How Not to Become Tools of Our Tools

Guest Writer, Nancy Evans

We have been using WebCT since 1999 and it is soon to be defunct when Blackboard, its current owner, will no longer support it. I have invited faculty to review some options and we have narrowed our search to Desire2Learn, a Canadian company which has managed to escape Blackboard's buyout, and Moodle, an open source course management system supported by Moodlerooms.

Let's clarify. An open source course management system is based on software which is not copyright protected. Since the source code for the software is available to anyone, users may change it, add to it and improve it as they see needs arise. And it is free.

So, why use a course management system? It is most advantageous to non-traditional students who may live at a distance from campus or cannot come to campus for classes. But these are not the only students who can benefit.

Perhaps an instructor wants computer-based or internet-based enhancements to their instruction. This is done by giving students access to specific information, access to each other in discussion groups, by calculating and posting grades online, by creating test banks and controlling access to tests, or by providing a learning environment very different from a traditional classroom — all in a password-protected online world.

And what about the online world at large? How can one gain access to people and information on the internet? A course management system can gather in one place controlled access to social networking tools and provide guidelines for students working on the internet.

Let's clarify. Social networking tools are free internet-based applications that allow one to share information and media with others. Examples include the ubiquitous Facebook, blogs, Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr, as well as the somewhat lesser-knowns, such as Ning, Meebo, dimdim, and SlideShare (see the ATS website for explanations). Note that though you may be able to control your privacy to some extent, you should consider social networking tools as opening your life up to the world.

So why not use a blog instead of a course management system? Simply put, ease and control. Most course management systems are quite linear in design, offering a default set of elements: drop box, discussion list, gradebook, chat room, email. These tools reflect a fairly traditional teaching approach - presentation, discussion, assessment - and most instructors use these elements easily and successfully. And most instructors are effective in classes organized on this model, whether in class or online. Here is a traditional course management system.

However, more modern course management systems offer more customization and new features associated with social networking tools, such as wikis and blogs. The course itself can look different and can be laid out as a portal (or not - there are choices). The portal layout will still give access to the traditional course management tools, but it changes how the instructor designs the course and how students interact with the tools. The portal design looks more like a website or a blog and may encourage delving into the tools to see which ones serve one's needs and which tools will further the learning objectives of the course.

Most instructors want to know what a course management system - or any technology - can do and how hard is it to learn. I think a better question is how can a course management system, or any technology, meet my pedagogical goals and my students' learning objectives?

How might an instructor's choice of course management tools be affected or determined by learning objectives? Consider these broad learning objectives:

• Students will demonstrate a depth of knowledge and apply appropriate methods of inquiry
• Students will interpret information, respond and adapt to changing situations, make complex decisions, solve problems, and evaluate actions
• Students will demonstrate the inclination to be life-long learners, a concern to become and remain well informed, the ability to retrieve and manage information appropriately, open-mindedness regarding divergent worldviews, and a willingness to reconsider and revise their own views when warranted (K-State Undergraduate Student Learning Outcomes. http://www.k-state.edu/assessment/slo/undgradobj.htm Retrieved 3/30/10).

In response, consider these questions:

• How is a student's understanding of drug rehabilitation programs (for example) enhanced by access to actual programs and counselors online? How can that knowledge be share and compared with other students, even those at other universities?
• How does a student-run blog help students interpret, respond and adapt to new information?
• How can an instructor encourage students' innate or latent curiosity in a subject with internet and course management tools?

We will move into a new phase of online learning and teaching when we choose a new course management system. How will we make our courses more effective, more responsive to learning objectives, more responsive to students? How can we enrich our students' learning? What new tools, or old ones, will we choose?

And, finally, how will we avoid this technology trap:

"Men have become the tools of their tools." -- Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Teaching/Politics

Guest Writer: Chieke Ihejirika

Teaching is a lot of things. It is an exercise in delivery and the midwifery (Plato) of knowledge about certain subject matter. It is for me an opportunity to do, at least, four things, namely: put forward my original ideas seeking publication; comment on other people’s ideas in a systematic manner; ensure that the students participate in the discourse in a way that leads to some expansion of their awareness of the subject matter; and it must involve some extrapolation seeking relevance for their daily life.

When I teach American government and politics, I am confronted by the current quagmire or deadlock in government, especially the inability to solve any of the major problems facing America. Common sense seems to suggest several solutions, but the reality seems impossible to manage. But what is the reality? The reality is artificial complications created by self-seeking persons playing God in their opposition to change.

One theme I want to share with the community is the future of America as we know it. This country was founded on the principle of "No taxation without representation." This principle held sway until the 20th Century. Yes! Prior to the Great Depression America operated on the Jeffersonian dictum that "Government is best that governs the least." Under the political economy of slavery and discrimination, government was able to escape its basic duties to the people under the 'social contract', by simply denying some of its citizens their basic rights.

Things have changed as justice seems to have been enthroned universally in the country. Hence, citizens who were earlier denied basic rights and privileges of citizenship now demand and get those rights, including social security and unemployment benefits, and these have to be paid for. Yet the only way government gets money is through taxes. Since the twentieth century, the people have gotten used to getting benefits from their government to help them with economic difficulties, and the national government itself has also grown very big as a global power which is also carries a big price tag. Can the country continue its aversion to taxation? I think the real fraud is making the people believe that the country can sustain itself and provide them with the necessary benefits they now cherish only by borrowing. American politicians, especially those of the ideological right, have since adopted the strategy of deception by making the people vote for only those who claim they will not raise taxes. Unfortunately, the people have naively, bought this baloney. Yet, when they get in there, they only borrow more, thus mortgaging the future of their posterity. The politicians have chosen to represent the people but without allowing themselves to be taxed. They still take all the financial remunerations of the offices they occupy on borrowed funds, even from the countries future rivals. They cynically know that it the poor masses that will pay this debt they continue to accumulate on the country. Besides, the interest alone is sure to deprive the government of future resources with which it could provide for the most vulnerable member for decades to come.

Questions:
Can the American political economy continue to grow as it did under unfettered laissez faire in the era when welfare capitalism has become the norm in the major industrial economies of the world?

Could it be that the American capitalist is moving abroad because of the loss of slave labor in America?

What is Praxis and how can every department help our students pass it?

Guest Blogger: Emery Petchauer

Praxis I is the common name for the Pre-Professional Skills Test (PPST) or teacher licensure test(s) that all students in Pennsylvania must take in order to become certificated teachers. Not only must students pass it to become licensed teachers, they must pass it (i.e., a reading, writing, and math test at roughly 8th grade content—approximately 40 questions each) before they can declare education as a major. Thus, education is a major that students must test into. This gatekeeper position of the exam is not because it identifies students who hold promise as effective educators; rather, the position is due to program accreditation demands set by the Pennsylvania Department of Education (as it the 3.0 minimum GPA requirement)

At time of this writing, there are 41 students enrolled on the main campus who have passed Praxis I. Some of these students passed all three parts on their first attempt, and some passed on multiple attempts. There are approximately 25 more students who have passed different combinations of the three required sub-tests and are working toward passing all of Praxis I. This number of passing students has increased since the education department centralized our preparation efforts in 2007 by creating the Praxis Cohort tutorial, and these efforts are modified each year to continually improve our program.

Despite these improvements and efforts, passing Praxis remains a significant challenge for many of our students and is the most common reason students change majors or are counseled to do so. This difficulty in passing Praxis is due to (a) some inadequate high school educations, (b) previous failure experiences with standardized tests, (c) the cultural and social class bias of such tests, and (d) misinformation about the test, which creates cognitive and affective dispositions that decrease the likelihood of passing (i.e., the ideas that “nobody” passes the test).

Since Lincoln University holds accredited teaching programs in many secondary fields (e.g., mathematics, biology, English, Spanish, history and social studies, etc.), each school on campus graduates teachers. In this way, each school can be a part of successfully preparing our students to pass Praxis by content and disposition. Preparation in terms of content is rather straightforward in that some classes in the mathematics, English and mass communications, and education departments (and thus our three schools) connect most directly with the three areas of Praxis I. The second area, dispositions, I believe is equally important and is more relevant to every department on campus.

What people believe about their capabilities on specific tasks significantly shapes the decisions they make, how much effort they exert, how much they persistence through obstacles, how much stress and affective burden they experience, and their perceptions of accomplishment. Beliefs, in fact, are often more important to motivation and affective states than what is objectively true. These points come from the extensive body of research on self-efficacy ala Albert Bandura (1997). Self-efficacy is shaped by four information sources: previous mastery experience, vicarious experience, verbal and social persuasion, and physiological states.

What all of this means to every department on campus is that by giving students vicarious successful experiences (e.g., highlighting the successful experiences of students “just like them”), and by giving students positive verbal and social persuasion about Praxis related skills (e.g., “I’ve seen your writing in class, and I think you will pass Praxis writing), professors play an integral roll in helping improve students’ Praxis efficacy. Similarly, being careful not to talk about the test and testing experiences in ways that decrease self-efficacy (e.g., “Lincoln students don’t do well on Praxis”) helps our students pass.

Here are some other factual pieces of information that you can easily tell students when the topic of Praxis comes up:

• People just like you pass Praxis all the time
  
• Some people pass the first time they take it; some have to study to pass
  
• There are over 40 students on campus right now who have passed all parts of Praxis
  
• One students last year missed only 1 question on the math test
  
• Another student’s math score improved 13 points (out of 40) after studying for the math test for 8 weeks
  
• You only have to get about 55% correct to pass—not 100%

Here are some things to avoid saying because they will likely decrease self-efficacy and/or they are not true:

• African American students do not perform well on standardized tests
• Lincoln students don’t to well on Praxis
• You can’t really study for Praxis
• I was never good at tests like that

Related Resources:

Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy: The exercise of self control. New York: W. H. Freeman and Company.

Bennett, C. I., McWhorter, L. M., & Kuykendall, J. A. (2006). Will I ever teach? Latino and African American students’ perceptions on PRAXIS I. American Educational Research Journal, 43, 531-575.

Goldhaber, D., & Hansen, M. (2010). Race, gender, and teacher testing: How informative a tool is teacher licensure testing? American Educational Research Journal, 47, 218-251.

www.ets.org/praxis

The Six Principles of Effective Teaching

Guest Writer, Safro Kwame

What do you think of the new (February 2010) book, Teaching as Leadership by Teach For America, which claims that highly-effective teachers do the following?

"(1) Set ambitious goals for student achievement; (2) maintain high expectations for their students at all times; (3) begin every endeavor with the key questions “Where are my students now versus where I want them to be?” and “What is the best possible use of time to move them forward?;” (4) make good judgments about when to follow through on their plans and when to adjust them in light of incoming data; (5) are their own toughest critics; and (6) refuse to allow the inevitable challenges that they face to become roadblocks."

One of their slogans is: “In God We Trust. Everyone Else Bring Data.”

Please post your data and answer. I would love to "hear" from you. The question is: do you agree with Teach For America about the six principles of effective teaching (either for college or pre-college teaching, for underprivileged or privileged students, or both)?

See excerpts from the book:

http://media.wiley.com/product_data/excerpt/61/04704328/0470432861.pdf

See articles about the book:

What Makes a Great Teacher? The Atlantic Monthly January/February 2010

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/01/what-makes-a-great-teacher/7841/

Six Principles to Teach By, The San Francisco Chronicle, February 9, 2010

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/02/08/EDHU1BUEQB.DTL

See video about the book:

Secrets of America's Greatest Teachers, ABC World News, 2/26/2010

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UmVXxpnB70

or

http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/secrets-americas-greatest-teachers-9961455