LESSONS LEARNED FROM LITRE FACULTY SMALL GRANTS

Emergent Themes in Student Learning

• Technology improves student learning by enhancing content through visualizations, simulations or modeling and enriched content.

• Technology facilitates communication, collaboration, feedback and interaction, which can improve student performance.

• Technology can increase motivation and student engagement

• Pedagogy is of vital importance.  Technology itself does not directly influence learning, pedagogical strategies enabled by technology do.

• Functional aspects of technology are important: Infrastructure, support and time investment are crucial.

• Attitude of users towards technology is crucial determinant of effectiveness and use.

Visualization of content facilitates student learning of the material. (Visualization is defined as the formation of mental visual images, the process of interpreting in visual terms, or of putting content into visual form to further understanding.)
For example, Oliver & Raubenheimer (2007) integrated web-based concept map (Cmap) assessments in five sections of graduate teacher education classes between fall semesters 2005 and 2006 (ECI 511, 41 students; EAC 595A, 26 students). Students found that using concepts maps was beneficial and helped their learning. Cmaps helped them make connections, tie information together, link or group information, and to explicate relationships among concepts. Through repeated assessment both instructors showed that students’ ability to identify and correctly relate concepts to each other improved over the semester, as shown by graded assignments.  In addition, based on survey results, students generally agreed or strongly agreed that concept mapping activities helped them make connections between major topics and sub-topics of the courses.

Interactive simulations or modeling promote learning.  (Simulations/modeling extends visualization by including the ability to manipulate variables or parameters and to see the effect of this manipulation. Simulations and models include imitation or representations [perhaps simplified] of some real thing, phenomenon, situation or process.)
For example, Peters (2007) prepared interactive modules for two of the laboratory sessions in MAE 405. Each module was composed of a series of PowerPoint slides using figures rather than equations to demonstrate practical examples of the material learned in that particular laboratory session.  Additionally, interactive Maple and MATLAB based files were included to allow the students to see the effects of varying certain parameters in the example.  For instance, one module demonstrated the vibration of the sail for a sailboat and a circular drum.  The student could then change the aspect ratio of the sail or mode number to visually see how the vibration changed.  Each laboratory module also contained an online quiz that the student needed to complete correctly before attending the in-class laboratory session.  Analysis of data showed that both sections of the courses using the visualizations demonstrated an increase in student learning.

Technology provides enriched content material.  (Enrichment is defined as the extension of content through technology enabled methods such as hypertexts, electronic archives, etc.)
One example of technology enriched content was the creation of a web-based diet analysis program, NCSUNutrition (http://www.ncsunutrition.com) to promote student understanding of the relation between energy intake and expenditure (Allen 2007).  The effect on student learning was not reported in the project.

Technology facilitates communication, collaboration, feedback and interaction, which can improve student performance.

Technology can be used to increase communication and collaboration between students and between students and faculty. Interaction with peers and faculty, feedback, and collaboration all contribute to enhancing student learning.

Expertiza, a suite of applications for developing reusable learning objects through peer review, was evaluated in several courses (CSC 216, CSC 253 and others).  In Expertiza, students submit assignments to the system, which then presents these assignments to other students for review.  Both reviewer and author can communicate over a shared Web page, and the author has a chance to submit revised versions in response to reviewer comments.  In a survey of students in one course (N=25), by a margin of 13 to 5, students thought doing the peer-reviewed exercises enhanced their learning.  By a margin of 15 to 6, they felt that the experience of writing for their peers gave them a deeper understanding of the concepts in the course.  Overall, students reported satisfaction with this tool (Gehringer, 2007).

Neel (2006, 2007) notes how the use of virtual slides and computers can add to collaborative learning in a class.  In most traditional microscopy systems only a single person or two people can easily view a slide at a time.  This creates an obstacle for students trying to share information about what they are seeing on different slides or for instructors attempting to demonstrate various features of a slide.  By viewing slides on a screen, more individuals can view the slides at once, which allows students to more easily compare slides.  Additionally, instructors can more efficiently demonstrate or discuss important features of a slide with larger numbers of students, while still maintaining a small group focus.

Technology can increase  motivation and student engagement
The literature on educational practices suggests that the more “engaged” a student is with their learning, the more they will learn. Many of the LITRE projects enable students to be more engaged.  In addition, some projects showed that students had more motivation to learn when they used the technology.

The study of the Graphic Design portal set up to supplement graduate and undergraduate courses (College of Design) found that students who were actively engaged online through the graphic design portal had a tendency to begin their projects earlier and developed them further (Brock). Similarly, in the Computational Chemistry laboratories (CH230, CH232) the PI observed that “The most interesting observation from the instructor view point was the way in which the students readily started assignments. (Sremaniak)
 
The use of a virtual microscopy system, with 20 virtual slides, was investigated in two veterinary courses (VMP, 942;VMP 978, 62 students).  Student surveys indicated that 80% of students said that they would spend moderately to significantly more time than they already spend studying slides if virtual slides were available for studying. (Neel)

Study of the use of CPS technology (Clickers) in an undergraduate psychology class found that surveyed students (N=26) were overwhelmingly positive about the use of this technology. The PI’s reported: “statements gathering the strongest agreements were related to students’ engagement during the actual class period.” (Niefeld and Osborne).

Lessons about Teaching with Technology

Pedagogy is of vital importance.  Technology itself does not directly influence learning, pedagogical strategies enabled by technology do.

It is not technology per se, but the pedagogical strategies that are afforded or supported by technology that are most likely having an effect on student learning. Use of technology is not an instructional method, but better viewed as a deliberately manipulated and deployed way of promoting, better enabling and scaffolding certain pedagogical methods or philosophies.  Learning is promoted through interaction of content, technology and pedagogy.  Much previous research has supported this . LITRE project results from last year also suggest that the greatest gains in student learning occur when faculty actively considered or modified their pedagogical strategies.

Rouskas and Miller (2007) present an example that illustrates this point.  They designed, implemented, and incorporated a set of learning modules to demonstrate fundamental programming concepts into their CSC 216/316 courses (Fall 2006/Spring 2007).  Students with laptops were able to download and use the modules during the lecture period to gain hands-on experience with the corresponding concepts.  For assessment purposes, two sections were studied.  One section required all students to bring and use laptop computers to each class.  These computers were used for the exercises in the modules.  The other section did similar exercises, but used paper and pencil.  Special questions were developed and used on the final exam to assess the students’ ability to solve realistic problems using Linked List data structures.  Results from the technology-based and non-technology-based classes were collected and compared.

“The main conclusion from the results is that technology in the classroom provided no appreciable differences in learning.  However, these results do not necessarily imply that the learning module approach does not have merit.  Since both sections used the learning modules, it is possible that the learning modules benefited both groups of students regardless of the technology used (laptops versus paper and pencil).  Therefore, it is possible that the interactive learning experience per se, is more important than the underlying technology.  However, without the support from COE’s laptop initiative and this LITRE grant, it is unlikely that the PIs would have undertaken the task of creating the modules and making classroom learning more interactive.”

On pedagogical change Gehringer (2007) notes,  “… it requires more effort to disseminate a teaching/learning strategy than to disseminate a teaching/learning tool.  It is much easier to find faculty who want to do electronic peer review in their courses than to find faculty who have ideas about how students can build resources to improve the learning of other students.  Perhaps this should not come as a surprise; faculty can learn to use the software in a few hours, but thinking about how students can take charge in improving the course requires more careful planning and changes the kind of homework that is assigned.”

Functional aspects of technology are important: Infrastructure, support and time investment are crucial.

Usability, Infrastructure and Support is Critical.
Several faculty highlight this issue.  For example, Rouskas & Miller (2007) state:  “For programming projects, it is important to use standardized software that is readily accessible to students.  Otherwise, it is likely to spend a large amount of time in-class to identify and resolve software incompatibilities.  We have also come to realize the importance of infrastructure in terms of wireless access and availability of electrical outlets in the classroom.  Neel (2007) notes that when technology is easy to use and works well, adoption can be smooth.  “A very high proportion of both 2006 and 2007 students found the VM system easy to use and the system has been easily integrated into both the sophomore clinical pathology course and the senior clinical pathology rotation.”  Similarly, Gehringer (2007) points out that students want to use tools that have an intuitive user interface. 

Large Time Investment is needed.
Like last year, many faculty reported that the incorporation of technology, conversion of materials into an online form, or creation of technology-based applications was even more time consuming than planned. Some examples:  Rouskas & Miller (2007) note that, “Preparing a well-defined learning module and making sure that the relevant JAVA code works correctly is a time-consuming task.  We estimate that preparing for a technology-based section takes approximately 20% more time than a non-technology-based one, with a similar increase on TA effort.”  Thoney (2007) noted, “Implementing the LTG and SCG (games software) require a lot of additional time when compared to preparing for a textbook-based lecture.  Heber and Howard (2007) observe that, “Although developing a visualization library from scratch is a time consuming endeavor, the use of visualization in the classroom might even save preparation time once such a library has been created.”

Attitude of users towards technology is crucial determinant of effectiveness and use.
Huff  & Monaco (2007) did a study of the use of TaskStream, an eportfolio system in the College of Education.  Student and faculty surveys (student n = 43, faculty n = 6) showed that both students and faculty seemed to have negative opinions regarding TaskStream.  Motivation to use the eportfolio system was low – 95% of students reported that they did not use TaskStream for projects other than those that were required by their instructor(s), and 74% indicated that they had not explored additional features of TaskStream that were not used as part of required assignments.  Students largely felt that the software did not increase their interest in course assignments and were unenthusiastic about its use.  Faculty responses were similarly negative.  Approximately 67% of respondents either disagreed or strongly disagreed that TaskStream enabled them to better align teaching objectives and evaluation strategies.  Nearly 67% of participants strongly disagreed that TaskStream enabled them to more efficiently manage student assignments.

Similarly, Norris’ (2007) study of the use of QuickTime movies and interactive Maple worksheets in Calculus III, MA 242 showed that by a margin of about 3 to 1 the students felt that Maple did NOT help them to better learn calculus.  Corresponding to this attitude was the finding that use of technology based modules had only a marginal effect on learning.  The average grade for all students in the treatment groups was 0.6 points higher (out of 10 points) than the average grade for students in the control groups, a 6% increase.