Synchronous learning at a distance: experiences with Tango

In the fall of 1997, and again in the spring of 1998, the Northeast Parallel Architectures Center at Syracuse University taught a computational science course at Jackson State University in Jackson, Mississippi using the TANGO Interactive collaboratory system. What made this course unique is that twice a week instructors met with students online, showing lecture slides and programming examples, and discussing concepts in real time over the Internet. The goal of the project was to investigate the use of TANGO in teaching a traditional lecture-based course in a distance-learning format.