Technology in the classroom

Professor John Crawford The software was actually quite easy to use and it did what I wanted it to do -- it improved the learning experience for the students. Professor Cynthia Weston The question you always have to ask is, 'Is this appropriate for what I'm trying to teach?' We can't afford to get lost in all the bells and whistles. Professor Claudia Mitchell People were more willing to challenge each other (in on-line discussions). In face-to-face conversations, it's much harder to be adversarial. People who are ordinarily very shy loved it.

DANIEL McCABE | Video killed the radio star, chimed the 1980s hit song by the Bugles. Will technology kill the off the age-old tradition of professors lecturing at their podiums to a classroom of students?

It might seem like a far-fetched notion, but it was a real concern for hundreds of York University professors during their 55-day strike last year. Teaching and technology was one of the major issues and professors patrolled the picket lines with signs declaring, "Televisions don't teach, people do." York history professor David Noble told The Chronicle of Higher Education that faculty were worried that web sites and videotaped lectures might be used in place of professors.

The York professors were also concerned about being forced to embrace teaching technologies that they didn't particularly think were appropriate for their courses. In the end, professors and administrators agreed to create a joint committee to examine the use of technology for teaching purposes.

"People didn't want to be forced to move into a classroomless university without giving the subject careful scrutiny," says David Clipsham, the head of York's faculty union.

"I can certainly see where the York faculty were coming from," says Professor Cynthia Weston, the director of McGill's Centre for University Teaching and Learning (CUTL). "Sometimes all a teacher needs to get her points across is a blackboard and some coloured chalk."

True enough, but there is little doubt that technology will be playing a greater role in universities' course offerings in the years to come. And despite the misgivings of the York professors, there are plenty of teachers out there who'll vouch for technology's benefits. McGill marketing professor Subir Bandyopadhyay, for one.

Last summer, he joined forces with University of Cincinnati professor Raj Mehta to offer a course on "World Marketing" to students at both McGill and U of C.

Thanks to videoconferencing, students at both schools were able to listen to the same lectures simultaneously. "Chat group" software and e-mail enabled students from the two countries to collaborate on class projects.

"In any course, the interaction between the students in the class is important," says Bandyopadhyay. "In this course, students really learned from one another. The American and Canadian markets are similar in many ways, but they're quite different from one another as well." According to Bandyopadhyay, the Canadian students were able to help out the Americans with Canada and vice versa.

Bandyopadhyay earned a Royal Bank Teaching Innovation award (see sidebar) to help support another McGill/U of C joint effort next summer. "We're hoping to add a Mexican university this time."

Physics professor John Crawford teaches a course called "Planets, Stars and Galaxies" -- a popular class aimed at non-physics students. "I always found it difficult when I talked about the motions of things in the sky," says Crawford. He needed a visual aid to help convey the movement of stars and show how comets travel through the cosmos.

Thanks to a teaching technology grant from the Faculty of Science, Crawford was able to find the tool he was looking for. He purchased some software which -- when used with a laptop computer and projector -- creates an in-class "planetarium" that he can program to demonstrate how heavenly bodies move about.

Crawford thinks the technological boost improved his course. "The software was actually quite easy to use and it did what I wanted it to do -- it improved the learning experience for the students."

"We don't really know what the impact of new technology will be on teaching yet," says Dean of Science Alan Shaver. "But we do know that it will have an impact."

That's why Shaver established a new information technology fund for his faculty last year. "The idea was to foster some experimental teaching approaches," says Shaver. The fund supports the purchase of hardware and software and the hiring of student assistants to help develop new teaching techniques that use technology. It also provides professors with release time from other responsibilities so that they can focus on their teaching and technology projects.

"We have to learn how to use technology for teaching. We have no choice, unless we want to become an isolated, elitist institution outside the normal stream of culture," says Vice-Principal (Information Systems and Technology) Bruce Pennycook.

"For one thing, our students are going to demand it. There are more and more high schools becoming wired. Some of them have pretty sophisticated resources and computer scientists on faculty. Students are going to be alarmed if they come here and the service we're able to provide them is worse than what they received in tenth grade."

"Some people think technology is going to reconceptualize the learning at university. I'm not in that camp. I think the focal point is always going to be the quality of the delivery of the instruction and the professor will always be at the core of that," says Professor Terry Gandell from CUTL.

Gandell isn't a Luddite. She believes that the World Wide Web is having a major impact on how students search for information and that it is giving them new ways to interact with one another. But she doesn't expect to see many professor-less universities in her lifetime.

"I foresee a strong emphasis on technology, but technology is a tool. It's not a replacement for the living, breathing person in front of the classroom or behind the computer conference -- somebody who can interact with students and guide the process."

There are plenty of professors out there interested in using technology to support their teaching. Ask plant science professor Marcia Waterway. When a CD-ROM she created was a little late reaching the marketplace, Waterway started receiving irate e-mails from colleagues who wanted to use her product for their courses.

Waterway began work on the CD-ROM when she worried that her course on plant characteristics was becoming a little dull. The problem was that she had to impart a lot of detailed material to her students -- the names and descriptions of dozens of flowering plants.

To solve the dilemma, Waterway developed a computer program with colour images that conveyed the detailed information about the different plants to her students, freeing her up to focus on broader topics during her lectures.

Using a Royal Bank Teaching Innovation grant, Waterway also incorporated an interactive quiz section into the CD-ROM, as well as a glossary.

"I knew I was on to something when I saw that people who weren't in the course enjoyed playing with it," says Waterway.

Professor John Crawford The software was actually quite easy to use and it did what I wanted it to do -- it improved the learning experience for the students. Professor Cynthia Weston The question you always have to ask is, 'Is this appropriate for what I'm trying to teach?' We can't afford to get lost in all the bells and whistles.

"It's paid off in the end -- the students really like it and I think my course has a better structure now, but it was a lot of work putting it together. I worked weekends and nights. If professors are going to get involved in this sort of thing, universities will have to give them time away from other things so that they can do it properly," Waterway advises.

Does technology improve teaching? Weston says it's still too early to say for certain. "It's a very hot topic right now, but the research on this is still in its infancy.

"The question you always have to ask is, 'Is this appropriate for what I'm trying to teach?' We can't afford to get lost in all the bells and whistles."

Pennycook agrees. "There is no reason to use technology if nothing is gained. It shouldn't just be pasted on."

Pennycook warns that if technologies aren't used well, they can cause as many problems as they solve.

"Students are easily irritated -- and rightfully so -- if they wake up early to make it on time to a class and it takes their professor 15 minutes to get a piece of technology working properly."

One university that has been very aggressive in making teaching and technology a priority is Acadia University in Nova Scotia. By the year 2000, all Acadia undergraduates will have been issued laptop computers with sophisticated software. They can use the laptops to connect to the Internet from 3,000 ports spread throughout the university -- in all classrooms, residences, libraries and student lounges.

Another cornerstone of the school's new emphasis on technology is the Acadia Institute for Teaching and Technology (AITT), which offers workshops and design and technological advice to professors trying to master the use of technology. It also offers them a centre where they can get together with resource people with technological and pedagogical expertise. "It's a place where people can experiment and try out new things," says AITT director Glenn MacDougall.

MacDougall believes that technology is altering the nature of the student-professor relationship. Instead of simply sitting in classrooms, soaking up facts from their instructors, students are becoming more active participants in their learning -- using tools such as on-line discussion groups and the Internet to seek out information they think is relevant to their needs.

As a result, professors don't have to impart information so much as help students to evaluate and process the information they're receiving from other sources.

During a workshop on on-line discussions organized by CUTL last semester, Education professor Claudia Mitchell relayed her experiences with making on-line discussion groups an integral part of a course she taught.

"The interactions between the students were very interesting. People were more willing to challenge each other. In face-to-face conversations, it's much harder to be adversarial. People who are ordinarily very shy loved it. Suddenly they were getting up on their soapboxes."

MacDougall says that technology is altering the academic experience for students in another way. "Students have different expectations now about the skills they expect to have when they graduate -- they expect to be much more knowledgeable about how to use technology. That's as true for a student in history as it is for someone in science."

Pennycook concurs. "Students are going to insist on receiving these life skills. Universities that don't deliver will see their ability to attract students decline."

Noting that many lecture rooms in the Faculty of Engineering are now capable of supporting multi-media approaches to teaching, Pennycook says that few engineering professors are making use of them.

"There is a gap between the installation of classrooms that support the use of new media and the preparation of our faculty to use them. The gap isn't insurmountable, but it's a gap nonetheless."

Says MacDougall, "To make technology work, universities have to invest as much in humans as in hardware. If the faculty don't know how to use technology, there's no point."

Pennycook will soon be putting together a workgroup that will draw on the expertise in teaching and technology that exists in the Faculty of Education, CUTL and other areas, to provide policy guidance to McGill as it expands its involvement in using technology in its courses.

Says Pennycook, "Today, if you're using technology, it doesn't make you special. If you aren't using technology, that's when you stand out."