The University of South Alabama in consortium with Vanderbilt University and the University of Alabama, Birmingham, will work with the 11 regional inservice centers to integrate the use of hypermedia into the education of preservice teachers. The regional inservice centers are associated with the teacher education institutions in the state. Vanderbilt University will be responsible for initial faculty orientation and training in the use of hypermedia and interactive videodisc technology to provide a context for the integration of mathematics content and pedagogy in the education of elementary school mathematics teachers. The purposes of the project are to develop a prototypical model of interactive laser videodisc instruction for mathematics teacher education, to disseminate this model and sample material, and to determine the effectiveness of the use of interactive laser videodisc instruction in the mathematics education curriculum of eleven of Alabama teacher education programs. Of particular interest is the diversity of the student populations in the sample the will be part of the intensive study of the effects of the use of the technology. Two historically black institutions are in the group and one is included in the intensive sample. The videodiscs that will the basis for the intervention were produced by a team at Vanderbilt University with a prior NSF grant, Bridging the Gap between Theory and Practice... This project will have state wide impact and will be a model of collaboration between universities and schools within a state. At the same time, the project will allow a large scale evaluation of the Vanderbilt materials. The project will have impact on both the faculty of the eleven institution and on the perservice teachers that are in the programs at the universities. There will be 50 faculty and 1,100 preservice teachers involved in the project. In addition, the regional center will work with experienced teachers in each region to assess the use of such technology in teacher enhancement. The number of experienced teachers reached will be approximately 165, 15 per site. Each regional center has responsibility for state sponsored teacher enhancement activities. This gives a natural opportunity to expand the use of the materials.
