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			In the months ahead, the Intel® Innovation in Education Web site will continue to expand with free tools and resources for teachers. Long before a new tool appears online, however, months of research and design go into resource development. Behind the scenes, a team of experienced educators, researchers, and software engineers works together to create tools for teachers to use to increase student learning. Dr. Jim Pollard, lead researcher for the online program developers, plays a key role in shaping which new tools will make their way from raw idea to reality. A 20-year veteran of evaluation in education, specifically educational technology, he knows from experience that the classroom value of any tool is what matters most. "Education is more important than technology." he says. "We want to enhance what the teacher does in the classroom rather than replace it." So what makes a good Web tool for educators? And where do good ideas for teacher resources come from? Pollard and his colleagues from the Intel Innovation in Education team recently invited a group of 50 teachers, university researchers, and software engineers to discuss those intriguing questions at the first Web Tools Forum. Four days of brainstorming and hard thinking generated a slate of new ideas for potential development. By design, all focused in some way on classroom activities that would inspire students to use higher-order thinking skills. "We were hoping to come away with four good ideas to develop, and we got at least 10," says Pollard. Free to Dream In the loosely structured environment of the Web Tools Forum, teachers broke into smaller teams and then were encouraged to dream. "We know there are a lot of teachers out there with ideas, and we wanted to bring some of them together," Pollard says. "The best way to be creative is to be with other people who are creative." Invited teachers came from across the United States. They teach in diverse classrooms; an urban high school for students in the California court system, an Alaska district that invests heavily in technology to connect students with the rest of the world, and an Idaho middle school where teachers regularly create projects that cross disciplines. What all share, says Pollard, is that "they're known for being good teachers." And they have a track record of integrating technology into the classroom to boost student learning. Sitting alongside these creative teachers at the Web Tools Forum were education researchers and software engineers. "They brought their own ideas and they helped make them more real," Pollard explains. Drawing on participants' diverse backgrounds, the teams were able to express conceptual ideas for new Web tools "in terms of software and also in terms of pedagogy." Building Blocks Months of development and classroom field-testing will take place before any of these new ideas will be ready to introduce on the Web site. Already, however, Pollard has a good idea of the building blocks required to make a Web tool useful for teachers and appropriate for delivery on the Intel Innovation in Education Web site. "In general, a good tool will have little connection to content. It's something that can fit into teachers' lives regardless of what subject they're teaching." Seeing Reason, a concept mapping tool introduced on intel.com/education last year, offers a model of all the elements that are assembled before a Web tool is ready to launch. An earlier version of the tool was developed by researchers at the Center for Innovative Learning Technologies at the Berkeley campus of the University of California. Basically, students use the tool to capture their thinking about cause-and-effect relationships by creating a series of boxes and arrows. That simplicity is the beauty of the tool. "As soon as students see how to create one factor and make one relationship, they're off. They don't need much instruction; it's all very intuitive. They are thinking about what is in their maps rather than how to use the tool; which is its absolute most important feature," Pollard says. "You're teaching about cause and effect rather than how to use the tool." Convinced that the tool "was exactly what teachers were looking for," Pollard led the work of adapting Seeing Reason for the Intel site, "so that it would work on any browser, any platform." He also added supporting components intended to make Seeing Reason more useful to teachers. "We spent about five months on development, putting the tool in a classroom and seeing how teachers would use it. We interviewed teachers, then made modifications based on their feedback," he explains. The supporting elements transform what might seem like a simple tool into a rich professional development resource for the teacher. So what does the "complete package" include, in addition to a great interactive teaching tool for the classroom? Pollard identifies the following elements: Research base: "This grounds the tool in theory and explains why it might be effective to use in the classroom." Teacher experiences with the tool: "What works best? What might you expect students to do? What to avoid? It's essential that we tell real teachers' stories that come from authentic experiences in the classroom. This adds credibility and lets teachers know they're learning from their colleagues." Quick-start examples: ""These ideas will get you started using the tool right away. We provide enough content so that good teachers can see the example and apply it to something they're doing in the classroom." Deep example: "This is an example that shows how to use the tool from start to finish, from learning goals all the way to assessment. We show a unit in detail, so that another teacher can pick up and do the whole unit to deliver a particular piece of instruction. It's tied to standards, has a depth of content, includes all the handouts and other materials needed for teaching. It's the complete package. If the quick example shows you how a tool might work, the deep example shows you how it really does work." Help: "This is instruction on using the tool itself." Management tools for the teacher: "This is something the Web does really well: providing management tools so a teacher can set up projects for the class, set up student accounts. The teacher can then go to the Web site, review student work, and exchange comments on projects with students. It's all there in one place, and teachers and students can access it all from any computer that has Internet access." From the Seeing Reason experience, Pollard says he's learned "there's a need for resources like this. Teachers have told us that having this tool available does change how they teach. And students like it. With very little instruction, they understand how to use it." Like Seeing Reason, the next generation of Web tools to appear on the Intel education site will also relate to higher-order thinking. Pollard describes upcoming tools in broad strokes: "Most will be collaborative. They'll be content-free, so they can work in any subject area. And really good tools also involve layering in some way—taking knowledge in one area, overlaying it in some other area, seeing connections, building on ideas. That's appealing from the Web perspective. We can combine ideas from different geographies." How soon might these innovative new tools be available for teachers? Look for at least two new ones by the end of this year, Pollard says. But first, there's much work to be done. It's a challenge, he admits, "but considerable fun." Error processing SSI file Error processing SSI file