The purpose of this study is to view how an electronic listserv (Quinto) was used by a group of highly motivated fifth grade teachers during a year of integrated curriclum planning, building and implementing. Quinto is a listserv administered by the research team at the University of California but limited to serving only the fifth grade teacher team members as clients.  The teacher team asked for this proprietary listserv to be created in order for them to electronically work and communicate among themselves.  How do the teachers choose to use this type of technology in their professional environment? What obstacles will burden this type of communication? How will the obstacles be overcome? What functions does Quinto serve? What roles do the teachers play as participants on the list? How is the electronic list linked to the planning and implementation of CREEK? How can this type of technology function as a professional development tool? These questions drove our research study.

Middle school reform is focused on active meaningful learning (Charney, 1992; Eccles, et al., 1991; MacIver, 1989) for all children.  In fact, James Beane (1991) has suggested that the middle school years (grades 5-8) may be the natural home of the integrated curriculum and that subject matter boundaries limit students' understanding of broader meanings, rather than promote wholeness and relevancy for students.  Middle school  reform efforts are aimed at curricula designed to offer the middle school student a pathway toward understanding their world through active exploration, problem solving and challenging learning opportunities.

Although middle school education reform efforts call for these active highly student-centered learning settings, the large middle school studies of the early 1990's suggest they are not being seen in our middle school classrooms.  Most of the data suggest that students are offered few choices, rarely challenged academically to use higher order thinking skills, engage in mostly passive drill and practice learning in most subject areas and are often in non-cooperative, highly competitive group work settings (MacIver & Epstein, 1992; Becker, 1990).  Attempting to change curriculum to meet the middle year reform goals is a daunting task, but one our teacher team accepted enthusiastically.

Writing and implementing challenging curriculum is a major undertaking. The key to curriculum development is professional development (Shubert, 1986, p.416). However, imposing curriculum from the outside is so ineffective as to be useless. Teachers will implement new curriculum effectively only if they are involved in its development and can adapt it to their specific classrooms and situations. Studies show that schools operating with teacher involvement in curriculum provided a better education than did schools operating without such involvement.  Additionally, these studies pointed out  that effective teachers are curriculum innovators (Glickman, Gordon and Ross-Gordon, 1995; Garcia, 1991).  Improving curriculum at the middle school level means integration of skills and processes into a coherent multi-disciplined curriculum where students work on challenging, relevant problems in cooperative settings.  This kind of high-level integration across subject areas necessarily demands more communication and involvement among those professional educators in whose hands the daily job of teaching lies (Pate, 1997).

Challenges exist in beginning to achieve bottom-up middle school reform with project teachers at the helm. The results of a number of studies suggest that the adoption of innovative and collaborative environments are an essential component of these types of reform, (Sandholtz, Ringstaff, and Dwyer, 1997; Means, 1994; Barth, 1990; Fullan, 1990). It is important to break down teacher isolation and other obstacles to team oriented work environments, (Sandholtz et al., 1997; Berry, 1995). However with the many time-consuming factors involved in teaching, how can teachers find the time to collaborate effectively? Sandholtz et al (1997) point to electronic networks as one possible solution.

Given the differing schedules of teachers--especially those in differing schools, districts, and even states-- being able to communicate without being in the same place at the same time is a boon. In addition, telecommunication permits long distance communication and collaboration without teachers even leaving the classroom (or home), (p 119).