Forms of Educational Television

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Wetzel, C. Douglas, Radtke, Paul, H. and Stern, Hervey W. (1994) Instructional effectiveness of video media. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers. USA.
Chapter 2
Quotes

• Three general areas may be noted in these reviews: (student) achievement, (students’) attitudes, and potentially effective techniques used within the medium. P6
• As a result (of Finn’s 1953 review) many early studies of instructional television were evaluations of conventional talking-head lectures that were televised. P7
• Chu and Schramm (1967, 1975) drew several conclusions on attitudes toward instructional television in their comprehensive review. They concluded that attitudes toward instructional television were generally favourable among both teachers and students, but tended to be more favourable in elementary schools than in secondary schools or colleges. Students at the college level tended to prefer small discussion classes over television classes, but preferred television classes over large lecture classes. Voluntary home students of televised college classes tended to be more favourable toward learning by television than were students taking these same televised courses in the classroom. Off-campus students valued an otherwise unavailable opportunity for education and the convenience of not having to travel to school. P12
• Chu and Shramm concluded that students are generally more satisfied with personal teacher-student contact. P12
• A telecourse is a learning system that consists of preproduced televised instructional programs integrated with printed supplementary materials such as syllabus outlines, study guides, textbooks and tests. P14
• The most frequently offered whole courses are in foreign languages, followed by mathematics and science, and then humanities. P15
• The primary attraction of telecourses for students is convenience. Telecourses are attractive to students at remote locations for whim travel is an obstacle, those whou must accommodate regular employment, and those needing flexibility in personal scheduling. P15
• Experience with the integration of visual and printed course material indicated that students place value on printed material documenting the aims and objectives of a program prior to the broadcast, points to look for during the broadcast, and postbroadcast notes summarizing the main points covered. P17
• It has been suggested that student videotapes should be designed to exploit their control characteristics by using segments, clear stopping points, indexing and integrating them with other media activities (Bates 1988). P18
• Broadcast media are comparatively inflexible from the learner’s point of view because fixed broadcast times limit their access. Tapes allow learners to control the transient and fixed pace nature of the medium. Integrated visual and printed materials are particularly important for documenting programs in accessible texts and notes that can be reviewed. P18
• Gibbons, Kincheloe, and Down (1977) reported on the effectiveness of a hybrid telecourse technique known as Tutored Videotape Instruction (TVI). The TVI technique attempts to respond to the educational needs of the students by combining the positive features of lectures with those of small-group discussions. P18
• Supplementary classroom use of videotapes and films. The attractiveness of these media is attributed to their offering an accessible technology under the direct control of the classroom teacher. The control involves the ability of the teacher to preview a film or tape, to introduce it at any time that it is to do so, to stop it at will for discussion, and to rerun it for review at any time. This control is not possible with live broadcasts unless they have been taped for replay at the convenience of the teacher. These control features allow teachers the opportunity to use several very effective introduction and follow up techniques commonly recommended for classroom use of films, filmstrips, or videotapes. P22
• Several often-discussed practical benefits of television-centred education are not easily expressed in terms of either achievement or costs. These benefits are generally related to convenience, control, access, standardization, quality, or other efficiency reasons. P24
• Instructional television, tapes, or films potentially offer a standardization in the quality of instruction over many sites by minimizing differences in the quality among instructors. Extreme examples are in developing countries with few or poorly qualified teachers are in short supply. P25
• Instructional television can share a good teacher with a very large number of classes, rather than one. P25
• Production and Delivery Costs and Characteristics: Television-centred media differ substantially in costs for development and delivery. The ability to initially opt for a medium can be affected by its costs for development, production, equipment and personnel. P33

Alberto Ramirez Martinell