English and Foreign Languages on the
Web
The English and Foreign Languages Department has begun work on several technology projects this past year. The Department's new home page, designed by Maureen Geiger, was completed and posted in the summer of 1999. Several members have published their home pages, which can be found through the Department page at
A few Department members have begun using Web sites in their courses. The sites are used as places for teachers and students to post course documents--assignments, journals, reports, and papers--but also as places in which to carry on course discussions, either during class time or throughout the week before and after class.
In the summer of 1999 Angelo Bonadonna purchased, built, and configured a computer to function as the Department's new Web server for hosting interactive class Web sites. The server project was made possible by funds secured by Maire Mullins from Dean Larry Frank of the School of Arts and Sciences. The new machine, which runs Apache in a Linux environment, is the University's first server dedicated solely to academic computing. It supports "courseware" packages like Critical Tools, Web Course in a Box, WebCT, and others-making available to teachers the full range of interactive course features that come with Web-based learning. The server has the capacity to host many courses, so the Department has invited faculty of other departments to use its new server.
Last January (1999), as part of his work on the Teaching Learning Technology Roundtable, Angelo Bonadonna started a Saint Xavier community technology listserv, TLTR-L. The list provides a convenient forum for faculty, staff, students, administrators--and alumni--to share ideas on the full range of issues involved in academic computing. You can join the list by sending email to majordomo@listserv.sxu.edu. In the message window type "subscribe tltr." By return email you'll receive instructions on how to confirm your subscription.
With Julie McNellis, Angelo Bonadonna applied for a 3M Vision Grant to form "Technology Teams for Education." The program they designed will fund the formation of several mentor-apprentice faculty teams to support the introduction of new technologies in teaching. Angelo Bonadonna also collaborated with Linda Burke in writing an Ameritech/ACI grant, the "Technology in Clinical Program." This grant will fund a new approach to clinical experiences for pre-service English and elementary teachers. Methods students will be assigned "mentor teachers" who will aid pre-service teachers in their first efforts to design, deliver, and assess instruction. The pre-service teachers will also be required to implement a technology component into some aspect of their teaching, and thus help the mentor teacher become aware of new pedagogical methods. Drs. Burke and Bonadonna are also collaborating on a major Department of Education grant, Preparing Tomorrow's Teachers to Use Technology, which they will write throughout the current academic year and submit in June, 2000. Keep posted!