| Chapter 2: | Background |
Likewise, there is an improvement in the flow of information from the school to home, from the teachers, and other practitioners to the parents concerning their children’s needs. Internet access can help generate a dialogue so that parents and teachers need not wait for the semi-annual parent teacher meeting in order to do so.
Student Behavior Using the Internet
The ways students use the Internet within the home can be observed and has been the topic of several studies. The behaviors students exhibit when making use of the Internet at home are an important aspect of study because they are in part the behaviors that are suspected to lead to a different academic standing. While there are studies that indicate students use the Internet to perform schoolwork (Becker, 2000; Lenhart et al., 2001; Levin & Arafeh, 2002; U.S. Department of Commerce, 2002; U.S. Department of Education, 2002, 2003) the qualities of the use are described differently. The literature also typically agreed with the notion that teachers had reservations about assigning homework that would require home Internet use. Teachers underestimate how many students have access at home, and as a consequence lower their expectations of all students in an attempt to be fair to those without Internet access at home (Lenhart et al., 2001; Levin & Arafeh, 2002).
The Pew Internet & American Life Project has published the results of their research efforts regarding what students are doing with Internet access. Two studies of interest are The Internet & Education Lenhart et al. (2001), and The Digital Disconnect: The Widening Gap between Internet-Savvy Students and their Schools by Levin & Arafeh (2002). The research methods for both of these publications involved survey research. The Internet & Education (2001) was based upon a survey of 754 teenagers (ages 12–17) who used the Internet including a parent or guardian and was “conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates between November 2, 2000 and December 15, 2000” (p. 9) with a margin of error of plus or minus 4%.
Notable among the 2002 study is the finding that “Internet-savvy students rely on the Internet to help them do their schoolwork” (Levin & Arafeh, 2002, p. 26).