Updated on: 3/24/2003
This part of the report includes discussions of problems and discincentives that faculty encounter putting a course online, related issues such as copyright and cooperative learning on the web, and some conclusions from my experiences to date.
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The problems and disincentive to take a course on-line can be subdivided into four main categories. Each of these subdivisions are discussed below.
Faculty members who have developed and taught outstanding courses at NCSU for many years should be the pool from which to recruit candidates to take their courses on-line. It is my distinct impression, however, that the degree of ease with which this is done has as much to do with whether they already have written their course in a publishable fashion (i.e., as an Independent Study Course to be offered for credit, or as a Course Pak available for sale for regularly scheduled courses) as it does with their desire to offer the course on-line. Writing lesson plans in a recognized format (Introduction, Learning Objectives, Reading Assignment, Discussion, and Written Assignments, etc.), even if the faculty member do not have plans to take the course on-line, can be a daunting task that may take many months.
I have been teaching MEA 200 for more than a quarter of a century. During the first decade as I developed the course, lesson plans were written and rewritten and I followed them quite closely in teaching the course. Since then, however, I have taught this course from a well developed outline, not from written lesson plans. The outline, a result of the evolving nature of the field and my own feelings about what is important and what most helps students learn, is for the most part quite different from the previously-written lesson plans. Writing the Independent Study Course in the proper format required more than 12 months of concerted effort to complete. As already stated, this written MEA 200 course formed the core of my web-course and was converted to HTML using Claris HomePage software. I am not entirely certain that I would have agreed to take my course on-line in the immediate future had I not already been contracted to write MEA 200 as an Independent Study course.
The main disincentive for a faculty member to actually get a course on-line is knowing where to get the training and/or technical help to create and put the web-course on-line, but the University invested considerable capital to hire this expertise as part of Project 25. This expertise has been restructured at LTS and each year proposals for funding are requested.
To convert an existing course to a web-course requires the purchase of high-end computers and software and purchase or ready availability of such things as scanners. In most instances, the purchase of these items will require a faculty member to obtain substantial resources, probably beyond that available from his or her own department operating budget. In fact, it was my impression that both the Project 25 faculty (myself definitely included) and technical staff were as much surprised by the need for such high-level computers and software as we were by the time required to bring a full course on-line. Minimum computer and software requirements also are included in the Procedures.
Related to the two categories above are some additional problems that need to be addressed by any faculty member contemplating an NCSU web course for credit.
The "Fair Use" rule that allows faculty to make appropriate numbers of copies of figures, articles out of scientific journals, etc., or show commercially produced movies, video tapes, slides, or transparencies in the classroom as part of the learning experience, may not generally apply to use of those same types of materials on a web course. Even when access to the web course is strictly limited to registered students, and they are required to purchase the textbook, permission may need to be obtained from the publisher for use of materials that would be permitted in the traditional classroom.
The laws relating to the use of copyrighted material in the 'new' learning situations is under consideration at the national level, and publishers and other commercial enterprises are working hard to restrict fair use on the web, or any other electronic media. Considerable concern has been raised by the Scholarly Communication Subcommittee of the University Library Committee (of which I was a member) to require faculty participation in the drafting of UNC GA Copyright Policy Document so that fair use of materials can be extended to electronic media.
Faculty interested in the issue of quality of instruction recognize the importance of cooperative learning, where traditional classes are routinely divided into groups to answer questions posed by the instructor, and in critical thinking, where questions are posed that require contrasting and comparing and looking for links between cause and effect, etc.
Faculty can include real critical thinking into their courses regardless of the venue, but cooperative learning is much more problematic and is difficult to emulate in a distance learning environment. Interactive video telecommunications, because it is synchronous, would most closing parallel the single classroom experience because it would allow the student at a remote site to ask questions and hear the group responses, though his or her participation with the group in the solution stages would be difficult and passive. Video tape courses would provide a step down from this because it is asynchronous and, though the remote student can hear the responses from the group, he or she would not be able to contribute to the discussion. Written independent study and web course students cannot participate actively in cooperative learning unless some mechanism is set up that would allow remote students to be interactive with the on-campus class. Instant messaging (IM) is synchronous and allow cooperative learning opportunities, though not to the same degree as offered to students in groups at the home site. Web conferencing and listservs, both asynchronous, would be a step down from IM, but would be preferable to no contact at all with the students in the home class. Someday technology advancements may provide an environment in which interactive synchronous video in a web course may be possible, but course scheduling would put very real constraints on students living many time zones away and on the faculty member who would have to be present during the chat. As stated in earlier status reports, the problems of providing cooperative learning in a web-course are definitely challenging.
There are some conclusions to draw from this study:
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