GOESCHKA, Karl Michael & POLEY, Meinhard
Vienna University of Technology, Institute of Computer Technology, Gusshausstrasse 27-29/384, A1040 Vienna, AUSTRIA, goeschka@acm.org
Abstract: This paper presents the first experiences and results of the integration of self-programmed Web based laboratory software with standard commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) software for Web based education and the usability for university courses. How the students are supported by the course software and how the teacher is assisted in designing and maintaining the course material. How the overall efficiency can be improved but also how much the initial investment costs in terms of time and money. Finally a new user survey provides results how the students appreciate the new service and how (and if) it improves the final ratings. The real outstanding feature of this courseware is, that there is no need to be present at the university, which is absolutely unusual at the Vienna University of Technology in these days. Thus the course can be accessed from everywhere on the Internet, with just a Web browser at the client side - even from other countries. For the students this means the possibility to learn at their own speed, to learn when and where they want (student centered learning). And it means strengthening international cooperations.
Keywords: Web based training software, open and distance learning, database backed Web applications.
Distance education, in most cases now ODL (Open and Distance Learning) has been proven in modern research to be the most efficient way to go in order to enable growing numbers of students to get especially engineering education as soon and as excellent as possible and to overcome the problems, which are quite common nowadays: An increasing ratio between students and teachers, severe budget cuts, increasing demand for new, additional topics and the still remaining obligation of top level research and high quality education. Therefore it is essential for us to investigate new ways in knowledge representation, learning and educational interaction to enhance the efficiency of the whole learning process. According to research results, modern learning theories ask for:
Currently, ODL is described as learning environment, student centered, offering course material or modules using modern IT (Information Technology), too. Some scientists [Gas95] even think about the role of IT & T (Information Technology and Telematics) as best tool to deliver educational innovations, provided that a well defined balance between functions as implemented by IT & T and other media is maintained. Creating interactive simulations and laboratories further enhances the efficiency of the learning process significantly, as proven in international research [FW94]. As Renwick [Ren95] describes, to guarantee these aspects, new paradigms of teaching and learning have to be taken into account. We have to go from fixed structures of teaching to new ways of learning, to flexible responses and personal empowerment.
Keeping these aspects of modern education in mind, we at the Institute of Computer Technology, try to implement open and distance learning and teaching in several lectures and laboratories. Experiments in remote laboratory work are currently done in a more learner controlled way, as will be shown later. Reason for the stricter guidance of learners was the obligation to keep students motivated, to provide immediate feedback to student work, to avoid a high drop out rate and to keep the tutor involvement to a reasonable, manageable level. According to research results of the Open University, UK, user guidance is a significant factor for success. Though mainly contacts by tutors (email, video conferencing) and student group contact were the most important success factors to minimize drop out rates [Dav95], immediate feedback in the learning environment can be seen as critical success factor, too.
At the beginning of 1997 the traditionally held face-to-face lectures left almost no possibility for lecturer-student interaction and discussion. The same time first pilots started to create hypertext lecture notes. They were seen as a supplement to the traditional paperware with some advantages. The idea was to give the students the possibility to learn some parts of the lecture on their own to save some time during the lecture for discussion. This was the very first approach, to combine traditionally held lectures (sometimes more than 300 students per lecture) with efforts to implement features of educational technology.
Most of our students are studying Computer Technology, a branch of Electrical and Electronical Engineering. They are very interested in experiencing the Internet, every student gets free Internet access at the university (but for a limited time per week only), about 40% have also Internet access from their home. Therefore we expected a positive attitude towards Web material.
We have evaluated these first approaches with user surveys among our students. The result was: The students appreciate the idea of WWW material in general. But they would not learn directly from the Web but rather print out at least parts of it and use it as a reference. What they really wanted were interactive tutorials and online testing [RGM97].If we compare the hypertext version (Fig.1) to the paper material, the main disadvantage of hypertext material is, that reading a computerized version is not as comfortable as reading a paper version. As long as there is no device as easy to handle as paper and capable of displaying on-line information, many people will prefer course material on paper. This can be seen in the questioning of our students, too.
On the other hand the advantages of hypertext are striking. As already known, hypertext material can be established in a much more structured way, leading to a better overview. The reader can always choose to go deeper into a subject or to move on (student centered learning, learning at own speed). Additionally, he can configure the pages according to his personal preferences of fonts or even colors. A further advantage is the possible integration of multi-media into hypertext. In many cases a good animation gives a better explanation than single pictures and words. Other features like a full-text search are impossible in paper versions, making hypertext useful as reference guide.
These results have lead us to new approaches: If hypertext material should be successful, it is not enough just to translate a paper version to the Web, but it is necessary to take advantage of the hypertext features as described above. But the main attraction of the Web is interactivity, leading us to the design of an interactive laboratory following the rules of open and distance learning concepts.
Therefore, our next approach was to redesign interactive tutorials and laboratories for Web access using database backed Web applications [GRRF98]. The software used includes an Oracle 8 Server on WindowsNT~4.0 on an Intel PC or Solaris 2.5 on a Sun SPARC workstation, the Oracle Application Server 4 [Oracle], PL/SQL as server-side programming technique and Java [Java] as client-side programming technique. The client software necessary to pass the laboratory is just a Web-browser. As first results we observed organizational and educational advantages, e.g. better student lecturer interaction and personalized access to information. By providing interactive tutorials and references on the Web, only some very difficult parts of the lecture have to be held in the traditional way, face-to-face, whereas many parts of easier but necessary theory can be given by the Web leaving more time to use the lecture more intensively for questions and discussion with the students.
Currently we are working on the next step: To integrate the course material and the interactive tutorials into one complete Web based course system by using standard COTS (commercial off the shelf) software modules as a technical framework. This involves especially online testing and self evaluation (this is what students wanted most in our survey) but also communication issues like chat tools, bulletin boards or one-to-one emailing.
A recent survey of Web based learning environments on http://www.ctt.bc.ca/landonline/previous/choices.html brought us to WebCT, the only tool in summer 98 that fulfilled all our requirements:
The other comparable tools (Web Course Box, TopClass, Learning Space, Virtual University) were missing at least one feature. Moreover, the licensing conditions of WebCT were rather encouraging: We could download the whole software package and start to develop, only the final students accounts during the lecture had to be licensed. Email support and active mailing lists helped us further during the development. After using WebCT for the first year we have no reason to search for another software.
The most important disadvantage of using Web based training software was the large investment of time at the beginning, which is typical for the setup of learning software. Therefore, it is only reasonable for large numbers of students or for more than one lecture (if the content does not change too much over time). Hence we decided to provide only some parts of the lecture within WebCT in parallel to the traditional lecture to determine after the evaluation, which parts of the learning software we will actually use next year.
Now to the integration of WebCT with our own Web based laboratory software: The laboratory itself is implemented as database backed Web application, using PL/SQL programs to generate the Web interface pages automatically from the database contents and to compute the user input data (Fig. 2, Fig. 3). At the first glance it seemed easy to just crosslink both systems with hyperlinks. The disadvantage was, however, that we had to set up two accounts for each student. Even more importantly, the different user interface provided some difficulties for our students. Therefore, we changed the user interface of our own software to fit better into the WebCT look. Still it was difficult for some students to differentiate between both systems.
We questioned the students about the different parts of the provided learning environment, how they used it and how the liked it. Moreover, some students have been interviewed in a personal way to clarify some points in the user survey. These are the results:
These are our most important conclusions:
The feedback of the students in general was overwhelmingly positive: The vast majority of the students (97%) liked the possibility to work anytime and anywhere, only 3% felt insecure and would have preferred a more restrictive course. The possibility to work on the laboratory remote from the Internet has some advantages: It saves time, resources and organizational effort, leaving more time for a very intensive and personal feedback discussion at the end of the work. On top of that, on-line assistance is done by email during the whole course to give answers to problems arising during work. Second it is now possible to join the whole laboratory from another university and even internationally, but rigid structures in the course scheme make it very difficult for students from other universities, that the exam is taken into account at the other university.
By providing interactive tutorials and references on the Web, only some very difficult parts of the lecture have to be held in the traditional way, face-to-face, whereas many parts of easier but necessary theory can be completely given by the Web leaving more time to use the lecture more intensively for questions and discussion with the students. So the university could migrate back from an unpersonal mass-university to a place, where students can discuss problems and solutions with their lecturers in a more personal way.
Now we plan to change the educational system for our institute significantly. Whereas currently most lecturers use the traditional way and only few are even thinking about using the possibilities of these new technologies, the changes will be inevitable. From our experiences we are sure, that the mentioned problems will be overcome by time, when other lecturers recognize, that there are possibilities to make even the best traditional lecture better by sensible use of the new technologies. With this approach to engineering education, which is new for our department at the Vienna University of Technology, we hope to create most efficient learning and teaching environments, fostering creativity and excellence in order to be ready for the already enhanced international competition.
[Dav95] Davis, N.: Telematics in Education: The UK Case. In: Veen, W.; Collis, B.; et al.: Telematics in Education: The European Case, Academic Book Centre, ABC, de Lier, the Netherlands, 1995.
[FW94] Field, M.; Weedon, R.: Professional training in computing: The UK Open University´s Computing for Commerce and Industry Programme. In: Open and Distance Learning - Critical Success Factors, International Conference, Geneva, 10-12 Oct. 1994, Proceedings, Berne 1995.
[Gas95] Gastkemper, F.: Pedagogy. In: Open and Distance Learning - Critical Success Factors, International Conference, Geneva, 10-12 Oct.1994, Proceedings, Berne 1995.
[Goe98a] Goeschka, K.: Design and implementation of database powered web systems -- experiences from the DEMETER project. Proceedings of the IFIP WG2.4 'Systems Implementation 2000 Conference', Berlin, Germany, Feb~23-26, 1998, published by Chapman&Hall, 1998.
[GRRF98] Goeschka, K.; Riedling, E.; Radinger, W.; Falb, J.: Using Database Backed Web Applications for the Implementation of Interactive tutorials on WWW. Proceedings of the ICEE98 conference, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Aug 1998.
[Hir95] Hirohido, H.: Experimental Analysis of User's Behaviour in Hypermedia CAI Systems. In: Liberating the Learner, WCCE 95. Proceedings, Birmingham 1995.
[RGM97] Riedling, E.; Goschka, K.; Manninger, M.: Education at the Vienna University of Technology: Traditional Lecture Based Education vs. Telematics Based Education. Proceedings (ISBN 1-885189-03-6) of the 'International Conference on Engineering Education: Progress Through Partnerships', pp.717-725, Chicago, Illinois, USA, August~13-15, 1997.
[Java] http://java.sun.com The Java Language.
[Oracle] http://www.oracle.com Oracle Application Server.
[Ren95] Renwick, W. L.: Organisational Strategies. Open and Distance Learning - Critical Success Factors, International Conference, Geneva, 10-12 Oct.1994, Proceedings, Berne 1995.
