RATIONALE FOR SUBMITTING Exploratorium: ExploraNet

There is one main reason for including The Exploratorium in this writing: this institution, more than any other, has set history in making SCIENCE FUN. The learning opportunities of the museum and of the website, are endless. A trip to visit either, yields excitement in learning, at its very best.

The Exploratorium is a museum of science, art, and human perception with over 500 interactive "hands on" exhibits. Each year more than 600,000 visitors come to the Exploratorium, over 90,000 students and teachers come on field trips, and more than 2000 teachers attend professional development programs which focus on inquiry-based teaching and learning in the K-12 classroom. The Learning Studio is where the multimedia team can study the most recent in inventive learning applications. The monthly Ten Cool sites are always state-of-the-art instructional design, created with the latest technologies for the Internet.Recent examples are: Build your own "Glitter Globe" with the Science Explorer, and the Digital Library – with online exhibits, web cams, past exhibitions, images, sounds, and Exploratorium A-to-Z. (Exploratorium home page, 1998).
 

ANNOTATION: Exploratorium: ExploraNet

Exploratorium. (1998). Exploratorium: ExploraNet. San Francisco, CA: Exploratorium
Design Team. [Online]. Available: http://www.exploratorium.edu/
There are so many fine models on this website, it is impossible to begin to applaud them all. Basic to the needs of a multimedia design team, with interests in recent trends in education, The Teacher Institute provides workshops for in-service science teachers of grades 6-12. The Institute offers a teacher-centered, content-based, learn-by-doing approach to science learning. It offers a rich mix of content-based discussions, classroom experiments, and teaching strategies based on the Exploratorium’s many exhibits. (Exploratorium, teacher institute, 1998).

Exploratorium Science Snacks are small-scale versions of some of the most popular exhibits at the Exploratorium. These are the museum’s efforts to take the exhibits to the kids.
 

"For three years, nearly one hundred teachers worked with staff members to create scaled-down versions of Exploratorium exhibits. The results were dozens of exciting Snacks – miniature science exhibits that teachers could make using common, inexpensive, easily available materials. By using Snacks in their classrooms, teachers can climb out of the textbooks and join their students in discovering science for themselves. What’s in a Snack? Snacks are divided into easy-to-follow sections that include instructions, advice, and helpful hints. Each Snack begins with a photograph of itself, a short introduction and a list of the materials needed. Other sections give assembly instructions, contain descriptions of how to use the completed exhibits, and explain the science behind them. Most of the Snacks can be completed by one person. If a partner or adult help is needed, this is indicated. A section called "etc." offers interesting bits of additional scientific and historic information." (Exploratorium, Science Snacks, 1998).
  Obviously, for the design team leader, there is much to be learned about the collaborative efforts and successes in developing exciting learning products within the framework of an institution, without sacrificing the needs of the individual – even very YOUNG individuals!

The Institute for Inquiry was created in response to a widespread interest in inquiry-based science instruction. The Institute provides workshops, programs, on-line support, and an intellectual community of practice which afford science reform educators a deep and rich experience of how inquiry learning looks and feels. (Exploratorium, Institute for Inquiry, 1998).
 
The Learning Studio @The Exploratorium. These sites are the "coolest of the cool," and introduced on a monthly basis. Visit 23 categories with over 300 reviews of the best science, art, and education sites. NetFrog, for instance, guides a frog dissection with a detailed series of pictures and QuickTime video clips that document the procedure and outline the major anatomical features. NO formaldehyde – a truly MAJOR benefit, in this author’s opinion! There are sections (among others!) in the Arts, Art Museums, Astronomy, Chemistry, Earth Science, Environmental Science, General Science, History, Invention, K-12 Resources, Kids Stuff, Life Sciences, Literature & Drama, Mathematics, Media, Natural History, Photography, Physics, Psychology, Science Centers, Science Literature, and Weather. It is obvious that this is an information-packed site, and definitely takes much time to explore completely. The design team will find the adventure worth the time spent! (Exploratorium, The Learning Studio, 1998).

 

RATIONALE FOR SUBMITTING Mungo Park

The Mungo Park website does for topics in Social Studies, what the Exploratorium does for Science. This is one of the most exciting visual websites on the Web. Expedia’s Mungo Park is. "A World Of Adventure, Across the seven seas to the seven continents . . . and beyond!" Here, a design team can view the excellence in development of such topics as Dinosaurs, Newfoundland, Space Shuttle, Cuba, Costa Rica, Panama, Chile & Antarctica, Journey of the Magi, Timbuktu, Ethiopia, China’s Jade Tiger, Vietnam, Papua New Guinea, and Cousteau’s Fiji. There are Live Expeditions via the World Wide Web! (Mungo Park home page, 1998).
   Figure 17-b. (mythofthemanger.jpg,  1997)   Mungo Park not only "does this very, very well," – it also does it very distinctly and uniquely! For instance, in the pages of Journey of the Magi, which aired around Christmas time of 1997, this site pondered – The Myth of the Manger: How many Wise Men were there? Mungo authors told the viewer: "The answer may surprise you." The surprise to this author is that this very sensitive subject was dealt with in such an articulate and successful manner, leaving little room for complaint from either religious persons or factions that have long sought to keep religion apart from all other of life’s environments – including, or especially, education. Approached in very historical, fact-based manners, this website stands as an excellent model for a design team, where sensitive subject matter can be delivered in effective and visual manners, to make a superior product. The user is allowed to trace the steps of the Wise Men from Tehran to Bethlehem. .The MEDIA TRIP – The Myth of the Manger: A cyber-look at the birth of Jesus – asks "What are the names of the Wise Men?
 
1. Balthazar, Gaspar, and Melchior
2. Shadrach, Brian, and Tommy
3. Belshazzar, Caspar, and Meltormay
4. The New Testament doesn’t tell us.

(Mungo, Journey of the Magi, 1997).
 
This site serves as a model for incorporating history, current events, audio-visual elements and even humor in a learning product.

ANNOTATION: Mungo Park

Mungo Team, Expedia.com, and Microsoft Corporation. (1998). Mungo Park home
page. Web Search: May 1998. [Online]. Available: http://www.mungopark.com/default.asp
 
Figure 17-c. (LargeMagellanicCloud_LMC.jpg,  1998)

The website for Space Shuttle explores the outermost edges of adventure! There are adventurous examples of multimedia, too! Surround Videos are the first 360-degree panoramas from space. Ask the Mission gives answers from the astronauts as they orbit the Earth. STS-81: LIVE FROM SPACE is where the learner can join the astronauts of the space shuttle Atlantis on their January, 1997, mission to Mir – complete with "out-of-this-world dispatches" (as in – live from outer space!) from astronaut JOHN GRUNSFELD. The MEDIA GALLERY is packed with images, movies, and Surround Videos that were updated daily throughout the mission. The NASA TIMELINE is an interactive chronology of space travel, and is a multimedia developer’s delight, with Flash and RealAudio capabilities. THE CREW is where the user can meet the astronauts of STS-81 aboard Atlantis. FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON goes back more than a century to when Jules Verne considered the possibilities of shooting men to the moon – literally. RIDING THE ROCKET is a women’s studies pick of the day, exemplifying Sally Ride’s place in becoming America’s first woman in space, and how her life took off in unexpected ways. A total visual rapture is HEAVENLY VIEWS – a gallery of images from the final frontier. (Mungo, Space Shuttle: NASA, 1998). The Hubble Telescope provided this image of the Doradus Cluster and Nebula – shown above – a star-forming region inhabiting an irregular galaxy known as the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) – which lies about 150,000 light years away from our own sun and is clearly visible from our Southern Hemisphere. (Mungo, DRUM: Heavenly Views, 1998).
 
Mungo Park stands as an icon of excellence in online use of sophisticated media, and of varying modes of distance learning.

 

RATIONALE FOR SUBMITTING National Geographic Society –
       www.nationalgeographic.com

Again visiting the realm of Social Studies and excellence in learning products, this review would be terribly amiss if National Geographic was omitted! Aside from its impressive historical place in education, NGS also offers one of the finest interactive sites to be found. Therefore, the rationale for inclusion of NGS’ site is threefold: 1) Historically well known (a fine ideal and goal for a multimedia team of today! 2) Highly interactive, and 3) Ability to serve as model for the design team. The site extends a welcome to "the home of geography standards on the Internet." In reviewing the site, it is indeed, an unprecedented array of resources makes teaching and learning about the world easier and more enjoyable than ever before. The Atlas allows the learner to discover nearly 1,800 maps of the world. The Forums allow an interchange of ideas on all things geographic.

Perhaps the most important model – for learners, and certainly for developer – is the site for Standards. These web pages have teacher-tested ideas and family activities. Their archive of the U.S. National Geography Standards puts principles into practice. Xpedition Hall is where you can enter this spellbinding virtual world and set fantastic contraptions in motion. Every switch, dial, and lever brings the National Geography Standards surging to life. (NGS, Xpeditions home page, 1998).

ANNOTATION: www.nationalgeographic.com

National Geographic Society. (1998). Xpeditions: Xpedition Hall. Washington D.C. and
CA: NGS and MCI Partners in Education, authors. [Online]. Available:
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/resources/ngo/education/xpeditions/main.html
   Figure 18-b. (NGS_volcano.jpg,  1998)   The site, "Eye on the Volcano," offers an excellent and realistic trip into the terrifying activities of an erupting volcano. Eruptions from a crater that suddenly reawakened in 1995, after centuries, have tormented the tiny Caribbean island of Montserrat for almost three years. (NGS, Eye on the volcano, 1998). "The chain of events that leads to volcanic eruptions like the one on Soufriere Hills in Montserrat (captured on video May 12, 1996) begins as red-hot magma blazes to the Earth’s surface in one of three ways." The website offers some superior interactive learning sessions (some scripted in JavaScript) on such things as Hot spots, spreading centers, and subduction zones. (NGS, The forces at work, 1998).
   Figure 18-c. (NGS_kids_logo.gif,  1998)   An admirable quality of NGS’ site is that it does not "talk down" to children. The Kids’ website is as active as anything else in the total web presence, and it fact, major "Doors" into the volcano site or the Xpeditions site, are located on the Kids’ home page. They invite you to "Try This! – from less-drastic options such as Fun Science Pen Pal Network, where, if you are age 6 through 16, you can join GeoMail, the National Geographic Pen Pal Network! World Online! and Washed Away! are high activity in the best sense. Talk Board Kids Network is a tremendous learning and collaborative activity for kids of all ages. Such questions as, "Are most shows on television okay for kids?: are asked, with lively discussion ensuing. The WORLD magazine posed this question to fifth-, sixth-, and eighth-grade students in Ohio, North Dakota, and Louisiana. The jumping interactivity was intense. (NGS, nationalgeographic.com/KIDS, 1998).

At the height of the interactive learning environment, where this author found definition for a lifetime of believing that we must – in work and in play – learn to laugh at ourselves . . . there is the Cartoon Factory – where the learner may create a cartoon! (NGS, Peale, 1998).

The temptation was unavoidable.

RATIONALE FOR SUBMITTING NOVA Online

NOVA goes yet one step further than Exploratorium or National Geographic. The makers of NOVA Online sneak into the most detailed corners of Everyman’s Universe (there is no way to "ungenderize" Everyman). They explore the boundaries of Social Studies, Science, the Occult and the Mysterious, the seemingly bland and the blatantly divine. This website absolutely embodies the standards of excellence and the embracing of large challenges that are the ideal learning environments that this author wishes to study, to emulate and to create. This very tool, this review on websites that are tools or models for a multimedia team, concerns the sincere desire to produce products such as those produced by NOVA. Within the countless moments of anticipation while wandering the lands of the Secrets of Lost Empires, the Secrets of Easter Island, or the bottomless caverns of Expeditions, true artistry in learning environments and ART are offered within the pages of this website. (Nova Online home page, 1998).

More sober looks at current issues such as The Truth About Impotence or Hot Science activities – where learning games designed for the Internet are explored – gives a peek into the mastery of the NOVA design team. A study of the TV Schedule, along with the ties to the Web Schedule and events, leads to a greater understanding of true multimedia development, where one is not tied to either a computer or a television screen, but an interactive blend of both. The NOVA website is a wonderful exemplar for the design team, intent on blending design with Lesson Ideas – and how to find content from fellow teachers that will blend with these lessons from the NOVA Teacher’s Guide. (NOVA Online: Teachers, 1998).

PBS Online and WGBH Educational Foundation (NOVA Online). (1998). Nova
Online home page. Various locations: WGBH and NOVA design teams as authors. [Online]. Available: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/
 
Figure 19-c. (nova_dinosaur.jpg,  1998)

The Curse of T. rex (Table of Contents) explores the topic that The Dinosaurs Weren’t Alone – and they propose that dinosaurs may have ruled the earth, but they were never alone on it. There was a colorful cast of characters, from gigantic reptiles to tiny woodland mammals in the Mesozoic age. The Curse of T. Rex Teacher’s Guide quickly points out the Subject Area focuses not only on paleontology but legal issues, as well. The Teaching Focus is the academic debate – over a long-dead and buried animal!

"In 1990, a group of fossil hunters in South Dakota found a nearly complete Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton, touching off a controversy that involved law, science, ethics, and media attention. One debate centered on who owns the skeleton. Another dealt with whether commercial fossil hunters should be allowed to remove and sell fossils from public land. A third issue focused on whether scientists should have access to significant fossil finds, no matter where they are discovered or who finds them. This program, profiling the story of a dinosaur nicknamed Sue and the commercial fossil hunter who found her, raises these issues and questions surrounding Sue’s discovery and the criminal investigation that ensued." (NOVA, Curse of T. rex: TOC, 1998).
 
Figure 19-d. (alienworlds.jpg,  1997)

All Alone? (Or Not?) also asks – What is the present state of the "hunt for aliens? In the fall of 1995, things changed drastically for astronomers and those interested in the possibility of extraterrestrial life. Planets of normal stars were unknown before then. But, out of a few hundred stars examined with the best new Doppler techniques or by direct orbit-wobble viewing, new evidence was found that eight normal stars have planetary mass companions. That is an astonishing new sampling, and it suggests that "between ten and a hundred million solar systems are to be found in the Galaxy around sun-like stars. Dr. Philip Morrison, Institute Professor and Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is a distinguished theoretical astrophysicist and a pioneer in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence through radio communication. In one of his many roles as a science educator, Dr. Morrison serves on NOVA’s Board of Advisors." (NOVA, Hunt for Alien Worlds, 1997). For this writer, NOVA’s exciting website holds the best of discovery and mystery in the learning environment. For many learners, this enhanced multimedia-driven setting is the most prime for advanced learning. A multimedia team should become well versed in the abilities of the NOVA design team . . . as much of the new technology is embracing these heightened learning offerings.
 
NOVA invites the learner to Be a Stargazer.
 

Figure 19-e. (odysseyhome.jpg,  1997)

It is this writer’s opinion that one of the most versatile and engaging elements to be found in the new methods of multimedia design, is the capacity for these elements to capture more than just the intellectual interest of the learner. When multimedia begins to involve things of the spirit, of the inner self of the user, of the sense-driven emotions of humans, there is an added element of being "in tune" with the nature of what if being learned. There is a deeper commitment. To instill these factors in the training of one’s multimedia team, is quite possibly what sets the team apart and elevates its successes to a higher realm. The photograph shown is from the companion Website to the mini-series, Odyssey of Life, a co-production between WGBH/NOVA and SVT, Swedish Television.

In Timing is Everything, the creators postulate that every living being carries inside of itself, evidence of more than 3.5 billion years of evolutionary shift and regeneration by its ancestors. This soul-stirring website shows that much of the evidence we humans carry is most obvious – to the eye, at least – during the stages of life that take place inside the womb. If you are watching developing embryos through the lens of evolutionary biology, they will carry you on even more amazing journeys – outward to the odyssey of life’s history, and inward, into the invisible world of genes. Deeper than that, the learner will begin to ponder all mysteries of life.

Learning is enhanced at a sophisticated multimedia level that should be studied by the design team – Morphing Embryos – where the learner may click to time-lapse sequences of growing embryos, viewable with the VivoActive plug-in (downloadable) to view the clips as streaming video, or they may be chosen as QuickTime or AVI files. (NOVA, Odyssey of Life, 1997).

RATIONALE FOR SUBMITTING PBS Online

The final website of this review is also the parent company for NOVA Online. The rationale for including PBS Online is to primarily show the similarities and the intense differences of the two websites, and how that might be important to the Multimedia Design Team. The Project Leader will find much in PBS’ website that will help the team in developing an insight into various methods of designing instructional tools and blending the technical abilities with a widespread number of individual talents within the team. It will show how these differences can become a STRENGTH of the team, rather than a point of consternation or dispute. In many ways, PBS is light years away in concept from NOVA, and yet some very basic design and content similarities are noticed. It is this very use of high-visibility contrast that the multimedia team must emulate, in order to provide a top level of services to the learning community. PBS asks, "Looking for something and don’t know where to find it? With our easy-to-use Web Site Guide, PBS Online can take you from where? to there." (PBS Website Guide, 1998). The site is a marvelous example of the abilities of a consolidated team in delivering well-developed learning environments.

ANNOTATION: PBS Online

Figure 20-b. (lewis_clark_logo.jpg,  1998)   "Lewis & Clark: The Journey of the Corps of Discovery is a production of Florentine Films and WETA, Washington, D.C. What was America like at the time of Lewis and Clark? Native Americans – Indian tribes already knew the lands that Lewis and Clark discovered. The Archive – Follow an expedition timeline and maps, or read the journals of the Corps. Into the Unknown – In this interactive story, you’re leading the expedition now. Classroom Resources – Explore the significance of the expedition using lesson plans and activities." (PBS Online, Lewis & Clark, 1998).
   Figure 20-c. (nerds_logo.jpg,  1998)   The final website to be visited in this review is aptly named Triumph of the Nerds. "The program zooms backward on the information superhighway to show in vivid detail how youthful amateurs, hippies and self-proclaimed ‘nerds’ accidentally changed the world. The online resources include a timeline outlining the history of the personal computer, facts about some of your favorite nerds, and an interactive ‘pick the computer’ game that lets you test your nerd quotient. Who are these Nerds? PBS Online is proud to present the companion Web site for the PBS television special "Triumph of the Nerds: The Rise of Accidental Empires." (PBS Online, Triumph of the Nerds, 1998).
 
Perhaps each of us involved in multimedia, instructional design, and the delivery of distance learning products, should take the Nerd Quotient Test! We have much to thank the "Nerds Who Have Gone Before Us" for – or, we would not be here now, in this time and place, finding the necessity or the desire to read these words!

(1,055 words)

 

 

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Collection of graphics, HTML coding & layout, creation of links for Figures List and References,
done by L. C. Boyd. All graphics are properties and © of the pertinent websites, individuals, or
companies, and may be found at the corresponding links.

©1998 Leanne C. Boyd