What is Using Media to Enhance Teaching and Learning
Initial Publication Date: October 12, 2010
The term media was first used to describe newspapers more than two centuries ago. Today media has many different connotations. For instance, there are mass media, print media, visual media and social media. While media can take on many different forms, the purpose of all media is universally the same -- media is a channel of communication.
Media can be used in direct instruction, active learning teaching strategies and student projects.
- Existing media resources can be used within lectures to stimulate interest in and develop knowledge of the material being taught. This traditional approach is teacher-centric, and information is pushed to the learner. Media allows the instructor to facilitate the transfer of expert knowledge to novice learners. Given the tremendous rate of technological change, instructors face an ongoing challenge in choosing the most effective media platform to reach their students. Instructors can also create their own media to effectively and efficiently convey knowledge.
- Existing media resources can also be used to engage students and facilitate active learning strategies which promote deeper learning. For example, media provides a useful platform for teaching with cases, cooperative learning, problem solving, and for giving more interactive lecture demonstrations.
- Student-created media involves a high degree of engagement; promotes individual learning, social interaction and immersion; and is highly customizable and collaborative (Yowell and Rhoten, 2009). Student-created media provide an alternative or a complement to traditional undergraduate student research. By doing a digital storytelling project, personal reflection and communication by students can be promoted.