Educational Technology | Z

Zhao, Yong (1998).  Design for Adoption: The Development of an Integrated Web-Based Education Environment.  Journal of Research on Computing in Education, 30, 3. 

Examines "eWeb," a Web-based educational environment drawing on social, cognitive, and technological resources to improve teaching and learning. Discusses teacher knowledge of technology and pedagogical beliefs, wide-area and teacher collaboration, design principles of "eWeb," and its components (forum, bulletin board, chat, test/exercise builder, materials development, home-page maker), and preliminary evaluation of the beta version.

Zhao, Yong; Englert, Carol Sue; Chen, Jing; Jones, Su Chin; Ferdig, Richard (1999).  TELE-Web: Developing a Web-Based Literacy Learning Environment. CIERA Report. 

This paper describes the development of a Web-based literacy learning software application, Technology Enhanced Learning Environment on the Web (TELE-Web). TELE-Web was developed based on the curriculum of the Early Literacy Project (ELP), an existing literacy program for elementary school students. In describing the development of TELE-Web, the paper adopts an emerging perspective on technology and established practices in education and literacy. This perspective explores how technology is affected by literacy practices in educational contexts, instead of concentrating only on technology's impact on practice. The paper is divided into five sections: the first section discusses the established practice, particularly the literacy goals and the believed effective approach to reaching the goals; the second section describes how technology extends the existing practice; the third section examines the affordances and constraints of the technological innovation to be applied; the fourth section describes the results of the dialogue between technology and established practices--the product; and the fifth section summarizes the discussions and concludes the paper. Contains 32 references and 4 figures representing screen images from TELE-Web. | [FULL TEXT]

Zhao, Yong; Rop, Sheri; Banghart, Rick; Hou, Kaijun; Topper, Andrew (1998).  Life on the Margins: Stories of Techguides. 

Traditionally, in the intersection of technology and education, two distinct cultures have existed side by side: the "techies"--technologically sophisticated or enthusiastic experts, and the teachers--elementary through higher education. In an effort to bring the two separated cultures together to engineer a new culture and to support technology integration at a large teacher preparation institution, a group of nine graduate students were recruited to serve as Techguides. One of the primary responsibilities of the Techguides was to partner with teacher educators to help them integrate technology in their courses for preservice teachers. This paper reports on the preliminary results of this effort by looking at the development trajectory of four Techguides over a course of 3 months. Two themes that surface are the role of the room (i.e., the physical space in which the project was housed) in the development of the Techguide culture and the impact of this culture's interaction with the broader teacher education culture of the college. As the stories presented suggest, the four Techguides, with quite different backgrounds in technology and teaching, were able to interact with each other to construct a shared culture of teaching and learning with technology. | [FULL TEXT]

Zhao, Zhengmai; Hu, Jian (1996).  Supporting Provision and Access of Educational Visual Resources on the Web. 

This paper presents an information retrieval system for delivering educational visual materials through the World Wide Web. The system is designed to meet the following user requirements: lecturers prefer direct control over their visual resources; lecturers demand a browser-based interface that will allow them to create and modify their online visual resources easily; and students prefer more approaches to retrieval of information than just keyword search. Topics discussed include: (1) a description of the system, including major features and types of facilities to support information delivery and access (i.e., searching, browsing, and editing); (2) an application of the system to build an online image collection about architectural history that will be used as resource material for courses related to the history of architecture and design; and (3) a database implementation of the system. Two figures illustrate the architectures of the system and the database-based system. An appendix contains sample searching and browsing screens. Contains 10 references. | [FULL TEXT]

Znamenskaia, Elena; Guan, Yi; Young, Michael F. (1999).  Teacher In-Service Multimedia Training: A View of Outcomes from a Situated Learning Perspective. 

This paper is based on observations of ten middle and high school science teachers in a multimedia workshop during the fall semester of 1997 in a large Northeastern public university. The workshop objective was implementation of multimedia technology in teachers' classrooms. The following methods were employed in this project: multimedia portfolio assessment, field notes, interviews, and questionnaires. Results were viewed from the situated learning perspective. Analysis revealed the following: teachers experienced positive conceptual change in their perception of PowerPoint, from it being a tool for teachers to it being a tool for students; goals of participants changed from more general to more specific; participants' confidence in video and computer skills improved; a collaborative environment developed among participants; participants showed emotional attachment to their workstations; teachers' reported understanding of the educational value of QuickTime movies improved; teachers' understanding of the educational value of PowerPoint presentations did not change; and teachers developed dependency on workshop staff. Nine tables illustrate the confidence decision tree from the information processing point of view, and results of selected questionnaire and interview responses.   | [FULL TEXT]

Zeon, So-young; Lundeberg, Mary A.; Costello, Sean M.; Gajdostik, Laura J.; Harmes, Nina R.; Roschen, Nikki A. (1999).  Restructuring at the Classroom Level: Effects with Technology. 

TIPS (Technologies in Pedagogical Strategies) is a collaborative partnership among the College of Education and Graduate Studies at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls, local school districts, and their respective communities. A key component of the partnership involves meaningful curricular integration of technology, so teachers and students may use this tool to foster higher-level thinking. This study focuses on one segment of the TIPS: teachers' curriculum integration projects. Goals were to document the kinds of technology being used to restructure schools at the classroom level; identify some of the best practices and highlight specific projects that have been designed and implemented by teachers; analyze the growth of respective teachers' experiences with technology integration; and identify challenges teachers face when infusing technology. A preliminary analysis was conducted from interview data with 17 teachers who wrote competitive project grants. Four teachers were selected to study in depth using interviews and observations to analyze how teachers used technology projects to restructure schools at the classroom level. Themes that emerged in all of the interviews included how curriculum, pedagogy, student learning, and assessment changed in the restructured environment, as well as challenges teachers faced with technology infusion. | [FULL TEXT]

Zukowski, Angela Ann (1999).  Communication Challenges for the Church in Asia.  Momentum, 30, 4. 

Recounts the discussions at the five-day Bishop's Institute for Social Communication in September 1999 held in Bangkok, Thailand to study and reflect on the impact of new communication technologies for "Being Church" in the 21st century. Describes the passion with which the local Church in Asia embraces of the countless possibilities that technological advancements can bring to the Catholic mission.

Zenger, Weldon; Zenger, Sharon K. (1999).  Schools and Curricula for the 21st Century: Predictions, Visions, and Anticipations.  NASSP Bulletin, 83, 606. 

In tomorrow's schools, technology will strongly determine how and what teachers will use for instruction. Literacy requirements will include accessing, thinking, and communication skills. Curriculum planners will grasp real-world requirements and will set guidelines for needed skills. Children will begin education in their cribs surrounded by technological marvels. Contains 22 references.

Zentall, Sydney S.; Javorsky, James (1997).  Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder Research-to-Practice through Distance Education.  Teacher Education and Special Education, 20, 2. 

Compares factors in the literature associated with successful outcomes in distance education with the experience of providing an inservice teacher-education program on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (AD/HD). Presents the method of a satellite- and telephone-based course and evaluation of this graduate level inservice course.

Zelasko, Nancy F., Ed. (1997).  NABE News, 1996-1997. 

The eight issues of the newsletter of the National Association for Bilingual Education contain articles on these topics in relation to bilingual education: federal policy and policy formation; teacher qualifications; the English-only movement; parent involvement; reading instruction; the effect of foreign-language schools on children's acculturation; education of American Indians; Asian/Pacific education concerns; cultural literacy; federal resource allocation; global learning networks; early childhood education; pre-literate older (late elementary/secondary school) students; learning culture through children's literature; electronic portfolios for student assessment; using graphic organizers for bilingual literacy education; communication with and within families; gifted education; Internet search tools; writing instruction; empowering language minority children in the mainstream; court litigation; learning strategy instruction; biculturalism; school-to-work programs; teacher education; and educational technology. Book reviews, resource listings, and professional announcements are also included in each issue. | [FULL TEXT]

Zelchenko, Peter (1999).  Exploring Alternatives to Hype.  Educational Leadership, 56, 5. 

Many South Chicago schools are successfully using older technologies, including photomechanical language-lab consoles, revamped and networked PCs, and "ancient" software packages rivaling today's expensive, repackaged products. Re-use is cost-effective. Schools should differentiate among computers' capabilities. Despite big industry's claims, newer is not always better.

Zellers, Robert W. (1997).  What Is Your School's T.Q.?  Clearing House, 70, 3. 

Describes a way to calculate a school's "technology quotient," a variation of intelligence quotient. Notes that the formula can be used to determine how technologically adequate a school district or a building is.

Zaslavsky, Orit, Ed. (1999).  Proceedings of the Conference of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (23rd, Haifa, Israel, July 25-30, 1999). Volumes 1-4. 

This conference proceedings contains 135 research reports, 73 short oral reports, 30 poster session reports, 4 plenary addresses, 3 research forums, 6 project groups, and 5 discussion group reports. Only the research reports, research forums, and plenary addresses are full reports; the others are generally one-page abstracts. The first volume includes: (1) "Where in shared knowledge is the individual knowledge hidden?" (R. Hershkowitz); (2) "Professional development, classroom practices, and students' mathematics learning. A cultural perspective" (G. B. Saxe); (3) "One theoretical perspective in undergraduate mathematics education research" (B. Czarnocha, E. Dubinsky, V. Prabhu, and D. Vidakovic); (4) "Cultural aspects in the learning of mathematics" (N. Presmeg and P. Clarckson); (5) "Developing skills of advanced mathematical thinking" (P. E. Kahn). The second volume includes: (1) "Teacher profile in the geometry curriculum based on the Van Hiele theory" (M. D. Afonso, M. Camacho, and M. M. Socas); (2) "Pupils' images of teachers' representations" (C. Bills and E. Gray); (3) "What kind of mathematical knowledge supports teaching for 'conceptual understanding'? Preservice teachers and the solving of equations" (D. Chazan, C. Larriva, and D. Sandow); (4) "Argumentative aspects of proving: Analysis of some undergraduate mathematics students' performances" (N. Douek); (5) "A numeracy assessment framework for the international life skills survey" (I. Gal). The third volume includes: (1) "'What Can We All Say?' Dynamic geometry in a whole-class zone of proximal development" (J. Gardiner, B. Hudson, and H. Povey); (2) "Pedagogy and the role of context in the development of an instrumental disposition towards mathematics (S. Goodchild); (3) "Alternative assessment for student teachers in a geometry and teaching of geometry course" (B-S. Ilany and N. Shmueli); (4) "Learning pre-calculus with complex calculators: Mediation and instrumental genesis" (J. B. Lagrange); (5) "This patient should be dead! Or: How can the study of mathematics in work advance our understanding of mathematical meaning-making in general?" (R. Noss, C. Hoyles, and S. Pozzi). The fourth volume includes: (1) "The research of ideas of probability in the elementary level of education" (A.-M. Ojeda); (2) "Monitoring of dynamics of students' intellectual growth in MPI-Project" (S. Rososhek); (3) "Conceptual understanding of conventional signs: A study without manipulatives" (C. Silveira); (4) "Does the understanding of variable evolve through schooling?" (M. Trigueros and S. Ursini); (5) "Boys, mathematics and classroom interactions: The construction of masculinity in working-class mathematics classrooms" (R. Zevenbergen). | [FULL TEXT]

Zucker, Susan; White, James A.; Fabri, Peter J.; Khonsari, Laleh S. (1998).  Instructional Intranets in Graduate Medical Education.  Academic Medicine, 73, 10. 

Three major issues have led to changes in graduate medical education: shortages of academic and community physician time to devote to teaching; limited resident exposure to various medical conditions due to shifts in training venues; and residents' lack of training in information technologies. Internal organizational networks (intranets) can be incorporated into graduate medical education to help bridge this gap.

Zirkel, Jessica B.; Zirkel, Perry A. (1997).  Technological Alternatives to Actual Dissection in Anatomy Instruction: A Review of the Research.  Educational Technology, 37, 6. 

Reviews the limited research on computer software alternatives to actual dissection in biology instruction. Concludes that research should include larger more representative samples; higher priority on psychometrically sound instrumentation; a paper-based comparison group; a design that carefully considers attitude; and practical measures to mitigate or buffer researcher bias.

Zirkel, Perry A. (1998).  A Divine School?  Phi Delta Kappan, 79, 9. 

Summarizes a complex case involving a reopened Minnesota elementary school serving children of the Brethren, a religious group that had earlier bought the school. Although no religious instruction occurred there, two taxpayers successfully sued the district. The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed this decision, noting the secular nature of instruction. The case underlines inherent difficulties in contractual arrangements between districts and individual religious groups.

Zbiek, Rose Mary (1998).  Prospective Teachers' Use of Computing Tools To Develop and Validate Functions as Mathematical Models.  Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 29, 2. 

Explores the strategies used by prospective secondary mathematics teachers (N=13) to develop and validate functions as mathematical models of real-world situations. Uses a grounded hypothesis on strategy selection. Concludes that strategy choice was influenced by task characteristics and interactions with other student modelers. Contains 38 references.

Zimmerman, Isa Kaftal, Ed.; Hayes, Mary Forte, Ed. (1998).  Beyond Technology...Learning with the Wired Curriculum. 1998 Yearbook of the Massachusetts Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. 

This yearbook for the Massachusetts Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (MASCD) provides educators with models of successful practices and raises questions and potential solutions to issues of accountability, policy, long-term planning, funding, and student motivation for learning. This 1998 yearbook assists educators at all levels to learn about, and with, the Wired Curriculum. Following comments from Linda Roberts made during the MCET broadcast, Massachusetts NetDay 1996, are the following contributed chapters: "Technology Is a Tool, Education Is a Relationship" (Steven Miller); "Five Keys to Successful Technology Implementation" (Frank Betts); "The Technology Coordinator as Political Activist" (Beth Lowd); "The Last Lie" (Alan November); "The Internet: We're Wired, Now What?" (Bard Williams); "Exploiting the Power of Media Integration" (Henry Olds); "Orcas in Our Midst in a Seventh Grade Classroom" (Sarah C. Haavind and Ann Koufman-Frederick); "Managing Mountains of Information: Helping Students Cope with the Information Age" (Martha Stanton); "School Productivity Centers: Customized Integration of Technology" (Virginia Warn); "Technology Redesign, Integration and Renewal: A Case Study" (Mary Frances Zilonis); "Teacher Preparation, Technology and the Academic Tradition: What's a Sweet Program Like You Doing in a Place Like This?" (John LeBaron); and "Professional Development for the Use of Technology in Schools: It Takes a Network To Connect a Village!" (Isa Kaftal Zimmerman).

Zimmerman, Sara Olin; Greene, Melanie W. (1998).  A Five-Year Chronicle: Using Technology in a Teacher Education Program. 

A network of electronic mail systems connects universities throughout the United States and several foreign countries. Colleges of education link with public schools to support the student teaching process. Telecommunication tools for collaboration promise benefits for university faculty, student teachers, and cooperating teachers. Appalachian State University (ASU) is one example of an electronic community for the teacher education program founded on the piloting results of earlier studies. This account chronicles the uses of technology in the field experiences of the teacher education program. Initially, e-mail discussions were unstructured and substantiated previous studies which had found that student teachers used technology more for exchange of social and emotional support than exchange of ideas. To encourage more focused discussions via telecommunications, use of listservs were guided by faculty in the following academic year. Critical teaching concepts were targeted for development. During the first two years, cooperating teachers' participation was extremely limited. Individual training and encouragement was given by faculty to increase participation. When surveyed, the majority of the graduates of this program have noted that e-mail and word processing are the two major technological skills they obtained. The cooperating teachers indicated many more areas of technology in which they were competent. Attitudes of these preservice teachers were positive toward technology; the hindrances were listed as (1) limited funds, (2) equipment, and (3) time. With easy access to a network and a true social and instructional community for support, an environment was created for teachers, students and university faculty to grow and explore. Contains 13 references.) | [FULL TEXT]

Zuniga, Robin Etter; Johnstone, Sally M. (1994).  New Pathways to a Degree: An Assessment of the Use of Instructional Technologies at Seven Institutions. AIR 1994 Annual Forum Paper. 

This paper examines the design and findings of a survey of 31 faculty and 550 students participating in 7 Annenberg/CPE New Pathways to a Degree electronic learning projects. Each project was selected because it proposed innovative ways to use technology to create new educational opportunities for "new majority learners" (students unable to attend college in conventional ways). All New Pathways courses used technologies in combinations, and communication between students and instructors and among students was supported via several technologies. Survey results indicated that off-campus students found delivery of lectures via video technology (two-way video, one-way video with two-way audio, broadcast video, and videotape) to be acceptable. Students felt that the quality of their mediated interaction with their instructor was as good as or better than experiences in face-to-face classes, and half the students felt that the frequency of their interactions were the same or more frequent. To promote interaction between faculty and students or among students, technologies such as audio-conferencing, electronic mail, or voice mail were more effective than video technologies. Faculty felt that the technologies that let them act the same way they do in face-to-face classes provided the best tools for interaction. The technologies are pushing changes in the relationship among course content, mentor, and student. | [FULL TEXT]

Ziems, Dietrich; Neumann, Gaby (1997).  Using Students' Knowledge to Generate Individual Feedback: Concept for an Intelligent Educational System on Logistics.  Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education, 8, 1. 

Discusses a methods kit for interactive problem-solving exercises in engineering education as well as a methodology for intelligent evaluation of solutions. The quality of a system teaching logistics thinking can be improved using artificial intelligence. Embedding a rule-based diagnosis module that evaluates the student's knowledge actively integrates the student into dialog with the system.