WISE Project Introduces Palm Pilots into Science Classes

A new effort by the GSE's Web-based Inquiry Science Environment (WISE) project is innovating the use of hand-held Palm computers in secondary schools. A grant from SRI International's Palm Educational Partnership (PEP) is allowing WISE to use 500 Palm Pilots in two school districts to enable middle school and high school students to collect data themselves as part of an inquiry-based science curriculum.

"The WISE learning environment is designed to scaffold students as they perform web-based projects," said James Slotta, WISE's project director. "The addition of Palm technology will allow for new activities that go beyond the classroom or computer lab."

Professor Marcia Linn is the principal investigator of WISE. Building on previous projects led by Linn, the Computer as Learning Partner and the Knowledge Integration Project, WISE is now pioneering the use of advanced technology to bring the excitement of scientific debate into classrooms.

The school districts that are partnering with WISE on this Palm grant are the Desert Sands Unified School District in Southern California and the Denver Public Schools. In both regions, diverse groups of students will have a chance to incorporate instruction in using Palm Pilots with science curricula on topics that engage students in current controversies. "When students work on WISE's curriculum regarding the issues surrounding genetically modified foods, for instance," said Slotta, "they will go home and survey family members' view on the subject." The students will bring the data they gather back to the classroom where the group will synthesize the information in an activity based on scientific inquiry. "The aim is to take the technology of the web and push it out into students' experience of the home, the playground, and field trips," commented Slotta.

Teachers from Denver public schools learning to use Palm Pilots in the classroom