Handbook Table of Contents > Teaching Methods > Technology for Teaching
Indiana University Teaching Handbook
Technology for Teaching
Introduction
The technology for presenting instructional materials and enhancing communication has been rapidly changing in recent years, but it is important to remain focused on the pedagogic rather than the “gee-whiz” value of technology in your class. Technology can make presentations more effective by introducing information in various new and interesting ways. The key to successful use of technology in instruction is to know the learning objective before choosing a technical tool. Technology can help your students to learn better if you plan it carefully to support specific learning objectives.
Presentation Technology
All classrooms should have an overhead projector. If you plan to use any other presentation technology in your teaching, whether it be videotapes, 35mm slides, 16mm films, computer display, etc., communicate the special attributes needed in the room you may be assigned to teach in to your departmental scheduling officer. These attributes may include such things as room darkening capabilities, ability to project dual slide images, active network connections, etc. If you have questions about the attributes of certain classrooms, call Instructional Support Services/Classroom Technology Services, 855 2921.
Video and Film
Adapted with permission from Middendorf, 1993
Most of our students have a great deal of experience passively watching video for entertainment. If you want them to actively watch video for educational purposes, you must help them to change their viewing habits. There are three stages to using video, film and other media in class:
Prior to Viewing
- Introduce the video/film by providing an overview of its content, a rationale of how it relates to the current topic being studied, and a reason students need to know about it.
- Direct student attention to specific aspects of the presentation, possibly by asking them questions beforehand that will be discussed following the presentation.
Viewing
- Show only the relevant sections of a video/film, rather than the entire piece, for best use of class time and greatest impact.
- It may also be appropriate to stop the video/film at appropriate points for discussion or clarification.
Post-Viewing
- Follow up a video/film with an activity that allows students to respond to or extend ideas presented.
- Discussions, short writing assignments, or application exercises, for example, will reinforce the concepts and increase learning from classroom media.
Several collections of films/videos are available for use in your classes. UITS Classroom Technology Services has a collection of curriculum oriented videos and 16mm films. This collection may be accessed via the Web at http://www.libraries.iub.edu/index.php?pageId=4686. At the username prompt, type guest. Subject-specific lists of materials are also available. Call 855-8065 for more information or reference assistance. The Media Services department of the IU Library (855-1650) also has a collection of videotapes, laserdiscs and DVD’s. They are located in the first floor of the Undergraduate Library, beside the Reserve Desk. Their holdings, as well as those of the branch libraries, are included in IUCAT, the electronic catalog of the IU libraries.
The IUB Libraries’ Kent Cooper Room (855-1650) also maintains a wide range of videotapes, audio tapes, laserdiscs, DVDs, and CD ROMS, and includes a Teaching & Research collection, as well as a Browsing collection. Media Services (http://www.libraries.iub.edu/index.php?pageId=1152) is located on the ground floor of the Herman B Wells Library, and contains a variety of audiovisual equipment which may be used to play material from the library’s collection, the user’s own material, or personal copies placed on reserve by faculty. Their holdings, as well as those of other branch, and Residence Halls libraries, are included in IUCAT, the online electronic catalog of the IU libraries. Access to the David S. Bradley (http://www.libraries.iub.edu/index.php?pageId=4758) 16mm film collection may also be requested through IUCAT.
Media equipment for classroom use, as well as training and support for faculty who teach in classrooms with installed technology, is available from Classroom Technology Services. Mobile equipment available includes TVs and VCRs, large screen video projectors, computer LCD display panels, laptop computers and peripherals (for classroom use only), laserdisc players, stereo CD and audiocassette players, 16mm projectors and operators, slide and overhead projectors, and record players. Equipment can be delivered to most classrooms. Call 855-8765, option 1, to schedule mobile equipment, and 855-8765, option 2, for consultation on installed technology classrooms. (If you are teaching in the Education Building, call 856-8407 instead.) Each classroom should be equipped with an overhead projector; if it is missing or malfunctioning, call 855-8765, option 3.
Slides
Less is more. Students learn more when they view fewer slides but have more time to analyze and interpret them. Discussions, short writing assignments, and application exercises will reinforce concepts and increase learning from slides.
With slides, the three steps are slightly different than those with video.
Prior to Viewing
- Rehearse the points you want to make about each slide; plan questions to direct student attention and activities to encourage student participation.
Viewing
- Direct student attention. Give them a question or two to answer as they view the slides.
- Do not turn the classroom lights all the way off.
- Do not show more than five slides in a row, or view multiple slides for more than five minutes at a time.
Post-Viewing
- Leave an empty slot after every few slides. Ektographic projectors, the most commonly used type at IU, will shut off automatically when a blank slot is left between slides.
- At this point, give the students an activity to respond to the slides: discussions, short writing assignments, or application exercises, for example, will reinforce the concepts and increase learning.
Chalkboard or Marker Board
Adapted with permission from White and Hennessey
Perhaps the most widely used medium of instruction is the chalkboard or dry marker board. The guiding principle of board work is to look at your writing as though you were a student in your own class. Almost anything you write will be clear to you. The task, however, is to make your presentation clear to your students.
Students must be able to see and to read what you have written
Illegible or obscured work is valueless. Watch out if you have small handwriting,
tend to scrawl, or write too lightly. Before class write something on the
board and then go to the back of the room to see if it is legible. Sit in
one of the last rows and take a critical look at your board work. Some instructors
like to mark off the “bottom line of visibility” with a chalk
line. Try to keep your work visible for as long as possible. If you are
right-handed, fill the right-hand panel first, then move to the panel on
the left and continue your writing. In this way you will not be blocking
the view of students copying the writing you have just completed.
- Your board work must be organized so that students will be able to interpret their notes later:
- First erase the board completely. This step is especially important in mathematics, where stray lines may be interpreted as symbols.
- If you are to solve a problem or prove a theorem, write a complete statement of the problem or theorem on the board, or write a precise reference.
- Fill one panel in at a time, always starting at the top and moving down.
- Make your notation consistent with that in the textbook or lecture, so that students do not have to translate from one system into another.
- Underline or in some other way mark the most important parts of your presentation: the major assumptions, conclusions, or intermediate steps that you plan to refer to later on. Colored chalk may help to clarify drawings.
Talk about what you are writing
Talking about what you are writing gives your students the material in both
visual and auditory modes. Be sure to speak loudly enough; if you are facing
the board to write on it, you must raise your voice somewhat to be heard.
Other tips for effective board use
- Erase only when you have run out of space.
- If you find that you have made a mistake, stop. Don’t go back over the last three panels madly erasing minus signs: first explain the error, then go back and make corrections, if possible, with a different color of chalk or marker.
- If you are presenting material that you want students to duplicate in their notes, you need to give them time to copy what you have written. They will want to copy everything you put on the board into their notes, even if you tell them not to. Don't ask them to analyze while they are writing. When you want them to discuss a point, stop writing. Let people catch up to you (they may be lagging behind by two or three lines). Then begin your discussion. Similarly, if you have engaged in a long discussion without writing very much on the board, allow them time to summarize the discussion in their notes before you begin to use the board or to speak.
- Students will copy everything you put on the board (and sometimes nothing else) into their notes. The board should serve to highlight and clarify your discussion or lecture.
Find out if you are using the board effectively
- After class, request one advanced and one average student to lend you their notes. If the notes seem inadequate, ask yourself what you could have done to make your presentation more clear.
- At some point, ask your students if they can read or make sense of what you have written. Don’t do this every five minutes—an occasional check, however, is in order.
- View a videotape of your presentation, putting yourself in the place of a student taking notes.
Overhead Projector
Adapted by permission from Middendorf, 1993
After the chalk or marker board, the overhead projector is the most frequently used teaching tool in the college classroom. Many of the points made above about board use apply to the overhead. Keep in mind these guidelines when producing and presenting transparencies.
Producing Overheads
- Keep visuals simple—limit each to one point or comparison.
- Use key words, not sentences.
- Use a simple lettering style.
- Use both upper and lower case lettering.
- Use no more than 7 lines and 6–7 words per line.
- Limit total number of words to 15–20.
- Keep lettering to at least a 1/4 inch (or 18 point) in height.
You can either draw on blank transparency film with a water-soluble marker or you can thermofax an image onto a transparency. Both write-on and thermofax film for transparencies are available at the Teaching Resources Center, Ballantine Hall 132, for instructors in the College of Arts and Sciences. Others should check with their own schools or departments.
Presenting Overheads
- Use masks to control pace and audience attention, covering those parts of the transparency until you want to show them.
- Use cardboard frames; write notes on margins.
- Face your audience.
- Use colored, water-soluble pen to add meaningful details.
- Use overlays, adding additional information with additional layers of transparencies.
- Switch the machine off when changing transparencies or to shift your students’ attention.
- Point to the projector stage, not the screen.
- Use a pen to point, not your finger.
These guidelines, if followed properly, will improve legibility of your projected materials, increase your students’ comprehension of presented materials, and increase your students’ retention of presented materials.
Presentations with Computers
If you are using computers to produce overheads or slide shows for presentation in the classroom, many of the design and presentation guidelines given above for overhead transparencies apply equally to computer-based materials. Some computer based presentation technologies, however, do present new challenges, even to those who use the technology to perform traditional functions such as visual support for a lecture.
- Because computers can make a series of slides appear visually slick, with seamless transitions, it's easy to rush through material too fast and to forget to keep students active and attentive. Developing a presentation sequence and rhythm that includes frequent interaction with students, writing exercises, problem solving, or other events will help keep students from being mesmerized by the march of slides.
- Another challenge is the result of the increased access to information that computers facilitate. Instructors who choose to present Web materials during lecture will find that the selection and editing of those materials becomes critical. More is not always better. Overloading students with information and seemingly infinite resources can cause them to feel overwhelmed, numb, and lost, which can eventually dampen their enthusiasm. Even if you find excellent materials to download and present in class, these may not always serve your instructional objectives. Select carefully, and make sure students know what is important and why.
- If you plan to surf on the web during a presentation, plan meticulously the navigation sequence. Students can grow fatigued and uninterested watching you click and browse, looking for the correct link. Also, if you are not the author of the pages you are planning to visit, it is a good idea to check the links the day of the presentation. Certain pages and links undergo continual editing, and may not always look the same from one visit to the next. Also make sure you’ve checked the pages in the browser you’ll use in class. Some pages interact differently with different browsers. It is less risky to download the pages and run them from a disk, rather than rely on the active server. Finally, be sure to enlarge the size of the display font in the browser and minimize clutter on screen by turning off extraneous buttons bars.
- One of the most important considerations in using any large classroom media is instructor mobility. In particular, computers usually require you to stand close by in order to navigate. In a small, intimate, conversational setting, this is not a problem. In a large class, however, being glued to your computer for an hour or more can be static and boring for the students. In developing your presentation, allow for frequent periods when you can move away from the computer and out among the students, to share the students’ perspective on the projector screen. This will give you an opportunity to have a more informal conversation with students, or to stir to attention anyone who might be distracted. Another technique is to have a student run the computer. He or she does the pointing and clicking, while you are free to roam the room.
- For help in development and production of computer-based presentations, visit the Teaching and Learning Technologies Lab, Ballantine Hall 307, 855-7829. Graphic Services (Franklin Hall M114, 855-4047) can help with production of the following kinds of computer-based visuals: charts, graphs, maps, medical illustrations, and animation. Classroom Technology Services (Franklin Hall 0009, 855-8765) schedules and delivers computer display devices and laptop computers for classroom use, and offers training on installed classroom technology.
Communication Technology
Whether it is e-mail, electronic bulletin boards, chat rooms, or Web pages, the communication technology you use will depend upon what you want your students to accomplish. Here are some of the crucial teaching and learning objectives that communication technology can help you achieve, with a brief discussion of how technology might help you achieve them. (For more information on the learning objectives, themselves, see Astin, 1993)
More Student Time on Task
Examples:
Daily assignments submitted by e-mail before class
Study questions posted on bulletin boards for electronic discussion
Mock tests and quizzes posted for individual practice online
Of all the learning objectives that technology can help achieve, this is one of the most important. Electronic communication can extend the reach of the instructor and the classroom to keep students engaged and on task even outside regular contact hours. The examples listed here are just a few of the ways to accomplish this.
The reach of electronic communication beyond the classroom walls can ultimately improve the quality of the class meetings themselves. You can require students to e mail their out-of-class work—such as responses to questions based on their readings, answers to problem sets, lab reports, or short reflective essays on a relevant topic—well before class. This ensures that students will come to class prepared, and reduces the chance that they will do the assignment hastily just before or even during class.
Furthermore, requiring students to post their observations or responses to an electronic bulletin board, and to respond to the postings of their peers, can ensure that the conversation and interaction among students in class meetings will be richer. The instructor can use the bulletin board to stimulate student thinking before class, to monitor student comprehension, and to pull topics to be addressed at the next class meeting.
Another effective way to encourage time on task outside of class is to place practice tests and quizzes on the web, so students can access them and take them whenever they wish to assess their own progress. This technique can be made even more effective by asking students to post their answers to a bulletin board, then compare and discuss the different responses through e-mail.
Improved Collaboration among Students
Example:
Electronic conferencing to discuss assignments outside of class
Electronic communication allows students to work collaboratively outside of class, even when their schedules do not coordinate, and even when they live at a great distance from one another. Communication among students is now feasible at all times of day, and from almost any location on or off campus, depending on computer availability. Assignments can be tailored to take advantage of this reality: for example, team projects facilitated by e-mail, or structured discussion among groups of students after class hours.
Improved Communication between Students and Instructor
Examples:
Extended office hours by e-mail
Confidential questions to instructor by e-mail
Confidential feedback to students by e-mail
One of the factors known to influence positively student success is the amount and quality of contact with the instructor. Through e-mail, an instructor can extend office hours well beyond the historical norm. While the use of e-mail cannot and should not replace face-to-face availability of the instructor, there are some clear benefits to incorporating e-mail into the normal communication structure of a course. For one, students can send a question at any time, and anticipate a response fairly quickly. For another, shy students who do not take advantage of regular office hours may find e mail the perfect medium to maintain the contact they need. Students who normally do not ask questions might find safety in the written word, and yet not experience the distance and delays that accompany note writing.
The confidentiality of e-mail can also contribute to a healthy student-instructor relationship. Students can use the medium to ask questions that they would not dare ask in class or in person, or to provide painful explanations of situations that are influencing their work. The instructor can use the confidentiality of e-mail to give speedy and, if need be, sensitive feedback to students. Assignments submitted by e mail can be evaluated and returned immediately with comments, if the situation calls for it.
Using e-mail as a teaching tool does have its drawbacks, however, and many users of this technology have suddenly found themselves spending enormous amounts of time just to manage their mail accounts. Here are some ideas to consider when planning to use e-mail extensively in a course (with thanks to Greg Hanek):
- Arrange to have separate e-mail accounts for the different functions of your work. Have one account for handling student or course-related e-mail, another for faculty, departmental or campus administration communications, and yet another for private, personal communication.
- For student questions that become common and even predictable, develop a set of generic replies that can be pasted into a response. These should be identified as generic, and the instructor should also add enough to personalize the message.
- Adopt a one-step, immediate response system. When you open a message, compose and send a reply before moving to the next e-mail. Unanswered messages can get buried after a day or so, and hunting for them later will multiply your work.
- Make clear to students your policies concerning e-mail. Explain what kinds of questions are appropriate, and specify the times of day when you are likely to respond. Your e-mail policies should include deadlines for questions that request a same-day response.
Improved Access to Course Materials, Policies, and Assignments
Examples:
Syllabus and assignments posted on the Web
Course materials and texts archived on the Web
Hyperlinks to information worldwide
Putting a complete course syllabus on the Web can have several advantages for both students and teachers. First, students can access the information any time, and the instructor can update or revise without having to distribute printed copies. Second, when the syllabus exists as a Web page, the instructor may use it to store information—such as assignments, readings, lecture notes, archives of e-mail communications—to provide a permanent resource for students. Finally, by using hyperlinks that connect with sites worldwide, the instructor can vastly broaden the scope of the course to allow students to pursue new interests that develop, or customize the course and materials as needed throughout the semester. A Web-based syllabus allows for a great amount of flexibility for students and teachers. If this is something that you seek to develop in your courses, then creating a Web page may be useful.
Happily, putting your syllabus on the Web is no longer a high-tech, engineering endeavor. Software programs that help you write for the Web abound, and there are software packages that provide you with a course template, organizational structure, and course management tools all in one. Teaching & Learning Technologies Centers in Ballantine 307 and Wells Library 305 (855-7829) can help you explore current options.
Appeal to Multiple Learning Styles
Examples:
Quiet, reflective students given means of expression and opportunity to
socialize electronically, via bulletin boards
Social learners’ needs facilitated by communication through e-mail
and e-mail conferencing
Many adopters of electronic communication as a central medium for their courses have discovered the unexpected: the medium of e-mail allows good students, who normally do not participate in classroom discussion, to become active members of the learning community. Quiet, self-conscious students may, when given the time to reflect and edit, post significant messages to an electronic bulletin board, and thus participate at a higher level.
E-mail can serve an important function to highly social learners as well. Collaboration and discussion are enhanced by the e-mail medium, in that e-mail makes possible out-of-class communication almost without limit.
Classroom Assessment for Students and for Instructors
Examples:
E-mail surveys of students
Anonymous electronic “suggestion box”
Documentation of student work and work habits by e-mail records
Electronic mail is an excellent medium for the ongoing assessment of how a class is doing. An instructor can e-mail a short survey to students to get their reaction to an assignment, or e-mail a question that checks how well students understood an important concept covered in the last class meeting.
Instructors can also, with relative ease, set up an anonymous electronic “suggestion box” in which students can deposit a confidential opinion or reaction to a burning issue in the class. The suggestion box account does not record the senders’ addresses, so the instructor will never see the author of any e-mail addressed to the box.
One of the least anticipated benefits of e-mail is the powerful record keeping it allows for both instructor and students. It is possible for all the correspondence in a course to be archived for any number of uses. To address a present situation, an instructor can retrace the history of communication with a student, or review that student’s output over the course of the semester. Similarly, a student can retrace a conversation among students or with the instructor, so as to enhance or refresh his/her understanding of a topic covered earlier in the course.
The Limits of Technology in Teaching: Some Lessons Learned
While communication technology can have a powerful effect on teaching and learning, that effect is not always positive. Below are some precautionary notes and suggestions for instructors to consider when experimenting with the ideas above.
- Just because you can do it doesn’t mean it’s worth doing. There is no evidence to suggest that use of technology, in itself, improves student learning. Review the goals of your course, how and what you want students to learn, and consider whether there are easier, simpler, low-tech ways to meet them.
- It is easy to confuse the reputed effects of a new technology with the effects of a new instructional method that might accompany the technology. Example: An instructor who normally lectures decides to put his/her course on the Web. In the new version of the course, now taught on-line in the computer lab, the instructor asks the students to process the material by working in groups, to study together, and to test one another to help them learn the material. At the end of the course the instructor sees that learning has improved compared to the lecture course, and concludes that the technology is responsible. In fact, the technology may have helped make some tasks more convenient, but it probably had less impact than did other components of the new course: the group work and practice assessments. Were the instructor to try group work and practice assessments in the lecture course, he or she might find that student learning improved there, too.
- Learning and implementing a new technology take more time than imagined. Begin planning well in advance of the semester in which you intend to introduce it.
- Start slowly and adopt gradually. Become comfortable with the technology you use before adopting it for your teaching. Students perceive and react negatively when you are not comfortable with a new approach.
- Orient students carefully to the use of the technology at the beginning of the semester. This would include technological how-to’s, policies, procedures, netiquette, and civility guidelines. Use a short questionnaire or survey to ascertain your students’ level of experience and expertise, so that you can focus your orientation appropriately. If you have students who are behind in technical skill, pair them with more advanced students for informal tutoring and mentoring.
- Plan and execute an assessment of the effect of the new technology as you go. It is important to keep a record of your innovations and their effects, so that you will have the basis for adjustments and improvements.
- Mix electronic communication with face-to-face communication. This will ensure that you meet the needs of students with different learning styles.
- Stay abreast of physical and procedural limitations that influence students’ ability to access the new technology. At the end of the semester, for example, students will be competing for computer lab time, and may have legitimate reasons for having difficulty with an assignment. Also, some university schools have set printing limits for students.
- Get help from specialists at the Teaching & Learning Technologies Centers in Ballantine 307 and Wells Library 305 (855-7829). They can save you a lot of time and shorten the learning curve. The specialists in TLTC have worked with a large number of instructors in a wide variety of projects. Their experience will be valuable to you. For more information, see their Class Communications page. You may also need the help of University Information Technology Services (UITS) (855 6789).
