I do not disagree with John Gastineau (below). I think I am indeed reacting
to people who want to "use a hammer all the time to build a house." The
computer is the hammer and my course is the house.
In order to be "technology savvy" (or competent, or literate, etc.) it seems
we are being pushed to integrate computer use into every lecture. Why else
would you spend all this money on computers and wired classrooms and tell
students they have to bring their computers to every class session?
So my question to John is this... if computers in the classroom are
sometimes useful and sometimes not, can you give me an estimate of how much
time is each way. If your room has a computer for every student, do you use
the computers during each class period? If so, how many minutes of each
class period. If not, how many class days per week are the computers used
(for one particular class)? Also, what's the purpose for doing it in class
as opposed to a homework assignment. Is it simply a way to break the
"lecture" into smaller pieces, or is it really the best way to teach the
physics.
Also note that some people are advocating a "laptop" for each student.
That's a whole lot different than a computer at each seat in the classroom.
This is a wild guess, but suppose we have sufficient classroom space for 30%
of our students to be in class at the same time. Providing a computer per
each student would require 3 times as many computers as a computer at each
seat. And laptop computers can easily cost 2-3 times what a desktop cost.
So requiring each student to have a laptop can cost 4 to 10 times more than
providing a desktop at each seat. Plus, the portability of the laptops
opens up the whole issue of theft as well as problems with dropping them,
etc.
Michael D. Edmiston, Ph.D. Phone/voice-mail: 419-358-3270
Professor of Chemistry & Physics FAX: 419-358-3323
Chairman, Science Department E-Mail edmiston@bluffton.edu
Bluffton College
280 West College Avenue
Bluffton, OH 45817
I disagree. One of the first things you'll find in teaching in a classroom
with
lots of computers is that sometimes the computers are useful, and sometimes
they
are not. You don't use a hammer all the time when building a house, do you?
It
is equally unreasonable to expect that the computer will be used all of the
time. If the activity you have created uses computers, then students will be
using the computers to do class work--that's what is desired. The problem
with
computers comes when you're doing something that doesn't use the computer,
and
then the computer is a distraction.
Another suggestion: arrange the classroom so that you can see most of the
computer screens when you are interacting with the students. The standard
lunch-room arrangement with desks all in a row, students facing the front of
the
room and the instructor facing the students is the worst possible layout.
Students can then hide behind their machines, and the instructor can't see
what
the students are doing. With almost any other arrangement, just the fact
that
you can see the screens keeps students on task.
--
John E. Gastineau john@gastineau.org
140 Tenderfoot Road (301) 387-8494
Oakland MD 21550-6957 (301) 387-8495 fax
USA http://gastineau.org