Hawley III, J. A., & Crynes, B. L. (1997, November). Stimulating development of technology based teaching/learning modules through a technical elective. In Frontiers in Education Conference, 1997. 27th Annual Conference. Teaching and Learning in an Era of Change. Proceedings. (Vol. 3, pp. 1399-1401). IEEE.

Categories: Technology, Communication Design

Summary and Citation:

The University of Oklahoma took a unique approach to help faculty use technology to deliver better tradition, online, and distance education courses. They "created a special three-credit hour elective technical elective called 'Design and Engineering Interactive Presentations' (ENGR 4510)" (Hawley & Crynes, 1997, p. 1399). in this course, student helped faculty improve curricula for other courses. Students would find and work with a faculty member to create a technology-mediated learning modules and/or presentations.

The faculty found this approach highly effective and the student responses from the first years of the program were positive. It is surprising this has not become more commonplace throughout education. Perhaps our current tools are so effective that the time element of creation is not enough to merit a course, or perhaps teaching and research assistants have and can fulfill this role without the challenges of creating and managing an accredited course.