Improving Student Learning During Travel Time on Field Trips Using an Innovative, Portable Audio/video System

Journal of Geoscience Education, Mar 2006 by Elkins, Joe T, Elkins, Nichole M L

STUDENT EVALUATIONS

A non-instructional, technology-savvy support staff member, whose duties involved the set-up and break-down of the portable audio/video device as well as documentation of the excursion with photography and videography, collected video-taped interviews of all 18 students on Geojourney during the fall semester of 2004 to provide a summative, qualitative assessment of the effectiveness of instructional media during travel time to field stops. In addition to questions regarding the students' assessment of the use of the portable audio/visual system (Box 1), students were also asked questions relating to other aspects of their nine-week field Geojourney experience regarding: a.) their attitudes toward geology as a subject, b.) questions regarding specific geologic concepts and content, and c.) questions regarding overall course evaluations pertaining to Geojourney as an unique learning experience. The responses to those questions are the focus of other research beyond the scope of this paper and those questions not pertaining to the use of the portable audio video device are not included in this work.

The interviews look place in camp, at night during the final days of the excursions before final grades had been assigned in the courses. Each student was interviewed separately from his or her peers. Students were seated on one side of an outdoor picnic table at the edge of the camp site, facing the interviewer who sat across the picnic table, while the interview space was illuminated using a portable propane lantern. Questions were read by the authors from a script approved by Bowling Green State University Human Subjects Review Board and followed a rigid protocol, where once the student completed answering a question, the next question from the script would be asked. Overall, each interview lasted from 20 minutes to 1.5 hours. A tripod-mounted MiniDV video camera was set up next to the interviewer, facing the student. Video-taped students' responses pertaining to the use of the portable audio/video device were edited together according to question and can be viewed at http://www.geojourney. org/movieclips/InstrMedia.mov. The interviews were transcribed and the dialogues from key questions concerning the use of instructional media appear in Box 1.

DISCUSSION

Students participating in Geojourney indicated that the use of instructional media had variable effects on the amount of time they spent studying outside of the time in the field and in the vans (Box 1). Students also indicated that they thought the use of instructional media while in-route to field stops brought coherence to Geojourney's overall academic agenda, and they generally enjoyed the use of the device for delivering introductory presentations (Box 1). Although there were issues associated with the occasional difficulty of taking notes while traveling in a vehicle, overall student responses suggest that use of the device should be continued (Box 1, and Elkins and Lyle-Elkins, 2004 b).