AT&T Fellows Final Report:Margaret Branstrator

AT&T Fellows Final Reports

April 2006

Name	Margaret Branstrator
Title	Biology
Department	Natural Science and Mathematics
Campus	IUE
Project Title	Virtual Environmental Field Trips
Project Goal	Create field trip videos and narrated PowerPoint lectures to use when converting BIOL L108 Environment and Life course to an on-line format.
Type of Technology Used in the Project	Video, narrated PowerPoint lectures

Executive Summary of Results

Need for the Project

Briefly explain why you believed there was a need for your project and what teaching approach was used to address this need.

Enrollment in the new On-line sections of Environment and Life has been strong and students have appreciated the option to do the field trips on-line or in person. Students in Q201 and Q203 have also used them for extra credit. Students commented on class evaluations that they enjoyed the opportunity to see how a landfill and a sewage treatment plant work and developed a new awareness about the consequences of the modern lifestyle. Quiz results confirm that students did accomplish the desired learning goals.

Use of Technology

Briefly explain how your project used instructional technology in a new or different way.

Original Oncourse has been used as a supplement to in class activities in the past. However the desire to develop an entirely on-line section required capabilities beyond the Original Oncourse. The new, larger Resources area and Assignment tab have been used extensively in order to make the videos and other material available to students. Requiring students to complete an on-line quiz encourages them to view the video seriously and enables me to evaluate its effectiveness

Instructional Design Plan

Describe how the use of technology used supported your teaching approach:

What student learning outcomes were expected?
How did your teaching plan encourage active learning, provide feedback, address respective learning styles, and build collaboration?
What resources were used? (campus technology support services, etc.)
Would your project be easily understood and executed by other faculty?

This field trip project is intended as the first step in developing a repository of modularized interactive course components for the Natural Science and Mathematics Division to include additional field trips, guest speakers and off campus programs. The landfill presentation, for example, might be used in a cultural anthropology class; the wastewater treatment presentation might be used in a microbiology class. The project will also serve as a model for field trips in other disciplines. For example, field trips to art galleries might be useful in an art history course.

Potential to Impact Student Learning

Clearly define how your project improved student learning - include specific examples of how your project:

Fostered depth of learning
Fostered the learning of large numbers of students
Has broader applications that will affect learning K-12 or community environments?
The PDAs were used in K-12 schools not only by IUS faculty and students, but by a select group of classroom teachers.

Assessment Plan

Briefly explain the effectiveness of your assessment plan:

What measure of assessment was used?
How did your approach obtain measures of performance?
Did you feel your measurement was accurate and effective?

Plan for Colleague Development

Describe your role and activities as a mentor:

What mentoring activities were implemented to assist colleagues
Faculty were provided with bi-weekly mini workshops to coach them in the use of the PDAs and Practicum students were given in-services on the uses and applications of PDAs which helped to develop colleague's instructional technology skills.
One of the more surprising effects of the project was the increased use of desktop computers in conjunction with their PDA. There was a significant increase in faculty use of several desktop software programs. The use of MS Outlook and database software on desktop computers increased 29 and 21 percent respectively over previous implementations. The use of the PDAs went from zero to 100% due to the fact no faculty had used them before. Faculty used the PDAs in unexpected ways such as note taking with supplied keyboards (86%), using electronic resources with the PDA (64%), and spreadsheets (54%) by the participants.

How do you think your contributions to the Knowledge Base will help colleagues planning similar projects?

Final Comments on Project Results

In order to compare the effectiveness of the videos I had students in several courses take a short quiz about the content of the field trips. As the following results show students taking the virtual landfill field trip showed scores similar to those students attending in person.

Spring 2006 –on-line and traditional L108 classes

Attending the actual field trip-Landfill		Doing the virtual field trip-Landfill
number	Quiz score	Number	Quiz score
9	97 %	15	85 %

Summer 2006- on line class

Attending the actual field trip-Landfill		Doing the virtual field trip-Landfill
number	Quiz score	Number	Quiz score
4	80%	15	80%

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