Home PublicationsL&LIssuesVolume 27 (1999-2000) November (No. 3)

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Are you trying to integrate the Internet into your teaching but don’t know where to start? The Link2Learn CD is an excellent resource for teachers at all levels of technology comfort and skill. Read how two educators made it fit their state’s staff development needs.

This is a familiar frustration (and challenge) for educators. As educators are expected to effectively incorporate technology into their teaching, the need for staff development increases as our time for it decreases. Most teachers feel crunched for time because of the heavier burden of meetings, curriculum responsibilities, and job stress. Most teachers don’t like to be out of their classrooms, even for staff development. It takes time to prepare for a substitute, and staff development takes time away from students and lessons.

But staff development is vital for teachers’ professional growth, and teachers frequently need to be out of their classroom to bring new learning back to their students. The challenge, then, is how to provide staff development and new learning to teachers in new ways.

While attending INSITE 98 in St. Louis, Missouri, we found a tool that could meet this challenge: the Link2Learn CD. It was developed by Pennsylvania State University as part of Pennsylvania’s initiative to instruct teachers and administrators in the effective use of technology with education. The project staff and advisory board included more than 30 educators, consultants, and advisers from K–12 schools, colleges and universities, and private business all over Pennsylvania.

Mark Toci, Senior Instructional Designer at Penn State, and several members of the Pennsylvania Link2Learn team were at the conference to present how their state was moving forward with educational technology and to demonstrate the Link2Learn CD-ROM. Mark showed the various tutorials, teacher interviews, and lesson plans that had been created by the Link2Learn team. We immediately saw the software as something valuable for our teachers in DuPage County. Our dilemma was that we wanted a CD-ROM that was more specific to our region and our teachers’ needs.

When we returned from the conference, we contacted Mark Toci to discuss the possibility of collaborating with the Pennsylvania team to develop a Link2Learn CD-ROM for DuPage educators. Although the team had not been approached about customizing the CD before, they were eager to share their resources with others interested in the professional development of educators.

To adapt the Link2Learn CD for our purposes, we went through the following steps. First, we evaluated the CD, deciding what to modify and what to leave alone. Then, we had to find funding for our project. Next, we worked with the original Link2Learn team to adapt the CD to meet our needs. Finally, we had to get the CD to teachers and show them how to use it.

Evaluating the CD

First, we had to decide what could be retained and what would need to be changed to make the Link2Learn CD useful to DuPage County teachers. We started by listing important Web resources. We wanted our teachers to be a click away from our office, so we included The DuPage Regional Office of Education Web site (www.dupage.k12.il.us). We also wanted them to have easy access to our Learning Technology office (www.dupage.k12.il.us/learning.htm), the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) site (www.isbe.state.il.us), and the Illinois Learning Standards (www.isbe.state.il.us/ils/). Finally, we added a link to an engaged learning discussion group (www.dupage.k12.il.us/list). These five links are all dynamic so teachers can continue to get updated information.

Many of the resources on the original Link2Learn CD were appropriate for any teacher and did not need to be modified for our needs, especially the tutorials, software resources, and Featured Teacher section. The tutorials include:

• How to Use Netscape Navigator
• Beginner’s Guide to the Internet for Educators
• Integrating the Internet into the Curriculum
• Getting Started with Web Pages (HTML)
• How to Create Advanced Web Pages and Sites
• Using Multimedia Tools with the Internet

These tutorials are clearly written, include appropriate screenshots, and address a diverse group of learners. Just like our students in a classroom, adult learners are diverse in their knowledge about technology. These tutorials give guided directions to both the novice and the advanced learner.

Software resources are varied. They include HTML, graphics, sound, and multimedia tools; Internet filtering software; Internet tutorials for students; and programs necessary for viewing some Web documents, such as Adobe’s Acrobat Reader.

One of the best resources on the CD is the Featured Teacher section, which consists of interviews of five educators or teams of educators discussing how they use technology to create rich learning environments. The concept of rich learning environment correlates well with Illinois educational goals. Jonassen (1995) defines a rich learning environment using the following learning attributes: active, responsible, constructive, collaborative, conversational, reflective, contextual, complex, and intentional. (Editor’s Note: For more on these attributes, see Laurie Dias’ article.)

These learning attributes fit well with the ISBE’s Engaged Learning Initiative, which helps teachers turn their classrooms into meaningful learning environments. Introduced in 1995 (Jones et al.), the engaged learning initiative continues to provide the framework for effective teaching in Illinois. Engaged Learning connects what we know about effective learning and effective technology. It is grounded in research and development findings from the North Central Regional Education Laboratory (NCREL). NCREL serves seven states in the Midwest. The ISBE and NCREL collaborate to give Illinois educators a firm understanding of the indicators of engaged learning and what it looks like in the classroom.

The learning attributes correlated with what the ISBE calls the Engaged Learning Indicators. The indicators are divided into eight areas: vision of learning, tasks, assessment, instructional model, learning content, grouping, teacher roles, and student roles. Each area is subdivided into the indicators. For example, the vision of learning indicators are characterized by learning, strategic, energized by learning, and collaborative. The Engaged Learning Indicators and Jonassen’s attributes of a rich learning environment have many similarities.

Like many regional offices, DuPage offers classes, workshops, and presentations on a wide range of current topics including engaged learning. Our classes are always well attended; however, we wanted to address a larger audience about engaged learning and effectively using technology. The Link2Learn CD-ROM would provide this opportunity.

Finding the Funding

We knew what was on the Link2Learn CD and what changes we wanted to make, but we needed funding and support. Each CD would cost approximately $3.00 to produce and license.

Berardo DeSimone, DuPage County Superintendent of Schools, has been supporting education in our county for the past 14 years. When we approached him with our idea to bring Link2Learn to our teachers, he was enthusiastic about the opportunity. The DuPage Regional Office of Education was also willing to provide funding for the resource. With $15,000 to cover the production and licensing costs, we would be able to provide the adapted Link2Learn CDs free to half of DuPage’s 10,000 active certified educators.

Working with the Link2Learn Team

Now with support and funding, we contacted the Link2Learn team to move forward with the project and customize its look and feel. We wanted to have the CDs in hand for the beginning of the school year. One custom feature we added is a video of the regional superintendent praising teachers for their interest in continuing their professional development.

Once the edits were completed, Mark Toci and his staff sent the master CD to be duplicated.

Distributing the CD

After the CDs were finished, we began discussing how we could get teachers to use it. We wanted the distribution of the CD to be as effective as the resource itself. We realized that if we just sent the CD to schools, it might end up in the pile of things on every teacher’s desk. We did not want this resource to sit around unused. We decided that we would go to schools, present an overview of the CD-ROM, and give every certified teacher in attendance a copy of the resource. The Link2Learn CD is a hybrid CD and can be used on both Mac and Windows machines. Therefore, teachers can use it at school or at home no matter what operating system they have.

Information about the CD-ROM presentation was sent out at the beginning of the school year through all-school fax, e-mail, and county technology coordinator meetings. We wanted the presentation to meet the diverse needs of school districts. Some schools needed to have the presentation given to small groups, and others wanted the presentation as all-district meetings. We discussed the best way to set up the presentation with district superintendents, assistant superintendents, principals, curriculum directors, and technology coordinators.

Scheduling was a challenge. We have 232 public school buildings in DuPage County. We needed to schedule dates throughout the school year to visit individual schools and give 45-minute presentations to staffs. Cheryl Duggan, our assistant, made a list of our available dates to give to school contacts when they called the office to make arrangements. We scheduled presentations on a first-come, first-served basis and continued scheduling until we had distributed the 5,000 Link2Learn CDs to districts who had requested the resource.

Presenting the CD. Typically, we would arrive at the school at the designated time, check in with the main office, and find the presentation room. If a school had scheduled a presentation for 3:30, we would arrive before the session in time to set up. All we asked the school to provide was a large screen, a room, and enthusiastic teachers. We brought our own data projector, laptop, and the Link2Learn CD-ROMs. We became efficient at set up and usually arrived 15 minutes before the presentation.

We began our presentation by showing and discussing the resources on the CD. We ended with a question-and-answer period and then distributed the Link2Learn CD to every certified educator who attended. Our e-mail addresses are on the CD, so we remained available for questions and comments after leaving the building.

School districts became creative in adding to our presentation. Some school building leaders provided lab time for the teachers to immediately pop the CD-ROM into a machine for their exploration. Originally, we would have liked to have every teacher have a hands-on session, but if we were to deliver the CD to most teachers, we realized we were unable to do this in one year. Our next best solution was to do the personal presentation and give them a preview of the valuable resources. We enabled the teachers to learn from the CD-ROM tutorials and lessons.

Reactions

We have had excellent feedback about the Link2Learn CD-ROM and are beginning to gather data about how DuPage teachers have used the resource. The CD provided our teachers with the ability to have just-in-time learning with valuable tutorials. We were able to provide this outstanding resource because of the Pennsylvania Link2Learn Development Team’s willingness to share and collaborate with the DuPage Regional Office of Education. In education, we talk about creating collaborative learning environments in our classrooms and schools. By collaborating with the Pennsylvania team, we were able to give DuPage teachers just-in-time staff development so they could create collaborative learning environments in their own classrooms.

References

Jonassen, D. H. (1995). Supporting communities of learners with technology: A vision for integrating technology in learning in schools. Educational Technology, 35(4), 60—62.

Jones, B. F., Valdez, G., Nowakowski, J., & Rasmussen, C. (1995). Plugging in: Choosing and using educational technology. Washington, DC: Council for Educational Development and Research.

Copyright © 1999, ISTE (International Society for Technology in Education). All rights reserved.