The Jasper Series

In your inquiry e-folio write a brief description of the Jasper series highlighting your impressions of the series. Try to suspend judgment and consider instead what questions this TELE raises for you as an instructor and what questions the series raises for you as a potential TELE designer.

The Jasper series is ambitious integration of several different disciplines presented to students as an online and multimedia interactivity. It tries to move away from the traditional mathematical word problems that really did not have any relevance. Rather, each problem consists of many different aspects that mirror "real world" applications. Moreover, each activity is presented in a video and text format, which allows students to be engaged while tackling a variety of problems. This leads to constructivist learning as the student is afford the opportunity to build on what they already have learned or know.

Although the Jasper series is an excellent resource and form of activity, it may still pale in comparison to many of the other forms of digital media that students are exposed to each day. The video itself is not really all that impressive and the presentation of each activity is not "glitzy". Possibly a redesign of the user interface of the activities may be needed.