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UW partners with company to bring new technology to classrooms
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by Taylor Hughes
Thursday, September 25, 2003
Handheld wireless-computing technology was implemented in several University of Wisconsin language courses this week.
The new technology is part of a project put forth by the College of Letters and Science’s Learning Support Services Instructor Network for Teaching in a Multimedia Environment (IN TIME) program and a grant from Hewlett Packard, Inc. awarded to LSS in the summer of 2002.
Equipment, including laptops, handheld digital assistants and wireless-networking equipment was included in the grant, Learning Support Services director Read Gilgen said. He added that the UW also received a monetary donation from the computer company. The supplies will be used in about 15 programs designed to provide a more effective undergraduate educational experience at the University of Wisconsin with the implementation of emerging technologies.
Some programs include the use of wireless devices to work with sound files in foreign-language programs, laptops and handhelds to conduct chat sessions with students in other countries or, in some cases, wireless handhelds to improve student interaction in discussions.
One such program, being implemented by comparative-literature professor Keith Cohen, involves the use of wireless-handheld devices in his Comparative Literature 203 course. In discussion sections this week, students taking the course were given state-of-the-art wireless devices provided by HP and asked to view a short film. After the film was shown, students were asked to respond to the film using their handhelds and send the information back to the teaching assistant’s central laptop. The students then discussed their reactions.
“Everyone had to comment — not just the person who raised [his or her] hand,” said UW freshman and Comp Lit 203 student Kate Robin. “There was more student involvement,” Robin added.
Teaching assistants for the class also noticed a significant difference in student interaction. “It definitely made the discussion more lively,” teaching assistant for the class Drago Momcilovic said.
LSS’s IN TIME program is working with HP in coordination with Division of Information Technology and various members of the LSS staff. The program started in the late 1990s and has implemented several successful projects for integrating technological advances into teaching methods in recent years.
The current program is part of a third round of projects and experiments executed by IN TIME and designed to begin implementation of technology in the classroom.
“We encourage faculty not to start out by revamping an entire course but to start small by revising three or four lectures,” Gilgen said. “After their (pilot) semester is over, they typically implement their [solution] on a larger, broader scale.”
HP’s call for grant proposals included the company’s goals for the initiative. The program stated its goal “to positively influence the teaching and learning experience of students on campus,” and “to stimulate explorations in emerging technologies,” as stated in the original proposal.
Grants from HP were awarded to four universities including the UW, though UW’s grant was the only award given to a humanities-oriented project.
