Wimba

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The Parthenon Newspaper Lauds Wimba Event at Marshall University

The pros and cons of long-distance learning

Read the original article in The Parthenon here

By Eric Divito

Educators from universities across the country met Monday in Drinko Library and online to discuss the use of technology in education.

Marshall University Provost Gayle Ormiston, told educators they must begin to look at the “new economy of the classroom.” Ormiston said technology has brought about a new kind of exchange between students and faculty as well as between students themselves.

 “The old version of the classroom to which many of us are familiar may be dead,” Ormiston said, “not in the sense that it is not going to be used, that we won’t need physical space and physical plants to hold classes in at some point, but it may not be as relevant to our students in the way that it has always been.”

The seminar began with Marshall faculty taking turns describing to their peers the advantages and disadvantages of Wimba.  Wimba is a virtual learning environment that includes audio, video application and content display.

Each of the speakers said they have only been using Wimba for less than two years and they warned that using a new technology has its difficulties.

Before moving into the discussion on Wimba’s shortfalls, the online portion of the conference temporarily disconnected and had to be restored.

 “It is easy to see there are technical problems that happen, obviously we’re seeing them right now.  I certainly in my experience have had lots and lots and lots of technical problems,” said Marty Laubach, sociology professor at Marshall.

“All these little technical glitches we see right here can be incredibly frustrating for you as an instructor and incredibly frustrating for your students,” Laubach said. “There is only one frustration that is even worse and that is to not be able to do it at all.”

 Tracy Chistofero, professor of technology management, explained the difficulties of Wimba are not just technical.  Chistofero said that it takes time to learn how to teach to a computer screen in an empty classroom.

“Talking to myself is not exactly where I am most comfortable,”  she said. “So in changing the instruction and being able to speak without students in front of you and not getting that interaction and seeing that people are nodding or frowning or understand or don’t understand, all I see when I look in my screen is me.  It’s really disconcerting.”

Chistofero said that for her subject of technology management especially, some of Wimba’s problems could be good learning experiences.

“You have to have a great sense of humor in order to take this class and laugh at the problems we are going to have.” Chistofero said, “When you get into the real world and this is your job and you are working with end users, you’ll know exactly how they feel.” 

Karen Mitchell, mathematics professor at Marshall, said Wimba is a very important tool because many of her students live all over West Virginia and they would have no chance to drive to Huntington for class.

“We’re meeting in real time in Wimba and it’s the only reason why we can run the program because there would be no way to get these students to a site for classes.”

   Another advantage to Wimba that Mitchell explained was the ability to record lectures to put into the archives.  Mitchell said this allows students who miss a class or do not understand something, the opportunity to go back and listen to the lecture again.

   “I have students who are now recording it out on disk and listening to calculus as they drive two hours back and forth for work.”  Mitchell said.