The Electronic Emissary is a Web-based service and resource center that helps teachers and students with Internet access locate mentors who are experts in various disciplines, then plan and engage in curriculum-based learning. In this way, the interaction that occurs among teachers and students face-to-face in the classroom is supplemented and extended by electronic mail, Web forum, chat, and audio/videoconferencing exchanges that occur among participating teachers, students, and volunteer mentors. These project-based online conversations typically range in length from six weeks to a full academic year, as students’ needs and interests dictate. The Electronic Emissary has been online since February 1993 and on the World Wide Web since December 1995. It serves students and teachers globally, but the majority of its participants to date have been in North America. Emissary-related research has focused upon the nature of telementoring interactions in which K-12 students are active inquirers, the motivations and perceptions of their volunteer subject matter mentors, why some teachers choose to persist in integrating telementoring into curricula despite considerable hindrances, effective telementoring facilitation techniques, and what teachers learn as they help their students to participate in curriculum-oriented telementoring projects. Students exploring complex curriculum-based topics need to actively build deep and sophisticated understanding. One of the most effective ways to do this is by engaging in ongoing dialogue with knowledgeable others, as the students form, refine, and expand their knowledge. Classroom teachers typically serve as the subject matter experts with whom students interact in curriculum-based areas of inquiry. Yet when the issues being explored are multi-disciplinary, technically and conceptually sophisticated, or dependent upon current and highly specialized research and theory, additional expertise must be made directly available to students and teachers longitudinally, and on an as-needed basis. This is what telementoring offers to learners and educators today, and what the Electronic Emissary brings to students and teachers worldwide.
Facilitated Telementoring for K-12 Students and Teachers
