Inverting Journalism

Making Mojos How iPads Enhance Mobile Journalism Education Nicole KraftAssistant Professor (clinical)@nicole_kraft

Natalee SeelyPhD CandidateUniversity of NC-Chapel HIll

Main Points

The college classroom must train students like an entry-level jobTechnology can augment student learning if incorporated into instruction.Dont assume students learn like you did.@Nicole_Kraft

McMillan & Dwyer (1989)As a result of educator/student interactions within a particular course, both parties anticipate that some learning will occur, some change in behavior will have taken place and some personal growth will be evident. To facilitate such change, educators should ask, to ask 'Do I need to change my style of teaching to match the learning needs of these students?' Investigate the possibility of matching teaching style with the students' learning styles. @Nicole_Kraft

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Find informationThis is where students

Seek out learning@Nicole_Kraft

Become engaged @Nicole_Kraft

Journalism students can no longer focus on being just writers or photographers or videographers. They must leave college with a multitude of media skills to have the greatest potential for career success.

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iPad and supporting apps have created a one-stop shop of journalistic that enable students to develop those skills, including notebooks, recording devices, research platforms and writing. @Nicole_Kraft

We conducted a yearlong study of beginning journalism students utilizing one-to-one iPads to examine the impact of iPads and appropriate apps in a flipped journalism classroom environment (where lectures are homework, and skill development and execution are done in class.@Nicole_Kraft

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OBJECTIVEOur goal was to identify how the iPad could be used to augment journalistic training and determine if use of such technology would accelerate student learning.@Nicole_Kraft

A $25,000 impact grant was used to purchase 30 iPads and iPad cases, wireless keyboards, microphones and six tripods for two news writing courses during Autumn/Spring semesters, 2013/2014.

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My New CoursesMy New Courses@Nicole_KraftStudents had a course developed for them that was navigated through the iPad in iTunes U.

iPads were configured with several apps, including Pages, Twitter, GarageBand, iMovie, iTalk, iTunesU, Evernote, Dropbox, Storify, USA Today, Instagram, and AP Stylebook. @Nicole_Kraft

Students were assigned five different types of articles during the course of the semester, including news and features, and each assignment contained a multimedia (video, audio, photo) and social media (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook) component.

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Students completed five online surveysa pre-assessment, three post-assignment surveys, and one post-assessment throughout the semester-long course.

In addition to the surveys, interviews were conducted, and additional data on students experience with the iPad was gathered from student blogs.

And the research showedStudent confidence in the iPad as a tool did significantly increase at the end of the semester. Most students utilized all the tools included in the device, from the video and audio recorder and camera, to note-taking apps, word processors and the AP stylebook.Initial feelings of confusion or doubt seemed to dissipate as students became more familiar with the device. @Nicole_Kraft

And the research showedMost students fulfilled our goals for the course by fully utilizing iTunes U and the iPad, and student work improved. Both the number of items students published and their grades reflected an elevated and expedited learning environment. @Nicole_Kraft

And the research showedUsed as both educational platform and multimedia tool, iPads engaged students more deeply than conventional classroom interactions and enabled future journalists to learn and execute concepts faster in a real-world-like environment. @Nicole_Kraft

And the research showedStudents reported higher perceptions of their writing and reporting abilities at the end of the semester. Student knowledge of how social media is used in journalism, personal experience with social media, and knowledge of journalism technologies also increased by the end of the semester.

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And the research showedStudents reported positive experiences with the devices portability and the convenience of having multiple tools in one.

Camera/video quality and note-taking resources were also commonly reported as advantages.

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ChallengesDigital native is, in part, a fallacy.

Students increased their iPad use for the second assignment, but iPad use dropped for the third assignment. We believe this was a result of increased difficulty of assignments, prompting students to go with the technology with which they were most comfortable.

Some students reported that the device felt bulky and awkward when shooting photos, and a few had difficulties getting used to the digital keyboard. A few comments were made about difficulties multi-tasking and a general sense of unfamiliarity. @Nicole_Kraft

Students Speak

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Thank you!@Nicole_Kraft