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						<TD align=left><H1>TELUS TOOLS4WRITING PROJECT</H1></TD>
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						<TD>	As I look back, I think that the project was definitely a success and possesses the potential to be a necessary component to the information and communication technology learning of elementary students. This report will address the following issues: impact on student learning and curriculum outcomes/expectations.  Some suggestions for improvement are built into the sections on student learning and curriculum outcomes and explains where any flaws in future projects might be avoided. <BR>
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Student learning<BR>
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Writing. The children were absolutely delighted to find the web pages that contained their writing. They enjoyed going to the site to read the work of themselves and their friends. Once another person responded to the writing that they had posted on the message board, the students began to see themselves as real writers and part of a community of writers. They were eager to begin any of the projects related to this project, which is saying a lot since many of my students are very reluctant readers and writers and that is why they are in a district specialized literacy program. Since the feedback on the message board was anonymous while coming from their peers, my students were able to view the comments of other students as non-threatening. Rather than getting frustrated and feeling as though their writing wasn’t “good enough” they welcomed the comments of others. This is evident in the following quotes, taken during one of our sessions at the computer. <BR>
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“ It was cool to read other kids responses to my writing” (JJ)<BR>
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“I can improve my writing by reading what other kids wrote to me” (SN)<BR>
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One of the pieces of writing that the students completed for the project was turning a rough draft on the water cycle, into a polished piece. They were required to use the editing features of a software program, rather than dictionaries or help from an adult. This was a very useful part of the project as they began to focus on the toolbar for the first time and to experiment with the different fonts, sizes, justifications etc.<BR>
Working together.  One of the most important part of this project was the linking of schools as well as classrooms. Working on the internet for many children is an isolating experience but the responses from other students allowed them the opportunity to understand that the information highway is filled with other people, similar to themselves. My students also enjoyed working in partners while they visited the message board, in spite of the fact that we had sufficient computers for them to work alone! They appeared to enjoy finding each other’s writing and discussing the feedback given by students in other classes and other schools. Thus discussion became an important part of the program, helpful also when we did experience some of the shortfalls of working with computer technology.<BR>
Information and Communications Technologies. I found that in my 15 years of elementary school teaching, this was the first time that I taught computer skills in a systematic manner rather than just on a need to know basis. This meant that by the end of September, each of my students had already mastered the following skills:<BR>
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	Log on, log off<BR>
	Save to personal files<BR>
	Retrieve and locate files<BR>
	Cut and paste<BR>
	Edit<BR>
	Change font and text size<BR>
	Indent, justify etc.<BR>
	Spell and grammar check<BR>
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Spending so much time putting pieces of writing on the internet has reinforced the need for keyboarding skills, so we will be moving on to that next!<BR>
By October the students were familiar with using the message board and with accessing the Telus learning site using the internet. For many of the students, this was the best part of the project as is evident in the following comments. “ I like being able to log onto the internet without help” (TM). “I learned how to “put my own stuff on the internet” (CH). “I learned how to post writing” (LS). We encouraged the student to access their writing from home, so that they could their writing with extended family and friends. We posted the URL’s of all the different sites in our newsletters and classroom notes that went home. We also used our student-led conferences as an opportunity for individual students to go to the computer lab and take their parents/guardians to the Tools4 learning site.  This was especially beneficial for those students who did not have access to a computer outside the classroom.  One student reported that best part of the project for her was that she was able to“get my grandma to read my work from my own house.” (CH)<BR>
By January 15 all of the students were now able to build web-pages, although they were very disappointed that the web-pages did not actually go on the internet. I can see that there is a lot of potential to be explored in this area, particularly for those students who have more experience with communications technology. In the words of one of my students,  “I really liked learning to make my own web-page” (BJ).  <BR>
Suggestions for future. Due to some of the glitches in the message board, we did not use the message board as much as I would have liked. One of the problems was the timing. There is just too much to do from September –November to do justice to all of the components of the project. I would have liked to have the students spend several months using some of the writing prompts or closing sentences as springboards into their own writing rather than beginning to set up web-pages. Another problem happened as the message board became more active. We were just beginning to use the message board effectively when it was flooded with responses and it took too much time and scrolling down to make the time worthwhile. The students became frustrated at the lack of organization on the message board when either they couldn’t locate their own messages (try finding 1 amid 600!) or finding one they were interested in responding to. However, the potential in the use of a message board is clearly there and I would love to do it again, spread over a year and perhaps only between twinned district classrooms. <BR>
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Curriculum Outcomes/Expectations<BR>
	I have already listed the computer skills that were learned during the project. However there were other curriculum outcomes from Information and Communication technology, as well as Language Learning and science that were also met. These I have listed below.<BR>
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Information and Communication technology.<BR>
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	apply terminology appropriate to the technologies being used at this division level (F1 2.1)<BR>
	identify and apply techniques and tools for communicating, storing, retrieving and selecting information (2.2)<BR>
	explain the advantages and limitations of using computers to store, organize, retrieve and select information (2.3)<BR>
	recognize the potential for human error when using technology (2.4)<BR>
English Language Arts<BR>
• ask for and evaluate the usefulness of feedback and assistance from peers. (Grade 6,  4.1)<BR>
• experiment with a variety of software design elements, such as spacing, graphics, titles and headings, and the font sizes and styles, to enhance the presentation of text. (Grade 6, 4.1)<BR>
	Select visuals, print and/or other media to inform and engage the audience. (Grade 5, 3.4)<BR>
	Experiment with words and sentence  patterns to create word pictures (Grade 5, 2.3)<BR>
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Science<BR>
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	State an inference based on results. The inference will identify a cause and effect relationship that is supported by observations. (Gr 6 Specific learner expectation)<BR><BR></TD>
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The tools4writing website was created by Catherine Suen; updated Feb.2004. All rights reserved
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