Colleges have spent millions on “smart classrooms” packed with the latest gadgets to assist teaching — computerized projection systems, Internet ports at every seat, even video cameras with motion detectors that can track the movements of a lecturer. But colleges have spent far less time and money giving professors the skills to use even the simplest technology effectively.
I very rarely use PowerPoint. I am much more likely to blog on a topic related to an upcoming lecture, and then during class use the links embedded in the blogs as an outline. I ask my students to do the same, though I do find that students seem to have written a conventional paper on a word processor, then pasted it into their blog… it can be rather dry listening to someone read word-for-word what your eyes can scan much more quickly.
I do occasionally load up the word processor, and type examples and thoughts as they occur to me… I sometimes do this on the blackboard when a good discussion is going, but I can take the word processor file with me.
This strategy is an implementation of the “just-in-time teaching” method, which I’ve found very useful, since my curricular material just keeps getting longer and longer, with more links and more examples, with every year that I teach… and all that information can be overwhelming to a student who sees it all laid out on the first day of classes.
9 Nov 2004 in Academia, Cyberculture, Literacy, Media, Technology.
Wouldn’t having to go through the training take more time away from the actual lesson preperation? Although I believe schools should “keep up with the times,” how would a projector, a smartboard, etc. be advantageous to a philosophy teacher, for example.
WFTI requires such equipment, but schools should not go overboard, lest professors focus on learning the technology and constructing a presentation. Everything in moderation.
I do think that a philosophy professor, or an instructor on any subject, can benefit from the ability to project web pages , but it’s often just a matter of convenience.
For example, if a conversation topic comes up in class, and you happen to know that there’s a good website with examples or definitions that will be useful, It’s convenient to be able to call up that page in class if and when the need arises. Convenient — but not vital.
While touch-screen smartboards are, indeed, cool, I haven’t really seen them get enough use to justify their cost.
As for professors spending too much time on the technology of presentations — that’s also a problem in student presentations, which is why I don’t encourage PowerPoint presentations.
I was interviewed for this article, specifically about assigning blogs, so was kind of bored when he didn’t even go there.
I do love my “smart” classroom though as I can walk my students through Blackboard and aspects of their blogging software that I would be too frustrated to write down. And my freshman tell me that no one else in the University ever teaches them anything about Blackboard–it’s just assigned. How awful! For this reason, many of my upperlevel students hate technology because no one has ever told them exactly what to do with it.
Too bad the article didn’t cite you, Daisy… maybe your comments will plant the seed for a later Chronicle article? One can hope.