Integrating digital library resources in elementary school classrooms - A case study of social study instruction

In Taiwan, integrating the computer technology with instruction has been becoming a major effort of the Ministry of Education to improve the quality of the education. However, teachers' willingness and capabilities to use these digital learning resources will have an important impact on the outcomes of the policy. The purpose of this paper is to study the educational applications of the digital library resources in elementary school. Combining the WWW technologies and the Internet resources of National Digital Archives, a web-based learning environment was implemented for classroom instruction. Teachers first developed several learning activities based the framework of situated learning, and then integrated these digital resources in the classroom instruction. The researcher-collected data of learning activities to evaluated the students' achievement and teachers' professional development. The results indicated that, in addition to factual knowledge, students had the opportunities to practice variety of skills such as teamwork, information searching and organization, presentation, and discussion. The teacher also comprehended the meanings and process of constructive learning by supporting students' learning with digital resources and technologies.