The teaching, learning and technical
aspects of the 2015 eLearning classes at Christchurch Boys' High School have been overall very successful.
General feedback from teachers has been positive with eight out of eight
teachers who responded to a recent survey either very happy, or happy to be
teaching students who bring their own devices to school to aid their learning.
As the year progresses many common themes are emerging, one of which is the
keyboard vs the stylus. A Maths teacher from one of the eLearning classes has spoken
of the inability for the students to do ‘real Maths’ on their devices when
using the keyboard only. He (along with many other members of the Christchurch
Boys’ High School Maths department) feel that laptops will not be fully
embraced into Maths pedagogy until all students have write on touch screen
capability. It is easy to understand a Maths teachers’ frustration as students
attempt complex Algebra indices problems using a keyboard only. Similarly,
teachers of Languages have recognized the time it takes Year Nine students to
accurately type French, Japanese and Chinese letters and characters on a
keyboard. A visit to a nearby school in
Christchurch also revealed a similar issue. eLearning class students were not
allowed to use their laptop in one Maths class unless their device had write on
capability. Students who did not have write on screen capability worked with
pen and paper.
With the emergence of technology in almost
all aspects of everyday modern society, the use of the pen and handwriting is
declining. A recent British survey
of over 2,000 people revealed that one in three respondents had not written
anything by hand in the previous six months (Docmail
in the Media: Handwriting dying a slow death, 2012). However, research is emerging to show
that students using keyboards for taking notes may not achieve as highly as
students who take notes with a pen. A study published in 2014 involving more
than 300 University aged students
from California, suggested that students who took written notes were better
able to answer questions on a lecture than those students who used a laptop. The findings revealed that students who took hand written
notes memorized the same number of facts as students who typed, but the laptop
users performed far worse when they were tested on ideas. “The students using
laptops were in fact more likely to take copious notes, which can be beneficial
to learning, but they were also more likely to take verbatim notes, and this
'mindless transcription' appeared to cancel out the benefits (Mueller & Oppenheimer, 2014)."
“...there is something about typing that leads
to mindless processing. And there is something about ink and paper that prompts
students to go beyond merely hearing and recording new information… (Mueller & Oppenheimer,
2014)."”
A similar study published in 2010 found writing by
hand allows the brain to receive feedback from a person’s motor actions, and
this specific feedback is different than those received when touching and
typing on a keyboard. The movements involved when handwriting, “leave a motor
memory in the sensorimotor part of the brain,” which helps the person recognize
letters and establish a connection between reading and writing (Mangen & Velay 2010). The researchers believe since writing by hand takes
longer than typing on a keyboard, the temporal aspect may influence the learning
process.
While
good teaching practice at Christchurch Boys' High School does not require
students to take notes on what a teacher says, research is suggesting that we
must consider the importance of students being able to write and not just type in
the eLearning classes. Further research is needed about whether the effect is extends
to when students write notes on screen as opposed to on paper, so too is research
needed in to education specifically at secondary school level. One of the major
benefits for students using their laptops at Christchurch Boys' High School is the ability
to keep all of their thoughts neatly in one place, eliminating the possibility
of losing notes while providing organization and clear legibility. Of the 55
students in the eLearning classes at Christchurch Boys' High School, 15 have
touch screen write on capability. Not one of the 15 students have ever used
their stylus to write on their screen at any time while at school. Many students
cite reasons such as an inability to write accurately on the screen, or the
functionality of their laptop does not allow the user to write at a comfortable
angle. While further research on this fascinating topic is needed it will be
interesting to see how laptop manufacturers react to this evolving area of
research. Mike Reading (Microsoft Education Master Trainer and Google Certified
Teacher and Trainer) predicts the next release of laptops designed for
education will have a greater emphasis on full function write on screen capability
and the stylus will play an increasing role for students in education. Furthermore
a Director of
eLearning at a local secondary school in Christchurch has recently reviewed the
recommended device specifications to strongly encourage students to bring devices
to school which have write on screen capability.
References:
Docmail in the Media: Handwriting dying a slow
death (2012). Retrieved August 6, 2015.
Mangen,
A., & Velay, J. (2010). Digitizing Literacy: Reflections on the Haptics of
Writing. Advances in Haptics.
Mueller, Pam A., and
Daniel M. Oppenheimer. "The Pen Is Mightier Than the Keyboard Advantages
of Longhand Over Laptop Note Taking." Psychological
science (2014):
0956797614524581.
