Symposium for Teaching and Learning with Technology

Faculty are invited to share innovative uses of technology to enhance teaching, learning, and research at the Penn State Symposium for Teaching and Learning with Technology. This year's theme is "Student Engagement and the Culture of Teaching and Learning." 

As part of this year's theme we are looking for presentations that highlight the student's involvement in the learning process. These could involve faculty and students collaborating on a project or an assignment showcasing students using any number of collaborative tools and new learning spaces. Some examples include the use of shared learning resources, the incorporation of digital media, and any best practices that foster student ownership of learning.

Faculty who are using technology to enrich teaching, learning, or research are encouraged to submit a proposal using the online form at 2009 TLT Symposium Session Proposal Form. The call for proposals is open until November 21, 2008, after which we will select presentations for the day.

Related Topics:

• Submit a session proposal
• Register for the Conference

Please consider this clip and invitation to help us create the 2009 TLT Symposium. This clip talks about our wiki page where you can read up on and contribute to the planning process.

I created a wiki page for the 2009 TLT Symposium in the hope that we as a community can shape the look and feel of the event. Some of the information available includes our list of potential keynote speakers, ideas for a theme, potential activities, etc. I hope you find it a valuable resource. Please contribute suggestions and ideas. I think we all felt the power of coming together as a community for last year's symposium and I hope we can keep the positive momentum going.

Note: There is a permanent link to the wiki under the Related Links heading on the left-hand side of the screen.

Here are some guidelines you can use when blogging about the symposium.

• If you get the chance, read the session abstract before the session to familiarize yourself with the material.

• Capture what jumps out at you as the key issue or theme that arises during the session. Don’t worry about capturing the minutia instead focus on what strikes you about the presentation.
• Use links in your post to point the readers to key information referenced during the session.
• Don’t worry about perfection. You are doing this live and on the fly. Mistakes and typos will occur and that is okay. You can always go back and fix the typos later.

Below are the guidelines to follow if you are presenting a poster at the symposium. Please note the following change to the guidelines: The poster session will be held in Room 206 and not in Room 207 as was originally announced.

* Poster submissions should be printed and mounted by the author.
* Suggested poster dimensions are 3.75 feet wide by 4 feet high.
* Check in your premounted poster at the Registration Desk the morning of registration. We will have it taken to Room 206 for you.
* The Poster Session will take place in Room 206 from 3:15 to 4:00 PM.
* The room will be available to you prior to the poster session, from 2:15 to 3:00 PM for display setup.
* Easels will be provided for displaying posters.
* A small table will also be provided for you to place a laptop or documents.
* We are unable to accept any posters mailed or delivered electronically to us prior to the symposium.

Brian Smith, Asst. Prof. PSU INSYS/ITS

Brain brought a panel of students to discuss their perspectives on teaching & learning with technology.

Students use a myraid of technologies in multiple classes everyday. What works? What doesn't? What would the like to see? Is it feasible to implement?

What kinds of technologies do you currently see in the classroom?

Jason (music): Logic Express, Sound Studio for digital audio; the mac lab for Final Cut, Garage Band, Logic Express. Used to record and manipulate their compositions.

File Maker & other data base sorting applications

When teachers use technology

Should be done when the technology serves a purpose. If the overhead is all you need, use it. If podcasts are effective, use them.

Should make sure the technology is not disruptive to the class.

Professor expectations are that student's can use technology.

Technology use should cross-pollinate. As professors are using technology in the classroom so should the students be, especially simultaneous use to take advantage of how this generation learns. They are multi-taskers.

This generation of students are not accustomed to learning in the manner of the previous generations, e.g., straight-up lectures. They want to be immersed and involved. Even as little involvement as posting the syllabus and homeworks on ANGEL is helpful.

Student sharing & collaboration

Existing technologies provide the affordance to students to create a collective knowledge base for a class. Based on expertise & interests students will designate note takers, someone to digitize the notes, and someone to coordinate the transfer of these notes to the rest of the class.

Also legacy artifacts are created. Students pass down information from one generation to the next.

Project-based classes and the ability for everyone to edit an object (e.g. a wiki) lend themselves to a collaborative environment that produces a unique product.

How this generation of students learn

They are hands-on and self-directed. They prefer to open up a product and dive-in. When difficulties are encountered students are skilled at finding appropriate resources, e.g., Google searches, subject-matter experts, available low-cost support.

What technologies (not currently in the classroom) are students using outside of the classroom?

Students use instant messenger and Breeze to meet interactively when face-to-face is not convenient. They use del.icio.us to find tools/resources. The tagging system emplyed allows for more precise searches. They also use other search tool such as Google. Students like del.icio.us in part because it is a "people's choice" search engine. They have trust in the fact that others have taken the time to develop their entries.

What do these outside tools offer that university tools do not?
Students are already uses spaces like Facebook and Aim for social things so they are already familiar with them. Academic alternative, e.g. ANGEL have to be learned. It is a matter of comfort. Plus, the fact that a tool is "university sponsored" automatically diminishes its appeal. There is also more freedom of expression in these tools.
Also, students are not aware of what toold such as ANGEL can do. And faculty are not maximizing its use.

Specific memories of great classes at Penn State that used technology?

Classes that used multi-media, such as video & Flash, Podcasts as well as group projects to promote collaboration. Vidcasts are a desired future alternative. Wikis as a means of collaborative knowledge development.

Gerry Santoro, Asst. Prof., UP-IST

Aim of using video projects is to reach those students who were interested in solving the people issues surrounding technology. Students know how to use technology, know how to consume it, but do not know the underlying structure that support the technology.

Students work in groups to create a 5-8 minute video exploring a technology of their choice. Takes advantage of the fact that these students are "multi-media" moguls. They tend to be visual learners who are used to and want to work in this medium. This taps into student's instrinsic motivation (creating video) to learn about a subject they know little/nothing about.
The group project reaches into the realm of systems-integration problem-solving as the workgroups go through the process from conceptualization to production.

Students see the use of video as an enabling technology to learn about and communicate about a subject (IST) they were not familiar with. They leave the class with two skill sets: 1) video creation and 2)IST. Students take the video making skills and use them in other classes.

Dr. Santoro needed to learn about all the video making tools out there and available in order to implement this method in his course. As a result of the experience he has incorporated videos he created into his teaching skill set.

Byron Hollowell, Worthibgton-Scranton

Overview
Goal was to create an authentic learning experience. Students were enrolled in StockTrack so they could match their progress against similar students in other universities.

Dr. Hollowell also created a portfolio based on prior classes that current students aim to surpass. His students tend to be first generation college students.

The portolio concept motivates students to put in the work because they rewards seem more tangible to them (the building of a portolio, the comparing themselves against the performance of their peers, etc.)

Goals of the simulation project
Project is integrated into every aspect of the course

No lecturing, no cramming for exams

Challenges students to analyze and synergize portfolio theory

Project-Based Learning Environment
Course created in accordance with Project Based Learning Theory (long-term, interdisciplinary, student-centered environment whose aim is to place the students into the world in which they will be working). Scaffolding built into the course. As student expertise grows scaffolding decreases. Learning becomes relevant and useful. Students begin building a professional network through contact with working members of the field. Course taps into students intrinsic motivation.

Challenges of PBL

Because this is a "live" investing environment student portfolios are subject market forces. Must not let students lose hope.
The project is dynamic and therefore unpredictable. Cannot work of a static syllabus

Students must become adept at long & short-term project management

Information/scaffolds must be delivered just-in-time to have the greatest benefit.

Instructor must be a role model and demonstrate to the students the behaviors to be exhibited, e.g. willingness to fail and adjust mid-stream.

Seven aspects of a successful project

curricular content

online simulation

student direction

collaboration

real-world connection

extended time frames

360 assessment

Time moves so quickly that if you're a slow adopter you run the risk of missing out. For those who prefer not to be on the cutting edge the trick becomes getting in when the moment is right. -Table 13

What are some of the ways we foster on-line learning environments?

Issues faculty at this table are facing: How de we get into the heads of our students? Struggle trying to understand why students act the way they do, e.g. in learning communities. Do learning communities foster shortcuts? Plagarism? Is it any different than how they operated in the "paper" age? Do technologies provide more affordances for discretions to occur? Or do we need to change our paradigm? (Refer back to the keynote speaker's ideas). Is the learning process now the thing as opposed to a final product?
Faculty at table 13 would like to assess the process, the contribution and the individual and group results.
Feel the need for students to somehow show the work.

Instructor involvement in the dialogue, creation, spurred student buy-in and contribution in learning communities such as team projects.
Impromptu Social Networks
Impromptu social networks, e.g. the gaming community comes together to "solve" a new game.How do we tap into this method of creating a "Collective intelligence" like this into the learning environment.
This led to a discussion on what constitues human interaction now? Walking down the street talking on your phone ignoring everyone else around you... what community are you a part of? Which one are you engaged in?

One of the challenges Kelly mentioned was building a rapport with students through an entirely on-line environment. What are some of the afordances we can ake advantage of to remedy this?

Kelly used:

-instant messenger for office hours (Is it possible to transition to a video communication tool such as iSight in the future?, How much of an audience can we reach with it?)
-a profile on Facebook

-timely reminders, emails, and announcements via ANGEL