ver hear of Snorri Sturluson, the legendary author who wrote some of Iceland's best-known medieval sagas before his death in 1241? Neither had most of the students at Fjoelbrautaskoli Vesturlands a Akranesi, a public school in Iceland. But knowing that their work would go on the Web, the students eagerly boned up on this pillar of Norse literature, creating essays and making drawings about him.

One student, who had been known as "a loser," emerged as a genius in Web page design. "It seems that students try harder to do their best when they can see their pages on the Web than when they write ordinary essays," says instructor Harpa Hreinsdottir. "They get their work appreciated more than usual."

Students all across Iceland, a country where half the population live on farms and in tiny coastal fishing villages, are going online. A remarkably high 80 percent of primary and secondary schools are connected to the Net through the Icelandic Educational Network. In addition to motivating students, the Net provides access to educational materials otherwise unavailable in Iceland. When teachers at a Sunday school discovered that they didn't have books that taught about Native Americans from the Indian perspective, for example, the teachers found appropriate materials on the Net. Their students went a step further, contacting Native American students directly.

Lara Stefansdottir, one of the founders of the Icelandic Educational Network, cites this as an example of students taking responsibility for their own knowledge. "Seeking, finding, and evaluating information is how much of life will be in the future," she says. "If, through the Internet, our students can listen and learn from people all over, . . . it will only increase their understanding about the world they live in."