Encountering Technological Resistance in the High-Tech Freshman
Author:  Corinna McLeod, PINTE Instructor
Organization:  University of South Carolina
MCLEODFREN@aol.com

In Spring 2000 I became part of the University of South Carolina’s innovative project called Program for Incorporating New Technologies in English (PINTE). Each participating teacher in PINTE is incorporating into his or her English classes a variety of technological applications, ranging from web design, to collaborative writing and document sharing in electronic spaces, to critically evaluating online texts, to e-conferencing in both synchronous and asynchronous multi-user domains. The teachers and students are using software applications that can be considered foundational in the subdiscipline of computers and composition:
word-processing; graphical presentation programs (such as PowerPoint); web-design editors; and updated web browsers that enable access to research and communication with individuals and groups from across the world. The teachers and students are also all making effective use of course management software to organize much of their online work; specifically they are using Blackboard, an application that has been site-licensed to USC Columbia¹. My main goal in using technology was to incorporate this technology into the English Composition curriculum as a way to foster collaborative learning. Using the Blackboard discussion board and LinguaMoo I anticipated technology as enabling a space for more in-depth discussion of literature read in class, creating an opportunity to debate issues raised in face-to-face class and in postings, as well as generating an overall greater awareness of language and its impact on audience. Over the course of the semester I have run the gamut from skepticism to idealism and back to skepticism; I am currently seeking to achieve balance in my view of technology: I am convinced it helps in the classroom by fostering an exchange of ideas--but I realize that technology in the classroom is far from perfect. This paper is a response to one of the challenges--initial student resistance--I faced in introducing the PINTE program and technology in the classroom to a traditional student demographic (ages 18-20), the majority of whom came from very traditional and conservative backgrounds.

The initial difficulty with the students lay in that the majority of the students were not aware they would be participating in an experimental computer-assisted program. Only the students who had taken my English 101 class the semester before knew that the 102 sections I would teach were going to be computer-assisted. Though a blurb existed at the bottom of the screen when students registered for classes online, none of the new students in my two sections knew that they would be part of the PINTE experiment. The shock was too much for many students--sparking a scramble to get out by some. One of the first signs of resistance expressed by the students was that they had not had a choice. There were some who resented the “guinea pig” role. On the first day of my afternoon class I discovered my biggest naysayer. Bill² was 18, from rural Georgia and not impressed with the idea of using computers in the English classroom. After I made an upbeat speech about how exciting it should be for them to be in a pilot program, not for the faint of heart and other optimistic phrases I had carefully chosen to support my own skeptical outlook, he began to ask questions. As I had also given my “this is an open-forum class” speech I found myself in the position of grudgingly allowing him to voice the many concerns he had. At the top of his list was the question of whether or not it was fair for the students in my classes to be part of the PINTE initiative. He was very concerned with choice, stating that the English 102 course is a required course and the time slot that he had signed up for was the one that fit his schedule, therefore the transferring option was not “fair.” He felt that there should have been more of a warning about the technological aspect of the course, claiming that since it was a requirement for graduation it was not “fair” to make some students part of an experiment. The word “fair” appeared over and over in his commentary and I began to see him as the embodiment of my fears as a PINTE instructor. I had wondered the same things myself. What if the PINTE initiative were a disaster? What if I couldn’t handle the technology? What if I couldn’t find a way to incorporate the technology into the lesson plans in an effective and constructive manner? What if the technology didn’t work? How would all of this have an impact on my students’ learning?

Bill seemed to voice every small question or concern of my own, as well as many I had not even thought of--such as whetherc outsiders could access their postings--and he was louder. His questions sparked a slight panic in the class as students who did not seem to react at the news that they were in a computer-assisted class suddenly found things to worry about. Interestingly, his final question of whether or not outsiders could lurk on our site and read postings became a very real sense of concern for many of the students, several of whom chimed in that they did not want “other people reading our stuff.”

I tried to maintain an authority in the classroom in the face of a skepticism that had me feeling anything but authoritative, while at the same time reintroducing the adventurous collegial element: We were “all on the same educational exploration team” and “each of us plays an active role in our education” were two slogans I spun out as part of the morale-boosting speech. The end result of the first day of classes was three very concerned (one tearful) students telling me they did not know much about computers and a total of five students dropping the course.

The remainder of the students were stuck in the course because their schedules could not handle a switch to a non-computer-assisted course or they stayed because they liked the idea of the challenge. The members of this latter group by and large had their own computers and, by the informational index cards they filled out the first day, considered themselves technologically aware.

As the course progressed, another student was lost. Julia, was an African-American, traditional-aged college student, who lived off campus and worked between thirty and forty hours a week. When not in class, she was at work. She did not have internet-access or a computer at home; she was heavily reliant on campus computer labs, most of which are not 24hour facilities. Incidentally, those facilities that are open 24 hours are in residence halls and for the use of those residents only. Thus the economic exclusion--a student who finds living on campus too expensive, must work to support herself and as a means to her college education--prevents access³. This issue of access created both academic and personal hardship for the student which in turn is a form of technological resistance. She was frequently unable to post, unable to access the homework, and at times, had to confess in front of other students that she was unable to access the internet due to her stringent work schedule and her own lack of a computer. Her frustration was apparent--as was her understandable expression of what I had failed to realize: the computer-assisted classroom does disenfranchise those students of lower-income such as those students who live off-campus and who are unable to afford a computer. This student saw the requirements of the class as being unfair. She voiced her frustration to other students, who recognized the unfairness of her situation and joined in the call for hardcopy handouts and abandoning the use of Blackboard as a course management tool. Julia’s story became the rallying cry for students--but it also served as an excuse for those students who did have access to not do their online homework. “I couldn’t get to a computer” or “The server was down” or “I didn’t have time” were taken from the validity of Julia’s situation and applied to other’s. Unfortunately, in order to curb this resistance I had to assert that “No Post Means No Grade” rule. After several zeros, students saw these excuses were not viable, and abandoned both their excuses and Julia’s cause. Though I empathized with Julia I also gave her zeros explaining that, in the interest of fairness, what I did for one I had to do for all.

Julia dropped the course. She was very involved in class discussion and essentially the type of bright, active student every instructor dreams of having in his/her class. As a matter of fact, when her former English 101 instructor discovered she was in my class he congratulated me on my luck of having one of those students who inspire people to teach. Yet she was failing the English102 course due to her lack of access privilege.

I never so clearly understood the policies of exclusion this pilot program was encountering and creating. After she dropped the course I later introduced the topic to the students. How many of them found access difficult and frustrating? All the students in the class who had computers in their rooms were the most enthusiastic about Blackboard and their ability to log on for homework, course information, my comments, etc. Those students without a computer in their rooms expressed resentment of those students who had computers. They raised the issue of fairness--that of course those students who had computers held an unfair advantage of access. Other students who relied on the limited hours and workstations of the on-campus computing facilities encountered lines, and occasionally hostility from other students who assumed the Blackboard site was non-academic websurfing and wasting other students‘ computing time.

Students also expressed a great deal of frustration with the lack of convenience of the computers. Unable to transport the computers, some students were also frustrated by the physical constraints of some of the class requirements. Homework that must be posted must be posted and not written, perhaps more conveniently, by hand or typed on a word processor and turned in hardcopy. Recently there has been a backlash against postings. Students preferring the “privacy” of writing a response for the eyes of the instructor only and resenting the immediacy and availability of the postings. They also feel at a loss with the “virtual homework.” In fact, some students have voiced a concern that they feel they are working but not producing because they are used to opening folders and seeing physical proof of their academic labors. Though I have reminded them they may and should print copies of their online work they stubbornly insist that this is not the same feeling of accomplishment they have when performing the somewhat nostalgic ritualized “handing over” of the homework. To my amazement, one student spoke wistfully of the pleasure and self-gratification he felt when he opened his notebook and pulled out his assignment to hand in to the instructor. Now, he feels instead a lack of closure: A sense of incompleteness with virtual postings. Rather than the jokes I expected, most of the students in class voluably agreed with him. Perhaps Sven Birkert would be pleased to hear that this generation is not lost to the feel of a text, and the idea of producing physical text is part of a postmodern conflict.

Finally, students perceived that those classes using computers necessitated more work than those classes not part of the pilot program and not incorporating new technologies in the classroom. This was the source of the most resistance. The preconception reasserts itself that computers necessitate more work, and that computers and computing technology signify complexity of task and general difficulty. Thus the “real world” consciousness that computers are difficult, the same presuppostition that caused students to drop the course after the first class period, was maintained and translated into the construction that computers are complicated thus using the computers in class complicates the class. To a certain extent, the students are correct. Using the computer does speed up the class and can, at times, cause the pace of the class to be faster than it would be in a traditional classroom. By and large students type quickly, and can submit posts and move on to the next activity faster than the traditional method of collecting paper and distributing handouts. The use of the internet also allows a faster browsing of materials than the perusal of an in-class packet. In these circumstances I can see how the students perceive that computers imply a greater amount of work.

I had not planned on encountering this type of student resistance. I assumed the incoming students were all computer literate, or at least internet-literate, and would be excited with the flexibility and increased access to materials I imagined Blackboard would provide. This was just one of many errors I made. I based my predictions for the course on poor assumptions: that internet access would not be difficult for the students, that they all understood the fundamentals of web-surfing, that there would be no anxiety over the physical act of posting to the discussion board, that all students were familiar with email. I was wrong on every single one of these issues. Even for the students who named themselves “experienced web-surfers” did not understand that the spinning planets on the Netscape icon signified the computer was “thinking.” Any delay in the appearance of the webpage we sought instigated an immediate “the computer is broken” or “Blackboard is down.”

Faced with this evidence of my own misconceptions of the students, learning how to handle student resistance has been difficult. While my instinct is still to defend myself and the program, I realize that by doing so I only add fodder to the fire when the inevitable technical glitches occur. I was also caught in the ethical quandry of defending the computer-assisted element when I myself was not convinced of its efficacy. I also realized that either position open to me was potentially awkward. If I was overly enthusiastic of the technology I felt that the glitches, when they occurred, would be seen as a flaw in my authority--afterall, I touted the technology as the next best thing since sliced bread. But I also realized that if I appeared too skeptical of the technological element that students would perceive this as an excuse to not take the technological aspects of the course seriously. Thus to bring the reluctant students on to my side, I had to help them see themselves in an exciting role. Rather than celebrate technology, I sought to place them in the mind frame that they were “lucky” to be in a class experimenting with technology--if only because they were in for a wild ride. But was this an ethical response to their concerns?

Placing the instructor in the position of trying to counter student resistance to technology while at the same time explaining to the students that the technology is far from perfect and acknowledging that they are part of an experiment is the first hurdle to overcome when teaching with technologies. Before even approaching the pedagogy of technology and its practical application in the classroom one must first break the news to the students.

On the first day of classes I made clear to the students that they would be in a computer-assisted classroom. What I did not make clear, and what I could not make clear, was just what kind of an impact the computers would have on our class itself. As a new instructor to teaching with technology, I simply did not know how the technology would shape the course. All I did know was that I would only have the computer room once a week, and that I would be learning as I went.

As an instructor in a pilot program, new to the idea of teaching with technology myself, I felt my own enthusiasm was naive and possibly misleading. I did tell the students that should the technology become unbearable, we would return completely to the traditional classroom setting. Despite this addendum, I continued to try and portray the class as an innovative experience--and relate it to the entire nature of “What is a University.”

There was resistance to the computer experience from the start. The first concern that students voiced was an issue of fairness. Most of the students had a preconception that computers meant they had to be computer engineers or had to know about computer programming. The first step was allaying their fears that this class, an English Composition and Literature class, would somehow involve programming and understanding the electrical circuits of a computer. I explained to students the software we would be using was Blackboard, and was web-based: essentially they would access course materials by surfing the web. The second hurdle came in reassuring students that we would meet face-to-face and that a computer-assisted classroom was not the equivalent of a non-existent physical space. Thus the first group of students felt excluded from the learning environment: they believed that to take part in a computer-assisted English course one must have a knowledge of computers. This misconception, regardless of any debunking that is attempted in the course, proved too much for some students. They chose to withdraw from the course conflicting less with the course materials themselves than with the computerized element of the course.

All of this brings us to the questions of how we can better work to incorporate new technologies in the classroom. I think the following would be best. 1) A footnote marking those sections that will be computer-assisted. Until technologies become the norm on the college campus students should be allowed a choice to participate in a computer-assisted course. Even if students still foster a reluctance to engage in the computer-assisted classroom they will at least have an awareness of the computerized element in the classroom. Though admittedly, this would still be indicative of a policy of exclusion--meaning one must recognize that those students who feel that not having a personal computer will be a hindrance in the course will not sign up--also possibly meaning that students who do take the course might be deprived of the insights and perspectives of their peers from a certain socio-economic class. An answer to both situations would be to incorporate a laptop component for students taking pilot computer-assisted courses. Though the debate over funding will surely spring into focus, a similar program in the College of Engineering at the University of South Carolina, Columbia is currently underway. The next step would be convincing the administration that funding for such a program is essential.

The second step in the process of acclimating students to the computer-assisted classroom would be a longer training period for instructors who would be incorporating new technologies in the classroom. The concepts, exercises, problems and successes that are incurred in a computer-assisted class are drastically different than the traditional classroom. As Tharon Howard⁴ writes in his book A Rhetoric of Electronic Communities,

To argue that electronic writing is just the same old print transmitted electronically rather than on the page is to operate from a outdated and retrograde view of the language. When we adopt this efficiency approach to electronic writing, it suggests that language is transparent and that technology is just a neutral tool for transmitting language. Such a perspective does not acknowledge that form and medium play a role in shaping meaning. . .(Howard, 5-6)

For instructors new to electronic environment an intensive training course assisting them in understanding how previous assignments successful in the traditional classroom may not work effectively in the computer assisted classroom is vital. Also, introducing these instructors to teaching with technology will provide them the opportunity to test materials on themselves and gain insight into the nature of the computer-assisted classroom. In this case, the instructor will be more confident with the technology and better able to understand his/her students’ frustrations with the technology.

As I read more and understand more about the implications of using computers in technology and its ethical implications, I feel that we as purveyors of this new technology and advocates of computers in the classroom have an ethical duty to prepare our students for this shift in the construction of the classroom. As instructors, we must not jump to the assumption that our students are part of a “technogeek society” and know more about computers than we do. In fact, we should remember that for many of the students, the computer represents a frightening shift from their concept of education. As radical as it is for us in altering our pedagogy, it is just as radical for them to adjust their learning and conceptualization of how learning is done.

Notes:

¹Program for Incorporating New Technologies in English. Ed. Darin Payne. 28 March 2000. University of South Carolina. < http://www.cla.sc.edu/engl/faculty/paynedp/pinte_home.htm >

²Pseudonyms have been used to protect the privacy of the individuals.

³ Charles Moran takes up the issue of access and exclusion in his chapter "Access the 'A' Word in Technology Studies." In Passions, Pedagogies, and 21st Century Technologies. Ed. Gail E. Hawisher and Cynthia L. Selfe. Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press, 1999.

⁴Howard, Tharon W. A Rhetoric of Electronic Communities. London: Ablex Publishing Corporation, 1997.