Using ICT to enhance student understanding of classification

It is common for 13-year-old students in Victoria, Australia to learn how to classify animals and plants using the Linnaean system and dichotomous keys. This is usually done with text based research on the major groups of animals and plants and a few simple exercises with various objects to explain the underlying concept of classification. In this paper we describe our attempt to achieve similar goals using three computer software programs to build dichotomous keys and represent the data: Inspiration, MS PowerPoint, and MicroWorlds. Student work is included to illustrate what can be achieved by students of various abilities with these information and communication technologies.