Now, folks, I’m pretty clearly in the technophile camp in most discussions. I still hold the (naive?) belief that it’s possible to write an interface that library users could actually use to harvest articles, or at least citations, from all of a library’s various books and databases, without needing librarians’ intervention or hours of training in syntax. I have a laptop that runs OSX and Windows, an iPod, a cell phone, and a digital camera, and I know how to use them all. I spend significant time playing on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, del.icio.us, and a good four or more other Web 2.0(ish) applications. I live by Google Reader and Google calendar, and five different e-mail accounts all filtering into my Gmail (invisibly to the people who e-mail me). I’ve built a digital library, I add content to a digital repository every week, and I contribute to four blogs. I am very good with technology. I like technology. I think technology can fix many of our problems.
Furthermore, I have successfully coordinated documentation and scheduling for a team of 60+ people spread over multiple organizations spanning four timezones. I have also designed a wireless system with colleagues in Michigan and California (I was in Virginia), and I worked almost as much from home as I did from the office. I am beginning to think digital reference is the single most important service an academic library can offer, and I truly enjoy my weekly one-hour IM reference session, as well as my coverage of e-mail reference. I’m good at distance work.
So when I tell you that distance education, as it is currently done, is not a good alternative to on-campus education, believe me, I’m not being a short-sighted technophobe or a touchy-feely “communication has to happen in person” drip. I’m serious, and I’m probably correct. Better: I’ve got a suggestion for how to begin to solve the problem (because I’m also not stupid–I know distance education is not going away). Let me tell you about my coursework now, and then I’ll begin to lay out a solution in my next post.
Two of my classes have serious online components, this semester; one is online-only and is taught by one of the best professors I’ve ever had the opportunity to study with. I know, from taking her class last semester, that she’s fantastic. This semester, though, I’ve found that I get very little from her lectures, or, in fact, her class, and I think I’ve put my finger on why: it is not sufficiently interactive; she talks into a microphone, and there are Powerpoint slides, but there’s no way for me to raise my hand in real time and ask a question or make a comment as it occurs to me. I can’t walk up to her after class and comment on something she said. She can’t tell when half of the class is staring at her, dumbfounded by what she is saying, and we can’t go off track into those wonderful side discussions where, in most courses (and my course with her last semester was much more the rule than the exception), the real learning occurs. We listen to the lecture, and there are discussion boards where we can post comments and questions after the fact. Our assignments are given to us over Blackboard, returned to the professor via Blackboard or e-mail, and presumably graded in Blackboard. Sometimes, our assignments require that we post to Blackboard, so we can see what other students are doing, if we care to read through 40+ other students’ comments.*
My other class is also taught by an excellent professor–admittedly, I have less experience with her classes, but from the semester so far, I have to say, I like her style. I always get something out of her class. Except for that one time when I was too sick to go in and watched the course on Panopto. That was terrible, because, like any good professor, she is interactive in her teaching style and tries to engage her students. She asks questions and encourages students to ask questions of her. It works excellently for people who are there in person, but for someone watching the recorded version, it is terrible. You can’t hear the in-person students’ comments, so you’re getting half-conversations, which is actually worse than if the professor just stood up there and lectured. She could repeat everything the students say, perhaps, but I suspect that would wind up annoying everyone involved. And there is still a Blackboard discussion component to the class, which is non-ideal, as well.
Perhaps online courses are the great equalizer: fantastic professors are brought down nearly to the level of their most sub-par colleagues (I had a couple of worse in-person experiences in engineering school than these online courses, I admit), and even the most excellent students are reduced to passively watching the lecture and waiting anywhere from an hour to a few days for any comment they might make or question they might be asked to be acknowledged and given a response. Their active engagement in the content is not encouraged, and so they do not provide it to the extent that they could.
*A sidebar: I love the democratic nature of the Web, the fact that we all have a voice and can all post our thoughts and opinions. I believe that some of the other students have things to teach the class, and perhaps, for in-person courses, it’s a shame when only the people who are brave enough to speak up in class have that opportunity. On the other hand, people only speak up in class when they have something they feel is worthwhile to say, and discussions in Blackboard do not work that way. We are encouraged to post–in fact, our participation grades count on it–and although we are told “do not post unless you have something meaningful to say,” there still seems to be an awful lot of noise to it all. The quality level is definitely lower, and the benefits of the “discussion” are dubious at best.
(Continued here.)
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