The Point of Technology in Education

By Sean Scarpiello

A typical Monday morning in General Psychology class begins with each student dragging into the lecture hall and grabbing a small clicker the size of a playing card. Today’s topic is “Gender Differences.” The first slide on the power point asks the question, “Do women talk more than men? Using your clicker, answer A for true, B for false.” After about 30 seconds the class results are in. The professor goes on to the next slide and there is a pie chart showing the results of the answers, showing percentages of true verses false. Now the class can have a discussion on the results and their opinions.

This technology is called TurningPoint. It is software that is available for both PCs and Macs which works with power point to poll students on their opinions. This kind of technology makes learning more interactive and thus more interesting. Students are allowed to add their opinion on a subject without having to elaborate in front of a large class, unless they want to. Also, it helps teachers by opening debate that otherwise may be ignored. These debates allow for the spreading of ideas among peers, which allows students to get a better grasp on interesting and even boring topics.

The clickers work over a high tech radio frequency so answer choices are completely anonymous to other students in the classroom answering the questions. This technology allows teachers to play review games before tests with TurningPoint. It then gives instant feedback with the graphs to tell the students and the professor what items students know, and the things they have to study. This software is so versatile; some teachers will give tests through a power point presentation. Since each clicker is numbered, teachers can assign a clicker number to each particular student and then have them take the interactive test. Later, the teacher can pull up the answer choices of each clicker and match it with the students and their grades. Since each clicker is completely personal and silent, it is virtually impossible to cheat on tests. Plus, if students change their minds on answers, they simply have to push the letter of their new answer choice and it is automatically changed. There is also a count on the top of the screen to show how many people answered the question, so the teacher knows if someone hasn’t answered and when to move on or not.

The software works great in all types of classes, but the price can make or break the success of the technology. After searching for 5 minutes, I found websites that would let you download the software for free. However, the software is useless unless you buy the radio frequency sensor and clickers, which cost about $42 each, but the company that produces them has special deals if schools buy them in large quantities. So overall they are expensive, but they are very versatile tools which can be easily transferred between classrooms.

Turning Eyes Growing Market

By GRACE WYLER

Turning Technologies — one of the region’s hottest software companies and the first success story of downtown Youngstown’s emerging high-tech campus — is expanding its focus on educational initiatives that use its technology to improve learning.

The company’s interactive-response technologies increasingly are being used to implement teaching and learning strategies that have been scientifically proven to boost achievement in the classroom, said Tina Rooks, the recently appointed vice president in charge of overseeing the Turning Technologies educational strategy.

“We have always known that students learn better when they engage,” Rooks said. “What we have discovered is that TurningPoint systems can engage students in a way that allows immediate feedback and progress monitoring.”

By allowing assessment and instruction to occur simultaneously, the company’s response technologies have helped prove the effectiveness of teaching methods that previously were too time-consuming to test in a classroom setting, such as pre- and post-testing and differentiated instruction based on students’ varying levels of understanding, Rooks said.

“The technology facilitates these practices that have been known to be valid,” Rooks said. “These theories often have not been put into play.”

Rooks, who has a doctorate in instructional technology, has been working with the U.S. Department of Education to help come up with ideas for implementing assessment strategies.

Turning Technologies initially focused its educational initiatives on customers in the company’s K-12 market. It is now expanding to apply its learning strategies to international clients and other customers using the technology in corporate or nontraditional classroom settings, Rooks said.

“We are finding that quite a bit of our practices are universal,” she said.

Turning Technologies has been expanding its Educational Consulting Team to capitalize on the success of these learning-assessment solutions, said chief executive Mike Broderick.

“We have really gotten to the point where there is a real body of data saying that, when [the software] is implemented in the classroom, it works,” Broderick said. “It is almost beginning to snowball.”

In the past two years, the team has grown from one — Rooks — to seven members. This group, made up of educators and educational experts, work with Turning Technologies’ sales representatives to help customers learn how to use the technology to improve achievement, Broderick said.

Turning Technologies’ educational initiatives represent a major growth opportunity for the company and likely will continue to expand, he said.

“We probably have our products in less than 2 percent of classrooms,” Broderick said. “We think the opportunity for growth is exponential.”

Source: http://www.vindy.com/news/2010/jul/07/turning-eyes-growing-market/