faculty-technology-tools

Faculty-developed tools that bend the curve on student engagement


The success with student learning thanks to mobile computing, coupled with faculty-developed, cloud-based tools means that high tech and great teaching aren’t necessarily at odds.

faculty-technology-toolsThree years ago, several colleagues at the University of Ottawa made a push to ban the use of laptops in the classroom, citing concerns that students were not engaged during class. They’re not alone. There has been a decade-long debate taking place at institutions over whether there should be rules in place to govern the use of laptops and smartphones in class.

What’s fascinating is the very technology that enables today’s students’ constant state of inattention can be an instructor’s best tool in engaging students in and beyond the classroom.

Published in 1987, The Seven Principles of Good Practice in Undergraduate Education urge active learning: regular interaction between students and faculty, collaboration among students, prompt feedback, high expectations, and multi-modal learning.

Early in my teaching career, active learning was relatively easy to implement. Small classes made it possible to incorporate case-based teaching, and facilitate class discussion. Today, with large lectures of 300 or 400 students, fidelity to that model is increasingly difficult.

(Next page: The possibilities created by faculty-powered tools)

We know that improving outcomes in the large lecture classes—where many first and second year students are enrolled—is key to improving student persistence and success; yet far too many students plop down in large lecture halls, counting the minutes as they watched (or didn’t) a professor stand at the front of the room and speak at them. Students see their role as passive: take some notes, memorize the key facts, and hopefully regurgitate what they “learned” at the end of the semester. It’s not a very inspiring model for the teacher or student. I couldn’t cave to the notion that great teaching and learning occurs only in small classes nor that the traditional model of lecturing is the way to go in the large classroom.

Four years ago, I began incorporating student response systems or “clickers” to poll students in real time and assess baseline knowledge. The lecture hall began to feel a bit smaller—but I was limited to multiple choice questions and one-way communication. I struggled to approximate a more intimate environment with 300 students. But in 2013, I heard about University of Michigan professor Perry Sampson, who created his own “lecture tools” that enabled more dynamic communication with students before, during and after class, and I was intrigued.

Perry felt powerless in the face of predictive analytics that told us which students were likely to struggle—but didn’t give us the tools to make a difference, or understand if his students were tracking during class. We know that note taking and participation are proxies for engagement, and that engagement correlates with improved outcomes. But it wasn’t until lecture tools moved to the cloud and mobile computing became ubiquitous, that the door opened to approaches, once difficult to implement, in the traditional classroom.

Perry’s solution was built on the premise that instructors should have all the tools at their disposal to engage students within and beyond the classroom. They allow me to publish course materials to students in advance of class and track engagement with content, evaluate student note taking during class, and provide students with tools to revisit the lecture, ask questions, or voice confusion.

Because they are cloud-based—the conversation doesn’t start and stop at the door of the lecture hall. I can now see which slides students were taking notes on, and at what point during the class did they hit the “I’m confused” button. I can also track student engagement with key concepts throughout the lecture and adapt and improve my approach.

Rather than shift the focus to the mundane, ‘going mobile’ has enabled me to move into higher order engagement with critical concepts faster. I’m no longer taking a shotgun approach to approximating student needs. I can target instruction and clarification on specific challenges—and preserve more time to test conceptual understanding or facilitate peer instruction.

The data from my classroom is illustrative of the potential:

  • Nearly 99 percent of my students—across three course sections—submit answers to questions I ask during class.
  • 66 percent of my students taking notes during class—annotating an average of 13 slides during a typical 18-slide lecture.
  • Class failure rates have over the last three years decreased from 5% (approximately 25 students) to 1 percent (approximately 5 students receiving F grades).
  • 10 percent average increase in final exam scores over three years.
  • 40 percent increase in learning gains measured pre- and post-assessments.

At scale, the potential is profound. These tools are offered by Echo360, a widely used lecture capture platform in use by more than 650 institutions in 30 countries that names AOL Founder, Steve Case, among their investors. Mr. Case, I suspect, knows a thing or two about developing technology that is responsive to the needs of end-users, and enabling large-scale, beneficial changes in behavior.

The success with student learning thanks to mobile computing, coupled with faculty-developed, cloud-based tools means that high tech and great teaching aren’t necessarily at odds. My message to faculty considering the use of technology in the classroom: demand more, and let technology help you meet the teaching and learning needs of your classroom.

Colin Montpetit earned a Ph.D. in Comparative Physiology and is now an Assistant Professor at the University of Ottawa. His work has appeared in Collected Essays in Teaching and Learning and the Society of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. He regularly teaches a 2nd year large enrolment course (~600 students) in Genetics, a 3rd year course in Cellular Physiology, and a 3rd year Lab course in Animal Physiology in both English and French.

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