Using a multimedia case study approach to communicate information technology concepts at the graduate level--the impact of learning driven constructs

Journal of SMET Education : Innovations and Research, Jan-Jun 2003 by Mbarika, Victor W A

ABSTRACT

Learning-Driven Factors, constructs that show the intrinsic value of the instructional materials to the end-user, have been found to be fundamental in improving a learner's higher order cognitive skills needed to communicate technical concepts like those in Information Technology (IT). Communicating IT concepts at the graduate level could be a difficult albeit challenging task when faced with a heterogeneous class made of students with varied backgrounds in IT. One tool that has been identified as helping students understand complex technology concepts is multimedia instructional materials. This research investigates the perceptions of graduate business students on

improvement of their higher-level cognitive skills when they participated in a multimedia based case study that involved making a multimillion decision to implement a new POS system at the Chick-fil-A food chain. Two groups of students participated in an experiment where they analyzed the case study and made their recommendations. One of the groups was made of graduate business students with at least three years of work experience in the IT area. The other group was made of graduate students at a traditional university, most of whom had no previous work experience in the IT area. Two questionnaires measured their perceptions on the improvements achieved on different con

structs.

Using the Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) procedure, the perceptions of the two groups of graduate students on the impact of the learning-driven constructs and higher order cognitive skills when using multimedia case studies were solicited. These results show that multimedia instructional materials were found to be very helpful in understanding technical issues. In particular, they were more effective for graduate business students with no previous work experience if they included learning-driven factors such as challenging the participants, providing self-learning opportunities, making it possible to learn from others, and enhancing learning interest.

Introduction

It is an established truism that the continuous spread of Information Technology (IT) has transformed the way we live and do things. Such transformation has been commonplace among graduate students at most institutions of higher learning, especially in the West. Current research on the influence of electronic communication technologies such as electronic mail, World Wide Web, electronic journals, bibliographic databases, and online card catalogs suggest that they broaden academic research communities and change the ways graduate students and researchers work (Covi, 2000). For example, a recent study on the interaction of graduate students with IT to enhance their work performance was conducted using 28 graduate students and their advisors in four disciplines at eight U.S. research universities. The findings from the study suggest that all the graduate students used IT in various ways to enhance their performance, regardless of their previous and existing patterns of work and resource use in their disciplines (Covi, 2000).

There has been emphasis over time on preparing students to graduate from schools with good decision-making skills and higher-level cognitive skills so as to enhance their performance in the realworld work environment. Educators have, therefore, invested much to prepare students to be successful as they go on to enter the work force, enabling them to become productive, responsible members of society by providing an education that encompasses good decision-making skills needed to be qualified managers (King, 2000). The need for qualified managers with good technical skills is well documented in job postings and academic literature. These technical skills usually include a good understanding of technical issues related to a given line of business. Communicating highly technical issues to the managers in a way they can comprehend has been an issue of concern in both academia and industry (Lim and Benbasat, 2000). Researchers state that to prepare students to be successful as they go on to enter the workforce it is critical to provide them an education that encompasses higher-order cognitive skills such as reasoning, problem identification, criteria specification, integrating, interrelating, and problem solving (King, 2000; Guzdial and Soloway, 2002).

Preparing graduate students for the workforce with an education that develops the students' higher-order cognitive skills posits a major challenge to the instructor. In fact, previous research shows that student learning is the primary purpose of teaching (Larkin-Hein and Zollman, 2000). The question "how do you teach or communicate technical Information Technology (IT) concepts to a heterogeneous graduate class made of technical and non-technical students?" is a challenge to both the instructor and to the students, given the very analytic and critical nature of graduate students. One tool that has been identified as helping instructors communicate difficult technical concepts in the field of Information Technology and Engineering is multimedia case studies (Raju and Sankar, 1999; Mbarika, et al., 2001; Mbarika, 1999). Researchers disagree over what impact multimedia has on a person's higher-order cognitive skills improvement (Dillon and Gabbard, 1999; Mbarika, 1999). Therefore, given the complex technological decisions that graduate business students have to deal with in their careers, the question "does multimedia case studies enhance graduate business students' higher-level cognitive skills?" posits as relevant and interesting.