The prediction, in brief:

As teachers gain familiarity with network resources, they will increasingly describe how they weave multiple resources together with more traditional resources to address specific learning objectives. These descriptions, or “hot lesson plans,” will be available on the network and contain hot links to other network resources used in the lesson. They will be of great interest to others and will pass around the network like wildfire. The best will have a small royalty fee that offers authors the opportunity of an impressive reward based on the number of potential users. Current events with scientific implications, such as natural disasters, earthquakes, space shots, major discoveries, and astronomical events, will generate particular interest when quickly incorporated into hot lesson plans.

Predictor: Tinker, Bob

Prediction, in context:

In 1995, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Educational Technology commissioned a series of white papers on various issues related to networking technologies. The department convened the authors for a workshop in November 1995 to discuss the implications. The following statement is taken from one of the white papers, “The Whole World in Their Hands,” by Bob Tinker, the president of Concord Consortium, he has a Ph.D. in physics from MIT and a reputation as a pioneer in constructivist uses of educational technology. Tinker writes:”Online lesson plans will become an important way for teachers to share ideas for using the network. Already some plans are online, but few have links to other network resources. As teachers gain familiarity with network resources, they will increasingly describe how they weave multiple resources together with more traditional resources to address specific learning objectives. These descriptions, or ‘hot lesson plans,’ will be available on the network and contain hot links to other network resources used in the lesson. They will be of great interest to others and will pass around the network like wildfire. The best will have a small royalty fee that offers authors the opportunity of an impressive reward based on the number of potential users. Current events with scientific implications, such as natural disasters, earthquakes, space shots, major discoveries, and astronomical events, will generate particular interest when quickly incorporated into hot lesson plans.”

Date of prediction: January 1, 1995

Topic of prediction: Getting, Sharing Information

Subtopic: E-learning

Name of publication: The Future of Networking Technologies for Learning

Title, headline, chapter name: The Whole World in Their Hands

Quote Type: Direct quote

Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.ed.gov/Technology/Futures/

This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney