Email discussion groups and message boards are a constant source of spontaneous discussion within classrooms and across campus. It's an amazing gift to be technologically savvy, especially in a field like international relations. The greater accessibility of Web technologies has transformed learning across the sciences, humanities, and social sciences. Perhaps the most valuable aspect is that it encourages collaborative relationships among students and between students and faculty, and creates new forums in which students can engage in discussions about their work. Students now have access to a much wider range of information, and must learn how to critically evaluate their sources.
Librarians routinely offer workshops on how to find and evaluate electronic information.
For film studies chair Elizabeth Young's upper-level seminar, Feminist Theory and film, she and her students established a Web site with a discussion forum, syllabus, course roster, and links to other useful sites. Immediately, students began to contribute wonderful ideas to the discussion forum and reactions to weekly film screenings. The quality of contributions was high and the tone consistently collegial. The medium seemed to have a democratic effect. Students who were shy in class were actually quite voluble on the Web.