Computer Conversations： Readers and Books Online.docVIP

Computer Conversations: Readers and Books Online The following is a selection of excerpts from Computer Conversations (NCTE 1996). Networks and Literature In the BookRead Project, teachers discovered the exceptional potential of networking for improving both literature and literacy education. Person-to-person communities of readers and writers, teachers, students and authors connected across state and regional boundaries have helped to erase provincial barriers of regionalism, ethnicity, and economic status. Local communities have enhanced reading and literature education at a reasonable cost by having authors visit multiple classrooms through computer telecommunication. Teachers, children, and even parents have entered the new world of computer telecommunications together through the BookRead Project. Students have become more enthusiastic readers through meeting contemporary authors and other readers like themselves. These children have increased their cultural awareness by getting to know their peers in other schools and other regions, as well as by reading good books. They have grown in their ability to respond to literature and to express their responses in writing by practicing these skills in an informal, real-world environment. The direct exchanges between young readers and their favorite authors have demonstrated clearly that good books themselves are the best motivation for reading and writing, while computers make writing a natural mode of communication for todays students. Authors Online We were fortunate enough to have authors Jean Craighead George, Sue Ellen Bridgers, and Gary Paulsen participate online with us in our study of their books during two separate projects. Their participation took several forms. Each author launched the project by introducing himself or herself to the children, writing some paragraphs about his or her life and work and sending them online to the participating schools. They read all the mail the children sent to each oth