The Program also noted that computers and the Internet could be used to achieve these two objectives.

The third revised budget of fiscal 1993 contained an allocation to launch the Educational Software Development and Promotion Project, as an Advanced Use of Specific Program. One of the major experiments in the project was the 100-School Networking Project, which provided schools with technology for use of the Internet.

The 100-School Networking Project, launched in 1994, was placed under joint control of the Information Technology Promotion Agency, Japan (IPA) and the Center for Educational Computing (CEC), in order to promote advanced uses of information by schools through the Internet, one of the main themes of the Educational Software Development and Promotion Project. To provide oversight for the project, the Educational Software Development and Promotion Center Collaborators Committee, composed of scholars and other specialists, was established. Application details for school participating were announced in August. In early December, the schools participating in the 100-School Networking Project were selected, and local providers were assigned. In early 1995, the relevant phone lines were linked with local Internet providers, and Internet-related equipment was installed by designated manufacturers at all member schools. In March, the Project began offering introductory and information-exchange meetings for teachers in charge of the Program as well as others involved in the Project.

Application details for school participating were announced in August 1994, with applications accepted until the end of October. A total of 1,543 applications were received from elementary, junior high, senior high schools, and special education schools throughout the nation. Immediately after the deadline, the applicant selection process began.

Number of Applications and Number of Schools Selected

Member Schools by Type

Type of Terminal Adapter and Modem Used by Group

Project participants were grouped into two groups: 41 Group A schools, which were networked using 64-Kbps dedicated leased digital lines; and 70 Group B schools, which were linked with providers using dedicated leased analog lines with band of frequency of 3.4 kHz. Four schools in Group A were linked to a local area network (LAN). Under the initial plan, servers were not scheduled to be provided for Group B schools, but based on the large number of institutions applying, the existing technological foundations at these institutions, and the content of proposals submitted, the project secretariat (IPA and CEC) decided to provide a server for every participating institution.

As part of preparations for the introductory meeting, project proposals submitted by the participating schools were analyzed and drafts of joint utilization programs prepared.

In 1995, the newsletter was issued. At the same time, the technical support center opened and a mailing list was prepared. After the summer vacation, the member schools began their proposed activities, making use of the Internet access provided for the project. The Educational Software Development and Usage Promotion Center Collaborators Committee established two subcommittees, one for educational uses of the Internet and one for networking technology. Joint utilization programs were also designed and implemented, and support for local Internet providers was provided. Study sessions on Internet use were held in ten locations, and a three-day special study session on the Internet was held for teachers in charge of network administration. In March, a meeting was held for member schools to report their project results.

The networking environment was built in cooperation with 13 local network committees, connecting 111 member schools to 39 operation centers via access points and a backbone of academic networks including WIDE and SINET. At the study sessions on Internet use, lectures on current Internet activity among educators were provided for pertinent personnel on the local network committees, as well as member schools; lectures were given by technical specialists from the companies that installed the networking system. The majority of problems occurred during this introductory period, and most were solved by the equipment suppliers. Other problems were dealt with by local network committees. Each member school was equipped with a server and a client computer, along with a router/terminal adapter or a modem. The system was linked to the provider via a dedicated line.

The Information Infrastructure Center opened in fall 1995, at which time the 100-School Networking Project launched its first homepage. A survey on Internet use conducted that fall revealed that 70 percent of the schools had located their client computer in their computer room. The survey results also showed that 94 percent of teachers and 44 percent of students were able to use e-mail. Eighty-seven schools already had their own homepages on the Internet, or approximately 80 percent of all member schools.

Internet utilization study sessions were held in six regional blocs (Hokkaido and Tohoku, Kanto, Hokuriku and Tokai, Kinki, Chugoku and Shikoku, and Kyushu) between October 1995 and January 1996. In addition, study sessions were held at the Information Infrastructure Center in Fujisawa City in Kanagawa Prefecture for elementary, junior high, and high schools, separately. A study session for special education schools was held at Makuhari in Chiba Prefecture.

Projects carried out in 1995 were of two types: programs initiated by member schools, and joint network utilization programs based on proposals from member schools. The joint programs were categorized into the following areas: information exchange, collaborative studies, electronic conference, and exhibition of students works. Another program was proposed by the secretariat and concerned special education. Collaborative studies included research on acid rain and ecological botany research (e.g., continuous observation of a tree at each member school), which continued in succeeding years.

In July 1996, the Central Council for Education of the Ministry of Education submitted a report on optimal approaches to developing the education system in Japan for the 21st century. This report proposed that all schools throughout the nation should have access to the Internet in the near future. At the conclusion of the three-year 100-School Networking Project, in late 1996, Internet utilization study sessions were held; in March 1997, project results were reported. Some collaborative studies were continued even after the Project ended. Konetto plan launched in November with approximately 1,000 participating schools.

Status of Communications Environment as of July 1996

In fiscal 1996, there was growing use of real-time transmission of image-based data, using programs such as CU-SeeMe, along with WWW resources and e-mail. Because of the discrepancy between available transmission speeds and the amount of information to be sent, however, the results obtained were not as good as expected. A survey of budget activity for network maintenance found that two schools had completed a maintenance budget, while two-thirds (74) of member schools were working to compile one. Five schools were reviewing their budgets, 20 schools had submitted budget requests to the local Boards of Education, and 26 schools were working internally to modify their budgets. Twenty-three schools were engaged in other, unspecified phases of budget activity.

Immediately after completion of the 100-School Networking Project in March 1997, the 100-School Networking Project (Phase II) was initiated in April 1997, with 108 participants. In place of subcommittees, CEC established four working groups, under a supporting committee, to implement CEC-initiative programs in four areas: globalization, area collaboration, utilization of advanced networking technology, and advanced utilization of school networking.

Number of Schools by Group Before and After Adoption of Faster Data Transmission Speeds

In fiscal 1997, 34 out of the 64 Group B schools switched to digital data transmission, thus becoming Group A members. After this change, 75 schools had installed 64-Kbps dedicated leased digital lines while the remaining 33 schools still used dedicated leased analog lines with the band of frequency of 3.4 kHz. Some prefectural and municipal governments approved a budgetary item to improve data transmission speeds, allowing more schools to adopt digital technology.

In fiscal 1997, mailing lists were still in use, and technical consultation services continued to be provided on behalf of school-initiative programs. For example, the secretariat offered software programs and manuals used to create CGI-based Web pages, and lent out the equipment necessary for implementation of programs. The secretariat also managed an electronic bulletin board used to recruit schools to participate in programs and to gather information, and also prepared mailing lists and offered a server-mirroring facility for member schools.

In November 1998, a questionnaire was issued to member schools, most of which had participated in the 100-School Networking Project (and later, in Phase II) since April 1994. The findings showed that the Internet was used most often for classes, followed by extracurricular activities, special activities, and school business. In addition to class times, there was high Internet usage after school and during the lunch break. Many teachers and students used the Internet during recesses and before first period. Approximately 60 percent of the member schools had improved their school networking environment by adding a LAN connection, while 68 percent of member schools had made their network system available to people in the community.

Ninety percent of the respondents said that technical support they received was useful, while eight percent received no technical support. Eighty-three percent of the teachers in charge of network administration found this responsibility a burden. Seventy percent of teachers said that they had to prepare more for a class using the Internet than for a conventional class, while 23 percent found no difference in the time and energy needed for class preparation.

In fiscal 1998, partly because of the situation regarding TRAIN, an academic network of the Kanto bloc, ORIONS (Kansai bloc), and KARRN (Kyushu bloc), more member schools paid for their communication lines; consequently, they made a switch to faster lines.

CSI = Chugoku and Shikoku Internet assosiation

Uses of the Internet can be categorized as follows:

These activities have been conducted in actual school settings in a wide variety of forms, under limited resources and budgets. Before describing these programs in detail, however, we present a framework for learning via the Internet.

What is the new framework for learning in the postmodern age, as we prepare for the 21st century? In an educational environment in which computers and networks are used as teaching/learning tools, learning may take place in the following situations or forms:

Figure 1 Learning Model using Computers and the Internet

Figure 1 shows a learning model using computers and the Internet. It is important to note that students must first recognize a problem for learning to begin. They establish their learning objectives and prepare a hypothesis to solve the problem, then gather data, conduct research, and analyze the information and results obtained. They then proceed to plan and design their problem-solving activities, using modeling and simulation concepts and techniques and other tools, to obtain possible solutions to the problem. To test their hypothesis, students prepare and implement actual problem-solving activities and evaluate the appropriateness of their solutions. If their results seem to be of some value, they may make a presentation or prepare a report to share their findings with other people, or create a database containing the findings obtained. Networking is indispensable if databases are to be built and knowledge shared; also, a system enabling students to participate in collaborative activities must be set up. At the same time, every time students take part in an educational activity using the Internet, they must be asked to think about the purpose of the activity in terms of its relationship to people, society, and information technology. In general, teachers must educate students so that they can be sound participants in the information society.

Following the 100-School Networking Project (April 1994?March 1997), Phase II of the Project (scheduled for two years), composed of CEC-initiative and school-initiative programs, was implemented. One of these CEC-initiative programs focused on advanced use of the Internet. Programs conducted in fiscal 1997 were as follows:

In fiscal 1998, the four themes above were narrowed down to the following two topics:

The project associated with mentally and physically challenged students was not carried out under this category in fiscal 1998, but it was conducted as an independent project which worked toward improvement of network accessibility for students challenged by multiple handicaps. In the following section, the educational implications and effects of the primary programs of the 100-School Networking Project (Phase II) will be briefly discussed.

Questionnaires and interviews were conducted to review the results of the 5-year 100-School Networking Project, with a primary focus on CEC-initiative programs. They were designed to evaluate the project results in terms of the following: (1) aspects associated with teachers, (2) aspects associated with students, (3) aspects associated with administrators in the Boards of Education, (4) aspects associated with the community, parents, and guardians, and (5) the cost-effectiveness of use of the Internet. The survey results obtained from people in different positions will be summarized below.

The educational effects and significance of the 100-School Networking Project can be summarized as follows:

Consideration should be paid to the following problems and issues.

The implementation of the 100-School Networking Project provided key information on the roles of teachers, and on the teaching skills and abilities needed for classes using the Internet.

What do the evaluation results from the 5-year 100-School Networking Project tell us? From a short-term perspective, a significant number of respondents gave positive opinions, but personal reactions can not be measured by quantitative research. In this section, I would like to discuss this Project from a long-term perspective. In other words, I would like to consider the Project in terms of how information technology will influence our learning and what significance it will have on our learning in the 21st century, when digital communications technology will play an important role in our lives. To that end, the following five criteria should be considered:

In light of these criteria, we conclude that the 100-School Networking Project definitely made major social and educational contributions.

Thinking patterns in these situations can be categorized into four major groups: rational (conservative) thinking, pragmatic thinking, critical thinking, and radical thinking, as shown in Table

1.Table 1 Four Thinking Models and the Positioning of Advanced Use of School Networking

The CEC-initiative programs concerning globalization were implemented in 1998 as part of the 100-School Networking Project (Phase II). Their objective was to explore the potential of the Internet as an educational means of promoting international understanding through cultural exchange, using such means as e-mail exchanges with overseas students and participation in global projects. This section will discuss the achievements of the two-year globalization programs primarily from a standpoint of international understanding; it also addresses some issues for future consideration.

Under the CEC-initiative programs, four projects were implemented: the Internet Classroom Project, Asia-High School Student Internet Interactive Communication Project, the Me & Media Project, and the KIDLINK Project. Related support systems were also established. In this section, the educational achievements and challenges of these projects will be first discussed; next, their support systems will be explained and discussed.

Through participation in the four programs mentioned above, students achieved the following:

It is extremely important to note that teachers are ready to accept changes in their roles and teaching styles.

Prior communication among teachers plays a key role in successful project implementation.

It is necessary to use multimedia along with e-mail messages as communication tools to facilitate communication and enhance friendship.

Teachers identified a number of future challenges for consideration: incorporation of cultural exchange activities into the curriculum, face-to-face friendship exchanges (visits to overseas schools by Japanese students, or to Japan by overseas students), financial difficulties, language barriers, establishment of offices to deal with business affairs concerning partner schools, and curriculum design (including the need for well-thought-out teaching plans).

In particular, hardware management and the need for prior discussions and arrangements impose a considerable burden on the teachers in charge.

This guidebook explains the basics of international exchange for teachers lacking experience in this field. It received favorable responses from such teachers.

Achievement

Challenges

It is necessary to build a translation support system that links overseas schools, Japanese schools, and translators.

As illustrated in the comments above, the CEC-initiative programs concerning globalization achieved overall success, although certain issues remain to be tackled in succeeding projects.

Special education in Japan takes the form of general education for physically and mentally challenged children. It is provided through special schools as well as special classes at regular schools, using special curricula and teaching methods. Curricula are designed to meet the needs of individual students and to give individualized academic instructions to each student, based on the nature of his or her handicaps, so that each student can develop his or her potential as much as possible.

Physically and mentally challenged children have greater difficulty moving from one place to another. As such, they have little opportunity to meet children at schools in general because special schools are classified based on the types of handicaps . Our great hope is that the Internet will compensate for these limitations and help children make use of the abundant information it offers, and also allow them to interact with more people. Use of the Internet may allow special education schools to conduct employ new, more varied educational activities which would not be feasible using traditional teaching methods. Such usage should also enhance the possibility that children with handicaps may acquire various skills needed for social participation, which is most important for these children.

Although the Internet is a medium with great potential, a major problem emerged when attempting to use in special-education settings: current computers (and associated peripherals) are not designed to meet the needs of people with handicaps. Children with physical and mental disorders have particular difficulty using them. Therefore, schools must use equipment offering greater accessibility to individual students with disabilities. The largest difficulties related to the use of graphical user interfaces (GUIs) and pointing devices. Blind and visually impaired children cannot read the information on Web pages, while physically challenged children have difficulty using pointing devices. As a result, these children could not use computers or the Internet.

Therefore, educational experiments have been initiated to find accessible methods of computing, primarily at schools for the blind and visually impaired and at schools for the physically and mentally challenged.

Eight special-education schools participated in the 100-School Networking Project: Tsukuba University School for the Blind and Fukushima Prefectural School for the Blind; Tokyo Municipal Ohta School for the Deaf, Osaka City School for the Deaf, and Hyogo Prefectural Kobe School for the Deaf; School for the Mentally Retarded attached to the Faculty of Education, Fukui University; Koumei School for the Physically Handicapped; and Soyokaze Branch of Koumei School for the Physically Handicapped. Kobe School for the Deaf was unable to participate in Phase II of the 100-School Networking Project.

Since special-education curricula and teaching methods are designed with special attention to handicap type, schools dealing with students having the same type of disabilities were able to actively cooperate with and support one another. However, schools found it difficult to share information and develop collaborative relationships with schools serving different handicap types. Along these lines, the School for the Mentally Retarded attached to the Faculty of Education, Fukui University; Koumei School for the Physically Handicapped; and Soyokaze Branch of Koumei School for the Physically Handicapped (for children who need medical care) were the only schools in their groups. Therefore, these three schools and Fukushima Prefectural School for the Blind cooperated with one another when necessary.

Tsukuba University School for the Blind introduced a pin display system to its educational environment. This system displays the letters and characters on the screen in the form of protruding pins which students can read with their fingers, and represents the latest technology from the United States for the blind and visually impaired. The Tsukuba University School researched the use of this system in special education for the blind and the visually impaired through trial-and-refinement. The school also experimented with use of a speech synthesizer, which changes text messages to voice messages. In this latter method, a GUI Web page is first sent to a server with a translation system, the Lynx Mail Gateway System. Then, the information on the Web page is sent back to the client computer in the form of text, which is then processed by a speech synthesizer. Students at Fukushima Prefectural School for the Blind carried out online debates with regular high school students, using these systems. Actually, the students conducted their debates through e-mail (and in this sense, the debates were not online). According to the report, this new way of interpersonal communication via e-mail produced great results since the systems allowed blind and visually impaired students to understand messages without reading them.

During implementation of the project, there was frequent communication and cooperation among Tokyo Municipal Ohta School for the Deaf, Osaka City School for the Deaf, and Hyogo Prefectural Kobe School for the Deaf, as all three schools serve children with hearing disorders.

Koumei School for the Physically Handicapped choose to use input devices most suitable for each student. It actively promoted the use of the Internet in education, and encouraged students to dispatch information on the Internet and to create homepages by themselves. On the assumption that the network system supports children who receive education at home, there were experiments with long-distance learning using CU-SeeMe.

At the Soyokaze Branch of Koumei School for the Physically Handicapped, students receiving medical care dispatched information when they felt like doing so. Thanks to warm support from mail volunteers, these students were able to make use of an expanded information network.

The greatest achievements of the 100-School Networking Project are that physically and mentally challenged children acquired a broader view of the world and society, due to their ability to access the abundant information on the Internet, and that they found joy in dispatching information and in building relationships with various kinds of people.

Teachers using computers in special education must have knowledge of computers and cannot avoid shouldering a heavy burden in relation to the accessibility of technology products. As a result, use of the Internet is limited to students of teachers who know a lot about computers.

The second biggest problem found through the survey related to the maintenance of communication lines. Every special education school in the Project was connected primarily to high-speed dedicated leased lines; however, some schools had to switch to dialup connections due to the financial support available from local government once the 100-School Networking Project ended. After using both high-speed lines and dialup connections, many teachers said that dedicated lines are necessary to use the Internet in special education. Because physically and mentally challenged children need more time to read and dispatch information, special education schools must have leased digital data lines which a) allow high-speed display of information on the screen and b) permit students to use the Internet as long as they want. Such thoughts should be needed in future planning for provision of Internet-related equipment and services for special education schools.

The 100-School Networking Project started as a pilot project to provide and improve the Internet equipment and services at educational institutions; however, there seems to be a big gap between the level of equipment and services provided by the Project and that which schools and sponsors can actually maintain.

Based on the program results and survey findings, use of the Internet in special education yielded the following results:

• Physically and mentally challenged children were able to overcome difficulties in moving from one place to another and in developing a wide range of interpersonal relationships. Students could gather and dispatch information using the Internet.
• Students developed communication skills through interaction with various people.
• By dispatching information to the outside world, students acquired a changed view of their own hardships as well as of society.
• Students acquired the skills needed to use the Internet, and at the same time obtained a means to participate in society. These skills opened up the possibility that they may find jobs after graduation.
• Further research was conducted on support devices designed to meet the needs of varying types of impairments, and on methods for using such devices.

Issues and challenges to be tackled in the future included the following:

Issues and challenges concerning computer equipment and services

Issues and challenges concerning support systems and research

Further research must be conducted on the accessibility and usability of technology products by individuals with disabilities. At the same time, educators must raise awareness of this matter. As computers and Internet technology becomes more advanced, a wider variety of accessibility equipment will become available. This will permit more disabled students to use the Internet. In the interim, educators must study accessibility technology and associated concepts whenever possible.

Another issue requiring consideration is the development of systems and human resources to support use of the Internet in special education. The most advanced computer equipment available is needed for students with varying handicaps. Unless outside organizations help special-education schools to maintain this equipment, the teachers in charge will face an excessive workload.

Mail volunteers are important in that they both support Internet-based educational activities and motivate children to dispatch information. Along with the development of teaching methods and technology, further research on human resource development must be conducted.

The primary objective of the 100-School Networking Project was to provide computers and Internet-related equipment and services for 100 selected schools throughout the nation, and to see what kinds of educational activities were possible using the Internet. The Project began in 1994, when the Internet was first introduced to Japan, as a nationwide pilot study on educational uses of the Internet. In the United States, an experimental K-12 project promoting use of the Internet in education from kindergarten through high school began in 1993. Given circumstances at the time, the 100-School Networking Project had to provide the equipment and services necessary for the use of the Internet for each member school.

First, the computers installed at each member school were connected to form a LAN, which was then connected to the Internet via a network provider. As mentioned in section 2.2, a local network provided a transit function linking the LANs of the member schools within the area to the Internet. Each school was provided with a server system and a client computer. These were connected via a hub to build the LAN. Then, the LAN was linked, using dedicated leased lines, to an NOC on the local network via a router.

As mentioned in section 2.2, two kinds of communication lines were available: 64 Kbps dedicated leased digital lines, and dedicated leased analog lines at 3.4 kHz. A modem with a maximum transmission speed of 28.8 Kbps was provided for every school using analog lines. In the area of Internet-related equipment and services, the 100-School Networking Project maintained certain installation policies, which required every member school to (1) use a dedicated leased line to connect to the Internet, and (2) build a LAN within the school to connect to the Internet via its local network provider. The dedicated leased lines allowed the schools to use the Internet without worrying about connection costs. Construction of the LAN enabled schools to connect more computers to worldwide networks, for a larger-scale experiment on educational uses of the Internet. In order to connect many computers to the Internet at the same time, schools must use high-speed communication lines. The secretariat of the Project adopted the policies mentioned above so that the teachers implementing the Project would not be discouraged due to constraints imposed by existing facilities.

In general, system operation at each school went smoothly. The system was chiefly managed by a teacher in charge of the Project at each school. In some cases, teachers who had played an active role in designing project proposals were transferred to other schools either before or during the Project. When replacement teachers were not available, the Internet was not used much in educational activities. At most member schools, the teachers who played a central role in designing the proposals and in setting up the system also played an active role in system management.

Many school used the Internet to browse World Wide Web (WWW) sites and to create Web pages to dispatch information about their schools. The teachers in charge of the system initiated Web publishing, but other teachers and students (in most cases, high school students) learned to create Web pages in no time. Schools could post their Web pages on a Web server system provided by IPA, but most schools posted their homepages on servers installed at their schools, which were capable of transmitting signals only within the signals at 28.8 Kbps through the analog telephone systems.

The NOCs of some local networks monitored the communication traffic of member schools in the area. Long-term monitoring was provided by the Information Technology Center of The University of Tokyo, the central NOC of TRAIN; and the Information Processing Center of Yamanashi University, a distributed NOC of TRAIN.

The monitoring results showed that the average communication traffic of the member schools was several percent of the traffic of a typical college. The local providers connect universities and other organizations in the area to the networks at the communication line connecting segments or hubs in their NOCs. The providers also installed connecting segments or hubs to connect the member schools in the area to the Internet. As mentioned above, the traffic of the Project member schools is much lighter than that of universities. Therefore, the local networks imposed less burden in terms of traffic control.

There was no relationship between traffic volumes and the space requirements for networking equipment. In the NOC room, the equipment for the 100-School Networking Project occupied the same amount of space as the facilities needed to connect universities to the Internet. Extra costs were related to electricity charges for the equipment. When the NOC was located on a route connecting a CU-SeeMe reflector to several schools, it had to deal with considerable traffic at one time.

Schools using dedicated leased digital lines experienced little trouble with the NOC, and they usually had smooth connections. Schools using modems for analog transmission sometimes asked their local networks to reset their modems. In general, the NOC handled regular amounts of traffic to and from member schools, and thus never experienced excessive loads at any one time. Member schools throughout the nation were linked to the NOC at their local network provider, which distributed the load on each NOC and enabled the NOCs to operate under stable conditions.

The 100-School Networking Project entered a new phase in 1997. As mentioned at the beginning of this section, the original Project lasted for three years (one year of preparation and two years of implementation at member schools). The Project provided computer and Internet-related equipment and services for member schools and conducted studies to see what could be achieved through educational uses of the Internet. The studies showed that use of the Internet in education produced positive results. Several nationwide model school projects, in which model schools would use the Internet in educational activities throughout the entire school, were scheduled to begin in coming years. In 1997, an experiment on area collaboration began. The objective of this experiment was to extend the achievements, experiences, and lessons obtained through the 100-School Networking Project to schools in areas adjacent to the member schools. For this area collaboration study, detailed programs were developed and implemented. During 1997 and 1998, programs in this area were carried out as part of Phase II of the Project. Project proposals were submitted by member schools, other schools seeking to use the Internet, and municipal education centers. The secretariat (IPA and CEC) selected programs to be implemented as CEC-initiative programs. The proposals submitted by other schools were carried out as school-initiative programs, and received support from the secretariat.

The 1997 CEC-initiative programs are shown in the table at right. These programs were classified into four groups, based on the nature and range of the activities involved.

The 1998 CEC-initiative programs are shown in the table below.

The CEC-initiative programs in Phase II adopted the networking and operational techniques developed during the original project (ended in 1997), as well as same methods for using information on the Internet in educational activities. The server systems used in the original project ran the Solaris and System V PC UNIX operating systems (OSs). In Phase II, Linux and Free BSD systems were often adopted. Also, more servers used Windows NT. In the original project, 24 global IP addresses were assigned to each member school; however, in Phase II, an extremely small number of global IP addresses were assigned by commercial ISPs managing the host networks. Therefore, in most cases, private IP addresses were used. Building a LAN is much more complicated under such conditions, as a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) and Network Address Translator (NAT) server are necessary. However, Web-browser performance and function has improved dramatically improved since the Project began. Authoring software programs that make Web publishing simple are now available as well. Overall, the technical knowledge and skills concerning school networking (and associated management) obtained during the original project made a considerable contribution during the implementation of Phase II. They made even greater contribution to the planning and implementation of the subsequent model school projects. These projects include the Konetto Plan (1996 to present), Project Involving the Use of the Internet in Specially Designated Areas (1997 to present), Model School Project on Connecting Networks with Fiber Optics (1998), and Advanced Educational Networking Model Project (1998 to present).

DHCP = Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol

NAT = Network Address Translator

The 100-School Networking Project was one of the first model school projects in Japan to promote educational uses of the Internet. The Project began at a time when it was difficult to use the Internet through commercial ISPs in some parts of Japan. Therefore, the Internet was connected to local networks of academic institutions and nonprofit organizations. At that time, the networking technology was relatively simple. Consequently, knowledge and skills obtained during this period lack applicability today, due to the greater complexity of the current Internet environment. Today, people can easily use the Internet by making arrangements with a commercial ISP, if they can afford the charges. If one seeks to build an Internet system without using commercial providers, as did the member schools of the Project, one must possess more advanced technical knowledge and skills?the computer technology has become much more complex.

Current communications channels are also more varied. The 100-School Networking Project used digital and analog dedicated lines exclusively. Now, dedicated leased lines are also available. However, high-speed lines are still expensive to use, though less so than previously. New alternatives include private fiber optics, CATV, radio signals, satellites, and asymmetric digital subscriber lines. Some of these are inexpensive to use yet support high-speed transmission. However, if you want to use high-speed lines for school networking, you must think about issues concerning LANs, including the question of whether these new channels are a better option for connecting LANs to the Internet and how much routing control they provide (desirable for operation of LANs). Some observers feel that harmful information cannot be blocked to the degree that educational institutions want. While this may be true, blocking efforts should be centered at the NOCs networking the educational institutions.

Many technical issues concerning the use of the Internet in education remain to be solved. In this section, we discuss general technical issues, with a primary focus on the use of high-speed lines and how to select information on the Internet, both of which are important considerations when using the Internet in more advanced educational activities.

The first obstacle faced by computer users, whether students or adults, can often be difficulty in using the keyboard and other man-machine interfaces. Children must learn how to type on computer keyboards at the introductory level of computer use, so that they can later become strong users of computers and the Internet. Some students may find keyboard skills difficult to master. Teachers of the lower elementary grades, in particular, may wonder whether they should have their students remember the kana character arrangement on the keyboard, or whether they should teach the Roman characters to their students before they learn how to type on computer keyboards. No matter which method is adopted, students should remember the arrangement of the English letters sooner or later.

ADSL = Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line

Keyboarding instruction does not cause any problems when a teacher is an experienced computer user; however, if the teacher herself hates serious problems arise. In general, technological development and standardization will be needed to solve keyboarding-related problems.

It is important to remember that computer hardware and software are not completely compatible and rapidly become obsolete. Corporations may be able to choose an option which minimizes overall costs in this area, including the expense of switching to heterogeneous computers or new systems. However, it is not feasible for schools to adopt new computers or systems while minimizing overall costs. Therefore, it is necessary to develop educational equipment and software programs using standardized technology, and to develop technology which will increase compatibility and make it easier to switch to newer systems.

It is also important to develop the technology to support teachers. Computer-assisted instruction (CAI) systems could be helpful for helping teachers to obtain knowledge about how to use computers and the Internet in education, for example. Similarly, operational support system would permit effective system management, while expert systems for troubleshooting would be of great help.

Due attention must be paid to copyright protection in developing teaching materials. In recent years, the international community has adopted copyright laws to protect information on the Internet. In addition, encryption systems, digital watermarks, and other copyright-protection technology have been developed. When you want to use information on the Internet for educational purposes, you must pay due attention to copyright issues and take all necessary measures to acquire permission to use the information.

Preventive measures must be taken against hackers, computer viruses, and other threats to information security. There are no perfect measures to protect against such threats; however, this issue should be dealt with by an operational support system as mentioned above.

The limited speed of communication lines represents a major problem with effective educational use of the Internet. Most schools use modems that convert digital data into analog signals transmitted over ordinary telephone lines or Information Network System lines due to their lower costs. While these lines work well when teachers can control student Internet access and display the same information on all computer screens, or when teachers can limit student access to information stored at proxy servers, in order to maximize the Internet's educational potential, students should have free access to the information on the Internet with limited supervision from teachers. To realize this, a school's LAN should be linked to its Internet service provider with at least a 1.5 Mbps connection and, if possible, with at least a 15 Mbps connection.

XML = Extensible Markup Language

High-speed lines allow many terminals to have simultaneous access to the Internet. They also transmit multimedia data such as live images and allow students to communicate with people in remote areas with no time lag. Additional research needs to be conducted to further evaluate the effectiveness of high-speed lines in raising student achievement. Based on the research results, a budget should be drawn up for the use of high-speed lines, and appropriate measures should be taken to install the necessary facilities at schools.

Teachers must understand that although most information on the Internet is educationally beneficial, some information (content) on the Web is illegal or harmful to students.

Although legal measures must no doubt be taken against illegal information on the Web, it is not always easy to clearly distinguish legal and illegal information. Moreover, different countries have different laws on the matter. In an information society, it is also important to protect freedom of speech. Since the laws cannot protect students from all illegal and harmful contents, schools must take the best possible measure to filter the information that is on the Internet. In particular, they must adopt technologies and take measures to block legal, yet harmful content on the Internet.

Some people raise an objection to these guidelines from the standpoint of the protection of free speech on the Web. However, other people maintain that it is highly likely that government legislation will be imposed unless people who publish on the Internet or network providers self-regulate. It is difficult to deny this possibility.

One of the most commonly used filtering systems is a full-text search. The filtering software searches the full-text for harmful words every time an Internet user receives Web documents or e-mail. If it finds even one harmful word, it does not allow the user to access the contents at all, or it permits the user to only have access to the text in which that harmful word is eliminated. This system is not efficient because the software performs a full-text search every time the user accesses the Web. This approach is not applicable to non-text data such as images. There is the possibility that the content is not actually harmful (such as an article on the improvement of the social status of women) even though it is filtered out by the system due to an apparently harmful word such as sex. Regardless of these disadvantages, the full-text search system can be helpful under the current circumstances in which Web sites are often renewed and in which there are no other practical systems available to screen the e-mail content.

The advantages of the above two systems can be integrated into a multiple rating system. This system supports the rights of free speech of Web masters and permits educators to make informed decisions about what information will not be accepted. This system is called a multiple rating system for the following reasons:

Secondly, rating categories vary. These categories include indecency, violence, discrimination, reliability of information, and how new the information is. Having a variety of categories is important.

The Recreational Software Advisory Council on the Internet or RSACi in the United States provides Internet users with a multiple rating system mentioned above. The RSACi system employs the four categories of violence, nudity, sex, and language and rates contents on five levels.

A multiple rating system provides consumers with rating information about the level of the predetermined categories in Web sites so that Internet users (in the case of children, their parents or teachers) can control what they access on the Internet. For this kind of filtering system to work, the system engineers must set up the categories of the rating system, the levels, and their descriptors in advance. However, the filtering system should have an option that allows users to increase the number of categories and levels, as these vary with the situation.

Furthermore, it is necessary to develop this technology further so as to reduce the time and effort required for rating Web contents and checking the reliability of rating information. At the same time, a technology is also needed to rate useful Internet contents and promote their use.

The overall evaluation of this five-year project primarily revolves around whether its two initial objectives--whether students would be able to become active learners, and whether teachers would be able to conduct educational activities beyond the spatial-temporal constraints of the classroom through educational uses of information technology--had been achieved. The project was also evaluated with an eye towards the objectives of the CEC-initiative concerning globalization, area collaboration, the utilization of advanced networking-technology, and the advanced utilization of school-networking.

We conclude that these objectives have been successfully achieved.

The 100-School Networking Project (Phases I and II) contributed greatly to the introduction of computer technology to education.

The 100-School Networking Project was an organized project implemented throughout the nation to promote the use of the Internet in education. It established the foundation for the succeeding projects on computer education.

The 100-School Networking Project built a close relationship between various government ministries. With respect to the use of the Internet in education, it had a positive influence on the communication between the four Ministries.

The Ministry of Education and the Ministry of International Trade and Industry founded the Center for Educational Computing (CEC). Since the foundation of the CEC, despite their past differences, these two Ministries have managed to work collaboratively to promote computer education in Japanese schools. The Ministry of Education also cooperated with the Ministry of Home Affairs in terms of providing the member schools with computer equipment. The 100-School Networking Project helped the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of International Trade and Industry strengthen their relationship.

In addition, the Project heightened the status of the CEC. This Project began at a time when the development of a standard computer for education was behind schedule, and when the CEC specification of BASIC and computer education were not so pervasive in Japanese schools. The third revised budget of fiscal 1993 was approved not only for construction activities supported by construction bonds but also for infrastructure facilities for the computer equipment. The budget for introducing telecommunications technology to educational institutions was not allocated to the Ministry of Education but to the Ministry of International Trade and Industry. With this budget, the 100-School Networking Project was initiated. The Project passed into Phase II and continued until March, 1999. The third revised budget of fiscal 1998 supported a project for creating educational materials. IPA and CEC contributed greatly to the introduction of computer technology to education under the guidance of the Ministry of Education in terms of the project design and implementation, and with the financial support of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry.

Of course, this contribution was not attributed to CEC alone. The move towards a more computerized society was part of an ongoing worldwide trend.

The 100-School Networking Project began in April 1994. In January 1995, the Ministry of Education published a summary of deliberations on the development of the educational policy in response to the development of multimedia. In February, the Advanced Telecommunications Promotion Headquarters published basic guidelines on the subject. Around that time, an item outlining basic criteria for Japanese educational system for the 21st century was submitted for deliberation to the Central Council for Education. In July 1996, the Central Council submitted a report which greatly contributed to the use of computers in education. In August 1998, the Research Collaborators Committee on Computer Education issued a report on the promotion of computer education in elementary and junior high schools in response to the advances of information technology. Based on the deliberations of the Curriculum Council, a new course of study for elementary and junior high school programs was announced in December 1998.

Along with these movements, educational reform programs were designed and special budgets were approved for the promotion of computer education. The 100-School Networking Project (Phases I and II) was carried out while the nation was making changes to its educational policies on computer education, and it played a role in materializing these measures.

In the early days of the 100-School Networking Project, the member schools and teachers in charge carried out on a trial-and-refinement basis . Next, the teachers and other people interested in the Project started to exchange information with one another. Throughout the five-year Project, the teachers developed various educational activities using the Internet.

Around 1995, when the Internet was installed at the member schools, only a few teachers had heard about the Internet and even fewer teachers had used it. A small portion of the teachers were willing to use high-technology then. One thousand five hundred and forty-three schools applied for the 100-School Networking Project. The teachers in charge did not know what the Internet was or how to use it. With technical support of local networks, universities, and corporate engineers, teachers became a little more familiar with using the Internet and started to use it in class to find effective uses of the Internet in educational activities. Through information gathering and exchange, teachers realized that they were communicating with people on the other end of the Internet. The information gathered via the Internet was created by people. There were people and friends who read e-mail messages and wrote back. There were also friends and parents who read Web sites the students of member schools had published. The Internet is not a computer but a wonderful tool for communication. When the teachers and students understood this concept, the Internet provided them with a wider variety of uses. They started to think about the objective of Internet use. They used the Internet with a clear goal in mind. The schools opened their doors to the communities, gathered information out in the communities, and published that information on the Web. Teachers and students studied similarities and differences between Japanese culture and overseas cultures to develop cross-cultural understanding. Students conducted research collaboratively via the Internet. In order to bring these collaborative studies to a successful conclusion, they spent time and energy on preliminary studies. As illustrated above, teachers and students worked hard to effectively use the Internet in educational activities as a learning tool. These activities developed into the CEC-initiative programs concerning globalization, area collaboration, advanced utilization of school-networking, utilization of advanced networking technology, and advanced utilization in special education. These CEC-initiative programs produced positive results.

In most member schools, only a small number of teachers and students dared to use the Internet when it was first introduced. Gradually, more people took to the challenge of using this latest technology. In some areas, students began to exchange e-mail with volunteers in their neighboring areas. When students became familiar with the Internet, they not only gathered but also published information on the Internet. Then, the schools began to receive information sent by e-mail from outside sources. First, a small number of schools exchanged information and messages. Then, the group grew larger. Several schools conducted collaborative research and surveys. Some schools established a support system in which volunteers translated messages written in foreign languages into Japanese. This system allowed students to communicate with overseas friends. In some cases, a few of these many groups became partners and developed off-line friendships.

When students are inexperienced Internet users, they often gather information to learn. When they feel more comfortable with using the Internet, they start to send e-mail messages to their friends, ask questions for information, and sometimes conduct research by sending out questionnaires. Students move away from their passive learning style, in which they mainly listen to their teachers, to a more active learning style beyond the boundaries of their schools. They select information in their research. They collect information they need via the Internet, and sometimes gather local information outside their schools using digital cameras. Students edit the collected information, and then design and create attractive homepages by using images, sound, and texts in their Web documents.

Learning is now taking place on a scale that was unimaginable before the Internet was introduced to Japanese schools. The Internet has made it possible for students to cultivate self-confidence. Internet use will play a key role in educational activities of comprehensive studies.

Many participants in the 100-School Networking Project have become leaders in the field of computer education. Some teachers have acquired more technical knowledge and skills than corporate computer engineers and are capable of not only managing the LANs within their schools but also educating corporate engineers. Some of the teachers now work as teacher consultants, and visit many schools to give advice to teachers on how to use the Internet in education. Unlike teacher consultants in particular subjects, those in computer education exchange information via the Internet with many people, including those they have not met. They communicate with many teachers and school volunteers on the Internet and participate in discussions as mailing list members. Through these activities, teacher consultants, teachers, and school volunteers have learned to solve their own problems, encourage one another, and begin team-teaching several classes at different schools in remote areas. As illustrated above, many teacher consultants in computer education have a wide range of experience. Making use of that experience, these teacher consultants provide other teachers with warm guidance.

In the early days of the 100-School Networking Project, only a few computers were available at each school and only a few teachers could use them. A small number of computers were connected to a LAN within the school building. Schools did not have much software or many projects. This situation significantly improved over the four and a half years of the Project.

Unfortunately, everything does not go smoothly. Occasionally, the networks do not function properly, and it is not always possible for teachers to fix the problems. Sometimes, schools must seek technical support from computer experts. This is inevitable given that technical problems should never prevent teachers from conducting valuable classes.

Teachers with computer expertise have become indispensable. Some teachers visit their previous schools to offer help after they finish their work. Others often come home after midnight due to their heavy Internet-related workloads. There is a tendency among teachers to rely on a small number of capable teachers. While these teachers spend many hours and much effort to help others conduct good classes, there are some teachers who are not interested in using the Internet at all and those who try to frustrate those teachers that use the Internet in their classroom activities. When these people are school administrators, the situation is serious. Since it has already been decided that the Internet will be introduced to all Japanese schools in 2001, such teachers and administrators must be studying about the Internet instead of trying to drag hard-working teachers down.

The 100-School Networking Project (Phases I and II) achieved splendid results as illustrated above. The valuable experiences that individuals accumulated through the project must be utilized in the future so that Japanese education does not retrogress. The experiences obtained and lessons learned in the Project should help similar projects taking place in the future to even greater success and provide useful lessons for the 40,000 schools that will use the Internet in education. The actual achievements of the 100-School Networking Project will be tested then. In the future, we need to seriously consider proposals made based on the experiences obtained through the Project.

The use of the Internet in education must be dealt with in the curriculum. Unless the objective of Internet use in education is set forth in the curriculum, students will lose interest in the Internet. Students browsed through various Web sites, exchanged e-mail, and dispatched information about daily happenings and activities, the environment, and the society when the Internet was just introduced. However, students gradually became bored with these activities and quit using the Internet. In order to encourage students to use the Internet on a long-term basis, the Internet must be used in everyday learning activities.

The Internet can be used as a tool in three major contexts: (1) learning how to use computers and the Internet; (2) studying various subjects; and (3) gathering information, conducting research, comparing data, processing information and data collected, and creating Web pages in comprehensive studies.

The first context amounts to computer literacy education. Students systematically learn how to use e-mail software programs, browsers, and search engines, how to search information, how to create homepages, and many other computer-related skills. They also learn about how computers work, how information is processed, copyrights on information on the Internet, computer ethics in relation to dispatching information, and the societal implications of computers.

Almost no member schools dealt with computer literacy as a project theme in the 100-School Networking Project. Most schools used the Internet as a learning tool. Computer literacy was learned as a by-product of Internet use.

The Internet is currently used primarily in social studies, science, music, art, and English and Japanese language classes. In these classes, students look for information, study collaboratively, conduct collaborative research, carry out collaborative projects, and exchange information with other Internet users. Because the Internet will be used by all Japanese schools in a few years, experiments should be conducted to obtain many successful sample lessons for the future.

Currently, most Internet use takes place in comprehensive studies. Using the Internet, students learn about the environment; do area studies; compare various cultures; conduct research on customs, prices, where things are produced, and the growth of plants. Studying interesting topics by using the Internet helps students become more autonomous learners. If students look for and exchange information on familiar things that they are interested in, they may not be able to find interesting topics and may lose interest in using the Internet after several classes. To use the Internet on a long-term basis, teachers must develop well-thought out plans, do sufficient preparation before the actual implementation of the projects, and exchange information with one another during collaborative studies. It is also important to develop friendship by encouraging students to exchange information and e-mail messages regularly.

To take advantage of the educational benefits of using the Internet, teachers must change their views on learning and education.

In traditional education, every teacher has a broad knowledge of his or her subject, and transmits necessary pieces of information in accordance with the content of the textbook. If the teacher wants to teach the basics, it is useful to use the Internet as a transmitter of that knowledge. In this case, the teacher may use the Internet to introduce information available on the World-Wide Web to his or her students. However, it is more effective to allow students to look for necessary information by using the Internet. Having students use the Internet leads to greater initiative and more autonomous learning. In order to develop independent learners through Internet use, it is important to design a curriculum and teaching plans that allow systematic studies of Internet-related computer literacy: how to use browsers, search engines, and databases; how to respect information copyrights on the Internet; how to evaluate data critically; and how to ask questions via e-mail. Web-based teaching manuals and workbooks may be helpful in this regard.

Students can gather local information outside their schools using digital cameras and video cameras and then create multimedia works using texts, images, and sound. They can then publish these works on the school homepage. After receiving questions and comments, students often modify their work and publish them again on the Internet. This is an ongoing process among model schools, cooperative schools, sister schools, and overseas schools. This learning process allows students to build on their knowledge.

Abundant, varied teaching materials must be accumulated on the Internet to make autonomous learning through the use of the Internet even more successful.

In order to have more teachers use the Internet in education, technical training sessions graded by ability must be provided.

First, the teachers who were excellent system administrators in the 100-School Networking Project will soon serve as wide-area coordinators to promote the use of the Internet. They will play a key role in promoting Internet use in education in their assigned areas and take responsibility for planning, budgeting, training, spreading the use of the Internet, and giving advice to teachers on behalf of the Board of Education.

In addition, capable teachers will be chosen from those who participated in the Project activities. Then, the selected teachers will be trained to become wide-area coordinators. They will first become local leaders and learn from the wide-area coordinators through working with them as their assistants. Later, they will be assigned to wide areas and serve as coordinators for their responsible areas.

It is urgent to develop training programs for local leaders. It is necessary to design a training curriculum and develop multimedia and Web-based training materials.

The success of the 100-School Networking Project was largely attributed to school leaders. Many school leaders will be promoted to coordinators and local leaders. Therefore, some teachers must be chosen from the those who participated in the Project and be trained to become school leaders. It is urgent to design a training curriculum and develop multimedia training materials.

In order for the schools to use the Internet effectively, it is essential to develop systems that allow them to receive support from people in a variety of fields.

The success of the 100-School Networking Project was partly attributed to generous support from people in various fields--including college professors, engineers, government office workers, volunteers, parents, local communities, and companies. It is desirable to organize these support channels into a nationwide support system.

An educational support group composed of college professors, experts, and participants in the 100-School Networking Project will be organized. Cooperation with the existing education technology associations and educational research institutions should be encouraged. This group will serve as the brains of the project on the promotion of Internet use in education.

The current network of engineers in local networks, universities, and companies will provide technical support. They will systematically help schools and communities by providing solutions to Internet-related problems. The technical support system must be able to cope with a wide variety of problems, from simple ones to extremely complex ones. It may be good to have wide-area coordinators take responsibility for arranging technical support activities.

An academic support group will be composed of experts in each subject and other knowledgeable people. A virtual network Q & A room will be organized in each area to answer questions from students and teachers. These local networks will develop into a nationwide network. Unlike homepages, students and teachers will be able to obtain direct answers or suggestions to their questions.

Infringements on copyrights of the materials on the Web, privacy protection, and computer ethics in relation to Web publishing and e-mail messages are extremely important issues to consider in using the Internet. In order to deal with these issues properly, it is important to establish a system in which people concerned can obtain consultation.

To promote the use of the Internet in education, it is important to improve on the current infrastructure.

Every classroom will have Internet facilities. School buildings will be converted into intelligent buildings. Multimedia equipment will be installed. Everyone will have a computer to use in class. High-speed lines will be installed to connect to the Internet. The infrastructure improvements mentioned above must be carried out as soon as possible, and preventive measures must be designed and taken against hackers and computer viruses for information security.

Multimedia teaching materials will be developed. At the same time, authoring applications, browsers, search engines, and filtering applications, as well as groupware, will be developed.

An education-related domain name will be selected so that schools can exchange information more efficiently.

Because the networks are hooked together with various kinds of lines, links, and satellites, all the schools should use the same type of communication lines for smoother information exchange. If schools use different types of lines, information should be disclosed concerning the type of lines they use.

Scientific research on the use of the Internet will be conducted.

Everyone involved in the 100-School Networking Project (Phases I and II) did not at first know what to do, and they had to work hard to make things right using a trial-and-refinement method. Therefore, the participants could not conduct systematic research on educational uses of the Internet and on the educational benefits of the Internet.

Although most participants think that the use of the Internet in education produced positive results, their impression is not scientifically supported. Therefore, they have no means to convince administrators, teachers, educational administration, the financial authorities, the Diet, and citizens who are negative about using the Internet in education.

In future projects concerning educational uses of the Internet, the secretariat must design systematic research plans based on previous experience in order to obtain reliable data on the use of the Internet in education and on its educational benefits. Then, the educational benefits of the Internet must be proved by scientific studies. The research will be carried out by researchers and scholars who participated in the previous projects. To conduct full-scale research, research expenses must be subsidized and cooperative relationships must be developed with administrative organs and the schools.

It is important to establish a nationwide system of information exchange to promote the use of the Internet in education.

The member schools of and other participants in the 100-School Networking Project (Phases I & II) have developed and accumulated the know-how, wisdom, human resources, connections, technical resources, and system mechanisms through valuable experiences. In order to share these resources and the experience accumulated by the model schools of the Konetto Plan and other similar projects with 40,000 Japanese schools to which the Internet will be introduced in two years, it is crucial to build an information exchange system so that these schools can work together to promote Internet use in education. To that end, the responsible organization must soon create a mailing list that everyone involved can join, and then post this list on bulletin boards. The mailing list and bulletin boards will be administered by the administrative center or the local centers.

(Takashi Sakamoto, Chairman of the Overall Evaluation Committee)