Dr. Coombs. Dick and I started the day with EASI's track of presentations this morning at 8:00. And here I am back at 5:00. Originally Dick and I were going to do this presentation together, but it turned out we have a half an hour slot. And I am sure that I will fill a half an hour without any trouble. You know the typical professor; you give him 50 minutes or he talks until the bell rings or something of that kind.
I want to say a couple things about EASI, Equal Access to Software and Information. If you do not know about it, well we try to help colleges and schools make their information systems more accessible for students with disabilities. We have a website, www.rit.edu/~easi. We have a couple of list serves. We have two workshops, one being Barrier Free Education Technology, and one being Barrier Free Web Design. These are given online for a month each. And you can find information about fees and registration at our website.
At the back we have a CD, an interactive multimedia CD that we produced. And we do not have funds to give it away for free. It is $20.00 a book that Oriks Press will not give a way for free, which is $34.95. Beth would be glad to take your money, your credit card, or your order form. There are some free handouts back there as well.
With a half an hour I feel breathless alread, and so I would like to get started. As you can see on the screen, EASI is concerned that students and professionals with disabilities have the same right to access information technology, as does anyone else. If you are sharp and watching, you will see that I have an earphone in my ear so that I can listen to my computer while you look at it on the screen.
Sometimes people get confused about adaptive technologies. I well remember I was riding the bus listening to a World Series game when I was a college student. I was holding a white cane while I was sitting at the front of the bus, and I had a transistor radio with an earplug in my ear. And a lady came up and said,' I see you are deaf.' Well no I am not deaf. This is so I can listen to my computer and not so I can shut you out.
Here to talk about distance learning and one can talk about it in several contexts here at CSUN. And many of the talks have do with accessibility to a computer, accessibility to the web, interface. I want to focus really on the teacher preparing materials, and on the actual materials. And so I am skipping adaptive technology to access the computer for the most part. I am not talking about web design and alt text tags and all of that. I want to get behind that to the course material itself.
I believe that we can transcend distances with distance learning technologies as well as transcend physical disabilities. And the two can be transcended at once. And so it can be really an exciting an important kind of tool. At first, we all think we know what distance learning is until we start thinking about it. On my campus, two-thirds of the students who take distance learning classes live within an hour driving distance of the school. Why take a distance learning course when you can drive to campus?
There are a lot of reasons. You are a hard-working young executive, you have got a wife and two kids, you are head of the Boy Scout troop, you are on a committee at church, and your boss wants you to work 12 hours a day. And so if you have got a distance learning class, you can may be plug into your computer during your lunch hour, especially if the class is asynchronous instead of time dependent, and do your work during your lunch hour. Or you can go home and do it. But you do not waste the hour drive to the campus and driving home from campus. It is enough to commute to your job without having to commute to campus as well.
Or you are a single woman, a mother, with two little kids three or four years old. You work all day, you come home and you get dinner and then tuck them into bed. Do you want to get a babysitter again and go out and abandon your kids again? No, you play with your kids. You get them settled into bed. You pour yourself something nice and cool to drink, you turn on your computer and you do your class work.
So there are a lot of reasons why you might live an hour from campus and take distance learning. You're a student on campus. And you have got all kinds of labs. You take electrical engineering, or one of the courses that have a lot of labs in it. And so you are in the classroom already 40 to 45 hours a week. And you have got to take this history class. And it is at the same time as your lab. And next quarter it is the same time has something else that you need to take. When are you going to squeeze it in? Well, if it is asynchronous you can do it that way.
If you are a really good independent learner and you like to work at your own speed and your own pace, distance learning, depending again on how it is structured, may be very useful for you to work I your own. The students who do the worst in most distance learning classes are the 18 year-old freshman. Essentially if you say, when is class? Well, when you get there. You tell an 18-year-old that it is when you get around to coming? I have some of them who try to do the course in the last week.
So it depends on your motivation and a lot of other things. But distance learning is not always at a distance. There are many kinds of distance learning to. It can be one-way audio. It can be one-way video. It can be two-way audio. Two way video is pretty hard to do out of your home, but some places have to campuses. They teach the course at one campus, and have two-way interactive satellite video to a classroom on the other campus. So it can include those kinds of things.
A lot of courses are taught using computers and the Internet. And that is essentially what I would refer to as computer mediated communication. Some people prefer the term asynchronous; others talk about distributed learning. Which I do not know what the heck that means. So it is hard to find a term, especially when your students are not all at a distance. What are you going to call distance learning?
As I said, some call it decentralized learning, distributed learning. Computer mediated learning I think describes it, but it is a baked ugly phrase. And so I am not going to stick a definition on it. I just want to draw your attention to the fact that there are a lot of kinds of technologies. And it may not always encompass much of the distance. In fact I found in my courses at African-American history, that students would not share much in class. I would try to get a discussion going, and I could not get a response. And I knew that the in the dorms, these kids talked about African-American history and race issues left and right. But in the classrooms they would not open their mouth.
And gradually I figured out that many of the kids were afraid that if they said anything that did not fit the typical suburban white stereotype, they would get some nasty labels stuck on them. And that many of the black kids, if they did not fit the ideas that they were expected to have out of the hood would be called Oreo Cookie, or something else more derogitory. And so they kept their mouths shut. I found that the same students on a computer began to talk and share much more openly, even though they were not anonymous. That I could have the kids in the classroom conduct a session, with those same students on a computer one-day a week and they shared in a different way. So I began doing that all the time.
They shared much more openly. One girl said that in class she hesitated to talk, and she got tounge tied. She was afraid that if she said something stupid she would get a crazy look. Well she was not worried about saying something stupid on the computer. Why? Kids might have thought she was crazy, but she did not have to see them thinking she was crazy. So I like to say that when there is no stage, there is no stage fright.
A friend of mine who teaches philosophy found that his students, when they discussed philosophy in the classroom, were full of hot air and other more negative terms he sometimes stuck on it. And he forbade them to discuss it in the classroom, and they could discuss it on a computer where they had thought about it a little bit before they talked. So a lot of people are taking these distance learning technologies and moving them into regular classes. So the term is really a misnomer. And I am really talking about more than distance learning.
I got involved in distance learning maybe 15 years ago. A friend of mine talked me into looking at a computer. And I told him what the blank blank does an historian want with a computer. And I have not turned it off since. My wife suggests that maybe I have got a mistress in the basement. And I assured her that my computer has a male voice, but maybe that does not make much difference in this day an age.
Around the time I got involved in that, I began to try to find out what could a historian do with a computer. I figured out that my students could send me their term papers in email. In my computer could read it to me instead of my paying somebody to read it to me. One of my first groups of students who volunteered to try to send me term papers in email, one of them was deaf. We have over a thousand deaf students on our campus at RIT. So I graded her term papers and mailed to get back to her. I got a letter back from her the next day asking a question about how I graded it. So I answered that. The next day I got another thing back asking me something else, and I answered that. The next day something else from her asking another question and I thought, is this kid starting an affair with me? What is going on? And the letter said this is the first time in my life I have talked to a teacher without someone in between us. Now she is deaf and I am blind, and we did it.
In another class I made by students do some work on the computer. One of the deaf girls was about to drop the class because she was afraid she could not do it. And I said it is my job to see that you can handle the computer. And I guarantee it. And so she came down to my office and I whipped out my computer, and I typed some sentences into it, which she read on the screen. I handed her the keyboard and she typed on it, and I heard in in my synthesizer. And I taught her how to use the programs we needed. At the end of the course she came in essentially to make sure that she had done everything. And then she finally oozed at how much she appreciated my forcing her to do the computer work. And it had helped her into so many ways. Then she puts her head on my shoulder and gives me a hug; I have been teaching for 30 years and no co-eds had been hugging me. And people think that the computer is impersonal. So it has the ability to transcend physical distances and physical disabilities in a whole lot of ways.
Why do it? Well obviously the first thing is that it is the right thing to do. You can open up fantastic possibilities for a lot of students if you put up your distance learning in ways that are accessible. Secondly, it does make economic sense. I mentioned at the end of the last peroid in the discussion session that it made economic sense. I know of a case in Virginia, at a well-known university, last fall. The webmaster refused to alter the web page interface to their distance learning class for a blind student. And so they printed the page off and had it Brailed, and mailed it to her a week later. Now compare the costs. Some stubborn webmaster won his point and the school lost money, and the kid got an inferior education in the process. So they can make economic sense. And there are a lot of ways in which it is the law. And it looks like many of these legal items may be tightening up more and more.
I want to talk about some ways that it teacher can and should design their material. And I would give at least the first two-thirds; I have got 15 points I am going to go through. The first nine of them I would give to anyone. But I think they are universal tips that help everyone, but also help people with disabilities.
The first thing is to remember that when you're doing distance learning, that what you're doing is trying to reach people, to communicate with people. You really are not playing with technology. I have been involved in many experiments with distance learning, and some of them have not gone well and maybe even failed. And every time I have had a failure or poor experience, it was because I got wrapped up in the technology and forgot the students. And I thought they would just get taken care of. I thought as a historian, I was about being seduced by the technology. But I got so captivated with the technology and what it to do and what I could do with it, that I forgot the human side of it. And I remember a bakery truck when I was the kid; it used to go down our street before I lost my site. And on the back of the truck it had this sign that said as you travel through life, whatever the your goal, keep your eye upon the doughnut and not upon the hole. And so in distance learning, the student is the doughnut. And the technology is the hole. But at least for us boys, there is the temptation for us to get caught up in our toys and forget what it is really all about. So remember technology for distance learning, for that matter adaptive technology, is about empowering people. Using technology is about people. It is not about using technology.
Secondly, I will urge all distance learning teachers not to try to repeat and replicate what you do in the classroom. And most them, when they think of distance learning, think of what they do in the class. How can I do it had a distance? And so the first thing they think of is lets wheel in a television set. And so you have a television set of a teacher standing at the front lecturing. Now most classroom lectures are pretty boring in the first place. Watching a television of a boring lecture is probably more boring than the first one. What we do in the classroom is not always worth replicating. I have had many students say Mr. Coombs? Do you mind if I tape record your lecture? That is fine, but I would'nt do it. And they say, why not? It's not that good. I would not want to listen to it twice. Take some notes and skim it in five minutes.
So that replicating what we do in the classroom is not always the best thing. We need to find out what the technology is good for and followed. And when you start to do it on the computer, one of the tips that I picked up early on from another practitioner was that on the computer the teacher needs to be a host. And I thought about it for awhile and discovered that happily for some intuitive reason, I was already doing that. In my classrooms I do not stand by the door and as the students come in reach out in say, glad you came today. Or glad you joined my class. I shuffle in halfway through, in five minutes half of the kids are in half of them are not. I dump my stuff and shuffle around my papers, and when it is time to start I start talking. I do not really think of being a host in the classroom, maybe I should have. But it occurred to me on the computer, that the students really need to know that I am there and that I am there as a human being. And I started to try to think about how do I do that. And you do that differently depending a little that on the actual conferencing system or whenever it is you're doing. But it is not as weird and strange as it sounds.
We use real space to impact our reactions, our interactions with people. And what I am really talking about is using virtual space to impact your interactions with people. One of my colleagues in the next office, when I went to his office and walked in the door, you barely got inside the door when you ran into his desk face on. And he was on the other side of the desk in his big share looking at two. And on my side of the desk was a little wooden chair that I could sit on. The desk separated us; the two chairs set up our rank. One of my other colleagues, when I walked in his door he has got his back to me with his desk to the wall. He wheels around in his chair facing me, I sit down. Next think there we are knee to knee in a much more intimate manner, and with no desk between us. It was a much more equal kind of setting. So the way that you arrange your furniture in your office, the way you arrange furniture in a classroom.
A friend of mine who talks a lot about church architecture would say that what we have here is like the typical church. Where everybody sits like cows in their stalls staring forward. You do not have a highly interactive furniture arrangement in your. So you arrange furniture in different ways. You know this table here separates us. I am the big honcho who knows what he is talking about, and you sit out there and learn, supposedly. That is what the furniture saying in any case. The PA his saying it too. You listen to me; I do not have to listen to you.
So we arrange furniture and physical spaces to say things. To set up an emotional framework, and atmosphere. And I think a distance teacher needs to do that. One of the things that I did that helped me fall into it in the beginning. My user name on the computer is nrcgsh. Great. Pretty ugly and impersonal. But I can stake in a personal thing I close along with it so that you will see a personal name with it. And I thought what will I call it? What will I put up there? One of my first thought was cyberprof. And I thought no I cannot do that. What do I do? Dr. Norman Coombs, oh God. I did not want to sit there get messages all day long, Dr. Norman Coombs. That is going to put a certain amount of distance between us. Cyberprof was too corny and friendly. Dr. Norman Coombs was not it. So did you ever get email from a colleeg? Want to know what it says? Prof Norn Cooombs. I am a bit friendly, and a bit stuffy. And I think that is who I am. So am not trying to be something I'm not. I tried to sit and think about who am I and how do I project that through the computer to my students. So that is the kind of thing I mean about being a good host.
The Internet allows alot of easy interaction. And I think we need to take advantage of it. And I see that I've got five minutes ago. Keep your message simple that is good for everyone on and off the computer. I think on the computer it has more need to be simple. And that is an advantage for people with learning disabilities in particular.
Break your material into small modules. For a lot of reasons that is very helpful in distance learning. It may be helpful for people with learning disabilities. I have found at my school that it was very helpful for people with hearing disabilities.
De-emphasized technology. I have sort of talked about that in another context. But in particular I refuse to let the technical people write the handout to my students for how to use our system. Because the technical people want to tell you that their system can stand on its head, wiggle its ears, chew bubblegum, and count to ten on its toes, all at once. And I do not care, and my students do not care. What do you have to know to take the course? So that you need to teach them what they need to know from the technology, but not snow them with it. And not end up teaching technology instead of your subject matter. Email is still one of the best things on the Internet. It is one of the most interactive, human ways of interacting. And I think that is a very important tool in a class. And I interact with my students on a personal basis with email a lot.
In the classroom if a student has a question and I determine the need, for his sake, a long answer. But also that most of the class do not need to sit through that long answer, I do not know what to do. So sometimes I give at the short answer and sluff it off. It is a little scary to say to the kid, come to my office and we will talk about it. He wonders what did I do wrong? How stupid am I? The other thing is that once you invite a student into your office to talk to him about a problem, he may stay for an hour and a half. So on the computer, in one second I have the sense of interacting with the class. The next second I can hit a button that says I'm sending a personal mail message to this student. So it lets me single him out without singling him out in public. So there are a lot of ways in which it is a really useful kind of duel.
And in my general presentation I end talking about design for universal access, including for students with disabilities. So let's go on and talk about some of those. How do you designed for students with disabilities if you're a teacher, and you do not know much about them? I suggest to making it a team project. Get someone from disabled student services to give you some advice interaction. Somebody from the computer or information technology center to help you. And probably, above all, do not forget the student. If you're trying to communicate with them, find out from him or her what works and what does not work. Make it a team approach.
One of the advantages of the computer is that we have the ability to use redundant communication modes. Text and graphics, sound, audio, video, all of those things. And the more that you use redundant communication, the better. First of all we know that with non-disabled students, redundant communication modes help. And classrooms where you show a video and it is captioned, the hearing students get better grades than when it is not captioned typically. So if you have got duel sensory import, you're more likely to learn. And so if you have redundant or duel sensory information, you can include the blind and the deaf, or auditory and visual learners. People with different learning styles and all of that.
I think it is important to understand a little bit about how adaptive technology works. If you do something about how screen magnification works, or screenreader's work, that can help you in designing your material. Typically a screenreader reads from left to right across the page. They are getting better at reading columns. But often times this student has to go through one or two keystrokes to read a column, once he recognizes that it is a column. If it is not material that really should be presented in columns, maybe they won't bother. So there are a lot of ways in which, if you understand how adaptive technology works, it might impact how you design some of your materials a little bit.
There are some special problems for science and math. Scientific and math expressions are difficult to explain. I am not a mathamatition. But I have been in some long discussions. If you have a long math equation, it can be very difficult to explain verbally. You may have parentheses inside parentheses, and superscripts over subscripts. In you can get so lost explaining it verbally. They have run tests were they have had a person in one room with a document, trying to read it to a person in another room. And see how well they understand it. None of them being disabled. And it can be really hard to explain some scientific and math material verbally. And so the courts have said for example, that if a student wants their materials in Braille, you do not always have to do that. However, Braille is the appropriate medium the school has to do it in. If this student comes in and says I want my James Joyce Ulyseys in Braille and you say it is too expensive, you can get away with not doing it. If he says he wants his math textbook in Braille, you probably better do it. So it depends on the material, the way the course stands at this point.
And preparing those materials can be tricky. EASI has some stuff on our website to help you with that. It still can be quite tricky and expensive. So if you do not have a lot of experience on your campus, you may need to outsource some of those things. But you at least need to be aware that those are areas with some special problems in it.
Regardless of disabilities, I think it is good in and out of the classroom, if the teacher is accessible and approachable. On our campus, we have found a lot of disabled students hesitate to go up to a teacher and say I'm disabled, I need a little extra time on the exam. They're afraid the teacher will think they are trying to jerk them around or various things. And they never know how the teacher is going to react to it, and so some of them keep their mouth shut. We have a memo that is sent out by the Provos every quarter, urging teachers to put on their syllabus or say in the first class that if any students have special needs to come talk to them. So in some way to communicate being accessible is important.
My last one is that it is possible to go too far in trying to be helpful to a disabled student. Particularly if the disabled student has been used to exploiting their disabilities with other teachers. I mentioned that we have a lot of deaf students on our campus. And my policy was that they had to earn the grades that they got. But I would stand on my head to help them if they wanted help. And I remember one girl in my office thinking me for making her do the work. She said all the way through high school they just gave her a grade and shuffled her on. And that I at least made her do the work. And so that has always been my stance. I am willing to give them extra help if they needed it and wanted it. I would not chase them down to give it to them if they didn't want to ask. But I always felt that it was important to make them earn their way like anyone else.
Not only to be fair to the other students. But if you are disabled, at some point when you are out on the job, somebody is not going to pat you on the fannie and say that is nice. At some point life is going to catch up with you. And so you do not to them a favor. Those are Coombs 15 points on distance learning. It does not, as I said, deal with interface or the other kinds of issues that you have heard plenty of from here. And time us up. I would be glad to answer a couple questions. No one is coming in here after us.