Using Technology to Tame the Large Oceanography Class

Abstract

Comprehensive software tools have been created to support a large general-education Oceanography course. The class meets formally three times per week for a one-hour lecture and once per week for a two-hour section in a Macintosh computer laboratory. Students have access to the computer lab during open-access hours. The goal is to provide students with access to selected earth-science databases and guide them in the process of “discovering” earth processes. Part of the process involves group and class discussions, peer review of writing, and a technical paper describing their results and interpretations. In addition, students enter weekly homework problems into the computer and receive a score immediately. Extensive help software enables students to use the system with little outside instruction. Student activity is scored in a central location so that grades are available to the professor, the teaching assistants, and the student (the student can only see his/her own grade). The focus of the content is o...