The Point of PowerPoint in SophLit
Method
1.
Overview
Courses, teachers,
environment
In both our studies (fall 1997 and fall 1998), two
of us did
the testing of PowerPoint in classes and the third focused
on
coordination and production. Mimi Barnard tested PPT in English
221,
Major British Writers I, a survey from Beowulf to Johnson.
Jana Anderson
tested it in English 222, Major British Writers
II, a survey from the late
eighteenth century to the present.
Both courses fulfill General Education
requirements and therefore
are dominated by non-English majors. Each
teacher had two classes in the study: a "PPT"
class
and, as a control group, a "non-PPT" class, both
with
identical readings and assignments.
In the fall
1997 study, we were
unable to control for classroom environment
and equipment; to assure
maximum integrity of the 1998 study,
all four classes met in the same
classroom, Jana's on MWF at 8:00
and 9:00 a.m., Mimi's on TR at 9:30 a.m.
and 1:30 p.m We were
fortunate to be able to use the Distance Learning
Classroom in
ACU's Center for Teaching
Excellence.
It is equipped with a Windows PC, a Macintosh, a digitizing
document
camera, a data projector, a VCR, three color television monitors,
two
video cameras, a projection screen, a white board, and a chalkboard.
In the non-PPT classes, we did restrain
ourselves from
using the document camera to show pictures from
books; to do so might have
spoiled the control groups by having
an influence similar to
PowerPoint's.
Procedure
Each
teacher selected several literary
topics from the course content which
could be enhanced by PPT
technology. With the help of a student, they
collected graphics
and provided brief text to accompany each picture. The
student
assembled each PPT presentation, and the appropriate teacher
tweaked
it.
The timing of the showing became an issue. In
the fall
1997 study, we showed each PowerPoint presentation at the
beginning of
or during the class on the day that particular work
was
assigned. In our 1998 study, we showed the PPT presentation at
the
end of the class two days before their reading
assignment was
due. (For example, at the end of the Wollstonecraft
lecture on Monday, I
would reserve five minutes at the end for
the PPT presentation on Blake's
Songs of Innocence and Experience,
which students would be reading
and preparing to discuss on Wednesday.)
These presentations were like a
"scenes-from-the-next-episode"
teaser on television and were
meant to stimulate students' interest,
sketch the cultural or authorial
setting for the work, and prompt
the students on major issues or themes.
The non-PowerPoint classes
had no graphic images to enhance their appetite
for the literature,
though the same information presented in PowerPoint was
delivered
orally to these students.