Creating profile of information technology knowledge

Creating profile of information technology knowledge

of newly enrolled students

eljka Pogaj

Department of informatics

Faculty of Economics - Zagreb

Trg J.F. Kennedy-a 6, Zagreb, Croatia

Phone: 01-238-3277, Fax: 01-2335-633, e-mail: zpozgaj@efzg.hrMirjana Peji Bach

Department of informatics

Faculty of Economics - Zagreb

Trg J.F. Kennedy-a 6, Zagreb, Croatia

Phone:01-238-3277, Fax: 01-2335-633, e-mail: mpejic@efzg.hrAbstract: Paper is based on the results of the surveys that Department of informatics conducts at the beginning of every academic year in order to asses the level of knowledge of newly enrolled students. Our goal is to find out from which schools our students come, how many years they studied informatics in formal education, and how they estimate their theoretical and practical information knowledge. We also want to find out their habits in computer usage, and for which purposes they use computers. Collected information is basis for shaping lectures and especially tutorial in Informatics.

Key words: information technology education, course development

IINTRODUCTION

Every year hundreds of new students enroll to the Faculty of Economics Zagreb. At the first year of their education they enroll course in Informatics. We try to shape and organize lectures and tutorials in Informatics as efficiently as possible, especially because Informatics is the only course in information technology during the first two years at the Faculty of Economics. In order to do it, we have to know better our newly enrolled students. One of the ways to full-fill this goal is the survey that we continuously conduct at the beginning of the academic year. In the survey some demographic data are collected. In addition students anonymously estimate their theoretical and practical information knowledge, they tell us about their habits in computer usage, their access to computers, and what they expect form the course in Informatics. We try to react to the results of the survey in the current academic year as much as possible. However, the results of the survey are fully applied in shaping and organization of lectures and tutorials in the next academic year.

Paper consists on five parts. Methodology and goals of the survey are presented in the second part. Third part presents the results of the survey. We have presented and interpreted the results of the survey about the previous education of our students, and their habits in computer usage. Fourth part refers to the organization of the lectures and tutorial in Informatics. In the fifth part we conclude with our vision of the further development in information technology education.

IIMETHODOLOGY AND GOALS OF THE RESEARCH

Paper is based on the results of the research conducted in year 2000 and 2001. Research is conducted at the classes in Informatics. In year 2000 research was conducted on the sample of 557 newly enrolled students at the beginning of the academic year. In year 2001 research was conducted on the sample of 494 students at the beginning of the academic year and on the sample of the 137 students at the end of the academic year. We compare the results with the survey conducted in 1998 on the sample of 636 students at the end of the academic year.

There were two goals of these surveys. First goal is to get to know newly enrolled students as better as possible (their current knowledge in information technology, usage of computers, etc. Second goal is two organize as efficiently as possible course in Informatics.

We shall present the results of the surveys conducted about:

Former education

Secondary school

Number of years of information technology education in secondary school

Estimated theoretical knowledge

Estimated knowledge in application software usage

Usage of computers

Ownership of computer

How often students use computers

What software students use

In what areas of information technology are our students interested in

IIIRESEARCH

1) Previous education. In order to shape contents of the course it is useful to be aware of the basic characteristics of our students. Our goal is to assess from which schools our students come (grammar school, trade school, or other). Based on such information we try to judge basic knowledge of our students in information technology. We are aware that:

Syllabus for Informatics course differs from school to school,

Number of years that students study Informatics and number of hours per year depend on type of the school and course syllabus,

It is possible to gain knowledge in information technology only if there are computers and appropriate software available, and if there are educated teachers that are able to pass on their knowledge.

Our goal is to assess following:

From which schools our newly enrolled students come,

Which is the distribution of our students according to type of the schools (grammar school, trade school, etc),

Number of years that our newly enrolled students study informatics

First and third elements are mutually connected. Syllabus of Informatics course is mainly connected with the type of the school, with some differences in number of hours per year. Such information combined with the distribution of our students according to the type of the school is basis for the estimation of the level of knowledge in information technology that our students have when they enroll Faculty of Economics.

Research indicate (Figure 1.) that number of newly enrolled students that come from certain type of the school are almost constant for both surveys conducted in year 2000 and 2001.

Figure 1: Type of school that our newly enrolled students

come from (year 2000 and 2001)

Figure 1. indicates that almost 70% of our newly enrolled students come from grammar schools. Number of students from secondary business schools has increased by 3% in 2001 compared to 2000 at the charge of other schools. In the years that are ahead of us we shall see if the trend will continue.

There are four types of grammar schools: general, language, math and classic that our students come from. More detailed analysis (Figure 2.) indicates following. Approximately half of the students that finished grammar school come from general type of grammar school.

Figure 2: Type of grammar school that our newly enrolled

students come from (year 2000 and 2001)

Therefore, distribution of our students according to the type of the school in academic year 2001/2002 is as following (Figure 3.):

Figure 3: Distribution of newly enrolled students according

to the type of the school

In designing syllabus for Informatics course it is important to be aware for how long our students studied Informatics in secondary school. Therefore, we measure Duration of information technology education in secondary school). Results of the survey point out that during the secondary education 45% (2000 - 43,8%; 2001 - 45,5%) of the students had Informatics course for only one year (Figure 4.). More detailed analysis gave us even more alarming results. Students that come from general grammar schools (2001 48%) had Informatics course for only one year. Better situation is with students from secondary business schools (2001 25%) that had Informatics course for three years.

Figure 4: Duration of Informatics course in secondary school

We also wanted to know how our students estimate their knowledge in information technology. We let our interviewees to assess their knowledge by themselves. We differentiate theoretical knowledge that refers to the fundaments capabilities of information technology and practical knowledge that refers to the usage of computers in everyday life and in business environment. Our students estimated their theoretical knowledge in the following way (Figure 5):

Figure 5: Theoretical knowledge of newly enrolled students

in information technology

It is necessary to point out that more than half of the respondents estimate their theoretical knowledge as some or none. Only 2% of respondents estimate their theoretical knowledge in information technology as excellent.

Our goal was to assess practical knowledge of our students in:

Operating system MS Windows,

Software tools Word, Excel and Power Point,

Internet.

We have selected these areas because we instruct them at the tutorial in Informatics. Our presumption was that our students would be mostly familiar with Windows, because they are the most often used operation system for personal computers, and with Word. Results of the survey conducted in 2001 were as we have expected.

More than one tenth (15,8%) of the students estimate their knowledge of Windows as excellent, more than one fourth (27, 1%) as very good, and more than one third (35,8%) as good. Results for Word are similar (excellent 13,2%, very good 34,8% and good 27,7%). In both cases approximately 20% have very low level of knowledge (none - Windows 4,0%; Word 6,9% or some - Windows 16,8%; Word 17,2%. We presume that these students did not have the chance to get to know computer in practice and use them often enough.

More than half of the students have low level of knowledge in Excel as (none 16,8% or some 35,4%). Approximately one third of students (31,2%) estimate their knowledge in Excel as good, 12,8% as very good, and only 3,6% as excellent. Level of knowledge in Power Point is even lower (22,1% some, and 65% none). Only 0,8% of students estimate that they are excellent in Power Point usage, which is not surprising because Power Point is rather specific tool.

Half of the students have low level of knowledge in Internet (18% - none, 28,7% some). On the other hand there are more than half of the students that has good knowledge in Internet (23,3% - good, 19,0% - very good and 10,7% - excellent).

We can conclude that among ten newly enrolled students:

Eight students have good, very good or excellent knowledge in Windows

Seven students have good, very good or excellent knowledge in Word

If we compare the results of the survey conducted in 2001 with the results of the survey conducted in 1998 we can conclude that students enrolled in 2001 have much better knowledge in operating system and software tools. The largest shift is in Internet knowledge (Figure 6.).

Figure 6: Knowledge of newly enrolled students in Internet

in 1998 and 2001

2) Usage of computers. Number of available computers that students can use everyday at the Faculty of Economics is still very small compared to the number of students enrolled. Therefore, it is important for us to know how many of our students own computer in order to estimate possibilities of our students for work on computer outside the Faculty. In the year 2001 there were 71,1% of the students that own the computer, which is quite better compared to 63,2% of students that had computer in 2000. This information is encouraging because on every ten students there are seven of them that are able to work on their own computer.

In the following analysis we shall focus on the issues:

How often our students use computer;

What software tools they use; In what purposes they use Internet.

We have asked our students to estimate how often they use computer. Results indicate (Figure 7.) that our students do not have developed habit of computer usage.

Figure 7: How often students use computer

Among 100 students only 14-use computer everyday, while 60 students use computer once to twice a week or less often. It is evident that our students are not computer addicts, and they only gain the habit to use computer more often. In other words, as information literacy of our students develops the same will happened with their need to use computer.

In investigating which software our students use most often we have offered tools specific for MS Office: (1) Word, (2) Excel; (3) Access; (4) Power Point; (5) Outlook; (6) Internet Explorer. Among these tools (Figure 8.) respondents use Word (81,4%) and Internet tools (75,9%) most often. Unfortunately, almost one tenth (8,5%) of students do not use computer at all.

Figure 8: Usage of software tools by newly enrolled students

at the Faculty of Economics

These results match up with the results that refer to purposes in which students use computers. Most of the answers (67,8%) refers to the usage of computer for writing text and to the Internet (55,1%).

One of the results of the research was that half of the students surveyed in year 2001 know how to use Internet. We were interested in what purposes our students use Internet. Three Internet services were selected: World Wide Web, e-mail and chat, and results are presented in Figure 9.

Figure 9: Purposes in which students use Internet

Purposes in which students use Internet could be ranked as following: (1) using WWW for fun, (2) E-mail, (3) using WWW for education, and (4) chat.

According to the results of the survey it is possible to create profile of information technology knowledge of newly enrolled student at the Faculty of Economics. Newly enrolled student:

Finished general grammar school,

Attended the Informatics course for one year during the secondary school education,

Has some or none theoretical knowledge in Informatics,

Estimates his or her practical knowledge of Windows as good, very good or excellent,

Estimates his or her practical knowledge of Word as good, very good or excellent,

Estimates his or her practical knowledge of Excel and Power Point as some or none,

Knows how to use Internet,

Owns personal computer,

Uses computer once to twice a week or less often,

In most of the cases uses Word or Internet,

Uses WWW for fun.

IVORGANIZATION OF INFORMATICS COURSE

In the organization of Informatics course some of the elements could not be changed:

Course is taught at the first year of the Faculty of Economics Zagreb during the two semesters

Total time fond is 120 hours (lectures 60 sati, tutorials 60 hours)

Tutorials are conducted in the info lab

Practical knowledge of the software usage is conducted only in the info lab in form of the two tests.

Problems in organization of Informatics course are primarily connected with the tutorials, and are results of the following conditions:

Large number of students enrolled to the first year:

Lectures: 8 groups with approximately 200

students each

Tutorial: 16 groups, each group is

divided into two sub-groups (36 sub-groups with 40 students each)

Limited capacity of info lab.

One classroom with 20 PCs

Tutorial organization:

One assistant, two students from higher years that help assistant, one computer per two students

Duration of tutorial in info lab:

Each student - 45 minutes per week.

Subjects that are taught at the lectures could be divided into three groups:

Fundamental knowledge about information technology

Hardware, software, algorithms, data organization, computer networks, information system

Internet and Internet services

WWW, e-business, e-marketing, e-payment

Selected subjects

Decision support systems, data warehousing, artificial intelligence, knowledge management, data security, software products security

Tutorial comprise:

Operating system - Windows

Word (start and advanced level)

Excel (start and advanced level)

Internet

Power Point

V CONCLUSIONS

Based on the results of the survey profile of information knowledge of newly enrolled student at the Faculty of Economics Zagreb is created, which gave us important information on knowledge of our students. Such discoveries together with the information collected during the lectures, tutorials, tests and exams are basis for better organization of Informatics course. We shall present two situations: first in which data collected during the research have directly influenced the selection of the themes of the lectures, and second in which the results of the first test confirmed us what we have presumed based on the survey.

(1) Students have estimated that their theoretical knowledge is weak or none. Therefore, we have decided to repeat at the beginning of the lectures some of the basic knowledge in information technology like hardware, software, algorithms, etc. We thought that this is necessary although we have reduced time available for other more specific themes.

(2) Results of the first test in tutorial confirm estimation of the students about their knowledge in usage of Windows and Word. Based on these findings we have decided to reduce the number of hours in which these themes should be taught in favor of more sophisticated software tools.

We believe that profile of information technology students of our newly enrolled students will improve together with the further improvement in the information technology tutorial in secondary schools. This will give us more space to introduce more new business oriented information contents in the lectures and tutorial in Informatics course.

REFERENCES

[1] A. Goodsell, J. Maher and V. Tinto, Collaborative Learning: A Sourcebook for Higher Education, National Centre on Postsecondary Teaching, Learning and Assesment, Boston, 1992.

[2]G.S. Everett, Braking the vicious circle: Getting faculty and technology together, In: Proceedings of 1997 Mid-South Instructional Technology Conference, Murfreesboro, Tennessee. http://www.mtsu.edu/~itconf

[3]V. Bosilj Vuki, M. Peji Bach, and K. urko: Obstacles in Teaching Informatics: The Case Study of Faculty of Economics, Proceedings of 10th International Conference on Information and Intelligent Systems'99, Varadin, 1999.[4]. Pogaj, G. Kardum: Computer Literacy of the Students, Case study: Faculty of Economics Zagreb, MIPRO, Computer in Education, p. 65-69, 2001.

[5]Faculty of Economics, Teaching Plan and Programs of Study, 1995.

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