Dr. David A. Manzo, Adult Literacy Department, Northampton Community College

Online Chat for Practitioners

Goal

The goal of this lesson is to prepare adult education practitioners to use online chatting as a means of exchanging relevant information about procedures, materials, etc. in a timely fashion.

Level:

The students for this class will be literacy, ABE, GED, and ESL instructors. It is assumed that these students are familiar with computers, keyboarding skills, and the Internet.

Duration:

Two hours of instruction

Objectives:

1. Using a computer, students will be able to successfully log into a chat room.

2. The students will exhibit an understanding of the basic terminology and commands required for using a chat room, this will be exhibited by sending/receiving messages.

3. Students will be able to use appropriate netiquette, as designated by the trainer at the beginning of training.

4. Using a pencil/paper "quiz" (as developed by the trainer, and not to be graded), the students will correctly identify 2 advantages of chat rooms versus bulletin boards, 2 uses for chat rooms to exchange information about issues affecting programs in their region.

Equipment:

1. Computers that have the capability to allow the creation of a chat room.

2. Hand outs

Procedures:

1. The assignment and expectations will be explained to the students using lecture format.

2. Students will be provided with hand outs that are relevant to the lesson. These handouts include:

A. How to create a chat room (/join#"name of chat room")

B. Chat room terminology ( e.g., nick, firewall, etc.) and commands (e.g., /JOIN, /PART, /MSG, ?TOPIC #channel new topic, /KICK #channel nickname, etc.),

3. The instructor will discuss advantages (e.g., brainstorming, inexpensive, immediate exchange, etc.) to chat rooms versus bulletin boards or list serves.

4. As much as possible, these hand outs will be explained by the instructor and the techniques demonstrated on the computer, which should be facing the students. Only the instructor is logged on.

5. The instructor will log on to a chat room and demonstrate how to best utilize a chat room (e.g.,, group chats, private chats, chatting in several rooms at the same time, etc.).

6. The instructor will then permit the students to practice logging on to a chat room.

7. The instructor will inform the students that when they first log on to a chat room they should watch the conversation for a while, to see where it is going and when to make a relevant (brief) comment.

8. The instructor will create a chat room where the students will enter.

9. The instructor will select a question relevant to adult education.

10. The students will be permitted to type comments on the question selected by the instructor.

11. The instructor will set aside time for the brief "quiz", and time to discuss the results in class.

Evaluation:

Evaluation will be based on accomplishing the objectives.