Introduction
To gain insights into how MIT
faculty members are innovating in their classrooms, we interviewed five
faculty members in Spring 2008.
Taken together, these five stories reflect the subtle and dramatic ways that MIT faculty are incorporating technology into their approaches to teaching. From accounts of real-time visual representations of astronaut motion and of protein molecules, to classroom clickers, wikis, and a dedicated dynamic Web site, the five stories illustrate the ways that OEIT incubates learning and technology projects initiated by MIT faculty.
Though the research and academic contexts for the technology implementation are defined by the professors in conversation with OEIT consultants, the technology referred to in these stories was either developed by OEIT or implemented in a pilot by OEIT. In all cases the technology implementation was targeted at specific MIT subjects/curricula.
Why Use Technology for Teaching?
Humans reason differently in STEM domains – and learn differently – when the knowledge representational systems for expressing concepts and their relationships are embodied in interactive computing systems, rather than historically dominant text-based or static graphic media. (p. 29; NSF Cyberlearning Report, June 24, 2008)
Although frequently perceived as merely augmenting existing teaching and learning practices this quote illuminates how technology alters the way that students process what they are learning and consequently how knowledge construction is changing. OEIT works at this intersection -- of educational innovation and technology -- and collaborates with faculty to work through the subtle as well as explicit educational innovation and technology issues.
Office of Educational Innovation and Technology
Building NE48, Cambridge, MA 02139-4044
Phone: (617) 252-1981; Fax: (617) 452-4044
