Deconstructing Classroom Technology in Practice: What Our Web Instructional Techniques Suggest about What Faculty Want

Abstract

This presentation deconstructs Web-based techniques that the presenters have researched and developed over several years, and demonstrates how each component can be used as a model for specific strategies in the classroom and services and products that faculty can use and apply. A variety of Internet and Web technologies are shown as they apply to the teaching of a statistics course and a fine arts course, both classes using a project-based or constructionist teaching strategy. Our unique coupling of the arts and statistics reveals how the same basic approach can be used in seemingly disparate settings to achieve instructional goals that are supported by many years of pedagogical research. Various technologies are used to stimulate students to create authentic finished work, publish their work on the Web, and develop real-world problem-solving skills. This paper discusses technologies and teaching strategies that reveal the characteristics of instructional technology services and products that faculty want.