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Students and Faculty Brave Technology Together
Education Technology Partners Program Underway 
Dr. Miyo Uchida of the East Asian Languages and Cultures Department made an agreement with her Educational Technology (ET) student partner Lenora Cheung: Dr. Uchida won't address the sophomore as "Cheung san," [the Japanese way of addressing a student] and Cheung won't address the Japanese instructor as "Sensei." Instead, the two are on a first-name basis in their relationship as ET Partners. "The students in my Japanese language courses call me 'Sensei' [the Japanese address for a teacher], but I don't look at Lenora as a student." In this case, the women feel they have surpassed the student-teacher relationship for something more like a partnership, which is exactly the intention of the ET Partners program. Another intention of the ET Partners program, according to program manager Chris Sarason, is that both the students and faculty experience distinctive challenges and exceptional learning experiences. The faculty and student partners have learned to draw upon each others complementary strengths. "She's a Mac person," Lenora giggles, "and I'm a PC person, so in order to get our project done, she had to teach me a lot of Mac stuff." Meeting in the middle is something the two have mastered as they work to accomplish Miyo's goals of creating a course Web site using software such as Dreamweaver and Fireworks, and specially edited clips of video and audio. When asked how their learning styles or personalities might intersect, the two burst out in friendly laughter. Besides having a similar eye for art and design on Web pages, they mention a few of the non-academic hobbies they share. "We're both huge fans of Anime," beams Lenora. Seated beneath the array of Anime [Japanese animation] posters in her office, Miyo confirms: "Yes, and I requested a partner who also plays a musical instrument. We're both artistic and creative." The creativity with which the ET Partners program was designed trickles down into each ET partnership. Case in point, these two combined their creative skills to begin working toward Miyo's long-term goal of maintaining her own Web site. It will include not only the typical course Web site features (lectures, assignments, messages, and grades), but also clips from Japanese movies. Miyo explains, "I will edit sound out of the videos, so students will have to fill in Japanese dialogue spoken by the characters in the movies. Since these mini-movies I edit together will be clips from Japanese TV and film, they will not only help students practice language skills, but will also allow them to experience Japanese culture." "Lenora really helped me set up the foundation for achieving this long-term goal," Miyo explains. Not only did Lenora get Miyo started by showing her how to use MyUCDavis (the campus Web portal) to create a quick no-nonsense course Web site, she has also helped her learn to create a more complex Web site to be housed on the department's server, complete with an attractive front page indicative of their mutual love for Japanese animation. Miyo, who claims to have relied on a typewriter in graduate school, has thought about creating a course Web site since she attended the 1996 SITT (the campus Summer Institute on Technology in Teaching), but was discouraged by the time-consuming prospect of learning HTML. "As a lecturer, I have a large teaching and grading workload. But now that MyUCDavis makes it possible to create a course Web site without needing to know programming code, and now that we have ET Partners, this actually became a reality for me." Miyo is part of a growing force of instructors here at UC Davis and across the nation who are interested in enhancing their teaching through technology, but for whom, according to a recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education by Dianne Lynch, "technology raises all kinds of troublesome issues, most obviously the plain and annoying fact that it takes a lot of time and effort to figure out how to use it." Not only does the ET Partners program respond to this sentiment, it also sets up a situation in which instructors can begin talking to each other about methods for enhancing instruction with technology. Miyo has been sharing her ET Partners experience with colleagues: "This program is so great. Some of my colleagues who didn't know how helpful and easy MyUCDavis was before this are now using it on their own!" In another partnership, Professor Blake Stimson of the Art History Department and sophomore Elizabeth Upton focused on digital imaging they needed to create a digital archive of nearly 1,500 images for Professor Stimson's Art History courses. During the quarter, Professor Stimson and Elizabeth explored new techniques and developed an efficient system for obtaining and manipulating images for use in Professor Stimson's PowerPoint presentations in class and on his Web site. In the process, the two warmed up to a digital camera. Elizabeth laughs that she and Professor Stimson "learned how to use the digital camera together." While she recognizes the benefits of hands-on learning, group training, and increased familiarity with certain applications, Elizabeth also noted that an invaluable part of her experience has been coming to understand the challenges instructors face in trying to implement educational technology and to recognize "all the work that goes into creating a [PowerPoint] presentation." Professor Stimson expressed his appreciation for the "collaborative troubleshooting" afforded by the ET Partners program's continuous training of the students, who meet each week to discuss their partnerships and seek advice from each other before their next appointments with the faculty members. The program greatly empowers the students to collaborate amongst themselves and to enhance their communications skills. "I've learned that I enjoy teaching. Even though I'll probably declare an Electrical Engineering major, I think being able to communicate and teach effectively will help me when I begin working in technical jobs after college," Lenora explains. Thinking about next quarter, when Lenora will be assigned to another faculty partner, Miyo laughs and asks, "I'm not ready to be on my own, am I?" Lenora reminds her of all the reasons that she is, in fact, ready for future self-guided explorations in technology: Lenora is leaving her intrepid ET Partner with a set of technical tips to keep handy, and has already made her aware of the many campus technology resources, which Miyo confirms she is "no longer reluctant to take advantage of." "I've recently been attending workshops on sound editing at the Language Learning Center," she confirms. Miyo expresses her gratitude as the two reminisce on their learning experiences together. "She has been such a patient teacher, very flexible and even willing to go on late-afternoon excursions to Fry's with me to pick up hardware goodies." The ET Partners is a pilot program. Learn more at the Mediaworks Web site (click on "Educational Technology" then "ET Partners"), or call Chris Sarason at 752-9545. |
