'Wikify' teaching: technological interactivity to support teaching and methods to evaluate its effectiveness

Vigentini, L. (2008) 'Wikify' teaching: technological interactivity to support teaching and methods to evaluate its effectiveness. In: Psychology Learning and Teaching Conference, Bath, July 2008,

Abstract

For many years scholars in education, psychology, computing science and artificial intelligence have explored the potential benefits that customization of learning technology could purport to students' learning. The most appealing aspect is the concept of adaptivity, which is explored in details in a recent review (Brusilowsky 2001). In most cases the results presented seem to produce positive effects and promote students' engagement to a varying degree of success. However there are many that strongly endorse the 'no significant effect' of the use of technology in support of learning (Russell 2001, http://www.nosignificantdifference.org/). It is generally quite difficult to draw clear conclusions from the chaotic literature which seems to be characterized by a wide variety of implementation which are contextually valid and successful, but using very different methodologies to evaluate effectiveness and have a close to impossible reproducibility of the results due to the variability and unpredictability of the students' cohorts in real life. The use of real courses for experimental studies is not feasible as it is not possible to use appropriate sampling techniques to split real courses without penalising one of the groups, therefore most studies produce results based on either lab-based experiments or abstract their findings based on a single course snapshot. In recent years Graff (2003, 2005) showed how cognitive styles and browsing strategies as well as site structure can be associated. However, his research is what can be classed as lab-based research. Cook (2005) also offers a very good overview of how learning and cognitive styles should be considered by educators when designing web-based learning. There are also a number of studies investigating the relationship between cognitive and learning styles and academic achievement (Cano-Garcia & Hughes 2000, Diseth 2003). However, to date, it seems that there isn’t a comprehensive study which is taking into account cognitive and learning styles, the use of web-based support material in a real course and the effect that these have on academic performance. In the past 2 years we have been studying students' online behaviours in a real setting and, using a mix of techniques, we set to explore the relationship of styles with the use of learning technologies. In particular, we collected data on thinking styles (Sternebers's mental self-government) cognitive styles (VICS-WA Peterson, Deary & Austin 2003) and approaches to learning (ASSIST, Entwistle & al 2000). All these measures are then used prospectively to explore usage data and academic performance to provide a rich students’ profiles.

• Item Type: Conference Proceedings
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Vigentini, Dr Lorenzo
• Authors: Vigentini, L.
• Subjects: B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology; Q Science > QA Mathematics > QA76 Computer software
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > School of Education