IU SBC Fellows: Good Practices

Good Practice from Thomas Keefe, IU Southeast

Title	Comparing Face-to-face and Online Instruction
Course or Project	Z302 Managing & Behavior in Organizations
Audience	Experienced undergraduates
Active	2000, still active
Background Information	I teach Organizational Behavior to undergraduates at Indiana University Southeast, School of Business (IUS). IUS is a regional campus in the IU system. As part of an Ameritech grant in 2000, I began a systematic investigation of technology in my classroom to improve my teaching and students’ learning. Six sections of 115 students in the same course participated in two studies to investigate the use of educational technology.
Teaching Challenge	In the spring of 2000, the objective was to test the “no significant difference effect” by comparing the effectiveness of an online and face-to-face version of the same course in a highly controlled situation. One of the primary criticisms of the “no significant difference effect” is that the lack of significant results may be attributable more to a lack of research control than quality of null results. In general, lack of research controls produce null results by failing to account for alternative explanations that muddy the waters and reduce the repeatability of results. The specifics of the research plan called for using control by design to rule out differences associated with different teaching methods, combined with statistical techniques to control for individual student differences. As many differences as possible in teaching methods would be weeded out by offering two versions of the same course that were as much the same as possible except for one critical difference. One version would be taught online and the other face-to-face.
Good Practice	All students came to class at least five times: the first day of class for orientation and training, three times for exams, and once for a presentation. In both conditions the first day of class, students were assigned to groups. Everyone’s grades were based on the same three exams; three, five page group video cases; a group Internet research project with a paper and presentation; and class participation. Instructional interactions outside of lectures were handled in the same way. Everyone has access to telephone, e-mail, online chat rooms, and threaded discussion forums. Handouts such as the syllabus, schedule, cases instructions, and announcements were supplied electronically to everyone at the same time and in the same way.
Impact	The two studies reported on showed significant differences counter to the “no significant difference effect”. Differences in students’ performance and perceptions were attributed to differences in media. Students taking this course uniformly performed better face-to-face in both studies. In terms of student satisfaction, when differences occurred, they, too, favored the face-to-face experience. More important was the impact of interaction separate from lecture on student performance. In the spring of 2000, both lecture and interactions operated together; they were either both online or face-to-face. In the fall 2000 and spring 2001 all lectures were moved online, separating lecture from interaction. Results indicated that differences in where interactions took place accounted for the bulk of differences in grades. The results are significant for several reasons. Much of distance education literature focuses on media comparison studies dedicated to finding the best lecture format for conveying information. Results point toward the importance of interactions to student learning rather than lecture format. If these results were replicated in other settings, the implications for designers of online courses would be to work to increase the quantity and quality of interactions as a way of improving their course offerings. In face-to-face classes, the importance of interaction holds interesting implications as well. Expositive lectures are based on one-way communication that does not require the use of valuable face time. In a traditional class, technology may be used to improve instruction by moving expositive lectures online and using the time freed up for additional value-added interactions.
Assessment	See impacts above
Keywords	Orienting students, assessing student needs, interactivity, presenting content, course management
Technical Format	Hybrid-Oncourse, streaming narrated PowerPoint slideshows
Relevant URLs	http://www.educause.edu/pub/eq/eqm03/eqm031.asp http://www.mhhe.com/business/management/kreitner5e/student/olc/ch01els.mhtml https://oncourse.iu.edu/Default.asp?action=login

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