Instructional Technology in College Courses
Comments: 7 - Date: April 8th, 2008 - Categories: Creativity, Learning, Participation Gap
As more Digital Natives arrive at colleges and universities, professors and instructors of all subjects are trying to use digital technologies to better connect with students. In my personal experience as a sophomore at Harvard, some professors have been quite adept at using online resources – like watching music videos on YouTube during a foreign language class – while others have yet to embrace digital technologies.
Overall, however, most professors who I spoke to here at Harvard were passionate about the opportunity of using the Internet and its resources to improve teaching and make student’s learning experience more engaging. Many wondered where to start, asking which types of tools would be best to help students learn. In an effort to identify what digital “tools” students find the most helpful, I worked with the Romance Language department to survey hundreds of undergraduate and graduate students about their experience with instructional technology. Specifically, we asked them to rank digital technology tools (like blogs, podcasts, and wikis) on a scale of 1 -5, where 1 is “not useful” and 5 is”very useful.” We also asked them to describe their best experience with digital learning and to comment on any negative aspects of using digital technology in college courses.
Consistently, students ranked the posting of course material online and interactive syllabi as the most useful. They believe that all courses should maintain a website that contains readings, notes and other content so they can be accessed easily during the semester. Furthermore, students greatly appreciated interactive syllabi – a list of lectures and assigned readings with links to download them. Both of these features enable easy information access, something that saves time and confusion. However “web 1.0” they may seem, students view them as a necessity.
It was interesting to see how different groups of students ranked newer technologies like lecture videos, blogs, and RSS feeds. For example, undergraduates gave recorded lecture videos a high ranking, while graduate students did not. In fact, graduate students wrote in and note the negative aspects of lecture videos, claiming that they allow undergrads to skip class and take a passive role instead of actively participating in the lecture. Freshmen tended to give higher rankings to “web 2.0” tools like wikis and blogs than did older students, perhaps a sign of digital natives entering the arena of higher education.
Most striking of all, however, was the difference in rankings between students who have used a given technology and those who have not. For nearly all technologies, students who had firsthand experience with tools tended to give them a higher usefulness ranking. This means that students may not know to ask professors to use tools like RSS feeds and podcasts until they have experienced them in another course. This is shown in the graph below.
My favorite part of doing the survey was reading the written responses. Although students expressed concern with digital technologies replacing personal discussions with professors, the vast majority of respondents praised digital tools for making learning more engaging and exciting. The best experiences with digital media where ones in which online content and tools supplemented inspiring lectures and stimulating readings.
Instructors looking to use digital media to improve the learning experience can look to first meet “web 1.0” needs, like easy access of readings and other material, and then incorporate social tools like blogs, wikis and RSS feeds of relevant news.
I encourage anyone who is interested in seeing the details of the study, including many of the open-ended answers, to download the full report at http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/digitalnatives/files/2008/03/instructionaltechnologysurvey.pdf .
– Tony P.
Comment by alex juhasz - April 11, 2008 @ 12:00 pm
I ran a related “study” last semester, using web 2.0 (YouTube, specifically) as subject, forum, and tool for higher education about/for media studies (I taught the course “Learning from YouTube” on and about YouTube). Enamored of and competent with social networking for “fun,” both students and I were much less sure how effective YouTube was or will ever be for the specific needs of teaching and learning. The binary of entertainment and education haunted our class discussion and work throughout the semester. This student video was particular smart on this tension (one of many I say are raised by going web 2.0 in academia, see my blog on that, would love some reaction): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-IYM9Aa_Hs&feature=PlayList&p=10C28D43426ABC40&index=3
Comment by Technology News: Harvard Survey Shows Undergraduates Like Video Lectures | Office of eTech - April 17, 2008 @ 5:04 pm
[…] Pino discusses the report in the Digital Natives blog. […]
Comment by Patricia Justice - April 17, 2008 @ 7:43 pm
Great report!
I am currently conducting research on the millennial generations preferred learning and teaching pedagogies. This report will assist in defining this rather gray area from a student-centered perspective versus administration, faculty, and on-line course designer.
Thank you,
Comment by Anonymous - April 17, 2008 @ 11:43 pm
Thanks for this report.
There’s a typo on page three. The year should be 2007.
Comment by Fay Nielsen - April 21, 2008 @ 12:55 pm
A colleague and I are trying to figure out if the grad students were surveyed as course instructors for undergrad courses, or as grad students in a grad class? We were confused about the grad students noting that undergrads might use video lectures as an excuse not to come to class. My colleague thought that meant that the grads were TA’s/Instructors. I thought it was just a comment by grad students about undergrads and the grad students comments were essentially about grad courses. Can you clarify?
Comment by Tony Pino - April 21, 2008 @ 2:44 pm
Thanks for the comments!
To clarify: Graduate students were surveyed as *students* taking graduate classes. However, since most graduate students also TF an undergrad class, the graduate students sometimes commented on the way undergrads use technology. Please do post any more questions; I’d be happy to explain any details.
Comment by evolve. » Harvard Reports on Technology in the Classroom - April 25, 2008 @ 11:21 am
[…] Department of Romance Languages and Literatures has released a recent Instructional Technology Survey (PDF download) they conducted on campus, where they asked […]