Summer 1998 I offered a course on envionmental chemistry
over the internet. The outline was the same as Chemistry 12 and the web portion may
be seen by clicking on Summer 1998 Environmental
Chemistry (not all links are active) An
experiment using Internet Relay Chat (IRC) as a means of online communication
with the students who participated was tried. There were only three students and
a number of onlookers (perhaps ten). The students were located in Arlington, Va.,
Wheeling, West Virginia and Chicago, Ill. with a parapetic participant in the Boston
area who sneaked in when his job at a computer company was slow.
The object of the internet course material that I use on campus (for example Chemistry
22 at Chemistry 22 Home Page) is to provide
an additional source of course information. In Chem 22 I have the audio portion of
the lectures as well as the overheads on the net so the student may review material
just as has happened in class. I do not view the internet material as supplanting
a class. A class in a lecture room is a dynamic thing and idealy there should be
give and take questions between the lecturer and the students. It is an ideal that
is often difficult to attain because of the reticence of students especially in a
large class. In my experience, however, if just a few studeents interact in a class
of a hundred or more the dynamics occur. I also use supplimentary material, special
topics not required for the course, for the "interested" student, and I
use "Internet Concept Tests."
Internet Concept Tests were my counter to Eric Mazur's computer, interactive classroom
at Harvard. The Internet Active Concept Tests are taken over the net, they are conceptual
questions about course material and they may be worked in teams if students wish.
These tests count for 10% of the course grade and they are designed to be a help
with the regular hour exams and the final.
The on-line summer course was a slightly different thing since no one was on campus
and the dynamics occurred using IRC. Readings were assigned, obtainable from the
course web page, and then a discussion occurred at a particular time. I signed on
IRC on EFNET as brownchem at 9:30am on Tuesdays and Thursdays and usually spent 1.5
hours. At the end of the session the IRC was logged and saved as an html file (using
Visual Page for editing). After our discussions I ran through the dialog and made
some corrections in red and some comments, sometimes with links, in blue and posted
these on the net. People could log in and read our conversations. I had a pretty
good idea of the ability of the students after these discussions. An example session
is here.
An immediate question arises: how would one deal with a large number of participants?
I think it is just like any other class. With large numbers it is impossible for
everyone to speak. Here, however, everyone can "speak" because his or her
messages are queued and arrive one after the other. If there is a dialog and a pause
in the typing someone can interrupt. If rules of the comments are laid down I think
this can work well. That is, if the goal is a dialog, then comments can come one
after the other and the instructor can respond in kind. A nice part of this dynamic
is that a record is kept and may be posted at the end of the session. Another, obvious
technique that has been used at Brown and other places, is to have students submit
written material. The written material may be commented on by others and the whole
thing is observable.
Another, obvious question has to do with exams. Proctoring exams over the net, at
remote places, is a problem. In the case of Internet Concept Tests, with 10% of the
grade, I assumed that students would use texts and each other to come up with answers
to conceptual questions and I hoped that all would be the better for it. Exams were
in class and there was a final. Although I think everyone is honest, I also believe
it is not fair to place personal pressure on students who may perceive that they
have to get a high grade in a course and by a course design be in a situation where
cheating might be an easy option.
Is there a future for the use of Internet Relay Chat in course communication. For
small courses the answer is yes, for large ones the answer is also yes depending
on orginzation and TA aid.
J. Baird May 1999