Interactive Tours A high school history teacher, located on the west coast of the United States, wants to showcase to her students new exhibits being held at two prominent New York City Museums. The teacher wants her students to take a “tour” of the museums and be able to interact city the museum curators, as well as see the art work on display. Afterward, the teacher would like to choose two pieces of artwork from each exhibit and have the students participate in a group critique of the individual work of art. As a novice of distance learning and distance learning technologies, the teacher turned to the school district’s instructional designer for assistance. In the role of the instructional designer, what distance learning technologies would you suggest the teacher use to provide the best learning experience for her students? I would connect the west coast teacher with the museums in New York with SKYPE video conferencing. As I was pondering how to even start this project I began by looking on the internet for ways to do a 2 way audio and visual connection. I went to http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/virtual-field-trips and found that video conferencing is a viable option for students to get real world experiences while staying in their classrooms. SKYPE conferencing would allow for the curator to use a computer with a laptop equipped with a camera and a speaker. The school would have computers setup for the class to view the tour and talk to the curator. As the ID I would talk to the learning department at the selected museums to find out how to best arrange for a virtual tour. In the Scholastic article a teacher reported that she did virtual field trips with the Challenger Learning Center which worked with her to create a virtual trip. She also reported other virtual field trip providers, such as the Cleveland Museum of Art, also work directly with teachers to customize trips. The museum invites teachers to request a tour specific to their needs. So I would assume that a call to the selected museums in New York would net me a wealth of information on how to best arrange for a tour and which technology they have. Another idea for schools to utilize video conferencing would be if to use google Chrome notebooks. My son is in 11th grade in Ohio and their school system purchased chrome notebooks for their students and he has informed me that his class has had video conferences with a school in Cuba. I looked up the price for chrome notebooks and they are not that expensive at 249.00 dollars per-student and once a class has access to this type of tablet. Students can benefit from a wider range of cognitive, linguistic, cultural, and affective styles they would not encounter in a self-contained classroom (Simonson et al. 2012, p 155). Taking students on a virtual tour will help students to travel anywhere in the world for free and learn from other cultures. References Simonson, M., Smaldino, S., Albright, M., & Zvacek (2012). Teaching and Learning at a Distance: Foundations of Distance Education Virtual Field Trips http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/virtual-field-trips