For my final
project in ED 387, I chose to create a staff development
inservice that would allow teachers in my school building
to make their own classroom web pages. Classroom webpages
were something they were extremely interested in
creating, but also found very intimidating.
The fourth grade
teachers agreed to be my first group to go through the
inservice. Two of the fourth grade teachers, our resource
center person, the director of technology, and I all met
to come up with a template and images to get us started.
As a group we decided what information should be included
on the webpage. We felt the most important areas to be
included were:
- class
schedules
- ways for parents
to contact the classroom teacher
- classroom links
(web sites students use in the classroom, sites
parents might find useful, or sites the teacher wants
to reference)
- a display of
student work.
At the meeting, we
came up with a basic template and a variety of images
they could use in their page. At first I wanted the
template to be loose and to allow the teachers to come up
with their own design scheme. However, after talking with
the two fourth grade teachers, they felt that it would be
too confusing to worry about design. For the first round,
they wanted to learn more about how to use the Claris
Home Page application. In later inservice times, we could
spend more time on creativity and design.
So, we made a basic
template as the starting point for teachers to use to
learn the Claris Home Page application. Teachers would
simply have to plug in the information that pertains to
them and choose the images to insert from the provided
folder. We came up with three basic images and varied
them in colors and styles. I also created Quick Start
Guides which explain and show teachers how to use the
application.
At the end of the
inservice, teachers will complete a survey measuring
effectiveness and suggesting possible future inservice
topics.