Students demanding online learning resources: almost all of them
Lecturers looking slightly panicked by this: many!
I am amending old courses and designing new courses ready for 2008-9 at the moment. Academics certainly have to plan ahead, working sometimes 6 months, even up to a year in advance. However, I decided to take notice of the feedback I was getting from this year’s student cohort and am trying to bring my courses into the 21st century by using online resources: easier said that done as you can imagine!
Many lecturers are resistant to using WebCT and other online/electronic resources while others embrace it whole-heartedly. I can see why people might be wary: it takes a lot of work to get your courses enabled on these technologies, only to find that in a year or two the institution has changed its software package, or that students are learning in a different way, leaving you having invested weeks into a now defunct technology. At the other end of the scale, the enthusiasts are using electronic learning environments to replace face to face contact. One course in our department is run on a lecture-only basis with small group seminars replaced by online tutorials and discussion fora. The technology also opens up access to universities to those who would not necessarily have come previously making online degrees the latest buzz word on the lips of many heads of department.
But I am starting small, no grand desires to conquer the electronic world! I am simply opening up another avenue of learning to my students. Digitising chapters from key textbooks is a great way of ensuring all students on a large course can have access to the text. It helps cash-starved librarians too; they no longer have to keep buying multiple copies of the same book to try to keep up with students demand. The downside is that copyright rules restrict the amount of text that can be digitised in this way, but it’s a start. I am also hoping to introduce formative assessments that students can work through in order to develop web evaluation skills: so they know for themselves why wikipedia should not be cited in essays rather than having to be told by their lecturers!
