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SCOOTER is an experiment in supporting online collaboration between schools. The first trial involved two schools, one in Milton Keynes, UK and one in Prague, Czech Republic. For example, one activity called "Place of the Week" involves students researching and visiting an area of local interest and presenting their findings to students in the other school.
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The trial was run both as an after-school club and as a part of the school-day curriculum. The two schools involved in the trial were Denbigh School in Milton Keynes, and Gymnázium and Základní škola Jirího Gutha-Jarkovského in Prague, Czech Republic.
Students were interested in sharing local history stories, puzzles and creative writing. Participating in the trial provided an opportunity for cultural exchange, the development of ICT skills, and for the Prague school practice in the use of the English language.
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Students wrote stories under different topics including "Place of the week", "Poetry and Prose", "Puzzles", "News", "Day in the Life", and "Reviews". The students were also able to respond to each others stories.
Some of the students in Prague used SCOOTER to publish interviews concerning people’s knowledge of the Enigma machine and code breaking.
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The SCOOTER home page has sections for People (giving the profiles of staff and students), Stories (historical stories, poems, puzzles, etc. contributed by the students), Search, My Scooter (where the student can access and edit their own stories and details) and Help.
The SCOOTER portal was built using the generic Community Story Exchange (CSE) toolkit.
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Using the software, students were able to publish and format their stories without any knowledge of HTML. Facilities were provided for associating pictures with stories, adding sound-bites, choosing templates and previewing stories prior to publication.
Editorial and moderation support allowed teachers to check student contributions before they were made public.
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The Community Story Exchange toolkit also provides facilities that support the awareness of community roles and membership. Like the Bletchley Park Guides, the SCOOTER participants could post profiles of themselves. In this case their hobbies, school subjects, family, and locality.
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In the My SCOOTER section students can create new stories and edit their personal profiles and stories. The My SCOOTER area allows teachers to review, edit and approve stories written by themselves and their students.
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- During the trial, 33 stories were submitted to the SCOOTER web site. These were mainly "Place of the Week" stories and "Puzzles".
- 50 students submitted personal profiles to the site.
- Teachers suggested the following improvements for the next academic year:
- Synchronised story submission by each school (e.g. for Place of the week)
- More powerful collaboration models for organising and interconnecting stories
- Regular online synchronous events
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