industry and community with learning expertise. However, there are significant challenges to this integration: Heterogeneous networks (e.g., ethernet in the office, AppleTalk at school, cable TV-based networks at home), complex interfaces, and motivating applications. What role can CS research play in making this reality take place?
Tools for Authoring Educational Technology
Chair: Chris Riesbeck, Northwestern U.
Creating educational software is something which can't be left just to the computer scientists -- too much needs to be done, it's too important a job, and a wide range of expertise is needed. As word-processors support writers and spreadsheets support accountants, technology needs to be provided to educators to do what they do: Invent activities, provide content, define curricula and objectives, evaluate students, coach, guide, and critique, etc. Most current authoring tools are not designed for educators (e.g., Director) or are limited in their applicability (e.g., Authorware). What do the tools look like that let educators define network-based learning activities, connect to content and domain experts around the world, create new paradigms of learning, and evaluate and manage students using these activities?
For more information about this workshop, contact Mark Guzdial, guzdial@cc.gatech.edu, http://www.cc.gatech.edu/gvu/people/Faculty/Mark.Guzdial.html, 404-853-9387.
Copyright 1995 SDSCwire.