Scholarly publications

Didn't see any music stars in Nashville while attending the 2011 SITE conference, but I did get to see some other kinds of stars....the scholarly type. I attended more presentations this year than ever before, and even more exciting, I was less disappointed than in previous years. Oh sure there still were presentations that did not come close to living up to their abstracts. Lots of presentations with 'Design' in the title were offered, but most lacked a connection with design as I understand it.

One star that was noticeably missing was Bernie Dodge. We later discovered he was ill and wasn't able to attend the conference. However, organizers failed to mention the absence to those that gathered for his first scheduled presentation. After 10 minutes of wondering if we were going to take a journey with Bernie in QuestGarden, we had a great conversation about Webquests. Those attendess unfamiliar with Dr. Dodge's work, were able to hear first hand accounts from those in the trenches who use Webquests in K-12 AND Higher Ed classrooms.

A presentation among hundreds that caught my eye was "Engaging Students Through Participation in Keypals Exchanges." HUH? Keypals? In this day an age? Isn't that an 'old' instructional strategy? And that is precisely what caught my attention. In the age of Web 2.0 and the Semantic Web, among the newer innovations that SITE scholars took on as their research focus, a powerful activity structure emerged from the pages of my program. I listened intently as the quiet German Middle School teacher from Pennsylvania explained her design plan and implementation, all the while thinking, our ITSers could do this!!!! Not only can ITSers do the project but also write the scholarly paper AND present it at an International conference. Yes, this researcher was a doctoral student, but she emphasized at the beginning of the presentation that she was a classroom teacher. It was refreshing to see that Keypals have not been forgotten, are still considered and proven to be valid instructional strategies, and that when used in a well-designed unit powerful learning experiences can happen.

To read this paper, visit University Libraries. From the Research Databases link, go to the Education link, then EdITLib Digital Libary. You will need your Mason email username and Mason email password to log in. Susan Featro is the author of the paper.