Distance Education and Teacher Education at Armstrong Atlantic State University. Fastback 440.

Overview & Synopsis

This publication describes some of the key technologies of distance education in the context of teacher education at Armstrong Atlantic State University, Georgia. The technologies permit college-to-school and school-to-school links, cross-cultural communication, and other expanded forms of communication. Section 1 examines distance education technologies, explaining that Armstrong Atlantic State University is a participant in the Georgia Statewide Academic and Medical System, the largest interactive distance education network in the world. Section 2 describes college-to-school links, explaining how distance education technology allows methods instructors to bridge the gap between college learning and school teaching. Section 3 examines school-to-school links via distance education technology, noting that classrooms of the future will include students who are actually sitting in other classrooms in the school, other schools in the community, and other locations around the nation or world. Section 4 describes how distance education technology promotes cross-cultural links, allowing students to meet other students from their own and other cultures. This section also includes a list of children's books that are appropriate for enhancing cross-cultural education. Section 5 describes teaching-learning links that are strengthened by distance education technology and offers a list of essentials for distance education that are equally applicable in a single, low-tech classroom. (Contains 46 references.) (SM)