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Teachers build the cornerstone of the Internet Science and
Technology Fair (ISTF) Program. They take responsibility for leading elementary, middle and high school students through the competition cycle, while attending to all their other academic requirements. This section is quite possibly most important,
as it comes directly from the individuals who make the ISTF Program possible. All new teachers, educators and administrators who read this section must understand that
UCF-CECS has, for the past seven years, considered and acted on the input of
participating teachers.
Approximately eighteen teachers
who participated in the 2003-2004 ISTF responded to
the Final Process Evaluation questions concerning the preparation
for, work on, and completion of their students' projects. Below is a
bulleted summary of the information these teachers provided. The
primary purpose of this report is to aid teachers in planning,
managing, and finishing participation in an ISTF competition. The
secondary goal is to present the same information for students,
technical advisors, parents, administrators, and any other
interested parties.
* You can also read what the
teachers thought "In Their Own Words."
Preparing for the ISTF Project
Here are some interesting facts about how teachers (who
responded) got
started:
- One-third had enrolled student teams in prior years.
- Over half said the teacher training guide and web site were
informative, but 33% said these resources
were not.
- Only 7% of ninth grade teachers had students
use the high school guidelines.
- Most teachers and their student teams reviewed the ISTF website’s content
guidelines,
Hall of Fame (past-year winning teams), and
National
Critical Technologies (NCT’s).
- 44% indicated it took more than three class sessions to decide on different student team project topics.
- Almost half had their students select a community or national problem and then correlate it to the NCT’s,
while the other half chose NCT’s and then discussed possible topics.
- 73% indicated their student teams
encountered a problem narrowing their project focus.
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Working on the ISTF Project
Teachers (who responded) discussed the somewhat daunting task of locating
technical advisors and explained the roles their team's technical
advisors assumed:
- 46.7% of the teachers' student teams located
technical advisors, while 40% received some form of technical
advice but had no technical advisor.
- 53% of the teachers helped their student teams locate a technical advisor.
- 33% of the students who found a technical advisor did so via Internet research.
- 26% of the students located a technical advisor who was a parent or friend in the community.
- 73% of the teachers said technical
advisor-student interaction was very
valuable, because:
- 80% of the technical advisors provided students with technical information and explained why their research was faulty.
- 60% of the technical advisors provided a critique of their
teams' final project websites, helped students locate useful content from web sites and helped students narrow their project focus.
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Teachers (who responded) assessed the communication between members of their
team(s):
- 13.3% reported that the technical advisor did initiate e-mail communication with the team but the team did not respond.
- 53.3% said the technical advisor communicated with both the students and the
teacher, while:
- 66.7% said the technical advisor communicated
only directly with the student team members.
- 6.7% reported the technical advisor communicated with the team
only through the teacher.
- 20% said the team did not communicate with the technical advisor often
enough, still:
- 53.3% reported that the technical advisor answered all the team e-mail related to the team's project.
- 33% said their students communicated often with their technical advisors,
and 40% communicated occasionally.
- 60% said their student teams exchanged e-mails on a regular basis and 20% met with their technical advisor before the October start date.
- 13.3% felt that communication was too limited by using only
e-mail, however:
- 60% felt the questions the students asked became more focused as the ISTF progressed.
- 53.3% felt the student teams learned
valuable lessons about communicating
through e-mail during the ISTF.
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Completing the ISTF Project
Teachers (who responded) expressed willingness to participate again:
- 73% indicated they would enroll teams in the 2004-2005 ISTF competition.
- 26% said they will enter more teams, while 33% said they would
enroll the same number of teams.
- 100% of the teachers said they would encourage other teachers to participate in the ISTF!
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* You can also read what the
teachers thought "In Their Own Words."
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