Just 10 years ago, many educators predicted that connecting classroom to the Internet would revolutionize teaching and learning. Today, the omnipresence of wireless access and handheld devices presents yet another opportunity to transform the learning environment. But is the newest gadget by default the best method of information sharing? Boston College educators emphasize that technology should serve learning, not drive it. "Technology is not a surrogate for good teaching," notes Eric Strauss, research associate professor of biology. "With a piece of chalk, a strong tacher will have no trouble keeping students engaged."
Strauss is just one of the number of BC faculty members who are eagerly adopting new technology to supplement timeless teaching methods in their classes. Strauss, whose work focuses on urban ecology and ecosystems, has found high-tech tools to be particularly useful in his lecture classes, where the large number of students prevents him from having a clear sense of how well they are absorbing the material. With more than 100 students, the usual cues - alert posture and gaze versus yawns and doodling - are much harder to track. To help him gauge student understanding, Strauss distributes remote control-style clickers. "I'll ask a multiple choice question, which students answer, and in real time I'll see a chart that shows the percentage of students who answered the question correctly, " he explains. "I can then modify how I spend the rest of my time in the class - by going over material for a second time, or moving on to the next topic."
Strauss also relies on web-based technologies to distribute video and audio content that complements what students learn in class and from their textbooks. For his course on animal communication, for example, he makes film and audio clips of animal's mating rituals and sounds available online. Thanks to a webcam trained on a hawk nest on campus, students in his class collect behavioral data in a real-world setting that could not be reproduced in a lab. They can also compare their findings with data gathered from an osprey nest on Cape Cod, or even data compiled by other students at another instituion. Investing in technolgy is of paramount importance to univerisites like Boston College that want to attract top-notch sutdents and faculty who are accustomed to the state of the art. "Students expect technology in the classroom. They grew up with it, they're used to having constant access to it, and they expect their university to deliver it," says Rita Owens, associate academic vice prseident for technology. "We also have to begin preparing today for students' expectations tomorrow."
Similarily, many faculty demand not only basic IT infrastructure, such as bandwidth, server space, and network access, to conduct their research, but also high-tech advances that can help engage students more fully with the material they are teaching. Through the Department of Instructional Design and eTeaching Services, Owens and a team of instructional designers work with faculty like Strauss to develop pedagogically sound strategies for using technology to enhance learning. These strategies invlove a variety of tools, from multimedia-rich websites to threaded online discussions to personal-response systems, the so-called "classroom clickers" that Strausss uses. Thanks to BC's new status as an "iTunes U," this fall faculty began including podcasts of their courses as well. According to Owens, faculty adoption of emerging technologies is rising exponentially. In 2001, approximately two percent of courses taught at BC included a web component. In 2001, that percentage soared to 60 percent. Also this year, some 100 professors were nominated by students for Teaching with New Media Awards.
While its impossible to forsee the high-tech demands of tomorrow's classroom, it is clear that Boston College has to ensure an ongoing replenishment of its technological infrastructure. "Classrooms are changing dramatically," adds Owens. "As BC builds out the master plan, we have to provide new learning environments that are capable of keeeping pace with cosntant change."
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