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Effects of Internet on current teaching practice

Adapted from Moore, Phil. "Teaching and Learning with the Internet," British Telecommunications plc 1995. pp 15-28.

Use of the Internet raises a number of issues about the ways in which we learn. For example:

• A typical learner on the Internet is more likely to be one of a group rather than an individual glued to a screen, 'lost in Cyberspace'.
• The Internet is a collaborative and co-operative learning environment and using it requires similar skills from learners. Deciding what to look for and how to find and use it can demand a great deal of negotiation between individuals and groups.
• The wealth of information available on the Internet and the variety of ways in which it can be accessed require the development of sophisticated reading and research skills.
• Reading around a text and seeing links within it are concrete experiences because a physical act is required to move around (i.e. pressing a mouse button).
• Learners using the information they discover will, of necessity, also develop editing and drafting skills.
• The discoveries learners will make are too exciting not to share within the classroom and beyond - the difficulties in finding them, too pressing to be solved alone.

... we know that successful learning can occur within the context of free exploration of information. It can also take place within a tightly controlled, structured learning environment. There is a tension between these two ends of the continuum of learning styles; both are relevant to learning with the Internet.

What are the implications of this tension in terms of use of the Internet? Perhaps you want students to find some information to support the current topic being studied in class. Suppose you have made a search on the Internet already, and established the route to the relevant pages. You know there's material waiting for the students and you can simply give them the directions to find it, in the same way that you might send them to the library for a particular book.

But there's another way of searching the Internet that uses a very different learning style. You will not be able to guarantee a predetermined outcome, but the possibilities, instead of being predictable and known in advance, become unpredictable and potentially explosive, and could lead to exciting and unforeseen learning outcomes.

Learning Styles

The following table characterizes a range of learning styles. Frequently, the tension between different learning styles in the same classroom can be creative and highly productive. Recent materials suggesting strategies for differentiation have often relied on the existence of such tension. Some pupils (and teachers) will find the unpredictability of some parts of the Internet frustrating; others will find it liberating and exhilarating. An effective learner will be able to operate confidently along the whole range of the continuum of learning styles.

Structured	Unstructured
Progression and intellectual level deliberately designed for learner	No planned progression and intellectual level unpredictable
Linear - started at A and got to B	No particular order - started at A and got to E, Z and a different B
Focused - I want this information for this purpose and for this audience	Random/digressive - this looks interesting. I'd like to know more about that and now I'd like to share it at school or with my partner school in Canada by e-mail
Predictable - I know I am going to get the periodic table	Unpredictable - a cyber sonnet! I didn't expect to find that, but it looks interesting. I'll write one and add it to the collection.
Quantifiable - we studied one section	Difficult to quantify - I found so MUCH!
Controllable - I followed the process I was given	Difficult to control - the search had so many possibilities but I tried to note the interesting ones for later
Testable - the teacher can check what I've learned	Not open to a simple test - so much learning can take place en route; the experience itself was at the heart of the learning; they discovered some of the excitement of learning for its own sake
Teacher takes responsibility for the learning experience	Learners take responsibility for their own learning
Stable, established body of information	Evolving, constantly changing and immensely rich body of information

Beginning a search on the Internet

Here are two examples of what might happen to the tension between these extremes of learning styles in practice, which we can label for convenience 'free' and 'directed'. Although they take English and Science as their content, the examples could easily relate to any other curriculum subject.

Example of an Internet Search: English

You are doing Wilfred Owen's Dulce et Decorum Est with a group and you want students to explore the poem's background. You narrow it down to the genre - First World War poetry. The 'directed' learning style sends the students off on a search for Wilfred Owen. Some use books in the library, while one group connects to the Internet.

The Internet group conducts a search but it keeps taking them back to the same documents - copies of two poems - by a number of routes. Half an hour and lots of frustration later, they return with a printout of the poems taken from the Internet. But they've already got them on their worksheet.

What went wrong?

Here is a summary of that search:

Task: to search the Internet for Wilfred Owen; to find background material onthe First World War.

Action	Reaction
Linked up to Internet.
Set up search for Wilfred Owen.	Many learning issues here.
Search found hundreds of matches with the word 'owen'.
Looked through the list, found a mention of Dulce et Decorum Est.	Loud cheers of triumph.
Double clicked on Dulce et Decorum Est.
Found text of poem. No more.	Disappointment.
Retraced steps looking for extra information. Tried slightly different route.
Came back to the same text. Again.	Learning flexibility needed here; a certain doggedness!
Tried search again. Hundreds of irrelevant 'owens'.	The issue of 'which Owen?' again raises many learning issues.
Tried again.
Back to poems!
Found a reference to Britten's War Requiem. Clicked to go there.	Is this a creative digression? Looks hopeful.
Language too difficult - totally unintelligible.	Again disappointing, this time for a different reason.
Eventually found a full list of classic poems. Excitement!
But it's the same list, containing the two poems already viewed.	If the search is too narrowly defined, useful information may be missed.
Third try. This time searched for World War 1.
Found a reference to the World's First Collaborative Sentence.	A typically bizarre and amusing digression. Irrelevant?
Intrigued, decided to look it up. Huge, long, rambling nonsense sentence! Uproarious laughter.	Relief from tension, but how can this chance discovery be used?
Went back to poem list. Found some poems, not by Owen, but relevant to the First World War.	Discovered that originally ignored material is relevant!

Example of an Internet Search: Science

You are working on physical processes and you want the students to find out a little more about the movements of the planets around the sun. You send them off with the 'directed' focus of the planets. One group decided to use the Internet.

But the search on the Internet keeps bringing up hundreds of references to the planets, with no apparent way of discriminating between them. They return a while later rather dispirited at their lack of success.

What went wrong?

Here is a summary of their search:

Task: to search the Internet for information about the movement of the planets around the sun.

In fact, we have to ask whether this information could have been found more easily using print-based materials in the school library. In both of these examples, the answer is probably yes. This is a case where it's important to understand the relative merits of print-based and electronic sources of information.

But the groups using the Internet derived a number of benefits from their searches:

• They logged on and got something. That has great value in itself, since the process uses many learning skills.
• They have learned something about research. Once more, this is a gain as teacher you can build in a way of valuing this; perhaps via your formative assessment system.
• They discussed the process of searching as they did it; they negotiated. The use of these skills and of reflection was a natural part of their use of the Internet. The fact that you did not give them unlimited time helped focus their use of learning strategies still further.

English

• They found poems by other First World War poets. This branch line to the riginal search may prove to be extremely valuable.

Science

• They made a connection between the name of the planet and the metal and connected to pollution.

Using a more flexible, less pre-defined approach, such digressions can be highly creative - especially in a medium like the Internet, where dynamic links between information can throw up some very interesting cross-references. For example, can the English group make links between other contemporary poets and Owen's poetry? Could the science group have done some further research into why the metal mercury has the same name as the planet? Could listening to Holst's music have given any insight into their work on space?

Such links in Internet texts are reminiscent of the way a child makes connections and creates conceptual structures while learning.

What should I try next?

You could try suggesting that they employ a modified form of the 'directed' approach, build in a degree of flexibility and use a different method of research: the 'fast prototype' approach. Instead of pursuing one line of questioning to its bitter conclusion, they could try lots of searches, using lots of different methods, and they should be prepared to abandon the search or the searching system if it doesn't work - there are lots of different ways of searching the Internet quickly. They can log the pathway for future use, either by jotting it down of, even better, by setting up bookmarks or printing the list of pages they have visited (called a 'Go' list). This might be part of the assessment or outcome of the work.

The students in both groups discuss what to do next. Having dealt with the initial frustration of reconciling the two learning styles, they decide to go back the Internet and try something else.

In fact they try some different searches:

The English group, looking for First World War poetry, uses a different searching system and finds The World's First Collaborative Sentence, because the computer found both First and World. it turns out to be, hilariously, and immensely long nonsense sentence. And at last they find numerous poems, some of them relevant to the First World War. The group also decides to send some e-mail messages to a partner school in America requesting ideas for places on the Internet where they might find further information and with comments on what they found already. They also send out a more general message asking for examples of poems about war from other cultures.

The Science group, looking for information about the movement of the planets around the sun, uses a different searching method and collects the sound files from Holst's Planet Suite and pictures from NASA's collection of Hubble ../images to make a computer-based presentation containing information about the planets of the solar system. They use an 'Ask the Scientist' scheme to question professional scientists about the movement of the planets around the sun. They also send out a request on a schools discussion group for details of Internet sites where they might find some relevant information.

Learning Skills Used During a Search

Here is a summary of the learning skills and strategies both
groups might have used in the 'getting information' phase:

• Posing questions, seeking answer/information (this can be an off-line process, continuing while connected to the Internet).
• Reading
• Evaluating the data - where has it come from? Why was it written? Who was it written for?
• Evaluating the search - how useful is the information? Can I understand it? What parts are relevant to my study? Do I need to continue searching?
• Selecting, storing and saving information.
• Co-operation and collaboration - small group, whole class, inter-school and international.

Using the information from the Internet

So now that the groups have the materials, what are they going to do with them?

They are pleased with what has been discovered and would like to find a way of sharing it - learning is clearly to do with output as well as input. Through sharing what has been experienced and finding a form in which to share it, the learner further develops understanding.

What do you do with the information?

For the teacher the 'directed' learning approach has often led to outcomes which involve copious copying, beautifully presented. You don't want it to happen, but what else do you do with all this information? This approach means that a neatly packaged project arrives on your desk - once again you are the audience.

What else can be done with it?

You could look at the speaking and listening that has occurred throughout the rather messy and unstructured searching process. You could appoint a member of the group to observe this and then create an opportunity for them to reflect on what they have done.

You could ask the students to find a form that would fit the material they have collected. What about using the new form they have just explored? Wall displays of flow charts, blind alleys, or, even better, their own page on the Internet!

Creating their own Web pages on the Internet would mean that instead of copying material, or even cutting and pasting it, the students could create links to relevant pages they have found. They could place all the questions they couldn't answer on their page with requests for others to provide answers. In this way, rather than excluding unanswered questions, they are celebrated and become possibilities. Other explorers of the Internet might send information or suggest new links.

There are several other advantages of this outcome:

• It enables the sort of collaboration about content that good drafting should include
• It gives the students some control of the medium
• It adds to the range of forms that they can use
• It highlights the idea that texts are not finite - they grow and change
• It sets up contacts with schools around the world

All this begins to touch on the notion of audience .

The audience is there. Communicating with it will place new demands on creativity and negotiating skills, and provide real reasons for pupils to be accurate in their writing. The audience is not captive; its distance creates freedom. Much has been written about the liberating effects on the imagination of working with e-mail - the way it allows people to become who they want to be.

This is a summary of the learning skills and strategies they might have used in the 'using information' phase:

• Developing a sense of audience
• Adapting and restructuring information
• Drafting
• Presenting information through a range of media
• Adapting writing to audience and purpose
• Collaboration

Most importantly, in both information gathering and information using, students have begun to develop the excitement of autonomous learning skills: skills applicable to all areas of the curriculum, skills for research, skills for life.

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