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Who needs that?
Of course, many instructional web sites can be found by using search engines.
But as far as my experience goes, this is not a very efficient way. -
And for many of the kids (and the teachers) this kind of access is pretty useless.
If instructional web sites expect to be looked up during school tasks
they should create some means to find them in the cyperspace - within a couple of seconds or minutes.
What a smart guide should supply
Direct and fast access
The guide itself has to be found easily in the cyberspace.
Links from the (mostly national) school web sites may help.
And the guide has to show up in all the search engines - covering many keywords.
Graphic interface
The guide has to present some sort of graphically designed interface:
a graphic setup with short explanatory texts.
The visual elements of the interface have to provide navigation thru the offerings of the site.
Self adjusting interface
A very smart interface should be able to adapt to the web literacy of the users:
- simple edition for beginners,
- more sophisticated version for experts.
The level of complexitiy can be choosen e.g. by clicking in a list of radio buttons.
Sophisticated input interface for queries
Before presenting a selection of links,
the guide has to treat the wishes of the users:
- subject field (e.g. short stories, grammar, vocabulary),
- level of skills (e.g. for beginners, intermediate, advanced learners),
- level of complexity (e.g. just abstract, full text, with/without integrated help),
- time to spend (e.g. covering how many hours of work),
- kind of response (e.g. presenting a html-page, download a pdf-file, download a executable file - for which platform).
Interface for collecting and displaying feedbacks
The guide should be able to gather evaluation statements of the users
having visited a instructional web site.
And as a result of this feature, a smart guide has to be able to present the evaluating feedbacks
submitted by other users before -
eventually together with recommendations of instructional experts.
Caution! As research on evaluation of instructional software shows:
learners and teachers may have a completely contrary impression of the same bit of software or of the same program.
How creating such a smart guide?
Of course, there has to be created a web site somewhere on the web.
With quite a few ingredients:
News and hilites
What's new in this educational field?
Short reports on trends, first experiences with them.
Short reports from congresses, research publications.
Contacting experts
Facilities for contacting persons and institutions working in the same field.
Persons providing help for teachers, trainers, learners, and parents.
Online tutorials
Tutorials about new or more demanding topics of this educational domain.
Introductions to collaborative learning, overview of rated software for computer aided learning and instruction.
New media
Presentations of new media for teachers, students and/or parents.
Books, periodicals, CD-ROMs, software and hardware.
Example: L2
Lets have a closer look into the educational domain of L2 - second language learning, langue deux.
Persons working in this field might wish to find on such a web site:
News from recent research projects
Informations about new results showing more efficient means of learning languages.
Results of tested methods, in order to compare efficiency of the different approaches.
This part has to present very short and fast readable informations.
Like a sort of a commentated index.
Links lead to more detailed informations as supplied in reports or tutorials.
Tour thru some of the core zines
What their recent issues offer, where to get them.
Since periodicals provide many usefull informations about recent research projects,
about new publications, about handy materials for every day use in class,
they have to be presented regularly on such a specific web site.
The different media - print media and electronic media - can support each other
in the intention to improve instruction and learning.
Contact database
Updated by the users/websurfers and by the site administrator(s).
A highly developped database can contribute its share to the network of this educational domain.
Anybody will be able to find new and more contacts for resolving the actual problem in instruction or in learning.
Tutorials, introductions, and backgrounds
About hot topics -
like
Leastening comprehension.
Presentations
Of new books, new web sites, new training software:
short overview, pros and cons, features, price, ordering online.
Of course, this specialized web site will devolop according the demands of its users.
More topics or group of topics will be added.
The development has to follow on the one hand the trends of the learning field L2,
and on the other hand the expectations of the people consulting this site.
The goal should remain the same
Provide selected informations in a useful and fast way -
with additional hooks for deeper queries..
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Chris Mueller (prolingua@access.ch)