Posted January 2005 Online communication helps students care Pamela Rushby Education Views, Edition 2, 2005
		The Australian Education Union recently announced a Tsunami Education Action Week, to take place across Australia in February. AEU Federal President Pat Byrne said that, apart from fund raising for victims, it was hoped activities would help students understand the impact of the disaster on children in affected countries. There's little doubt that online communication helps students care. Research has shown that people communicating online share emotions as well as information, and develop friendships as well as gaining new knowledge. Students of Japanese at Townsville State High School, for example, regularly chat online with students in Iwaki, Japan. They've never met, but they're friends. In the past, fostering a global approach wasn't easy. Students gained new information and concepts from books, guests visiting their school, field trips, phone calls and letter writing.

But now the walls of classrooms are down. Students today have access to online communication, and the world is open to them.

One of the ways they access it is through the Learning Place. Education Queensland's Learning Place provides communication methods such as video and data conferencing, Comic chat, online experts and collaborative projects. Students take part in chats and forums with people they might never, otherwise, have had the opportunity to meet.

The Learning Place brings the world closer to students and helps them learn more about it.

To assist students understand how the tsunami occurred, and its impact on affected areas, The Learning Place will run a Tsunami online event between 31 January and 11 February, when seismologists Col Lynam and Dion Weatherley from The University of Queensland's Earth Systems Science Computational Centre will chat online. The Learning Place also plans to include officers from aid organisations.

In another Learning Place online event, students have assisted in raising awareness of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD). DMD is a fatal, muscle wasting disease which affects one in 3500 boys worldwide.

Dr Andrew HoeyThrough a special course on The Learning Place, senior science students have taken part in a WebQuest on DMD research, and primary students from Australia and the Czech Republic have designed greeting cards for 2005's Duchenne Awareness Week, 13-19 February.

The Learning Place will also host online chats where students can ask questions of world renowned scientist and researcher Dr Andrew Hoey, Head of Muscle Research Lab, Centre for Biomedical Research, University of Southern Queensland.