The Context: Students come to the university with a lifetime of experience with technologies. They expect to utilize technology in their learning experiences. Do students really use them to assist in learning, or does it disengage them from the process? My central question is: Do the use of technological learning aids truly promote learning? Learning for the purpose of this project can be defined as the ability to demonstrate knowledge of a concept by application. I believe there are two threads of inquiry: what helps students learn and how do students use aids to learn? The first question focuses on learning objects that help students understand a concept. Learning objects can be as straight-forward as taking notes to more complex activities such as using simulations to practice the application of concepts in a business setting. To study this question, the focus would be to test various learning objects to determine how well their use enhances learning. Technology enters into the picture in this question when the study focuses on what type of technology is most effective. Simulations offer the highest level of "what If" games, but learning objects can also include a simple computer program that provides reinforcing questions. Underlying this question for me as an instructor is: given a limited amount of time to prepare and use learning objects, what is the best use of class-time? The second question, how do students use aids to learn, focuses on the process of synthesizing information. Again, the final outcome of learning is the ability to demonstrate knowledge and application of concepts. By the time students have reached their freshman year in college, they have some established habits regarding the organization of data to be learned (although that skill may be refined throughout the college years). To understand how students use aids to master material (anything from 'old-fashioned' note-taking to the most sophisticated learning objects), the focus of the study was to gain insights into the methods students use to gather information (how do they organize the material, what 'codes' do they use to highlight what is important, do visual resources influence their information gathering process and in what way?) and whether their chosen gathering method is effective (does it result in learning i.e. success in the course?) Here is where technology comes into play. Note-taking is affected by many conditions; ability to hear, weeding out "noise," interpretation, handwriting speed, ability to focus on what to write (and what not to write), and (the focus of my project) the influence of power point on note-taking habits.

Project Summary: I wanted to focus on one of the current trends in presentations, that is the use power point in lectures. There are many aspects of the use of power point to study. Does the natural visual nature of power point (color, icons, the larger, neater-than-handwriting print) aid the note-taking process? Should power point slides be available prior to class? If so, should they be complete or should the student fill in the blanks? If power points copies are available, does it improve learning or deter from it? Are students more focused on understanding when they are not worried about what to write or do they simply tune out because they don't feel the need to add anything to the power point slides? In this study, I utilized class notes written by students on two concepts in one unit. No power point slides were made available to the students either prior to or after the lectures. I wanted to assess what note-taking habits students used when no note-taking aids were provided. In the future I will conduct similar studies where power point slide copies are provided and later I hope to continue the study by introducing the use of other learning objects. Context of this study: The class, Global Business, is an introductory freshman class. The class is required in the Business Administration major and minor and the Accounting Major. This academic year, I teach 2 sections of this class in the fall and spring semesters. In the fall semester, I conducted a pilot study and in the spring semester, I conducted a similar study. Based on experiences in the fall semester, I modified the study to look at how students expressed in their own words their understanding of the two concepts. Depending on the time of day the class is offered, all four sections consisted primarily of freshmen or sophomores.

Career Relevance & Impact My year as a Scholar has invigorated my desire to improve my teaching methods. My colleagues in the program were very helpful and it was interesting to hear what their teaching questions were. My study was quite small in number (both a blessing and a curse), but I am encouraged to move forward with my broader question -- how do students use technology to learn? I appreciated the opportunity to participate in this program and look forward to a continued relationship with fellow researchers in the scholarship of teaching and learning!

Preliminary Results, Findings, Conclusions, & Implications While it was unfortunate that the spring semester volunteer count was low, it did make it easier to assess the information! I broke the students into 2 categories: those getting a C or better in the course and those earning a D or F. Students who were getting a C or better in the course, were able to correctly explain the concepts in their own words, even though most of them wrote down in their notes exactly what appeared on the power point or board and nothing more. Their scores for the unit (quiz and test) were slightly better than previous test scores. Those students getting below a C wrote only what appeared on the power point or on the board and were unable to explain the concept in their own words. The results might lead to another line of inquiry; studying the hypothesis that students in the A-C range have successfully negotiated a learning style where notes serve as a prompt to support their understanding of a concept whereas students in the D-F range rely on memorizing without understanding.

Evidence of Student Learning & Methods of Analysis Method: I conducted the study during Unit III which covers International Finance. This unit is typically the most challenging because it introduces complex content. Although it is merely an introduction to the world of international finance, even the most basic concepts (such as how to calculate exchange of dollars to another currency), can be quite confusing. The outcomes for the unit are for students to obtain a basic understanding of how to do exchange calculations, understanding what effect changes in currency valuation can have on international business transactions, and gaining some appreciation for the complexity issues surrounding "value" in a financial context. My overarching goal for this unit (and really for the entire class) is for students to ask, what influences this outcome/event? Why did this happen? How do businesspeople use this information to make decisions regarding the conduct of day to day business? I asked for volunteers to participate. No extra credit or other inducements were offered. Students would provide me their notes which were copied for my use. I did not provide the student with details about my study; I simply said I was doing a study on note-taking. Once I had copies of notes, I keyed in on 3 concepts, the Law of One Price (fall semester), the difference between fiscal and monetary policy and how those policies are employed and the Life Cycle theory of trade (both of those concepts were explored in the spring semester). I compared what was written in student notes with what was on the power point slide, written on the board, what I said as the concepts were explained. By design the power point and board merely had the words (i.e. monetary policy-interest rates; fiscal policy-government spending/borrowing) or a graph (which was exactly the same graph in the text). I was careful to use the same words when I explained each concept. I noted whether students wrote exactly what was on the powerpoint/board, whether they organized the information in their own way, and whether they added words beyond what was presented on the power point/board. Finally, I compared their written answers about the concepts with what was in their notes. I noted each student's overall course grades thus far in the course, the overall grade in the prior 2 tests to this unit's test, and whether they got the question on the concept correct. Unfortunately in the spring semester, I had very few volunteers (unlike my experience in the fall semester) and some of the volunteers had to be eliminated because they did not provide notes for the days the concepts were discussed or, as in one case, although notes were provided, the student didn't take the unit exam.