Hawaii Education & Research Network

Properly designed interactive learning environments are fundamentally different from pre-planned laboratory experiments and equally distinct from the decontextualized demands of textbook-based memorization and problem sets. Interactive multimedia makes possible non-linear and thus, "non-cookbook" experimentation-based approaches to learning any subject. Interactive network resources can present students with rich streams of data and dynamic representations that are responsive in real time to inquiry and student-manipulation of variables. In an instant, a well-designed environment can offer access to powerful tools of reference, reflection, and communication from:

• archives and on-line electronic notebooks,

• annotations by peers and faculty, and

• communication via telecommunication links with experts and collaborators;

While interactive learning offers tempting glimpses at transcendent models for promoting scientific literacy, advances in technology can never automatically substitute for the changes that must take place in our schools and classrooms. The work of educators in this decade is not only the work of installing and utilizing hardware and software. It is the work of transforming American schools so that patterns of teaching and learning reflect the spirit of inquiry that is the basis for all science. So long as teachers remain "instructors" -- isolated both physically in their individual classrooms and intellectually in their individual disciplines -- and the school day remains a loose collection of fragmented 50-minute periods of "instructional units" there will be little or no change in the learning environments or learning outcomes.

The University of Hawaii (UH) and the Department of Education (DOE) are moving quickly (compared to most states) to implement high speed networks to link all UH and DOE campuses statewide with voice, data and video connections. These access points will provide opportunities for Hawaii's students and teachers to move from being participants in educational programs designed by others to being the originators of their own learning experiences. This will also allow Hawaii's educational communities to move from being searchers for information on the Internet to being providers of information to the rest of the world via the Internet. The realization of these "opportunities," however, will require that teachers become learning facilitators who are members of interdisciplinary teams and "co-learners" along with their students, and that the "school day" be restructured into flexible work schedules that allow and promote "project-oriented" -- rather than "lesson-oriented" -- learning programs.

HERN GOALS

The HERN Project and, as the project's central component, the HERN Institute has the following goals:

1. Management and Institutional Structures: Over the course of the 3-year project (which is subject to funding) the HERN project team, in cooperation with the participants in the HERN Institutes, will determine the most appropriate organizational mechanisms for facilitating the implementation and support of a shared, statewide networking infrastructure for education and research institutions (public and independent, K-12 and higher education). This will also include appropriate exploration of the necessary management and operational agreements and procedures to develop and maintain such a network. The HERN project team will also seek to determine which aspects of educational networking can be centralized, which can be provided by higher and K-12 education independently, and which can be decentralized to individual campuses and schools. The project team will also investigate appropriate strategies for providing home- and office-based access to this educational network infrastructure.

2. Connectivity: The HERN project will make access to the Internet and its information resources available to any and all faculty and students at Hawaii's public and independent schools and colleges who are participating in the HERN Institutes.

3. Use and Support: The HERN project will provide appropriate user support to facilitate access while promoting commitment to common goals and objectives. Specific elements are:

• Summer institutes and academic year (September 1, - May 31) follow-up programs available to teams of teachers from schools and colleges in each of three years;

• Network support services to educational institutions with participating teams; and

• Integration of education related Internet components into the participating institutions.

• Establishing mechanisms for institutions to restructure the school day and school experience where students and teachers can engage in collaborative projects on site, between schools, and with other locations throughout the world; and

• Developing a series of both models for collaborative curriculum development and delivery of learning environments which incorporate on-line network access and interactive multimedia components into learning settings.

The groups selected for the HERN Institutes consist of project teams from Hawaii public and private K-12 institutions and both individual faculty members and campus-based teams from the University of Hawaii's community colleges and four-year campuses. In order to participate, the K-12 institutions agreed to create a project team composed of three to six teachers, representing at least (but not necessarily only) the core disciplines of math, science, social science and languages from one or more schools, as well as to suggest a multi-year interdisciplinary project. The higher education institution participants also have suggested projects which they will pursue either as individuals or as part of campus-based and intercampus-based teams. These projects will be developed during the HERN Institute's summer workshop and implemented during the following academic-year. The project team proposals address educational goals, progress, teaching techniques, learning styles, curricula, discipline and education alternatives with a mission to try something novel or unique and to evaluate the outcomes, especially centered around how well and what students are learning.

Projects which involve collaboration among multiple institutions are encouraged (e.g., teachers at a high school working with colleagues from another high school or a community college; high school teachers working with colleagues from "feeder" elementary and intermediate schools in their complex). All projects should have multimedia or interdisciplinary components, as well as internetworking components, and include projected outcomes with a method for evaluation.

Projects will also be encouraged to follow the Dalton School or the Coalition of Essential Schools' models where teachers are consultants and facilitators for student generated projects, thus modifying the conventional class schedule. Projects should be designed so that the schedule structure does not dictate what the students do, but rather the students determine what the structure can do for them. The reorganization of conventional schedules to accommodate changing pedagogy to improve student performance will be a main focus of school day reform.

HERN Annual Institute Cycle

Spring: The HERN project staff finalized procedures, institutional agreements and sites for the Summer Workshop. The Institute program, in the form of a "request for project proposals," was announced to all DOE and HAIS K-12 schools and to UH faculty by means of letters and flyers with applications due back late April. Successful project participants were notified in May and began receiving Institute information by means of both post office mailings and electronic mail, as well as through postings to the HERN Gopher and World Wide Web sites.

A client/server based, graphical user interface to the Internet -- GINA -- has been selected for the first year's participants to test as a controlled access "educational interface" to the wealth of resources available on the Internet. Multiple HERN servers are being prepared for use by the Institute participants. In partnership with the State of Hawaii's Information & Communication Services Division, the Hawaii FYI modem banks are being upgraded and expanded with HERN funds to provide better dial-up access for participants.

Summer: A two week (13 day) workshop or "Internet Bootcamp" will be held at Kapiolani Community College to work on new ideas and skills, coordinate collaborative resource development, and finalize project goals, objectives and implementation plans. Daily agendas will provide opportunities and resources to promote: 1) Understanding multiple perspectives/inquiry to stimulate critical analysis that will shape theme cycles and integrate science, technology and society into the topics; 2) Discovering the need to make substantial improvement in student performance by evaluating and creating alternative learning experiences; and 3) Incorporating interdisciplinary offerings of network utilization by learning the skills of on-line collaboration and resource sharing and gathering.

Educators will familiarize themselves with various client/server software such as Turbo Gopher, GINA, Netscape and others to better understand their "usability." The facilitators will assist with the development of documentation by collaborating with users of various projects such as Shadows, Urban Math Collaborative, Alternative Assessment, Academy One, MayaQuest, The Global School House, The Jason Project, The Copernicus Model, Community of Explorers, and commercial services such as CompuServe and America On-line. The purpose is to seek successful interfaces and projects and to find empirical results concerning the benefits of networking for learning, educational use and support needs, and efficient models of organizing networking services at different educational levels.

Fall & Winter: The Multiplier Effect -- HERN project teams will recruit, train and involve additional colleagues at their institutions as part of the implementation of their projects. The purpose of this is to share the knowledge and insights gained by the "core team" at the summer workshop with widest possible audience at each institution and to begin the process of having the members of the HERN Institute teams become identified as and begin to function as resources for "local support" of Internet related projects.

Quarterly progress updates will highlight examples of various HERN teams' successes (and failures when instructive) by means of electronic articles posted to the HERN Gopher and World Wide Web sites as well as in presentations on the State's distance learning network. The HERN participants will identify new opportunities and problems that need to be addressed during these quarterly updates. The cable programs will feature successful and challenging projects to encourage sharing of "best practices" and to lure participation by new teams for the next Institute.

The initial, 1995-1996 Institute will be used also as an evaluation tool for future institutes and training models which can be replicated both within Hawaii and across the nation.

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For more information about HERN write to: hern@hawaii.edu This page and presentation of information is Copyright © 1998 by the Hawaii Education & Research Network. Permission is granted to distribute and use this information freely, so long as this notice is kept with it.