My Life as an Infomercial: On Time, Teaching, and Technology

My Life as an Infomercial: On Time, Teaching, and TechnologyAuthor(s): Pat MillerSource: Profession, (2001), pp. 137-141Published by: Modern Language AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25607192 .

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My Life as an Infomercial: On Time, Teaching, and Technology

PAT MILLER

What if I told you that you could teach your course in such a way that your class's final average would improve by nearly one full letter grade, that your course evaluation average would improve by seven percent, and that you could do so by spending one-third less time in the classroom? Conjures up visions of Suzanne Somers in her latest guise of wide-eyed innocence mar

veling over some incredible product that makes her life meaningful while

actually reducing cellulite, doesn't it? I'm loath to say that I find myself the

academic equivalent?at least at the small southern university where I

teach print journalism as part of the English department's professional

writing track. A bit of perspective. Two years ago I received a small grant from my

university to develop a Web-based component for my news writing course.

My idea was simple: Put the information portion of the course online (just how many times can you explain newsroom organization without inducing spontaneous combustion?) and use class time to develop the actual skill of

writing news stories. In short, the elements that bored me?primarily my

lecturing on the same material ad nauseam?and that bored my students I

put in interactive modules using a program called WebCT. (Let me, in good debate style, answer my opponents' objections. It's not that I'm a lousy lec turer or don't update material or try fresh approaches. It's simply that the restriction of having to communicate a certain amount of information in a

particular time frame limits the methods of presentation. It's the classic

The author is Professor of English at Valdosta State University.

137 Profession 2001



138 III MY LIFE AS AN INFOMERCIAL: ON TIME, TEACHING, AND TECHNOLOGY

case of "if I had world enough and time." In addition, students' learning

styles have changed as the technology that drives our society has changed. Students, especially those first-generation students I often have, aren't

geared to listening to and discerning what's important in a lecture.) WebCT

allowed me to create a site that integrates my lecture notes with readings from a textbook and sample stories. The reading material directly corre

lates with exercises designed to reinforce the theory just presented and

with quizzes that qualify students to take exams. I set up a system that en

couraged students to do what they were going to do anyway: I allowed

them to work together on exercises and quizzes but required that they make an 80 or better on each quiz in order to qualify to take the related exam. The exam, logically, required them to demonstrate a knowledge of

both theory and practice. I encourage them to work together because that's

what they'll do when they enter the profession. Writers, editors, and de

signers collaborate.

To their great (both anecdotal and statistical) delight, the students didn't

have to attend class on days designated as WebCT lessons, an arrangement I

cleared with administrators. In practice, this meant they met, on average, twice rather than thrice a week on a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule.

A typical WebCT lesson asked them to read the chapter in the textbook as

sociated with the topic?how to structure a news story, for example. Then

they read my concise essay on how to do whatever was being studied; read

examples; completed exercises; and, finally, took the online quiz. They al

ways had two opportunities to take a quiz. I encouraged them to take it di

recdy after they finished the lesson. If they failed to make an 80 or above, I

encouraged them to print the quiz, find the answers, then take it again. When they came to class, the emphasis was on application: they wrote

news stories (and grades indicate that they wrote them better than their

non- WebCT counterparts). The course design also meant that they could

work at their own pace as long as they met the deadline for completing each lesson and that they could work ahead. They had ample opportunity to e-mail me questions or talk to me during office hours. I kept the com

puter lab open during class hours to ensure that students had access to

computers, though surveys showed that access was rarely an issue. When

they did meet, they were either writing or workshopping stories, taking exams, or watching one of my brief demonstrations based on material

they'd already covered?like how to write effective leads.

A bit more perspective. The workload at my small southern university, at

the best of times, is heavy. I teach four courses and advise a weekly student

newspaper. Then there's the rest of what almost every faculty member does:

committee work, advising, student conferences, service, the occasional



PAT MILLER II 139

foray into actual research. Thus I'm forced to look at the return on invest

ment for every endeavor that threatens to take a significant amount of time.

Learning software and developing online courses take a significant amount

of time. Maintaining those courses takes somewhat less time but still a con

siderable chunk. So I've learned to ask two governing questions to help determine return on investment: Will this endeavor make me a better

teacher? Will it make me a better faculty member?

I'm a natural cynic?which is what you learn to say when various pres sures make you use business terms to describe something as vital, in all senses ofthat word, as the art of teaching. But the statistics more than indi cate that the use of technology to teach (meaning to communicate infor

mation) is well worth the investment for this course and, by extrapolation, for others that inherendy intertwine theory and skill. Students are satisfied

with the course change. They rated the spring 2000 course, the first time I

used the WebCT component, at a 4.7 on a 5-point scale, compared with 4.4

for the spring 1999 course. Equally significant, eight out of thirteen re

spondents gave the course a perfect 5 for all categories. Students particu

larly liked having the class notes available at all times, especially when they needed to review for exams. They liked the immediate feedback of the on

line quizzes. Their grades were better after the change. The class average for the

spring 2000 course was 82, compared with 74 for the previous class. Similar

though less striking improvements were evident when I compared the course

statistics for Maymester 2000 (a three-week intensive course) with those for

Maymester 1999. The success has been impressive enough, both to me and the administrators, that I sought and received another grant this summer to

develop a WebCT component for my grammar and editing course.

Lest you be reading this essay late at night, when your natural skepti cism is down and you feel the overpowering urge to sign up for the tech

nology team, let me point out that the practice has some serious drawbacks

beyond the basic technical snafus that seem to haunt every system and that can be remedied only by those pasty-faced techies who generally lurk un

detected behind computers always several generations ahead of yours. As a

pedagogical matter, you must recognize that the computer teaches subject matter; it doesn't necessarily teach human beings. It can't gauge how infor mation is being received. I can. That means that I can adjust to put infor mation in a helpful context for each particular class or subset in the class.

Moreover, I can tell stories that put meat on the skeleton of information students receive. In short, personal contact tends to make the information

more memorable. I use narrative and humor to tag information for stu

dents. Both narrative and humor are potentially explosive when delivered



140 II MY LIFE AS AN INFOMERCIAL: ON TIME, TEACHING, AND TECHNOLOGY

by computer (remember how Hal was misunderstood?), because they can

be easily taken out of context. I also worry about the students' loss of lis

tening skills, especially when they're preparing for a profession that relies

heavily on interviewing. Equally disturbing (though I realize this comment

may simply be saying something about me), I don't get to know the stu

dents as well and they don't get to know me. Thus I have a more difficult

time figuring out how to help individual students, and they may have a

harder time coming to trust that my actions (e.g., comments on papers,

grades) are for their benefit. As a practical matter, more students dropped the course when it involved the WebCT component?almost twice the nor

mal drop rate in spring 2000. The basic lesson is that the computer neither nurtures nor accommodates. I can do both. I also discovered, since I make no small plans, that my ambition concerning the course may outstrip my students' capabilities.

All of which brings me back to time, teaching, and technology. The day that classes resumed this fall marked twenty years (almost to the day) since

I first walked in front of a class as a teacher. And it was twenty years to the

day that I first ranted about students' inability to appreciate what I was

teaching. I've learned a thing or two since then. We faculty members are

under an ever-increasing burden to accomplish more in less time. As a re

sult, we have to find more effective ways to teach information and skills as

well as to demonstrate why both are important. In short, the question has

long since ceased to be if we should spend more time. The question now is

how to use limited time most effectively. The question is not whether to

use technology but how to use it so we can become better teachers. Tech

nology is a science, a capable tool. Teaching is an art, capable of transform

ing us and those we teach.

There's one more serious question: Does using technology make me a

better faculty member? As a teacher, my contract is with my students. I'm

obligated to effectively communicate the most current and useful material

in a setting that recognizes their value and individuality. I'm also obligated to teach them to uphold the standards of the profession they're preparing for. As a faculty member, I'm primarily obligated to my colleagues and to

my institution. (Theoretically, my obligation as a faculty member extends

to my community, which justifies the service component for tenure, but I'd

argue that my role as community member, not as faculty member, is what

obligates me. But that's another essay.) In the light of the ability technology has given institutions to go beyond their walls, first, does my success with a

Web-based component unduly pressure other faculty members to develop such components, even for those courses that won't benefit from them?

More simply, will market forces determine the delivery system no matter



PAT MILLER ||| 141

what a course's content? Second, given the unresolved debate over who ac

tually owns the content of online courses, do I erode the long-recognized

principle of a faculty member's intellectual property? Third, does the mass

producibility of such a course undermine the diversity of ideas that leads to

progress? Have I, in short, contributed to the creation of the McCourse?

However, the better situated (both economically and intellectually) my in

stitution is in the marketplace, the more the faculty benefits. It would sim

ply be naive to think otherwise.

Counter to the rhetorical logic of the infomercial, I can't close by assur

ing you that this product will transform your life. (I can, however, assure

you that this essay is not designed as a plug for WebCT. WebCT was simply the program available at the time.) I can assert what we know: faculty

members must put technology to its best use for teaching. We must incor

porate it according to classroom need rather than allow it to be imposed. We must invest that commodity in shortest supply?time?to ensure that we create courses that best fulfill our obligation to students. We must insist on a place at the table when institutions discuss the use (and occasional

abuse) of technology, especially in the classroom, walled or Web.

We can't afford to do otherwise.



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My Life as an Infomercial: On Time, Teaching, and Technology