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publishing them as series of books
through Otago University Press. The latest: NetWorking: Teaching, Learning &
Professional Development with the Internet, edited by Hong Kong-born Dr. Kwok-Wing
Lai, Senior Lecturer at the university's School of Education.
 From Canada, Lane Clark is building an international reputation as
an expert skilled in training teachers to blend the world's best learning methods
with the world's best interactive, digital technology. Her staff-development model is
based very much on theme-based inquiry learning, but showing how students can use digital
technology to retrieve information. In a typical month, you're likely to find her
running staff development courses for schools in Canada and the United States, Tahatai
Coast School in New Zealand and in Western Australia running extended courses for the
Center for Excellence in Education.
From the New Zealand city of Christchurch come other examples of
the enormous strides that can be made when students are encouraged to learn in their own
way, with their own style, at their own pace.
When co-author Dryden in 1991 produced six one-hour
television documentaries on new world learning breakthroughs, one of the most spectacular
individual examples came from Christchurch. Michael Tan, son of Malaysian-Chinese parents,
was that year studying senior high school mathematics - at the age of seven. By the end of
the year he'd passed New Zealand's top secondary school examinations - while spending his
spare time playing table tennis, basketball, the classical piano and working on the
family's home computer. Father Choon Tan, a modest engineer, insisted that "it all
comes down to love, really".17
When Jeannette Vos went back to Christchurch in 1994 as
the guest keynote presenter and workshop facilitator for the Canterbury College of
Education - the city's teacher training university - she dined with one of her workshop
attendees, Chrystal Witte, the mother of 11-year-old Daniel Witte. Many teachers regarded
Daniel as a discipline problem. But over dinner, a different story emerged. At age four,
Daniel had built an electronic circuit board. At aged nine, he had hacked into his
father's office computer. But at primary school he'd continued to get into trouble until
his parents found outlets for his scientific bent. In Jeannette's view, he was gifted, but
bored. Chrystal and husband Stephen obviously agreed. And their big breakthrough came when
Papanui High School agreed to enrol Daniel, aged 12, at a fourth-year secondary
school level.
By the end of 1995, he'd passed six bursary exams and
won the
Contents Page Preface
Introduction
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