The fourth-grade poetry Web project features students' illustrations and poems
By Lucinda Rector
 f ever there was a principal who lived and worked his commitment to school technology, it would be Howard Pitler. All you have to do is examine his necktie to see what drives this guy. Hanging down the middle of his shirt i
s a piece of silk decorated with green and purple computer disks, red mouse pads, pink CDs and a psychedelic monitor. The effect is amusing but entirely appropriate.
 At 7:00 a.m. on Monday, the voluble Pitler is already in fourth gear. From his office, he logs onto L'Ouverture's Website to check out a school poetry project. Scrolling through
an impressively dense table of contents--which includes a student-produced newsletter, updates from each of the school's classes, a school history and a mission statement--he clicks on the poetry icon. Up pops a richly illustrated page with a library of p
oems written by fourth-graders at L'Ouverture.
Over the past four years, the Wichita elementary school, led by Pitler, has completely changed its approach to elementary education. At the center of it all is the computer, which in the hands of L'Ouverture's 15 teach
ers, has become a singular means of cooperative learning. "It's like a pencil or a calculator," says Pitler. "The computer is simply a tool, not a curriculum. But it's a wonderful tool."
Learning All Over Again
Pitler had been principal of L'Ouverture for one year before deciding to make the school a magnet technology site. "I've always felt technology was a great way for kids to learn," Pitler says. He also knew that technology would bring more kids into the i
nner city. "We wanted to put a carrot in front of them," he says. "I felt that a cutting-edge school would be a way to do that." The school district, while enthusiastic about Pitler's idea, at first lacked the funding to move forward. Then an unexpected $
500,000 windfall of state funding blew in Wichita's direction. "It was a miracle," says Pitler. "They unexpectedly got this money, and we were given the go-ahead."
The principal's plan did not involve massive renovation of the school building or hiring of new staff, but says Pitler, "it did involve a major infusion of technology." Fifteen classrooms received 10 computers each, gi
ving L'Ouverture an enviable computer to student ratio of 2.5 to 1. But not everything clicked that first year. Pitler recalls, "We lost power almost every day for a while."
Pitler has likened restructuring a school to redesigning an airplane while it's moving down the runway. Still, his staff seemed eager to go along for the ride. Even though every teacher was given the option of transfer
ring to another school if they didn't want to log on to L'Ouverture's new approach, no one elected to leave--despite the fact that only one of the teachers was computer literate. The technophile principal led the training, but one tense session was an awk
ward lesson that his staff members would need to learn at their own pace, helping one another as they went along. The patient approach paid off, as did Pitler's keeping his priorities straight. "The teacher," he says, "is the most important and most expen
sive piece of technology in the classroom."
Getting the faculty to embrace a new form of teaching was another formidable challenge. "I was a traditional, whole-group teacher," says Janelle Burge, who had been teaching fifth grade for 20 years when the opportunit
y to work at L'Ouverture came up in 1992. "It was really hard to change to a cooperative approach and give up some of my control," she recalls. Today kindergarten teacher Heather Hodson-Kisner wonders whether she could teach without the individualized les
sons available through computers. But her learning curve was steep. "Once I tried to get a disk out with a fork," she recalls with horror. "I had no idea what I was doing."
Parents of L'Ouverture students are a key component of the school's success. After their kids are accepted into the program, they receive written updates on their child's progress twice a month and come to the school f
or quarterly parent-student-teacher conferences. Many are avid users of the Internet themselves, in many instances because of what they have learned from their children. "I get lots of E-mail from parents," says Pitler. Their enthusiasm is apparent in the
parent fund raisers that bring in $10,000 to $15,000 a year.
From Squids to Poetry
For parents wandering the halls of L'Ouverture, an interactive kiosk shows off what the kids are up to. A visitor presses the button for "The Squid," by second-grader Parker Corrin. It's an interactive project that includes illustrations, text and Corrin'
s recorded voice explaining how squids eat. Another important lesson we learn: sometimes careless fishermen kill squids.
Down the hall in Jane Farris' fourth-grade class, the morning's lesson plan reads "Netscape, Hyperstudio, Math-problem solving, Painted poem, Home page message." At one computer, 1
0-year-old Anna Millham is creating a portfolio of memories of her fourth-grade year to share with her
parents on conference day. She is illustrating her report, using the Hyperstudio program. One stack shows the child's rendering of a tiger at the Wichita Zoo. Across the room, classmate Elizabeth Burden is using the SuccessMaker Integrated Learning System
to practice algebra concepts and problem solving. To a large extent, these programs have replaced workbooks and other printed curriculum materials. And while textbooks still line the shelves at L'Ouverture, it's clear they are no longer the preferred med
ium.
A newcomer to L'Ouverture might wonder whether this is any way to teach. Where is the whole-class activity? Where is the teacher control? But for Farris and other teachers at L'Ouverture, this is exactly the kind of te
aching, and learning, that they think matters most. "Computers enable me to meet each child's needs," says Burge. "Before I knew globally where they were. Now I know specifically."
Learning activities are highly individualized and geared toward each child's level. That means a fifth-grader reading at a third-grade level will work on lessons that match his or her
abilities. "Kids are at different levels," says Burge. "This enables me to evaluate and meet each child's needs."
For third-grade students in Pam Wegeng's class, computers have opened their minds to an entirely new resource for gathering information. Consider how Wegeng lead a Chocolate Fever project using the Internet and the fam
ous children's book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Through E-mail, Wegeng's students asked other kids around the world to rank their favorite chocolates. Wegeng's class then tallied the responses and reported them on a bar graph. As a geography extens
ion, the students made a map showing all the countries that responded.
"Technology has allowed me to teach in a way that I had wanted to teach for a long time," says Wegeng. "Now I feel like I know much more about my students, and that allows me to find ways to enhance their learning."
Where will all this computer-centered learning lead? Teachers at L'Ouverture hope they are giving their students tools that will serve them in later life. "These kids are learning something they'll use in the future,"
says fourth-grade teacher Lauri Wedel-Isaacs. Burge echoes the sentiment: "I'm helping them prepare for a world in which you have be resourceful and get along with others.This whole experience has changed me as a person and as a teacher. I wouldn't go bac
k if I could." 
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