Educators face a daunting task once computers are plopped in front of them and they are advised to use them. How? There are steep learning curves, too much to learn, and everyone is bound to feel overwhelmed, and isolated since very few people know how to carpool on the information superhighway.

Fortunately, there are programs, systems and educational communities in place to facilitate jump-starting educators. One such community is the Educational MOO (Mud Object Oriented), where real time help and mentoring are available. Inside Diversity University MOO is a help menu on something called: Visiting Student Player Object. This feature gives a step by step guide of how to bring students online and use the system. Currently I am in the process of adding to this help menu with a tutorial, which I will gladly send to interested educators.

The bottom line on the Net is that people will not generally spend the time or energy to learn and use something that takes too much time, is too difficult to grasp, and doesn't achieve desired results. If people are interested in the following, I suggest looking into Educational MOOs, Diversity University and the VSPO feature:

1) Becoming part of and building within an educational community
2) Engaging in real time team teaching
3) Being mentored online
4) Learning how to cut and paste information onto other computer screens
5) Learning how to project URLs onto other computer screens

Currently I am involved with all of the above, and welcome new "mentees".

For further information contact : coops@value.net

 

Two publications reviewed on DEOSNEWS provide examples of educational opportunities and present possibilities for education for the future. Brave New Schools: Challenging Cultural Literacy Through Global Learning Networks. J. Cummins and D. Sayers. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1995, reviewed by Kyle L. Peck, Assoc. Prof. Adult Education, Instructional Systems, and Workforce Education and Development, The Pennsylvania State University.

In Search Of The Virtual Class: Education In An Information Society. John Tiffin and Lalita Rajasingham. London and New York: Routledge,1995, reviewed by Stephen C. Ehrmann, Director Flashlight Project The American Association for Higher Education.

To see the reviews go to: http://www.cde.psu.edu/ACSDE/ for information on subscribing to DEOSNEWS.