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Providing Enrichment and Acceleration in the Electronic Classroom: A Case Study of Audiographic Conferencing

Audiographic conferencing technology is currently used by the Education Department of Western Australia (EDWA) to provide enrichment programs for talented and gifted students living in rural and isolated areas of Western Australia. In addition to increasing the access and participation of isolated students to a special curriculum designed to extend and enrich their learning, current policy also aims to improve and develop the applications of technology for special education needs. For the particular students involved in the study, the goal of higher-order thinking was sought as a learning outcome. Based on observations and research on the actual classrooms where audiographic conferencing was used to mediate learning, this paper suggests that higher-order thinking (HOT) among gifted students can be fostered by utilizing audiographic conferencing to create a classroom milieu of peer discourse, investigation and visual display of ideas. When teachers are encouraged to adopt a process-based approach and to foster the skills of negotiation, verbal elaboration and peer revision of ideas they also begin to utilize the two-way audio and video elements of the technology to maximize learning. The initial evaluation of the project for gifted and talented students indicated that the interactive features of the technology provided the possibilities for task-related collaboration and gave students the opportunity to share, discuss and evaluate concepts, thereby leading to higher-order thinking.