Enhancing History Essay Writing Skills: Learning and teaching with new technologies at the University of Newcastle

Enhancing History Essay Writing Skills: Learning and teaching with new technologies at the University of Newcastle

Authors: Erik Eklund and Kaye Cleary

University of Newcastle, Newcastle, NSW

Keywords: History, Essay Writing Module, interactive learning, autonomous learning, reflective learners, skills education, computer-based environment, academic support service, University of Newcastle.

Article style and source: The original paper was presented to the Australian Historical Association Conference, Newcastle, 28-30 September, 1997.

Introduction

At the University of Newcastle an interactive learning module was trialed in 1996 and 1997 that addressed the complex and crucial skill of writing a history essay.¹ The module was aimed at improving skills rather than delivering subject content, and this sets it apart from most CD ROM or web-based applications that are emerging in this area (See, for example, McQuilton, 1996). Traditional forms of content delivery such as lectures, tutorials and weekly readings were maintained (each with aspects of skills education), but the computer-based environment was chosen to introduce and reinforce the skill of essay writing. This paper sketches the educational context in which these developments arose, and outlines the aims and design philosophy of the Essay Writing Module. Thereafter, we discuss a number of key issues that emerged with the introduction of the module, such as new teaching methods, the changing role of academic support services such as the University Library, and student reaction to the module. top

Educational Context

The History Department at the University of Newcastle had attempted a range of strategies to highlight important skills such as essay writing, but such strategies were only partially successful. Upper level teachers still encountered a number of students who had completed first year history yet had not adequately mastered the essential skills of essay writing. Following the identification of benchmark skills in research, writing, and historical analysis in 1995, it was agreed to address these skills more explicitly the following year.

Along with these specific educational circumstances there were also broader changes in the teaching environment. Numbers enrolling in first year Australian history, the Department's largest first year offering, had steadily increased from 271 in 1995 to 333 in 1996. At the same time the University, like most throughout the country, faced significant financial pressures and the resources available to cater for increasing numbers of students were declining. In this context placing a small though important aspect of our curriculum in a readily-accessible electronic form made sense, especially when the financial resources were not available to employ more staff and the University was investing in the technical and teaching infrastructure that would make it possible to organise large classes in the computer laboratories.

Teaching methods adopted for these large classes also have a profound impact on academic support services like the Library. One extreme is to ensure that students have a reasonable opportunity of reading recommended material by placing a greater proportion of it in "short loan" collections, or place a greater reliance on purchased texts. An alternative is to encourage students to make more use of the range of resources to be found in the Library - diversify and develop students' information skills. The latter provides opportunities for collaboration between academic and library staff, and often, a significant increase in the Library's instructional activity.

These local developments dovetailed with national debates about the importance of skills in higher education. The nature of undergraduate education is moving towards emphasising the acquisition of a set of investigative and problem-solving skills that may be applied across many domains. Along with this shift towards skills education, new educational technologies offer effective ways for students to engage with and master key areas of competency in their discipline. These broader developments were persuasive evidence that an interactive module specific to the discipline was worthy of a trial. top

Aims

The module was conceived of as one of a suite of tools available to students and teachers that would encourage good essay writing. It was not meant to replace other methods such as classes on essay writing, one to one consultation with students, or the circulation of 'model' essays. Rather we hoped to cover some of the basic features of a history essay, while also addressing typical errors that are made in first year essays. The class in which the module was used, and the module itself, would be a focus of initial student discussion of history essays, but would also point them to other resources and other issues that they could take up with their tutor or lecturer. By scheduling distinct classes on essay writing we also hoped to communicate the overall importance of this skill, and the time and energy required to master it.

From the Library's perspective, this initiative also provided a suitable vehicle in which to develop information skills. The context was essay writing skills rather than a discipline-based topic. Beginning students often find it difficult to separate out the transferable skills they develop in an assignment, from the discipline content of the assignment. This made it easier to highlight the practical benefits of developing information skills - a broader reading base places students in a better position to develop critiques and analysis of a topic. Citing sources is introduced in the context of plagiarism, and leaving a trail for the reader to better understand the thoughts informing your response... it is a courtesy to your readers and an acknowledgment of the work of others. top

The Target Audience

The tertiary student population is becoming increasingly heterogenous, with a significant change in the population profile as students return to studies or change careers (40% of 1996 first year history students were aged over 25; and nearly one quarter had already attended post secondary institutions). Learning resources that support, but do not directly address the subject content need a flexible structure to accommodate this heterogeneity. Students returning to study tend to be highly motivated, but this very motivation often brings a narrow focus along with it. Students need a "bare bones" approach to recognise whether they already understand the material, with additional material readily available. Those students from secondary schools are often moving from a highly directed, instructor driven environment, into a tertiary environment that is increasingly encouraging autonomous, independent learners, negotiating learning goals and assessable tasks with lecturers. As students are encouraged to become reflective learners, accepting more responsibility for their own learning, evaluating the quality of information retrieved, and taking more control over how they learn, they need a resource-rich learning environment.

While a range of formats such as text, video, and to a lesser extent audio, are useful for promoting information literacy skills, the interactivity and evaluative feedback implicit in well-designed computer-based learning modules render them a potentially powerful resource, particularly for the diverse student profile described above.

Of course the degree that the students are comfortable with using computers will affect their ability to use them as a learning resource. A 1996 survey of first year history and nursing students revealed a substantial diversity in both levels of confidence, and actual usage of computers. Just over 50% classified themselves as non-users or beginners, with 40% anxious about using new applications. This anxiety compounded for 15%, who reported being too embarrassed to ask for help. On the other hand, 18% described themselves as proficient or advanced computer users, with 37% not anxious about using a new application. Consistent with a resource-rich learning environment, the University has purchased videos on essay and report writing, and referencing and plagiarism as additional resources to support the information literacy project. top

Module Contents and Design

The module is consistent with adult learning theories, based on principles implicit in andragogy, recognising that the majority of the students are moving from a highly directive, instructor driven secondary environment, towards increasing expectations of independent autonomous learning negotiating learning goals and assessable tasks with lecturers in a resource-rich environment. However, Pitcher's (1995) observation that Scottish students commencing higher education courses, irrespective of whether they came straight from secondary school "often lack the skills required to cope with the work they have to do", is useful to bear in mind for our own students. As our students pass through their undergraduate degree, they are encouraged to become reflective learners, accepting more responsibility for their own learning, evaluating the quality of information, taking more control over how they learn. The module was developed to support this type progression.

The module is structured around the task of writing an essay, with clear objectives based on the 1995 course evaluation. It provide overviews to show where tasks fit into the broader picture, showing "worked examples", and explaining the reasons for suggested approaches/strategies to avoid recipe-type application of numbered steps. It attempts to provide students with some basic information literacy skills and indicates that history essays are about distilling facts and interpretations into one coherent argument, rather than finding the 'correct answer'.

A basic level of information is presented in a structured sequence. In addition to a high degree of learner control over selection of additional information via the push of a button, questions are posed to assist the students to assess their level of understanding the key points of the material presented. The questions are based on commonly encountered problems, providing corrective feedback, explaining misunderstandings. For interest value, a variety of interactivities (eg. "point and click", "text input", "drag and drop" etc.) have been used for the questions.

Importantly, in terms of the design phase, the project brought together academics with subject matter expertise and library staff who had experience with information literacy, and programming expertise in interactive learning. This is a key characteristic of curriculum development in this area, and an important departure from more traditional discipline-based curriculum development which tends to be solely authored by a content specialist. As McNamara and Core (1996) observe, "At their best, librarians and academics can work in productive partnerships which ensure that the information and search skills... are carefully integrated into academic courses". top

Teaching with the module

The module was presented in structured class times with a teacher present to explain the aims of the exercise. The sessions were placed prior to the due date of the first piece of written work - a minor essay - and students were encouraged to make the links between the module contents and their up-and-coming assessment task. The 1996 survey of students who were completing the module indicated that 50% were either 'anxious' or 'very anxious' using computers as learning tools, even for basic tasks such as word processing. This suggests that further trials in this area need to be done in structured class times with a teacher present, at least until computer literacy skills become more widely present in the student cohort.

Use of the module in classes involves quite a different form of interaction with students to more traditional group approaches (Laurillard, 1993). Once a session has been introduced by the teacher, and students have accessed the module, they are encouraged to work at their own pace and explore the module in their own way. Interaction with students tends to be one on one with questions concerning particular aspects of the content, or more rarely, problems with navigating the module. These one on one interactions allow the teacher to explore particular issues with individual students - almost paradoxically, developing a more individualised approach through the use of technology. However, it is important that the context for the class is clearly established, and the computer program is designed with the diversity of student skills, competence and levels of confidence in mind. As one would expect, students have a low tolerance for repetition equating it with "boring". Some level of recognition of prior learning is necessary, encouraging students to quickly move through content with which they are familiar. Computer-based instructional programs are rarely sufficiently informative and motivating in their own right to truly "stand alone".

Another feature of the implementation of the module was the inclusion of library staff in the classes. This was an attempt to help students appreciate the value and importance of the library in terms of organising their research and locating relevant material. We wanted to demonstrate that history department staff, much like their students, require a close partnership with library staff in order to locate and sort the usually large number of references that are necessary for effective historical research. In this way most classes had direct access to library staff expertise.

In their role of teaching assistants in other courses, the library staff had already developed a range of materials and instructional approaches to support information skills development in small classes, particularly at the postgraduate level. The Library was aiming to develop a suite of strategies to support these larger undergraduate classes, and in particular develop skills in electronic support. This project provided an opportunity to work with a clearly defined problem, of manageable proportions, initiated by the lecturing staff. It was also important that any material developed was easily accessible to students outside the classroom whenever they needed it. The final stage was to package the module so it would be accessible via the History Department's home page. top

Evaluation

Student evaluation of the usefulness of any part of the curriculum will be influenced by their perception of the value their lecturers place on it, and whether it acknowledges varying levels of prior knowledge in the student body as well as. If it is optional or mandatory, is assessed or not assessed, are all unmistakable cues to students. Because of the diversity of academic backgrounds, one would expect diversity in the perceived usefulness of a topic such as essay writing, however students responded very positively to the module. They appreciated its visual and interactive dimensions and anecdotal evidence suggests that the sessions were useful to highlight the importance of essay writing and the process of research that it entails. This indicates that the design aims were substantially realised. Students were able to follow varying levels of detail through optional pressing of buttons for more explanation, moving straight on, or returning to a previous screen.

Evidence from the five markers involved in the subject in 1996 and 1997 suggest a decline in the number of 'typical' errors, an important result given our focus on addressing such common mistakes. As with many such studies, the results were more ambiguous in terms of improving student grades for essays in the pre and post-module environment. In 1995, that is before the introduction of the essay writing module, the average mark for the minor essay was 8.9/14 with a standard deviation of 1.6. In 1996 the average declined slightly to 8.8 with a standard deviation of 2, while the average mark for 1997 was 10.02. It is difficult to rely on such quantitative analysis as we are dealing with three very different student cohorts across the three years in question, but what these results may suggest is that the first few cohorts of students who encounter the module are somewhat disadvantaged owing to their comparative lack of familiarity with computers, which is especially the case with mature-age students. top

Conclusion

This trial represents just one of the many projects arising from a broader information literacy agenda occurring in the Faculty and in the University Library. As the information web of disciplines such as history becomes larger and larger, and information is presented in different formats of varying quality and purpose, emerging researchers need more time and support to develop their skills to gather, manage and present the results of their research and writing. Computer-based learning represents one way to encourage this new focus on skills, particularly in the current climate of increasing student numbers and decreasing resources. The approach involves important departures from traditional methods of instruction in the discipline of history in the areas of student/teacher interaction, the necessity to share responsibility for curriculum development with instructional and graphic design experts, and, more generally, the use and role of computers in history education. In the last five years computers have established a place as a vital research tool for historians not only for word processing and desk top publishing but increasingly in searching and manipulating the increasing amount of data available electronically.

The next major challenge with regard to this potentially valuable teaching tool is to effectively integrate computers into University teaching and learning, and the Newcastle trial represents a small though important step in this direction. One of the major benefits of this particular approach is way in which computer-based learning has been carefully chosen to enhance one particular aspect of the curriculum, while more traditional methods have been maintained. This cautious approach to computers in education allows us to retain aspects of teaching and learning which are performing effectively and which are popular with students, while also exploring the potential of new learning technologies and benefiting from the experience of implementation problems still reported in the literature such as those by Briggs & Thompson (1997). top

¹ The authors would like to acknowledge the work of Dr Claire Walker and Ms Debbie Booth in designing, programming and evaluating the module. Funding was provided by a University of Newcastle Teaching Grant. top

Reference List

Briggs, H. and Thompson, L. (1997). "Mainstreaming use of converging communication and information technologies in tertiary teaching - a view from the trenches". pp. 56-63. In CAUSE in Australia '97: Information Technology - The Enabler. Melbourne: The Association, University of Melbourne.

Dick, W. and Carey, L. (1992). The Systematic Design of Instruction. 2nd ed. Glenview Ill: Scott and Foresman.

Laurillard, D. (1993). Rethinking University Teaching: A framework for the effective use of educational technology. London: Routledge.

McNamara, D. and Core, J. (1996). The EduLib Project: Staff development for higher education librarians' teaching expertise: Progress and issues. http://www.hull.ac.uk/Hull/CTLS_Web/edulib/bourne.html.

McQuilton, J. (1996). Diggers, Dispossessed and Democrats: Colonial Australia to 1880. (CD ROM). Sydney: Allen & Unwin.

Merrill, M.D. and Twitchell, D.G. Eds (1994). Instructional Design Theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology Publications.

P itcher, N. (1995). 1994-95 Report of the Learning Technology Dissemination Initiative. Bristol, Scottish Higher Education Funding Council. http://www.icbl.hw.ac.uk/ltdi/report/main.html. top

About the Authors

Erik Eklund
History Department,
University of Newcastle,
University Drive,
Callaghan. NSW. 2308.
ph (02) 4921 5219 hiece@cc.newcastle.edu.au
Kaye Cleary
Auchmuty Library,
University of Newcastle,
University Drive,
Callaghan. NSW. 2308.
ph (02) 4921 5855 ulkac@dewey.newcastle.edu.au

Copyright Erik Eklund and Kaye Cleary, 1997. For uses other than personal research or study, as permitted under the Copyright Laws of your country, permission must be negotiated with the authors. Any further publication permitted by the authors must include full acknowledgement of first publication in ultiBASE (http://ultibase.rmit.edu.au). Please contact the Editor of ultiBASE for assistance with acknowledgement of subsequent publication.

Send feedback to manager@ultibase.rmit.edu.au
Copyright © 2001 Faculty of Education Language and Community Services
Document URL: http://ultibase.rmit.edu.au/Articles/dec97/eklund1.htm
Last Updated: 20-November-1997 by Marita Mueller

current II subscribe II about II search II events II resources