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Western Technical College medical care students hone their skills on mannequins that can talk, breathe, bleed and even simulate cardiac arrest, allowing for more in-depth training before working with real patients.
And students at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse can watch their math professor work through problems 24/7 via a calculus podcast on the course Web site.
Technology is giving students more ways to learn — and instructors more ways to teach — than ever before, said experts at the three institutions.
“We need to look at technology as a method to provide information, instruction materials and learning objects to students anytime, anywhere,” said Jim Jorstad, UW-L director of education technologies.
Here’s some of what’s being done using technology at La Crosse’s three colleges:
Meet ‘Simson’7
The Human-Patient Simulation Laboratory at Western Technical College is a lot like a mini-hospital. Students can print off lab reports, store patient medication and meet patient “Simson” in a waiting room.
Simson is the name Western students and faculty gave their high-fidelity mannequin — or SimMan — that can speak, simulate breathing, produce bodily fluids and give different physiological responses depending on the care and medication students use, said Laurie Love, nursing instructor.
The clinical simulation lab, however, also allows students to do things they couldn’t in a real hospital setting, said Love. If a student struggles with a decision, for example, or has a question, he or she can pause the session and evaluate the situation. They can repeat scenarios and experience medical challenges that might be rare in real life.
Western has two mannequins: one SimMan and another that “is not quite as jazzy,” said Love. They plan to purchase another SimMan in the near future, as students training to become EMTs, paramedics and respiratory care technicians also use the mannequins.
“This teaches students how to interact with individuals with compassion and care, and individualize the care they are giving,” said Love.
Communicating through ‘clicks’7
Michael Alfiere, assistant professor of biology, uses clicker technology in two of the classes he teaches at Viterbo.
Alfiere assigns clickers to individual students to get feedback on attendance and quizzes. It also helps generate discussion — for example, before delving into a topic, he might ask students if they agree, disagree, strongly agree or strongly disagree with a particular question related to that subject.
“It not only helps break the ice but also serves to show students where their opinion falls among their peers,” Alfiere said.
He believes the system helps students focus and learn more, too, giving them “an active role in their learning,” he said.
The technology, in turn, can let Alfiere involve the entire class, which sometimes numbers up to 75 students.
“The system gives immediate feedback, so that I can direct my teaching based on student understanding,” he said.
The clicker system is used in courses such as nursing and chemistry as well, said Alfiere.
Viterbo’s classroom technology efforts received a boost in 2003 with a grant for enhancing education through technology, said Theresa Moore, the university’s instructional design specialist.
The grant helped fund 14 technology projects totalling $139,000 in various departments across campus, she said.
Calculus 24/7
Students don’t stop learning at 5 p.m. when the classroom door closes. The Internet allows students today to continue their studies, at any hour they choose, said UW-L’s Jorstad.
“We need to look at technology as a method to provide information, instruction materials and learning objects to students anytime, anywhere,” he said.
UW-L mathematics instructor Bob Hoar uses a “calculus podcast” to give students online instruction, even when when he’s off work.
A podcast is a video for the Web that Hoar creates on a tablet PC, a version of a laptop that can lay flat on a table. The PC records Hoar solving an equation, then transfers the information to the course Web site.
Students then can watch the podcast at any time, fast-forwarding or rewinding as needed, as Hoar diagrams out the solution in digital ink, explaining each step in an audio voiceover. He mentions choices they could make and what mistakes to avoid.
Hoar made a total of 50 podcasts for the course. His tech savviness earned him an award at the 2007 Project Technology international conference in October in Seattle.
And Hoar’s podcasts have proven popular — surveys in his classes have indicated that while the podcasts are optional, students use them as a primary source of information.
“You need to keep doing complex operations over and over to learn them,” said Hoar. “Students see it once or twice in the classroom, and then they have access to it on a podcast and this allows them to review it over and over again.”
The future of technology on campuses will continue to evolve toward a wireless environment, said Jorstad. There also is a strong national trend toward collaborative learning and teaching on campuses.
“What we need to do is show the what-ifs of technology to faculty, so they can know what’s out there and how it can help the teaching and learning process,” he said.
Technology already allows students to project their computer screens on a tablet PC for the whole class to discuss their work, or navigate a computer menu by fingertip on a glass screen, free of a mouse or keyboard, said Jorstad.
“Our job is to investigate if these new technologies can aid learning,” he said. “If they can, we need to pilot them and if they are successful, deploy them on a large scale.”
KJ Lang can be reached at (608) 791-8226 or klang@lacrossetribune.com.
