Technology in the

ClassroomAlyssa Altieri, Christina Bean,

Chelsea Graham, Erin McEntegart, and Brooke Powers

C

Integrating Technology into the College Classroom: Current Practices and Future Learning

Research Study about current and future learning in regard to the integration of technology in the classroom

106 participants

Technologies Identified:

Support teaching and information sharing: Powerpoint, projectors, smart boards, discussion boards

Collaboration: Discussion boards, voicethreads, twitter, email, voicemail

Individual Technologies: computers, digital cameras, camcorders, scanners, ipods, online grading, online assignment turn in and return

B

Technologies commonly used by college students:

Today’s college generation is the most technical in history

Internet, email, instant messaging, blogs, and social networking sites at higher rates than any other generation.

It is important for professionals to be aware and familiar with technology that students use, especially since newer technologies are used to increase student engagement and improve educational outcome.

Also important for professionals to keep up with the newest technologies in order to best serve the students

Professionals should develop a technical mind-set

Most common use of technology among college students are, cell phones, instant messaging, blogs, social networking cites, and virtual worlds

College students use the highest internet rates than the rest of the U. S population A

The Role of Digital Technologies in Learning: Expectations of First Year University Students

Methods: 547 student involved The research team adopted a quantitative and qualitative mixed method

approach to data collection. The supplementary quantitative survey data was analyzed and informed

the core qualitative data from focus group interviews.

Findings Students in this study did tend to use digital technologies in a variety of

ways. The survey results showed that the technologies most frequently used in-

school for learning included the Internet, email, word processing, math and science programs, texting on cell phones, and electronic databases.

Students reported that they expected professors to use a variety of digital technologies in their classrooms. Some of these expectations were met, while other students reported being in classrooms with professors who did not choose to integrate digital technology into their teaching.

C

“Understanding the use of educational technology among faculty, staff, and students at a medical university”

Study was conducted at a college of health professions at a medical university in South Carolina.

College consists of eleven academic programs in health sciences.

Study sought to find out the current state of technology use, perceptions of technology, and training needs.

Surveys and focus groups were used.

29/68 faculty members, 21/42 staff members, and 250/771 students participated in the study.

Email, Microsoft Word, and Microsoft PowerPoint were tools “always” used by all three groups of respondents.

Staff showed a desire for additional training on email, calendar tools, SharePoint, Facebook, Respondus, and Survey Monkey.

Students were asked to rate their use of technology compared to students at other universities (average 61.8%, high 32.5%, and low 5.6%).

Students were also asked to rate the use of technology in their respective programs of study (average 51.6%, high 48%, and low 0.4%).

The faculty was asked similar questions, and the answers followed the general response trend of average-high.

Three student and two faculty focus groups were formed to talk about the use of technology at the university and give recommendations for improvement. E

Computers and Education

Purpose: To study the overall impact of using technology based instruction within the classroom on k-12 or even higher levels of education settings

Methodology: experimental or quasi-experimental research design, wanted to measure virtual reality based instruction.

Findings: Game shows showed that there were higher learning gains that other type of virtual learning. Students are better learning by themselves rather with a group for this form of technology.

Virtual learning did have a high learning rate also.

CH

Problem and Hypothesis

Problem: Do Franciscan University students think there

is an appropriate amount of technology used within the classroom?

Hypothesis: Franciscan University students do not think

that there is enough technology used within the classroom.

CH

Methodology

Administered surveys to 11 different classes at Franciscan University, which contained students of various majors and grade levels.

Classes were chosen based on the willingness of their professor to have us come in during their class time.

Students were asked to fill out the survey to the best of their ability.

304 surveys were collected.

The results of the surveys were gathered together and tallied.

E

1.) What is your major? _____________________________Minor?______________________________

 

B

2.)What is your gender?☐Male ☐Female

B

3.) In high school, what kind of high school did you attend? 

☐Public ☐Private ☐Home school

B

4.) Indicate your class level:  ☐Freshman ☐Sophomore ☐Junior ☐Senior ☐Graduate

student

B

5.) How many semesters have you attended Franciscan University, including this one? ☐1 ☐2 ☐3 ☐4 ☐5 ☐6 ☐7 ☐8 ☐9 or more

A

6.) Did you transfer into Franciscan University of Steubenville from another college or university? 

☐Yes ☐No

A

7.) If you answered yes to number 6, did your previous school use more or less technology than FUS? 

☐More ☐Less

A

8.) Do you have access to a personal computer or laptop?☐Yes ☐No

A

9.) How often do you typically utilize the computer labs on campus per week?

 ☐0-2☐3-5☐6-10 ☐Over 10

C

10.) Of the times that you use the computer labs on campus, how often is it just for printing purposes? 

☐Every time ☐More often than not ☐Less often than not ☐Not at all 

C

11.) In which ways do your professors integrate technology in the classroom setting? (Check all that apply)

☐Blackboard ☐MyFranciscan ☐Powerpoint ☐Videos from the Internet ☐ Other

 

C

12.) How many of your professors this semester are using the following (indicate the number of professors on the line): 

____ Blackboard ____ MyFranciscan ____ Powerpoint ____ Videos from Internet ____Other

C

13.) Of all of the assignments in your courses this semester, around what percentage of your assignments require the use of technology? 

☐ 0-24% ☐ 25-49% ☐50-74% ☐75-99% ☐100%

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14.) Of all the assignments in your courses this semester, around what percentage of your assignments are turned in using technology?

☐ 0% ☐25% ☐50% ☐75% ☐100%

CH

15.) How comfortable are you using technology in an academic setting? 

☐Not at all ☐Moderately comfortable ☐Very comfortable 

CH

16.) How many of your professors have taken class time to explain the forms of technology that could be useful in your studies?

☐ 0 ☐ 1-5 ☐6-10 ☐Over 10

CH

17.) How many of your professors have taken class time to explain the forms of technology that could be required for

their class?☐ 0 ☐ 1-5 ☐6-10 ☐Over 10

E

18.) How well do you feel that your courses, over all, use technology in the classroom this semester? 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

E

19.) Do you feel that your professors should integrate technology into the classroom more than they are currently doing?

 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

E

20.) What were your expectations of the use of technology at Franciscan University? And were

your expectations met?

Met: 96

Not Met: 89

No Expectations:78

Some expectations that were not met: MyFranciscan is used more Basic training on how to use MyFranciscan and Blackboard Laptops in the classroom Better internet

A lot of questions were left up to our interpretation because they didn’t specifically use the words “met” or “not met”

Many people stated their expectations were met, but they had very low expectations. E

20.) What were your expectations of the use of technology at Franciscan University? And were

your expectations met?

“I thought blackboard would be utilized a lot and that grades would be put online- neither of which has occurred at all. I also had hoped handouts would be online but they are not either. My high school was much better with this than FUS.”

“Technology could be used more in communications of grades/assignments as well for turning in assignments. Coming from a high school where virtually everything was done online, my expectations of the University were similar but have not really been met.”

“Now that the classrooms have Wi-Fi access (unlike last year), my expectations of being able to save paper by following notes online have been met.”

“I did not expect much, and I have not gotten much. However, that is not to say that I think the level the University is currently at is acceptable. I firmly believe that the university ought to devote some resources to making this campus a little more modern.”

E

Discussion

Hypothesis was not right, but it was very close.

Expectations were very different from person to person.

People generally come to school because the standards meet their standards, even if it does not meet the general standards

B

Implications

Policy CSWE

Technology requirements in the classroom because knowledge of how to use it in the field is important

Practice Agencies should use it, but because of the

differences used in different college settings there is a wide variety of knowledge

C

Limitations

Question #1: What is your major? Minor?

Question #3: In high school, what kind of high school did you attend?

Question #4: Indicate your class level.

Questions #7: If you answered yes to number 5, did your previous school use more or less technology than FUS?

Grad Students and their technology in their undergraduate schools

Question #14: Of all the assignments in your course this semester, around what percentage of your assignments are turned in using technology?

CH

Limitations continued

Question #16 and #17

Human error

#16 & 17: There was some confusion from some participants regarding whether questions were referring to this current semester.

Not clear definitions of technology

Difference in what people want in terms of technology

Total of 304 surveys but many questions had under 300 answers

CH

Suggestions for future research endeavors

Administer a pilot study to a small group of people in order to catch the errors that were overlooked by us.

Have an understanding that there will be limitations regardless of how the survey looks or is created.

Remove the qualitative question from our quantitative study

Compare it to other universities resultsA

What we learned…

It takes a lot longer to do the whole project than we thought.

Some people do not take research seriously.

There is a wide range of expectations for the use of the technology at Franciscan University.

E

References

Annan, D., Carson, N., Freeland, M., Hodge, A., Kazley, A., Seif, G., & Zoller, J. (2013). Understanding the use of educational technology among faculty, staff, and students at a medical university. TechTrends, 57(2), 63-70.

Lindbeck, R., Fodrey, F (2010). Integrating Technology into the College Classroom: Current Practices and Future Options. University of North Carolina, NC: National Social Science Association.

McAuley, A., Gabriel, M. A., Campbell, B., Wiebe, S., & MacDonald, R. J. (2012). The role of digital technologies in learning: Expectations of first year university students. Canadian Journal of Learning, 38(1), Retrieved from http://ehis.ebscohost.com.fr.opal-libraries.org/eds/detail?sid=ed6f1e79-e369-499f-a6b5-e8002f8d6748@sessionmgr4003&vid=3&hid=4211&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmU=

Merchant, Z. & Goetz, E. & Cifuentes, L. & Keeney-Kennicutt, W. & Davis, T. (2014). Effectiveness of virtual reality-based instruction on students’ learning outcomes in K-12 and higher education: A meta-analysis. Computers & Education. Volume 70. Retrieved from http://journals.ohiolink.edu/ejc/pdf.cgi/Merchant_Zahira.pdf?issn=0360