Software for constructing simulations and distributed databases of "linked" text and graphics.
A few key organizations have experimented with courseware development
in advanced environments, and their efforts can be analyzed with hindsight
by their participants.
The data for this qualitative study was gathered through "ethnographic"
interviews with 19 key developers and managers in educational
computing initiatives or courseware development projects that used networked
workstations from more than one vendor. Participants from four different
organizations were selected to allow distinctions to be made between phenomena
common across institutions and phenomena that occurred due to circumstances
in particular organizations (Spradley, 1979).
The following projects, organizations and participants were the focus of this study:
Project: ESCAPE (HyperCard and HyperNews)
Organizations: Educational Research and Information Systems (ERIS, Purdue)
Participants:
Hopper,
Lawler,
LeBold,
Putnam,
Rehwinkel,
Tillotson,
Ward
Project: TODOR (BLOX) &
Mechanics 2.01 (cT, Athena)
Organizations: Athena and Academic Computing (AC, MIT)
Participants:
Bucciarelli,
Daly,
Jackson,
Lavin,
Schmidt
Project: Physical Geology Tutor (AthenaMuse)
Organizations: Center for Educational Computing Initiatives (CECI, MIT)
Participants:
Davis,
Kinnicutt,
Lerman,
Schlusselberg
Project: Context32 (Intermedia, StorySpace)
Organizations: Institute for Research and Information Scholarship (IRIS, Brown)
Participants:
Kahn,
Landow,
Yankelovich
[See the Switchboard for further information.]
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In addition to transcriptions
of interviews, published documents were used as a supplemental form of data.
Analysis of the data revealed consistent relationships between three areas of
concern inherent in the nature of "educational computing projects".
These three areas were pedagogy, technology and organizations.
Pedagogical decisions presented technical problems, that resulted in
organizational challenges. In attempts to take advantage of valuable
pedagogical goals afforded by new technological capabilities, technical
challenges became intertwined with traditional organizational structures
for distributing and managing human, technological, and financial resources.
Over the course of projects, opportunities and limitations afforded by the
pedagogical, technical, and organizational contexts became reflected in the
character of the courseware that was developed.
References
Champine, G.A. (1991). MIT Project Athena: A Model for Distributed Campus Computing. Bedford, MA: Digital Press.
LeBold, W.K., Hopper, M.E., Feghali, A.A. (1991). A Hypermedia Solution to a Hyper Problem: Personalized Computer Engineering Career System. 1991 ASEE-IEEE Conference Proceedings , p. 482-488.
Spradley, J.P. (1979). The Ethnographic Interview. New York, NY: Holt Reinhart & Winston.
Yankelovich, N, Meyerowitz, N. & VanDam, A. (1985). Reading and Writing the Electronic Book. IEEE Computer, 18(10) 85, 15-30.
© Mary E. Hopper [MEHopper] |
MEHopper@TheWorld.com
[posted 00/00/00 | | revised 02/02/02]