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2008 52: 667Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual MeetingSahika Vatan Korkmaz, Carolyn M. Sommerich and Steven A. Lavender

A Pilot Test of Participatory Ergonomics and Technology Teams among High School Teachers  

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A PILOT TEST OF PARTICIPATORY ERGONOMICS AND TECHNOLOGY TEAMS AMONG HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS

Sahika Vatan Korkmaz, Ph.D., Carolyn M. Sommerich, Ph.D., Steven A. Lavender, Ph.D.

The Ohio State University

Columbus, OH

The promise and potential of Information Technology (IT) to improve education in educational environments is offset by potential for problems that can stem from an unhealthy information ecology. The long-term goal of this line of research was to improve teachers’ effectiveness with IT and incorporating IT into their curriculum. This goal was addressed in this research through a participatory approach that employed an action research model. The specific aim was establishing small groups of teachers to meet weekly to engage in collaborative exploration of the use of IT in their classrooms and assessing progress of their learning. Teachers’ team evaluation surveys indicated that a majority of Participatory Ergonomics and Technology Team members were satisfied with their participation and the quality of the teams. Team member teachers’ perception about their own computer proficiency and their belief about the usefulness of IT statistically increased from pre- to post-intervention. It is possible to conclude that this approach is a viable method that may have positive effects on supporting teacher collegiality and improving teachers’ use of IT.

INTRODUCTION

Teachers are a key factor in the use of technology in

schools. If they do not incorporate the technology in their class activities on a regular basis, even though everybody has computers at the schools, the school cannot claim to have a fully functioning technology program.

There are several factors that affect teachers’ use of technology, including several skills and competencies which teachers feel they need in order to find IT easy to use. These include their experience of using technology in their daily lives outside the classroom, ownership of a computer, confidence in using IT, ability to easily control the class, ability to easily think of new lesson ideas, and the availability of help and advice from colleagues (Cox, Preston and Cox, 1999). There are some other factors that may contribute to teachers’ perceived usefulness of IT, such as the use of IT in helping to make the lessons more interesting and diverse, improving the presentation of materials, giving the teacher more prestige, making the teachers’ administrative duties more efficient, giving the teacher more confidence, making the lessons more fun, enhancing the teachers’ career prospects and helping the teachers discuss teaching ideas (Cox et al., 1999). Age, having the necessary software at school (Robinson, 2005), the way teachers were taught in college (Stitt-Gohdes, 2001), and teaching style (Hernandez-Ramos, 2005) may affect ways in which and extent to which teachers use IT. One of the main factors that impact the teachers’ use of IT is the quality and amount of training they receive (McKenzie, 2001).

Further, there are some other factors that actually discourage teachers from using IT, such as teaching inexperience with IT and lack of the following: on-site support for teachers using IT, help supervising students when they are using computers, IT specialist teachers to teach students computer skills, computer availability, time required

to successfully integrate IT into curriculum, and financial support (Mumtaz, 2000). If the teachers are not feeling comfortable enough to use the computers in front of the students, then they will not use them. For more experienced teachers, another factor is having already prepared materials throughout the years and not having enough time to update the way they teach and their teaching materials. Teachers already have many demands on their time.

Smith stated that “Behavioral cybernetics theory views self-control of behavior as a biological imperative” (Smith, 2001). By this viewpoint, systems in which participants have little control, systems that are controlled externally, are considered to be fundamentally flawed. In some schools, the administration may be considered an external controller and teachers may only be able to influence teaching factors and some elements of the design of their own classroom.

One of the main factors that slow down an IT program is the limited involvement of teachers in the planning, design, and/or administration of the IT program (Karsh, 2004), ie. the a sign/symptom of the lack of control discussed by Smith. To improve the effectiveness of teachers’ use of IT, as well as the degree of control they can exercise in their work environment, several pathways are suggested. For instance, formal computer training may help some teachers use computers more effectively and improve their self-efficacy. We suggest that another pathway may be teacher collegiality.

An environment that facilitates structured and/or unstructured teacher collegiality may help teachers’ adoption of IT. This may, in turn, foster expanded knowledge of computers, effective integration of the computers into the curriculum, and the degree to which teachers feel they have some control over their work environment. Teacher collegiality has been shown to be a preferred method of learning by teachers (Lima, 1998; Harris and Anthony, 2001). It has been shown that when teachers work in small groups and share IT-related information they not only use IT more,

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but also enjoy using IT better. It may be possible to introduce, through the structure of teacher collegiality, a participatory ergonomics process in the educational environment. Formation of participatory ergonomics teams amongst teachers would encourage teacher collegiality and could target IT as the subject matter. Unlike formal training, a team structure may help a wide range of teachers who have different IT backgrounds, different teaching philosophies, and different attitudes about IT use.

This study adopted and combined three approaches: (a) participatory ergonomics, in which stakeholders learn about ergonomics principles and then apply them to make improvement in the workplace; (b) action research, in which participants implement those improvements in their work environments and evaluate the effects; and (c) teacher collegiality, in which teachers share information to form a hybrid intervention process for teachers’ self-directed learning about IT. The study tested the effects of this hybrid process on perceived proficiency in IT use and effect of IT on professional development.

This aim of the study was to implement Participatory Ergonomics and Technology (PET) teams among a sample of high school teachers in order to improve their effective use of IT, and to document the progress of these teams throughout the study. The hypotheses that were statistically tested were:

(1) PET team participants would have higher self-reported computer proficiency levels over their pre-participation levels, while non-participants scores would not change or would not change as much over the same interval of time (a school year);

(2) PET team participants would rate themselves higher (post v. pre participation) on a set of questions that assessed the extent to which they find IT provides professional benefits to them, while non-participants scores would not change or would not change as much over the same interval of time (a school year).

METHOD

The setting for the study was a high school in US Midwest

(HSX) with which the researchers had an established relationship.

Participants

During the year of this study, all 39 teachers who were

actively teaching at the high school were invited to participate in the PET teams. 18 teachers volunteered to be in the study. Three groups were formed with the 15 teachers who stayed in the study. Teachers were placed in those groups mainly based on their schedules. There was a mix of teachers from different IT backgrounds and different subject matters in each team.

Protocol The study was approved by the Ohio State University’s

(OSU’s) Institutional Review Board. Once all the PET teams were set up, each team went though a training where they were given some initial instruction in team building skills and working abilities, basic ergonomics principles, and action research characteristics. This was conducted by OSU researchers. After the initial training, each team had two meetings where they brainstormed ideas about what they would like to focus on during the study period. Each team created a weekly meeting schedule for the rest of the study period.

Once the initial training was completed, the control of the teams began to gradually shift from the researchers to the team member teachers. One or more OSU researchers participated in every team meeting. Each team had a different set of goals and they met once every week until the end of the study. The intervention was conducted over a three-month period. Monthly team evaluation surveys were conducted at the end of each month.

Study Design

The research employed a quasi-experimental design (a

nonequivalent pre-post intervention comparison group design), where assignment of participants was not explicitly controlled, and subjects self selected to be in the PET team (Campbell and Stanley, 1966).

Independent Variable. The independent variable was

group membership and has two levels: PET team member or control group member (the teachers who did not opt to participate in the PET teams).

Dependent Variables. Short questionnaires, distributed

monthly to the PET Team members provided information about the PET Team process (Bohr et al 1997). Participants were queried about quality of the team meetings and suggested improvements; satisfaction with the effort by the individual and team; communication within the team and resources that were presented to the team by the researcher and the school whenever necessary. Annual surveys, distributed to all the teachers at HSX at the beginning and end of the school year, provided questions on various aspects of teaching and IT use in education. For this presentation, we will focus on two scales: Perceived Proficiency in IT Use (PPITU) and Professional Development (ProD). The former provided information about the way teachers viewed their level of expertise in using various IT tools, and the latter queried the teachers on the extent to which they see IT as a beneficial tool for their professional development.

Statistical Analysis. The changes in the monthly team

assessment survey responses throughout the three month-period were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Pre- and post-intervention scales (Table 1) were compared using pair-

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sampled t-tests. Whether there was a difference in the pre-intervention or post-intervention survey results for PET team and control group was also examined by t-tests.

Table 1. Scale Calculations Q.ID Question

(TPC refers to tablet PC) Scale construction

Perceived Proficiency in IT Use Scale (PPITU) How you rate yourself as a user of … 1a DyKnow Vision for Presentations 1b DyKnow Monitor 1c DyKnow Attendance 1d Journal writer 1e Internet 1f Email 1g Turnitin. Com 1h Homework Online 1i SMART Board 1j Gradequick 1k PowerPoint 1l Word 1m Excel 1n Digital Camera 1o Voice recognition feature on tablets 1p Converting paper documents to e-files 1q Daily Dialogue 1r Basic computer skills 1s Skype 1t ArtRage 1u Moodle 1v Using electronic textbooks

Each question is rated by the respondent as follows: No experience=1; Novice = 2; Intermediate = 3; Advanced=4; Expert = 5. Ratings on each item are totaled to produce the scale score. Scale Score Range = 22-110

Professional Development Scale (ProD) 2a IT makes my job

(less enjoyable=1 – more enjoyable=5) 2b Usefulness of the SMART board to me

(not at all useful=1 – very useful=5) 2c Usefulness of the TPC that was assigned

to me (not at all useful=1– very useful=5) 2d How the HSX TPC program has affected

my workload (adds significantly to my workload= 1 – significantly reduces my workload=5)

2e How the HSX TPC program has affected the grades in the classes that I teach (grades have generally been negatively=1-positively affected=5)

2f Does use of IT alter the effectiveness of teachers who are not “IT savvy”? (generally reduces=1 - increases their effectiveness=5)

Each question is rated 1-5 by the respondent. Ratings on each item are totaled to produce the scale score. Scale Score Range = 6-30

RESULTS

Teacher PET Team Assessments From the three monthly team evaluation surveys that were

conducted, descriptive statistics were calculated. Over eighty percent of the teachers agreed to some extent that they were satisfied with the quality of the team meetings, with the effort spend towards the team goals, with the communication within the team and between the team and the researchers, and with the resources that were presented to the team by the researcher. The main barriers or obstacles that were

mentioned by over half of the teachers were time pressure and lack of meeting structure. Overall, almost all teachers (ninety percent) indicated that they would like to participate in these small group meetings to discuss and learn more about IT with their colleagues in the upcoming years and would recommend participation to a fellow teacher. Assessments Based on Annual Teacher Surveys: Pre- vs. Post-Intervention Comparison

Internal consistency was high on the Perceived

Proficiency in IT Use (PPITU) scale (Cronbach’s alpha post = 0.92). There was a statistically significant increase in the PET team’s PPITU score in the post-intervention survey when compared to the pre-intervention survey (p=0.0097). It should be noted that the PET team’s mean scale score appeared to be higher than the control group’s in the pre-intervention survey (PET: mean=57, SD=8; Control: mean=48, SD=17) as well as in the post-intervention survey (PET: mean=64, SD=11; Control: mean=53, SD=22). However, two sample t-tests did not show significant differences between the groups within surveys.

Internal consistency was moderate on the Professional Development (ProD) scale (Cronbach’s alpha post = 0.77). There was a statistically significant increase in the PET team’s ProD scale from pre- to post-intervention (p=0. 022). The PET team’s scale was slightly lower in the pre-intervention survey than the control group (PET: mean = 20, SD=2.7; Control: mean = 21.6, SD=1.9; t-test showed no significance) and the means were equal in the post intervention survey (PET and Control: mean =21.7; PET SD = 3.5; Control SD = 2.5). Table 2. Results of tests of statistically significant differences between pre- and post- PET Team participation scores, by group. Some teacher’s score from the PET team and the control group had to be removed from the data since they did not have their pre- or post- intervention survey score.

N

Mean Diff-erence (Post-Pre)

S. Err.

T value

Pr > |t|

Perceived Proficiency in IT Use Scale (PPITU) PET team 13 6. 5 2. 13 3. 07 0.009 Control 11 4. 5 3. 15 1. 41 0. 18

Professional Development Scale (ProD) PET team 10 1.7 0.62 2.76 0.022 Control 8 0.1 0.88 0.14 0.89

DISCUSSION

The aim of the study was to pilot test the implementation

of PET teams among a sample of high school teachers, and to document the progress of these teams throughout the study and this was achieved. While this aim was achieved, some issues and challenges that arose, such as the obstacles faced

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by the teachers and researchers while implementing this study, are important to examine. Time constraints and demands on teachers

For the teachers who were motivated to participate, time constraints were not prohibitive. Only three teachers withdrew from the study and they did so in the first week of the study. There were no dropouts during the rest of the study period. The reason for the early dropouts was that they did not have enough time. There was, on average, over ninety percent participation rate in the weekly meetings. Even though teachers who participated in the study mentioned “time” as one of the two main obstacles in the success of the process, they still participated in the weekly meetings with a very high attendance rate. Teachers were offered 0.1 Continuing Education Unit’s (CEUs) for every meeting in which they participated and this may have contributed to their high attendance rate as well. Collinson and Cook (2004) mentioned that “time” was the most important influencer of the learning and sharing relationship in a qualitative study of a three-year IT project where the researchers identified factors that motivate teachers’ sharing and restrain their sharing in schools. It should be noted that even though time was a constraint in the current study, as well, once the teachers saw the value of sharing knowledge through participation, they did everything they could to manage their time commitments in order to participate in the meetings. Diversity in teachers’ IT Skills

Teachers being at different IT skill and knowledge levels affected the study in several ways. The groups were mixed in terms of IT skills. A majority of the teachers seemed very satisfied with the team mix. Having teachers at different IT skills helped the groups be dynamic and fostered interaction. Some of the advanced teachers stated that they would prefer to be in groups where all teachers were close to their level so that they could learn more and improve further. However, they also acknowledged the fact that if all advanced teachers were in the same team, then there would be nobody in the rest of the teams to share knowledge with teachers who were still trying to become acquainted with IT. The teachers with highest level of IT skills did not gain as much in skill as the teachers with lower level IT skills. However, they did acquire some skills, such as learning about efficient back-up procedures. (The back-up system at the school was not available to back-up the extensive directories of some of the IT-advanced teachers.) Teacher collegiality

Teachers repeatedly mentioned that they got motivated when they saw how another teacher in their team used a particular tool. This motivation may lead to enthusiasm and use of IT by teachers. Results from this study support the idea that providing up-to-date IT and supportive networks

may not be enough for teachers to become enthusiastic and use computers in the classroom (Mumtaz 2000). Mumtaz (2000) stated that teachers need to be given evidence that IT can make their lessons more motivating, more interesting, more fun for them and their students, (Mumtaz, 2000). One way of providing evidence to teachers is for them to hear and observe how their colleagues are using IT. This study showed that a pathway leading to teacher collegiality provided teachers a means to start sharing their IT knowledge amongst each other, something that had not naturally occurred but had to be formally encouraged, and resulted in measurable benefits to those who chose to take part. Participative customized training vs. group level training

Many teachers in the PET teams mentioned the fact that the PET teams were more beneficial to them than the 1-day long group workshops they have attended where either all teachers were trained at the same time or in smaller groups. This is supported by Harris and Anthony (2001) where they claimed that there was consensus that traditionally delivered workshops do not promote teacher learning and do not result in significant change in practice. As a result of that, some schools are attempting to create opportunities for teachers to become more collegial, through mentoring programs, interdisciplinary teams, and teacher networks. The current study would be a good example of a collegiality-based approach to teacher learning. Limitations of the study design

Limitations of this study should be acknowledged. First,

as in any field study, there were a number of factors that were very hard to control and account for including teachers’ reasons to participate, their teaching style, educational background, familiarity with IT, enthusiasm, regular participation to weekly meetings, perception of other teacher, etc.

Teachers were not placed in the PET teams and in the control group by randomization. All teachers who volunteered to participate were included in the teams and the rest of the teachers who did not volunteer or who stopped participation because of time limitations were placed in the control group. As a result of lack of randomization to the groups, it was not possible to use the data to conduct complex statistical analysis and conclude that a causal relationship was the basis for differences in pre- and post-intervention annual surveys. Only t-tests were performed to compare PET teams’ and control group’s pre- and post-evaluation survey responses. The choice of the school was not random, either.

Another limitation was that the teachers were only followed up through email in the following school year. However, the responses to our emails showed a promising result, indicating that the PET team efforts were extending beyond some of the PET team members. All former PET team members who responded to our emails stated that they benefited from PET team activities and were able to incorporate what they learned in the previous year to their

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current teaching efforts; they also responded that they would be willing to participating in future similar activities.

CONCLUSION

The aim of this study was to implement PET teams among

high school teachers to improve teachers’ use of IT and to evaluate whether this intervention was successful. Three teams consisting of fifteen teachers were created at HSX and they met every week for three months.

Team evaluation surveys indicated that a majority of PET team members were satisfied with their participation and the quality of the teams and the study. PET team members further indicated this study either met or exceeded their expectations that they had before participating in this study. Almost all teachers indicated that they would participate in the following years and they would encourage other teachers at HSX to participate, as well. The only exceptions, those who were a little less satisfied with their participation, were the teachers who had higher levels of computer skills and knowledge. They did not benefit as much as the rest of the teachers from participating to this study.

PET team member teachers’ perceptions about their own computer proficiency and their belief about the usefulness of IT statistically increased from pre- to post-intervention. In contrast, there was no statistical change in the rest of the teachers, those who did not participate in the PET teams.

Based on qualitative and quantitative evaluations, it is possible to conclude that this approach is a viable method that may have short and long term positive effects on supporting teacher collegiality and improving teachers’ use of IT.

References

Bohr, P. C., Evanoff, B. A., & Wolf, L. D. (1997). Implementing participatory ergonomics teams among health care workers. American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 32(3), 190-196.

Campbell, D. T., and Stanley, J. C. (1966) Experimental and quasi-experimental designs for research. Rand. McNally. Chicago.

Collinson, V., and Cook, F. T. (2004). Learning to share, sharing to learn: Fostering organtizational learning through teachers' dissemination of knowledge. Journal of Educational Administration, 42(3), 312-332.

Cox, M., Preston, C., and Cox, K. (1999). What Factors Support or Prevent Teachers from Using ICT in their Classrooms? Paper presented at the British Educational Research Association Conference, University of Sussex at Brighton.http://www.leeds.ac.uk/educol/documents/00001304.htm

Harris, D. L., and Anthony, H. M. (2001). Collegiality and its Role in Teacher Development: perspectives from veteran and novice teachers. Teacher Development, 5(3), 371-389.

Hernandez-Ramos, P. (2005). If not here, where? Understanding Teachers' use of technology in silicon valley schools. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 38(1).

Karsh, B. T. (2004). Beyond usability: designing effective technology implementation systems to promote patient safety. Quality and Safety in Health Care, 13(5), 388-394.

Stitt-Gohdes, W. L. (2001). Business Education Students' Preferred Learning Styles and Their Teachers' Preferred Instructional Styles: Do They Match? Delta Pi Epsilon Journal, 43(3), 137-151.

Lima, J. A. (1998, April 13-17, 1998). Improving the Study of Teacher Collegiality: Methodological Issues. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Diego, CA.

McKenzie, J. (2001). How Teachers Learn Technology Best. The Educational Technology Journal, 10(6). Retrieved December 21, 2007 from http://fno.org/mar01/howlearn.html

Mumtaz, S. (2000). Factors Affecting Teachers’ Use of Information and Communications Technology: a review of the literature. Journal of Information Technology for Teacher Education, 9(3), 319-342.

Smith, T. J. (2001). Educational Ergonomics: Educational Design and Educational Performance. Paper presented at the International Society for Occupational Ergonomics and Safety, Fairfax, Virginia.

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