Intel® Teach To The Future Program Expands With Addition Of Hands-On Workshops
American K-12 Educators Offered Free Instruction On Web-Based Tools
SANTA CLARA, Calif., June 21, 2004 - To help students develop higher-level thinking skills, Intel Corporation has introduced a new workshop series to teach K-12 educators how to effectively use new Web-based tools to engage students and enhance learning. The workshops are an expansion of the successful Intel® Teach to the Future Essentials Course.
The new Intel® Teach to the Future Workshops on Interactive Thinking Tools provide teachers with face-to-face, hands-on instruction for using free teaching tools available on the Intel® Innovation in Education Web site. Participants gain valuable experience working with online tools to foster critical thinking. Such tools include "Seeing Reason," an interactive mapping tool that helps students construct models of their understanding of cause and effect relationships, and "Visual Ranking," an interactive workspace involving a wide range of cognitive skills based on Bloom's taxonomy of intellectual behaviors (a categorizing level of abstraction of questions that commonly occur in educational settings).
"The 'Visual Ranking' and 'Seeing Reason' tools are favorites of mine as they help me reach my goal of improving students' higher-level thinking skills," said Julia Fischer, science teacher at Kyrene Akimel A-al Middle School in Phoenix. "The tools facilitated discussion among students that allowed for a deeper analysis of the problem and possible solutions."
The workshop series was developed in response to feedback from the Intel Teach to the Future 40-hour course, now known as the Intel® Teach to the Future Essentials Course. Ongoing research on the effectiveness of the program confirms that while teachers view the Intel Teach to the Future Essentials Course positively and go on to implement new technology-integrated lessons, many would like follow-up opportunities to collaborate with peers and increase their confidence in using new technology tools.
"After successfully completing the initial Intel Teach to the Future training, teachers came back to us and asked, 'What's next?' Now those teachers can go beyond the essentials of technology integration to provide new, unique experiences with technology-based learning tools," said Wendy Hawkins, director of education at Intel.
The "Interactive Thinking Tools" workshops are available nationwide to schools and districts participating in the Intel Teach to the Future program. The first workshop in the series focuses on the "Seeing Reason" and "Visual Ranking" tools. The series will expand in early 2005 to include a workshop on a new tool that prompts students to make well-supported arguments with clear claims based on reliable evidence. For more information on the workshops visit www.intel.com/education.
About Intel Teach to the Future
Intel® Teach to the Future is a worldwide effort to provide free professional development for teachers to help them integrate technology into instruction to enhance student learning. Teachers learn to incorporate technology tools and resources into their lesson plans, how to create assessment tools and how to align lessons with educational learning goals and standards. The training incorporates the use of the Internet, Web page design, and student projects.
Intel Teach to the Future is part of the Intel Innovation in Education initiative, a sustained commitment - in collaboration with educators and government leaders worldwide - to help today's students develop the higher-level thinking skills they need to participate and succeed in a knowledge-based economy. Intel is focused on helping to integrate technology effectively into the education process and to improve science, mathematics, engineering and technology education.
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