The strategy
When we started we had really naïve ideas of how to accomplish our goals. Our first project was to create an interactive lab manual on CD-ROM for a conventional wet lab. What we really learned is that this kind of work requires a unique team--if we did this on our own, we would not be able to do it in a reasonable amount of time. So we hired a programmer to program the software and an artist who helped us with the images and the overall design of the software. It made a big difference. But creating a CD-ROM was very expensive in terms of time and people that you need. It also locks you in. It's possible to make changes, but you have to hire the programmer and the artist, and if another faculty wants to customize it to his use, it's not easy. The turnaround time was too great; it was very frustrating.
Meanwhile web technology had made a really big leap in the last few years. I remember asking the chemistry education postdoctoral fellow who came to work with us if we could make the material accessible independent of the CD, that they can just go to a computer and dial in to get the same material via the Internet. At first he said, "No," but then he came back and said, "That's an interesting thought."
So we have started to work in this area, not focusing on a lab at first, because we need to do more thinking and we are probably not quite there yet. But we started to do lecture work in introductory chemistry courses, which are required for all biology majors before they take biology courses. We thought, what happens if we have those lectures available at any time, on-line, that allows students to learn on-line with a lot of additional tools. So it's not just a replication of the lecture but also an expansion of the class. Then we can use the time in the lecture to engage students intellectually at a higher level, with interactive work, collaborative work, thinking about case studies and problems. Here's an example screen shot of an organic lecture while here's another example of an introductory chemistry lecture screen shot
We have finished this project; we taped the lectures and we've put them on-line with additional work so the students can follow the lecture in a very different way. They have additional material that helps them understand, they can look at it over and over, they can search for certain topics, and they get quizzes on-line so they can check their understanding.
In the summer, we took it a step further and offered one of the courses for the first time as an on-line course. The production was relatively easy because we had a very, very good teacher; we taped and then digitized the lecture; and then again we annotated and enriched the material considerably. So the turnaround time was very fast, and it was produced so that even students with a dinky modem can look at the material at home without any loss in quality. We also stay in contact with the students via e-mail.
Ultimately, we want to videotape procedures for biology lab courses and show them on-line, and also show animations on-line. But we started with the chemistry courses because it was an easier task for us to try first. We are in contact with the students via e-mail, but our goal is to be in contact with them in a synchronous mode; again, the technology is not quite there yet for the number of students participating in this class. We want to go beyond the chat room kind of interactions, because as soon as you have more than four people, it just doesn't work anymore. Meanwhile, since the technology is coming up very fast, we're also developing the infrastructure to allow that to happen.
The courses
The original course for the Interactive Lab Manual was "Biochemical Techniques," an introductory biochemistry/molecular biology wet lab course. The Web-based chemistry courses comprise a one-year sequence of three general chemistry courses: Chemistry 6A-C. These three medium-to-large-sized courses are required for the biology major. These are lecture courses, but there are lots of visuals and lots of experiments done in front of the students.
The learning technology
Interactive Lab Manual (ILM): We created this multimedia CD for the laboratory course, "Biochemical Techniques," to allow students a "virtual hands-on" experience and prepare them better for actual time in a convention wet lab. The CD is available on computers maintained by the Biology Division and available to all students. The ILM is non-linear; students can choose any modules they are interested in or need to work on more intensively. For example, the "Experiments" modules provide simulations of exercises in a wet lab, while the "Techniques" modules give demonstrations of equipment use, such as spectrophotometry procedures, among others. The presentation of the material is very sophisticated, and the spectral photometer really is a piece of virtual equipment. And, keeping in mind that today's undergraduates grew up with video games, the ILM presents the materials with extra twists and "pizzazz" integrated into the ILM to surprise students and keep them engaged.
You can see sample screen shots from the ILM CD-ROM at http://www-mill.ucsd.edu/. This website also has links to the preliminary website version of the ILM CD, put up on the Web by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, which funded the CD-ROM project. Remember, however, that Web technology is not quite equal to CD-ROM technology; the simulations on the website will not be quite as impressive. You can read more about the ILM at http://www.hhmi.org/BeyondBio101/ucsd.htm.
The project support
We funded this project with money from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute; the National Science Foundation; the University of California, San Diego; and the University of California System.
The results
The students are really excited about the Web-based courses, but we do get mixed messages. I think some are afraid, just as many faculty are, that this will result in a decrease in faculty-student interactions. That's absolutely not what we have in mind--we want increased interaction and at a higher level. We didn't get that feedback from the CD because the students understood its purpose and really, really liked it. They felt they got out of it exactly what we were hoping they would: a much higher-level preparation and feeling more confident coming into the lab and talking about the issues in the lab. Also, many of our students have English as a second language, and this medium allows them to learn at their own pace and repeat what they don't understand.
We really came to understand that we were working as a team. That's a new kind of situation for many of our faculty; we're so used to doing things alone and not depending on somebody else. But to do something like this, you have to get out of that mode. We're trying to produce something that is technically very easy to use, easy to custom tailor, and easy to modify and annotate. To start this from scratch you do need technical support and you do need money.
This whole process helped Barbara and me become much better teachers, because when you put together such an instructional tool, you have to rethink what you are doing in the classroom, throw away your old yellow notes, and start all over again. It really helped to have the programmer and the artist there--they didn't have the background and when they asked questions, we realized how poorly we described something or how misleading our descriptions were. It has been a very rewarding process for us, the teachers.
If you have any questions, you can contact me at: gwienhausen@ucsd.edu
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