Transcript Building Bridges to Success with Mathematics and Technology Innovations in Teaching Session # 81 Bill White USC Upstate.

Building Bridges to Success with
Mathematics and Technology
Innovations in Teaching
Session # 81
Bill White
USC Upstate
Today, I will address three main topics
•Course management systems
•Online instruction
•Statistics paired with English composition
Course Management Systems
• A program that allows you to use technology to
conduct your class.
• Can be a small part of course instruction or it
can be the entire class.
• Most have been created by publishing
companies; tied to textbooks.
• Note that not all systems are equal, no matter
what the book representatives tell you.
What Systems Are Available?
• WebCT / Blackboard
• WebAssign
• EduTools
• MyMathLab – Pearson-Addison Wesley / Prentice-Hall
• Eduspace – Houghton-Mifflin
• Hawkes System – Quant Systems
• MathZone – McGraw-Hill
• Academic Systems – Plato
What Can You Do with It?
• Assign practice / graded homework,
quizzes, tests
• Use computer generated problems or
create you own
• Let the computer do the grading for you –
grades automatically go to online gradebook
• Give students access to online
demonstrations, tutoring, discussion boards
and other types of assistance
Why Should You Use One?
What are the advantages?
• No papers to distribute or take up.
• Students get immediate feedback on their
work.
• Students have access to course materials
24/7. They can ‘t say they didn’t get the
assignment.
Why Should You Use One?
What are the advantages?
•Students can have access to e-books – this
can save them some money.
• You can use the e-books for in class
discussion.
• Students who want extra practice and help
have many more options available to them.
Why Should You NOT Use One?
What are the disadvantages?
• You are using technology – there is always
the possibility for problems here.
• Questions are not always what you like; it
takes time to create your own.
•Students can’t show their work.
• You can’t be sure that students are doing
their own work.
• Adds to the cost of the course.
Which Ones Have I Used?
• Blackboard (WebCt) – the platform for
many of the publisher systems
• MyMathLab
• Eduspace
Blackboard
• Create / manage courses online
• Use standard files – Word, etc.
• Extras – Chat rooms, email, discussion boards,
digital dropboxes, etc.
• Requires user id / password for access
• Takes some work to learn to use
MyMathLab
• Best publisher system I have used
• Problems match the textbook
• Easy to use with multiple sections of a course;
easy to copy assignments from one section to
another
• You can change settings for an entire class or for
individual students
• You have control of users – you can deactivate
or remove students from the course
Eduspace
• Used one semester in statistics
• Had problems with registration of students
• Problems did not match the textbook – made
assigning problems a bit difficult
• Could not remove students from the class – had
to be done by Eduspace administrators
• They may have corrected these problems since I
used it last.
Setting Up an OCM System
• Many OCM systems are tied to the publishers
textbooks; book reps are best source – they can
arrange demonstrations, class trials and provide
assistance in getting set up
• Set up a student account for yourself
• Make sure you give yourself enough lead time to
become familiar with the basics of the system
• Students must purchase new text book or
purchase access separately
Online Instruction
• I have been doing my online course since
Summer 2007.
•The course is an elementary statistics course.
•Enrollments have been good.
•It is still pretty much campus based because I do
my testing on campus.
•Students in my online class do about the same
grade-wise as my regular students.
Online Instruction
• The material is presented through Breeze for
PowerPoint using Blackboard. I do have some
audio to accompany some of the more important
concepts.
•Technology is a must. We use either Excel or the
TI graphing calculator. I have technology
assistance available online to go along with the
help in the textbook.
•Camtasia Studio is a nice program to enhance
instruction.
Online Instruction
•I do quizzes online; I have collected homework
both electronically and manually.
•All testing is done on campus in a classroom.
Computers are available but the test is pencil and
paper.
•I want to move to totally online. My primary
obstacle continues to be online testing.
Pairing Statistics with English Composition
• Did not get this project off the ground this
semester; plan to try again next fall
• Common students in two classes – elementary
statistics and English composition
• Use the statistics content to drive the English
writing assignments
• Students writing is graded both for content and
writing skill
• Enhance practical understanding of statistics
How to Reach Me
Mail:
Mathematics and Computer Science
USC Upstate
800 University Way
Spartanburg, S.C. 20303
Phone:
(864) - 503-5359
e-mail:
[email protected]
Fax:
Web address:
Building Bridges to Success with
Mathematics and Technology
(864) - 503-5930
http://faculty.uscupstate.edu/bwhite