Faculty colla- boration with colleagues from around the world will become far easier when personal computers can function as sophisticated video phones and show pictures and data in real time. At Penn, an ad hoc Videoconferencing Group has begun looking at how these emerging capabilities can create new educational opportunities and how to take advantage of them. Computer and information storage technology, such as hypertext tools and CD-ROM, make it possible to access information about a subject in many different ways, tailored to the subject and the user. For example, simulation and visualization software can transform the way mathematics and subjects based on mathematics are taught. Science diskbooks can include simulated experiments, visual displays of real experiments, and interactive problems.
Medical texts can include moving pictures, including simulated surgery.
History diskbooks can integrate information from primary sources, visuals, sound, and moving pictures. Diskbooks for language instruction can include powerful dictionaries, foreign film clips, and interactive speaking and pronunciation guides. Diskbooks for architecture can incorporate dynamic visuals of landscapes and buildings, and allow for practice in creating new designs. Although the field is in its infancy, diskbooks of this sort are already becoming available, including some developed by Penn faculty and staff. Using tools such as Mosaic, an author now can integrate geographically distributed sets of information just as conveniently as CD-ROM diskbook, but much more dynamically.