Annual Meeting

Toward a heuristic of classroom presentation technology

By Eric Noble [1]

Experience in solving problems and experience in watching other people solving problems must be the basis on which heuristic is built. ... The study of heuristic has “practical” aims; a better understanding of the mental operations typically useful in solving problems could exert some good influence on teaching... [G. Polya, How To Solve It]

Information technology has had an enormous impact in law schools over the past 20+ years. Starting with the introduction of Lexis, then Westlaw, in the late 1970s–early 1980s, there has been a series of technological revolutions that have changed the ways law is researched, taught, learned and ultimately practiced. Each of the new technologies has gone through a process of experimentation and eventual adoption by a majority of faculty. We have seen this “technology adoption cycle” in the use of word processing (mid-to-late 1980s), E-mail (late 1980s-early 1990s), computer networks (early to mid-1990s), and finally the World Wide Web starting in the mid- to late-1990s. Not all new technologies introduced into the legal education profession have flourished. For example, in the early 1990s there was great hope for the “electronic casebook” which was supposed to supplant paper and ink, but the idea never made it beyond the “early adopter” stage.

Currently, there are several new technologies in law schools that have not made it into the “majority use” category. Whereas previous technologies concerned researching, writing, and personal communication, the new technologies confronting law schools touch on the fundamental, core teaching mission. Course management software (WebCT, TWEN, etc.), online course discussion groups, class web sites, and distance education – many examples can be found in legal teaching today. The one citadel, though, that new technology has barely touched is the classroom experience itself.

Many law schools have upgraded their physical classrooms in the past decade to include computer projection systems, audio-visual systems, video recording and playback, digital overhead projectors, Internet access, and even wireless networking. However, rarely is this new technology used to its fullest potential. Most law faculty still use blackboard and chalk as their most advanced technological teaching tools.

The question is – why? Answering that will be one of the fundamental goals of this workshop. What are the barriers that prevent law faculty from using classroom presentation technology effectively?

To help answer that question, we will have three practitioners of classroom technology who will demonstrate the methods that work in their classrooms. They have learned (in all cases, self-taught) to use technology in ways they believe enhance their teaching and the students' learning. Two of the faculty use Microsoft Powerpoint for computer presentations, the third uses a Smartboard to present textual materials and conduct interactive, notated class discussions.

Any new technology has an uphill battle before it achieves the “majority” stage in the technology adoption cycle. There are many unknowns — many questions that the “unconverted” have before they become convinced to put time and energy into learning how to do something in a new fashion. This is especially true of teaching when many teachers have techniques that they know work, and are comfortable using, having forged their use over many years. Why adopt a whole new technique, especially something so radically different as computer presentations?

That will be one of the questions we want our panelists to address foremost – what is the benefit of using computer presentations in the classroom? This is especially important because many of us have seen awful examples of presentations. Microsoft Powerpoint is notorious for its reputation in the hands of bad presenters. There was even an article recently which suggested that the muddle-headed thinking at NASA which in part was responsible for the Shuttle Columbia explosion in January, 2003, was due in no small part to the use of Microsoft Powerpoint by NASA engineers in analyzing the risks posed by the foam damage on takeoff. [2]

We will need to get this “Powerpoint controversy” out of the way quickly. And our two Powerpoint-using faculty will give examples of the “Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” when creating and delivering presentations. Because there are some general rules-of-thumb which novices (and even the advanced user) need to keep in mind.

There are other areas we would like to address in this workshop, that involve some of the concerns that we have heard among faculty at our institutions. Some of these are:

We have heard that classroom presentations are useful in lecture-type courses. But what about the analytical discussion class (i.e., Socratic method). Surely, Powerpoint doesn't offer anything, in fact would just get in the way of this type of interaction, would it not?

We have heard that one of the main impetuses for using classroom presentations is the notion of the “visual learner.” Is there really any evidence that some students learn more effectively with visual input? If so, what about the rest of the students? Is it not a waste of their time?

Just exactly how have you measured the effectiveness of your teaching, or the learning that goes on? Do you have any surveys you can show us?

Isn't it much more time consuming to prepare a classroom presentation? Aside from the time to learn how to use the hardware and software, how much extra class preparation time is involved?

What do you recommend for any faculty who are interested in using classroom presentation technology, what are the first steps to take?

Are our administrations providing enough incentive for faculty interested in experimenting with technology? Please comment.

What new techniques do you see on the horizon that will be useful in the classroom? Speaking of hardware, isn't that a huge stumbling block to majority adoption? What if the computer breaks down? If a piece of chalk breaks while I'm writing on the blackboard, there's always another piece to pick up.

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We expect this workshop to involve a high level of audience participation. Why? Because every conversation we have had on the topic of classroom technology with law school faculty always turns into a lively debate. Everyone seems to be on one side or other of the technology fence. By demonstrating a new technology, especially as used by current practitioners, we can see the promise and pitfalls it holds for legal education.

Raising the Bar - Technology in the Smart Classroom

James P. Beckwith, Jr.

North Carolina Central University

Any discussion of technology in the smart classroom should begin with assumptions. First, what technology are you assuming to be in place? Secondly, what are your pedagogical goals? What do you wish to accomplish in the class? The utility of any instructional technology depends upon its furtherance of these goals.

Teaching and the dangers of half-measures

A smart classroom cannot be a half-way undertaking. In order for technology to be used effectively and not be an improvisational distraction to the students, the entire room must be engaged. For a traditional classroom, that means complete renovation. The same holds true for clinical instruction. Law students and jurors have much in common. Most importantly, you must keep their attention. In a smart classroom or a smart courtroom (such as Courtroom 21 at William and Mary), effective teaching or persuasion requires that the use of technology be unobtrusive. It must not distract either the student or the juror from the argument. Traditional courtrooms that incorporate technology without complete renovation run a risk of distracting jurors just as improvised classrooms can distract students. Instead of focusing on the classroom exchange or the persuasive argument, they focus on the novelty of how the half-way system was concocted.

What does a smart classroom require?

1. It should be a wireless environment for laptop computer usage. The issue of laptop policing is a matter of judgment. I am persuaded that if students do not wish to pay attention, then that is their loss. I do not have an answer for the greater distractive potential of a laptop in the row in front of an attentive student. No student has complained of silent visual laptop distraction.

2. It should contain audio enhancements for faculty and students: Student microphones, podium microphone, wireless microphone for professor, ceiling speakers, and wall speakers for Internet audio and video downloading. Student microphones can be problematic if they are used in tandem with both laptops and traditional casebooks and statutory compilations. Their very sensitivity can cause distractions when they amplify the sound of students' moving printed material around. A wireless microphone has its own practical problems. For example, colleagues may fail to shut it off after class, resulting in a dead battery. You are well advised to carry a spare battery into class to assure a smooth opening. A brief “testing 1-2-3" should tell you whether a new battery is needed. Upon occasion, a battery may die during class. The students will probably tell you that they cannot hear you from the ceiling speakers. Then you may have to project your voice in the old way to the back row in a large class. When the system is working, set the volume at the podium control at a level high enough (say, 60%) to project a modulated voice without shouting. To project the old way with a microphone can be deafening. Old habits die hard. Also, if you have a cold, be polite and shut off the microphone before you blow your nose.

Smart Board. A Smart Board (with a back-up dry white board) is at the core of the smart classroom. The Smart Board is a plasma screen overlay device manufactured by the Smart Tech Company of Calgary, Alberta. The Smart Board enables an instructor to employ a variety of teaching techniques, the two most important being the Smart Board Notebook and the plasma overlay function. Which Smart Board configuration is best? I am convinced that for large law school classes, you must use a ceiling projection system with a theatre-size screen taking up much of the front wall of the classroom. That way, visual learners are stimulated to do their best, and even the back row will be more engaged. Presumably you will have a smart lectern with its own small screen for starting up the system. The instructor will have an adjacent wall-mounted Smart Board with smart styli in various colors in the pen tray. The instructor will then mark with a smart stylus on the adjacent Smart Board, and the resulting diagrams or overlay markups will simultaneously fill the wall-sized screen.

3. The Smart Notebook. The Smart Notebook is a boon for anyone who makes active use of a chalk board. No longer will you have to cope with small white marks on a board perhaps already smeared with erasures or filled to capacity with notations. Instead any diagram or notation is readily visible to the entire class with contrasting colors and with ample sequential pagination and storage capacity. The “next” function allows you to accumulate successive pages of diagrams, which are successively portrayed in miniature at the side of the screen and can be retrieved with the touch of a finger. This succession of diagrams could reflect a series of cases or transactional diagraming [see, e.g., Lawrence, Diagramming Commercial Paper Transactions, 52 Ohio St. L.J. 267 (1991)].

4. Smart Board and the Textual Overlay. The plasma screen overlay function makes the discussion and markup of statutory or judicial language vibrant and immediate especially for visual learners. With live Internet access you can download opinions or statutory text from a variety of web sites for projection onto the theatre screen. The overlay allows the text to be marked or highlighted as the discussion proceeds. The size of the language is important to students. Remember to choose the “largest” text size. In Windows go to “view” and double click to open. Click on “Largest” to maximize the size of the text. Then your visual cues will reach the largest number of students in a large class. The sources of statutes are varied. You could go to the superb Cornell web site for uniform laws or federal statutes. For local law, you could go to your state's legislative web site. If your version is hyper-linked, then you have the link in place to facilitate your move to a related section. If your web site is not so constructed, you will have to move manually to any related sections you wish to emphasize. In either case, ask the student to tell you how to make the transition (e.g., the meaning of the term is found in Article 1) before you go there.

To mark up a projected opinion or statute, several methods are available. The smart stylus from the pen tray works best. The smart stylus is intuitive and maximizes hand-eye coordination. You can mark up the text in a variety of colors, and, if it becomes too messy, a touch of a fingertip will erase the marks and you can once more have clear text. An alternative is the “floating tools.” The floating tools include a yellow high-lighter that is difficult to control with precision. The controlling cursor is mouse-driven and your hand movement is divorced from your eye. The least useful device is a laser pointer. The fleeting image of a moving red dot lacks the permanence and visibility of a stylus markup.

After considerable use of a Smart Board, the stylus mark on the screen may begin to appear several inches off-center from the point of contact with the stylus tip. The stylus overlay will then need to be “oriented” so that the stylus mark will appear at the contact point. The orienting exercise is straight-forward. Simply press the red crosses in sequence and your marking of the statute will correspond with your stylus tip's contact point with the screen. If you discover that the mark is off-center after class has begun, the orienting exercise takes about fifteen seconds to complete.

5. The uses of photographs and video. The Smart Board does an excellent job of projecting visual images and video. The supporting technology will be the usual web browsers and media players. Some photographs provoke student interest during a discussion. For a contracts teacher useful images include Lady Duff-Gordon in her finery and the front door of the Walker-Thomas store. The photograph is a useful backdrop for case discussion. Video is more problematic because it is more obtrusive and can displace discussion. I would use video very sparingly if at all and only when it is directly applicable to the class. The most familiar example is the Pepsi harrier jet advertisement litigated in Leonard v. Pepsico. (Thanks to the web site of Professor Val Ricks.) If casebooks can show the printed advertisements from Carbolic Smoke Ball, Lefkowitz, and Craft, then the short video in Pepsico is worthwhile to refresh the students' memories before discussing Judge Wood's opinion.

An example of contracts and commercial law

Contracts is the quintessential first-year course. What goals do you wish to accomplish? We all bring assumptions to the job. As a modest realist who accepts the relevance of policy in common law adjudication, I aim to teach skills in the reading of cases, encouraging students to seek out the two becauses of doctrine and policy. As an example of the latter, I introduce the utility of markets and the insights of economics, especially the path-breaking work of Hernando DeSoto concerning wealth creation in the developing world. I also suggest that in evaluating judicial action, a becoming modesty is appropriate in setting the limits of human aspiration in a context of our invariant human nature and inescapable intellectual limitations. In a complex world decentralized mediating mechanisms become ever more important and our own hubris ever more destructive. Can technology help you do the job of teaching the careful reading of cases and statutes?

Consider third-party beneficiaries. As you work through the cases such as Lawrence and Seaver, perhaps you might want to utilize a three-party diagram. As the discussion works through the cases, each case could be diagramed in sequence using the “next” function of the Smart Notebook. Then perhaps you might want to use the plasma overlay to mark up the text of the three alternatives of 2-318 in sales cases. Other likely candidates for a plasma markup would be the estoppel in pais reasoning in Ricketts or the difficult language of 2-207. One virtue of questions asked with a projected text is that the text is literally “in your face.” As you discuss reliance or parse the Code section and mark up the words in red, evasion of questions is impossible because the basis for the question literally fills a wall-sized screen behind you.

Should you go to the web? As noted above, in contracts projected photographs and an occasional video are worthwhile. They should be used with caution, however, so that the technology does not become the tail that wags the dog. Its use should advance your pedagogical purpose and not become a source of entertainment.

In commercial law, the utility of the Smart Board may depend on the extent to which you are engaged with the specific statutory text. Do you work with problems and assume that the students have wrestled with the text and that the discussion should focus upon application of text to facts? Are you getting above the statutory text to discuss larger theoretical and policy questions? How important is the evolving transactional reality? If a markup of statutory text is not contemplated during class, then the utility of a Smart Board is lessened.

Other uses of technology have an impact on the classroom. Three are important in my work: (1) The postings on the TWEN site such as class announcements, prior examinations, and syllabi. (2) A voluntary on-line tutorial conducted by e-mail involving the two previous final examinations. Students who do not speak up in class may be more comfortable asking questions privately. (3) Voice-recognition software such as Dragon Naturally Speaking. You must be careful in using such software because of the problems created by regional accents and homonyms such as “false” and “faults.” A surprising error might appear on an examination such as when my Tidewater voice converted “sale” into “say all.” The software engineers must assume that everyone is from New Jersey.

Success in a smart classroom takes what the proverbial tourist needs to get to Carnegie Hall:

Practice. Practice. Practice

For a smart class to be successful, the use of technology must enhance discussion and be unobtrusive. The students should not be distracted from the discussion by your use of the technology. I would advise you to practice in a smart classroom before you ever attempt to use the technology in class. Perhaps a colleague might be willing to watch your presentation. If you have a web site that you will be using in class, navigate it thoroughly beforehand so that you will be able to use it to your full advantage.

Transition to class: get there early

In a smart classroom, the prior class must end promptly in order to give you enough time (a minimum of five minutes) to set up the technology, especially if the prior class was taught by traditional means. You must activate the computer and lower the theater screen. You must click on the browser and the Smart Board icons to activate the Web sites and the necessary blank pages of the Smart Notebook. You must check your wireless microphone and insert a spare battery if necessary. If you are discussing specific statutory sections with plasma overlay, you can pull up those specific sections and use the Windows miniaturization feature to set them up on the lower bar for easy retrieval. Alternatively, you may choose to pull up an entire statute and scroll the text as needed. Be sure to practice your transitions among statutory sections beforehand, to avoid wasting class time. If necessary, speak to a dilatory colleague and explain why you must get started before the class hour begins.

Flexibility: what if the system crashes?

Technology confers vulnerability to risk as much as it confers power. You are as vulnerable as the technology you use. Its infirmities are yours. An overhead projector can overheat. A computer can crash. Thus you must be prepared to revert to traditional teaching methods instantaneously. You must be prepared to make a judgment as to whether it is worth your time to pursue corrective measures when the time taken for these measures is time taken away from the class hour. I am persuaded that the better course is to always revert to traditional teaching unless I am certain that I can almost instantaneously correct the problem. Occasionally, your technically proficient students will have the solution and will help you. It is essential that the classroom dynamic not be disrupted, and a reversion to traditional techniques usually works best.

Empirical validation?

Do I have proof that the use of technology creates better or more successful lawyers? No.

At this point, all I can offer is my perception of student discussion and their attitudes toward technology. Students are unanimous in stating that they prefer the smart classroom over the traditional methods. If anything, perhaps your development office will encourage the uses of technology for the pragmatic reason that a graduate who is happier about her law school classroom experience will be more inclined to donate generously when asked later.

Sources of faculty aversion to technology

Age: Incentives matter, and older faculty members may have weaker incentives to invest in new forms of human capital. When your time horizon is relatively short, it is quite rational not to put in the time necessary to master new teaching techniques that you might use for only a few years. Apart from a passion for teaching, a possible fascination with technology or a desire to appear au courant, the rewards for the most senior faculty are relatively modest. Similarly, the youngest faculty members seeking tenure have competing claims on their time. To the extent that tenure decisions hinge on publication, then it is rational to focus one's energies to those ends. An ambitious research agenda can consume the time that might be used to master a smart classroom.

Status: Law schools are hierarchical, and faculty members, like the profession and much of humanity, are often preoccupied with status. Some faculty members may resist the uses of technology because they see it resulting in a loss of dignity or station. These professors may not wish to appear vulnerable or lacking control in front of students. An awkward struggle with technology in a classroom filled with technically savvy law students is perhaps unappealing. Some professors may also wish to avoid an increased and visible dependence on staff technology professionals of assumed lesser academic accomplishment.

So perhaps the younger, newly tenured faculty will take the lead because they have the time, the inclination, and the strongest incentives to master the techniques. Let's roll.

Note: An earlier version of this talk without any demonstration of a Smart Board was given at the 2003 CALI annual meeting. At www.cali.org you can click on the 2003 annual meeting webcast for Thursday, June 19 at 2:30 p.m. My talk lasts for about twenty minutes.

SOME POINTS ABOUT POWERPOINT

Eric J. Gouvin

Western New England College School of Law

I. Introduction

A. I've been using PowerPoint slides and CALI lessons in some of my classes for the past couple of years.

B. By trial and error I've learned some lessons about what works and what doesn't – at least for me.

II. How Not to Use Powerpoint

A. Let your teaching materials carry the heavy load.

B. If you are presenting difficult material to folks who might not be as verbally skilled as you are, Powerpoint might be a useful tool to explore.

C. In my opinion, this technology is best when it is not primarily textual.

D. PowerPoint shouldn't be a Teleprompter.

III. Ways that I do use PowerPoint....

A. I have found three pedagogically sound ways that I am comfortable integrating this technology into my classroom:

1. To get the text of statutes, restatement provisions or opinions up in a way that everyone is looking at the same language.

2. To save time and make more legible drawings that I could do on the board using markers.

3. To enliven the presentation by using pictures, sounds or movies.

B. Text based applications....

1. All my courses have some kind of important text.

2. I find it especially helpful in Secured Transactions to get the statute up on the screen so we are all reading from the same page.

3. I can get the relevant statute up on the screen and use a laser pointer to indicate the text that we are focusing on.

4. Sometimes I have a slide ready to highlight key language to drive the point home for the class.

5. Using hyperlinks you can make some cross-referencing links that are quite handy.

C. Drawings that you could have done on the board:

1. General thoughts:

a) It seems to speed up the class a bit.

b) PowerPoint allows you to do things that you can't do very well on the board.

c) You can jazz things up a little. Some of my courses deal with dry stuff. A special graphic or a little joke to lighten things up goes a long way.

2. Timelines:

a) Can animate these to unfold as the facts come out.

b) Can have a back-up “what if scenario.”

3. Illustrating the Problems or cases.

4. Graphs:

a) Allows you to get the graphs right and not worry about things lining up.

b) Shading in various colors.

c) Changing the graph, yet being able to return if necessary.

d) Plus, you can always put another graph on the white board if you have to.

5. Numbers:

a) Putting up legible numbers and then changing them is a daunting chore.

b) Not so with the presentation software.

c) Might even be better to toggle to a spreadsheet or have a hyperlink.

D. Livening up the presentations:

1. Pictures:

a) Just about every case has some visual aid that can help it come alive.

b) Go on-line to get more images. The free MS database is easy to search and contains lots of images in different styles, for free.

c) These might add an emotional aspect to the presentation and help get the students connected to what you are trying to show them.

d) You can animate these, too.

2. Sounds:

a) I've mostly used these for fun...

b) Find them online, as the ones in the program are pretty lame.

c) Admittedly, the sound effects should be used sparingly – don't link them to bullet points. That is really annoying.

d) I could imagine that you might have some testimony or a famous recording that is pertinent to your class that should go in this way.

3. Movies:

a) Movies are also fun, but I've been more successful in working them into the class.

b) In Contracts I use a set of materials at the beginning of the course to get the students thinking about legal reasoning.

c) The “Rules for Monica” videos prepared by Charles Calleros at Arizona State. This is a series of vignettes describing a mother and daughter's interactions about how late the daughter may stay out on school nights.

d) Some of the responses I want to elicit are predictable enough that I put them in a regular PPT slide, but when we get the “holding” of the Mom's feedback I toggle to a WordPerfect screen and type in the responses.

e) Actually, I have a pretty good idea of what some of the responses will be and I've got macros prepared and ready to go for those responses.

IV. Conclusion

A. It's by no means a godsend and there are times when it's just plain inappropriate, but in some applications, it helps the larger project.

B. I put the slides up on my TWEN page for the students and they seem to appreciate that.

[1] Director of Information Technology, University of California, Hastings College of the Law.

[2] “Ideas & Trends: The Level of Discourse Continues to Slide,” by John Schwartz, The New York Times, Sept. 28, 2003, Section 4, Page 12.