Design Resources

Virtual Community Project Examples
General Content & Organizations
Other Virtual Learning Communities
Tools for Collaborative Learning
Teacher Professional Development
Articles

DesignWorlds for Learning are collaborative learning and creative design environments, designed by and for use by virtual communities of students, teachers, and professionals from their communities. DesignWorlds are also the virtual communities themselves–the learners and designers whose creative contributions and content add value to their networked connectivity and technology resources by providing learning resources for themselves and for other communities.

The following are examples of some existing DesignWorlds for Learning, and other key collaborative web based communities. (As with any Web sites, several of these sites or their links may have changed. Check with the DesignWorlds for Learning web site for updates).

* indicates active working relationships with DesignWorlds for Learning.

Examples of Virtual Telecollaboration and Virtual Community Projects

* DesignWorld Communities:

* DesignWorlds for Literacy : Collaborative Projects in Earth Science, Literacy, and Social Studies between 6th & 7th grades in six OGSD schools.

• Mars Virtual Olympics
• Blossom Valley Learning Consortium (BVLC)
• Davis Poetry & Cookbook Projects

General Content and Organization Resources

* Anti-Defamation League (ADL) --Creators of "A World of Difference Institute" (tolerance and anti-bias education programs for schools, workplaces, campuses and communities).

Bay Area School-to-Careers Action Network : Major San Francisco bay Area regional resource and public-private alliance sponsoring alternative projects and business-education partnerships on school-to-careers projects, multimedia academies, service learning and more.

Bay Area Science Alliance

Cable News Network (CNN) WorldNews Classroom Resources and Student News Bureau Project .

Center for Digital Storytelling (formerly San Francisco Digital Media Center), Berkeley, CA: Co-directed by Joe Lambert and Nina Mullen, this is a major international leader in promoting hands-on learning and use of digital storytelling for education, business, and informal learning.

* Center for Innovative Learning Technologies : NSF-funded virtual collaboration between SRI International; University of California, Berkeley; Vanderbilt University, and the Concord Consortium.

* Center for Media Education : National resource and policy center around issues of media, culture and education; recently hosted a national conference on "Ensuring a quality media culture for children in the digital age: Framing a research agenda."

* "Challenge 2000" Education and Multimedia Project (Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network).

Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum .

Digital Clubhouse Network (digital story telling workshops).

Earth News Radio & Science Interchange (email: earth@enn.com ).

Exploratorium , San Francisco –one of the best "hands on" science museums and science learning resources in the world.

* George Lucas Educational Foundation : "Learn & Live" (major resource of exemplary integration of technolgy for education and lifelong learning).

The Getty Center and ArtsEdNet : Arts Education resources from the Getty Museum and the Getty Education Institute for the Arts.

GirlSite : This is an innovative Web site and virtual community, designed to appeal to the interests of girls.

Math Forum , Drexel University (one of the best online mathematics education resource sites and communities).

MMAP : Middle School Mathematics through Applications Project (IRL), major middle-school mathematics curriculum and technology project, based around collaborative student design projects.

Milken Exchange on Education & Technology . Major Milken Family Foundation information, project resource and exchange forum for issues related to use of technology in education.

PBS Online .

"The Tech" (The Tech Museum of Innovation of Silicon Valley, San Jose).

Other Related Virtual Learning & Knowledge Design Communities

Cityspace Project (virtual cities, designed and built by kids around the world).

* The Educational Object Economy Project (EOE) & EOE Foundation :

Over 1,500 member-contributed and indexed Java applets/interactive environments for education; learning exchange/reviews/discussions, plus a free downloadable Generic Object Economy (GOE) database and templates for starting your own object economy).

* Educational Software Components of Tomorrow (ESCOT) Project : Funded by the National Science Foundation, this project is bringing together a collaboration of leading research and development partners to design interoperable component software modules for mathematics and science learning.

Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE Project) : International collaboration between scientists and students in many countries around environmental monitoring and protection; sponsored by the NSF, NASA, Office of the Vice President, and many other agencies.

Global Lab Project–International collaborations in science for middle-high schools, sponsored by Technical Education Research Centers (TERC) and funded by the National Science Foundation.

Global SchoolNet Foundation & CyberFair Contest .

* International Education and Resource Network (I*EARN): Online projects for enabling kids to "make a difference" in the world; includes Holocaust & Human Genocide Project and other inter-disciplinary social studies, science/language arts.

MUD ("Multimedia U Design") Pie School. Multimedia guru Fred D'Ignazio's Web site of student-created Web pages (primarily K- 8); CD-ROM and instructional booklet available.

NASA/Passport to Knowledge "Live from Mars" project and Mars Virtual Explorer .

Virtual High School - The Concord Consortium.

Tools to Support Collaborative Project-Based Learning

Agent Sheets : New easy-to-use visual authoring tool & Java development tools for interactive Web-based simulations; based on research and development at University of Colorado’s Center for Design and Lifelong Learning.

* Creative Partner (emotion, Inc.). A professional client-server system used by major entertainment, video and commercial marketing communications companies for distributed multimedia content review, management and distribution.

Stagecast Creator (Stagecast Software): New visual programming environment for creating interactive games, simulations and web-based learning environments; based on "Cocoa" technology developed by Apple Computer’s Advanced Technology Group.

Teacher Professional Development Communities & Resources

Challenge 2000 Multimedia Project .

* Galef Institute & Different Ways of Knowing (DWoKnet) –interdisciplinary learning through the arts/humanities.

Science Education Academy of the Bay Area (SEABA) –excellent Web of science, technology and math education resources for teachers in the San Francisco Bay Area.

"Tales from the Electronic Frontier" (teacher stories of math/science educational collaborative projects on the Internet).

"Tapped In" –Teacher Professional Development and support Web site.

The Well Connected Educator –Dr. Gwen Solomon hosts this site, an excellent resource for teachers, developers, and the education community.

 Dr. Ted Kahn's Articles

Creating Virtual Design and Learning Communities
Technology is not a panacea for solving all (or even most) of our problems in American education. However, technology can be a very effective catalyst for change. ..