Tapped In Newsletter: September 1998

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********** ...ON THE TAPIS **********
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Issue # 11 September, 1998
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...ON THE TAPIS is a monthly letter with updates on TAPPED IN and related events. Check our website to learn more. Contact us if you forgot your password or user name. Please update us if your email address changes.

Quote of the Month:

"All kids are indeed capable of generating powerful ideas; they can rise to the occasion. It turns out that ideas are not luxuries gained at the expense of the 3 R's, but instead enhance them." - Deborah Meier, The Power of Their Ideas, 1995

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[1] TAPPED IN Block Party!
[2] September 14, 1998
[3] Bringing students online into TAPPED IN
[4] How to get a group started in TAPPED IN
[5] ED's Oasis Lesson Plan Contest for Teachers
[6] Grant information
[7] About ...ON THE TAPIS
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[1] TAPPED IN Block Party!
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On September 22, 1998 9am - 9pm PST TAPPED IN will have its first Open House. We're calling it the TAPPED IN Block Party. Come to the Block Party and get to know the neighborhood! Meet the teachers, staff developers, university professors, professional development providers, preservice teachers, and administrators that make the community what it is. Come find out about online projects, great curriculum and resources, Internet based projects, and many exemplary uses of technology for collaborative activities.

If you haven't logged in for a while, come take a look at how things have changed in TAPPED IN. For more information and a schedule of the day's events contact us.

[2] September 14, 1998
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If you tried to log in on Monday, September 14, 1998, you may have experienced some difficulty. Early in the morning, a squirrel and a transformer met up on the SRI Campus (where the TAPPED IN server lives). We're sorry to report that neither the squirrel nor the transformer came out very well. Electricity to all of SRI was out for approximately 19 hours. We apologize if the electrical outage caused you any inconvenience. We're back and everything is working fine again! (We're looking into a back-up power source to prevent future downtime too.)

[3] Bringing students online into TAPPED IN
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Are you looking for ways for your students to collaborate with people who are outside your classroom or school? Would you like them to engage in dialogue with others that goes beyond Questions and Answers? You can bring your students into TAPPED IN's Student Activities Center (SAC) with special student accounts.

You can see an example of a student forum conducted in SAC last May by going to http://www.tappedin.org/info/resources.html and clicking on Civil Rights Forum. At that site you can also see summaries of planning meetings for the Forum, and transcripts from the actual Civil Rights Forum itself. Student forums can, of course, be done in any subject area. TAPPED IN Associate Educator Hulda Nystrom (Hulda or HuldaN) can help you plan your own event.

[4] How to get a group started in TAPPED IN
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Over the past year, TAPPED IN staff and partners have helped numerous groups get started using TAPPED IN for their professional development. On September 2, we called these groups together for a special After School Online session to pool their collective knowledge. A panel of experts shared their experience in motivating and orienting groups to incorporate TAPPED IN into their work.If you would like a copy of the transcript or a summary of the meeting,
visit the After School Online Room and get one from the transcript vendor. See Judi or Mark or Hulda online if you have questions. If you have suggestions or tips to share with people just getting started in leading a group in TAPPED IN, email Mark Schlager contactus@tappedin.sri.com.

[5] ED's Oasis Lesson Plan Contest for teachers
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Enter the Second ED's Oasis Lesson Plan Contest. We're looking for Lesson Plans that:

  * are curriculum-based
  * use Internet resources for student research, collaboration, communication, and publication.
  * support learning standards, and
  * have been classroom-tested.

The contest information can be found at: http://www.edsoasis.org/TGuild/MasterSearch.html

Visit ED's Oasis (http://www.edsoasis.org/) or see Terrie Gray in her office hours in TAPPED IN for more information.

[6] Grant information (NEH and Toyota TAPESTRY)
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The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) supports school teachers & college faculty in the U.S. seeking to strengthen the teaching & learning of history, literature, foreign languages & cultures, and other areas of the humanities. Deadlines for receiving applications under the 1998 & 1999 Education Development & Demonstration Program include the following:

* National Education Projects -- October 15, 1998 & October 15, 1999 Funding available: up to $250,000 total for three years

* Humanities Focus Grants -- Propose a study of a humanities topic during the summer or academic year with colleagues from your school building, school district, college or university. Application deadlines: April 15, 1999 & April 15, 2000 Funding available: up to $25,000

For more information, or if you have ideas about developing a project, please write or call:
Education Development & Demonstration, Division of Research & Education Programs, National Endowment for the Humanities, Room 318, 1100 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20506,
Phone: 202/606-8380 FAX: 202/606-8394 Email: education@neh.govTDD (for hearing impaired only) 202/606-8282
Guidelines & application forms are at the NEH website: http://www.neh.gov/html/forms.html

Toyota TAPESTRY Grants

The TAPESTRY program, funded by Toyota Motor Sales, USA and administered by the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), awards 50 grants of up to $10,000 to K-12 science teachers to fund their innovative science projects over a one-year period. Individual teachers or teams of up to five teachers are eligible in two categories: environmental education or physical science. The proposed project must be interdisciplinary and hands-on. Information on the TAPESTRY program, including guidelines and entry forms, can be found at http://www.nsta.org/programs/toyota.shtml. The deadline for receipt of proposals is January 15, 1999.

[7] About ...ON THE TAPIS
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Postings of all ...ON THE TAPIS issues are available online. Contact us if you have any questions about your subscription, login name or password, or if you have any news items that you want to share with the community for ...ON THE TAPIS.