communicative media across disciplinar y groups Figure 5.11 below visually depicts the way disciplinary groupings are using
5.2.8 The teaching event of practice: use of adaptive media
forms as reported by staff and students
Teaching & learning event Practice
Teaching strategy Model
Learning experience
Experimenting, practising, repeating, feedback Related media form
Adaptive
Feedback, learner control
Examples of non-computer-based activity Laboratory, field trip, simulation, role play Example of computer-based activity
Drill and practice, tutorial programmes, simulations, virtual environments
Student learning needs to be scaffolded and students need to practise as they learn (Bruner 1966). The affordances offered by computers to enable practice, self-paced learning, feedback, drill and practice, and automated feedback have been highlighted in both this report and the literature (Kennedy, Eizenberg and Kennedy 2000).10 Yet computers in our region are hardly being exploited for the event of practice. Table 5.19 shows that while 69% of students participated in activities as part of their courses, only 52%
used a computer to do so. Whereas 80% of staff asked students to undertake activities in general as part of their courses, only 51% asked students to use a computer to do so.
Table 5.19 shows that students most frequently engaged in activities which provided feedback (28%) and multiple-choice quizzes (26%), whilst staff said they most frequently asked to students to engage in multiple-choice quizzes (28%), and drill and practice activities (32%). The activity which students and staff engaged in the least frequently was use of computer games for learning (13% and 22%
respectively).
Table 5.19: Use of adaptive media forms
Students
Think about your experience studying at [your institution]
Staff
Think about your experience teaching at [your institution]
Yes No Yes No
Have you ever been asked to participate in activities for your subjects?
69% 31%
Have you ever asked your students to participate in activities for your
subjects? 80% 20%
Has this ever involved using a
computer? 52% 48%
Has this ever involved using a
computer? 51% 49%
Students: If yes, how often do you use a computer to look for
Staff: If yes, how often do you ask students to use a computer to look for
Infrequently Occasionally Frequently Infrequently Occasionally Frequently a multiple- choice
quiz? 49% 23% 28%
a multiple-choice
quiz? 56% 16% 28%
a simulation, role
play or case study? 42% 32% 26%
a simulation, role
play or case study? 55% 18% 27%
a game? 71% 16% 13% a game? 65% 14% 22%
an interactive task which enables you to
drill and practice? 48% 28% 24%
an interactive task which enables them
to drill and practice? 51% 17% 32%
a computer activity which provides
feedback? 45% 29% 28%
a computer activity which provides
feedback? 50% 18% 33%
Adaptive average 52% 25% 23% 55% 17% 28%
The low use of computer games reveals that the possibilities of computer games in educational contexts so assiduously being tried, researched and promoted internationally (Amory, Naicker, Vincent and Adams 1999; Gee 2003, 2004) are hardly being explored in the Western Cape.
Relatively few students (30%) who used adaptive media forms participated in all activities at least rarely or more
often. This does not measure frequency; instead it measures whether or not an individual engages with the range of activities for the event of practice in some way.
In Figure 5.12 we can see that the activities of using multiple-choice quizzes (MCQs) and online activities which provide feedback are more frequent among foundation and undergraduate students in particular. For example, 34%
of foundation students use MCQs frequently compared to 23% of postgraduate students. First- and second-year undergraduate students in particular make more frequent use of MCQs and computer-based activities with feedback (43% compared to 32% (in third year) and 16% (in fourth year and above). Aside from online activities involving simulations, role plays and case studies (which involve no obvious differences across the curriculum), all adaptive activities show less use in later years of the undergraduate curriculum.
Table 5.20: Variation of student use of adaptive media forms for activities with the event of practice
Count Percentage
Unvaried 2079 70%
Varied 865 30%
(n) 2944
* Varied = use of more than one activity
Figure 5.12: Breakdown of frequent use of adaptive media by students overall at different levels and different years of undergraduate study
Ov er all use U se at differ ent le ve ls
Feedback
U se in differ ent underg raduat e y ears
1st43%2nd
Figure 5.13 visually depicts the way in which disciplines are using adaptive media forms. The closer the point to the centre of the web the less frequent the reported use and the further away from the centre the more frequent the use.
This representation enables us to examine
• which disciplines have a high and low frequency of use of a particular media form compared to each other
• the differences between what students and staff in each discipline report in terms of frequency of use.
Figure 5.13: Summar y of staff and student indices of use of adaptive media across disciplinar y groups
Adaptive media
0 1 2 3 Business
Engineering
Health Sciences Humanities
Science staff student It is possible that these findings are due to the suitability of scaffolded activities at undergraduate level. It is also possible that adaptive media, which can be time-consuming and expensive to develop, are used at the first- and second-year level where large classes are predominant. Alternatively other reasons may explain the low level of use of computers for practice events. These may include lack of access to appropriate infrastructure, lecturers being unfamiliar with the capabilities built into adaptive media forms, or academics unconvinced of the value of these possibilities.
5.2.8.1 How adaptive media forms are used to support the event of practice in the different disciplinary groupings
In the use of adaptive media students reported frequent use in the applied disciplines of Health Sciences, followed by Business when compared to Science, Engineering and Humanities disciplines. Staff from the hard disciplines of Science and Health Sciences had a higher frequency of use compared to staff from the soft disciplines of Humanities and Business. Staff from Engineering had the least frequent use of this type of media form.
There was no difference between disciplines in terms of use of drill and practice activities. Health Sciences had the most frequent use for all activities, except for using a computer to undertake a game (which students reported doing most frequently in Business disciplines).
In addition to the frequent use in Health Sciences, students from Business and Engineering also make more frequent use of using a computer to undertake a simulation, role play or case study compared to other disciplines. Aside from Health Sciences, students and staff in Business had a high frequency of use of MCQs, whereas students and staff in Engineering had the lowest frequency of use for undertaking MCQs.
These results are particularly interesting when one examines different approaches to assessment between disciplines.
Hard disciplines require memorisation (mastery of
techniques, factual understanding) and application of course material with a strong practical focus, and soft disciplines are more likely to favour accumulation and shaping of knowledge, and require analysis and synthesis of course content. Knowledge acquisition is emphasised more in pure than applied disciplines with MCQs being favoured as a method of assessment in applied but not pure fields (Neumann 2001).
One would therefore expect these types of adaptive media activities to be more predominant in hard applied disciplines such as Health Sciences, and infrequent in soft disciplines such as Humanities. This is certainly the case in this study, with Health Sciences and Business using MCQs frequently and Humanities less frequently. However, we would have expected a higher use of this type of activity in the Sciences as other studies have demonstrated frequent use of computers to support individual task-based activities such
as MCQs in the Physical Sciences (Hammond and Bennett 2002).
On the other hand, the frequent use of a computers to undertake a simulation, role play or case study in Engineering is consistent with the findings of a study that found that technical subjects in Engineering have a high use of simulations, modelling and real software (Baillie and Percoco 2001).
When examining use of adaptive media forms we see patterns emerging along the lines of different approaches to assessment. The applied fields of Health Sciences and Business use MCQs more frequently – this is consistent with non-computer-based teaching and learning strategies (Neumann 2001). However, other studies have shown this type of computer-based activity to be frequent in the Physical
Sciences (Hammond and Bennett 2002), which was not the case in our study.
The high frequency of use of computers for simulations, role plays and case studies in the hard applied disciplines (Engineering and Health Sciences) is consistent with hard disciplines’ strong practical focus on application of course material. It is also consistent with other studies, which demonstrate the high use of these activities in Engineering (Baillie and Percoco 2001).
It is, however, surprising that the hard pure disciplines (i.e.
Science) had a low frequency of use of this media form.
Given these disciplines’ general focus on memorisation (mastery of techniques, factual understanding), and the way adaptive media lend themselves to practice, self-paced learning, feedback, drill and practice, and automated
Table 5.21: Student ranking of their use of adaptive media according to disciplinar y groupings
Question Business Engineering
Health
Sciences Humanities Science
A multiple-choice quiz 2 1 3 1 1
A simulation, role play or
case study 3 3 3 2 2
A game 3 2 2 2 2
An interactive task which enables you to drill and
practice same same same same same
A computer activity which
provides feedback 2 1 3 1 1
2.5 1.75 2.75 1.5 1.5
* Where 1 equals least frequent and 3 equals most frequent
Table 5.22: Staff ranking of their use of adaptive media according to discipline groupings
Question Business Engineering
Health
Sciences Humanities Science
A multiple-choice quiz 2 1 3 2 2
A simulation, role play or
case study. 1 1 3 1 2
A game 2 1 3 2 2
An interactive task which enables you to drill and
practice 1 1 3 1 2
A computer activity which
provides feedback 2 2 3 2 2
1.6 1.2 3 1.6 2
* Where 1 equals least frequent and 3 equals most frequent
feedback, we are interested in why this is the case. Certainly other hard disciplines are using this type of media form frequently for specific activities.