David M. Marcovitz, Ph.D.

Education Department, Loyola College in Maryland, Baltimore, MD, USA

Email: marco@loyola.edu

Teachers use Internet projects with their classes for a variety of reasons. Some have broad objectives, such as adding a technology component to their curriculum or motivating their students. Others have specific curricular objectives. In many cases, broad or specific objectives are met by Internet projects, and in many cases they are not.

In this ongoing study, I am communicating with teachers who have participated in Internet projects with their classes. The classes range from K-12 and include public and private schools, single-grade and multi-grade classrooms, and regular classroom teachers and resource specialists. I am specifically looking at three Internet projects: The World Weather Watch (http://youth.net/weather/), Signs of Autumn/Signs of Spring (Signs, http://www1.minn.net/~schubert/ssf/), and Global Learning and Observation to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE, http://www.globe.gov/). Each has students observe the environment as the seasons change. World Weather Watch and Signs require little or no training and a minimal commitment of time and effort on the part of participating classes. GLOBE requires teachers to attend training for five days, requires daily measurements that conform to scientific protocols, and requires approximately $500 of equipment.

In World Weather Watch, students gather sunrise/sunset times, high/temperatures, and a general description of weather conditions each Wednesday during the project. This information is shared with all participants. Additionally, each class is paired with a partner class in a different climatic zone, and partners email their data to each other. A discussion board is provided at the project web site for group discussions. World Weather Watch is open to students in grades K-12, but over two-thirds of the participants are in elementary classrooms.

In Signs, students make weekly observations about the changing seasons for four weeks in the fall or spring. Observations, stories, and pictures are sent to the project coordinator who compiles an electronic magazine (e-zine) each week. Students compare their seasonal changes to others by looking at and discussing the e-zine. The project also suggests several extension activities to supplement the observations made. Signs is open to classrooms in grades K-6.

In GLOBE students collect one or more types of data on a daily basis according to specific scientific protocols. Weather data, for example, must be collected at solar noon each day, including weekends and holidays. The data is posted to the GLOBE web site and can be viewed by participants in various formats, including scientific visualization software. Participating teachers are given an "Implementation Guide" with a variety of learning activities and protocols for collecting and using the data. GLOBE offers opportunities to discuss the project with scientists who are using the data. GLOBE is open to classrooms in grades K-12 and includes lesson plans and activities appropriate for all grade levels.

Overall, participating teachers were very happy with the projects. Most reported that their objectives were and they hoped to participate in the project again. Nearly all teachers reported some problems. Some of the problems were viewed as obstacles to overcome and others interfered with some or all of the objectives of the project. In this paper, I describe some of the obstacles and successes that the teachers encountered.

This informal qualitative study involved sending electronic mail surveys to participants in each of the three projects studied. The questions were modified for each project to include one or two questions that related to the specific project. The questions asked of GLOBE participants were: "How did you find out about the project? What were your objectives for participating in this project? Were they met? Did you have any problems? What did you do with the data that was collected from your class and from the entire project? Did you participate in any of the Learning Activities? Have you participated in this or other Internet projects in the past? If so, which projects? Did your students benefit from the fact that the data was being used for real scientific purposes, or would it have been just as beneficial to have participated in a data collection project that was not linked to scientific study? Was the project worthwhile for your class?" As results were received, each respondent was sent an electronic mail message of thanks, and some respondents were asked follow-up questions.

For World Weather Watch, 5 out of 9 teachers surveyed responded. World Weather Watch includes approximately 70 classrooms each session. World Weather Watch was used as a pilot for this study. I was concerned that teachers would be disturbed to receive unsolicited email. I was pleased to find that no one who responded complained about unsolicited email, and many were pleased that I had found their work on the web (and disappointed that more people had not sent them email about their project).

For the Signs Project, 12 out of 29 teachers responded to my survey.

For GLOBE, 59 out of 237 teachers surveyed responded. GLOBE includes hundreds of teachers from the United States and all over the world. About one-third of GLOBE participants in the United States were surveyed. No participants from outside the United States were surveyed.

The respondents to the survey do not reflect a random sample, and the responses are not used for any statistical analysis. Those responding are more likely to be technically savvy (at a minimum, they must have entered correct email addresses for the project, and they must have read and responded to an email message). Many of the respondents were excited to share their success stories so those who were unsuccessful with the projects might have been less likely to respond. Responses from participants were analyzed for common themes as well as unique stories to serve as a roadmap for the possibilities and the pitfalls a classroom teacher might encounter when undertaking an Internet project.

The vast majority of teachers reported that the project in which they participated was successful, meeting or exceeding their expectations. As one GLOBE teacher reported, "The GLOBE program has surpassed my original expectations, which were to have students participate in a project that would represent real science, doing what real scientist do.... The extra benefits we have reaped: my students have participated in GLOBE chats with the real scientists, we have downloaded information from our own archives which has enabled us to see patterns about how the earth's systems are connected, we have also used our data to make predictions concerning El Nino weather patterns."

Most teachers reported problems along the way. Some of these problems were obstacles that were overcome while others limited how well the objectives of the project were met. Problems fell into five categories: time and management, technology, curriculum, communication, and other. These categories are not strict and many overlapped, but they help give a sense of the kinds of problems teachers encountered.

Time and management problems were the most commonly reported problems. These included problems of not having enough time for the project, not having the appropriate time for the project (e.g., temperature readings needing to be taken at a certain time that did not coincide with class time), and general issues of managing students as they did the project.

Both World Weather Watch and GLOBE required readings to be taken at specific times (temperatures at solar noon, for example) or on specific days of the week. In addition, GLOBE weather readings were required every day, including weekends and holidays. This was a burden for many teachers. As one GLOBE teacher reported, "It has also been difficult at times to collect data on the weekends. Students are not always able to come in since their families have other activities on the weekends (like soccer games that are also occurring at solar noon)." Another GLOBE teacher who could not have readings taken over the summer was disappointed because she thought the summer readings would be beneficial.

While many teachers reported problems with collecting data regularly, some viewed this as an opportunity to teach responsibility. One teacher, whose class missed very few days over a two year span of taking measurement for GLOBE, reported that her success was due to her emphasis that science included making sacrifices. In addition, she offered extra credit for weekend and holiday measurements. Other GLOBE teachers found that using more experienced students and parents as helpers alleviated the burden on the teacher: "So that we don't all have to go out to the weather station each day, I have trained two former science students, upper classmen, who come to my two Earth Science classes and take two kids out to the weather station to do the measurements, then to the multi-media lab to enter the data.... It works perfectly. During the summer, I train parents to take over, so I can take a break. On weekends during the school year, I record the data, since I live only 3 miles from school." One GLOBE teacher found that this helped raise the self-esteem of the student who was helping out.

Other teachers reported a more general concern for lack of time, fitting the project into an already packed day. As one GLOBE teacher stated, "My only problem has been finding enough time! (Isn't that everyone's complaint?) Our schedule is so packed (5th grade) and there are so many extra programs they are supposed to participate in: DARE, Jr. Achievement, Here's Looking at You 2000, H.E.A.T., Ropes, etc."

Because of the flexibility of the curriculum, many specialists and resource teachers found Internet projects to be worthwhile, but specialists had the problem that they did not see the students regularly enough.

Many of the time and management problems limited the impact of the project, often to a few students. This was due to schedules that did not coincide with the time for taking readings and the fact that an entire class does not need to go to a weather station to take a single temperature reading. Some teachers used rotating schedules so different groups of students took readings each day. In one case, more than one group took readings each day, but only one group's readings were "official" and used for the project. Other teachers simply limited who could participate in the project. A GLOBE participant responded: "The major concern I have involves the actual number of students who participate in the program. I begin the year training all of my students how to perform the atmospheric protocols.... The protocols must be completed during solar noon. Only three of my five classes take place during the prescribed time.... My other problem is that it doesn't take 30 students to perform the protocols."

Management problems were not limited to managing individual classrooms. Many schools or grade levels that tried to use a project with several classrooms had difficulties in managing groups of teachers. One school tried to integrate the GLOBE project into four fourth grade classrooms. This created some problems because not all the teachers were interested in the program. One teacher reported that "not all teachers felt ownership and therefore not as invested; some teachers believe too difficult for 4th graders; some teachers believe too difficult to manage; some teachers believe too time-consuming (GLOBE plus regular science curriculum)." This teacher found solutions to problems for her own classroom, but teachers who were not as interested in the project were not as willing to find creative solutions.

Problems and difficulties with technology were common. However, teachers chose to participate in the projects with a basic understanding of the technological needs of the project, so technology problems were mainly obstacles that teachers found ways to overcome. None of the projects required computer technology more advanced than simple email and world wide web access. Problems included a lack of an Internet connection in the classroom or school and difficulty transmitting information in the appropriate format.

In World Weather Watch, information was exchanged with partners via email. One teacher's partner class chose to send an attached file with the students' messages. This teacher could not read the attached file. Solving this problem took several weeks to solve. This limited the class's ability to establish an pen-pal relationship.

A participant in Signs had difficulty submitting pictures, "My main problem was my inability to know how to send pictures. The computer technician at my school put them onto a disk for me to transmit from home, but they never got to wherever they were supposed to go."

Many teachers reported that their classrooms were not hooked up to the Internet. Most solved this by finding other computers in the school to send data or by sending data from home. This worked out well for the technical needs of the project, but some teachers found that it separated their students' from the project. One Signs teacher reported, "I went into the project knowing that our school didn't have Internet access in any place except the principal's office. I knew that that I would be responsible for uploading the information from home and that was okay. I thought we would have more time to examine other schools' work in the central office but it took so long to do this that we could only view our own work twice and we didn't view the work of other schools at all. So I guess the children felt a kinship with other students completing the project knowing that they were part of the group but they never saw the other students' work."

A GLOBE teacher reported that he found the students got more out of the project after the classroom was hooked up to the Internet, "Last year I was taking the data home and sending it on my home computer. This year we are on line at school..... The students have much more ownership this year. Each child gets to enter the data and then we print out a copy of the completed sheet for them to take home to show their parents. They are amazed that their data is instantaneously sent to Boulder, Colorado."

While entering data at home worked well for some teachers, one GLOBE teacher could not always keep up with the data entry, "I did not have a computer with the Internet in my classroom and have had to enter the data by myself. I was not able to do it consistently even though the data was being taken."

Some teachers found that students could help them with technological problems. For example, "The first year I taught GLOBE I had two wonderful students who were very strong in science (they also were good on the computer).... I was having trouble at first logging on. They read the instructions and figured out which number was our code and which was out password."

Teachers find more success with projects when the projects match their curricular goals or when their curricula were flexible enough to change to the objectives of the project. Whenever technology is viewed as an add-on to the curriculum and not integrated with the curriculum, it becomes an extra burden.

Several teachers found that the projects helped organize and extend their curricula. One GLOBE teacher responded: "I don't find that GLOBE detracts from my curriculum since I determine what is in my curriculum. As a matter of fact, it has helped me organize my ecology curriculum around a central theme."

Other teachers found that the projects were worthwhile, but they did not meet their curricular needs. This was most apparent with a teacher who was looking for something very specific that Signs did not provide. His objective was for his "students to discover that kids in the southern hemisphere were reporting increasing temperature/hours of daylight, and corresponding changes in plant activity" while his students were reporting the opposite in the fall. He was disappointed that the semester he participated in the project, there were no participants from the southern hemisphere.

Others found that the projects met many of their personal objectives, but they had to first fulfill specific school, district, or state objectives. This limited the amount of time they could dedicate to the projects. Many teachers found success with the projects by finding ways that they could be used with their existing curriculum. This did not provide a great deal of time for the project, but teachers found success by applying the projects to the curriculum.

Different teachers found that the projects were more appropriate with different grade levels. GLOBE offers learning activities for students in a variety of grades, but many teachers found that younger students had trouble understanding the importance of the data, and one teacher reported that older students were bored, "Younger students (participation ranges from 3rd to 10th grade) had difficulties not only in taking measurements but in understanding the significance of the measurements; some older students became bored with the repetitiveness of taking the same daily measurements."

A few teachers reported problems with students as young as 3rd and 4th grade understanding the significance of the GLOBE data, "This year I have a straight Third Grade class. In my opinion, they are a little young for most of this program.... For these reasons, I am turning over the program to a Fifth Grade teacher here at my school.... These 3rd graders are still very focused on themselves." One 6th grade teacher found that his students had similar problems, "I often wonder if they are able to make connections from their experiences to the use of their submitted data. It tends to get lost once it is typed in. I have not been successful in pulling back their data and comparing it to other GLOBE sites." Other teachers, at various grade-levels, simply felt that the GLOBE program was not appropriate for their grade level.

Many teachers were struggling with issues of making global connections and connecting the data they were collecting to how it was being used by others. Other teachers felt that making the global connections was the real benefit of the projects. "Previous to GLOBE our school had participated in a weather data collection project sponsored by a local television station. The station uses the data for forecasting and reports which school is supplying the data, but the students felt that the GLOBE program had a larger impact due to the greater number of schools and people involved."

A kindergarten teacher found that Signs could help her teach concepts that are difficult for her students, "Everyone is not having the same weather at the same time. Kindergarten children have a hard time with concepts like that."

Issues of communication were a problem for some teachers. This was true World Weather Watch in which classes were partnered with other classes. Partnering provided great benefits to participants with active partners, but those benefits were limited in some cases by partners that did not keep up their communication.

A World Weather Watch participant commented that communication, including an electronic discussion board and email with the partner school were beneficial, although not all schools took full advantage of them, "It was nice that she included a partner school and a place to share. You always hope that people take advantage of the sharing, but this is a new medium for teachers."

The organizer of the World Weather Watch project expressed her concerns about participant sharing. She was hesitant to match classrooms with partners, but she felt that the benefits outweighed the risks, "As with any free endeavor, there was a certain amount of attrition. In many instances, I was informed via email that a class would not be able to continue and I was then able to rematch their partner class. In other instances, the class left high and dry chose not to be rematched but rather to just use the weekly data on the page for their in class activities. I spent many hours trying to decide if I wanted to match classes for this very reason and decided that with having a partner school came a little more commitment." Since the project was free and easy to join, not all schools felt the same commitment that they might if they had paid to join the project or paid for expensive equipment. This created some frustration when partners dropped out of the project.

Many other problems occurred for some of the teachers. Projects had fairly strict timeframes and schedules, as do schools. When these schedules are disrupted by problems, Internet projects might not work. The most serious problems were expense and equipment security. Although none of these projects had a registration fee, the GLOBE project required approximately $500 worth of equipment to take proper data readings. Many teachers found support from their schools and districts. Others sold popcorn.

Security of the equipment became a problem for many teachers. Even locked equipment was occasionally stolen or vandalized, as one GLOBE teacher reported, "Another problem we encountered was vandalism. Our station is locked, but one of the students didn't lock it securely and another student took one of the thermometers and hid it.... This year our rain gauge was smashed even though it was within a brick wall."

For every problem with Internet projects, some teachers find it limits the usefulness of the project and others find solutions or view the problem as an opportunity.. Almost every teacher reported some kind of problem with every project, but most of them found ways to be successful despite (or sometimes because of) the problems.

While many of the teachers found that the basic requirements of the projects were enough for their classes, many teachers found creative ways to use the projects. One Signs teacher reported:

In the GLOBE project, data is collected and used by scientists around the world. Almost all the teachers in GLOBE reported that it was beneficial that real scientists used the data. It helped to motivate students, to give them a feeling of real purpose, and to make them take pride in their work and be more careful in taking accurate measurements. This was true for gifted and talented students as well as underachieving students. "I think it has been a real motivator. As with the other field study projects we're involved in, students take on a more serious demeanor and have a high proud factor as they collect data for a purpose.... At least with my students who are gifted and talented, just doing an exercise without any purpose is a real turn off." "I feel they have a sense of responsibility and that they have contributed something worthwhile in a way they never could before.... Just being able to participate has bonded my students, who have heretofore felt worthless and incapable in academic areas, together to provide a sense of pride, belonging, and contribution to society."

Of course with an attitude like this, it is hard to fail: "All my involvement with ... technology-related work in the classroom for students is worthwhile, even if the project doesn't work out. I like to explore new challenges and opportunities in these areas to take risks and see if the chances I take (academically) can make me a better teacher.... Mistakes are challenges to be overcome."

Technology can be very beneficial, and it can be intimidating and difficult to use. Anyone who attempts to participate in an Internet project is sure to run into problems. Simple projects, like the World Weather Watch and Signs, and more complex projects like GLOBE had their share of problems. The Internet does nothing for education on its own. Creative and dedicated teachers find ways to use the Internet to expand their classrooms and enhance their curricula. Obstacles with time and management, technology problems, mismatches with existing curricula, personal communication, and expense can all be overcome to create a powerful learning environment. But teachers must understand that it is their hard work and dedication that will be necessary to overcome these obstacles. This paper provides a guide to some of the problems and successes that several teachers encountered while expanding their classrooms to take advantage of telecommunications projects.