Providing and Evaluating Instructional Multimedia Institutes for Science, Mathematics and Technology Educators Donna Tupper dtupper@ ccbcmd.edu Andrew Beiderman abeiderman@ ccbcmd.edu Sylvia Sorkin ssorkin@ ccbcmd.edu Mathematics Department Community College of Baltimore County - Essex Campus Baltimore, MD, 21237, USA Todd Abramovitz tabramovitz@ccbcmd.edu Internet and Multimedia Technology Department Community College of Baltimore County - Essex Campus Baltimore, MD, 21237, USA Marianne Cinaglia cinaglia@rowan.edu Department of Secondary Education/Foundations of Education Rowan University Glassboro, NJ, 08028, USA Abstract This paper describes a series of two-week summer institutes for college faculty and secondary school teachers of mathematics, science, and technology. National Science Foundation funding provides stipends for forty educators to learn how to use several website development, screen capture, and multimedia software packages. Participants create interactive Multimedia Learning Activities for use in their classes, and agree to attend two-week institutes in two consecutive summers. Keywords: multimedia, NSF, evaluation, Dreamweaver, Authorware, PhotoShop, JavaScript 1. INTERNET AND MULTIMEDIA TECHNOLOGY PROGRAM Beginning in 1999, an Internet and Multimedia Technology (IMMT) program providing three associate's degrees and several certificate programs was created at the Community College of Baltimore County, Essex campus as described in (Sorkin, Mento, Harmeyer 2000) and (Sorkin, Tupper, et al 2003). In September 2002 National Science Foundation funding was awarded for a three-year project with these goals: development of a new Instructional Multimedia certificate program for inservice educators; organizing an annual Internet and Multimedia Technology conference; creation of a digital audio/video computer production studio; providing two-week intensive instructional multimedia institutes for 40 secondary teachers and college faculty (with half returning from the previous summer and half new participants) in science, mathematics and technology fields. In July 2003 the first such institute, called Teaching with Instructional Multimedia in Mathematics, Science and Technology (TIM2S), was provided for 39 participants, with instruction provided by six faculty from the IMMT program, with assistance provided by two IMMT students. These secondary school educators and college faculty participants had indicated their desire to employ multimedia elements in their science, mathematics, or technology classrooms. In addition to teaching the computer skills necessary to create, modify, and maintain multimedia presentations, we aimed to promote the intelligent use of these activities and the opportunities they present. In particular, multimedia presentations and activities can be used to clarify and visualize abstract concepts, to provide opportunities limited by physical and/or safety concerns in the classroom, and to accommodate various learning styles. The expectation was that each participant should create a classroom website and a multimedia learning activity, using Macromedia Flash or Authorware, for classroom use. 2. TOPICS COVERED IN THE INSTITUTE Faculty and participants met for seven hours per day for two weeks, with an optional eighth hour for extra help from faculty. Figure 1 shows the schedule for the first day. This was typical of the entire first week of the institute, which was very labor intensive for both the faculty and the participants. The main topics covered for participants in their first summer were Macromedia Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Flash, and HTML and JavaScript basics. However, participants were also introduced to copyright law, ADA guidelines, FTP, digital cameras, web animation, PowerPoint, and TechSmith SnagIt. In their second summer participants began using Authorware, Fireworks, Shockwave and Camtasia’s Production Studio. Although we do have hands-on exercises on each of these topics that are worked on while we are in the lab, participants still felt overwhelmed by the pace. Their concerns did subside during the second week, which is devoted to creating their Multimedia Learning Activities (MLAs). Figure 2 illustrates two MLAs that participants created, Moving and Copying Files, and Box and Whisker Plots. All MLAs created by participants are available online at (Harmeyer 2004) for educational use. Dreamweaver topics covered included a basic introduction, images, image maps, rollovers, navigation bars, forms, frames, website management and how to ftp. Flash topics included creating graphics, symbols, movie clips, motion tweening, shape tweening, using layers to perform multiple simultaneous animations, inserting buttons for interactivity, basic introduction to ActionScript to control playback of the movie, and how to publish their movie and create a web page for it. Photoshop topics included creating animated gifs, creating buttons with rollovers in Image Ready, cropping images, using filters to create visually simple graphics (for when photo realism becomes distracting), drawing objects, illustrating in Photoshop to enhance images, saving as JPG, PNG, and GIF and making selections, adjusting color, using Layers, History, and Styles. JavaScript topics included basic form handling, for loops and conditionals. These topics were introduced in the form of self-grading tutorials that participants could modify to use in their own classes. We found that flexibility was the key in teaching a labor-intensive institute like this. Although we posted an hourly schedule of topics online at (Harmeyer 2003), we found out on the first day of the workshop that people in our advanced group did not need a review of Dreamweaver’s introductory topics. They were able to start with rollovers, navigation bars and image maps. They needed only a brief review on how to ftp their work to the server. This gave us more time to cover Flash and introduce Camtasia’s Production Studio. Similarly, the beginning participants felt we were covering material too fast and requested more time, especially for Flash. During our two-week session, the schedule was modified five times. Although we were initially concerned about the apparent lack of organization, the participants were actually very appreciative of our willingness to adapt to their needs (or desires) on such short notice. For the 2004 summer institute, we will ask returning participants to send us a list of topics they wish to work on so that we could be better prepared with our handouts. 3. EVALUATING THE 2003 INSTITUTE Results from the daily formative and overall summative evaluations used during the TIM2S 2003 institute are in (Sorkin, Tupper, Harmeyer 2004). In addition, participants were surveyed by mail by the project external evaluator approximately six months after the conclusion of that institute. This gave the participants enough time to use material they gathered from the summer institute in their own classes. Figure 3 contains the Evaluator Questionnaire part of the survey instrument. The second part of the survey contained a list of software topics covered in TIM2S 2003, and asked participants which topics they had used during the school year, and which ones they needed more practice with for efficient use. There was a 74% return rate (29 of the 39 TIM2S 2003 participants) for this survey by outside evaluator (Cinaglia 2004). Those who responded felt that Dreamweaver and Flash were the two most valuable and/or useful sessions they attended. When asked which TIM2S software topics they used during the school year, 12 or more of the 29 respondents listed these: digital photo/scanning, creating a website, Dreamweaver, using existing graphics from Math/Science web resources, Photoshop Elements, FTP, SnagIt, and PowerPoint. As shown in Figure 4, when asked which sessions they needed more practice or instruction on to use effectively, the most frequently selected topics were Advanced Flash, JavaScript, Authorware, Fireworks, Shockwave, and creating graphics. This information provides us with a valuable starting point in planning for the TIM2S 2004 institute. 4. CONCLUSION Science, mathematics and technology educators participating in the two-week TIM2S 2003 summer institute have found Macromedia Dreamweaver website development software and Flash animation software to be particularly valuable for creating their own websites and multimedia learning activities for classroom use. They have indicated that they need more practice in the use of JavaScript, advanced Flash, Authorware, Fireworks, Shockwave, and creating graphics. This will be provided when they attend their second TIM2S institute in 2004. 5. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This material is based upon work supported in part by the National Science Foundation (NSF) under award DUE-0202260. Opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF. 6. REFERENCES Cinaglia, Marianne, 2004, "Analysis of Responses to Teaching with Instructional Multimedia in Mathematics, Science and Technology (TIM2S) 2004 Winter Survey Using General Questions Generated by IMMT Staff and Evaluator as Basis." Unpublished report. Harmeyer, Kathleen, 2003, "Daily Schedules for TIM2S July 14-25, 2003." Online. Internet [August 11, 2004]. WWW: http://student.ccbcmd.edu/tims/ schedule2003.html Harmeyer, Kathleen, 2004, "Perfect Little Programs Page." Online. Internet [August 11, 2004], http://student .ccbcmd.edu/immt/plp.htm Sorkin, Sylvia, Donna Tupper, Andrew Beiderman, Kathleen Harmeyer, and Barbara Mento, 2003, "Creating an Internet and Multimedia Technology Program in a Computer Science Department." Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges, v18 (3), pp. 32-44. Sorkin, Sylvia, Donna Tupper, and Kathleen Harmeyer, 2004, "Instructional Multimedia Institutes for Mathematics, Science and Technology Educators. Paper accepted for presentation at CCSC-E04, (Baltimore). Sorkin, Sylvia, Barbara Mento, and Kathleen Harmeyer. "Developing an Internet and Multimedia Technology Certificate Program." Proceedings of ISECON 2000, v17 (Philadelphia): §202. Teaching with Instructional Multimedia in Mathematics, Science and Technology (TIM2S) 2004 Winter Survey Name: ____________________________________________________ School District/College: ________________________________________ Position: ____________________________________________________ Subject(s) taught: ______________________________________________ Grade(s)/level(s) taught: ________________________________________ Year(s) associated with the CCBC TIM2S program: ____2003 only _____both 2002 & 2003 How did you learn about the TIM2S Institute? __________________________ My work during the school year has required me to use ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) guidelines. ____yes ____no My work during the school year has required me to address copyright issues. ____yes ____no I have shared what I learned at TIM2S with other teachers/faculty at my school. ____yes ____no If “yes:” list topic(s)_______________________________________________ I have used the Multimedia Learning Activity (PLP) I created this summer. ____yes ____no If “yes:” in the following class(es)_______________________________________________ I have used PLPs, available on the CCBC website, that other participants have created. ____yes ____no If “yes:” cite names/topics of PLPs used:________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________ The Science, Mathematics and/or Technology websites I used with my class(es) this fall include: _____________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________ Have your students been affected by your use of these new materials? ____yes     _____no If “yes:” state student reaction:______________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________ CCBC Essex will host an Internet, Multimedia and E-Business Conference on June 24-25, 2004. I intend to participate in the June conference as a presenter. ____yes ____no I intend to participate in the June conference as attendee. ____yes ____no The most valuable/useful sessions this summer were:_______________________________________ If you have feedback that would benefit future sessions please include that on the back of one of the survey sheets or on another paper in printed or word-processed form or email to me at Cinaglia@rowan.edu February 2004 Figure 3. Survey distributed to participants six months after the TIM2S institute. TIM2S 2003 Topics Used during this 2003-2004 school year Need more practice/ instruction to use effectively Digital Photos/Scanning 16 2 Create website 18 4 Dreamweaver 15 4 Tables & forms in Dreamweaver 13 2 HTML 11 7 Math and Science Web resources 9 2 use existing graphics 13 1 use existing sound files 7 1 use existing videos 7 1 use existing animations 10 1 Graphics with Flash 9 6 Flash animation 10 9 Advanced Flash for Learning Game 4 12 Photoshop 10 6 Photoshop elements 12 5 FTP 13 5 JavaScript 6 13 Self-grading online quiz 8 4 Using advanced features of email 10 7 Using 3DMeNow for Web Animation 3 7 Authorware 4 12 Using SnagIt for image capture 17 4 Capture video 4 8 Create video 4 11 Capture audio 8 10 Create sound files 8 8 PowerPoint 21 1 Advanced PowerPoint 17 4 Fireworks 2 16 Shockwave 3 13 create graphics 7 12 create animations 6 11 Figure 4. Responses from 29 of the 39 TIM2S participants to the software use portion of the survey.