Faculty Authoring Development Program and Courseware Authoring Tools Project
Encyclopedia
The Faculty Authoring Development Program (FAD) and Courseware Authoring Tools Project (CAT) were courseware development initiatives at Stanford University
Stanford University
The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...

 during the years 1984-1990s. Several dozen teaching applications were created including tutorials in economics, drama simulations, thermodynamics lessons, and historical and anthropological role-playing games.

Courseware Authoring Tools Project

In 1984 FAD began by asking professors to propose projects for teaching with microcomputers. It then awarded programming support for six months or a year to several faculty. In 1987 in a new project, the Courseware Authoring Tools Project, end-user authoring systems for creating teaching applications were developed. Faculty used these authoring tools to create their own applications with a reduced level of support. A multimedia lab was also started at this time to author videodisc-based applications. The effort was started by Michael Carter, director of Stanford's Instruction and Research Information Systems group, and managed by Barbara Jasinski. Applications were distributed on floppy-discs with assistance from the Apple University Consortium through Kinko's copy centers.

The TheatreGame

The TheaterGame was a 2.5D Theater staging simulation, running on a 512K Apple Macintosh computer. Using it, students design an Elizabethan stage and then direct a play by moving characters and changing their body positions on the stage. Students record scenes synchronized to their audio recording of the play and then replay their work for the full class audience. The Shakespeare Project was a videodisc
Videodisc
Videodisc is a general term for a laser- or stylus-readable random-access circular disc that contains both audio and analog video signals recorded in an analog form...

-based tutorial that used theater techniques in interactions such as writing the subtext for multiple versions of the same scene as played by different theater companies. It was distributed through Apple Computer
Apple Computer
Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh line of computers, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad...

 as part of its multimedia marketing effort. Authored by Prof. Larry Friedlander, assisted by Charles Kerns, with graphics by Marge Boots.

The Would-be Gentleman

The Would-be Gentleman was a role-playing game, modeling the economic and social life of a French bourgeois during the life of Louis XIV of France
Louis XIV of France
Louis XIV , known as Louis the Great or the Sun King , was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre. His reign, from 1643 to his death in 1715, began at the age of four and lasted seventy-two years, three months, and eighteen days...

 (1638-1715). In the game, the player makes decisions about investing income, planning marriages and estates, and seeking influence with powerful figures. The game starts when the player is told that his father died and left him a small amount of cash and land. The student then decides how to invest his resources. Historical and personal events are inter-related in the game. The real challenge is keeping one's social and economic status in balance. If successful the player will archive a high court position and riches. Authored by Prof. Carolyn Lougee and Michael Carter for the 512K Macintosh computer.

The Rankine and Brayton Cycles

The Rankine Cycle and Brayton Cycle, two thermodynamics
Thermodynamics
Thermodynamics is a physical science that studies the effects on material bodies, and on radiation in regions of space, of transfer of heat and of work done on or by the bodies or radiation...

 simulations and tutorials, in which students manipulated variables for steam and jet engines to affect power output. Authored by Prof. Robert Eustis for a 512K Mac. Later released as ThermoWare in 1990 by the Stanford Mechanical Engineering Department.

The Computer-aided Tutorial in Economics

The Computer-aided Tutorial in Economics was a set of interactive lessons for an introduction to economics course. Students played the role of consumer, producer, and policy maker to learn about the forces that drive different parts of the economy. During the tutorial, students responded to questions and interpreted graphs. Authored by Prof. Michael Boskin
Michael Boskin
Michael Jay Boskin is the T. M. Friedman Professor of Economics and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. He also is Chief Executive Officer and President of Boskin & Co., an economic consulting company.Boskin holds B.A. with highest honors, M.A., and Ph.D...

 for an IBM PC XT with 320K memory.

Tarski's World

Tarski's World is a 3-D block world in which students use the symbolic language of first-order logic
First-order logic
First-order logic is a formal logical system used in mathematics, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science. It goes by many names, including: first-order predicate calculus, the lower predicate calculus, quantification theory, and predicate logic...

. Turing's World is a simulation of a simple computer, a Turing machine
Turing machine
A Turing machine is a theoretical device that manipulates symbols on a strip of tape according to a table of rules. Despite its simplicity, a Turing machine can be adapted to simulate the logic of any computer algorithm, and is particularly useful in explaining the functions of a CPU inside a...

, one of the key abstractions used in modern computability theory to study what computers can and cannot do. Currently published by the Center for the Study of Language and Information and distributed by Cambridge University Press
Cambridge University Press
Cambridge University Press is the publishing business of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII in 1534, it is the world's oldest publishing house, and the second largest university press in the world...

. Authored by Profs. Jon Barwise and John Etchemendy
John Etchemendy
John W. Etchemendy and of Basque descent is Stanford University's twelfth and current Provost. He succeeded John L. Hennessy to the post on September 1, 2000....

.

Mogul

Mogul, a role-playing game for learning the history of cinema in the U.S., in which the player helps Adolph Zukor
Adolph Zukor
Adolph Zukor , born Adolph Cukor, was a film mogul and founder of Paramount Pictures.-Early life:...

 run nickelodeons and start a movie production company. In one activity the player views and books early movies for theaters and has his position in the company affected by theater profits. Authored by Prof Henry Breitrose

Alias

Alias, a role-playing game authoring tool, written in Hypercard
HyperCard
HyperCard is an application program created by Bill Atkinson for Apple Computer, Inc. that was among the first successful hypermedia systems before the World Wide Web. It combines database capabilities with a graphical, flexible, user-modifiable interface. HyperCard also features HyperTalk, written...

 by Brodie Lockard.

American Sign Language

American Sign Language, a tutorial and visual dictionary; Heat Exchange in Animals; Chemotherapy Simulation for practicing administration of drugs and monitoring vital signs; The Drama Image Archive, a large set of still images accessed on a videodisc controlled by a Macintosh computer, Science for Living, a set of tutorials and simulations teaching about the heart and circulatory system; a SuperCard
SuperCard
SuperCard is a high-level development environment that runs on Macintosh computers, under OS 8 and 9, and OS X. It is inspired by HyperCard, but includes a richer language, a full GUI toolkit, and native color .The programming language used by SuperCard is called SuperTalk, and is largely based on...

  version of A La Rencontre de Philippe, a French language exploratory world original developed at MIT
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...

's Project Athena
Project Athena
Project Athena was a joint project of MIT, Digital Equipment Corporation, and IBM to produce a campus-wide distributed computing environment for educational use. It was launched in 1983, and research and development ran until June 30, 1991, eight years after it began...

for workstations; Physics Simulations.
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