June 30, 2011 –
The term “technology education” used to conjure up images of students seated at rows of computers in an outdated lab. No longer. Gillian Hayes, assistant informatics professor and mentor to SURF-IT Fellow Rachel Ulgado, kicked off the SURF-IT lunchtime seminar series this week by sharing the dramatic impact ubiquitous computing can have on very different learning environments.
“One of the things that’s most compelling about ubiquitous computing is that we have devices from microscopic (size) all the way up to wall-sized displays,” she said. “This gives us the opportunity to ask ‘how can technology help this learning for this student within this type of education structure in this environment?’”
Hayes presented three case studies. The first was a special education classroom geared toward children with autism. Teachers in these settings rely heavily on visual schedules and artifacts, which can increase trust, motivation, independence and self-esteem, but are time-consuming to assemble and maintain.
Hayes’ team collaborated with a school in Fullerton at which they implemented an electronic system to replace these artifacts. Each student was given an iPad-sized device networked to a classroom monitor. The devices contain personalized schedules, prompts and incentive systems to help the children complete their work; the system monitored and recorded each child’s progress.
The classroom teacher praised the effort in a video testimonial. “It’s been amazing; we haven’t had to worry about setting up (manual) schedules every day. And the kids … have been able to learn many new concepts through this device.”
The team’s next goal was to see how technology could assist teachers in a regular classroom setting. Hayes and her students worked with public- and private-school teachers in Costa Mesa to better understand how technology is incorporated into their classrooms, what it means to consider technology on a classroom scale instead of on a student- or task-level scale, and to create new technologies.
In addition to spending time in the classrooms and interviewing the teachers, the team invited teachers to a series of workshops, where they began designing their own applications.
In this type of educational environment, Hayes said, technology goals include encouraging reflection; helping children communicate with each other and share artifacts; and allowing teachers to monitor progress, communicate with parents and display classroom work easily.
“Hopefully, by the end of the summer, we will have some nice designs and maybe even some systems we can share with the teachers,” she said.
The group’s third project involves using technology in an informal environment to teach children about technology itself. “It’s important to build technology literacy and demystify some of the scariness that exists, particularly for girls and other under-represented kids,” Hayes said.
The researchers worked with 53 middle-school-aged girls who were participating in a Girls Inc. summer camp. The effort focused on creative technical design with a problem-based, construction-oriented approach. Using “PicoCrickets,” tiny computers that can make objects spin, light up and play music, the would-be engineers designed and built a variety of group projects. They took turns role-playing as civil, electrical, software and design engineers, using the kit’s actuators, sensors, lights and craft materials, as well as easy-to-use drop-and-drag programming in their creations.
The participants were mentored by high-school students, who were mentored by the UCI undergraduates who conducted the workshops. “Everybody felt they had support from one level up,” Hayes said, noting that all of the student groups experienced an increased interest in engineering at the project’s end. “As we hoped, the girls showed a better understand of engineering, improved attitudes towards engineering, and higher enthusiasm and interest.
“That’s exactly what we were going for, for them to see a pathway into a world in which they could be engineers,” she reported.
Hayes also shared with the audience a project in which informatics postdoctoral researcher Garnet Hertz conducts workshops that teach children how to create new devices from the pieces of old or discarded toys. In the process, “they learn more about electronics than you might think,” she said.
In summary, Hayes said, novel technologies can create custom learning environments for all students, no matter their age or skill level. And that computer lab mentality? “We see that it’s just not compelling.”
— Anna Lynn Spitzer
