Abstract
In Texas, elementary school pupils are doing homework on a telecommunications network. A professor, a principal, and a production manager for a telecommunications network spearheaded this innovative use of an educational technology system. They got a pilot project started in one innercity school in 1991, and it has already spread to six surrounding school districts. The endeavor now involves parents, elementary teachers and administrators, university faculty and students, telecommunications technologists, videotex writers, and business sponsors.
The children in the pilot program averaged two hours a week of extra-credit homework on the network during the school months. During their summer vacation, these children were allowed to keep equipment for accessing the telecom network at home. In June and July their average time online increased to over two hours a week on videotex programs that exercised math, writing, and reading. For this group, an educational technology system that involved doing homework on a telecommunications network definitely increased academic time on task.
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