Computer-Assisted Instruction At Stanford, 1966-68. Data, Models, and Evaluation of the Arithmetic Programs

527 Pages·1972·17.44 MB·English

by  Patrick Suppes and Mona Morningstar (Auth.)

COMPUTER-ASSISTED
INSTRUCTION AT
STANFORD, 1966-68:
Data, Models, and Evaluation of the
Arithmetic Programs
PATRICK SUPPES and MONA MORNINGSTAR
in collaboration with
ALEXANDER C ANN ARA, JAMESINE FRIEND
ELIZABETH GAMMON, MAX JERMAN
JAMES MOLONEY, LOIS OKSENBERG
BARBARA SEARLE
INSTITUTE FOR MATHEMATICAL STUDIES IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
Stanford University, Stanford, California
1972
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PREFACE
This hook presents an analysis and evaluation of the
arithmetic programs in computer-assisted instruction at
Stanford for the years 1966-68. Part I describes the
drill-and-practice program that was run in a large number
of elementary schools in California, Kentucky, and Missis-
sippi. Unlike the previous volume published as an account
of computer-assisted instruction at Stanford during I965-
66, the present volume concentrates on behavioral data, the
application of models to these data, and an evaluation of
the effectiveness of the programs, rather than on the oper-
ational or technological aspects of computer-assisted in-
struction. On the other hand, a detailed description of
the curriculum is included.
Part II describes the tutorial program in primary-
grade mathematics developed at the Stanford-Brentwood Labo-
ratory in East Palo Alto. As in Part I, the concentration
is on behavioral data and the development of simple mathe-
matical models for the analysis of data. In the case of
this tutorial program, we also devote considerable space to
the application of models to individual student behavior.
Although we have concentrated on the analysis of stu-
dent performance in computer-assisted instruction, we have
also included either in the main text itself or in several
long appendices detailed accounts of the curriculum used in
both programs. In no sense do we consider the curriculums
described as having reached anything like an ideal state.
Since 1968 we have continued to develop intensively ap-
proaches both to drill and practice and also to tutorial
mathematics. We do believe that these descriptions of ele-
mentary curriculum will give the interested reader a good
sense of what a drill-and-practice curriculum or a tutorial
curriculum for use in a computer-based setting is like.
Vll
PREFACE
The authors of this volume have had an immense amount
of help from their seven collaborators. The extensive data
analyses reported in this volume have required the dedicat-
ed efforts of a number of people. The very long Chapter 3
applying regression models to data from the drill-and-
practice program could not have been written without the
extensive collaboration of Max Jerman, Lois Oksenberg, and
Barbara Searle. The equally complex following chapter,
Chapter k, on the application of automaton models to some
of the same data of the drill-and-practice program has been
written jointly with Alexander Cannara. The first two
chapters of Part II, Chapters 6 and 7> dealing with the
Stanford-Brentwood Laboratory and its tutorial program,
have benefited from collaborative efforts with Jamesine
Friend, who served as project coordinator of that tutorial
program during 1966-68. The data analysis of the tutorial
program in Chapter 8 has been done in collaboration with
James Moloney. Finally, the individual student analyses of
Chapter 9 were undertaken in collaboration with Elizabeth M.
Gammon. Our seven collaborators have been coauthors of
these various chapters in every respect. Without their ex-
tensive help this volume would never have been completed.
We also want to emphasize that, in addition to these seven
collaborators, we have benefited extensively from the com-
petent assistance of the staff of the Institute for Mathe-
matical Studies in the Social Sciences. The complicated
projects described in this book would have been impossible
without their dedicated efforts to make computer-assisted
instruction in the schools operationally viable.
The work reported here has been supported by the
National Science Foundation (especially under NSFGJ-I8709
and NSFGJ-M^Xl) and the United States Office of Education
(recently especially under OEG-9-70-002^(057)). Without
the continued support of the National Science Foundation
and the U.S. Office of Education, not only during the peri-
od 1966-68 but in the years since then while this book was
in the process of being written, the kind of work described
in this book, either as a technological innovation in the
schools or as an extensive research project on the learning
and performance of elementary-school students in arithme-
tic, would not have been feasible.
Vlll
PREFACE
Although our research efforts have involved a large
number of schools in several states, we want to acknowledge
our special relation with the Ravenswood City School Dis-
trict of which Brentwood School is a part. The deep and
committed cooperation over many years of William Rybensky,
Principal of Brentwood and CA.I Coordinator for the District,
John Minor, Superintendent of the Ravenswood District, and
many teachers and staff has been invaluable.
Finally, we acknowledge with gratitude the extensive
and devoted editorial assistance of Mrs. Lillian O'Toole,
the superb artwork of Mrs. Maria Jedd, and the typing
of the manuscript (for photo offsetting) by Mrs. Dianne
Kanerva, who has made technical typing a new art form in
its own right.
Patrick Suppes
Mona Morningstar
IX
Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
The main purpose of this book is to report the 1966-68
Stanford mathematics programs in computer-assisted instruc-
tion. Part I describes in detail the 1966-68 arithmetic
drill-and-practice program, which followed the similar pro-
gram run in 1965-66. The earlier program has been described
in detail in Suppes, Jerman, and Brian (1968). Part II
describes the tutorial program in first- and second-grade
mathematics at Brentwood School in East Palo Alto.*
Each of the two parts emphasizes three main aspects
of the program: the curriculum, the operation of terminals
in schools, and the behavioral analysis of student data.
From a theoretical standpoint, the most important part of
the volume is devoted to the last topic, the behavioral
analysis of student-response data.
In the earlier book mentioned above, we attempted to
give an overview of computer-assisted instruction and a
history of Stanford work in the area. These matters are
not referred to here. The interested reader is referred
*The tutorial program in mathematical logic for bright
elementary-school students, begun in 196^-65, and described
in Appendix 1 of Suppes, Jerman, and Brian (1968), is not
reported for the years 1965-68 in the present volume. A
partial summary of the logic program for 1965-66 may be
found in Suppes and Ihrke (1967) and for 1966-67 in Suppes
and Ihrke (1970). A comprehensive overview of the logic
program since its inception is given in Suppes (1971)· A
recent version of the program is described in detail in
Goldberg (1971).
1
1. INTRODUCTION
to the first chapter of that book and to the more recent
overview given in Suppes (1971)· Nevertheless, because
of the increasing social and intellectual significance
of computers we would like to devote the first section
of this opening chapter to considering some of the issues
raised by computer-assisted instruction. The second sec-
tion of this chapter is a brief overview of the operation
during 1966-68 and the number of students involved, and
the final section outlines in greater detail the organi-
zation of the remainder of the book.
1.1 Issues Raised by Computer-assisted Instruction
We discuss four rather closely related issues that
have had a certain prominence in the discussion of computer-
assisted instruction (CAJ). The first centers around the
claim that the deep use of technology, specifically computer
technology, will impose a rigid regime of impersonalized
teaching. Perhaps the best image in the popular press of
this issue is that of student protest at being represented
by IBM cards in the files of the central school adminis-
tration.
To those advancing this claim of deep impersonaliza-
tion, it is important to say that indeed this is a pos-
sibility. Computer technology could be used in this way,
and in some instances it probably will. This is little
different from saying that there are many kinds of teach-
ing and many ways in which the environment of learning
and teaching may be debased. The important point to in-
sist upon, however, is that it is certainly not a necessary
aspect of the use of the technology.
Indeed, our claim would be that one of the computer1 s
most important potentials is exactly the opposite. It is
to make learning and teaching more personalized rather than
less so. Students will be subject to less regimentation
and lockstepping, because computer systems will be able
to offer highly individualized instruction.
It is important that the remark about individualized
instruction not be passed off as sloganeering. Courses
in the methodology of teaching have emphasized the impor-
tance of teaching according to the needs of individual
2
COMPUTER-ASSISTED INSTRUCTION 1966-1968
students and therefore attempting to individualize instruc-
tion as much as possible for many years. It is recognized,
however, by anyone who has examined the structure of our
schools either at the elementary- or secondary-school level
that a high degree of individualization is extraordinarily
difficult to achieve when the ratio between students and
teachers is approximately 25 to 1.
One direct approach is to reduce this ratio by a large
factor to something like 5 or 10 to 1, but the economics of
this approach is totally unfeasible in the long run and on
a widespread basis· All the evidence points to the fact
that the cost of having first-rate teachers in the class-
room, training these teachers appropriately, and providing
them with the kind of salaries that will be competitive
with other technical and professional jobs in our society
will simply make it impossible for schools to afford any
drastic reduction in the student-teacher ratio. One of
the few real opportunities for offering individualized
instruction lies in the use of computers as instructional
devices. Some of the ways described in this book of how
computers have been so used are suggestive of what may be
anticipated in the future.
We do wish to emphasize that we do not envisage re-
placing teachers entirely, especially at the elementary-
school level. It would be our estimate that even under
the maximum use of technology only 20 to 30 percent of
students1 time in the elementary school would be spent
at computer terminals. While classes or substantial parts
of classes were working at terminals, teachers would be
able to work with the remainder. Moreover, they would be
able to work intensely with individual students, because
some of the students would be at the terminals, and
equally because routine aspects of teaching would be
handled by the computer system.
To draw a contrast at the opposite end, at the college
level the situation is different. At most colleges and
universities students do not now receive a great deal of
individual attention from instructors. Certainly we can
all recognize the degree of personal attention is greater
in a computer program designed to accommodate itself to
individual students' progress than in the lecture course
3
1. INTRODUCTION
on a general subject that has more than 200 students in
daily attendance.
Complex intellectual problems are yet to be solved in
offering tutorial computer programs on advanced subjects at
the university level. We do believe that the teaching of
basic skills ranging from elementary mathematics to foreign-
language instruction at the college level can well be per-
formed by computer-assisted courses. Results of a computer-
assisted tutorial Russian program at Stanford, under the
direction of Professor Joseph Van Campen, are reported in
Suppes and Morningstar (1969)· Students received 50 min-
utes of daily individualized instruction at a computer
terminal consisting of a teletype with Cyrillic keyboard
and earphones--the audio tapes being controlled by the
computer.
In addressing ourselves to the issue of depersonaliza-
tion, we feel that the greatest block to individualized
instruction is not the Imitations of computer technology
as such, but rather the absence of tough-minded intellec-
tual studies of how we can do it. Discussions of these
matters in education over the past several decades have
lacked serious and systematic intellectual content, and
there is not a serious body of developed science and
technology to turn to in implementing programs of in-
dividualization.
Much of the data analysis quoted in subsequent parts
of this book is addressed to the problem of showing how we
can build up a serious science of these matters. We would
insist all the same that there be no illusions about the
difficulties yet to be overcome and the problems yet to
be solved. Our response to this first issue then is that
the problem of CAI is not one of depersonalization, but
rather one of reaching for a deeper intellectual under-
standing of how to individualize and thereby personalize
instruction.
A second common claim is that the widespread use of
computer technolo©r will lead to excessive standardization
of education. This claim is raised again and again in
general discussions with educators and the interested pub-
lic. In 1968 when the senior author was lecturing on
4
COMPUTER-ASSISTED INSTRUCTION 1966-1968
computer-assisted instruction in Australia, exactly this
claim was made by one of the senior professors of education
in Australia. When he was asked how many different books
on Australian history are used in the Australian secondary
schools, the reply was that two books are used in over
90 percent of the classes.
To those familiar with the current situation in text-
book adoption and uses in elementary and secondary schools,
it is clear that already a high degree of standardization
exists in education. It is important to admit at once that
a still greater degree of standardization could arise from
the widespread use of computers. This is a possibility not
to be denied. It is, however, in no sense a necessity. It
would technically be possible for a state department of
education, for example, to require that at 10:10 in the
morning every fourth grader be adding one-half and one-
third, or every junior in high school be reciting the
amendments of the Constitution. It is true that the cen-
tral danger of the technology is that edicts can be en-
forced as well as issued, and many persons are rightly
concerned at the specter of the rigid standardization
that could be imposed.
I think we would all agree that the ever-increasing
use of books from the sixteenth century to the present has
deepened the varieties of educational and intellectual ex-
perience generally available. It is not difficult, however,
to construct a caricature of present concerns in terms of
the horrors it might have been claimed would be introduced
with the widespread use of books. It is easy to visualize
a certain type of critic arguing that the highly individu-
alized and effective qualities of the individual teacher's
voice would be lost in the completely standardized use of
the written word and the written text. The individualiza-
tion of comment, the adaptation of comment to the expres-
sion of individual students and to their responsiveness and
comprehension, would be lost in the use of books in place
of teachers.
Now we all recognize that there is a truth at the
heart of this caricature, but it is not a truth that ar-
gues for the abolition or suppression of books in educa-
tion. It argues rather for educational experience of a
5