Canadian stories of distant cases: Audiographics teaching and learning of high school physics in the RACOL project

Abstract

The Rural Advanced Community of Learners (RACOL) project is intended to provide learning opportunities to high school students in remote communities in northern Alberta. This paper uses a narrative case study research methodology, and reports the author's experiences as a teacher of a class of 16 physics students. The teacher was located in a room 800 km from the students, who were scattered among 4 schools located across several hundred kilometers in northern Alberta. The paper is focused specifically on some of the unique challenges presented by this mode of teaching and learning, as well as on the project's success in providing enhanced opportunities for these students.