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Category: Education

His Students Hate Math Less

Dr. Ira Lansing Dr. Ira Lansing teaches mathematics and statistics at Marin Community College in Kentfield, California, and he does this with enthusiasm. For one of his courses, Introduction to Probability and Statistics, Lansing goes online with ActivStats a comprehensive multimedia statistics courseware product developed by Data Description and distributed by Addison Wesley. Within the college walls he has created a "distance learning" course that combines the use of the ActivStats CD, a textbook, an online forum, and online communications with Lansing.

Lansing finds the live interactivity of ActivStats and the data visualization capabilities particularly effective, and he says, "I see the ActivStats CD as the perfect application of multimedia."

While Lansing has opened new paths his students can take to learn statistics concepts and practice, he has not relaxed either his standards or the college's authority. Students must be registered at Marin and qualified to enter the course. "This is not a public site," Lansing points out. It's an opportunity limited to students at Marin, and more specifically to students who have CD ROM capability.

Lansing has found that for some students online learning is just the thing -- working students, parents who don't have much give in their schedules, and traditional students who want to take additional hours but can't fit another traditional class into their schedules. As a rule, he says, the student who succeeds in his online class is motivated, self-directed, and not intimidated by the prospect of posting questions online where other students can see them.

The feedback he gets from students about the course center on administrative issues rather than course content, and he continues to develop improvements in the way the course functions. For him, opening new avenues of learning is part of a central mission in his career. "I think I'm getting students to hate math less."

 

Name: Dr. Ira Lansing

Affiliation: Marin Community College
Home Page
lansing@marin.cc.ca.us

Location: Kentfield, California