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COMPUTER USE IN CLASS PAYS OFF FOR ONE SPECIAL ED TEACHER

March 1, 2000

Talk about obstacles to overcome. In rural Reedley, Calif., in 1993, there was no Internet access for miles around, let alone at Alta Elementary School, where special education teacher Cheryl Vitali wanted to integrate computers into her classroom. Despite that initial lack of connection, in the modern computer-world sense of the word, Vitali made connections in her community and at education conferences that have developed into a whirl of ongoing Internet-based projects that link her students to their peers all over the world. For her efforts, Classroom Connect named Vitali its first "Internet Educator of the Year" last month.

The Classroom Connect award is the first in what the Internet site hopes will be a series of annual awards recognizing teachers who integrate the Internet into their regular curriculums. The award includes $5,000 in cash, $5,000 worth of Classroom Connect products, two round trip tickets for two with EF Educational Tours, a color palmtop computer and a laptop computer, both from Compaq Computer Corp., and software from Knowledge Adventure. Vitali was selected for the inaugural award "based on her proven ability to successfully integrate the Internet into her 1998-99 curriculum and her plans to continue using the Internet as part of her classroom curriculum for the 1999-2000 school year," Classroom Connect said.

Starting From Scratch

Highlighting the Internet projects for Vitali's class during the current school year was the second annual International Fest, which the students celebrated Feb. 25. This year's fest included a live online chat with explorer Jon Waterman, who traveled by dog sled and kayak across the arctic ice cap. The chat connected Vitali's students in California with Waterman in Colorado and Rene de Vries, who facilitated the chat from Holland.

Though the celebration of international cultures and traditions was an inspirational success for the students, getting to her present state of Internet integration was a multi-year trek for Vitali. Thanks to some tinkering she had done with a couple of old Apple computers, Vitali was tapped to become network manager for Alta in 1993. "I didn't view myself as that technically literate, but I plunged into the challenge with a passion," she told Special Education News. Her appetite whetted by her students' excitement at having access to a computer, Vitali next set out to win support from outside sources to turn her classroom computer into a door to the rest of the world.

"I heard the word telecommunications -- didn't know what it meant -- and decided this is where education is going to be heading. I wanted to be a pioneer in this new technology," she said. Vaulting her special ed. students into that future was a key goal. The Internet "empowers children to speak with the voices they have and haven't been able to fully utilize before," Vitali explained. "A child with severe writing and reading disability may attempt to write in ways they didn't before, because editing is not as daunting."

Led By Kids and Creativity

The students needed little coaxing into the Internet world, she added. In fact, students in general can facilitate a teacher's efforts to become Internet savvy, Vitali says. "Follow children's lead and it becomes easier. Children are not afraid of this technology, but adults are."

Winning grants for funding and equipment also was not particularly difficult, though it was time consuming. Working with the school district's grant writer rather than getting formal training in how to write grants, Vitali learned the basics of how to inspire corporate sponsors and non-profit groups to fund Internet projects. In fact, the first Internet service provider to reach Alta Elementary and the rest of Reedley was not a private company at all. It was the Telis Foundation, which set out in the mid-1990s to train educators in Northern California to use the 'net. Telis has since expanded that original goal to include all learners.

The key to rounding up outside support is having a clear idea of what the project should accomplish, Vitali said. "There are many businesses that want to support education, but you need to present a clear, concise vision."

The teacher also must be prepared for the responsibility outside funding brings. "I do not make promises, but often a grant has some accountability. I do keep commitments," she said. "I would not want to attempt bringing in change without accountability. If you just get equipment and software without support and training, it will not change things that significantly. There needs to be a reason behind why this change is fundamentally in the interest of children and education. Otherwise, why go to the effort?"

As the computers, Internet access and software gradually became available, Vitali was also cultivating contacts that could point her to more grant opportunities and to interesting information sources for her Internet projects. Conventions on integrating technology into the classroom became a major tool, as did the Internet itself. Vitali said she makes a point of introducing herself to everyone she meets at technology conferences. Then, recognizing many company representatives meet hundreds of teachers at each conference, she follows up after the conference with an e-mail message. "That is very effective and opens up doors of communication. Conferences are some of the best networking places to go," she said.

The Art of Letting Go

Vitali also worked to get her own colleagues at Alta more interested in computers and the Internet in their classrooms. Though it was not easy, the effort has paid off by easing the responsibility Vitali shoulders. "The easiest part is also the hardest: I have learned to let go of a lot of responsibility I carried in the district. This is very liberating, and once you let go of one area, you help others to become involved and collaboration builds," she said.

"There is a difference between letting go and abandoning. I think my special ed. background has really helped here, because working with teachers is very individualized. Relinquishing control is a bit like transitioning or mainstreaming. It just makes sense."

Though her load has gotten easier through collaboration with others, Vitali's days are no less packed. She became a Fresno Regional Telementor in 1994 through the California Telemation Project run by the Telis Foundation. In addition, Vitali continues to apply for, and usually wins, various grants for her class and school projects. Now that she has the hang of it, Vitali noted she has to be selective about which grants she pursues. Though teaching is a full-time job, "managing a grant is time consuming as well," she said.

Besides the International Fests, Alta Elementary has participated in several web projects designed to bring students from different communities together. Vitali has run a project to explore agriculture around the world, called "History, Heritage, Legends, the Land: Fabric that Ties us Together," directed the compilation of a worldwide archive of wildflowers that schoolchildren continue to add to, and conducted a history and culture lesson called "Igniting the Pioneer Spirit." That project, which lasted about two weeks and can easily be duplicated by other teachers by accessing Alta Elementary's web site, helps students explore their own and others' cultures through interviews with their own families and online interviews with adults considered pioneers in their fields.

Power For Special Ed

All of these projects integrated three key factors in Vitali's classroom: standard curriculum lessons for subjects such as history, science or social studies, use of the Internet to reach out to others, and the empowerment computers and the Internet provide for special education students. For children with difficulty communicating, the computer is especially effective, she said. "Their vocabulary is often greater than what they will show with conventional tools. A child with poor fine motor skills can take great delight in producing writing that visually equals his peer," Vitali said.

"Their disabilities become one part of their unique journey, learning to deal with them and overcome them becomes a challenge they can relate to what they are learning about," such as pioneers, she noted.

Children with more profound disabilities, including more limiting physical disabilities, can also benefit from computers if the teacher is willing to be creative and adapt the technology when necessary, she said. For example, one of Vitali's students, who has Autism, has shown major progress since gaining access to the Internet. "I do not think anything has inspired her vocabulary and verbal skills quite as much as the interactions that have been built through using the Internet. I'm not quite sure why, but it is very powerful for this student," she said.

The Internet's vast resources and interactivity make textbooks look a bit bland these days, Vitali said, though she is still careful to make sure the students study the material they are expected to cover. "I always keep my children's IEP goals in focus as my primary goal, but it is really very easy to integrate a very rich curriculum within the context of special education," she said.8