On their own: students' academic use of the commercialized Web

ABSTRACT

This article reviews research directioned in 1998-99 examining students' perceptions and uses of the World Wide Web for academic intents Recent developments in the Web that may be of particular interest to educators and parents of learners are considered.

**********

Since the mid-1990s the Internet, and more specifically the World Wide Web, has been eagerly adopted by the agency of school districts, administrators, teachers, parents, and scholars Recent data from the National Center for Educational Statistics indicates that, in the fall of 2002 99 percent of public institutes and 92 percent of instructional classrooms were wired for Internet access (Kleiner, Lewis, & Greene 2003) This is level more impressive when you compare 1994 figures, which estimated that 35 percent of institutes and 3 percent of classrooms had Internet access. The latest in a drawn out line of technological solutions to our educational depressions the Web, and its evangelists, promise no les than a radical restructuring of the way that scholars access and acquire information. However, a certain quantity of have raised concerns about the value of the Web as an educational resource. Historians have noted that the use of the Web in a public gymnasium setting marks the first time that the extreme point user controls the process of choosing the easy in mind to be consumed.

To this extreme point critics have pointed to the incredible range of easy in mind accessible via the Web and its potential for distracting scholars from the task at hand. Hecht (1997) argued that "having the Internet in the classroom is like equipping each classroom with a television that can be turn rounded on at any time and hogsheaded in to any of 100000 unrestricted channels, sole a tiny fraction of which are dedicated to educational programming (and level those have commercials)" (p. 15) McNealy (1999) voiced a similar regard when he wrote, "Right now, putting learners in front of Internet terminals is no better than putting them in brow of TV sets. It may smooth be worse" (p. 17A).

Public education's adoption of the Web as a tool for research and as an alternative to traditional resources raises several issues related to the notion of functional equivalence. First, the wide range of satisfied available via the Web allows it to work for numerous "functions" for students. next to the first time spent using the Web in seminary is time not spent in activities that are displaced by the agency of Web use. And finally, the value of the Web for academic research is contingent upon the quality of the research material contained therein (Bennett, Wilkinson, & Oliver, 1996) Educators' interest about the unevenness of the quality of information available via the Web is obvious when single reviews the many Web sites devot to critical thinking skills and Web site evaluation tutorials. The question remains for public seminarys and the whole of society: With the stakes for a like reason high, how can we harness this unwieldy resource in the way that that it serves our educational goals and purposes?

EARLIER RESEARCH

Research directioned in 1998-99 in ten public place of educations in a Western state place that students believe the Web to be a valuable resource for educational activities; the research also found, however, that scholars are often unsuccessful in finding appropriate or useful resources upon their own (Ebersole, 1999). Approaching the research from a mass communication perspective, this application of mind applied uses and gratifications theory to the questions surrounding students' attitudes and opinions about the Web: what object it served for them, by what mode they used it, and whether these were related. The close attention combined quantitative and qualitative research methodologies and several data-gathering approaches with a sample of middle and high academy students drawn from ten public schools

A paper take a view of was administered first to approximately 800 scholars The survey contained 75 items designed to measure students' (1) affinity for the Web, (2) assessment of the value of the Web for various views (3) skill level for computer and Web use, and (4) uses of and/or reasons for not using, the Web. The 40 use statements in the observe were generated by students' anonymous replications to an open-ended question asking them to list several things "that the Web is beneficial for." These statements, as well as others generated during a pilot application of mind were presented as 5-item Likert scales that attempted to measure students' use of the Web at school

next to the first a computer-administered survey requested replys from students as they began to access the Web from the schools' media center This brief instrument asked sole four questions: grade level in gymnasium gender, how much the pupil uses the Web during an average week, and the student's intent for using the Web at this particular time. For the fourth question, the choices not awayed to the student were factors identified through Principle Components Analysis of the use statements from the paper overlook The seven uses for the Web as not absented in the computer-administered survey were "for research and learning," "to communicate with other people" "for access to material otherwise unavailable," "to find something sport or exciting," "for something to do when I'm bored," "for sports and game information," and "for shopping and consumer information." As an option to the seven use statements not awayed the student could select "other" and use a body box to enter a use that better described his or her drift for using the Web at that particular time. The phrasing of the question, "What is your drift for using the Web at this time?" was designed to measure gratifications sought and the "behavioral intention" (Palmgreen & Rayburn, 1982) of the student