Integrating Technology Into Your Teaching
Teaching has been affected profoundly by three technological revolutions. The first, Socratic dialogue with direct one-on-one interaction and probing discourse with students remains our model of “effective teaching”. As this revolution led to the establishment of universities with class sizes unsuitable for a conversation between students and a learned master, the technology gave way to “lecturing”, the potential for loss of active student engagement. Our challenge has been to integrate this technology of active listening and a thoughtful exchange between students and professor in the classroom that is larger than that of the seminar class.
The second great revolution was Guttenberg’s moveable print. This permitted the transmission of ideas across distances and time through texts. Print has democratized education by making great ideas available to anyone who can read. Unlike active discourse this technology is limited by individual motivation to engage the thoughts on a printed page. Our challenge has been to integrate text materials into our courses in ways that the printed ideas are read by our students to become a basis of thoughtful conversation in the classroom.
The third and current revolution is Information Technology, the combination of computational and communications devices to present ideas, simulate “real world” experience, and interact with one another in new ways, such as the Internet. My role on this panel is to offer what my experience has been in attempting to integrate these new technologies in teaching. It is hard to ignore the explosion of use of this technology. In 1997 the Census Bureau reported that about 40% of household has a PC and 23% were using the Internet. Today industry monitors estimate that there are nearly 100 million Americans over 16 using the Internet. Despite the rapid diffusion of the technology, as you will see, there are many challenges to integrating the technology in teaching, not the least of which is that we collectively have very little experience in its application to education in comparison with the earlier technologies.
My story is that I came to college teaching late, so I have no preconceived notion that I know how to teach. For most of my career I have been a businessman. Although as a college student I had the required courses in FORTRAN and COBALT, the technology of the mainframe was never useful and much too complex. As a businessman I bought my first IBM PC and Apple IIe. Using DOS and later UNIX systems with the old Texas Instruments TRS-80, personal computing became part of my business experience early. When the Internet became commercial I subscribed to the early systems, connecting to sites in an era that had no browsers. So, when I started to teach I had a background in this medium and understood its utility to business, though e-commerce was not well developed.
In my first few years at Hampton I attempted a few assignments using the Internet, but found that most of my students did not have the skills or much access. I started a survey each semester to track computer and Internet skill development of my students, while mostly just encouraging the use of this tool. While 60%, by one authority, of our students will end up in careers that require Internet skills, in business the skill is required in 100% of the jobs. Three years ago about 30% of my students reported that they used the Internet. I started my first website simply to induce students to use it, and thereby develop a skill I knew that they needed – no other rationale. It was simply a site with links to other sites that I used in simple assignments. I saw Internet skills among my students rise to 100%.
Since this crude experiment the University has vastly expanded student access through Internet PC’s in the ATM, access to dormitory terminals, and decentralized labs across much of the University. My students come to the University fairly well equipped from high school and home in the use of personal computing and the Internet. Novelty and the need to develop Internet skills are no longer for me a compelling rationale for using this technology in courses. Technology must add value or efficiencies to what I attempt to accomplish as a teacher.
So I want to introduce early in my presentation my own cautionary observation about integrating Information Technologies into teaching. Our history of finding educational value in new technologies is limited. Morse’s Telegraph, Bell’s telephone, the wireless technologies of radio and television are impressive innovations that, I suspect, have all had some impact on the way we teach, but failed to gain an integrative role in our teaching, unlike discussion and print. The promise of television and later video as an educational tool proved to be mainly illusionary. Although I do a lot my learning at home through the TV, I observe that TV and videos in the classroom have been, in my experience, more often evidence of lazy teaching and result in more class naps by students than learning. It has turned out to be a passive exercise that fails to engage the student with thinking, except in the case of a very exceptional professor who interacts with the storyline of the program.
These technologies become part of the ambience of modern life. We wire our campuses for the technology of telephones and television because they are ubiquitous and our students demand and expect it, but we do not confuse their utilities with what is useful for teaching and learning.
With this note of cynicism, let me also say I am no Luddite renouncing the inevitability of technology. I am a person who simply tries to identify what makes sense to me and makes my life easier – I have video players at home we don’t use much, a telephone with answering capability that we never turn on, and I still prefer Dina Washington on reel-to-reel stereo to the CD. But, I use the microwave, use the PC and Internet too much, and if I have to go to a hospital, I want it to have the latest medical “gismos”. In my classroom I strive for Socratic method, believe that students ought to read the assignments, and use Information Technology where it helps me do my job. My experimentations simply have been to see what works for my students and me.
Here is what I have tried and my observations:
1. E-Mail: I teach nothing about getting or using e-mail in my classes, but I require all of my students to have e-mail. I ask students to communicate after office hours with me by e-mail. The advantage of this is that I ensure my students have this skill they need in business. I sometimes get interesting comments about ideas discussed in class from students who otherwise would not participate willingly in the class discussion. Mostly, I receive excuses for attending class, complaints or inquiries about grades, and questions about assignments. I feel like I have a better capability to communicate directly with a student. I also feel like I have less private time away from my students. Although I worry about the anonymity of this manner of communicating, I retain it because it is efficient in allowing me to determine how and when I respond to a student. It allows me to communicate with students who miss too many classes or clarify personal issues after careful consideration.
2. Website: I maintain a website for my courses which I use for the following. -
a. Student Registration. I use an e-mail form at my site that students must complete. This provides me information that I once collected with an in-class form. I use this to set up a student database to include the student’s advisor, major, career objective, interest in MBA or doctorate, and campus contact information. This gives some insight into the individuality of each student, and I know whom to contact if I have a problem with the student’s attendance, grades, or conduct. This is a convenience.
b. Grades. I post grades and attendance behind a password-protected screen to ensure privacy using a code that the student provides on the Registration form. I find students do audit their grades and are more attentive to accuracy than I am. To meet the University’s requirement for a final exam and a final grade reporting within a short time, I have found that posting grades helps limit errors or student-professor conflicts in determining the final grade. Students find it useful to know their course grade before the official grade is mailed to them. This is an efficiency in managing my class.
c. Course Materials. Materials that I once copied and passed-out in class are now posted at my site. Students retrieve this material by downloading it or printing the web page. This is a convenience to me. As I often had to copy my own material, it is a cost saving to me.
d. Syllabus. I now put my syllabus on-line and have a copy available for downloading. I no longer replace “lost” syllabi – a minor convenience in managing the class.
e. Links. I use the Internet for student research. Business students need to learn what information of value is available to them from the Internet, and there is a lot that is there. I post these links at my site. This has value to me in teaching and to the student’s learning.
f. Interactive Testing. This semester I have experimented with multiple choice testing as an aid to student mastery. This is a test at my site that provides the “correct” answer or reference to source materials when the student selects the incorrect answer. Although a “grade” is automatically provided to the student, I do not record the grade and use this tool as an experiment to see if it enhances learning. I do provide course points to the student for simply taking the test. The student types her name and pushes the “submit” button at the end of the test, sending me an e-mail message that the student has completed it. I have two such tests. It is not evident that this has enhanced student learning, although students report that the test is useful for preparing for the in-class test. Interactive pre-testing is still an experiment.
g. Teaching Notes and Plan. I post my Teaching Notes for major topics where I have no reading materials that cover the topic. These can be read either at the site or downloaded as a Word document. When read on-line I am able to hyperlink each learning objective to specific content in the document. I think this helps learning, and I know it ensures that I do cover each objective.
This semester I am experimenting with posting daily Teaching Plans for one of my courses. Frankly, I have never planned a course on a day-by-day basis until now. I have found this to be tough to do, but very helpful. Some students use this information for class preparation. Other than assisting me with the delivery of the course with greater clarity of purpose, I am not sure what the contribution to student learning is, if any. In the classroom, posting my daily teaching plan at my site has enabled me to de-emphasize preoccupation with note taking by students. This should assist in carrying on a discussion with students who are attentive to the conversation, but this is still an experiment.
h. Student Projects and Assignments. Because of the vast amount of information available now on the WWW, my web site has permitted me to attempt assignments with my students that I could not otherwise attempt. For example, all my students in the introductory management course complete an extensive personal career development assignment that includes on-line activities of taking multiple career tests, researching future demand and salary for an occupational choice, and identifying prospective employers. This assignment evolved from my dissatisfaction that seniors in business could not answer the question “What are you going to be when you grow up?” So, I decided to integrate the student’s search for a career into my lower course. I could not do this without the Internet. I have concluded that it is one of the more important things I accomplish with my students.
My seniors track historical stock movements and forecast economic data available on-line, real-time. To limit class time for reviewing statistics or stock price interpretation, I have links on the assignment page that direct the student to answers to the questions I once handled in class. This adds to student learning.
Since business is now on-line. As a business professor I have an obligation also to introduce this manner of business. In my introductory class, this is attempted through an assignment to develop an on-line grocery with links to companies attempting to do this and links to articles on the subject. In class students’ projects become the basis of discussing systems relationships as well as e-commerce. For seniors, the focus is case discussion of strategies for e-commerce versus “bricks and mortar” companies in examining Barnes and Nobles versus amazon.com and the economic value of time in technology based firms.
i. Student Peer Evaluations. I use student teams in many activities. As a business professor I teach managing and leading. Each student is required to lead one team activity. Team members grade team leadership. A student goes to a page with an e-mail form and evaluates the team leader. The form is sent to me for averaging as the grade for this assignment. I think this assignment has value. Using the website to evaluate a team member is convenient to the students, and there is some convenience to me in receiving grades in this manner.
j. Personal Information. Seeing many professors post personal information, I too post at my site my resume and family album. This may help to personalize the professor. Students do ask questions about me that they did not ask before. This is more of a vanity feature that probably has little value in teaching. It might have value to someone in the job market, especially since Internet technology is becoming a prerequisite skill for university teaching.
3. Computer Simulations. Gaming or simulations are practicable teaching tools in business. The simulation I have used is a commercial product in which student teams manage a firm competing against other teams. The simulation requires students to make human resource, materials, financial, price, and similar kinds of business decisions each week. The decisions are entered via PC software and recorded on a diskette. All team diskettes are processed to yield a new state of the market each week, when subsequent sets of decisions are made throughout the course. The project is graded on a competitive basis by rank ordering results of teams. While this kind of technology does get the student involved in decision-making and engages students in the use of “real” business information, I have ceased the simulation for now to focus on reading – in my opinion, a much greater concern which surfaced one day when I asked unprepared students to simply read aloud the material we were discussing. I have mixed feelings about simulations: They do engage students in appropriate skills and decision-making, but it is not clear to me if students see the relationships between the decisions they make and the outcome. Doing is not always the same as learning. This is an experiment, which I will re-integrate into my courses when I learn to manage the time that the simulation requires so that it does not interfere with other priorities.
Well, that is what I have done with Information Technologies that would be evident to the student. As I have identified most of these are benefits in convenience and student communications, and the learning value is, for many of these experiments, not yet determined. The greatest benefit of this new technology is not evident. By using the Internet I am able to visit sites of other professors and universities and see what they are attempting. I am able to look at the syllabus of the authorities in my discipline, borrow and configure their ideas, reading materials, tests, and assignments to my own needs – and I hope some professor “out there” is borrowing from me.
Here are examples of my borrowing: Seeing an experiment on critical thinking at one university, I have adapted much of these ideas in my teaching of decision-making. This is an attempt to improve the logic underlying business case analysis in my courses. Seeing that some of the best authorities in my field do not use textbooks for their undergraduate classes gave me the courage to do what I already wanted to do – focus on original sources, reading and integration skills, with me, the professor, providing the context and framework for the material. I now use readers, on-line articles, and cases in my courses, thanks to the knowledge and freedom I have gained from the Internet. I also use the Internet for much of my class preparation and research – its fast and convenient once you learn to use it.
Perhaps presumptively, I am going to assume that this experience allows me to offer some general observations about using the new technologies in your classroom:
1. As well intended as their applications may be, expect that the initial excitement about something novel will dissipate if there is no integration with content and no perceived value to the student. Learning how to use the technology over time will lead to an understanding of what has value in student learning and what does not. We are all in new territory, and there are few authorities to help us understand what will endure as important pedagogy. We do not now even understand what the technology of the Internet or computer will look like in the near future.
2. If you decide to experiment with the technologies, expect problems. Lectures sometime don’t work and assigned readings can sometimes not serve the purpose we thought. Computer software and Internet sites also have glitches. Students, learning the new technology, forget to save their work or can’t get a printer to work. Websites sometimes are down. Learn how to build slack into your teaching plan for inefficiencies and develop a sense of humor about the new technology.
3. Don’t expect this technology to save you a lot of time, effort, or money. Maintaining a website is labor intensive. Learn to use it only when the benefit outweighs the trouble. Running the simulation exercise took me as much time as grading tests. And, I have paid from my own pocket for everything I have attempted. I also do not have an Internet PC in my office. I use my own home PC, pay for my own e-mail and web host, and have bought all my own tools for maintaining my site. Only after these investments have I begum to realize efficiencies.
4. If you opt not to do a website, I personally think that is fine. We can easily overload a student with gratuitous websites. But, if you are not exploiting the new technologies you are giving up a chance to teach your students the tools that are simply part of the modern landscape that they will be expected to have. If not the Internet, try one of the following (and do not worry that you may not know how to do it – if you require your students to do it, you will learn too):
a. Require your students to use word processing on formal papers;
b. Require your students to do math problems using a PC spreadsheet and graphing;
c. If you have opportunities for student presentations, consider requiring that students create a web site, use Power Point, or create a video;
d. Encourage the student to use the Internet for researching assignments. Find other people’s websites or on-line articles that help you do what you need to do.
5. Do not forget: Whatever you do in the classroom, teaching is about someone else learning something of value. Lecturing is just talking, unless someone is paying attention and thinking about what you say; a book is just printer’s ink, unless the reader is engaged and is linked to the writer’s thoughts; and, a new technology is just another gimmick, unless it has something that makes your student do, read, or research while thinking.
6. Last: Have no fear! You will screw up. Start with the assumption that we may not know much about how what we do leads to someone else leaning. I suspect that much, most, of what we already do in class may have little to do with what a student actually values and can be used in 10 years when the student needs it. In ten years our students will realize that what you taught today in class is obsolete, if they remember it. Use Information Technologies to allow the student to find answers to new problems.
For those who believe that Information Technologies may have value to you, and for those who would like to join the experiment in the application of a new technology I have provided some “handouts”. I will also put these on my web page in case you decide to try it later and lose these materials – just click on “Faculty Resources” in the index banner. If you venture forth, learn to borrow from others. Borrow ideas from other professors now on the Internet. I put my pages there to be used. Borrowing from one another is the most efficient way to disseminate applications of a new technology and the fastest way to gain collective experience. To start you off. I have one handout that lists Internet sites that are discipline specific. If I did not include your discipline get on the Internet, go to a University web site where the authorities in your discipline work and see if anyone has a web site. I got most of my ideas for my courses simply by looking at what other management professors are doing and adapting their ideas to what I can do and what is appropriate for my own courses. This keeps me current, teaching to what I know to be high standards, and forces me to continuously reassess what I teach.
My second handout is a list of web resources. I have tried to provide a sample of Internet resources that would be of assistance to the instructor that never used the Internet to those that would use the Internet more if only you had a free ISP, free hosting service, free editing tools, or free help in some of the advanced techniques.
In conclusion, as you are new faculty, I too welcome you to Hampton University. I am glad to have you as a colleague and fellow member of a society of educators who understand that teaching is not the other side of learning, teaching is just learning by sharing. I thank you for allowing me to share.