There have been a lot of good suggestions here. A number of comments have noted that for the "soft" sciences (I agree it's a terrible term,) statistics is more relevant. I think that this is the key for what you need to do. Find examples of where calculus is necessary to solve a problem in the social sciences and build your course around those relevant examples. People will work harder and understand better if the material can be shown to be relevant to them.
There are lists floating around the internet of the "best" or "favourite" episodes of the various Star Trek episodes. I'd choose one of the "best" episodes from the first series (The City on the Edge of Forever would be one good candidate) to introduce the characters and general situation, and then move to "best of" the other series.
Age 8 is a difficult one for science fiction, and you might be better off with fantasy. One book that my children fell in love with at that age was Barbara Sleigh's Carbonel (http://www.amazon.ca/Carbonel-Barbara-Sleigh/dp/0141319739/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1340289236&sr=1-1). It was broadcast by the BBC at least twice as a radio drama in the 1950s. You might have to explain some of the background though, as it takes place in England just after WWII, when rationing was still in place, etc.
Another book that my children liked at quite a young age is André Norton's Star Man's Son (http://www.amazon.ca/Daybreak-2250-D-Star-Mans/dp/0449236145/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1340289489&sr=1-1), which I believe was the first post-nuclear-apocalypse novel to be written and is still studied in some university courses.
With a bachelor's in math and a master's in education, your wife has a number of options open to her in the education field. One is to change level, and teach at a community college. These will be students with few, if any, behaviour problems, and that greatly reduces one's stress load.
A second option is to teach online. Again, there are few behaviour problems online (although flame wars are possible,) and I suspect your wife would find this satisfying. A bonus is that you can usually work from home when you teach online.
If you are thinking of teaching online, I recommend Palloff's and Pratt's book (see below) as a good starting point:
Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2001). Lessons from the Cyberspace Classroom. The realities of online teaching. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
I was a secondary school teacher for many years. We used to allow open book tests. The students always found those to be the hardest.
Many students wouldn't bother to study, since they could look up the answers. But looking up answers takes time, and exams are time-limited. I suspect that you will find exactly the same thing in your classes. Let them look up whatever they want, but structure the exam so that the questions are problems that require understanding of principles, not just recitation of facts, and you should be just fine.
E-learning is not only viable, but rapidly becoming essential. Many upgrading courses for adults, and these are becoming essential to any professional occupation, are conducted online. As a result, schools are going to have to teach children the skills needed to successfully work in online learning environments. It's no longer a frill, but as I say, an essential.
I am an instructor at a university in Canada, and I find it frustrating sometimes that I have 3rd- and 4th-year students who have never had any experience with online learning. It makes my job more difficult when I have to teach basic skills instead of the courses I am supposed to be teaching.
I currently run my courses in a hybrid manner, part traditional, and part online. This allows the students to feel comfortable with the traditional part of the course, and makes the online portion less intimidating. Here's a link to a paper I recently wrote about my class, and which describes the approach I take. The same approach with hybrid classes and software has been used in elementary and secondary schools.
The real problem with technology in schools is not the technology itself, but a lack of clear pedagogy on the part of the teacher. Just throwing technology into a class and waiting for a miracle to happen is ineffective. The teacher should decide which technologies support their teaching objectives and use those. The UNESCO Towards Knowledge Societies report (2005) states,
"Teacher training must therefore extend beyond the bounds of competency in a particular discipline and must include, as components in their own right, training in the new technologies and study of the ways and means of stimulating the students’ motivation and personal commitment. What they will need to learn, then, is not so much a technical skill as the ability to choose from among the increasingly abundant array of teaching and other software and educational programmes on offer, those that are most appropriate. Face-to-face tuition to learners, remains nonetheless essential in basic education. " (pp. 82-83)
I have a project in hand in which my science education students are creating lesson materials based on the work of the iDAPT lab in Toronto, Canada , a unique research facility that studies how adults with disabilities interact with their environment and other health care issues.
If you are interested, we could set up an online discourse environment for your class to work on the materials and interact with myself and my students about this work. We've designed the materials so that they align with the Ontario curriculum, which is very similar to most U.S. curricula, and each component includes a design challenge based on real-world problems for the children to work on.
My name is Dr. Donald N. Philip, and I can be reached at don.philip@utoronto.ca
I am currently a lecturer at a Canadian university, and I encourage my students to bring their laptops to class. I ask that they log onto our online environment and place comments or thoughts into it while I am lecturing. I feel that this engages the students more with the lecture, and gives them a focus as to how laptops can be used constructively in class.
We have to look ahead to the days, not long hence, when computers will be ubiquitous and either implants or part of the students' clothing. At such a time, banning computers in the classroom will be unenforceable, so we should work not on whether or not they should be banned, but on how they can best be used.
Most of the time, when such a project is undertaken, technical and technological factors get the first, and often the only, priority. What is left out is the human factor–how people with interact with, and use, the environment. There has now been considerable work done on this by human factors engineers. So before doing anything else for your control room, read Kim Vincente's book, "The Human Factor", especially the parts where he deals specifically with control rooms. Making the correct human factors decisions can reduce accidents and deaths resulting from poor design choices.
I agree with the comments above that conducting a literature review is a good place to start. However, one way that occurs to me is that most universities maintain lists of professors for the press to contact for comments about stories in their areas of research. These lists (at least at my institution) are listed under "Press Contacts" and are listed by the particular research interest.
While I don't feel that I can advise you what to do, I can advise what not to do. We live in strange times, and while science in the past was often done by wealthy amateurs, it is now done mostly in university or corporate labs. Any private citizens not affiliated with such organizations will attract attention from Homeland security or whatever the equivalent is in your country (if it isn't the U.S.) I would avoid biology DIY research, likewise most chemistry research, and some physics research (i.e., rocketry) for that reason. The last thing you want to do is wind up in jail.
A lot depends on what you'd like to do with the course. If you just want to explore scifi and fantasy, then the suggestions already made are fine. However, there is the possibility of linking the science fiction part to historical events to give students a better understanding of them. To that end I would recommend:
Alas Babylon: This is a book about the aftermath of a nuclear war, and its effect on a group of ordinary people.
Star Man's Son (aka Daybreak-2250 AD): Another post-apocalyptic novel (and suitable for younger readers) that illustrates the level of worry about nuclear war in the cold war.
Sirius: A very early story about genetic engineering. A scientist produces a dog with human intelligence, and the book revolves around the relationship between the dog and the scientist's daughter.
All of these, and there are a number of others, reflect the concerns of the 1950s and 1960s, something that your students might not be aware of, and which are still affecting us today.
I think you are too focused on the technology. You need first to focus on effective collaboration, which is messy, involves multiple inputs, and takes time. There are different kinds of software that allow for collaboration and support the writing process.
Currently popular is the wiki, similar to Wikipedia, that allows multiple authors to create a single document, etc. Knowledge Forum is software specifically designed for collaborative knowledge work, and contains multiple forms of support for both collaboration and the writing process.
After collaboration and creation of the text form of the document, it is relatively simple to format the document in any one of a number of programs. Focus on effective collaboration first.
I highly recommend Flatland By Edwin A. Abbott. An older book, it is excellent for introducing the key concepts of dimensionality. Amazon carries it, as I'm sure do others.
One of the best places to start on this is Jonassen's book Computers in the Classroom. Mind Tools for Critical Thinking
He introduces the concept of Mind Tools as...
"... computer-based tools and learning environments that have been adapted or developed to function as intellectual partners with the learner in order to engage and facilitate critical thinking and higher-order learning." (p. 9)
These tools include:
databases
spreadsheets
semantic networks
expert systems
computer conferencing
computer programming
In designing the programs, the software chosen should represent knowledge in powerful ways, generalize to different content and subject areas, facilitate critical thinking among students, support simple and powerful ways of thinking, and be easy-to-learn so that the focus in on what is to be learned, not the software.
Once this has been done, the choice of hardware will be much clearer.
For some ideas of how such programs can be run in practice, see the Institute for Knowledge Innovation and Technology website (http://www.ikit.org, University of Toronto) where there are some papers and video clips of students working with knowledge building software.
Reference:
Jonassen (1996). Computers in the Classroom. Mind tools for critical thinking. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Your question has lots of layers. The school has s duty to safeguard the students, but many of the safeguards proposed by school boards are to soothe panicky parents or lawyers, not really to benefit students. As a result, the restrictions put on computer use tend to hinder effective use by the students.
One possible solution is to use a Roman law vs. Common law analysis. Under Roman law, anything that was not specifically allowed was forbidden. This tends to inhibit creativity.
Under Common law, anything that is not specifically forbidden is allowed. This tends to foster creativity.
So instead of thinking about what should be prohibited, think instead about why anything should be prohibited, and don't act unless you're solving a real (as opposed to hypothetical) problem. Solve problems as they arise.
I notice that no one seems to have mentioned LOGO, the programming language for children designed at MIT. It introduces basic concepts, etc. As well, there are other similar programs (i.e., SQUEAK) that might be more suitable for your age group.
One advantage of the LOGO language is that it can be combined with the Lego/LOGO robotics system. YOu could get your students to learn programming while actually building something that interests them.
Bringing in technology is a necessary, but not sufficient step. It is also necessary to integrate this with providing teachers with the training and knowledge about how to effectively use computer technology in the classroom. This latter step is all too often ignored, and the technology is not used effectively.
A good place to start is Jonassen's book, Computers in the Classroom: MInd tools for critical thinking. Jonassen details what kinds of software should be used and how it should be used. It's an excellent place to start.
Reference:
Jonassen (1996). Computers in the Classroom. Mind tools for critical thinking. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
I've had much the same dilemma over the years. What worked for me was combining diet with exercise. Formerly, I used a treadmill, and did about 2 miles a day on it. Because of knee problems, I have given up the treadmill and bought an elliptical trainer, which has been working well for me.
If you decide on an elliptical trainer, make sure you try a few out. They are designed for different stride lengths, and it makes quite a difference how they feel for you, and how pleasant the experience is. The correct stride length makes quite a difference.
You could do worse than to look at the work of Kim Vincente who deals with human factors engineering, or the work of Donald Norman, who deals with much the same area.
References:
Norman, D., Things that make us smart. Defending human attributes in the age of the machine. 1993, Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books. 290.
Vincente, K., The Human Factor. Revolutionizing the way people live with technology. 2003, Canada: Alfred A. Knopf. 351.
Essentially what you're talking about here is what is being called the Net Generation or N-Gen (Tapscott, 1998). Tapscott gives this as a population of approximately 90 million young people who have grown up with digital media, or, to paraphrase Bruce Sterling (2002), those who have grown up marinated in a hot rising tide of networked silicon chips.
While Tapscott is essentially, correct a more recent study From ECAR (Salaway et al., 2006) shows that this is not quite nuanced enough. At present, only about a third of the current crop of students are full-blown N-Genners. About a third or more are more moderate technology users and a third or less is technologically disadvantaged. However, for your purposes, most of the true N-Genners tend to be male and in engineering or business, so you pretty much are dealing with full-blown N-Genners in your classes.
Tapscott gives the following set of eight shifts educators have identified in regard to the N-Gen students. Their learning should move:
1. From linear to hypermedia learning;
2. From instruction to construction and discovery;
3. From teacher-centred to learner-centred education;
4. From absorbing material to learning how to navigate and how to learn;
5. From schooling to lifelong learning;
6. From one-size-fits-all to customized learning;
7. From learning as torture to learning as fun; and
8. From the teacher as transmitter to the teacher as facilitator.
As to libraries, Eastbrook (2007) found:
"Those who do turn to libraries have success, and they appreciate all the resources available at libraries, especially access to computers and the internet. And those in Generation Y (age 18-30) were the most likely to turn to libraries for problem-solving information." (p. v, original emphasis). Further:
65% of those who went to libraries went to get access to computers and the internet.
58% used reference books.
42% went for journals, magazines, or newspapers.
The N-Gen are among the largest users of libraries, but libraries are now resources providing information in many forms, not just books.
In sum, the Net Generation is not 'lacking skills' so much as their brains are wired differently than those of previous generations, and while this is not yet wholly homogeneous among the population, it will increasingly be so. Education has to change to accommodate this. I've got a webcast about this available at: http://breeze.uliveandlearn.com/p11443785/
References:
Philip, D. N. (2007). The Knowledge Building Paradigm: A Model of Learning for Net Generation Students [Webcast]. Cyberspace: Innovate Live.
Salaway, G., Katz, R. N., Caruso, J. B., Kvavik, R. B., & Nelson, M. R. (2006). The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2006: Educause Center for Applied Research.
Sterling, B. (2002). Tomorrow Now. Envisioning the next fifty years. New York: Random House.
Tapscott, D. (1998). Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Along with the other excellent posts recommending books, I'd like to add the following:
Horn, R. E. (1998). Visual language : global communication for the 21st century. Bainbridge Island, Wash.: MacroVU, Inc.
Horn describes a system of visual language that might be of use in interface design. He makes you aware of some of the issues surrounding the display of visual information, etc.
As well, have a look at:
van Merriënboer, J. J. G., & Sweller, J. (2005). Cognitive Load Theory and Complex Learning: Recent Developments and Future Developments. Educational Psychology Review, 17(2), 147-177.
In particular, pay attention to Sweller's 'split attention' effect, in which the cognitive load is increased if the user has his/her attention divided among related interface elements that are separated on the display.
Slashdot Mirror
There have been a lot of good suggestions here. A number of comments have noted that for the "soft" sciences (I agree it's a terrible term,) statistics is more relevant. I think that this is the key for what you need to do. Find examples of where calculus is necessary to solve a problem in the social sciences and build your course around those relevant examples. People will work harder and understand better if the material can be shown to be relevant to them.
There are lists floating around the internet of the "best" or "favourite" episodes of the various Star Trek episodes. I'd choose one of the "best" episodes from the first series (The City on the Edge of Forever would be one good candidate) to introduce the characters and general situation, and then move to "best of" the other series.
Another book that my children liked at quite a young age is André Norton's Star Man's Son (http://www.amazon.ca/Daybreak-2250-D-Star-Mans/dp/0449236145/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1340289489&sr=1-1), which I believe was the first post-nuclear-apocalypse novel to be written and is still studied in some university courses.
A second option is to teach online. Again, there are few behaviour problems online (although flame wars are possible,) and I suspect your wife would find this satisfying. A bonus is that you can usually work from home when you teach online.
If you are thinking of teaching online, I recommend Palloff's and Pratt's book (see below) as a good starting point: Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2001). Lessons from the Cyberspace Classroom. The realities of online teaching. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
You should probably contact the Canadian Embassy in Beijing. They would be in a good position to advise you how to proceed.
I was a secondary school teacher for many years. We used to allow open book tests. The students always found those to be the hardest. Many students wouldn't bother to study, since they could look up the answers. But looking up answers takes time, and exams are time-limited. I suspect that you will find exactly the same thing in your classes. Let them look up whatever they want, but structure the exam so that the questions are problems that require understanding of principles, not just recitation of facts, and you should be just fine.
I am an instructor at a university in Canada, and I find it frustrating sometimes that I have 3rd- and 4th-year students who have never had any experience with online learning. It makes my job more difficult when I have to teach basic skills instead of the courses I am supposed to be teaching.
I currently run my courses in a hybrid manner, part traditional, and part online. This allows the students to feel comfortable with the traditional part of the course, and makes the online portion less intimidating. Here's a link to a paper I recently wrote about my class, and which describes the approach I take. The same approach with hybrid classes and software has been used in elementary and secondary schools.
The real problem with technology in schools is not the technology itself, but a lack of clear pedagogy on the part of the teacher. Just throwing technology into a class and waiting for a miracle to happen is ineffective. The teacher should decide which technologies support their teaching objectives and use those. The UNESCO Towards Knowledge Societies report (2005) states,
"Teacher training must therefore extend beyond the bounds of competency in a particular discipline and must include, as components in their own right, training in the new technologies and study of the ways and means of stimulating the students’ motivation and personal commitment. What they will need to learn, then, is not so much a technical skill as the ability to choose from among the increasingly abundant array of teaching and other software and educational programmes on offer, those that are most appropriate. Face-to-face tuition to learners, remains nonetheless essential in basic education. " (pp. 82-83)
Reference:
UNESCO. (2005). Towards Knowledge Societies. UNESCO World Report (p. 220). Paris: UNESCO Publishing.
If you are interested, we could set up an online discourse environment for your class to work on the materials and interact with myself and my students about this work. We've designed the materials so that they align with the Ontario curriculum, which is very similar to most U.S. curricula, and each component includes a design challenge based on real-world problems for the children to work on.
My name is Dr. Donald N. Philip, and I can be reached at don.philip@utoronto.ca
We have to look ahead to the days, not long hence, when computers will be ubiquitous and either implants or part of the students' clothing. At such a time, banning computers in the classroom will be unenforceable, so we should work not on whether or not they should be banned, but on how they can best be used.
Most of the time, when such a project is undertaken, technical and technological factors get the first, and often the only, priority. What is left out is the human factor–how people with interact with, and use, the environment. There has now been considerable work done on this by human factors engineers. So before doing anything else for your control room, read Kim Vincente's book, "The Human Factor", especially the parts where he deals specifically with control rooms. Making the correct human factors decisions can reduce accidents and deaths resulting from poor design choices.
Reference: Vincente, K. (2003). The Human Factor. Revolutionizing the way people live with technology. Canada: Alfred A. Knopf. Amazon: http://www.amazon.ca/Human-Factor-Revolutionizing-Live-Technology/dp/0676974902/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1283779722&sr=1-1
I agree with the comments above that conducting a literature review is a good place to start. However, one way that occurs to me is that most universities maintain lists of professors for the press to contact for comments about stories in their areas of research. These lists (at least at my institution) are listed under "Press Contacts" and are listed by the particular research interest.
While I don't feel that I can advise you what to do, I can advise what not to do. We live in strange times, and while science in the past was often done by wealthy amateurs, it is now done mostly in university or corporate labs. Any private citizens not affiliated with such organizations will attract attention from Homeland security or whatever the equivalent is in your country (if it isn't the U.S.) I would avoid biology DIY research, likewise most chemistry research, and some physics research (i.e., rocketry) for that reason. The last thing you want to do is wind up in jail.
All of these, and there are a number of others, reflect the concerns of the 1950s and 1960s, something that your students might not be aware of, and which are still affecting us today.
I think you are too focused on the technology. You need first to focus on effective collaboration, which is messy, involves multiple inputs, and takes time. There are different kinds of software that allow for collaboration and support the writing process.
Currently popular is the wiki, similar to Wikipedia, that allows multiple authors to create a single document, etc. Knowledge Forum is software specifically designed for collaborative knowledge work, and contains multiple forms of support for both collaboration and the writing process. After collaboration and creation of the text form of the document, it is relatively simple to format the document in any one of a number of programs. Focus on effective collaboration first.
I highly recommend Flatland By Edwin A. Abbott. An older book, it is excellent for introducing the key concepts of dimensionality. Amazon carries it, as I'm sure do others.
He introduces the concept of Mind Tools as ...
"... computer-based tools and learning environments that have been adapted or developed to function as intellectual partners with the learner in order to engage and facilitate critical thinking and higher-order learning." (p. 9) These tools include:
In designing the programs, the software chosen should represent knowledge in powerful ways, generalize to different content and subject areas, facilitate critical thinking among students, support simple and powerful ways of thinking, and be easy-to-learn so that the focus in on what is to be learned, not the software.
Once this has been done, the choice of hardware will be much clearer.
For some ideas of how such programs can be run in practice, see the Institute for Knowledge Innovation and Technology website (http://www.ikit.org, University of Toronto) where there are some papers and video clips of students working with knowledge building software.
Reference:
Jonassen (1996). Computers in the Classroom. Mind tools for critical thinking. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Your question has lots of layers. The school has s duty to safeguard the students, but many of the safeguards proposed by school boards are to soothe panicky parents or lawyers, not really to benefit students. As a result, the restrictions put on computer use tend to hinder effective use by the students.
One possible solution is to use a Roman law vs. Common law analysis. Under Roman law, anything that was not specifically allowed was forbidden. This tends to inhibit creativity.
Under Common law, anything that is not specifically forbidden is allowed. This tends to foster creativity.
So instead of thinking about what should be prohibited, think instead about why anything should be prohibited, and don't act unless you're solving a real (as opposed to hypothetical) problem. Solve problems as they arise.
I notice that no one seems to have mentioned LOGO, the programming language for children designed at MIT. It introduces basic concepts, etc. As well, there are other similar programs (i.e., SQUEAK) that might be more suitable for your age group.
One advantage of the LOGO language is that it can be combined with the Lego/LOGO robotics system. YOu could get your students to learn programming while actually building something that interests them.
Bringing in technology is a necessary, but not sufficient step. It is also necessary to integrate this with providing teachers with the training and knowledge about how to effectively use computer technology in the classroom. This latter step is all too often ignored, and the technology is not used effectively.
A good place to start is Jonassen's book, Computers in the Classroom: MInd tools for critical thinking. Jonassen details what kinds of software should be used and how it should be used. It's an excellent place to start.
Reference: Jonassen (1996). Computers in the Classroom. Mind tools for critical thinking. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
I'd just go to Costco. They usually have a good price on some really nice wedding rings.
If you decide on an elliptical trainer, make sure you try a few out. They are designed for different stride lengths, and it makes quite a difference how they feel for you, and how pleasant the experience is. The correct stride length makes quite a difference.
References:
Norman, D., Things that make us smart. Defending human attributes in the age of the machine. 1993, Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books. 290.
Vincente, K., The Human Factor. Revolutionizing the way people live with technology. 2003, Canada: Alfred A. Knopf. 351.
While Tapscott is essentially, correct a more recent study From ECAR (Salaway et al., 2006) shows that this is not quite nuanced enough. At present, only about a third of the current crop of students are full-blown N-Genners. About a third or more are more moderate technology users and a third or less is technologically disadvantaged. However, for your purposes, most of the true N-Genners tend to be male and in engineering or business, so you pretty much are dealing with full-blown N-Genners in your classes.
Tapscott gives the following set of eight shifts educators have identified in regard to the N-Gen students. Their learning should move: 1. From linear to hypermedia learning; 2. From instruction to construction and discovery; 3. From teacher-centred to learner-centred education; 4. From absorbing material to learning how to navigate and how to learn; 5. From schooling to lifelong learning; 6. From one-size-fits-all to customized learning; 7. From learning as torture to learning as fun; and 8. From the teacher as transmitter to the teacher as facilitator.
As to libraries, Eastbrook (2007) found: "Those who do turn to libraries have success, and they appreciate all the resources available at libraries, especially access to computers and the internet. And those in Generation Y (age 18-30) were the most likely to turn to libraries for problem-solving information." (p. v, original emphasis). Further:
The N-Gen are among the largest users of libraries, but libraries are now resources providing information in many forms, not just books.
In sum, the Net Generation is not 'lacking skills' so much as their brains are wired differently than those of previous generations, and while this is not yet wholly homogeneous among the population, it will increasingly be so. Education has to change to accommodate this. I've got a webcast about this available at: http://breeze.uliveandlearn.com/p11443785/
References:
Philip, D. N. (2007). The Knowledge Building Paradigm: A Model of Learning for Net Generation Students [Webcast]. Cyberspace: Innovate Live.
Salaway, G., Katz, R. N., Caruso, J. B., Kvavik, R. B., & Nelson, M. R. (2006). The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2006: Educause Center for Applied Research.
Sterling, B. (2002). Tomorrow Now. Envisioning the next fifty years. New York: Random House.
Tapscott, D. (1998). Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation. New York: McGraw-Hill.
A similar sonar cloaking device was described in a Tom Swift novel I read when I was kid. I wonder if the researchers read the same book?
As well, have a look at: van Merriënboer, J. J. G., & Sweller, J. (2005). Cognitive Load Theory and Complex Learning: Recent Developments and Future Developments. Educational Psychology Review, 17(2), 147-177.
In particular, pay attention to Sweller's 'split attention' effect, in which the cognitive load is increased if the user has his/her attention divided among related interface elements that are separated on the display.