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“Technology is a vital ingredient in enhancing learning. Discuss”
Or: Phil vs Tansy – Who Won?
Dr Stephen WebbHead of Technology Enhanced LearningUniversity of Portsmouth@stephenswebb
20 June 2016: all-day event – The Digital Classroom British Academy of Management Knowledge & Learning SIG Debate: This house believes that:
Technology is a vital ingredient for the enhancement of learning
For: Dr Phil Richards, Chief Innovation Officer @ JISC Against: Prof Tansy Jessop @ SSU
Debate at Portsmouth Business School
Phil looked at the impact of business intelligence and learning analytics on Higher Education Institutions
Tansy argued that technology is not as vital for the enhancement of learning as the proper and consistent construction of assessment and feedback
Two debate streams chaired by Steve Wheeler of Plymouth University (for the motion) and James Johnston of the University of the West of Scotland (against)
This talk: observations from someone whose job it is to promote the use of technology in teaching and learning (bias?!)
Would like to focus on just one aspect
Debate at Portsmouth Business School
Forthcoming:
Glyph Riches (tentative title) – December 2016 delivery
The Past That’s Yet To Be – August 2016 delivery
Could go from PC to Mac, OS to OS, without pause...
... because I used TEX Its main aim is “to produce beautifully
typeset documents, especially documents containing mathematics” (Knuth)
It is a free, sophisticated, extremely robust platform
Same output on all computers, at any point in time
A platform for writing
Unusual Effects
InParticle
Diffraction
Thesis, 1988
Written on a DEC VAX 8600 using manroff
Computer is long obsoleteCompany is defunctEditor is discontinued
But I could still use the content and get identical output ...
A platform for teaching?
Consortium of 14 UK Physics depts 1993-95; worked with Phil on this Self-paced learning Assessment engine Superb simulations! Deep learning! Pre-web (Microcosm-based)
A platform for teaching?
1993-95; worked with Phil on this Consortium of 14 UK Physics depts Self-paced learning Assessment engine Superb simulations! Deep learning! Pre-web (Microcosm-based)
Distributed on CDs for Windows PCs only Big migration costs (“If I wanted to go there I wouldn’t start from here”) Diversity of OS and security concerns SToMP is no longer supported Embedding SToMP in the curriculum led to costs (financial & time)!
I joined the University of Portsmouth in 2006 VLE when I joined was WebCT VLE soon migrated to Vista-based “Victory” VLE then migrated to Moodle
Opportunity costs involved with each migration! Webconferencing tech has moved from:
Live Classroom to BBB to WebEx
Numerous classroom response systems in place. And so on...
A platform for teaching?
April 2016, Portsmouth was part of JISC “Student Digital Experience Tracker”
We surveyed L4 students; had 678 responses 74.4% of students agreed that “when technology is used by
teaching staff, it helps my learning experience” However, a common complaint [free text field] was that many
teaching staff struggled to use technology – even basic technology
Teachers are highly inconsistent in the use of tech!
A platform for teaching?
A platform for teaching?
How can we ensure sustainable, equitable, institution-wide provision when...
Research
QA
TEF
REF
Recruiting
Admin
Exam boards
Contact time
Pastoral work
Technology can enhance learning!
Students themselves say that technology enhances their learning (JISC)
Richard Noss (UCL): Tech can make some things learnable!
For example, flocking of birds is difficult to describe analytically
But children can investigate and understand the behaviour with eg Scratch
Simulations can engage students in deep learning (SERC, in US)
Used in u/g science, engineering, politics, economics courses...
Deep learning means that students learn methods including:the importance of model buildingrelationships among variablesdata issues, probability and sampling
Deep learning means that students reflect on and extend knowledge by:transferring knowledge to new problems and situationsunderstanding and refining their own thought processesseeing social processes and interactions in action