Monday, March 19, 2018

What is Turnitin?

Turnitin is a cloud-based program that provides a comprehensive solution for grading assignments, preventing plagiarism, and safeguarding an institution's reputation. For students, Turnitin provides personalized and timely feedback while identifying areas for individual growth and improvement. For faculty, Turnitin streamlines the grading and feedback loop through integration with Moodle. Turnitin keeps an institution's reputation top of mind by reducing unoriginal content and fostering confident writers.

Moodle ISU instructors can now add Turnitin to their course using the Add an Activity or Resource function. The ITRC has made getting started information available for both students and faculty at https://isu.edu/itrc/turnitin. Feel free to also call the ITRC at 282-5880 or stop by the lab for more information and assistance with using this new tool.

The Pluses and Minuses of Turnitin According to One Faculty

In the article, "My Love-Hate Relationship with Turnitin", author Ry Marcattilio-McCracken (2015) candidly admits that he loves Turnitin. He states that it is "Painless, effective, and just as important, already there for me to use" and saves him significant time each term "Google-searching" student papers. Additionally, when he is forced to pursue an incident of academic dishonesty, Turnitin provides a tidy, official-looking report that "tends to convince students of the authority and weight behind the meeting'" he is having with them.

In spite of how much Marcattilio-McCracken (2015) "loves" Turnitin, he has reservations about the company's "fair-use" and profitability from the submission of student work. Marcattilio-McCracken ends his article with the admission that at some point he will have to decide which is more important: his time, or his overriding philosophical concerns about the company.

Turnitin's Privacy Pledge

"Integrity is at the heart of all we do; it defines us." --Chris Caren, CEO of Turnitin

TurnitIn's privacy policy covers the kind of data they collect, what they do with it, and how they protect any personal information that is provided by the student or instructor.


Turnitin Can be Used as a Writing Coach for Students

Turnitin recognized that there was a gap for student writing between what the instructor needed to see and what students needed to do and launched its Revision Assistant in 2017. This tool is designed to be a personal writing coach for each student. Instructors can assign writing prompts from a bank available in Turnitin and using a machine learning model, the system adapts to each new essay written by the student and scores it against a changing rubric (Ravipati, 2017). For more information about Turnitin's Revision Assistant read Ravipati's complete article, "Turnitin 'Revises' the Writing Process" and watch the Revision Assistant Walkthrough video (2:21).

 

References


Marcattilio-McCracken, R. (2015, Sep 08) My Love-Hate Relationship with Turnitin. The Chronicle of Higher Education. 

Ravipati, S. ( 2017, July 06). Turnitin 'Revises' the Writing Process. Campus Technology.

Thursday, March 8, 2018

Allowing Mobile Devices in the Classroom - Are You For or Against?

In the August, 2016 blog post "Student Dependence on Technology - Interesting Facts" the following statistics about college students and technology were provided:
  • 73% of college students (sample size of 500) said that they cannot study without technology.
  • 38% of students cannot go more than 10 minutes without checking their email, tablet, laptop, or smartphone.
  • 70% of students use keyboards to take notes instead of pen and paper.
  • 91% of students used email to communicate with their instructor.
  • Digital textbooks cost approximately 40% less than printed textbooks.
With those statistics in mind, what is your stance on whether or not mobile devices and phones should be allowed in the classroom? In the article, "Laptops and Phones in the Classroom: Yea, Nay or a Third Way?" Kamenetz (2018) provided some of the pros and cons of this debate.

Arguments Against Allowing Personal Devices in the Classroom

The naysayers worry that phones are distracting to students in the classroom. One faculty stated, "If something on their desk or in their pocket dings, rings or vibrates--they will lose focus". In addition, there may be missed opportunities for social interaction if each student is sitting quietly and independently accessing their phone. Some students prefer to take notes on their laptop during class but research has found that note-taking by hand can lead to better recall than note-taking by typing.

Arguments For Allowing Personal Devices in the Classroom

Those who are open to the use of technology in the classroom also make some valid points. The first is that some students use their device to accommodate for special needs and requiring them to ask for permission to use it in class is an invasion of their privacy and singles them out from the other students. The second reason listed by Kamenetz (2018) is that personal devices can be used as a tool during class to look up difficult terms, participate in live polls, and work collaboratively on a project. For some students, their phone may be the most powerful computer they have access to. The third reason for allowing phones in the classroom is for emergency notifications from campus security - it is essential for those messages to be received immediately.

Regardless of your personal stance on allowing mobile devices in the classroom, the reality is that students do not want to put their devices away during class. Kamenetz (2018) suggested that faculty "fight technology with technology". 

Suggestions for "fighting technology with technology"

Kamenetz (2018) suggested the use of phone apps like Flipd that can be used to set a timer that locks out all of the phone's functions except for basic texts and phone calls. This provides a way for students to eliminate the distractions that come from push notifications from Facebook, Instagram, and other apps while still being able to receive emergency information. Some faculty are offering their students extra credit for installing the app and using it during class.

One of the hottest trends in teaching with technology is turning wi-fi ready, used smartphones into handheld computers. Secondary schools are taking donations of used phones and removing all apps except for ones that are useful in the classroom for video capture, imagery capture, and immersive virtual reality activities. See the article, "Virtual Reality Gives Cellphones a New Purpose in the Classroom" for more information on that trend. Students in higher education could be encouraged to use their personal device for these same type of activities.

Conclusion

With a little forward thinking and creativity, faculty in higher education can meet their students where they are at and provide positive opportunities for them to pull out and use their mobile devices. With that mindset, students will not only use their phones, tablets, and laptops to consume content, but to create it as well (Kamenetz, 2018).

Reference

Kamenetz, A. (2018, Jan 25). Laptops and phones in the classroom: Yea, nay or a third way? KQED Live.