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Visions of the future   Students at Enid High School take learning into their own hands and lead their K-12 community to the Internet.   By Terry Sacket

y vision began in 1994, when the Board of the Enid Education Foundation (EEF) asked administrators and subject matter consultants for proposals--they wanted to know how we thought they should spend foundation money to better education in Enid. After a brainstorming session with other teachers in the district, we knew that we wanted to connect the schools and that we wanted students and teachers to serve as a resource for the community. At the time, though, we did not know how this would work. The Internet was not connected to our district computer system and such a connection was not considered a possibility.        I joined forces with Phyllis Maupin, the math supervisor, and Pat Davis, the media center consultant, to write a proposal to connect the high school to the Internet. The foundation saw some merit in the proposal, and we received a $2,102 grant. The funds were spent on a basic computer, a Phone Blaster, and Internet access for the Enid High School media center.

ll of the sudden, we were surfing the wave of Internet enthusiasm with no idea how to stay on the board. Thanks to our district, Phyllis Maupin, Pat Davis, and I attended an Internet workshop at Oklahoma State University. We realized instantly the potential the Internet offered, and our initial belief that the connecting the schools would be a great leap forward were confirmed. From that point on, we knew there would be no better way to reach our education goals, and we were determined to bring this valuable resource to others in the district.

	uring the next year, reality set in. Because money was scarce, the Internet would only be accessible in each of the four secondary sites. Also, we found that teachers had nominal to zero knowledge or expectations of what the Internet could do. They presumed the knowledge required for getting students and themselves on the Net would take too much time and effort to be worthwhile. The typical observation was, "I don't have a computer in my room, let alone Internet access. Even if I did, how would I be able to use one machine with 23 students?"
	We had to find ways to circumvent these issues, or the project would fail. After much thought and discussion, we decided we needed to draw on the most valuable and plentiful resource available: students. We identified students willing to serve as library assistants at each secondary site. A variety of students participated, from techie types to the educationally challenged. Setting up the Internet might be new to the educators, but it wasn't to most of these students. I had John, one of the Enid High School assistants, traveling and trouble shooting problems that would crop up with the browsers. Other students were assigned to work on homepages for school sites. These kids were learning! As a result, student-to-teacher mentoring reduced some surfing anxiety, and money expenditures on equipment and connections were optimized.

hat a year of learning for us all! Out of ignorance, my expectations of what these few kids could accomplish within their assigned blocks was too high. Much of the time, they were on their own, with little guidance. They learned about the Internet, and I learned what not to do. There were not enough students, hours, or quality instruction sessions, and the conclusion I came to was that there would have to be an Internet class and an Internet teacher.        Fortunately, the administration agreed to the new teacher assignments and the addition of the Internet to the high school curriculum. A digital camera, a flatbed scanner, and Adobe Photoshop were purchased in time for summer school. I could test the waters before the fall session began.

y approach to this Internet summer school class was somewhat unorthodox. Initially, I demonstrated how to manipulate images, use the hardware, and create Web pages with HTML. After those brief introductions, students were on their own. Ninety percent of instruction included cooperative learning, trial and error, and a lot of self-motivated problem solving. Half the time I'd be the one asking, "How did you do that?!" An easy class to facilitate, I settled down to enjoy using the Internet for the first time.        The students identified which sections of the Enid High School Web documents needed work. I simply walked around, learning with the kids. I focused on the big picture, while they focused on their own individual elements. Ron and Kurt brought their own computers from home, because these machines were more productive with HTML. Bart worked on the EHS graphic for one week and then concluded that it would not work. I thought it a nifty piece of art work, but what expertise did I have to say he was wrong? I enjoyed seeing his mind work as we reasoned it out. Bart and I decided together not to use the graphic.

fter the pilot course, the vision came more into focus. I knew it was something within our reach. I envisioned small groups of students traveling to all 15 elementary and junior high schools and working with administrators, teachers, and students to make Web pages for individual programs. Groups would also visit other school districts and non-profit organizations. Students taking both speech and the Internet class would provide Internet training for patrons and teachers. Students would be responsible for setting up appointments, determining the right questions to ask, and evaluating whether information provided to them would work in a Web document. They would be the teachers, not me. Student creativity, problem solving, and collaboration would be the focus. I envisioned some students mastering animation, others Java, and still others, communication skills. They had to work together and exchange information in order for the project to work.

was now starting the 1996-1997 school year with four sections of the Internet class and more than 70 students. I still did not have Internet access in the lab, but it was coming--soon, I hoped! The multimedia hardware and software was up and running. The biggest problem was not the technology, it was the mind set of the students. They had been trained most of their school lives to expect traditional teaching styles, and they wanted me to fit into the same mold.

The Enid High School center for Web production.

he first assignment helped change their expectations. I said, "Here is the digital camera, flatbed scanner, Video Blaster, Photoshop, and instructions created by my summer school students. The instructions include visual graphics to assist you. I want you to generate a picture from each. Include an explanation of how you created each image. Print it out. Get into groups of three or four. It's due in two weeks. Start now."        When they got past the frustration of having to think for themselves, they started producing. We quickly covered Web organization, layout, story boarding, and HTML. We evaluated school sites on the Web and made a to-do list. Finally, we developed a script for interviewing people in the district who wanted Web pages. Four weeks into the year we were ready to provide our services. Students went to all of the school sites to interview principals about their schools. I couldn't have been more proud of the way they handled the interviews. Information was gathered and Web page production began.

till, something wasn't right. We took the important first step of involving the principals, but we really needed to talk with the teachers and students at each school. The final product would have to be presented so that the classroom teacher and their students appeared to have developed the page. We had to make the students and teacher look good, not ourselves. Also, in order to instill ownership, each school site had to have a bigger role in making its homepage. To do this without taking weeks of my students time was impossible. Access to all teachers and students at each school site would be needed in order to solve this problem.        To address this issue, my kids developed the idea of a Web display. Each school site would have their own form of a Web display located in their media center. Kathy, Dennis, Emma, Jessy, and Audrey explained this idea to selected teachers from each school site. These students were a lean, mean machine when working with teachers. The phrase, "If you want something done right, do it yourself," did not apply to this group at all. They freely discussed the Internet, layout, and how they wanted to develop links with the teachers and classrooms.

ver the next month, the teachers and students were given the opportunity to modify their own Web display. We hoped that, despite not having access to the Internet, students could still play a major role in developing their school's Web documents. They would tell us how to do it. By the beginning of second semester, the elementary and junior high Web productions were in full swing.        Meanwhile, for the other 55 students, activities began to diverge. I gave the students the option of defining their own projects. Almost all of the kids were ready to go. John had long been doing Web pages. He really didn't need me, an educator who knew less than he did, to show him the wonders of the Web. Neither was I interested in wasting his time. After we got past our preconceived expectations of one another, he was able do what he did best. He took the initiative and created the front end Web document for Enid High School, setting up frames and supervising the linkage to the EHS home page.

aquel, Mary, Ken, and James in my third block were busy working on the "Meadowlake Watershed Protection Program." This program was an EPA-funded study, and Enid High School was the leading volunteer-monitoring organization. The Internet was the logical avenue through which to share the data with other involved school sites. Through e-mail we were able to exchange questions and comments with the Oklahoma Water Resources Board (OWRB), using Quatro Pro-produced images and tables. The Chemistry and Biology II classes would go out and gather the data, and my students Pedro, Elizabeth, and Linda would compile it. The Web pages included maps, pictures, student activities, data, OWRB information, animation, and soon-to-be-online tutorials demonstrating data collection.

The Enid High School home page provides information for students, teachers, and parents, and features a virtual tour of the campus.

ike, Jake, and Bob took on the job of maintaining Web documents for my physics class. They compiled their classmates' data into graphical form so that it could be viewed using Acrobat Reader. They included pictures, lab reports, data tables, suggestions for collaborative activities, and soon-to-be-interactive physics simulations. Dave and Sam took charge of the Enid High School virtual tour. They were the masters at creating clickable images and the source to go to for advice about this.        Tom and Tad, my two foreign exchange students, started working on a Teen Culture Exchange document. This contained a small list of questions directed at teens. The questions could be replied to by kids anywhere in the world. With these questions in mind, brief essays from teenagers from all countries were solicited through e-mail. With the aid of foreign exchange students and our foreign language department, these essays were written in multiple languages.        Abe and Richard had their own little project. They adopted Leonardo's Discovery Warehouse. The best thing I did for them was stay out of their way. They had tunnel vision. Abe was coming in weekly to try to finish the homepage. These two soon realized that with Web documents, there was not such a thing as done. These documents would have to be continually modified.

eanwhile, John assisted me with the Internet class Web pages. With the Internet class, I didn't need to buy textbooks. All of the curriculum materials were already on the Net: HTML tutorials, plug-ins, graphics. I did not need to type up worksheets or anything else. The Internet class Web page has links to all of the directions taken by students, increasing the depth of curriculum materials for future classes. The class was like an online publishing company, with its products formed out of the collaborations of youthful minds. All I needed to do, on occasion, was press the reset button for a couple of students, and they were off and running. Even the six or seven students that had a little trouble connecting with others stayed busy updating our link directories or completing some other necessary, repetitive task. Every student was needed.        The time line of how things would progress changed. Building a Web site from the ground up for a K-12 community would have to be done in phases, and it would take at least a year. By February, our Web documents were online, but this only reflected what was done in the first semester. Portions are still under construction, and this may always be the case.

y vision of what my kids can do with Internet will never be static. Because of the innovations that spring from young minds, each semester will have a different focus, and the projects undertaken will take new and unexpected directions. The Internet has made individualized learning a real possibility, and I thank my students for showing me that the initial vision of connected classrooms in Enid is not an illusion.

Terry Sacket is a teacher in Enid, Oklahoma. Read more about this author. Teacher Testimony authors are nominated by people like you. Send nominations to the editor. © 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000 SCR*TEC.   This page is Bobby Approved.