Re: reflections

Jane Jackson (jane.jackson@asu.edu <jane.jackson@asu.edu>)
Mon, 11 Dec 1995 14:20:35 +0000 

>2) follow-up support is crucial to making the change last.  We use
>a newsletter, direct phone contact, and periodic reunion meetings of
>participants.  Clearly the reunion meetings were a recharging
>opportunity for many of the teachers - the chance to share with each
>other was far more important than anything the project staff had to
>offer.

Please tell me how you do the reunion meetings, since your teachers are
from all over the nation.  How often?  How long?  Pay, travel and housing
costs?  What format works?  What do the teachers do at the reunion
meetings?

>
>I wish all our participants had e-mail.  I think if we had a forum
>to discuss issues in our own project like the TEECH forum has offered
>it would have been very beneficial.

Yes.  The Modeling Instruction in H.S.Physics project is training 50
teachers from all over the nation.  In our application we strongly
encouraged them to get an Internet connection.  It worked; 42 of them have
connections, and all but 1 (an inner city teacher) have the opportunity to
get connected soon.  Some h.s.'s put in phone lines and/or bought them
modems, other teachers got connected via a physics professor at a local
university or community college, some paid for their own PPP/SLIP
connections with a commercial Internet provider, some signed up on state
teachers' networks (and some were already on Labnet).  Only a few schools
are Internet nodes.
        We started our listserve list for the teachers a month ago, and
they have shared about 50 posts since.  It has been a good help to them in
solving problems, sharing solutions, comparing insights, and giving one
another support.  For the project staff it has made our communication with
the teachers MUCH easier than mailing letters and phoning.
        My suggestion: make it a goal for all participants to have full
Internet-to-desktop connections, and give applicants advice and assistance
to accomplish this.

Jane Jackson (Prof. of Physics, Scottsdale Comm. College--on leave)
Dept.of Physics, Box 871504, Arizona State Univ.,Tempe AZ 85287-1504.
jane.jackson@asu.edu <jane.jackson@asu.edu>     PHONE: (602)965-8438.  FAX: (602)965-7331.