Technical Help

If there is one way in which the web is self-reflexive, it is in offering an enormous amount of resources on technical help for working within it. Below is an initial sampling; you will find that technical help is ever-present within the medium as you begin project development and authoring. The need for expensive workshops, training sessions, and even books for general technical help seems slim indeed given the abundance of web-based resources.

Understanding the World Wide Web Historically and Conceptually

This is an entire workshop on the Internet developed by Patrick Crispen called Internet Roadmap 96 and is good for someone wanting more background on the Internet and the WWW (lessons 23 and 24). There is also a whole range of accessible lessons on other aspects of the Internet, including e-mail, FTP, listservs, and Gopher.
Learn the Net is an excellent introduction to the history and structure of the Internet and the World Wide Web, with plenty of links for those desiring further study. Note also the useful overview of Understanding Web Addresses, which helps to demystify who it is you're communicating with on the web.

Introductions to Creating Web Pages

Hyper Text Markup Language (html) is the standard language used produce web pages. All of these resources include information on html, or pointers to other sources for such information. There is little that is mysterious about basic html codes, and through new software, such authoring is getting easier all the time. Some of these sources also situate the creation of web pages in broader educational purposes and within the entire process of project design.

For a no-nonsense Beginner's Guide to HTML, go to this site produced by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois. Another useful guide for authoring and trouble-shooting is the Help Desk, which also discusses more sophisticated web weaving with Java, CGI scripts, etc.
Considering Learning Differences: An Alternative Web Design Guide, by D. Michelle Hinn, challenges us rethink how our webpage designs take into account the particular needs that learning-disabled students may have. Hinn's suggestions and models provide valuable guidance for web page design generally speaking.
Building a Website that Works, from the Texas Education Network (TENET), offers tips on the development process, links to style guides and exemplary sites, and a template. A good home base for beginning development.
Harnessing the Power of the Web, from the Global SchoolNet Foundation, to help support work on the web from "an old-fashioned, student-centered, project-based learning point of view." This site situates the entire process of pedagogy on the web in a particular educational vision and offers background on the web, examples of student projects, and a step-by-step tutorial on planning, implementing, and reviewing web-work. Also, valuable links to other web authoring resources.
The Interactive HTML Crash Course by Andy Carvin at EdWeb, complete with self-quizzes, is a great little introduction to web authoring. The entire EdWeb site is unique and well worth exploring in that it includes discussions of the history of the web, its role in education, its relation to educational reform, and competing visions of its future.
For web page design, consult Nan Goggin's short guide from the School of Art at UIUC, or the Web Style Manual by Patrick Lynch at Yale.

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