by Kate Crawford and Carolyn Staudt
 chools are under new pressures to prepare young people for a world in which human activity involves more creative and diverse forms of social expression, critical evaluation, negotiation and problem solving. In order to successfully realize these new community expectations, schools must be able to use new information and communication technologies to their advantage.
Thinking and learning possibilities
Although many routine tasks are accomplished by technology, many of the software applications available for students do not focus on learning the necessary skills of personal inquiry. We need to pay more attention to cultivating human capabilities and awareness through experiences in designing, testing, questioning, and understanding the meaning of the data we now are able to gather so easily. Allowing students to develop these skills of inquiry helps them become more confident and self-directed learners.
  New portable devices, like the Palm™ and the Royal daVinci™, have captured the public imagination and are changing society. Witness the sale of these small computers - already in the millions - and the growing number of business people who daily use them to plan, schedule, calculate expenses and take notes. Portable data logging probes (or sensors) that can be attached to these devices are offering new opportunities for awareness and analysis of data. Adults in many fields already use compact data logging instruments to collect valuable information, such as monitoring the temperature of refrigerated trucks hauling meat for long distances or tracking the heart rate of at-risk patients with portable heart monitors. Electronic probes make it possible to become aware of small changes that could not be experienced through the senses alone.
When used in combination with a handheld computer, probes offer an immediate and portable feedback system, which provides information about levels and changes in temperature, pH, and voltage through computer-based graphical representation. The system allows for immediate measurement and accurate representation of the smallest changes over time. Using this combination of handheld computers and probes, students can graph changes in air temperature near their nostrils as they breathe; observe a graphical representation of variation in pH throughout a 24-hour period in a pond; or detect different levels of voltage produced by a solar cell throughout the day.
True "personal" computers
Because desktop computers are developed primarily for business and research, they usually have a combination of price and performance features that make their use in schools economically unfeasible or, for the nation's poorest districts, impossible. These products have been designed for thinking within the limits of current business practice, rather than to meet the needs of education. Desktop computers do not meet students' learning needs for mobility within and outside classrooms. Nor were they designed to empower students to take their technology with them for field testing, thus providing them with both a sense of ownership of the technology and ownership of their own learning process. Moreover, even if the students have a space on the school's network to store their work, thoughts, ideas, data, and drawings, this information is not usually available to the student at home or in their neighborhood. Finally, training and maintenance of the rapidly changing systems requires a high degree of technical savvy and investment. Clearly the desktop computer/application/network software model is widespread in schools not because it satisfies educational requirements, but because inertia conspires against better alternatives.
 A technological revolution is under way. There are many promising alternatives based on inexpensive handheld computers, wireless networking, and interoperable software components. It is certainly possible that some of these leaner and far less expensive alternatives could be better suited for education. Such devices could be made available to more (if not all) students on a far more equitable basis than desktops. New handheld technologies, coupled with inexpensive networks, could enable students to carry personal tools of inquiry into the field, between their classes, and between school and home. They could empower collaboration and networking regardless of location.
The Concord Consortium is keeping abreast of this revolution by scanning the technological horizon, anticipating implications for learning, and providing feedback to the marketplace. We are developing prototypes that exemplify the potential payoff of alternative strategies for integrated technology use. We believe that by creating a compelling prototype of how people can use technologies in new ways to learn and solve problems, the reluctance of educators to abandon their reliance on traditional methods will be overcome. Like breaking a logjam, once the significance of innovative combinations of commercial products and research offerings begins to be recognized, many other imaginative educational applications will follow.
Active learning in the field
In the past, portability was limited to data collection in the field with note taking and analysis performed at a later time. When students are confronted with data in this way - in isolation and out of context - they do not experience the benefits of learning in context. Handheld computers, in contrast, provide an integrated system of inquiry: since they are equipped with a drawing program and a facility for taking notes, they link the thoughts and design of the student-initiated questioning to the data gathering process. As new questions arise, new investigations can be carried out.
The options afforded by handheld computers make it convenient for students to predict changes by drawing a graph of their expectations and also taking notes on the results of their measurements as they're making them. The combination of a handheld computer and probe allows changes in the practical limits of time, access, and place, and provides the additional possibility of multiple investiga- tions at the same place.
Handheld computer enhancements promise to provide flexibility and tools that are limited only by the imagination of the students and the roles and expectations of learning communities. Through our initial research (see "Probing Untested Ground," pg. 1) we have found that:
- Students have no fear of the handheld technology and use it effectively to facilitate complex investigation activities.
- Students in second and fifth grade classes found the active mode of problem solving, asking questions, defining the task, predicting and evaluating results engaging and attractive.
- The very focused hand-eye coordination and kinesthetic input of a small handheld computer clearly suited the younger age group.
- A drawing program provided a useful medium for creative representation of predictions.
- Graphical representation was interpreted well when used often and in close relation to data gathering activities.
- The portability of the equipment allowed even young children to investigate relatively complex and challenging environmental data in ways that were satisfying.
- The integrated note taking option was used effectively as an authentic support for thinking and systematic investigation.
Handheld computers provide a possibility for seamless data collection and note taking, allowing students to design and question in creative new ways. Inquiry focuses on motivating the students to take an active role in their own learning. Ownership is the key to this process. This requires dynamic involvement instead of passive memorization. By placing a handheld computer with attached probes in the hands of each student, the focus of instruction shifts to inquiry and investigation. Students can design their own investigations given the proper tools and knowledge base to explore phenomena around them. And wouldn't that be a great start to education in the twenty-first century?
Kate Crawford is on the education faculty at the University of Sydney, Australia. Carolyn Staudt is a curriculum developer and teacher professional development specialist at The Concord Consortium.
katecis@ozemail.com.au
carolyn@concord.org
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