Keynote address at Engage 2015 teaching conference at Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University

1. The Revitalizing Power of Teaching with
Technology
Dr. Kelvin Thompson
University of Central Florida
@kthompso #refreshbytech
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Sharealike 3.0 Unported
License. Portions of this work are the intellectual property of others and are attributed appropriately in
context.

2. http://bit.ly/thompson_engage2015

3. A Story

4. “desert” by kthompso404 on Flickr CC BY 2.0 https://www.flickr.com/photos/drkelvinthompson/17096084530
Based upon an original CC BY 2.0 work by Josh Sommers on Flickr at
https://www.flickr.com/photos/joshsommers/935470210

5. “Bigelow's Monkeyflower (Mimulus bigelovei)” by Steve Berardi on Flickr CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
https://www.flickr.com/photos/steveberardi/6864068835

6. Observation
When dissatisfied with the status quo,
technology can provide a catalyzing opportunity
for positive change if embraced with the
attitude of a learner, tolerating imperfection and
in search of human moments.

7. Observation
When dissatisfied with the status quo,
technology can provide a catalyzing opportunity
for positive change if embraced with the
attitude of a learner, tolerating imperfection
and in search of human moments.

8. Status Quo
Based upon “Chrysalis” by Sid Mosdell on
Flickr CC BY 2.0
https://www.flickr.com/photos/sidm/561
2179133

9. “You Are Here” by everyday Zoid on Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
https://www.flickr.com/photos/vermegrigio/5923415248

10. BYOD?
• Some studies indicate that 95% of college
students bring cell phones to class each day
- May, 2012
• Nationwide, 90% of adults (98% of those 18-29)
have cell phones with the majority (63%) using
for internet access
• 61% of US adults own a laptop computer
- Pew Internet & American Life Project, 2014
http://bit.ly/pew_data http://bit.ly/may_data

11. Quick Web Search Challenge:
How often is human knowledge
estimated to double?

12. James, J. (2014, April 23). Every
minute of the day. [Infographic].
Retrieved from
http://www.domo.com/blog/2014
/04/data-never-sleeps-2-0
2014

13. Students “Very Likely to Use…”
• Google, etc. (94%)
• Wikipedia, etc. (75%)
• YouTube, etc. (52%)
• Their peers (42%)
• Cliff Notes, etc. (41%)
• News sites of major news organizations (25%)
• Print or electronic textbooks (18%)
• Online databases (EBSCO, etc.) (17%)
• A research librarian (16%)
http://bit.ly/pewreport_full

14. 21st Century Fluency Project http://www.21stcenturyfluency.com
ISTE National Educational Technology Standards (for Students)
http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students
Association of College and Research Libraries Information Literacy Standards
http://www.ala.org/acrl/standards/informationliteracycompetency

15. Employer Expectations
“…baseline information competencies…
knowing how and where to find information
online, without much guidance, to use a search
strategy beyond the first page of Google results,
and to articulate a ‘best solution’ and conclusion
from all that was found.”
[emphasis added]
http://bit.ly/employer_study

16. “A Wall of Books” by mikecogh on Flickr
CC BY 2.0 license
http://www.flickr.com/photos/activeside/2367540964/

17. “That Huge Lecture Theatre” by teddy-rised on Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
https://www.flickr.com/photos/teddy-rised/2814710002

18. “The Illusion of Lecture” by Stephen Ransom on Flickr CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ransomtech/6841686779

19. “Much of classroom teaching
is based on faculty presentation of information to a
group of students who are then responsible for demonstrating
that they have accumulated it. The instructor is
on center stage and determines the official agenda of the
course. In the audience of lecture halls and classrooms,
students are called on occasionally to demonstrate their
comprehension and are tested periodically to determine
their retention. The emphasis is clearly on teaching with
the expectation that if it is done well, students with ability
and ambition will learn.”
Lemke (1995) cited in Oblinger and Maruyama (1996)

20. “Active learning, student engagement and other
strategies that involve students and mention
learning are called learner-centered. And
although learner-centered teaching and efforts
to involve students have a kind of bread and
butter relationship, they are not the same
thing.”
- Dr. Maryellen Weimer
http://bit.ly/Qp8DvD

21. Differences in Orientation
Teaching-Centered Learning-Centered
Deliver instruction Produce learning
Transfer of knowledge from teacher to student Discovery and construction of knowledge
Active faculty Active students
One teaching style Multiple teaching styles
Curriculum development Learning technologies development
Quantity and quality of resources Quantity and quality of outcomes
Quality of faculty Quality of students
Time held constant; learning varies Learning held constant; time varies
Learning is linear and cumulative
Learning is a nesting and interacting of
frameworks
Promote recall Promote understanding
Faculty are lecturers Faculty are designers of learning environments
Learning is competitive and individualistic Learning is cooperative and collaborative
Barr and Tagg (1995) cited in Hartman, Dziuban, and Brophy-Ellison (2007)

22. Student Engagement
…two critical features…
The first is the amount of time and effort students put
into their studies and other educationally purposeful
activities. The second is how the institution deploys its
resources and organizes the curriculum and other
learning opportunities to get students to participate in
activities that decades of research studies show are linked
to student learning.
National Survey of Student
Engagement web site
http://nsse.iub.edu
http://bit.ly/QrbLuF

23. Student Engagement
I would argue that engagement is not solely a proxy [for
learning]; it can also be an end in itself. Our institutions of
higher education are settings where students can
encounter a range of people and ideas and human
experiences that they have never been exposed to
before. Engagement in this sense is not just a proxy for
learning but a fundamental purpose of education.
Lee Shulman,
Carnegie Foundation for the
Advancement of Teaching
http://bit.ly/M3X4h1

24. Student Engagement
… such activities as student-faculty interaction,
peer-to-peer collaboration, and active learning…
Chen, Gonyea, and Kuh (2008)
http://bit.ly/MyZZv1

25. "What we do relies heavily on getting to know
your students. I think this is so important with
respect to engagement. The better you get to
know the students, and the better the students
know you, the more they are able to connect to
the material and to your teaching.“
- Kyle Keegan
(related to impact of “new technologies”)
http://bit.ly/N4KACU

26. How do you think of knowledge and
instruction?
What metaphors come to mind?
What is the relationship between the two?
What is your role as an instructor?

27. If you think of
knowledge as...
a quantity or packet of
content waiting to be
transmitted
a cognitive state as
reflected in a person's
schemas and procedural
skills
a person's meanings
constructed by interaction
with one's environment
enculteration or adoption of
a group's ways of seeing
and acting
Then you may tend to think
of instruction as...
a product to be delivered by a
vehicle
a set of instructional
strategies aimed at changing
an individual's schemas
a learner drawing on tools
and resources within a rich
environment
participation in a
community's everyday
activities
Wilson, 1996

28. Catalyzing
Opportunity
“ripples” by kthompso404 on Flickr
CC BY 2.0
https://www.flickr.com/photos/drkel
vinthompson/16663483934
Chance favors the prepared mind.
- Louis Pasteur

29. Networked
Technologies
Digital
Information
Abundance
Human Interaction

30. Flipped Classes
http://bit.ly/1DrZTx8

31. Multiple Approaches
Tech Enabled
F2F + Online
Web Enhanced
Flip Class
Reduced Seat Time
Mandated “Recipes”
“Blended”

32. Online
• 90% of CAOs believe that blended learning is
as good as or better than f2f
• 95%+ of institutions offer online (5,000+)
• 70% of CAOs believe online learning is
“critical” to institution’s strategy
• 28% of CAOs report faculty accept
the “value and legitimacy” of
online education
http://bit.ly/1zcZSlC

33. Fall 2014
Total UCF students 60,400
Students in Face-to-Face (F2F) 50,441
Web OR Blended 38,469
F2F + Web 12,157*
F2F + Blended 8,827*
F2F + Web OR Blended 18,288*
F2F + Web + Blended 2,696*
Web Only 5,522
(Summer 2014: 9,036)

34. Fall 2012 Student Headcount
“Live” Regional
Students
4,815
Web Students
20,648
“Live” Main Campus Students
50,402
34,267
57.6%
12,823
21.6%
4,928
8.3%
439
0.7%
1,408
2.4%1,283
2.2%
1,672
2.8%
Total Student Headcount is 59,767 (including medical)
Note: Circle size is proportional but the overlapping regions are not and are for demonstration purposes only.
783
1.3%
796
1.3%
828
1.4%
250
0.4%
“Live” Rosen Campus Students
2,670
Counts Not Included in Diagram
Main, Regional, & Rosen: 9
Web, Regional, & Rosen: 2
Main, Web, Regional, & Rosen: 2
(all add to less than 0.1% of total)
Note: Medical
students (277)
are not included
in this diagram.
Live = any course not
delivered via web (W)
Web = ‘W’ courses only

35. 87
91
87 87
90
87
90
94
90 90
94
9088 89 88 87 89 87
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Spring 11 Sum 11 Fall 11 Spring 12 Sum 12 Fall 12
F2F (n=669,638) Blended (n=66,124) Fully Online (n=176,856)
Student Success
Used with Permission. UCF Research Initiative for Teaching Effectiveness

36. 3 2 4 4 3 53 2 4 4 3 44 4 5 5 4 6
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Spring 11 Sum 11 Fall 11 Spring 12 Sum 12 Fall 12
F2F (n=748,226) Blended (n=67,190) Fully Online (n=176,983)
Student Withdrawal
Used with Permission. UCF Research Initiative for Teaching Effectiveness

37. 52
48 48
44 42
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
M W F2F RV V
%
"Excellent" ratings by modality (n=913,688)
Student Course Evaluations
Used with Permission. UCF Research Initiative for Teaching Effectiveness

38. Facilitation of learning
Communication of ideas
Excellent Very Good Good Fair Poor
Then...
The probability of an overall rating of Excellent = .97 &
The probability of an overall rating of Fair or Poor =.00
If...
A Decision Rule for the Probability of UCF Faculty Member
Receiving an Overall Rating of Excellent (n=1,280,890)
Respect and concern for
students
Used with Permission. UCF Research Initiative for Teaching Effectiveness

39. Amount of interaction in UCF Online Classes
Compared to Comparable F2F Sections
More
interaction
Equal
to or
less than
W
n=55
M
N=40
Modality
13%
45%
16%
15%
62%
30%
2%
7%
8%
3%
Increased
Somewhat
increased
About the same
Somewhat
decreased
Decreased
Used with Permission. UCF Research Initiative for Teaching Effectiveness

40. Quality of Interaction in UCF Online Classes
Compared to Comparable F2F Sections
Better
interaction
Equal
to or
less than
W
n=55
M
N=43
Modality
22%
30%
33%
19%
35%
37%
9%
2%
14%
Increased
Somewhat
increased
About the same
Somewhat
decreased
Decreased
Used with Permission. UCF Research Initiative for Teaching Effectiveness

41. “Technology-enhanced learning has evolved both from
enhancements to earlier generations of face-to-face
teaching and enhancements to earlier generations of
distance education. Engaged intentional design of
learning experiences has also evolved to promote the
most effective design to serve the learners, their life
experiences and the opportunities and limitations of
the particular environment.”
- Frank Mayadas and Gary Miller
http://bit.ly/1IdFLFP

42. Attitude of a Learner

43. Instructional Transformation Model
Familiarization
Transformation
Reorientation
Integration
Utilization
Rieber and Welliver, 1989; Marcinkiewicz and Welliver, 1993; Hooper and Rieber, 1995

44. Technology As…
• “Talisman”
• Tool-to-Task
– Content
– Interaction
– Assessment
• Transformation
– Individual
– institutional

45. Non-scored activity
Scored activity
A Range of Student Engagement
A Range of Student Engagement by Dr. Kelvin Thompson available at http://bit.ly/rehumanizing_slides is licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/deed.en_US.

46. Learning Challenges to Consider
1. Start teaching with networked technologies and information
2. Look for ways to make technologies RE-humanizing rather
than de-humanizing
3. Foster active, higher-level learning
4. Model human interactions via technology
5. Design learning activities in which students meaningfully
interact via technologies
6. Become a learner within digital info-abundant environment
7. Learn to surf the (info) wave
8. Learn when to use/re-mix information resources
9. See knowledge/learning as “perpetual beta”

47. Read More About It
Annotated Survey of
Technologies for Engagement
http://bit.ly/tools_survey

48. Sustaining Resources
• Campus Technology
http://campustechnology.com
• Faculty Focus
http://facultyfocus.com
• EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI)
http://www.educause.edu/eli
(Particularly “7 Things You Should Know
About… series)

49. “De-cluttering” by Seeking Sense on Flickr
CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 License
https://www.flickr.com/photos/thechrists/53662
00152

50. Human Moments
“What to my wondering eyes should appear” by James Jordan on Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 License
https://www.flickr.com/photos/jamesjordan/3070534443

51. Human Moments
those moments when we feel connected to
someone or something outside of ourselves and
in the presence of what matters
Edward Hallowell, M.D.

52. We don’t connect to technology.
We connect to other people through
technology.

53. Video
http://bit.ly/rogers_video
• Watch
• Follow directions
• Reflect

54. Consider:
How might human moments be
related to student engagement?

55. “Research shows that perfectionism
hampers success…. Perfection is the
enemy of the done.”
- Brene Brown
“[M]aybe you have a crack in your
disbelief. As many great sages have said,
that's how the light gets in. What if I
asked you to suspend your conviction
just for a few minutes…?”
- Anne Lamott
Embrace Imperfection
“2011-01-22
Craquelure (squared)”
by muehlinghaus on
Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
License
https://www.flickr.com/ph
otos/muehlinghaus/5401
974300

56. Expect technology to let you down.
Have a back-up plan, but be willing to
let the flaws show.
Stay focused on the goal.

57. struggling by theparadigmshifter on Flickr CC By-NC 2.0 License
http://www.flickr.com/photos/theparadigmshifter/83716487

58. "In times of change, learners inherit the earth
while the learned find themselves
beautifully equipped to deal with a world
that no longer exists."
- (paraphrased from) Eric Hoffer
“Aha Cleveland” by Erik Drost on Flickr CC BY 2.0 License
https://www.flickr.com/photos/edrost88/14669029608

59. Please Follow-Up
Dr. Kelvin Thompson
@kthompso
kelvin@ucf.edu
http://about.me/drkelvinthompson
http://bit.ly/thompson_engage2015