Review by: Reichert, Raimond (2004-07-21)

This article reports on an experiment on web-based lectures replacing traditional lectures which took place in 1997 at Aberdeen University. Even though the experiment took place in the early days of the web, it is instructive to consider the results in today’s context and to reflect on what might have changed since, and what might not have changed.

Nine lectures of a course on Economics of Public Policy were conducted as web lectures. 53 students had access to the lecture notes on the web, to a notice board for administrative purposes, and to two links to useful sources of further information. Five surveys were applied to elicit students’ opinions of the use of computers in higher education. Two of these surveys asked students to determine the value placed upon six potential advantages and eight potential disadvantages of web lectures. Another survey addressed students’ opinion of the experiment. In the following, this review focuses on these three surveys.

Of the six potential advantages that students were asked to rate, the most important perceived advantages were richer learning resources and greater freedom of when to study and of the pace of study. Of the eight potential disadvantages that students were asked to rate, the most important perceived disadvantages were loss of contact with staff and other students, and lack of access to computers.

The results of the survey on students’ opinion of the experiment revealed a number of interesting issues. First, access to computers was not a problem for the students, so that potential disadvantage was not an issue. Second, students took the opportunity of greater choice as to when to study, realizing this particular advantage. Third, however, more than half the students did not pursue either of the two suggested links or search for other relevant information themselves, even though better learning resources were perceived as one of the most important advantages. It is also interesting to note that most students printed the web pages to read them, even though the pages were designed to be screen-readable. Also, almost all students ignored the possibility of editing the web pages to create more customized notes.

This experiment shows that students may not always use the web as imagined by course developers, even though too much generalisation of these results should of course not be attempted, as the authors point out. Students approached the web lectures conservatively and with a reluctance to explore and experiment. The issue of how students could take advantage of web-based learning environments should be kept in mind when developing new such environments.