[Air-l] laptops and Internet access in class

[Sam Ladner]

This is an interesting discussion.

A colleague and I redesigned our first-year courses to include laptops and
internet access, as a pilot project. It was incredibly difficult to get the
technology we wanted (tho wi fi was already available for everyone who
brought their OWN laptop). We redesigned the class to have round tables, not
lecture style, and a single laptop per 3 students.

We then interspersed "mini lectures" with some PPT slides with "mini
exercises" which were typically Web-based. An example was visiting several
statistical agencies' sites and investigating how they asked the question of
race or ethnicity. Students collectively (in groups of 3) visited the sites,
and as a table or group, collated their responses to critical questions.

These were then shared with the larger group of the entire class. From
there, the next "mini lecture" would start.

We found students did indeed still IM and check email during class. However,
they were also much more engaged with the subject matter and had a better
grasp than they would have in a traditional lecture style.

Our learnings would amount to:

* have students share laptops, and keep an eye on who controls it (dominant
personalities? men? women? senior students?)
* design interactive exercises intended to develop "critical surfing skills"
and autonomous learning (i.e., without their professors holding their hands)
* reconfigure the physical classroom to support collaborative learning over
lecturing

Now if you do none of those things, well then, go ahead and shut off the wi
fi.