Cognitive control in media multitaskers

Main points:

• An individual's prior interaction with varying amounts of media affects how they interact and process information.
• Individuals who have a regularly high media intake have a more difficult time directing their attention than those individuals who use media less often.

Still unclear:

My most burning question after reading this article addresses the potential impact of attention disorders in this study. I acknowledge that learning disorders like ADD and ADHD are not often addressed in STEM Ed literature but the nature of this article and the content area it's housed in makes me feel like it's presence would be appropriate. This article is making claims about certain individuals being more "distract-able" than others, a trait that is thought to be present in those with diagnosed. The three tasks utilized in this study consisted (at a maximum) of 19 high media multitasker students. Green and Rabiner (2013) suggest that up to 13% of college students sampled (n=197) likely had the disorder. The small sample sizes used by Ophir and colleges could be reflective of a population who is innately more likely to be distracted.

I was also weary of the sorting of students as high and low media multitaskers. The survey threw out the media I would anecdotally say is most prevalent on college campuses, that being texting. Also, if the survey was presented to the students in a manor similar to it's presentation in the article, the results of other media forms might be misleading as well. With the ready access students have to technology, I think a better survey would have included the source of the media.

Further questions:

•  Does this evidence change what we originally gathered from the Mayer paper? There seems to be some overlap (i.e. limiting excess content) but I imagine that a multimedia lecture adhering to those 10 principles would not best support the HMM and LMM learners as made evident here. Who do you tailor it to?
• Were the three tasks presented here really getting at processing?
• According to this survey, I am most definitely a high media multitasker, should I do something about that? (The evidence here does not convince me to toss out my technology.)

Teaching implications:

I felt like this article is subtly suggesting that instructors should be more mindful of the type of media they use in the classroom and to what extent. Technology can be exciting, especially when you find something you feel aligns well with your learning objectives, but this article suggests that it might not always be beneficial. I'm left with the suggestion that bigger, rather "more" in this case, isn't always better.



Green and Rabiner (2011). Prevalence and Correlates of ADHD in College Students: A Comparison of Diagnostic Methods. Journal of Educational and Developmental Psychology. Vol 3, No 1.

Applying the Science of Learning: Evidence Based Principles for the Design of Multimedia Instruction

Main points:

·      Multimedia instruction can and should be designed in accordance with education literature (theoretical and empirical).

·      The 10 principles of multimedia learning are the result of theory informed evidence and can be applied when designing multimedia instruction.

Still unlcear:

            I struggled with the amount of weight the authors put on the relationship between basic research and applied research. A lot of space was devoted to this argument and as a result, I feel like I only have a superficial grasp at the presented concept. I understand that research can be conducted in the frame of a learner and in the frame of instruction and I also understand that theory and pedagogy can be applied at different depths. But is this all that the authors are striving for? I also struggled with their definitions of learning objective and learning outcomes. We have been introduced to these terms multiple times and this explanation is minimal compared to other education literature. Explicit examples could have improved this area. I felt like the authors may have over simplified the evidence they brought forth to support their claims. I often had lingering questions about how they measured performance and I would have liked to see the retention and transfer tests explained better. I also wondered the amount of time students could have with the animations in question. Could they review them multiple times? Could some of the performance gains be attributed to time on task?

Further questions:

·      The animations attached to many of the textbooks I’ve seen often contradict many of the 10 principles identified here. It seems like this evidence could be convincing to a novice in the research world. Why haven’t mainstream biology textbook manufactures caught on?

·      Should “personalize” all of my A&P instruction?

Teaching application:

            I think the evidence presented here will be top of mind when I’m selecting animations or other resources to present to my students. I will be aware of how any media selected aligns with the 10 principles identified here. I think it also might affect how I personally present information to my students. For instance, I plan on recording lectures for my summer class and I planned on diagramming through the recorded lecture.  I imagine I would have made an effort to write/draw and then verbal explain due to anecdotal evidence.  After being introduced to the temporal contiguity principle, I will think about doing those two acts simultaneously.

Digital Autobiography

I can honestly say that 80% of the time I devoted to this project was spent on the ascetics of the autobiography. I spent time creating a background and layout that reflected who I am and my style as opposed to heavily textually representing myself, with which I struggled. I tried to keep my audience in mind when choosing what to include but that seemed to be even more problematic. I found myself asking "Do I really want my students to know that?" and often times the answer was no. As a result, I only included the bare-bone facts about myself that you could probably discover through a standard Google search, my hometown, my education, and my aspirations. I clearly need to work on how to professionally present myself in an online format.

I'm planning on teaching an online course this summer and I do plan on introducing myself to my students in some fashion, however, I'm not sure if it would be in this way. I found Gloggster awkward to use (I was even less impressed with Narrable) and I often thought about how much easier it would have been to create this through PowerPoint. I know that would have been much more limiting as far as the types of media I would be able to include, but I think it actually it would have allowed me to be much more original and creative.

What role should technology play for you and your students in a college classroom?

In my classroom, technology will be used as a tool to improve student learning. This is an incredibly broad goal and can take form in a variety of different ways. I will use technology to increase and improve student interaction with material covered in my course. This might mean making the material more accessible (ebooks, mobile compatibility, apps), more interesting and relevant (podcasts, social media) and more exciting (animations, interactive games).

It will also be an important part of assessing students understanding of course material. I imagine I will often be teaching large lecture courses and an efficient and quality assessment of a large student body will involve technology. For example, group work will rely heavily on students communicating and collaborating outside of class and technology will play a large role in that. Technology will provide me with usable data (clickers, personal response items) that will inform my curriculum decisions.