LUCID-A New Model for Computer-Assisted Instruction in Chemistry

为了应对社会、技术和世界经济的快速变化，学生们需要成为快速学习者、批判性思考者和问题解决者。他们需要精通计算机，并在沟通、团队合作、管理和评估方面技能娴熟。超越单一学科的基本概念的综合知识是必不可少的。为了获得这些特质，学生需要积极参与学习、思考、解决问题、与他人合作、交流自己的成就、评估他人的成就、反思自己的表现、制定改进策略，并记录自己的成长。传统的教学方法和支持它们的软件产品专注于展示和评估，而不是解决这些问题。我们正在开发一种计算机辅助教学的新模式。这个模型体现在一系列名为LUCID的活动和工具中，即通过基于计算机的交互式发现进行学习和理解。这些问题正在通过本项目的目标加以解决。1. 开发创新的基于web的工具，这些工具可以被教育软件开发人员用来支持基于团队的学习、报告以及同伴和自我评估活动。2. 提供一系列基于网络的活动，包括一整年普通化学的代表性主题，作为在课程开发和教学中使用这些工具的模型。3. 开发创作工具以支持其他学科中类似材料的开发。为了实现这些目标，我们正在将当前基于PC局域网的软件移植到Web上，将我们的功能封装在Java组件中，为课程元素和学生作业开发数据库，并改进和扩展我们当前的活动集。我们的读者包括中学和大专学生、教师、课程开发人员和教育软件开发人员。虽然这个项目的主要目的是将技术融入教育，但我们的活动设计解决了多样性问题，我们的传播计划涉及教师发展。来自许多其他机构的教师正在与我们合作，开发、实施、评估和传播正在制作的材料。

To be prepared for the rapid changes occurring in society, technology, and the world economy, students need to become quick learners, critical thinkers, and problem solvers. They need to become computer literate and skillful in communicating, teamwork, management, and assessment. An integrated knowledge of fundamental concepts beyond a single discipline is essential. To acquire these attributes, students need to actively engage in learning, thinking, problem solving, working with others, communicating their accomplishments, assessing the accomplishments of others, reflecting on their performance, developing strategies to improve, and documenting their growth. Traditional teaching methods and the software products supporting them are focused on presentation and evaluation and are not addressing these issues. We are developing a new model for computer-assisted instruction. This model is embodied in a set of activities and tools named LUCID, for Learning and Understanding through Computer-based Interactive Discovery.These issues are being addressed through the objectives of this project. 1. Develop innovative Web-based tools that can be used by educational software developers to support team-based learning, reporting, and peer and self-assessment activities. 2. Provide a series of Web-based activities encompassing representative topics across a full year of general chemistry to serve as a model for employing such tools in curriculum development and teaching. 3. Develop authoring tools to support the development of similar materials in other disciplines.To achieve these objectives we are porting our current PC LAN-based software to the Web, encapsulating our functionality in Java components, developing databases for curricular elements and student work, and improving and extending our current set of activities. Our audience includes secondary and post-secondary students, teachers, curriculum developers, and educational software developers. While the primary thrust of this project is to integrate technology into education, our activity design addresses issues of diversity, and our dissemination plan involves faculty development. Faculty from a number of other institutions are working with us to develop, implement, assess, and disseminate the materials that are being produced.