Download the rtf version of this file.

Summaries of the Eight Telecommunications Curriculum Projects

Index:

Introduction;

Core Propositions and Principles;

Linking Natcom 3 Outcomes and the Natcom 4 Projects Structure;

Project Model Components;

Summary of Projects:

• Designing investigations: National Science Week 2000;
  
• Seven Investigations of Sport;
  
• Aussie Action Online Projects;
  
• Screen capture;
  
• A Technology NetQuest;
  
• Mathematical Jukebox;
  
• Literacy TourBus;
  
• Thinking in another language - a communicative world classroom;
  

Introduction

This document summarises the telecommunications curriculum projects developed by the 8 Key Learning Area (KLA) associations.

Each telecommunications curriculum project makes use of models for online activities that were defined through the collaborative work of personnel representing the eight KLA associations during Natcom 3. It is significant to note that curriculum projects described here, make use of more than one model and can not be implemented without parallel development and implementation of other projects. Further, the projects' context and audience is within the professional communities that constructed them, and thus they need to be implemented within the professional associations activities which take advantage of wisdom resident across the associations and which contain communities of teachers who already work together to improve learning and teaching in an communications age context.

The projects should be considered as a means of creating and providing online content. These projects provide web-based information for teachers and students, generate information through activity, provide online activities to engage students and teachers in the learning process, engage learners in authentic contexts by linking them with expertise outside of education, and enable learners to manipulate the tools and resources only available in online environments. These definitions of online content are integrated within the project designs and the models from which these projects were written.

The projects should also be framed as professional development strategies. Participation in telecommunications curriculum projects provides an authentic context which embeds high-quality curriculum interpretation, modelled practice and professional community in a place where curriculum leaders and practitioners can generate and share professional knowledge. Telecommunications curriculum projects that have professional community embedded deeply within their design, are already adopted by systems and associations as a strategy to develop teachers' learning technology competencies.1. Telecommunications curriculum projects are powerful tools to change teaching practice and embed information technology into learning in relevant and forward thinking ways. A core belief inherent in the design of these projects is that they provide excellent models of professional development.

One collaborative professional development project, an Australian Teachers Thinktank provides a strategy to help curriculum leaders prepare to build the next generation of telecommunications curriculum projects. These teachers need to understand the goals and principles in the Australian Framework for an Information Economy. They are isolated from the conversations that develop such goals and are isolated from the communities where such dialogue occurs. They have therefore, little awareness of the rationales for the changes in thinking needed, to build a significant new national economy and Australian lifestyle. Further, they have little access to the workplaces and strategic management practices that will implement national information economy goals. Thus there is a distinct danger that teachers will implement learning technology goals in ignorance of the information economy context and not help the next generation of Australians learn the attitudes, skills and knowledge that are necessary to drive Australia forward. Thus all of these projects have a role to play in helping teachers understand the attitudinal shifts and the holistic changes in how businesses, government, consumers and citizens will learn, work and play. The online communities from these projects will link together through an Australian Teachers' Thinktank which will provide teachers with access to the global thinkers and the agents who are building the new information economy rationales. These ideas must be embedded in curriculum which is being currently being rewritten within the information technology frame.2

Thus ten projects have emerged from the models and core principles of the Natcom process in Natcom3. Eight telecommunications curriculum projects have been developed in themes from the KLA curriculum areas. One 'thinktank' professional development project will broaden the contexts from which teachers interpret curriculum. One coordination project will provide professional community for curriculum project managers and professional associations executive, enable economies of scale in development of tools to support teacher involvement and ensure that sharing expertise within collaborative teams causes the whole collection of new online content to be more valuable than the sum of the parts. These ten projects are interwoven in such a way they can not implemented separately.

Core propositions and principles

Linking Natcom 3 outcomes and the Natcom 4 Projects structure
An outcome of Natcom 3 was to develop some telecommunications curriculum models that could be used to develop online content through telecommunications projects for teachers and their classes. In developing the models, it became obvious that implementation issues and professional development were key themes. It also became apparent that online content and activity had to be developed to encourage teachers to participate, and that models to help teachers see the curriculum value of project activity, needed to be devised. In the proposed collection of projects, the processes for developing online content to support implementation and professional development have been extracted as separate models, though in projects they are implemented by each association. In addition, some associations are providing a lens across all projects to model alternative ways that teachers might value the role telecommunications curriculum project can have in delivering educational outcomes. The interconnected aspects of model parts within projects is difficult to explain in linear text.

All curriculum projects have three types of components:

activity and online content for students,

activity and online content for teachers and

the management tasks which ensures implementation supports the teachers and students involved in the project.

Some elements of curriculum projects rely on professional project models which have been defined during the Natcom process. For example a Literacy Walk and Numeracy Companion are integral to the tools teachers and project managers need while working with their students. Diagram 2, Project Model Components, illustrates the components which are likely to be included in telecommunications curriculum project models.

Project model components

Summary of projects
Each KLA association has built a suite of activities under a theme, drawing on the models developed during Natcom 3, and presented them as "a telecommunications curriculum project" for teachers in their professional communities. The projects have been developed collaboratively and partnerships between associations are evident in the project descriptions.

The projects are complex and a thematic approach draws the component parts into a series of linear processes. The projects specifically address concerns in Australian education about literacy, numeracy and learning technology approaches to the use of IT in curriculum. Within each project frame, professional development of teachers is paramount and integral to the design of projects and their implementation. A communities definition of the Internet which underpins the Natcom process, places prominence on professional communities of teachers, learning communities for students and reaching into the broader communities surrounding schools. The projects need also to address specific curriculum demands in the key learning area and do this in a context of the connectivity afforded in an information economy. This is further complicated by the demand to design projects which account for varying quality in connectivity options and access in schools and the need to nurture early-adopters as they push boundaries while also scaffolding learning for novice computer-using teachers.

These Natcom telecommunications curriculum projects have a number of unique characteristics. They include multiple projects models within the one project, something very rare globally and certainly unique in Australia. Activities are defined in terms of the curriculum project models and not presented as a smorgasbord of small unrelated activities. Online communities of teachers surround each project as a core professional development structure, and while this is significant in some existing Australian telecommunications projects, the Natcom extend professional community by encouraging participants to contribute to developing online content surrounding each project. The lens over each project from all KLA associations, the Literacy Walk and Numeracy Companion and interrelationships with non-educational groups will result in a powerful cross-curricula content model not yet developed or practiced in the country.

The implementation of all projects involves a defined process. The project will be defined in detail. Resources and tools will be developed. Trials and case studies will be undertaken and then content and designs refined to include the new knowledge and content. Thus professional content will be captured and shared, so ongoing implementations evolve in sophistication and improve educational practice.

Coordination between the stakeholders is essential as projects are developed and trialled. The Natcom Hub will feed ideas between project teams in KLA associations and collect expertise to share with others. The professional dialogue between Natcom participants is key to development of the next generation of telecommunications activity.

This section contains a summary of the projects and relates the projects to the broad telecommunications curriculum project models described briefly in the previous Appendix.

Designing investigations: National Science Week 2000
ASTA
Designing investigations is a project where students participate in a range of online and offline experiences while they design scientific investigation's and inventions. These investigations are shared with other students and become an essential source of online content for teachers seeking models for high-level investigations to use in science curriculum. The project aims to provide a constructivist environment where students work collaboratively to participate in managed episodes of open-ended authentic investigations. This project takes advantage of the National Science Week structure which is well supported and acknowledged in the educational community. It draws on the theme of Sport, encouraging students and teachers from a variety of curriculum areas to make use of National Science Week during the Olympics year, to focus activity and share designs for solving significant modern problems which drawing community attention during 2000.

This project is a major implementation of the Creative Investigations Design Model but also draws on the Aussie WebQuests project model and the Oz-Collections Model during the investigation process. In this project Literacy Walks will be conducted and a Numeracy Guide will help ASTA create considerable online content to support the embedded professional development model inherent in this project. ASTA will draw on the expertise within the Natcom Hub to develop, implement and review this project.

Designing Investigations will model the science investigations curriculum process and illustrate how telecommunications enriches this process. The process involves three parts: preparing to design, designing, and sharing the designs. During the pre-design phase, students will participate in an Aussie Netquest episode or oz- Collections episode to gather data in broad themes set by ASTA. A registration process will enable a project officer to build support teams between schools working on similar investigations or problems. During the investigations design phase, schools will be encouraged to make use of the data gathered and shared in phase one and draw on online expertise by hosting guests, conducting interviews, running online workshops via chat and inventing events using other synchronous tools. The results of these processes can be shared amongst support teams. In the third phase, students' investigations designs can be published and students can defend their designs with audio and text commentary. Support teams may offer critique of these designs. A specific online environment will have to be developed to organise contributions and provide easy ways for students to contribute.

By participating, teachers will experience professional development about using learning technology in science when undertaking significant project work with their classes. ASTA will provide online content which supports teachers while they are participating and conduct a case study of early trials for others to use. ASTA will draw on existing expertise about National Science Week activities and use the online communities from this project to collect content from teachers. A literacy walk will provide supportive online content and help teachers address literacy outcomes while implementing this project. A numeracy guide will provide teachers with ideas for working in a numeracy context.

A case study of the project will emerge as the activities of the project are recorded and the online professional community collaborate and build a support network. The case study may not be a separate activity but will evolve as the project unfolds within the public online environment.

A project officer will draw on ASTA's expertise to conceptualise the project, make use of Natcom hub to design and use online tools, initiate activity and collect resources and stories from teachers about their participation, as case study material for further professional development activities. ASTA will also build professional information by implementing the components of the Online Professional Content Model throughout the timeframe of this project and contribute to activities in the Natcom Hub.

Seven Investigations of Sport
ACHPER
Seven investigations is a project where students undertake a range of offline and online activities to participate in an online forum using an information literacy or other approach to social investigations. The seven curriculum areas which constitute the KLA of Health and Physical Education provide the topics or themes for the seven episodes of activity under the broad theme of sport, thus complementing ASTA's project and using the content from that project as a resource. The themes chosen will also make use of existing CD Rom and other materials produced nationally for teachers of HPE in previously funded projects. This project will connect the teachers and students using these materials together, while they implement social investigations and information literacy approaches in the KLA.

This project is a major implementation of the Australian Cultural Forum model, providing case studies of a number of adaptations within the model. In this project Literacy Walks will be conducted and a Numeracy Guide will help ACHPER create considerable online content to support the embedded professional development model inherent in this project. ACHPER will draw on the expertise within the Natcom Hub to develop, implement and review this project. Teachers in the ACHPER community will be encouraged to participate in the Australian Teachers Thinktank to extend their own thinking into a global context and to practice the arguments and processes that may be used in the Seven Investigations project.

Seven investigations will enable ACHER to model a number of approaches within the social investigations framework of 'Define the issue', 'Identify stakeholders', 'Build positions', 'Defend positions', 'Draw to conclusions'. In some episodes, an information literacy approach will enable students to dip into online content and other information sources as part of the investigative process. In other episodes, the Thinking Hats approach will help students play roles while they participate in online debates and discussions. Other episodes will encourage students to hypothesise rationales and predict future developments. It may be possible to draw on the oz- Collections and Aussie NetQuest models to implement stages of this social investigations process. In all episodes students will present and defend arguments with each other through Global Youth Forums, an existing technical infrastructure in oz-TeacherNet.

In episodes of this project, an ACHPER project officer will select a volunteer school to act as a host. The host will initiate activity, set the frame for discussion, initiate debate and offer to be a key subject of an evaluative case study. Other schools will join in by registering from a calendar of forums. Online activity occurs in three stages and parallels the curriculum approaches undertaken by teachers in their classrooms. In the first stage, students use the online forum structure to share their interpretation of the problem or issue and describe their plan . Students then work offline to develop roles, seek data and build positions. In this phase schools might make use of online guests, online content and remote peers. Results could be shared amongst participating schools. Positions, solutions or predictions are then shared online. The host school then critiques positions and asks students to defend their positions. Debate ensues until the host school closes the debate. The host school may ask participating schools to share their final positions, or ask a critical friend to comment on the quality of students arguments.

By participating, teachers will experience professional development about using learning technology in Health and Physical Education when undertaking significant project work with their classes. ACHPER will provide online content which supports teachers while they are participating and build case studies for others to use. An online community of participating teachers will be hosting dialogue while classes are engaged in activity.

ACHPER will draw on existing resources and use the online communities from this project to collect content from teachers. A literacy walk will provide supportive online content and help teachers address literacy outcomes while implementing this project. A numeracy guide will provide teachers with ideas for working in a numeracy context while collating data and debating issues.

Seven case studies of the project will emerge as the activities of the project are recorded and the online professional community collaborate and build a support network. The case studies may not be a separate activity but will evolve as the project unfolds within the public online environment.

A project officer will draw on ACHPER's expertise to conceptualise the project, make use of Natcom hub to design and use online tools, initiate activity and collect resources and stories from teachers about their participation, as case study material for further professional development activities. ACHPER will also build professional information by implementing the components of the Online Professional Content Model throughout the timeframe of this project and contribute to activities in the Natcom Hub.

Aussie Action Online Projects
AFSSSE
Download Full Project Description

Aussie action is a project where students use telecommunications networks to understand what it means to be citizen in Australia in the context of an information economy future. Students use these network in the process of developing local action. They either share the results of local community action they undertake or they initiate some online action. Through the project teachers are able to implement the social investigations model from SOSE syllabi and use online activity as stimulus, a way of engaging in the process and as an audience for debates and action. The project will draw on the issues and activities from the Discovering Democracy kit, distributed to all Australian schools. This project will build a community amongst users of the kit, use the material as content and add the discussion and audience to the kit which will bring it to life for students. By using telecommunications, this project will deliberately extend the students thinking into the global context and enable them to live the experience encouraged in the Discovering Democracy materials.

This project is a major implementation of the Australian Cultural Forum model, though it provides a significant extension where students host forums as product of their cultural investigation as the Action phase of their work. The Aussie NetQuest model will be used to help students develop a knowledgeable basis from which they can hosts debates with others students and with members of the community. A significant element of this model is that AFSSSE will collate online content about using telecommunications to extend the ideas in the Discovering Democracy Kit. In particular, Literacy Walks will be conducted and a Numeracy Guide will help teachers understand the numeracy interpretations of social investigations and how to use numeracy ideas to pose better questions, develop stronger rationales and explain positions. This project models a social investigations process between schools and thus is a professional development activity. AFSSSE will draw on the expertise within the Natcom Hub to develop, implement and review this project. Students developing online action as their action phase may make use of Global Youth Forums, an existing technical infrastructure in oz-TeacherNet. Teachers in the AFSSSE community will be encouraged to participate in the Australian Teachers Thinktank to extend their own thinking into a global context and to practice the arguments and processes that may be used in the Action Online project.

The Aussie Action project begins with a national professional development program which engages teachers in professional discussions about implementing telecommunications curriculum project in classrooms and helps them plan to implement the Aussie Action project. AFSSSE would develop some online content about implementing telecommunications projects, identifying issues and approaches within existing materials, using telecommunications tools and resources and classroom strategies.

The project episodes would begin with teachers registering their topic and school on a calendar of activities. This would draw audiences or partners for student-hosted debates. Teachers would use the NetQuest model to engage students in developing arguments for the variety of positions arising from their chosen issue. Students would publish their quests that would illustrate the links between positions and the resources online which could be used as evidence to defend or refute positions. Support from ALF to help students capitalise on the medium to convey meaning within a NetQuest structure would be essential support for students and their teachers. Students would then prepare to use the Global Youth Forums structure to host the action phase of their project. During this phase, students can debate with a known audience from their informed and broad position and offer to debate issues with community members and prominent Australians.

By participating, teachers will experience professional development about using learning technology within SOSE approaches to curriculum. AFSSSE will provide online content which supports teachers while they are participating and build case studies for others to use. An online community of participating teachers will be hosting dialogue while classes are engaged in activity.

AFSSSE will draw on existing resources and use the online communities from this project to collect content from teachers. A literacy walk will provide supportive online content and help teachers address literacy outcomes while implementing this project. A numeracy guide will provide teachers with ideas for working in a numeracy context while collating data and debating issues.

Project officers will draw on AFSSE expertise to conceptualise the project, make use of Natcom hub to design and use online tools, initiate activity and collect resources and stories from teachers about their participation, as case study material for further professional development activities. AFSSSE will also build professional information by implementing the components of the Online Professional Content Model throughout the timeframe of this project and contribute to activities in the Natcom Hub.

Screen capture
NAAE
Screen Capture is a project which encourages new forms of arts expression and communication and extend the ways arts-works by young people can be shared using technologies. Students will be engaged in building portfolios and contributing work to a digital gallery, performance or exhibit curated in ways that develop a critical community around digital forms and representation of art and expression. A range of online and offline activities will help identify and develop young digital artists and provide an online culture which supports new expression , provides a critical audience and a chance to observe and critique trends in digital art. A key element of this project is to provide online forums for young artists articulate their thinking and engage in metacognitive reflection, and to use e-zines as a medium for artists to share their stories and art in context.

This project is a major implementation of the Digital Portfolios Model but also draws on the structures within the Australian Cultural Forum Model. In this project Literacy Walks will be conducted and enhanced to include a variety of media and genre particular to the digital art and digital representations of art and communication. NAAE will draw on the expertise within the Natcom Hub to develop, implement and review this project.

Screen Capture provides the strategy for teachers to make use of learning technologies while addressing the core processes common in Arts curriculum: Artistic expression and communication, Metacognition about arts expression and communication, Responding to and evaluating arts and Recognising the role of the arts in society.

This project will initially have two major parts developed through a series of conceptually related but independent events. Each part will be developed concurrently. The first part, Building Digital Literacy in the Arts, will focus on helping students develop new forms of expression and communication through digital media, using digital, telecommunications and Internet technologies and to develop a supportive community of peers engaged in similar activities. It will involve identifying young digital artists, running real-time and online workshops, publishing an e-zine about new media expression. The second part, Making Digital Portfolios will focus on providing opportunities for new media to be shared through establishing a web site for the sharing of new media expression in dance, drama, media, music, visual arts and emerging forms such as multi-media. A further stage will involve curating new media exhibitions/performances so that when new audiences come to these sites, they are supported in understanding what is different and significant about the new forms of expression. In developing new forms of art, e-mail and discussion based forums will help young artists to articulate their thinking and reasons for making arts works using new technologies . It is likely that the e-zine could include examples and material that contributes to the cultural ferment and debate about the use of new technologies as forms of artistic expression.

A parallel activity will support teachers in accepting the new ideas about digital expression and provide them with an online peer community to sift through issues and share strategies to help students be involved. NAAE will provide online content which supports teachers while they are participating and develop a case study about some classes and individual students participation, for others to use. A literacy walk will provide supportive online content and help teachers address literacy outcomes while implementing this project.

A case study of the project will emerge as the activities of the project are recorded and the online professional community collaborate and build a support network. The case study may not be a separate activity but will evolve as the project unfolds within the public online environment.

A project officer will draw on NAAE's expertise to conceptualise the project, make use of Natcom hub to design and use online tools, initiate activity and collect resources and stories from teachers about their participation, as case study material for further professional development activities. NAAE will also build professional information by implementing the components of the Online Professional Content Model throughout the timeframe of this project and contribute to activities in the Natcom Hub.

A Technology NetQuest
TEFA
Technology NetQuest is a project which will enable students to use technologies and the technology process of design, make, and appraise , while working on information and technology problems. Students will use the NetQuests products of other students and those developed specifically for the project as a model for unravelling and constructing problems. Students will also make use of the NetQuest process to understand problems, achieve the outcomes of the information strand of technology syllabuses and express solutions to technology problems. Communications technologies enable students to work with others during this process Netquest makes use of the scaffolded strategies inherent in the Webquest strategies built by Bernie Dodge and Tom March.

The project would at first involve a small trial group of 5-6 teachers and their classes undertaking a NetQuest to explore the interaction of the built and natural environments, the problems created and possible solutions. This can best be described by the focus question - How do people apply technology and solve problems created by the interactions of built and natural environments?

Students have to investigate:

• the problem solving process how to identify a problem, the steps taken to solve a problem
• how similar problems are solved by experts
• the successful and unsuccessful use of technology
• the steps taken by others in similar situations connecting with schools globally to compare local environment problems
• the local environmental context of the posed problem in relation to the problem solving model, and develop their own problem solving approach appropriate to this context
• the environmental conflict from a range of perspectives. This might involve students role-playing these perspectives

Students then use the technology process to develop their own solutions to the problem, and present them to receive feedback from stakeholders and other project partners. Students will make use of the scaffolded activities of NetQuest structures to gradually develop skills to develop complex questions and organise data around complex problems.

The students work and commentaries by teachers would provide a walk-through model for various groups in TEFA to implement more widely in a variety of situations. Other groups within the Natcom community would also use their highly structured and developed case study of integrating a telecommunications curriculum project model structure, into the processes normally undertaken in curriculum areas.

Following the trial process, TEFA would provide consultancy to Natcom and TEFA associations about implementing NetQuest processes as curriculum and professional development processes. TEFA would also implement a number of episodes of NetQuests with the curriculum areas which constitute the technology umbrella.

A project officer will draw on TEFA's expertise to conceptualise the project, make use of Natcom hub to design and use online tools, initiate activity and collect resources and stories from teachers about their participation, as case study material for further professional development activities. TEFA will also build professional information by implementing the components of the Online Professional Content Model throughout the timeframe of this project and contribute to activities in the Natcom Hub.

Mathematical Jukebox
AAMT
Mathematical Jukebox is a project that provides a smorgasbord of mathematical modelling problems for students to solve in monthly brackets. Students will use communications technologies to work collaboratively to solve problems, share solutions and critique the processes and solutions of peers. Students will be encouraged to share problems they wish to pose, on the next monthly bracket. The monthly brackets on the jukebox will provide students of multiple ages and abilities with problems to solve mathematically and will enable AAMT to illustrate exemplar modelling problems and help teachers consider new kinds of mathematical problems that are emerging because of the information economy context and connectivity. In particular some problems in each bracket will be posed to extend the gifted children who enjoy problem solving. These problems may also engage children with home computers. The project will provide teachers with professional development in teaching strategies to help students solve problems using mathematical knowledge and processes as well as provide significant model of high-level problems to engage students of all ages and mathematical abilities. In particular problems centred around the new technologies of the Internet will be developed and students will encouraged to reflect on the impact of this medium on creating new types of problems, on new ways for collaboratively solving problems and new ways of sharing problems and solutions.

This project is a major implementation of the Tech-Problem solving model but also may in some jukebox problems, draw on the Oz-Collections model or the Australian Cultural Forums model. In this project Literacy Walks will be conducted to teachers support students describing the rationales for their problems solving processes and to communicate solutions of problems. AAMT will draw on the expertise within the Natcom Hub to develop, implement and review this project.

Mathematical Jukebox provides the strategy for teachers to make use of learning technologies while addressing the core modelling and mathematical processes common in Mathematics curriculum. The project also encourages making use of online resources, using online communities as problems solving and advisory teams and using online environments to build and share solutions.

A number of projects will be added to the web-based Jukebox each month. Classes and individual students will register to work on a problem. Students will be encouraged to make use of the online tutors assigned to each problem and participate in the activities organised by this tutor. This might involve forming online partners to step through problems, interviewing experts online, seeking online information and asking problems or collecting data. Students will be encouraged to share their solutions online in a Jukebox store and add commentary to their solutions. The tutor will then build activities which encourage students to critique the range of solutions.

Case studies of how teachers use the Mathematical jukebox will be conducted. The level of tutors interaction with students usual teacher can vary between close to zero (particularly in the case of extension and training problems) and substantial (where the online activity is cast as core class work, with the teacher and tutor working together. This provides for significant professional development potential and an rich source of models for teachers taking increasing facilitator roles in mathematics classrooms.

A project officer will draw on AAMT's expertise to conceptualise the project, make use of Natcom hub to design and use online tools, initiate activity and collect resources and stories from teachers about their participation, as case study material for further professional development activities. AAMT will also build professional information by implementing the components of the Online Professional Content Model throughout the timeframe of this project and contribute to activities in the Natcom Hub.

Literacy TourBus
ALF
Literacy TourBus is a project that enables students to investigate genre and language in traditional and new media, and express their understanding of them in graphical form. These representations will be shared on a virtual tour which collects digital portfolios of representations from schools. The resultant gallery of literacy images and the stories collected on tour, provide a rich source of ideas for students' literacy activities and for professional development. Literacy TourBus also visits the projects of Natcom, conducting literacy walks which result in a Literacy Walk Development Model for others to use, a collection of literacy tools for teachers to use to help children develop literacy skills and a digital portfolio of literacy activities in curriculum projects to take "on tour".

The project will begin by working with a few teachers to help them develop curriculum programs where children construct their images of various genre and language in graphic form. This high level abstraction of the structure and meaning of language and literacy, expressed graphically, will model the first contributions to the Digital Portfolios sent on the TourBus. During this time, online tools to enable children to portray and explain their images will be developed. In this process the concept of screen literacy will influence designs and alter the genre in which children are publishing abstractions of their thoughts and activities.

ALF will simultaneously conduct literacy walks with other telecommunications curriculum projects and Natcom associations activities. These examples will be added to the TourBus along with a case study of their development. A web site will capture the essence of the gallery of literacy products available on the TourBus.

An online community of teachers concerned with literacy and language, will add initial content to the tour bus. This content will consist of tools teachers use to help children develop literacy skills as well as models for use of learning technology processes to develop literacy skills. Teachers in the community will then offer to host the bus and a tour will develop. The project officer will accompany the bus on its virtual tour, working intensely with a school for a short period of time. As the bus tours, the previous host will help the project officer work with teachers and classes at the new destination. This is a professional development strategy and a way of providing audience for students literacy investigations, ideas and products.

While the TourBus is being hosted at a school, teachers will be invited to add resources to the bus, run professional development about literacy in curriculum areas and add a digital portfolio of their activities to the bus for others to enjoy. Students will be invited to put their digital portfolios of graphical and other representations of language and genre to the bus. Teachers and students will be working with peers from the previous host at this time to add different contributions to the tour and to learn how to participate in the process.

It is anticipated that once there is sufficient content for the professional development and literacy activities and as communities develop that several TourBuses could operate, thus reaching more teachers. This model would be an excellent strategy for regional or district literacy consultants in schools and for activities in the member associations of ALF.

A project officer will draw on ALF's expertise to conceptualise the project, make use of Natcom hub to design and use online tools, initiate activity and collect resources and stories from teachers about their participation, as case study material for further professional development activities. ALF will also build professional information by implementing the components of the Online Professional Content Model throughout the timeframe of this project and contribute to activities in the Natcom Hub.

Thinking in another language - a communicative world classroom
AFMLTA
Download Full Project Description

Thinking in another language involves helping Australian children extend their language skills to a point where they think in the target language during a problem solving process while communicating about the problem and problem solving process with remote classes, some which may be natives of that language. The project will match international classes and their teachers with Australian schools. Students will investigate a common problem and collaboratively develop a "digital portfolio" or "Netquest" in the target language of their solutions and investigative process. Students will also participate in an evaluative phase where they conduct walks or galleries of solutions and provide expert commentary on the solutions. AFMLTA will trial the process with six schools and build a 5 stage professional development model for teachers participating with their classes. Teacher resources and online communities will be developed during this trial. The result will be a duplicable model with sets of professional development materials and tools available to support teachers wanting to engage in this project with their classes.

This project is a major implementation of the Digital Portfolio model and the Aussie Netquest model. A number of variations are possible and matched teachers will vary the implementation processes to suit their circumstances. In this project a Literacy walk will help teachers identify literacy opportunities through the project in the target language. Further a numeracy companion will remind teachers of the numeracy orientations which can help students engage in debate as part of their problem solving process. Development of professional development materials will be significant as pairs of teachers will need to collaboratively design their activities. An online community to discuss teaching strategies to help children think in the target language will be imperative.

Thinking in another language will enable AFMLTA to investigate a number of models for social investigations, and other problem solving processes inside of the various curriculum documents from foreign language courses. AFMLTA will investigate the degree of structure teachers want prescribed and develop a series of models for undertaking collaborative investigations and publications. A digital portfolio model will enable schools to provide multiple contributions and enable other schools to draw from the portfolios when solving problems. Unique to this project is the use of the portfolios in the Evaluation Phase of the project where students will develop walks through portfolios or undertake a curator role, choose the best examples of ideas that solve the problems. This creates an audience for the student portfolios and web publishing as well as a critical community of peers. AFMLTA will investigate classroom models that support this level of activity that is all conducted in the target language.

Professional development for teachers interested in using international schools to support language teaching and other curriculum processes in foreign language programs is essential if teachers are to know what to do with their partner school. This project involves the teachers collaboratively planning before their classes start communicating and provides a curriculum framework which extends far beyond the limitations of the "penpals in another language" practices often tried in schools. Thus development of materials during a trial is an important phase before there is sufficient online content and help to support teachers initiating international exchanges. Online content will also be generated by working collaboratively with other associations to identify curriculum activities, particularly literacy and numeracy activities. Online communities will help develop contemporary content and provide "just-in-time" help for those practical logistical problems.

A project officer will help design the process, develop the trial and use it to develop extensive online professional and curriculum material. This officer will develop a matching service model and help devise sophisticated curriculum models which help teachers facilitate thinking in target languages. The experience of this project will enrich the knowledge of the Natcom hub and provide valuable support to other projects.

1. Learning technology competencies are defined by state systems as teachers skills (knowledge, non-technical and technical skills and attitudes) that are important when using information technology with students to achieve for curriculum goals.

2. This document uses the term information technology (IT) to encompass information and communications technologies used in the community and is compatible with the definitions used that NOIE (1998) , NBEET (1998).