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Findings

The lack of support for the expectation of the study does not mean, however, that important discoveries were not made. What it means is simply there was not enough data to associate teaching style to instructional technology use. What is important in this study is the clear evidence that the use of instructional technologies is tied not to a particular teaching style, but to beliefs about teaching, which can be manifest through various teaching styles and methods, and those beliefs stem from who that faculty member is as a teacher, and how he or she views teaching. A faculty member will most likely not use an instructional technology, and therefore will not invest the time, effort, or energy in creating, mastering, and implementing that technology, unless the faculty member believes that the technology will be a tool that will benefit the teaching and learning process. Only then, after the faculty member has an established intrinsic belief in the value of instructional technology, will he or she begin to deal with the extrinsic barriers associated with instructional technology incorporation.

There were six major findings of this study that directly relate to how faculty members perceive themselves, meaning their beliefs about themselves as teachers, and how these beliefs influence incorporation of instructional technology. The following findings support the proposition that it is faculty members' beliefs about themselves as teachers that influence the incorporation of instructional technology.

  1. There is an inconsistency between the way many faculty perceived themselves as teachers and how they scored on the Grasha-Reichmann Teaching Style Inventory.
  2. There is a difference in teaching methodology among Groups A, B and C.
  3. There are difference among groups in terms of changing teaching methodology.
  4. There is a difference among groups in beliefs about the benefits of instructional technology incorporation.
  5. There are more intrinsic barriers to faculty instructional technology incorporation than extrinsic.
  6. The discussion of student learning styles is not uniform across groups.

 
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