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Breaking Boundaries: The Experience of a Team of Educators Who Set Out To Explore How One Aspect of Technology--Web Page Design--Could Develop Understanding of the Teaching--Thinking--Learning Dynamic Which We Call Education
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American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education Annual Meeting,

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Abstract

A collaborative Internet Web page design project broke disciplinary, college, and classroom boundaries when used to re-imagine teaching-thinking-learning possibilities to reconfigure education. The collaboration, named Tools for the Mind: Using Technology for Mindwork, involved teacher education students and university professors from the University of Detroit Mercy; teachers from an urban elementary school; and pupils. Action research stimulated an interdisciplinary systems approach to developing discourse communities for breaking boundaries created by restrictive mental models. Initial brainstorming across cultural boundaries led to articulation of purpose, audience, and content ideas for the Web page. Participants shared resources and ideas in order to complete the planning. Once the initial planning group designed the beginnings of the Web page, they opened it up to interaction by all of the school's teachers attending a summer workshop in technology. The project found that cultural perspectives were essential in developing discourse communities to break boundaries, utilize differences, and strengthen collaboration. Issues of equity of access to knowledge, learning, and technology need to be addressed within context in order for visionary-practical change to occur. Seven appendices present information on (1) the Four Cities Professional Development School Network; (2) Tools for the Mind: Supporting Mindwork with Technology; (3) Strategic Plan (K-16) for Tools for the Mind; (4) Hampton Web Site Plan; (5) Cool Sites for Teachers/Curriculum/Kids--Hampton Web Site; (6) Hampton Web Site; and (7) Summer Curriculum Technology Workshops. (Contains 52 references.) (SM)

Citation

Letscher, J., Culik, H., Phillips, C., Young, G.H. & Tibbs, C. (1998). Breaking Boundaries: The Experience of a Team of Educators Who Set Out To Explore How One Aspect of Technology--Web Page Design--Could Develop Understanding of the Teaching--Thinking--Learning Dynamic Which We Call Education. Presented at American Association of Colleges of Teacher Education Annual Meeting 1998. Retrieved August 13, 2024 from .

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