Greetings from St. Louis - Thursday's Sessions

Since, Wednesday, I have been in St. Louis for the Central States Communication Association conference. I've had a great time so far and wanted to share some highlights of panels that I have attended, mainly for my own benefit so I remember everything.

1. Referring back to a previous blog about the use of technology in the classroom and the community college has led to many interesting discussions. I attended a session yesterday morning about instructors that were requiring technology in their courses...but at their institution everyone had a laptop so everyone had easy access to a computer. Unfortuately at an institution like Kirkwood, many students do not have access to a computer at home, let alone internet. Sure, there are computer labs on campus, but will students take the effort to use them? Probably not. This semester, I have gone paperless and have used multiple forms of technology in my fundamentals course. I've found that the students who are using it are doing better than students who are not, but that is irrelevant because a vast majority of students aren't using it. I suppose the extra effort it takes for a student to login to ANGEL, find the handout, download the handout, and print the handout themselves, is 3 extra steps of effort for them. To get back to our session discussion (there were 2 attendees including myself and the presenters, so it was a nice, intimate discussion), we also discussed the students who lacked motivation simply because they lacked knowledge about using the technology - the notion of the "digital divide." We assume since many of my students this semester are 18-19 and text during class, that they come with the knowledge necessary navigate an LMS, and I don't think that is an accurate representation. However, we don't have the class time necessary for "tech 101." That brought me to my first idea: Integrate ANGEL into College 101. Not sure if it is currently a part, but I really think it should be.

Another issue I brought up in the session was the fact that, if you require technology, and a student has technology trouble, is the instructor responsible to troubleshoot? Sure, we have a helpdesk and an elearning helpdesk at Kirkwood that should be able to help students with any technological issues, but if the technology is course specific (such as video editing, blogging, etc...) the helpdesk isn't going to be as helpful. One idea that an instructor had was to create a "virtual helpdesk" discussion forum in the LMS where students could help each other instead of the instructor being responsible for help.

Interesting stat: Only 58.9% of students in a study by EduCause liked using an LMS. Not sure if that includes online students or only ftf students, but I actually found that to be a very low number, considering 60-some percent wanted instructors to use technology in the classroom.

2. The second session I went to focused on connecting with the "digital natives", so basically, another tech session. The most interesting study here was a study done at Oakland University regarding Second Life and Public Speaking. Students were brought into SL to perform a speech in front of a "dummy" (no human behind the avatar, tho they didn't know it) avatar audience. They measure CA as well as qualitative analysis of general reactions. I was somewhat interested in the CA, but more the findings that students actually preferred giving the speech face to face than in second life, because of the live audience feedback.

3. The online course. I will be developing Fundamentals online this summer, and piloting next spring. I went to one panel about teaching online, but found it a bit dry and didn't get the info I was really looking for (like how to adapt speeches). Some of the ideas that came from this session (and others) are A) Creating a ning page specifically for your course, and uploading speeches for critique here. B) Utilizing programs such as Elluminate or WIMBA to enhance online communication...I'll be pushing for this in DL this week.

The challenge for developing this course is the speech adaptation. Some institutions use a hybrid format where students are required to come to campus a few times over the semester for speeches, others only require that the student finds their own audience of at least 8 adults (doesn't matter who it is). I, and I know my KCC colleagues agree, take issue with students giving their speech in their living room in front of their parents and 6 of their friends. One professor argued that it really didn't matter who was in their audience, and actually family and friends were MORE intimidating than a formal student audience because they cannot empathize with the speaker. I suppose this makes sense, I'm still not sure that I buy it, however. I did find it interesting to hear that many students sign up for online speech courses because they think it will be less anxiety provoking, when in fact many students actually drop because it is more anxiety provoking because the student audience is not their to empathize. Just think, 8 of your silly drunk college friends watching you speak, while they are laughing, trying to make you mess up, heckling, etc...My idea from this is to give students two options for giving speeches: Either come to campus on a designated speech day or give your speech to a formal audience of your choice such as Toastmasters and upload the video to YouTube, or ANGEL or Ning.

So those were my thoughts and ideas that spawned from Thursday's sessions. I focused on the tech sessions, and even helped someone with an ANGEL problem. The one thing I did learn about myself is that I didn't have much interest in attending any interpersonal or group panels, which is my designated "specialty." I think the communication ed and technology is really where I see myself and I can't wait to do some more research of my own and I even created some panel and paper ideas that I could easily submit to next year's conference.