I'm pleased to report that Hofstra's Media Engineering group has deployed Extron's Global Viewer product to enable remote support for all the University's technology-enhanced classrooms. When a faculty member calls the Faculty Support Center we will be able to see if their projector is on or off and turn it on or off for them, as well as select an input source. This will tremendously shorten the response time for such calls at the beginning of the semester when faculty are returning to the classroom. The system will notify us via SMS text and email if an AV controller freezes and needs a hard restart, and also when projector bulbs reach their end of life. We will also be able to collect data on when and how our technology classrooms are used, helping us to plan better for these resources as well as target new idea suggests for faculty who may want them.
I'm incredibly proud of Joshua Daubert and his staff, who suggested and then implemented this exciting project. I'm looking forward to all the great results this will bring. Thank you, gentlemen!
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Friday, June 25, 2010
What Not To Do This Summer
It's been rather unreasonably hot here in Long Island of late, and as July approaches I am as concerned as any faculty member with my summer productivity.
As faculty we tend to make lists for ourselves for the summer: the research we will do, the articles we will write or submit, the reformatting of the bibliographies of the articles from last year that we need to RE-submit, and so on and so forth.
For your fall classes, I'm sure you're reading new material, revising your syllabus and assignments (I'm sure you're doing this now, right? You would never leave this till the last week of August!), and perhaps revising your Blackboard courses.
If you're interested in technology, perhaps you want to use this summer time to learn something new - a new tool, like Twitter or the Sympodium, or a new way of using the tool, like moving review sessions online and reserving class time for new material.
So let me give you my rules of thumb that will help you decide what NOT to do in learning new technology tools for your classes. Because honestly, if I can give you a reason NOT to do it, that's best for everyone, isn't it? Many's the time I've helped a faculty member spend an absolutely terrifying amount of time doing something with technology for his or her classes. And it doesn't always produce a result; sometimes there's no result at all. Far better that you not waste your time on technology stuff that won't have any effect on the class. Trust me. There's not enough time in the summer for that!
1) WIll it be a fundamental part of the class?
So often faculty are nervous about technology and they want to dip their toe in. It'll just be for the last week of classes, they tell me, or it'll be optional. Don't bother then, I respond. If you're not making a fundamental change in the way you teach your course, then you're doing something ancillary. And students have a keen eye for the ancillary. They can spot it from 100 yards and they won't go anywhere near it. They're not in your class to do extra things; they want to take the class, get the grade, and get gone, for the most part. (Perhaps on a less cynical level, they're in the class to learn something about European Romanticism, or international marketing, or television production. Even in that delightful situation, they're not in the class to mess with technology tools that aren't contributing clearly and directly to that goal.)
That doesn't mean you have to do something huge. But you do have to do something fundamental. Something that will happen every week (so students will get a chance to learn how you want it done and see how it contributes to the class). Something that will achieve a specific goal you have in mind. It can be small but it needs to be repetitive and it needs to be core.
Students aren't keeping up with the homework? Have them do a self-scheduled online quiz each week before they show up. It can't be for no credit (it has to be fundamental, it has to be core), but you can keep the percentage of the grade low enough that it won't much matter if they cheat - if they get the answers to the questions in ANY way they may keep up better than if they didn't do it at all. And if they're computer-gradable, you don't even have to manually grade them. It helps them keep up, or see if they aren't keeping up.
Students aren't contributing in class? Have them turn in reading responses online before the class meets. Your classes will be directed to where they are right now in the material and you can just give them credit for turning them in.
Students aren't getting a key concept? Give them a learning object that covers that concept in detail, let them review it as often as they want, and make sure somewhere later in the course you assess whether or not they got it. Students who need more repetition, or who need the material in a different format (to see it rather than to hear it, for instance) will be helped by this.
All of these suggestions are fundamental - you will change how you actually do your class. That's scary, but remember, it's also a work in progress. You might change what you do or how you do it as you go forward teaching with technology. But if you don't use a technology tool in a way that's fundamental to your class, I recommend you not do it at all. It's too much time and trouble to do something extra just for the sake of doing something extra.
2) Is it the first time you're teaching the class?
If you're teaching a course for the first time, now is not the time to try a bunch of new technology tools as well. Trust me on this one. You'll spend enough time getting the material you want to teach under control and figuring out how much work to assign, what are the types of work that get the best results, and how much you can cover in a class, a week, a semester. Don't figure you might as well throw some podcasting or Blackboard quizzing or something else in there on top of it all. If you're comfortable with those tools, by all means, incorporate them. But don't try them for the first time while you're teaching a particular class for the first time. You won't be able to separate how well the students are doing with your course material from how well the technology tool serves the course material. And you may just explode from the sheer volume of work to which you find yourself committed as well.
3) Is it reusable?
Are you trying something you can use in future iterations of this class or in another class? Then go for it. But don't dive into building a film of, say, the movements of the armies at Gettysburg when you're never going to teach the Civil War again. And don't spend the time building a list of web links that pertains to this year's student interests that next year's students may or may not be interested in at all. You can go down a lot of time-consuming rabbit holes with this sort of thing but you may not come out again.
4) Is it graded?
This one can be a killer. I'm not proposing anyone up their grading work. But if you can't honestly give some sort of a grade for the work, even if it's just pass/fail, then the work isn't fundamental to your course and you probably should skip it.
Your LMS - like Blackboard - has good tools for giving the students a numeric grade, or a letter grade, or even a pass/fail mark. Contributions to a discussion board, for instance, can be counted, and credit given if a student just makes a certain number. More complex tools or more complex assignments may need a rubric attached and expectations clearly conveyed. Students doing video essays with FlipCams, for instance, should know if they need to keep and submit drafts, or if they'll be allowed to revise, just as they would do with a text essay. And they should get a grade that reflects the amount of work that went into the assignment. That sounds commonsensical but again, when faculty are afraid of committing to the use of technology they sometimes assign students a lot of work without giving them concomitant credit for that work. Make sure the work counts, and you'll be much happier with the result.
There, there's four rules of thumb that can help you avoid a lot of work. Feel better? Honestly, if the thing you want to do isn't fundamental, isn't reusable, or isn't graded, or if this is the first time you're teaching the course, I highly recommend passing on the technology integration for now.
When you want the rewards that you can get out of integrating technology into your teaching, then you should tackle learning the tools and reworking your class to integrate them. It's a commitment, but when you get over the hump of the first-time learning and the first-time using and you get fluid and comfortable with the tools and you get back the student work that you want to be seeing, you'll be glad you didn't fritter away your time on smaller things. The time you invest will pay off.
As faculty we tend to make lists for ourselves for the summer: the research we will do, the articles we will write or submit, the reformatting of the bibliographies of the articles from last year that we need to RE-submit, and so on and so forth.
For your fall classes, I'm sure you're reading new material, revising your syllabus and assignments (I'm sure you're doing this now, right? You would never leave this till the last week of August!), and perhaps revising your Blackboard courses.
If you're interested in technology, perhaps you want to use this summer time to learn something new - a new tool, like Twitter or the Sympodium, or a new way of using the tool, like moving review sessions online and reserving class time for new material.
So let me give you my rules of thumb that will help you decide what NOT to do in learning new technology tools for your classes. Because honestly, if I can give you a reason NOT to do it, that's best for everyone, isn't it? Many's the time I've helped a faculty member spend an absolutely terrifying amount of time doing something with technology for his or her classes. And it doesn't always produce a result; sometimes there's no result at all. Far better that you not waste your time on technology stuff that won't have any effect on the class. Trust me. There's not enough time in the summer for that!
1) WIll it be a fundamental part of the class?
So often faculty are nervous about technology and they want to dip their toe in. It'll just be for the last week of classes, they tell me, or it'll be optional. Don't bother then, I respond. If you're not making a fundamental change in the way you teach your course, then you're doing something ancillary. And students have a keen eye for the ancillary. They can spot it from 100 yards and they won't go anywhere near it. They're not in your class to do extra things; they want to take the class, get the grade, and get gone, for the most part. (Perhaps on a less cynical level, they're in the class to learn something about European Romanticism, or international marketing, or television production. Even in that delightful situation, they're not in the class to mess with technology tools that aren't contributing clearly and directly to that goal.)
That doesn't mean you have to do something huge. But you do have to do something fundamental. Something that will happen every week (so students will get a chance to learn how you want it done and see how it contributes to the class). Something that will achieve a specific goal you have in mind. It can be small but it needs to be repetitive and it needs to be core.
Students aren't keeping up with the homework? Have them do a self-scheduled online quiz each week before they show up. It can't be for no credit (it has to be fundamental, it has to be core), but you can keep the percentage of the grade low enough that it won't much matter if they cheat - if they get the answers to the questions in ANY way they may keep up better than if they didn't do it at all. And if they're computer-gradable, you don't even have to manually grade them. It helps them keep up, or see if they aren't keeping up.
Students aren't contributing in class? Have them turn in reading responses online before the class meets. Your classes will be directed to where they are right now in the material and you can just give them credit for turning them in.
Students aren't getting a key concept? Give them a learning object that covers that concept in detail, let them review it as often as they want, and make sure somewhere later in the course you assess whether or not they got it. Students who need more repetition, or who need the material in a different format (to see it rather than to hear it, for instance) will be helped by this.
All of these suggestions are fundamental - you will change how you actually do your class. That's scary, but remember, it's also a work in progress. You might change what you do or how you do it as you go forward teaching with technology. But if you don't use a technology tool in a way that's fundamental to your class, I recommend you not do it at all. It's too much time and trouble to do something extra just for the sake of doing something extra.
2) Is it the first time you're teaching the class?
If you're teaching a course for the first time, now is not the time to try a bunch of new technology tools as well. Trust me on this one. You'll spend enough time getting the material you want to teach under control and figuring out how much work to assign, what are the types of work that get the best results, and how much you can cover in a class, a week, a semester. Don't figure you might as well throw some podcasting or Blackboard quizzing or something else in there on top of it all. If you're comfortable with those tools, by all means, incorporate them. But don't try them for the first time while you're teaching a particular class for the first time. You won't be able to separate how well the students are doing with your course material from how well the technology tool serves the course material. And you may just explode from the sheer volume of work to which you find yourself committed as well.
3) Is it reusable?
Are you trying something you can use in future iterations of this class or in another class? Then go for it. But don't dive into building a film of, say, the movements of the armies at Gettysburg when you're never going to teach the Civil War again. And don't spend the time building a list of web links that pertains to this year's student interests that next year's students may or may not be interested in at all. You can go down a lot of time-consuming rabbit holes with this sort of thing but you may not come out again.
4) Is it graded?
This one can be a killer. I'm not proposing anyone up their grading work. But if you can't honestly give some sort of a grade for the work, even if it's just pass/fail, then the work isn't fundamental to your course and you probably should skip it.
Your LMS - like Blackboard - has good tools for giving the students a numeric grade, or a letter grade, or even a pass/fail mark. Contributions to a discussion board, for instance, can be counted, and credit given if a student just makes a certain number. More complex tools or more complex assignments may need a rubric attached and expectations clearly conveyed. Students doing video essays with FlipCams, for instance, should know if they need to keep and submit drafts, or if they'll be allowed to revise, just as they would do with a text essay. And they should get a grade that reflects the amount of work that went into the assignment. That sounds commonsensical but again, when faculty are afraid of committing to the use of technology they sometimes assign students a lot of work without giving them concomitant credit for that work. Make sure the work counts, and you'll be much happier with the result.
There, there's four rules of thumb that can help you avoid a lot of work. Feel better? Honestly, if the thing you want to do isn't fundamental, isn't reusable, or isn't graded, or if this is the first time you're teaching the course, I highly recommend passing on the technology integration for now.
When you want the rewards that you can get out of integrating technology into your teaching, then you should tackle learning the tools and reworking your class to integrate them. It's a commitment, but when you get over the hump of the first-time learning and the first-time using and you get fluid and comfortable with the tools and you get back the student work that you want to be seeing, you'll be glad you didn't fritter away your time on smaller things. The time you invest will pay off.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Grading and using blogs
There's a good ProfHacker post at the Chronicle today about grading student blogs. I like the idea of having two student blog grades - one an overall "I did this" grade, and one a grade of perhaps the two best posts, (perhaps revised and) submitted for review. I love portfolio grades in writing classes, and getting students to explain in their own words why they should get the grade they say they should get on their writing is one of the most effective assignments I've ever given.
When I teach in general, though, I use blogs (or discussion boards) as reading responses. I ask my students to raise a question or to point out something really interesting, and then I highlight the best points when I next see my class. Sometimes I put the blog/board up on the screen to discuss; sometimes I quote the best responses and put them in a handout. I agree with the ProfHacker post that sharing the best work with the class gets you better quality work. Some students might feel left out - I've had students ask me "Why don't you ever quote me in class?" But to my mind that's a good incentive for a better student, and I welcome the chance to talk to them about their blog posts. It might not be that there's anything wrong with their posts, but perhaps other students put the same idea more succinctly or more vividly. Or that they came up with something more insightful, perhaps calling back to previous work! Am I the only one who sometimes has a hard time getting students to realize that there's a whole world of work above the "adequate" category?
Sometimes a student will post a long, interesting entry on something only tangentially related to the topic at hand. Last semester I had a good student (who never spoke in class) post a long entry about how much she learned by trying to track down an Nollywood film in a local retail store. I made sure to respond to her on the board. We wouldn't have time in class to spend on such a tangent - but it was a very educational tangent, related to the topic of the class, and I was thrilled that she shared it.
I don't usually grade anything about the quality of blog/board posts because how would I reflect the credit that student deserved adequately? It was a once-in-a-semester event and I treasured it but didn't try to shoehorn it into any kind of a grading structure. Most of the students weren't so enterprising and most of them wrote perfectly reasonable, interesting entries raising a question or a point of observation each week and I gave them credit for doing it. With very little grading overhead on my part I get a class that's going on through much of the week and a bunch of stepping-off points for discussion in each new week's class meetings.
When I teach in general, though, I use blogs (or discussion boards) as reading responses. I ask my students to raise a question or to point out something really interesting, and then I highlight the best points when I next see my class. Sometimes I put the blog/board up on the screen to discuss; sometimes I quote the best responses and put them in a handout. I agree with the ProfHacker post that sharing the best work with the class gets you better quality work. Some students might feel left out - I've had students ask me "Why don't you ever quote me in class?" But to my mind that's a good incentive for a better student, and I welcome the chance to talk to them about their blog posts. It might not be that there's anything wrong with their posts, but perhaps other students put the same idea more succinctly or more vividly. Or that they came up with something more insightful, perhaps calling back to previous work! Am I the only one who sometimes has a hard time getting students to realize that there's a whole world of work above the "adequate" category?
Sometimes a student will post a long, interesting entry on something only tangentially related to the topic at hand. Last semester I had a good student (who never spoke in class) post a long entry about how much she learned by trying to track down an Nollywood film in a local retail store. I made sure to respond to her on the board. We wouldn't have time in class to spend on such a tangent - but it was a very educational tangent, related to the topic of the class, and I was thrilled that she shared it.
I don't usually grade anything about the quality of blog/board posts because how would I reflect the credit that student deserved adequately? It was a once-in-a-semester event and I treasured it but didn't try to shoehorn it into any kind of a grading structure. Most of the students weren't so enterprising and most of them wrote perfectly reasonable, interesting entries raising a question or a point of observation each week and I gave them credit for doing it. With very little grading overhead on my part I get a class that's going on through much of the week and a bunch of stepping-off points for discussion in each new week's class meetings.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
ProfHacker proposes that humanities scholars should learn digital tools. I disagree.
I like the idea proposed on this site for "The Humanities and Technology Camp", otherwise titled "Project "Develop Self-Paced Open Access DH Curriculum for Mid-Career Scholars Otherwise Untrained"". And I'm still thinking about it even though I already posted a comment disagreeing with it (which contained a typo, which according to academic blogosphere etiquette automatically disqualifies my thoughts).
It's my personal belief that faculty for the most part should spend more time on figuring out HOW they will change their teaching (or for that matter their research) than WITH WHAT. The "with what" changes so frequently and faculty who are interested usually can pick up the "with what" with minimal help, or on their own, once they know why they should bother.
This proposed camp sort of posits the opposite idea: that mid-career scholars are being held back by their lack of knowledge in FTP, HTML or CSS, and web server administration.
I have a strong prejudice against turning faculty into low-grade web designers or server administrators. A light gloss of technology skills doesn't necessarily help you really understand the technologies you're working with, or how to spot the revolutionary ones. In my opinion, RSS is revolutionary as it changes how people get information and travel the web and interact; CSS is not because it doesn't really affect any of those things (in fact almost by definition RSS supersedes it). Without a doubt there should be scholars prepared to argue such things; but I don't think the question pertains to most of us who just want to teach and research and survive. I think universities should provide technology specialists to work WITH the faculty and help support their interrogation, but I don't see that a lot of faculty themselves need to have (or be able to fake) those technology skills.
I also have a prejudice against this because faculty who do know how to modify a style sheet or install a PHP app with a pushbutton GUI think that's all we technologists do. There are huge differences between near-consumer-level technology skills and the skills of a professional technologist. But faculty who know enough to serve themselves in this area often don't want to understand how different it is to provide tools or services for 15,000 people instead of just one.
If I show a faculty member three ways they can integrate electronic discussion into their class, and some ways in which that can achieve some specific pedagogical goal (getting the quiet students to talk, increasing time spent on homework outside of class, or increasing time spent on critical thinking writing), that idea is going to be the same down through generations of technologies. I've used electronic discussion in my classes since 1992, and I have weathered VMS discussion boards, mailing lists, Blackboard and blogs. The basic idea is the same and as a teacher I only want to know about the technologies to the extent that they do or don't facilitate my teaching goals.
But I could be wrong. We could certainly offer more classes for faculty at Hofstra in such topics as web server administration. It's a skill that is certainly useful, and it's easier than ever now, when hosting solutions make everything push-button and hardly technical at all. Is that something we should be teaching our faculty? Do people who don't have those skills want to gain them?
It's my personal belief that faculty for the most part should spend more time on figuring out HOW they will change their teaching (or for that matter their research) than WITH WHAT. The "with what" changes so frequently and faculty who are interested usually can pick up the "with what" with minimal help, or on their own, once they know why they should bother.
This proposed camp sort of posits the opposite idea: that mid-career scholars are being held back by their lack of knowledge in FTP, HTML or CSS, and web server administration.
I have a strong prejudice against turning faculty into low-grade web designers or server administrators. A light gloss of technology skills doesn't necessarily help you really understand the technologies you're working with, or how to spot the revolutionary ones. In my opinion, RSS is revolutionary as it changes how people get information and travel the web and interact; CSS is not because it doesn't really affect any of those things (in fact almost by definition RSS supersedes it). Without a doubt there should be scholars prepared to argue such things; but I don't think the question pertains to most of us who just want to teach and research and survive. I think universities should provide technology specialists to work WITH the faculty and help support their interrogation, but I don't see that a lot of faculty themselves need to have (or be able to fake) those technology skills.
I also have a prejudice against this because faculty who do know how to modify a style sheet or install a PHP app with a pushbutton GUI think that's all we technologists do. There are huge differences between near-consumer-level technology skills and the skills of a professional technologist. But faculty who know enough to serve themselves in this area often don't want to understand how different it is to provide tools or services for 15,000 people instead of just one.
If I show a faculty member three ways they can integrate electronic discussion into their class, and some ways in which that can achieve some specific pedagogical goal (getting the quiet students to talk, increasing time spent on homework outside of class, or increasing time spent on critical thinking writing), that idea is going to be the same down through generations of technologies. I've used electronic discussion in my classes since 1992, and I have weathered VMS discussion boards, mailing lists, Blackboard and blogs. The basic idea is the same and as a teacher I only want to know about the technologies to the extent that they do or don't facilitate my teaching goals.
But I could be wrong. We could certainly offer more classes for faculty at Hofstra in such topics as web server administration. It's a skill that is certainly useful, and it's easier than ever now, when hosting solutions make everything push-button and hardly technical at all. Is that something we should be teaching our faculty? Do people who don't have those skills want to gain them?
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
More news, in small bites
Just a few weeks ago we completed the ninth Catalyst Faculty Boot Camp, an intensive pedagogy and technology workshop. At the end, as we always do, we asked the participants for their feedback and ideas on how we could educate the rest of Hofstra's faculty about their technology and teaching options.
As usual the participants suggested that one way to increase participation would be to avoid the four-day time commitment of Boot Camp. Could you have had the same experience if you hadn't spent these days here with your colleagues discussing each other's teaching as well as hearing about the technology tools, I asked? No, they all agreed. But, they added, they would still have liked to hear some of the ideas about teaching with technology, even if they had not had the same luxury of discussing and developing them with each other.
I try to act on what my customers tell me. Clearly not everyone can commit to the full four days of Boot Camp, but if our faculty feel there's a benefit to getting some of that information in nuggets unrelated to a surrounding workshop, then I absolutely will convey what I can.
To that end Faculty Computing Services at Hofstra intends to publish many more case studies, ideas, and news nuggets in the coming year than we have previously done. I am always leery of contributing to information overload for our faculty, and I never want FCS to be one of the groups whose messages are deleted unread because of sheer overwhelming volume. But I realize that our department is often a clearinghouse for information about which Hofstra faculty are doing great, creative things with teaching technologies, and as such we need to disseminate what we know.
This blog will be updated periodically (not more than once a week) with ideas on teaching with technology, and I hope you'll give me your feedback if there are things about which you'd like to hear more. In addition, my own stream of bookmarks of interesting news or tidbits on teaching with technology is always available at http://delicious.com/jtabron/bootcamp; feel free to check it out or subscribe.
As always, FCS stands ready to help you with your own investigations into your own best way of using appropriate technology tools in your teaching. Visit http://www.hofstra.edu/fcs for more info on how to use our services.
As usual the participants suggested that one way to increase participation would be to avoid the four-day time commitment of Boot Camp. Could you have had the same experience if you hadn't spent these days here with your colleagues discussing each other's teaching as well as hearing about the technology tools, I asked? No, they all agreed. But, they added, they would still have liked to hear some of the ideas about teaching with technology, even if they had not had the same luxury of discussing and developing them with each other.
I try to act on what my customers tell me. Clearly not everyone can commit to the full four days of Boot Camp, but if our faculty feel there's a benefit to getting some of that information in nuggets unrelated to a surrounding workshop, then I absolutely will convey what I can.
To that end Faculty Computing Services at Hofstra intends to publish many more case studies, ideas, and news nuggets in the coming year than we have previously done. I am always leery of contributing to information overload for our faculty, and I never want FCS to be one of the groups whose messages are deleted unread because of sheer overwhelming volume. But I realize that our department is often a clearinghouse for information about which Hofstra faculty are doing great, creative things with teaching technologies, and as such we need to disseminate what we know.
This blog will be updated periodically (not more than once a week) with ideas on teaching with technology, and I hope you'll give me your feedback if there are things about which you'd like to hear more. In addition, my own stream of bookmarks of interesting news or tidbits on teaching with technology is always available at http://delicious.com/jtabron/bootcamp; feel free to check it out or subscribe.
As always, FCS stands ready to help you with your own investigations into your own best way of using appropriate technology tools in your teaching. Visit http://www.hofstra.edu/fcs for more info on how to use our services.
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