Laptop U: Where No One Looks at the Professor

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Interesting post linked above. Excerpt:

I’m in the midst of a brilliant lecture. I’m very well prepared for this class. I have thirty or forty Powerpoint slides that boil down the textbook chapter into handy outlines. I have included outside material that I spent hours finding and scanning. I have even inserted a two minute clip from a news show that someone had uploaded to YouTube. I also genuinely find this topic fascinating, so I’m able to talk passionately about it. I’m pacing and making wild arm movements. I’m wearing a short skirt.

But about half the class isn’t staring at the wonder that is me. Their eyes are glued to their computer monitors.

OK let me get the cheap shot out of the way: maybe it’s the skirt. There’s no photo with the article which is a vital quantum of information, neh? Occam’s razor, you know…

But seriously, I too have noticed the laptop in lecture hall phenomenon. I team teach one face-to-face lecture/seminar course and like to sit in on the lectures of my colleagues. I usually sit at the back where I can see everything. So I can say with confidence that in most cases they are not taking notes on their computers. And why should they? If they’ve got all that hardware on the desk they could just record it if they wanted a permanent record. Mostly what they seem to be doing is browsing the web. This is not a bad thing, in my view. In fact, quite sensible. I have seen quite a lot of examples of students downloading relevant articles, fact-checking mid-lecture and, yes, reading email. Even the last doesn’t bother me. The alternatives (glassy bored look) or quiet placing of head on desk for a nap are worse. Last term a student of mine seemed to be nodding off; it was disconcerting with the rest of the class either listening intently or tapping on a keyboard, or both. I found my attention focusing on her and wanted to say hey ‘get a laptop! Do some instant messaging or something because your snoring is throwing me off.’ The further irony that day was that I had prepared an extensive PowerPoint presentation but the audio-visual guys never showed up to hook me up to the data projector (ever so conveniently located on the ceiling). So I had to mime my PowerPoint slides while the students had computer support. On balance, I think it worked out better that way for everyone.

Actually, I think that those most bothered by this laptop in classroom debate are failing to connect the dots. If students find it more congenial and effective to engage with the course material on-line and through various other media then why not just drop the lecture entirely? There really are much better ways. Sitting in rows imprisoned for two hours while somebody stands at the front of the room and talks is not the best way of teaching and learning. Very 19th century, in fact.

I think we get better student and teacher experience, and better results overall, in our on-line programme MA War in the Modern World (press the red button in the sidebar, if you’re interested). The only thing missing is the pub which is a shame because that has always been the best place for discussing whatever it is you may be studying. Never have I seen a student in the pub tapping away on a laptop. There’s a  lesson there.