In response to the recent tsunami in the Indian Ocean, the Division of Ocean Sciences/Ocean Education Program awarded this request to hold an on-line teacher workshop that will provide teachers with information and teaching techniques necessary to explain this event to their students. The information will also be freely available on the web to anyone who is interested in it. Teachers have an immediate need to understand the characteristics of this recent overwhelming natural disaster to address their students' questions and concerns. Providing a direct link between scientists and the education community will help address educational needs about tsunamis in the midst of the shock of this event with its catastrophic loss of life.
The College of Exploration (TCOE) will provide timely information to educators by designing, developing and implementing a three-week virtual teacher workshop in February, 2005 where NSF-supported scientists and other experts will present summary information in an online format about their research and be available asynchronously to interactively engage in dialogue with the educators. The overall goal of this workshop is to increase teachers' and students' awareness about the science of the recent tsunami and tsunamis in general at a time when this tragedy has been impacting the world so dramatically, and has been and continues to be a major news event.
The workshop will include three to six keynote presentations by tsunami researchers and experts drawn from NSF-funded scientists, as well as others who are noteworthy experts engaged in tsunami-related research and educational outreach. The workshop will be offered asynchronously, thus allowing participants to take part at their convenience during the three-week period. An external evaluation team will assess the workshop's effectiveness as a professional development tool, determining the success of this model of online workshops using tsunami content to create innovative learning experiences for educators in timely response to a natural disaster.
