Journal of Technology and Teacher Education Volume 5, Number 4 1997 Articles Making Technology an Integral Part of Teaching: The Development of a Constructionist Multimedia Course for Teacher Education Michael Carbonaro Educators Electronic Toolbox: Journey to a New Level of Literacy Eunice M. Merideth and Hilda L. Williams Lessons Learned From a Technology-Integrated Curriculum for Multicultural Classrooms Inés Márquez Chisholm and Keith Wetzel Teacher Talk: Capturing Innovative Teacher Voices on the World Wide Web Kris Bosworth, Paul Haakenson, and Kevin McCracken The Teacher Effectiveness Scales: Assessing Teachers Perceptions of Computer Competency and Classroom Management Skills Erica A. Stetson, Eleanor R. Hoffman, and Kathy E. Green Abstracts Making Technology an Integral Part of Teaching: The Development of a Constructionist Multimedia Course for Teacher Education MICHAEL CARBONARO Department of Educational Psychology University of Alberta, 6-102 Education North Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, T6G 2G5 Mike.Carbonaro@UAlberta.ca There is a growing awareness of the need to prepare both pre-service teachers and current classroom teachers so they can use technology as an integral part of teaching. The University of Alberta has begun a restructuring process to address these issues. This paper outlines the theoretical underpinnings of this restructuring process and describes a pilot course that was designed, developed, and implemented with a small class of education students. From a general theoretical perspective computing is viewed as another language that we should start teaching at the beginning of a childs educational career and the constructionist learning approach is suggested as the best strategy to do so. The pilot course focused on the use of multimedia and hypermedia for both the presentation of ideas and for problem-solving/knowledge-representation use in the K-12 environment. The Teacher Effectiveness Scales: Assessing Teachers Perceptions of Computer Competency and Classroom Management Skills Educators Electronic Toolbox: Journey to a New Level of Literacy EUNICE M. MERIDETH and HILDA L. WILLIAMS Department of Teaching and Learning School of Education, Drake University Des Moines, IA 50311, USA eunice.merideth@drake.edu In todays information age, literacy has once again been redefined through technology that supplements text with images, sound, and movement and literally makes the world available with a few electronic key strokes. This paper describes an effort to address teachers needs through the Electronic Toolboxa course especially designed for teaching professionals to explore different levels of communication and learning with technology. Within the course, students develop a multimedia unit of instruction specific to their own discipline or interest, integrate resources available on the World Wide Web with other multimedia resources, acquire computer graphic, digitizing, and editing skills, and learn to use electronic presentation software. Before and after the course, students were asked to rate their comfort level or expertise with the use of 17 electronic tools. Mean comfort ratings increased on all 17 tools. Novice on-line communication followed previously reported patterns. After the course, students were asked to rate the importance of each of 16 course components to their overall learning. Mean ratings on a 5-point scale were 3.5 or higher on 14 items and below 3 on only 1 item. Lessons Learned From a Technology-Integrated Curriculum for Multicultural Classrooms INÉS MÁRQUEZ CHISHOLM and KEITH WETZEL College of Education Arizona State University West Phoenix, AZ 85069-7100, USA ines.chisholm@asu.edu This paper proposes multicultural criteria and applies it to the evaluation of 32 technology-based instructional units created over a two-year period by teachers at two elementary schools. The curricular units demonstrated successful integration of academic and instructional goals, a focus on higher level thinking skills, and the use of technological tools to support student work. Also the units lacked adaptions for languages other than English and for second language acquisition. Further, the units generally omitted parental involvement and collaborative work at the computer. The authors offer their conclusions and recommendations for further research. Teacher Talk: Capturing Innovative Teacher Voices on the World Wide Web KRIS BOSWORTH, PAUL HAAKENSON, and KEVIN McCRACKEN School of Education Indiana University Bloomington, IN 47405-1006, USA kboswort@indiana.edu Integrating practical wisdom from teachers in the field with teacher preparation provides several challenges that technology can overcome. This paper reports on an innovative use of the World Wide Web that allows practicing teachers to share their experiences with preservice teachers. Teacher Talk focuses on issues relevant to teachers and uses the Internet to reach its audience and multimedia to engage teachers. In an evaluation of one issue of Teacher Talk on sexuality issues, those students who had access increased their knowledge and their comfort level in dealing with sexuality issues in the classroom. The Teacher Effectiveness Scales: Assessing Teachers Perceptions of Computer Competency and Classroom Management Skills ERICA A. STETSON, ELEANOR R. HOFFMAN, and KATHY E. GREEN College of Education University of Denver Denver, Colorado 80208, USA estetson@du.edu Effective evaluation of teaching is important for establishing and maintaining high quality instruction. The reliability and factorial validity of the Teacher Effectiveness Scales (TES) were investigated in this study. The scales were written to assess general aspects of teaching skill focusing on classroom management and computer competency, and these two factors were found in a principal components analysis. Pretest and posttest scores were collected from 265 in-service teachers participating in a training program on the use of computers in the classroom. Scale reliability was high for both factors. Computer competency scale validity was supported by moderate correlations with a computer scale. These scales appear to be reliable new measures of teachers own perceptions of their effectiveness. |