Ethnographic Study
This week's post is about this observational studies we made about why are students in NUS not paying attention during lectures.
Our group ( Junhao, Yieng, Jialin) we concentrate on the observational method. Observe people in the lecture, with my super duper Acer webcam on my laptop. Thus, we are able to do a non-invasive observational, or discretely observe our subjects. Oops they sound like rats to me.
We are focusing on the CS3253 Management of IS lecture in LT34, cos of the amount of insights and the hilarious part of lecture, not because of a hilarious lecturer, rather how interesting things happened.
First, she started the lecture late, like 15mins, people are still walking or rather taking their own sweet time after 30mins of the lecture. Most of them are carrying their breakfast too! For the first 40mins of the lecture, the projector kept giving the lecturer a hard time. It kept turning off or went pitch dark. (no signal) She (the lecturer) called for the IT technician, seemed like a game, when he arrived the projector was fine.... (crippy huh? ... jus kidding).
Enough of the 'heavy' and 'dry' subject, the monotonone voice, nice cooling air-con and nice timing, everyone was falling asleep. Some tries to keep themselves awake by self-entertainment, chatting with friends, giggling at the back and corner of the LT, wipping out their source of life- breakfast like sandwiches, packets of milk and pastries, some rather work on other stuff with their laptops. So we feel that the technological advances with mobile devices have some what affected how we learn and how much we learn. With the affordability and availability of laptops, we can do other stuff 'behind the scenes'.
Time was 11am, the lecture continued. People got restless, moving around in their seats, doing some stretching while trying to stay awake. Some just gave up and drooled all over their lecture notes. Not only is she speaking at a monotone voice, the slides were not interesting, no pictures or videos, not interaction with the students. Worse, is 11am and there is still no break!
It is really hard to get participation in a large class, especially when there is no points given for participation. The technopreneurship modules in school of business ( previously under Engine school) relies a lot of class participation, so no method how big the class, people will 'fight' to have their voices heard.
Finally after 1hr 15mins, a break was given. Hurray!!!!! The students slowly make their way to toilets and the canteen to grab some food. They took longer than expected. The lecture should end by another 15mins or so at 11.45am. What is the point of giving a break now, since it is just another 15mins?
Our suggestions for improvement :
1. Give a break near the one hour mark
A limit to the attention span of the students.
2. Engage with the students in meaningful discussions
Instead of just throwing a question to them.
3. Give out small goodies to those who answer the questions
Encourage participation
4. Slides and presentation design
Less points on one slide
More pictures instead of all words
Use of multimedia teaching material
5. Leave blanks in lecture handouts (my personal favourite)
So that students have to pay attention to take notes.
This is exactly what is done by Dr Lim Sun Sun for her NM2209 module, she left blanks on her lecture notes ( usu the important points) so that students have to pay attention to every single details in the lecture.
Conclusion :
1. Nerds and those who really want to learn will pay attention no matter what ( at least they will put in an effort to stay awake, drink chicken essence and coffee)
2. LTs are too big to make teaching engaging ( and the class size)
4. Learnng experience can be enjoyable with the effort of the gave the information provider (lecturer) and the user ( students)
- students should come in on time
- students should try to participate when ask to
- students should not burn the mid-night oil the previous night, sleep earlier ( but this is really hard!!!!)
Review of Others' Presentations
I like the one about feng shui, serious I don't believe in that, but it is really hilarious! The part about the time of the rat, makes you sleepy and not concentrate. I have a question, I am born in year of rat, means I will be sleepy for my lectures???
I think feng shui makes things sound so complicated. It is by logic that if we plant more trees pr plants, it make the environment nicer, fresher and more regenerated. People feel more refresh to start a lecture. The path up to the LT, haha more like after walking for quite a distance people feel tired. ( I wonder if the group is really crapping?) These are really logical stuff and can be improved.
pls : will update on this part after everyone has finished their presentation ...
Our group ( Junhao, Yieng, Jialin) we concentrate on the observational method. Observe people in the lecture, with my super duper Acer webcam on my laptop. Thus, we are able to do a non-invasive observational, or discretely observe our subjects. Oops they sound like rats to me.
We are focusing on the CS3253 Management of IS lecture in LT34, cos of the amount of insights and the hilarious part of lecture, not because of a hilarious lecturer, rather how interesting things happened.
First, she started the lecture late, like 15mins, people are still walking or rather taking their own sweet time after 30mins of the lecture. Most of them are carrying their breakfast too! For the first 40mins of the lecture, the projector kept giving the lecturer a hard time. It kept turning off or went pitch dark. (no signal) She (the lecturer) called for the IT technician, seemed like a game, when he arrived the projector was fine.... (crippy huh? ... jus kidding).
Enough of the 'heavy' and 'dry' subject, the monotonone voice, nice cooling air-con and nice timing, everyone was falling asleep. Some tries to keep themselves awake by self-entertainment, chatting with friends, giggling at the back and corner of the LT, wipping out their source of life- breakfast like sandwiches, packets of milk and pastries, some rather work on other stuff with their laptops. So we feel that the technological advances with mobile devices have some what affected how we learn and how much we learn. With the affordability and availability of laptops, we can do other stuff 'behind the scenes'.
Time was 11am, the lecture continued. People got restless, moving around in their seats, doing some stretching while trying to stay awake. Some just gave up and drooled all over their lecture notes. Not only is she speaking at a monotone voice, the slides were not interesting, no pictures or videos, not interaction with the students. Worse, is 11am and there is still no break!
It is really hard to get participation in a large class, especially when there is no points given for participation. The technopreneurship modules in school of business ( previously under Engine school) relies a lot of class participation, so no method how big the class, people will 'fight' to have their voices heard.
Finally after 1hr 15mins, a break was given. Hurray!!!!! The students slowly make their way to toilets and the canteen to grab some food. They took longer than expected. The lecture should end by another 15mins or so at 11.45am. What is the point of giving a break now, since it is just another 15mins?
Our suggestions for improvement :
1. Give a break near the one hour mark
A limit to the attention span of the students.
2. Engage with the students in meaningful discussions
Instead of just throwing a question to them.
3. Give out small goodies to those who answer the questions
Encourage participation
4. Slides and presentation design
Less points on one slide
More pictures instead of all words
Use of multimedia teaching material
5. Leave blanks in lecture handouts (my personal favourite)
So that students have to pay attention to take notes.
This is exactly what is done by Dr Lim Sun Sun for her NM2209 module, she left blanks on her lecture notes ( usu the important points) so that students have to pay attention to every single details in the lecture.
Conclusion :
1. Nerds and those who really want to learn will pay attention no matter what ( at least they will put in an effort to stay awake, drink chicken essence and coffee)
2. LTs are too big to make teaching engaging ( and the class size)
4. Learnng experience can be enjoyable with the effort of the gave the information provider (lecturer) and the user ( students)
- students should come in on time
- students should try to participate when ask to
- students should not burn the mid-night oil the previous night, sleep earlier ( but this is really hard!!!!)
Review of Others' Presentations
I like the one about feng shui, serious I don't believe in that, but it is really hilarious! The part about the time of the rat, makes you sleepy and not concentrate. I have a question, I am born in year of rat, means I will be sleepy for my lectures???
I think feng shui makes things sound so complicated. It is by logic that if we plant more trees pr plants, it make the environment nicer, fresher and more regenerated. People feel more refresh to start a lecture. The path up to the LT, haha more like after walking for quite a distance people feel tired. ( I wonder if the group is really crapping?) These are really logical stuff and can be improved.
pls : will update on this part after everyone has finished their presentation ...
posted by Jialin at 8:43 AM
1 Comments:
Hi, glad you found our presentation hilarious, that's part of our plan.. haha! Anyway just wanna let you know that we aren't exactly Feng Shui masters ourselves. What we are doing is also to find out if FS is applicable in doing this assignment. I'm surprised pple ask me about the rat timing thing. Admittedly that came at the spur of the moment, and even our sources have varied interpretations. So yeah caution is to not to take FS toooo seriously.
I agree with you that FS somehow make things sound complicated. What we found in our research also yields what you mentioned. Alot of theories mentioned in FS can be interpreted via sheer common sense and logic. One of the main things taught in FS studies is the idea of clutter. Even in NM 2208, Reddy told us about leaving spaces around our design so as not to have too much clutter!
So overall we see that FS do has its use, cos when stripped down it is but logic and science mystified by talks of Chi, Dragon, Tiger, Phoenix etc. =)
Post a Comment
<< Home