Source: Reuters

Help at hand: it is ¡®often the more prosaic¡¯ use of technology that aids learning

Lecturers need to develop a better grasp of how technology can be used to facilitate learning, and better understand the way in which students use digital resources.

This is according to a paper by academics at Monash University in Melbourne, who surveyed more than 1,600 undergraduates at two universities in Australia and found that while digital technologies are a ¡°central element of undergraduate education¡±, they are ¡°clearly not ¡®transforming¡¯ the nature of university teaching and learning¡±.

¡°University educators perhaps need to temper enthusiasms for what might be achieved through technology-enabled learning and develop better understandings of the realities of students¡¯ encounters with digital technology,¡± the paper, ¡°What works and why? Student perceptions of ¡®useful¡¯ digital technology in university teaching and learning¡±, finds.

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Published in the Studies in ³ÉÈËVRÊÓƵ journal, the research highlights a number of distinct digital ¡°benefits¡± of technology identified by participating students. These include the ¡°organising and managing the logistics of studying¡± (46.9 per cent of respondents say this is a benefit); ¡°flexibility of place and location¡± of studying (32.7 per cent); and time-saving (30.6 per cent). Michael Henderson, senior lecturer in the Faculty of Education at Monash and co-author of the study, said that there was ¡°considerable evidence¡± that technology was aiding learning but that it was not always ¡°the cutting edge or headline use of technologies but often the more prosaic or mundane¡±.

Other findings from the same survey, which are to be published in a separate forthcoming paper by a team from Monash and Griffith University, in Queensland, reveal the ways in which students say technology is impeding their work.

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The most commonly cited problem is ¡°disruption¡± (28 per cent of respondents) ¨C instances where technology has failed to function, preventing them from working. Diversion (25 per cent), where technology ¨C either their own or someone else¡¯s ¨C distracts them from the task at hand, and difficulty (24 per cent), where technology might not be the most suitable tool for a scholarly task, are also cited.

Finally, 19 per cent of students said that technology could be a ¡°detriment¡± to their learning, citing ¡°death by PowerPoint¡± in lectures and poor quality digital learning materials as examples.

chris.parr@tesglobal.com