School: Vartan Gregorian Fox Point Elementary School
Teacher: Karen DiPrete
Audience: 3rd Grade Mathematics
Project: Ms. DiPrete has her students do a "Mad Minute" of
multiplication everyday, in which they work through a series of multiplication
tables (for 1 minute each), and then do 30 mixed problems (also for 1
minute). Afterwards the students work on 100 problems and try to answer
them correctly as fast as possible. The project is to design and build
a program that students can use for these exercises that would be more
engaging, challenging and effective than the current paper and pencil
medium, and Ms. DiPrete is also considering having the program include division
problems as well. Possible tools include Authorware, Director, and
HTML/Java.
Comments: This is a interesting project not so much
because of the content but because of the pedagogical constraints and
the challenge of making a computer-based exercise that is superior
to something that is currently done (well) without computers.
School: Vartan Gregorian Fox Point Elementary School
Teacher: Claudia Pietros
Audience: K-5 Art
Project: Mrs. Pietros is interested in a program to go with a
unit she is developing for her students entitled "African-American Artists
and Their Art." The project involves the development of a program that
would allow students to survey specific artists, learn about the style of
art they practiced, as well as how they applied elementary concepts and
principles of art. In meeting with new Art Standards her students need
to know how to pick out specific themes in the art work, learn about
how a specific idea can be portrayed in a series of art pieces, and how
art work can be used to tell a story and/or convey emotions. Another
objective of the program will be for students to see how the history
and events of a certain time period may influence the artist's work,
along with his/her cultural heritage and background. An analogy that
the student should be able to make is that just like an author tells a
story with words and sentences, an artist often communicates feelings
and ideas with visual imagery. Possible tools include Director and
Authorware.
Comments: The students who worked with Mrs. Pietros last
year found it an inspiring experience, and they produced a
wonderful program called "Building Blast". We are fortunate to have
another great proposal from her, and this year the pedagogical and
creative challenges include meeting a set of standards that influence
how students' understanding of art will be assessed.
School: Vartan Gregorian Fox Point Elementary School
Teacher: Jacqueline Fish
Audience: 5th Grade students of Ancient Japan
Project: Ms. Fish teaches a unit on Ancient Japan each year
and she uses the unit in part to teach her 5th graders to understand
the Feudal system. In the past, this was the first time any of the
students had ever heard of this type of system and she found that it
was difficult for them to understand and that it was rather complicated
considering the grade level. This project calls for the creation of a
program to help teach the unit, especially the visual aspects of Ancient
Japanese culture. Ms. Fish suggests that perhaps through the use of a
game, which the students might play in pairs or small groups, where
through a series of questions, the players distinguish themselves as
Shogun, Samuri, serf, etc. Ms. Fish would like the program to
provide a clear visualization of the hierarchy of the government and
present visuals of Japanese weapons, Bonsai, maps, the Tea Ceremony,
rice pad dies, and clothing in an effort to bring students into the
world of Ancient Japan. Possible tools include Director and Authorware.
Comments: The challenge of this project is clearly
how to present rich cultural material to elementary school
students in ways that keep them engaged and facilitate an
understanding not just of cultural details but of the structure of
a particular political system as well.
School: Vartan Gregorian Fox Point Elementary School
Teacher: Christine Mendonca and Holly Polhemus
Audience: 4th grade multi-subject
Project: Ms. Mendonca is an ESL teacher and Ms. Polhemus
is a "regular" ("EFL?") teacher, and they each teach
Math, Science, Social Studies, and Language Arts to their students,
who range in age from 9-11. They are interested in a program that
they could both use with their students to cover one or more of
the following subjects: 1) The muscular, skeletal, nervous,
circulatory, respirattory, endocrine, reproductive, digestion,
and excretory systems of the human body; 2) the geometric concepts
of perimeter, area and volume; and/or 3) the concept of a fraction,
and elementary mathematical operations on fractions. Possible tools
include Director and Authorware.
Comments: This is a very challenging project regardless of
how many of the content areas are addressed because what is requested
is a program that will be as useful and engaging to the regular
4th graders as to the ESL group. This is a unique opportunity because
you'll get to work closely with both Mendonca's and Polhemus'
classes in the design and testing of the program.
School: Vartan Gregorian Fox Point Elementary School
Teacher: Ellen Lynch
Audience: ESL Mathematics, Kindergarten
Project: Ms. Lynch would like her students to understand the
concepts and computations involved in finding the perimeter and area of
various object shapes. In class the students use blocks, spheres and
cubes of various sorts, and this project calls for the creation of a
program that would let students apply the concepts they've learned,
reenforce their understanding, and assess that understanding as well.
A second component of the project (or a separate second project)
involves the presentation of simple functions as "function machines",
and she would like a program that could provide engaging visualization
of and exercises using this idea of function machine. Possible tools
include Hyperstudio, Director, Authorware, and HTML/Java.
Comments: Ms. Lynch's students have limited skills in
English and perhaps the greatest challenge of this program is to
create something that does not rely on English text to convey the
concepts and offer exciting exercises for the students on the
computer.
School: The Met School
Teacher(s): Charly Adler and Suzette Thiebault
Audience: Grade 9 Health
Project:
The Met School (The Metropolitan Career and Technical Center),
is an alternative high school in Providence, and a lab school for the
Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE). Among its innovative
practices is the use of personalized learning plans that allow
students to make decisions about what to study, how to study, and even
where to study (through the use of an extensive internship program).
As you might imagine such individualized learning poses interesting
challenges for traditional ideas of teaching and curriculum.
This project is meant to provide the 9th grade class at the Met with
a program to help students understand the material covered
in the Health curriculum recently required by RIDE, and to prepare
them for the exam that all 9th grade students are required to take
each March. You'll work closely not only with the 9th grade teachers
at the Met but with their students, who will assist in the production
of this program. Possible tools include Director, Authorware, and
HTML/Java.
Comments: Health is an important area of new curriculum
these days, particularly in Rhode Island, and this project is
a great opportunity to create something innovative and effective,
for students working in a remarkably flexible school environment.
School: Classical High School
Teacher: H. Peter Turner
Audience: Latin students, grades 9-12
Project: This project has two components. In the
introductory Latin course, taken primarily
by 9th graders at Classical, Mr. Turner covers the basic conjugations
and declensions of the language, and he is interested in a program
that could help students learn these through a more visual and
dynamic presentation than traditional texts allow. For example, he
has in mind an interactive illustration of bases, stems, and the
attachment of endings in order to improve and deepen students
understandings of the basics. This would assist the begin
ning students in mastering the declensions and conjugations.
The second componenet of the project is aimed at the students
enrolled in AP Latin, mostly 11th and 12th graders, where the focus
is on Latin literature (e.g. Catullus and Ovid). Mr. Turner would
like a program that would help teach his students metrical schemes
of Latin verse and give students clear and compelling exercises
in scanning lines of poetry, identifying long and short
indicators and dividing the lines into the appropriate metrical
feet. Possible tools include Authorware, Director and HTML/Java.
Comments: If you have ever taken Latin you know that
there is something pleasingly mechanical about its structure (well,
ok, not everyone finds it pleasing). This is an excellent project
that features a well-defined curriculum, a knowledgeable teacher
and some very good students for whom to design something engaging
and effective.
School: Mt. Pleasant High School
Teacher: Diane Cresto
Audience: Writing for ESL and Special Education Students
Project: Ms. Cresto works with both students in special
education classes as well as students for whom English is a second
language. Because the reading levels of the two groups is similar
in English, she would like a program that focuses on basic writing
skills concerning grammar, punctuation, and capitalization. The
project calls for the creation of a program that engages these
students (perhaps using a game, or video-game metaphor) and
provides constant reinforcement of these basic skills. Possible
tools include Director and Authorware.
Comments: The challenge of this project is to figure
out a way to not only engage students in exercises they will like
to spend their time on, but in designing them in a way to improve
the students' understanding of the basic language concepts. A
program that did these things well would have tremendous appeal
in almost every high school in the US, and to be able to design
it with the students and faculty at Mt. Pleasant is a great
opportunity.
School: Providence Country Day School
Teacher: Carol Conrad
Audience: 11th Grade American History
Project: Ms. Conrad has put together a curriculum
called "Visions of
Revolutionary America: Form and Function," that aims at engaging
students in the study of 18th century America using a combination of
original photographs, primary documents, and linking narratives in
innovative ways. She has emphasized the interdisciplinary nature of
historical studies by focusing on topics in agriculture, architecture
and art (to take just three examples), and she is anxious to have
these materials presented in a medium that can integrate such materials
more flexibly and effectively than a traditional textbook. The project
involves the creation of a program that, using this curriculum,
weaves the different media into self-paced instructional modules that
allow for multiple paths and different uses of images, documents.
(and assessment techniques), in the study of history. There is also
the possibility of designing the software so as to give students
an instructional context for (and links to) the various archival
material of the period available on the Web. Possible tools
include Director, Authorware and HTML/Java.
Comments: With an excellent curriculum already in place, this is
a great opportunity to create an effective multimedia program that
will give students a deeper understanding of aspects of 18th century
U.S. history than they would find in any textbook. Challenges
include not only how to design effective presentations for a variety
of student styles and interests, but how to structure interaction
so as to direct, reenforce and assess the learning process.
School: Dept. of Mathematics
Teacher: Dev Sinha
Audience: Undergraduates in Linear Algebra (MA0052)
Project: In his linear algebra course, Professor Sinha
has an innovative way of teaching affine transformations in the
plane that
involves the introduction of fractals. Trying to develop students'
geometric intuitions about these transformations he introduces
fractals encoded by collections of affine transformations.
The encoding is essentially through the fact that such
transformations actually determine the
self-similarities of the fractal. Another way of saying this is
that by identifying different subsets of the fractal image that
"cover" the fractal, one actually defines the fractal uniquely.
The project calls for the creation of a program to be accessed via
the Web that allows students to visualize affine transformations
and to generate fractal images by manipulating parameters of the
transformations.
The software produced will not only be a teaching tool but a tool
for creating fractal art.
The likely environment for this project is HTML/Java.
Comments: For students interested in mathematics, this is
a fascinating project. You will be implementing procedural code
provided by Professor Sinha, but the questions of how best to
design and manage the interactions in the program are quite
challenging, and the the drama of fractal images provides
great opportunities for an effective engaging program.
School: Dept. of French
Teacher: Annie Wiert
Audience: Introductory French
Project:
The main objective of this project is to help beginning French
students bridge the gap between the spoken language and the written
language. It is a fact that the written code in French (as in English)
does not allow students to establish a one-on-one correspondence
between sounds or groups of sounds and letters: one oral utterance
may have several possible transcriptions (e.g. "temps", "tant",
"tend", "taon", "tends", "t'en" all have the exact same pronunciation!).
Furthermore, many letters or even entire syllables are not pronounced
in the spoken language, which is very confusing for visual
learners. The project is to create a program that will allow Professor
Wiert to create and allow her students to use, dictation-type
exercises on the computer. For each lesson in the textbook, she
would like the following computer-based exercises:
1)
Students hear vocabulary items and have to check all the possible transc
riptions of what they hear (multiple choice);
2) Students hear phrases and have to check the correct transcription for
what they hear (multiple choice).
3) Students hear phrases and have to type in the transcription (with accent
marks). They should
get immediate feed-back on their transcription: words that co
ntain mistakes might be highlighted and either a hint might be provided
to help the student correct the mistake, or the correct transcription
might be provided;
4) Students hear questions or commands and have to type in their answers.
Ideally they could print these answers and turn them in to their
instructor. This program would be designed for use in the Language
Lab (or the Clusters), and might allow students to work in pairs as
well as individually. Possible tools include Director, Authorware,
HTML/Java.
Comments: This is an extremely challenging project, both
because of its technical requirements and because it raises a number
of important questions about the design of effective instructional
programs. The opportunity to work with Professor Wiert, who has a
clear idea of what she wants in this program and how her students
can benefit from dictation exercises is another great aspect
of this project.
School: Dept. of Politcal Science
Teacher: Darrell West
Audience: Undergraduates in Mass Media (PS111)
Project: For a course he will teach in the fall semester
focusing on the Presidential Election, Professor West is interested
in teaching students aspects of analyzing and deconstructing
a campaign ad. This project involves the creation of a program
built around a 30-second television spot that would be broken down
into sections of perhaps 5-10 frames each in order to
illustrate how ads are put together, who the target audience is,
and how people respond to ads, etc. One possibility for the ad is
George Bush's 1988 "Revolving Door" ad, and the material included
in the program could draw on Professor West's own work (e.g the
studies reported in AIR WARS). Possible tools include Director,
Authorware and HTML/Java.
Comments: This project offers great materials to work
with and significant design challenges to create a program that
will be a compelling unit on the analysis of political ads and
images. This is obviously a
great chance to create something with great and
widespread appeal to anyone studying politics, and to work closely
with a faculty member whose expertise in the area is well-known.
School: Dept. of Psychology
Teacher: Leslie Welch
Audience: Undergraduates in Perception (PY0027)
Project: Each year Professor Welch covers aspects of
perception having to do with color, depth, and motion.
This project calls for the creation of a program that would allow
students to explore the details of these topics, and understand
how perceptions of color, depth and motion are produced by
cues and other aspects of a particular scene or environment.
The program would allow students to manipulate scenes and see
the objective basis of both accurate perceptions and illusions.
Possible tools include HTML/Java, Director and Authorware.
Comments: The computer is well-suited to the sorts
of investigations Professor Welch is looking for, and the project
offers technical challenges (e.g. implementing motion algorithms)
and design challenges (e.g. embedding and orchestrating the
interactions so as to make for an effective instructional program).
School: Dept. of Visual Art
Teacher: Roger Mayer
Audience:Students in VA 10
Project: In 1998 a group of students in the Seminar created
a Web-based program for Professor Mayer called
Color Theory. The program has been
used in VA10 for the past two years with great success. This year
he would like to both expand the program to include a complex
tiling unit and have a redesign of the 1998 project that, among
other things, would allow it to run more smoothly on the various
platforms used by students at Brown. The tiling module will allow
his students to develop a complex modular design in which the
experience gained in the color mixing and color contrast modules
might be applied.
This entails developing geometric or free form designs in individual
modules which would then hold mixtures of color to be ramped to other
locations in the larger modular design. These ramps should be able to flow
horizontally, vertically, and diagonally. Other directions might also be
explored (e.g. a spiral). The required new module would be a
drawing/design program that is linked to the very useful color chooser of
1998 project. This program needs to be developed and (re)designed
in HTML/Java
Comments: This is a great opportunity for both programming
and design, and it's the first time we will try to build on
and improve a project completed in a previous year. This is a
project with an interesting user-study
component as well, since the redesign will be based in part on
feedback from users of the Color Theory program over the past two years.