How Students Are 'Evolving' With Technology

Scott Jaschik writes "A new study explores how "digital natives" (today's college students) have changing technology habits — and how those habits have infiltrated the classroom. What does that mean for professors and their teaching methods?"

Note taking

Maybe it's just me, but I've tried taking notes on my laptop before and I just didn't retain the information as well as when I physically write notes with paper and pencil.

Re:

The biggest problem I saw was that the tap-tap of typing is extremely annoying, especially in smaller class sizes (granted in a huge lecture hall, the general noise of the room drowned it out).

Re:

I finished school a couple years ago now, at that time the kid who brought a laptop to every class was called "laptop", and it wasn't the most endearing nickname.

My girlfriend is still in school now though, and the majority of her pre-med program class

Yeah

The only subject I have trouble seeing easily transferable to an electronic form without some form of tablet would be math and engineering subjects which require extensive equations. There is no good standard equation editor that can create and manipulate formulas nearly as fast as can be done by hand afaik. (Although LaTeX equations do look a whole lot better than by hand once you get all the symbols in the right place.)

As an engineer I stuck to desktop computers, took notes on paper, until this year. I have a Ph.D., and my comittee consists of a colleague at work, my advisor at school, and me doing work at both work and school and home. So I broke down and I use it for research, but I still take paper notes. You just can't effectively do a free body diagram on a notebook...

Re:

I found that I did better in classes where I used my laptop to take notes. I remembered more, had an easier time sharing, and didn't have to try deciphering my own writing.

But there were only a few classes where I actually did that...most professors th

Re:

Perhaps, but why should other students in your classes suffer? Laptops in the classroom are just obnoxious if the people with them are doing anything more than keeping up with powerpoint slides, and even that isn't the most useful as the cost of a proper p

Re:

I've never found laptops to intrude on my learning.

Tha[tap]t's[tap] bec[tappety-tap]ause[tappity-click][tap] yo[tap]u nev[tappy-tappy]er [tap]sit [tap][tap]nex[tap]t to[tap] your[tappa-tappa-tappa]self[tap].

Re:

Sigh, it isn't my opinion, it is a long standing tradition in the academic world that people not make unnecessary noises during a class period. It is a distracting and rude thing to do. It really isn't any different than talking in class or popping bubble

Re:

That bit about "where you are guaranteed to have a writing implement" is an issue for me. My laptop leaves my side only at mealtime and when traveling to work (where I also have a computer), and even at those times it is often with me. Finding a pen or p

Re:Note taking

I use a Tablet PC/Notebook hybrid =D

All benefits of handwritten note plus ultimate storeage, organization, and the ability to copy/paste large swaths of repeated information and to resize/reshape/duplicate graphs and tables. Built-in microphone is starting to get use, too. Its nice to be able to hear a lecture over again encase I missed important info during note taking.

Re:

Maybe it's just me, but I've tried taking notes on my laptop before and I just didn't retain the information as well as when I physically write notes with paper and pencil.

Starting in 7th grade up through current time, I would take notes in pencil and then

Re:

I'm not a student anymore, but I'm a bit of a digital-age kid, so I'll still offer my thoughts. For me, it has always been a bit of a trade-off. If I type, I can't draw little pictures and arrows all over the place. But if I use a notebook, I can't read

Re:Note taking

If I wrote down notes, I tended to miss parts of the lecture, usually important stuff.

I didn't have that problem with the notebook.

Re:

Whenever I had a class where I'd worry I'd miss something important while taking notes, I'd bring along my microcassette recorder. Then I could go over my notes re-listening to the lecture and fill in gaps (and also make more effort to make the chicken sc

Re:Note taking

... some profs don't like cassette recorders ...

I think that might have been the point of the original post. The profs are just going to have to adapt.

Only if you can prove students actually benefit

The killer sentence is in the second paragraph

"Most students (60.9 percent) believe it improves their learning."

Most students also believe drinking 10 pints of beer and farting loudly is really funny and will improve their chances of getting laid....

What the students believe and what is actually true may be two completely different things. I should imagine most professors will turn round and ask to see proof that the technology really does improve student learning before adopting a different teaching methodology.

(disclaimer: I'm a university researcher working in technology and education)

Re:

Some people can type plain English much faster than they can write. Therefore, in most humanities courses it pays off to use a laptop for notetaking (particularly in Ivy League-type schools for obvious reasons).

Re:

It's no doubt due to my Ivy League education, but I have no idea why that's obvious. Am I supposed to be a particularly good typist (false) or have particularly poor handwriting (true)?

AntiSocial society

You know, I love technology and all that it has done and is continuing to do, but I'm also starting to feel that technology is making a large portion of society very antisocial. When I was younger I used to enjoy going to the library, playing in the park etc., nowadays I see a huge portion of younger people skipping the libraries in favor of wikipedia or finding it online. Same goes for interaction, say dating... Why should someone head to a bar, coffeeshop, the laundrymat to meet someone when they could find it online. Alot of interaction has gone down the tubes and while it may be nice to think of an "e-classroom" of the future, I'd be pretty pissed if I couldn't clown around in person as opposed to faking smiles behind a screen. Screw that give me some dirty smelly kids, jokes, teachers throwing chalk at me versus a "digital classroom"

Re:

I'm with you Packetmon. I got through a demanding program in Electrical Engineering in the 90s without owning a computer. I used the UNIX terminals in the engineering building for homework, and used the Mac lab to write my papers. Saved me a lot of mone

Re:AntiSocial society

I agree, which is something I find rather amusing considering the huge number of people using "social" networking sites, making "friends" on MySpace, etc.

There is a lot to be said about a digital classroom at a certain point. It can be great in many college classes. I am highly against the "shove computers into higg/middle/elementary schools" movement. I've been in those schools, I know just how poorly they get used. Instead of something good the kids get "How to use Word" (not how to use a word processor). "How to type". "How to make a PowerPoint presentation". Some bits of this are useful (especially typing) but these are being taught not as means to an end, but the end its self.

Re:

What were you doing being social in the library? I thought the whole point of them was to actually get away from distractions and be able to concentrate? In all seriousness though, just because someone isn't being social the exact same way you were doesn

Re:AntiSocial society

On the same token, I'm glad for all this technology because I'm no longer forced to interact with other people unless I particularly want to. (And, incidentally, isn't it a little creepy, trying to meet people at the landromat?)

Re:AntiSocial society

Actually I see some technological trends in the opposite direction. Sites like Facebook enable people to be connected to each other more quickly and pervasively than ever before. Organizing events is easier. Photos from parties get posted and commented on within hours of the party ending! Keeping in touch with old friends is now so much easier than it used to be. I actually think that this increases socialization for many people. In particular, those on the "more awkward" end of the normal distribution (e.g. "geeks" and "nerds") now have an easier time of becoming socially connected (both online and offline). Sometimes it can actually be a bad thing, of course--people are spending time socializing online (and planning more offline social activities), which can disrupt other pursuits (e.g. learning!).

With regard to the library... I've never thought of the library as a social-hub. In general, for every hour that is saved by using a more efficient online resource, instead of walking to the library, that's an hour that can be spent doing something else (e.g. learning something new or hanging out with friends).

So, I'm not at all convinced that this technology is making people anti-social. For every anti-social anecdote I've seen, I've also seen instances where the technology is drawing people closer together, and helping forge friendships. Humans are social animals. Technology can't change that--if anything, it reinforces it.

Re:

By your own examples the technology isn't causing people to become antisocial. Its simply changing where the socialization happens. Those that are uncomfortable with change will of course have a wide range of reactions including mild discomfort and proclai

Sure... digital is cool but...

I consider myself an early adopter and a person who's generally always interested in finding a competetive advantage, but one thing is for sure: when it comes to studying, I like to have something tactile in my hands. It's almost as though interacting with a paper medium is easier to deal with then a digital medium, and through that interaction I tend to learn more. It's why I've printed out all the Powerepoint slides to class and write on the slides in longhand rather then add notes on the actual slides themselves. I'm not sure if that's something that will eventuially change as people start becoming more exposed to computers at an early age, but I do believe that in my generation (college) people still generally prefer to have a non-digital medium for actual learning. I've rarely run into anyone who would rather read a digital textbook then have some sort of physical document/book in their hands.

Re:

There are plenty of studies that have been done to show that

A) Certain people learn better in certain ways. http://www.vark-learn.com/english/index.asp [vark-learn.com]

B) The atmosphere you learn something in is the atmosphere you'll recall it best in. This means that if

Re:

Do people that have never tried, or even had a chance to try, really count? We are talking about implementing this in education. If the child grows up with the chance/choice, and still prefers books, that's one thing. But if they've never had the chance

Re:

but I do believe that in my generation (college) people still generally prefer to have a non-digital medium for actual learning. I've rarely run into anyone who would rather read a digital textbook then have some sort of physical document/book in their hands.

It all boils down to what you're used to and what makes you feel comfortable. I love reading books on a palm device. I can curl up in bed and it's every bit as nice as having a physical book. I've been doing some computer certs and the books for the subje

The real advantage IMO

See, technology does has its advantages. Let's talk learning here. To me, when I was in school, there were two types of lectures, two types of classes, two types of professors/teachers. I could usually tell right away which type a particular class would be, and that would set the stage for me and eventually my final grade.

The two types:
- Rote memorization
- Conceptual learning

Back before google was a verb I couldn't just 'google' my question and get the answer within seconds. It was advantageous to use some of my (maybe a lot of it) on simple rote memorization.

But now, with so much information literally at my fingertips, I see no reason to fill as much of my memory up with the rote knowledge and facts. I feel that I am better served by learning the art of skepticism, philosophy, conceptualization, and the general techniques used to analyze, logically, the goings-on in my daily life.

I think that in today's schools, if they choose to embrace technology in this way, you will see that in this sense this is advantageous over not having the technology at all.

Re:

These are very good points. In programming courses these days the teachers are saying that learning the language isn't as important as learning the concept, but then they teach it in a very language-oriented manner and often are unable to get the concept a

Re:The real advantage IMO

I suspect that that sort of personalized schooling is possible for the wealthy.

For the rest, we'll just have to wait for true Artificial Intelligence. It might be a while.

Imagine that, a professor who literally IS a walking encyclopedia. /orbit

I was always blown away when reading about the biographies of the smarty smarts from history. You didn't typically get contributions to philosophy and the sciences from the poor because they didn't have the free time for any kind of productive recreational pursuits. They were lucky to have an hour for some beer before passing out before the next 12 hour workday. But these kids of the wealthy, they had the best minds of the day hired as tutors. You look at their accomplishments and think "Holy shit, they were geniuses beyond compare!" And then you look at the modern education system and think "hold on there, they were bright but just look at how inefficient our own education system is. Imagine if the kinds of resources thrown at the rich kids were thrown at one of the bright poor kids in class. Just imagine where he could be!"

I wouldn't necessarily say that AI would have to be involved, we'd just have to seriously reconsider the way we structure learning in our society. The farmer's son learns at his side in the field. The cobbler's son learns at his side in the workshop. But with the industrial revolution, there was no time for taking kids to work along with dad -- maybe set them to work changing bobbins and losing fingers but that's it. For middle class jobs, junior isn't going to be working with his dad at the bank. But imagine if he were. I was taught math and reading at home before we ever encountered it in school. My dad was a mechanic by trade and it would have been quite interesting if I were able to work alongside him for part of the year, see how things are done. I have no aptitude for mechanics but it would have still been an interesting experience. Imagine if a very bright kid could be paired with a suitable mentor and take half his lessons that way. Yes, I know there were some drawbacks to apprenticeships historically but you can say the same thing about our compulsory education system, a mixed bag.

Similar to...

Note that this story is somewhat similar to a previous Slashdot item [slashdot.org] on "When 'Digital Natives' Go to the Library [insidehighered.com]" (complete with the 'Digital Native' buzz-word that I have not seen used on other sites).

This quote included in TFA is, I think, the best way to look at integrating new technologies with teaching:

Good teachers are good with or without IT and students learn a great deal from them. Poor teachers are poor with or without IT and students learn little from them.

It's a truism that's pretty obvious, but bears repeating. In my opinion, technology can only enhance the teaching/learning experience, since good teachers will have the wisdom to deploy it carefully. Less skilled teachers will deploy it poorly (e.g. using it as a gimmick instead of an useful tool), but then again those are precisely the teachers that would be wasting student's time with other tools (chalkboards, textbooks, etc.).

This is not to say that there have not been "growing pains" with integrating technology into teaching. Certainly I've seen otherwise competent professors make mistakes with over-zealously deploying an immature teaching tool. But, overall, I think the unsurprising conclusion is that all these new technologies provide advantages to those who are smart enough to exploit them properly.

My general view is that rather than try to integrate specific technologies (which then become gimmick-like), it's best to simply make generic resources available to students and teachers (e.g. computer labs, Wi-Fi, laptop loaner programs, site-wide software licenses, etc.). When resources are available, students will inherently gravitate towards using them in the most useful ways. For example, rather than explicitly integrating a particular piece of tech into a course (a particular software package, forcing students to use an online message board, etc.), my inclination would be to make a bunch of avenues for learning available, and see which ones the students inherently use.

Looks more like entertainment

I was in the first class of engineers which my school required to have a computer. That was 20 years ago. I now live in that college town, and have occasional interaction with the engineering department and its students. (No, that's not what I meant - get your mind out of the gutter). They use computers for the same things I did - CAD, spreadsheets, term papers. They get more out of them through the internet as many professors put assignments, notes and samples on line. We didn't play too many games because there weren't many immersive ones, and we didn't surf because the internet did not exist then as it exists now. The web had not yet been created (by web, I mean HTML and browsers). We didn't chat, unless you count BBSs - which I don't. We didn't download music or videos - most PCs didn't have sound cards, video wasn't really possible on an 8086, and p0rn, even if it existed was not really a hot item at 320x240 (in a stunning 256 colors).

It seems that most of the progress has been in added functionality (as in more built-in functions - 3D solid cad, more rows/cols) and speed of processing. Everything else seems to be more about entertainment, whether its games, connectivity, or casual information (surfing). Students can amass more crap via downloads, but if you never print it out or look at it on the screen page-by-page it's just as bad as a Kinkos-printed set of notes where you watch the comb spine slowly yellow over the years. Actually, I suppose its worse - without that yellow spine in the bookcase to remind you that you have it, you don't even remember that lecture note set exists, buried in some sub-folder in you document directory.

IMHO very little has changed in 20 years on the teaching front. The critical component to education in the interactive ability of the teacher and student to work together. Web-enabled learning still tens to fall short, imho, and expanding class attendance through distance learning just reduces the opportunity to get everyone involved in the learning process.

Wait...I take part of that back - email does make a difference. Quick questions can be answered efficiently in an asynchronous manner that wasn't possible in my day (yes, we had voicemail, but couldn't copy the whole class). Still, it doesn't really scream "new teaching methods are necessary," unless new teaching methods involves putting web blocking software in the routers to keep the kids from surfing in a boring lecture.

Technology & history

I'm a mature student doing an undergraduate history degree at a UK university, and the lecturers say that historical research has been completely revolutionised in the last five years by the internet. As an example, take Early English Books Online (EEBO),

More hurt than good, really.

It's hard to say no to a new tech grant because new computers and the possibility of a "laptop for every child" can look so good in the Sunday paper, but the truth of the matter is that high technology (like PDAs, cellphones, computers, even graphing calcu

mixed feelings

Having spent a lot of time in the education system, both in front and behind the desk, I have mixed feelings about all this IT craze. When I was a pupil back in the 80's, I had to brew my own text processor (cp/m computer, wordprocessor still to be invented...). Wonderful experience, I typed back home my (terrible) handwritten notes. I still don't think it helped me a bit learning my lessons, but it taught me about computers when it was still quite new and shinny. Coolness factor at the time, about zero. Being a nerd wasn't hype then.

Reel forward : 20 years later, I'm teaching criminal law. Still a nerd, but mainly as a hobbyist. Still produce most of my work on computers, likes wikipedia (but know it's not a source of scholarly value), use fluently most parts of internet. Students in front of me are wired as much as they can lift. After letting them do as they please (we're at university, they should be grown up, FFS), I have to step in and forbid recording devices in my class room, read the riot act (throwing the lowest possible marks as if shot in burst with a M16) at those stupid enough to forget I too can google parts of their dissertation to find the true author, etc. Now, I don't even provide a powerpoint during the course, they f*ckin' have to listen to me and write things down with a pencil. If they don't like that, my door is always open and works both ways.

Finally, my feeling is IT is very good for homework, library work, and anything research-related. But it's the worst ennemy of the student willing to truly learn. I know many will swear that it's helping them, but that's self delusion. I too had a friend before internet who used to swear sticking colored stars next to chapters heads was helping him. It failed. he should have read the actual contents instead of fuzzing around. So have done successful students for past centuries, so will they for centuries to come.

Nothing replace hard personnal work. But there is still a place for IT : it's a considerable step forward for anonymity of dissertations, and it avoids students having low marks for the sole reason the teacher can't decipher them because they have a bad writing.

What a superb article

I'm so glad that my eyes 'evolved' since my birth to allow me to read it on an LCD screen rather than the primitive CRT screens that my parents 'evolved' with. I guess my DNA got mangled about the same time that my fingers 'evolved' the ability to press little square buttons in order to produce this post.

In other news, I'm still awaiting the mutation that will allow me to 'evolve' the ability to let pop science jargon slip by unchallenged. I pray to God every day that to reach in with with His Noodly Appendage and screw with my chromosomes.

Re:

Just because Evolution with a capital E often refers to the modern theory descended from Darwin's theory of natural selection and descent through modification, doesn't mean that evolution stopped being a perfectly legitimate term in unrelated scientific an

why so few "mass media" professors?

The idea is fairly old - Thomas Edison the inventor of the phonograph and co-inventor of movie films proposed commercializing education by recording the most charismatic teachers and showing them at schools. This supposedly would solve two cost problems: first you stimulate students with the best teachers; second you reduce the number of [expensive] teachers by replicating their presententions. EVERY TIME a new form of media was invented since Edison someone has proposed the same arguments for commercializing education- to this day, now with Internet text messaging and videos. To a small degree the InterNet has facilitated grade-school charter school and college-trade schools. It cuts the cost of classrooms, but not the labor costs of interactive teachers. There must be something fundamental about the interative give-and-take of teachers and students thats resisted change int the 2500 years since Plato's Academy.

Re:

Of course this won't happen. You mentioned that teaching is an interactive process, but you forgot to add that the TIAA would require a payment of nearly the cost of a typical teacher to replay the recordings. Technology is about opportunity to increase re

Who says you evolve with technology?

I can point to several religious websites that will refute that very notion. I'm not sure if I find it ironic, tragic, or maddening that religionists will use the latest in multimedia technology, the product of the scientific method and research, to spread their anti-intellectual and anti-science message. And they would certainly take great umbrage at the use of the word "evolution" to describe the changes in their evangelism strategy. We're talking about using satellite and internet communications to promulgate the tribal superstitions of poor, ignorant goat-herders. Ugh! If we were still listening to you guys, you wouldn't have satellites and TV! You wouldn't even have PA systems!

Oh, well. At least the Muslims have been known to use the technology to party [youtube.com]. I've heard of sucka MC's but never mullah MC's.

Re:Change along with technology required to be hea

That's not always true. I've seen a lot of professors who were able to capture the students' attention, and actually have them learn the material quite well, with only a blackboard and a piece of chalk. I've also seen a lot of professors with all this tricked out technology and completely fail at teaching, either by not getting the students interested, or completing failing at getting the point of the lecture across. So, while technology can help, especially if the professor understands it, I would say that the majority of professors who are bad, can't be helped by just throwing more technology at the problem. And professors who are already good, don't need high tech gadgets to teach.

Re:

Chalk and blackboard? Pfft. My MAE623 professor uses **transparencies** :P (despite the fact that each room is equipped with an LCD projector, and there are several rooms equipped with digital blackboards ... he is old school and uses the overhead projecto

Re:

That's not always true. I've seen a lot of professors who were able to capture the students' attention, and actually have them learn the material quite well, with only a blackboard and a piece of chalk.

I find it largely depends on the course. I find maths must be written by hand as the layout of the formula and notes on the page can be just as important as the information itself and trying to replicate this on a standard computer is simply too time cons

Re:Change along with technology required to be hea

I've found that if a lecturer isn't very good he's going to get worse if you give him Powerpoint.

Re:

I had a teacher who put a box outside the classroom with a sign that basically said "Put tamagoshi or gameboy here during the class, any tamagoshi or gameboy found inside the classroom will be hammered", of course, I was 7 then and no one had cellphone or

Re:

I feel sorry for your children who have to deal with your inferior methods. For example I write my notes before attending my lecture by reading the lecture notes provided. I can follow along more easily and only have to add what is communicated verbally in

Re:

Inferior does not imply bad, simply not as good. People use to ride around on perfectly healthy and usable horses for a long, long time. I'd still call them inferior to travelling by an automobile though.

Re:

I've just messaged your prof to tell him to throw a piece of chalk at you.