Welcome to Dr. Trudy Abramson's class blog for DCTE 760, winter 2008. I have been monitoring the evolution of Web 2.0 technologies - blogs, wikis, RSS feeds, and to a lesser extent, podcasting - waiting for a respectable foundation of scholarly literature to be published appropriate to higher education teaching and learning. Whereas much has appeared, it is largely how-to, anecdotal, K-12 or training related. It remains for us, and others who are undertaking similar experiments and investigations of the new technologies in higher education, to bring Web 2.0 applications into the mainstream.
To initiate our foray into the read/write web, below is an editorial written about a decade ago for a now defunct journal, HyperNexus, the Journal of Hypermedia and Multimedia Studies, published by the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) for HyperSig, a special interest group.
Abramson, T. (1998). The editor's pulpit: Adapting instruction to the medium. HyperNexus: Journal of Hypermedia and Multimedia Studies, 8(3), 2-3.
Adaptive Instruction Circa 1998
The word "adaptive" as an adjective describing instruction or assessment typically refers to a process that adapts to an individual learner. Recently, adaptive instruction has taken on a new meaning: Adapting presentation of instruction to available technology.
Today’s Internet has three menu offerings: plain vanilla or all-text with hyperlinks, vanilla and chocolate or text with still images and hyperlinks, and best of all, any three flavors or text, still and moving images, sound and hyperlinks. Given freedom of choice and the assurance that all orders will be filled equally fast, most people would opt for full hypermedia/multimedia. However, sometimes the best of all possible worlds is simply not available. Computers that access the Internet at a speed lower than 56 kilobytes per second (kbs) or that are equipped with last year’s browsers, can do little more than present text at people-acceptable rate. The choice, then, is take what is available or do without. We advocate choosing to use Internet resources in the learning process.
Adapting learning to media is an instructional design (ID) issue whose solution is nowhere as cumbersome as it first appears to be. There are five steps to the ID process. First is analysis where a thorough needs assessment is conducted to determine the needs of the target audience. Second is design in which the subject matter expert provides the subject expertise to the designer who sculpts the lesson plan. Third is development where prototypes of the lesson take shape. Through these time-consuming, labor-intensive processes, tentative decisions are made regarding which media to use for product development. At the fourth step, implementation, the lesson is given a physical life of its own and becomes a product. The final ID step, evaluation, assesses the value of the product as an instructional vehicle.
Internet Technologies
Increasingly, education and training applications are being delivered across the Internet in order to reach as many learners as possible in as many different settings as possible. As defined above, the Internet is not a single technology so it then becomes necessary to ADAPT THE INSTRUCTION TO THE MEDIUM. In other words, the same content may be delivered using all text, text and graphics, and full multimedia. Will these option present equal learning opportunities? Of course, they do not. However, the alternatives are to bring everyone down to the lowest common denominator or to exclude those who do not have state-of-the-art online systems. Supporters of adaptive instruction say, in effect, "Here is the instruction. Avail yourself of the most sophisticated version possible."
How much additional development time is required to develop the three options? Refer back to the ID description above. Only implementation must be done in three versions to accommodate different browsers and modem speeds. Given the choice between text only or no access at all, almost everyone would choose text only. Similarly, given the choice between fast-access text and watching images come across one line at a time or watching images build at some unfathomable fashion, most people would choose text only.
Educators have long ago agreed that the involvement of the greater number of senses and the use of more sophisticated media enrich the delivery and accommodate the largest number of learning styles. Until the day when we all have the best possible technology, let us adapt instruction to available media.
[End of editorial]
All responses/comments should be 200 words or fewer.
1. Write a brief history of how far we have come in a decade in terms of evolution of online learning technologies. Include URLs if appropriate.
2. Write a brief, state of the art description of the availability of online learning tools. Include URLs if appropriate.
3. Describe an online lesson that capitalizes upon implementation with today's media.
4. Comment on the applicability of the instructional design process described above to today's learning media.
5. What can we do with today's technologies that could not be done a decade ago?
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12 comments:
Response to Question 5
I attended the first WebCT conference in 1999 that was held in a fairly small theatre at the University of British Columbia. I attended the conference because I heard about the technology at a national nursing conference in Ottawa from a presenter from the United Kingdom. The presenter had identified WebCT as a good interface for online learning.
After attending the first WebCT conference, I was amazed at the capabilities of the program, especially the discussion board, and linked up with the University of Manitoba who were looking for people to “try out” the new technology. We eventually converted one of our Neonatal and Pediatric Critical Care courses into the WebCT environment. Were any comparable technologies available via one’s home computer? Not that I know of, however, today, with what would be considered moderate computer literacy, individuals can collect free tools from the Internet, and essentially build their own WebCT! I still find it absolutely amazing, for I finished my graduate program in the early 1990s with a computer that did not have a hard drive, no Internet for searching databases in my pyjamas, and a spell checker that took so long I usually cooked supper at the same time and occasionally went over to the computer to see if it stopped on a word!
Response to question 4: Comment on the applicability of the instructional design process described above to today's learning media.
The instructional design process described is known as the ADDIE model and most instructional design processes are based on this model. Whether the steps are explicitly stated, combined or extended, the general concept of needing analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation has been established in the literature. As time consuming as the process seems while in progress, it is usually less time intensive to follow the steps carefully than to have to keep redesigning a poorly designed course.
With the advent of new technologies, sound design is still needed. As mentioned in the article, it is the implementation that would be different based on the media chosen. It is also precisely because there is so much to choose from, in terms of media, that a structured process must be followed or an inappropriate medium may be applied in a learning situation. Adapting the instruction to the medium does not mean that any and all media can be used in any and all instructional environments. However, proper analysis and design, as initial stages of the instructional design process, will help guide the designer on how various media may be used to best represent the same information, to accommodate as many persons and situations as became apparent during the analysis phase.
I believe that one of the biggest changes regarding online technologies in the past decade is our access to them.
In the mid-90s I visited a quaint little town called Panajachel, one of my favorite places in Guatemala. At that time, a major selling point for a local hotel was the fact that it had a telephone – one telephone – that could be used by its patrons for a fee. Today, there is a broadband Internet café on every corner in that little town.
A decade ago, webmasters were still designing web pages so that text and pictures could be downloaded over a dial-up modem in a reasonable amount of time. The available bandwidth really limited the kinds of online technologies that would be successful.
Today, broadband Internet access is so commonplace that web designers are free to use any multimedia product they wish, including audio, video, and flash presentations. Online learning environment tools such as Elluminate take advantage of high bandwidth to provide live classroom interaction, complete with live discussions, text messaging, multimedia presentations, and application sharing.
Try doing that over dial-up.
I agree with Avril’s observation that new technologies make it even more important to use sound design practices when designing instruction. Yet much instruction that uses the new technologies is not well-designed. In the rush to jump on the Web technology bandwagon, paper or classroom-based instructional materials are being transferred to the Web, and, with the addition of a little multimedia, are being called web-based instruction.
This is not much different than what happened in many businesses as they moved their business applications to the Web. As a Web consultant for IBM, I saw many businesses that took their traditional “green screen” applications and “ported” them to the Web. The applications had basically the same functionality but ran slower and sported a Web-based, point-and-click interface that was less efficient for employees to use.
As with the application software, what needs to be done with instruction is a true redesign. One must go back through the instructional design process and redo the analysis and design before developing and implementing the instruction using new technologies. The use of new technologies may be the means to the end, but learning still must be the end goal. Technology must be used for a purpose, not just for the sake of using it. The instructional design process helps to insure the instructional goals are supported by whatever technology is chosen for implementation and delivery.
The subject matter I teach is software skills, primarily in productivity software, to both faculty as part of a faculty development program and students enrolled in graduate programs. I do not believe this can always be fun; but, I do believe it can be something more than boring. A happy medium between the two, which I will call “relevance”, is what I strive for as an educator. When I, as a student, find a particular subject matter relevant to my own professional or personal experiences I am interested and engaged in the topic. I strive to create examples and lessons, which are demonstrative in nature, applicable directly to the programs offered in my environment. For example, many faculty are not comfortable using the equation tools in the Microsoft environment. While there are thousands of useful tools in any given software title, I work to include the equation tools as I know my audience will find the tools useful. Do students consider it fun? I suspect most would not describe the subject matter using the word “fun”. Are students engaged? I find they are.
Question 5:
Ten years ago, downloading a song off the internet was unheard of (literally). To do so would have taken hours for one song because dial-up was still in 28.8 kbps. And then, what format would the song be in? For a specific example, a course that I know of uses a learning management system (Angel LMS) to post musical pieces for required listening. The songs are in .wma format and cannot be downloaded, only listened to through individual Microsoft Media Players for each song. Only students enrolled in the course have access to the music. Further, because of the LMS listening exams could be given and taken in the same web environment, on-going discussion on particular facets of the music could be discussed in an online forum discussion, a body of knowledge could be developed and built upon by the students within an in-course Wiki, and students could blog their impressions of hearing particular pieces for the first time. Ten years ago this would have been impossible!
In 1998, I was the Director of Career Services for a small liberal arts college. The Career Center had two computers, one of which was DOS based. A student from the IT department had been assigned to me to help update the systems. I found it amusing that the student was unable to input the DOS commands to transfer the data from that computer to a disc. He was too young to have used DOS and was impressed that I knew the commands.
Now in 2008, whenever my students complain about not having wireless Internet connection in the classroom, I tell them horror stories of really slow connections and writing HTML manually. They can’t remember living without cell phones, iTunes, and email. My students in 1997 were fascinated with my PowerPoint presentations; my 2008 students are much less enthusiastic. Educators must stay abreast of current technologies to keep the interest and respect of their students. The current generation expects virtual reality and interactive Web 2.0 technologies. However, it is important not to forget pedagogical considerations in the pursuit of the “newest and coolest” etools.
The instructional design process described in this article is very applicable to today’s learning media. Originally the process had to account for the different levels of access speed. Now, I would say the process, namely the implementation, should account for several of the new technologies.
Podcasting seems like a great technology with particular value in distance education. The problem for me is that I do not carry my iPod with me very often. Not everyone has a podcasting compatible device. To sit at my computer and listen to a podcast would be less than desirable. Including a blog option along with the podcast would open the interaction to far more people. Not only can I participate if I don’t have an iPod but I have an alternative if I’m not into using my audio device for educational purposes.
A decade ago technology was already allowing portability of items such as phones and CD players. I remember toting the two items mentioned above in my school bag along with a day-planner to keep track of assignments and contact information for my friends in high school. Today’s technology allows me to consolidate the cell phone, music player, video player, calendar/planner, address book and more into one convenient device. Devices such as the Blackberry and the iPhone offer the same features plus they allow you to send and receive email and browse the web. This is great progress in just ten years and the field of technology continues to advance daily with innovations such as multi-touch interface (see URL below)! Personally, I would love to see the day when each classroom has a multi-touch wall. At this rate, there is no telling what types of devices will be in our homes and classrooms ten years into the future.
URL to video of Jefferson Han's multi-touch media wall:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/
technology/industry/4224762.html
I agree with Angi about the importance of "relevance" for the learner and with Robin about "the newest and coolest etools".
Ten years ago the technologies and bandwidth did not even allow us to imagine what is possible today. Although I championed anywhere, anytime learning even then, I still believe that careful, and iterative, design of learning experiences is very important - especially if we want to support everywhere, all the time learning. We need to encourage colleagues and students to communicate, collaborate, and celebrate learning!
5. What can we do with today's technologies that could not be done a decade ago?
After doing some reading and contemplation about the technologies available today, I find the potentials somewhat overwhelming. The diversity of the materials being presented and the multiple means of input for the observer/student may set expectations or minimal requirements for stimuli to promote learning. The social network and interaction possible with Web 2.0 was not available a decade ago, yet services are increasing exponentially.
Alexander (2006) opened up a pandora’s box. I am discovering there is so much that I do not know. I had no knowledge of LiveJournal as a potential for development of a blog, discussion, social network, or private journal (http://www.livejournal.com/). Folksonomy was a new term for me, as was social bookmarking and tag clouds. I had never been to del.icio.us (http://del.icio.us/) and when entering topics found numerous links for information that I want to pursue, and the potential of networking with other individuals with similar interests is intriguing. Tutorials are available on del.icio.us,including MySQL for databases (http://www.tutorialspoint.com/mysql/index.htm) and Go2Web2.0 is linked with “The Complete Web 2.0 Directory” (http://www.go2web20.net).
The student learns from one teacher, multiple classmates, and now a world of peers. Research questions abound…what formats are optimal for learning; is there a minimum amount of stimuli necessary; is there a maximum amount of stimuli that interfers with learning; is there a recommendation for the number of new formats to include in a course; is there an optimal means for integration of new social learning formats…and the list continues. We can do more today with technology than I dare say most of us realize.
Alexander, B. (2006). Web 2.0 A new wave of innovation for teaching and learning? Educause, 32-44.
Dr. A's discussion of adapting instruction to the new Web 2.0technologies set a few bells jingling for me.
I recently finished my dissertation, a study of how high school English teachers are currently using blogs as a tool to teach writing. In my reading, I found three recurring themes, alluded to in Jen's, Suki's, and Yvette's posts. First, much of what teachers consider "using technology" is actually just *adopting* computer capabilities for traditional classroom practices without "adapting" them to take advantage of the medium, e.g. using a teacher's blog to publish class schedules, reminders, assignments. If school policy allows for student participation in class blogs, often the outcome is simply homework credit for posting to the blog a required number of times, with insufficient attention to blogging as a tool for shared learning.
That leads to the second theme. Teachers may go to conferences where they learn about Web 2.0 possibilities, think that blogs and wikis and podcasting are fascinating new tools that they want to try when they are back to their own schools, establish one or more of the technologies as a startup, and then abandon them -- often sooner rather than later. Why? Because the tools do entail extra work, though with familiarity comes understanding of how to reduce the burden and maximize the benefits for students. But gaining that level of comfort takes time, experimentation, and recognition of how their instuction methodologies can be yes, adapted, to the medium. Teachers who are already technology oriented have an easier time of it, although not only and not always. A corollary to this issue is that those who explore new tools often feel isolated and overwhelmed because they are the only one (or one of the only ones) in the school using them, without an effective support system. Further, students may be resistant because they are the "only class" that "has to do this," and they feel burdened. And third the reality of teaching in test-and-curriculum focused current times intrudes, putting teachers under additional pressure.
Paul Allison, who is the New York City tech liaison for the National Writing Project, is an ardent and highly effective supporter of Web 2.0 technologies. He blogs, vlogs (video blogging), and podcasts about his own experiences and perspectives. Here is a link for a quite extraordinary, telling post that encompasses the three themes. The blog is "Weblogs & Wikis & Feeds, Oh My!" Scroll down (past the picture of Paul) to the rather lengthy post "Finding My Way Back to the Margins," October 21, 2007. Notice the difference in his descriptions of the 7th Grade English class, and the technology-based class he transferred to. Then see the discussion near the end that begins "We were ready to roll, but . . ." http://paulrallison.blogspot.com/
Marilyn O.
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