Design and Integration of low-cost technologies and software to create interactive learning and support environments which augment traditional learning

This paper presents the preliminary results of a project based on the premise that technologies for learning should not attempt to replace traditional education, but should provide services that facilitate teaching, learning, and education-related administrative tasks. It examines the need for an easy-to-use, open, and affordable interactive learning environment that can support both face-to-face interaction and computer meditated interaction. In contrast to simply automating presentation, there\´s a lot that interactive learning technologies can do to address more powerful forms of pedagogy ased on learning by doing, and collaborative teaming (Roschelle, Teasley, 1995). This will allow students to act rather than listen, and to try things within the technology world that are impossible in the real world and link to outside resources and communities of practice. The paper touches the tension between enterprise practice and "small piece" approach design. It advocates segregating hardware and software efficiently between various devices to meet design needs effectively, and to facilitate economical and popular development of educational technologies by providing an appropriate Linux platform, and using tested open source software, also eliminating licensing fees.