Happy New Year

Image by: AltoExylAs the new year begins, I often find myself reflecting on the past and planning for the new year. As I think about 2009, I would like to share some of the things I learned about teaching and learning last year.

#1. Technological bling is dangerous

Using technology without an instructional rationale for using the technology can cause problems for student learning. Providing too much technology can cause student confusion and lead to cognitive overload, which can overwhelm the student and detract from the learning process. Plus there is much to be said for using classroom-based instructional strategies that do not require technology.

#2. Not all students like technology

This was a bit of a revelation for me. As a student, I love technology and I like to try out new things, to me – change is great! I visited a class last year and found that the students were not excited about the technology and really didn’t find a need to use it. This leads us back to #1 – there must be an instructional purpose to using the technology.

#3. Not all classes and/or instructors should use technology

If an instructor is not comfortable using a technology it may detract from their instruction as opposed to enhancing it. Additionally, not all topics lend themselves to using technology. While I have seen a number of classes that I was iffy about being delivered using certain technologies have amazing success, I have also seen attempts fail. I definitely believe that there are times for the use of technology and times other instructional techniques can be used without technology.

#4. Communication and connections are key

I have read quite a bit of research and personal testimonies that have brought to light the successes that can occur when we make connections with our students, whether it is a connection between the instructor and the student, a staff member and the student, or simply among the students. For instructors, one way to make these connections is through regular communication with the students whether they are attending in class or online.

#5. If you build it, and they come, they are not necessarily prepared for it

Many students are excited to use technology and new learning techniques in the classes that they take but although we make assumptions that our students are technologically savvy, in many cases they lack the fundamental understanding necessary to use some of these technologies for instructional purposes. For example, while they know how to facebook and play games on their computers, they may not have other computer skills that we deem necessary for their success, therefore we must be here to support them and assist them as needed.

With that, I would like to share what I have planned for the spring 2010 semester:

#1. Targeted training topic weeks

Workshops will be conducted this semester in themed weeks (a schedule will be posted next week). Many of the sessions will be recorded and available for later viewing. The themes and dates for those weeks are as follows:

Facilitating e-learning week

Learn tips & tricks for teaching in an online or hybrid environment, including delivery of content, communication, tracking student success, and tricks for making grading easier

Assessment week

Learn how to write test questions, develop assessments that don’t require tests, and learn how to easily upload assessments in word processing format to Blackboard

Design/Redesign week

Learn how to adapt materials that you already have or that are readily available to an online learning format.

Project week

Learn how to create meaningful research projects, how to develop rubrics and learn about copyright issues and plagiarism detection software.

If you cannot make the sessions and would like to learn more about a topic, feel free to check your email for recorded sessions or contact me and I can review the information from the session with you individually.

#2. Tips & tricks sessions

A number of sessions will be tips and tricks sessions that will provide you with immediate instructional techniques that are easy to learn and can be readily applied to your classes. The objective of these sessions is to provide you with tools that can make your job easier and improve student success.

#3. Dedicated time to work individually with faculty on their courses

It is a fact, faculty are busy and no matter what time workshops are planned for, there will be conflicts for some. With that in mind, I am happy to schedule appointments to help with the design of their course development or review some of the material covered in any of the workshops. Appointments can be made by emailing me to request an appointment.


What Do Students Want?

Photo by Roo ReynoldsAs an Instructional Designer/Educational Technologist I generally work with faculty who want to learn how to design/improve their courses or use technology to enhance their teaching and their students’ learning. Faculty who I work with are generally excited to work with me to enhance their instruction and are very passionate about teaching. Even if they are apprehensive about learning a new technology they want to learn it so they can better reach their students.

So, you may be thinking, “Why are you telling me this?” I am sharing this with you because I had an experience a few weeks ago that makes me wonder what our students really want.

I was asked to give a guest lecture in a class on the use of Twitter and social networking for marketing. I started out by asking the students in a low-tech way, if they had ever heard of Twitter. By a raise of hands, I found that about 1/3 of the students had heard of it and only 2 students had used it. The make up of the class was that there were many recent high school grads and a few re-careering adults. I started off by providing a definition of Twitter, showing a brief video of what it is about and how it can be used. I provided examples of how it can be used in their field and shared examples of how businesses in their selected occupation had interacted with me on Twitter. What was interesting to me is that the reactions of the students were much different than I had expected and much different than I have had with the faculty. They thought it was weird and seemed somewhat disengaged. Now of course, Twitter is an interesting topic, as people’s first reaction is often, why would I want to do that? In fact, Alan Levine has created a Twitter Life Cycle, in which the first reaction of a Twitter user is “That’s the dumbest thing…” Now of course, the industry that these students want to go into uses Twitter for marketing, and they may need to use it in the future, but the experience got me thinking about some other experiences I have had.

Image by @cogdogAt the Student Success Conference held in later October, Arleen Arnspayer from CCCSE at the University of Texas - Austin shared with us that students come to us motivated and ready to succeed, yet the stark reality is that 50% do not persist through their first semester. So, there is data that shows that students want to succeed in accomplishing their educational goals. I haven’t seen much data indicating that students want to learn about Web2.0 technologies.

About 8 years ago, a colleague of mine inquired of her students (~ aged 18-21) how they wanted to learn. She gave them options of online, hybrid, and in-class delivery. Their response was that they wanted to come to class and have her “teach” them, they wanted to use their technology for their own entertainment.

Research articles abound about how students use their technology, even about how they personalize their technology, but have we asked the question “do you want to learn with technology?”

Now of course, students don’t always know best. There are times when years of experience and success in reaching and teaching learners demonstrates best practices that our students do not necessarily like. Additionally, we need to prepare our students to work with technologies they will encounter in the workplace and prepare them for a future in a global market. But I wonder what strategy we should employ in providing these technology tools/teaching and learning enhancements to our students.

Students have overwhelmingly requested a web presence in their courses. If a course does not have a Blackboard site, they wonder why, and request it. Perhaps we should start off with small steps, looking at what tools can be integrated into Blackboard and what tools are necessary for students to learn for their specific career choices and move on from there…  Something to think about.
 

Getting an Education at EDUCAUSE

Last week I had the privilege to attend the EDUCAUSE conference in Denver, Colorado. I had heard many great things about this conference over the years but never had an opportunity to attend. First of all, it lived up to the hype. My brain is full of information and there is still so much that I want to experience through the recorded sessions that I did not have a chance to attend. The recorded sessions allow you to be in more than one place at a time – so cool. The following video by my colleague, Alisa Cooper, of Glendale Community College captures the essence of the EDUCAUSE experience. I think there were three main things that led to a great conference experience: (1) the sessions, (2) the networking opportunities, (3) getting to see new products.

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If you are using technology, you must be cheating…

I had the opportunity to attend an excellent conference focusing on student success. The presenters provided 450 student services personnel, faculty and college administrators with a lot of great ideas to consider in regard to how we can help our students succeed in achieving their educational goals. Throughout the conference, I had my laptop open and connected to the Internet. When my laptop was put away, I had my iPhone out. So, what was I doing with my technology when I was at a conference?

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The Same but Different

by thoth92I am currently involved in team facilitating two workshops. The workshops are being offered to the same audience, during the same month. The workshops are a hybrid format, meeting for a total of 4 modules, in which two are online and two meet in-class. What is fascinating is that the dynamics of these two workshops are completely different.

Surely, this has happened to you as well – teaching two sections of the same class at the same time when the behaviors and performance of the students are completely different, even though you, the instructor are doing the same thing in both classes.

So here is what is happening in the workshops:

In one section of the workshops, participants are very active with the online portion of the classes, posting to the discussion boards, doing the assignments, and developing an online learning community; however the majority of the participants did not attend the face-to-face sessions (due to illness, conflicts, etc.) In the other section of the workshop, very little of the online work is being done, aside from the initial introduction, however the majority of the participants attended the face-to-face session.

So, why is this occurring? The facilitators are being consistent in the communications being sent to each section, sending emails, posting announcements and being present in the discussion boards daily. Both workshops are being delivered during the month of October, although their start dates were staggered by one week.

I think the reason behind this is three-fold – based on time to dedicate to the task, motivation, and desire to apply the knowledge gained in the workshop. First let’s look at motivation. All of the participants had the motivation to register for the workshop, however they may not have had clear expectations of the amount of time that they would need to spend on the workshop, especially since it is in a hybrid format. This often occurs with our students. They see the seat time and enroll, not realizing that there is quite a bit of time that will need to be dedicated to the class outside of the listed class meeting times. Additionally, given that it is mid-semester, this can be a difficult time for faculty to set aside time to work on their own professional growth while dealing with mid-terms and other priorities, not to mention the massive amount of illness permeating the Valley. Finally, I believe that many faculty attend professional development opportunities throughout the year and then take advantage of the holiday, spring, and summer breaks to put their new found skills into practice. I hope that by leaving the workshop materials available to participants that they will be able to access them when they need them.

So… this is what is occurring and why I think it is happening. The classroom is a bit of a different situation than a workshop for faculty. Why do you think there are similar dynamics in two sections of the same class?