ATTACHMENT:
Catherine Kurkjian wrote:
Here is a question/issue that I thought I might pose to you for starters. Your recent book, Teaching with the Internet: Lessons from the Classroom, is dedicated primarily to the use of technology as it relates to the Internet. Why the Internet? What is the rationale for focusing on the use of the Internet in the classroom?

Don Leu wrote:
Hi Cathy!

Let me tell you why I would like to focus my comments on teaching with Internet technologies.

In the fall of 1998, 51% of the instructional classrooms in the public schools of the US contained a computer with at least one Internet connection (National Center for Educational Statistics, 1999. Available at: (http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=98031XXXXX). Four years earlier only 3% of classrooms in the US had an Internet connection while it is expected that nearly all classrooms will have at least one Internet computer by the end of 2000. Thus, in just six years, one of the most powerful technologies for information and communication will have entered nearly every K-12 classroom in the US. The Internet will have entered the classroom at a faster pace than any previous technology including telephones, television, computers, printers. This is already fundamentally changing the nature of literacy and literacy learning in the classroom.

The changes in the technologies of literacy are so profound they are redefining the meanings of what have traditionally been viewed as authentic reading and writing experiences. For some children, using Internet technologies to engage in a literature response project with children in different parts of the world has become more authentic than simply reading a book and discussing it in their classroom; it is both more meaningful, more transformative, and more common.

Catherine Kurkjian wrote:
You collected data from outstanding Internet educators. What are some of the key lessons/ ideas that you have
learned about using technology for teaching?

Four Key lessons from Internet Pioneers

Don Leu wrote:
Rachel Karchmer, Kathy Hinchman, Pat Iannone, and I have been studying exemplary Internet educators during the past several years through email correspondence, listening to the stories of their journeys. They have taught us many important lessons. Here are a few.

First, teachers who have been using the Internet in their classrooms for several years are going to teach us how to use the Internet in our classrooms. These teachers have been creating wonderful curriculum on the Internet for all of us to use. We refer to this as the "Miss Rumphius Effect" since, like the title character in this book, these
teachers are making the world better for all of us. An article about this, with links to many wonderful classroom resources is available in IRA's electronic journal Reading Online. Available at:
httpwww.readingonline.org/electronic/RT/rumphius.html

Visiting their classrooms will teach you much about how to use the Internet in your classroom. Teachers such as Marjorie Duby in Boston (http://lee.boston.k12.ma.us/d4/d4.html),
Sue Pandiani on Cape Cod
(http://www.capecod.net/voyage/navigators.html), Cherrol McGhee in Queensland, Australia
(http://rite.ed.qut.edu.au/oz-teachernet/projects/book
rap/),and Beth Rohloff and Tim Lauer in Portland Oregon
(http://buckman.pps.k12.or.us/room100/room100.html) have much to teach all of us about the best use of these new technologies for literacy. Visit their classrooms and you will see what I mean.

Second, one of the lessons these teachers have shared with us is that these new technologies are highly engaging. Children work harder with more purpose and more enthusiasm, absorbing important lessons about these new literacies so quickly it is surprising, even to these teachers.

Third, classrooms change when the Internet enters the classroom. No longer is the teacher the single expert. Instead, each member of the classroom community knows something special that can be useful to others. As a result, new instructional methods such as Internet Workshop, Internet Project, and Internet Inquiry become very useful. These take advantage of more distributed notions of expertise as each member of the classroom community teaches others what they know.

Finally, it is clear to us that a major challenge for the literacy community will be the important staff development and teacher education efforts that lie ahead. A recent survey by the US Department of Education (http://nces.ed.gov/pubs99/1999080.htm) reported that 80% of K-12 teachers are not comfortable with the use of technology in their classes. And this report did not even focus on the use of Internet technologies. Clearly we have much work ahead of us in order to support the important work that takes place in the classroom.

Catherine Kurkjian wrote:
In your response to my questions about lessons from the classroom a common theme of collaborative learning emerges. In your "Miss Rumphius" example, teachers become a source of information to other teachers via the Internet. At the classroom level expertise resides within the community versus solely with the classroom teacher. Will you elaborate on what you mean by "distributed notions of expertise" and teaching methods that take advantage of this view of teaching and learning?

Collaboratively Sharing Expertise: Preparing Children to be Successful in the Work World of Future

Don Leu wrote:
Sure! The fact that expertise with the new literacies gets distributed is a central aspect of the changes taking place as the Internet appears in our classrooms. Teachers sometimes describe this change to me as moving from a "sage on the stage to a guide at the side." What they mean is that a teacher changes from being the only expert at the head of the class to being one of many members of a classroom community with expertise, each one knowing something very special and important to others.

Most of us first see this change when we have students in our classroom who begin assisting us when our computer freezes, when the printer isn't working, or when something else fails. Suddenly, a students' expertise becomes visible and critical to our classroom's success. As digital technologies become more important to our classrooms and as they repeatedly change, it is impossible for anyone to keep up with everything taking place. You will see each student
becoming an expert in a particular area that interests him or her. One child might be an expert with knowing the best resources about Jan Brett, another with information about butterflies, and still others will become experts in other information areas or other aspects of technology.

This change, by the way, reflects the changes taking place in the world of work today. The highly structured and top-down model of business and industry has changed to a far more decentralized model in order for companies to successfully compete in a highly competitive global economy. Nimble, aggressive companies that take advantage of individual employee's expertise survive; inflexible and tightly structured companies that ignore their employees' special talents fail in a world of rapidly changing information and technology. Thus, it is also important that we prepare children for these new worlds of literacy and life-long learning they will experience as adults.

Catherine Kurkjian wrote:
What are some teaching methods to help our students to be prepared for the new worlds of literacy that you describe?

Getting our "feet wet" with Internet Workshop

Don Leu wrote:
Which teaching methods help us to achieve this goal? We describe several of these teaching methods in our book on Teaching with the Internet: Internet Workshop, Internet Project, and Internet Inquiry. Each serves to support
children as they develop individual areas of expertise and then learn how to share their knowledge and seek the knowledge they require from others. Knowing whom, when, and how to ask for information becomes more important than even
having information in these new worlds.

Internet Workshop is a useful model with which to begin as the Internet becomes available in your classroom. Internet Workshop has many variations. Generally, though, it contains these steps:
1. Locate a site, or several sites, on the Internet with content related to a classroom unit of instruction and set a bookmark for the location(s).
2. Develop an activity requiring students to use the site(s).
3. Assign this activity to be completed during the week.
4. Have students share their work, questions, and new insights at the end of the week during a workshop session.

A beginning example and a more extended explanation of Internet Workshop may be found at: (http://web.syr.edu/~djleu/interwork.html). This lesson was used by a fourth grade teacher to introduce a unit on Japan and Japanese literature.

A more advanced example of Internet Workshop may be found at:
http://web.syr.edu/~djleu/titanic.html This wonderful experience culminated a literature unit on the Titanic disaster. You will see how each lesson helps children use the amazing information resources the Internet in ways that
permits each child to become an expert in an area of interest. Each also limits random surfing for child safety reasons and to maximize the limited time available for computer use in one-computer classrooms. Experiences like these prepare children for their literacy and learning futures in wonderful ways.

Catherine Kurkjian wrote:
Internet use in the classroom can be a double edged sword. Teachers are often concerned about safe use of the Internet. What advice can you give teachers regarding safety?

Six Child Safety Tips

Don Leu wrote:
Child safety is another new literacy that is important for all of us to develop: children, teachers, and parents. Here are some quick and easy child safety strategies to build into your instructional program as you use the
Internet:

1. Be certain you communicate with both children and parents about the child safety rules and policies you will follow in your classroom. Explain to children why each is important. Many schools use an acceptable use policy that teachers, students, and parents must read and sign. An example may be found at: http://www.cyberangels.org/cyberangelskids/agreementform.html More information about acceptable use policies may be found at:
http://www.gsn.org/web/webproj/define/protect/aup.htm

2. Some teachers set aside a special evening, separate from "Back-to-School Night", and invite parents to an "Internet Evening," so that they might explain the nature of their Internet program.

3. Turn all computer monitors in your classroom so that they face the center of your room. That way, you can always see what children are working on at the Internet computer and other children can help you to monitor appropriate use.
Never place an Internet computer in a corner of your room where others may not see the screen.

4. All e-mail should be sent through your account, especially in the elementary grades. That way, you are able to monitor all correspondence in and out of your classroom. Children should not be allowed to use their own email accounts
from your classroom.

5. Limit the use of search engines to ones such as Yahooligans
(http://www.yahooligans.com/) that screen all sites for child safety and appropriateness.

6. Don't let these simple strategies make you excessively fearful about the Internet. Have fun with your students as you explore the many wonderful resources that are available.

Catherine Kurkjian wrote:
Time is precious to teachers given the scope of what they must teach and the range of their responsibilities. Are there any tricks you have found in helping teachers to use Internet in a time efficient way?

Time Saving Tricks: Use of Central Sites, and Bookmarking Favorites

Don Leu wrote:
"I just don't have the time!" I hear this a lot from teachers reluctant to use Internet technologies in their classroom. To be certain, learning something new takes time. I especially hear concerns about spending time using search
engines and not finding anything useful for the classroom. A better strategy for finding useful resources for your class is NOT to use a search engine, except when you are looking for a very specific location. Instead, use a central site strategy. Central sites contain extensive and well organized links to useful resources. Visiting a central site will quickly provide you with many resources for your instructional units and save you valuable time. Below, I list a number of exceptional central sites for content areas. Most have been designed for busy teachers. As a result, they are organized to make it easy to locate useful resources for your class. Many teachers find it useful to set bookmarks on their Internet browser (e.g. Netscape Navigator or Internet Explorer) for central sites such as these. This permits them to quickly find classroom resources throughout the year as they begin different instructional units. (See Donald Leu's Favorite Central Sites)

Catherine Kurkjian wrote:
We read and hear a lot about how technology is changing the nature of literacy. In an earlier response you used the term "new literacies". I wonder if you would be willing to give your vision of how the Internet will impact literacy in the future. What are the implications for teachers?

Challenges the Future Poses to Literacy Educators: The New Literacies

Don Leu wrote:
There are so many changes ahead for all of us in the reading community it is hard to know where to start. The Internet fundamentally changes what it means to be literate and it also changes our role as teachers. I refer to these
changes as the "new literacies." You can see these new literacies in action at many locations being developed by teachers and classrooms. Visit some of these wonderful curriculum resources developed by teachers around the world:

Susan Silverman's 2nd grade class on Long Island (http://www.kids-learn.org/)
Patty Taverna's 2nd grade class in Sleepy Hollow, New York
(http://www2.lhric.org/pocantico/tubman/tubman.html)
Tammy Payton class and school site at Loogootee, Indiana
Mark Ahlness' third-grade class in Seattle, Washington
(http://www.earthdaybags.org/)
Peter Lelong and his Year Four students at the Fahan School in Hobart,Tasmania, (http://www.fahan.tas.edu.au/sites/sites.htm)
Maggie Hos-McGrane's Grade 5 and 6 social studies classes at the International School in Amsterdam, The Netherlands
(http://www.xs4all.nl/~swanson/origins/intro.html)

Many of us will find that literacy, in these and many other classrooms, differs substantially from the literacy on which most of the research in our field is based.

I describe these changes in several forthcoming articles and chapters in Reading Research Quarterly, the Handbook of Reading Research, and the new edition of IRA's book, What Research Has to Say About Reading Instruction. If
they are interested, your readers can read recent work on this topic at the links in my home page (http://web.syr.edu/~djleu/home/home.html) Here, I will
just summarize some of the changes taking place.

First, literacy will continuously change as new technologies for information and communication repeatedly appear. Literacy will be defined more by our ability to adapt to continuously changing technologies for information and
communication than by the simple, unchanging definitions of reading and writing we use today. As teachers, we need to help children learn how to learn new technologies for reading and writing. No state assessments measure this, even
though this skill will be central to children's ability to construct their literacy future in a world of rapidly changing technologies for information and
communication.

Second, teachers and children will increasingly develop reading and writing curriculum for others to use in their classrooms. We describe this phenomenon in the "Miss Rumphius" article at
http://www.readingonline.org/electronic/RT/rumphius.html. This is such an exciting prospect! It radically changes traditional sources of curriculum and expertise, grounding these firmly in the classroom. What works on the Internet? Where are the best resources for my upcoming unit? Increasingly the answers to these questions will be available at classroom web sites.

Third, the new literacies complement and build upon traditional literacies. Reading and writing will always be central to the new literacies but each will
be changed in important ways. Reading will require similar types of vocabulary knowledge, for example, but new strategies for locating, evaluating, and using
information will be required. Writing will require similar types of spelling knowledge, but new strategies for structuring additional media forms will be
required.

Fourth, the new literacies will be increasingly dependent upon the ability to critically evaluate information for its accuracy and its utility. Open networks, such as the Internet, permit anyone to publish anything; this is one
of the strengths of this technology. It is also one of its limitations. As a result, information is widely available from people who have political, religious, or ideological stances that profoundly distort the nature of the
information that they present to others. We must assist students to become more critical consumers of the information they encounter. Such skills have not always been important in classrooms where textbooks and other traditional
information resources are often assumed to be correct.

In addition, the new literacies are largely socially constructed. We will need to support children in learning how best to learn from others. Each of us will have a certain level of understanding of core technologies that meet our
needs. For other technologies, we will need to rely upon others, expert in those technologies, to show us how things are accomplished. Workshop, cooperative group learning, and other collaborative approaches will be especially useful.

There are many other changes ahead for all of us, but these are some of the more important ones. All of them will require each of us, as teachers, to acquire these new literacies and think in new ways about how best to support our children in their acquisition. I see this as a very special and exciting
time in the history of literacy education. New opportunities await us all.

Cheers!
Don
Don Leu's Favorite Central Sites
Literature
Children's Literature Web Guide
(http://www.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/index.html)
Cyberguides (http://www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/score/cyberguide.html)

Science
Action: Eisenhower National Clearinghouse
(http://www.enc.org:80/classroom/index.htm)
Science Learning Network
(http://www.sln.org/)

Math
Action: Eisenhower National Clearinghouse
(http://www.enc.org:80/classroom/index.htm)
The Math Forum
(http://forum.swarthmore.edu/)
Canada's SchoolNet: Mathematics
(http://www.schoolnet.ca/home/e/resources/mathematics/)

Social Studies
American Memory
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/ammemhome.html
History/Social Studies Web Site for K-12 Teachers
(http://www.execpc.com/~dboals/boals.html)
Nebraska Department of Education Social Science Resources HomePage
(http://www.nde.state.ne.us/SS/ss.html)
People Past and Present
(http://www.ala.org/parentspage/greatsites/people.html#b)

Multicultural Resources
Multicultural Pavilion
(http://curry.edschool.Virginia.EDU:80/go/multicultural/)
Diversity
(http://www.execpc.com/~dboals/diversit.html)
Cultures of the World
(http://www.ala.org/parentspage/greatsites/people.html#b)
K-5 Cybertrail: Multicultural Curriculum Resources
(http://www.wmht.org/trail/explor02.htm)
African American Culture Multi-Cultural Paths: African American Resources
http://curry.edschool.Virginia.EDU:80/go/multicultural/sites/afr-am.html
Chicana/o Latina/o Culture LANIC (http://www.lanic.utexas.edu/)
CLNET (http://clnet.ucr.edu/)
Native American Culture Native American Indian Resources
(http://indy4.fdl.cc.mn.us/~isk/mainmenu.html)