Using Technology In (and Outside of) the Classroom
Gary Cziko [email:
g-cziko@uiuc.edu]
Educational Psychology
College Teaching Effectiveness Network (CTEN) Seminar 2005/04/11
- I. Overview
- Instructional goals
- Courses taught and technological tools used
-
Questions, comments, discussion
- II. Instructional Goals
- Learning
- make students more active learners
- reduce role of lectures
- use cooperative learning
activities
- use quizzes as feedback and learning activities
- prompt feedback
- feedback comments
- ensure that students have done the assigned readings before
class
- frees up class time for discussion and active learning
- have students participate in collaborative, long-lasting projects
that can be continuously updated
- Student assessment
- formative assessment of student learning
- WarmUp quizzes for "just-in-time" teaching
- reduce or eliminate manual grading of quizzes, tests and
projects
- facilitate student record keeping
- Course evaluation
- facilitate student perceptions of . . .
- general organization of course, lectures/demos and activities
- specific course activities
- III. Using Compass (WebCT, Vista) for EPSY 480 & EPSY
401
- A. Illinois Compass [http://compass.uiuc.edu]
- CT = course tools
- provides Web-based environment for
- *** quizzes (projects)
- ** surveys
- * communication (email and bulletin boards like WebBoard)
- course content
- B. EPSY 401: "Child language and
education") [www.ed.uiuc.edu/courses/epsy401]
- "Basic" application
- Quizzes
- short quizzes of main ideas to be done each week before class
- can take quiz twice with maximum credit if
get all items correct on first try within time limit (1 minute
per item)
- provides controllable feedback
immediately after quiz submission
- teacher can analyze quizzes
- by student
- by item (indicates areas of students' strengths and weaknesses)
- item anslysis -> indicates what should be reviewed in
class
- teacher has control over quiz using settings
- time available
- how much time allowed
- password control
- repeats
- scoring
- feedback
- Surveys
- anonymous student evaluation of
- general course
or parts of the course
- specific classes
- Discussions
- students alternate weeks in discussing readings and commenting on
other students comments
- C. EPSY 480: "Elements of (educational)
statistics" [www.ed.uiuc.edu/courses/epsy480]
- more advanced use of Compass
- course organization
- Meets in Oregon computing site with computer for each student
[photo]
- Five cycles consisting of [calendar]
- Independent study
- WarmUp uiz
- Lecture/demo
- Study plus practice quizzes
- Group quiz (teams of 3 or 4 students)
- Group project
- Individual quiz (best of 3 attempts)
- Final exam
- use of item groups allows
- repeated (5) practice quizzes
- repeated (5) individual quizzes
- Benefits
- very little manual grading (TAs like this!)
- need less TA help
- improvement in course evaluations
- from excellent (before technology) to poor/fair to excellent (with
technology)
- three factors
- course is better
- students more comfortable with technology (even expect it now!)
- technology is better
- IV. Using Moodle for EPSY 490ATL [http://www.ed.uiuc.edu/courses/epsy480]
- Moodle [www.moodle.org], the Course
Management System for the rest of us
- free
- open source
- modifiable
- some College have servers for instructional use (e.g., College of
Education)
- can be set up on your own server PC, or rented on a server provider for
as little as $10/month
- Not as powerful as Compass for assessments
- Has some activities for collaboration missing in Compass
- controllable e-mail notification of discussion posts
- six "flavors" of groups
- Choice (for polling students)
- Lessons (choices and branching)
- Glossary
- Wikis
- V. Wikis
- Features
- instantly and easily editable (by anyone or with persmission)
- Watchlist
- history and compare functions
- Wikimedia [http://
www.wikimedia.org]
- (VI. Skype [www.skype.com])
- Free Internet telephony with text chat ("instant messages")
- allows free calls to other Skype users on Windows, Mac or Pocket PC
computers
- allows calling telephones anywhere in the world at reduced rates (about
2.5cents/minute for the U.S. and most of the "developed" world, including
Western Europe, New Zealand and Australia)
- can control privacy/access
- VI. Questions and discussion