EDUCAUSE QUARTERLY • Number 3 2004
10
All freshmen at the United States
Military Academy at West Point
now have laptop computers to
use in class. Several instructors for the
General Psychology course that all
freshmen take are currently incorpo-
rating classroom learning activities
and strategies to leverage the technol-
ogy tools available with laptop com-
puters. The purpose of the study
reported here was to examine teaching
techniques, lessons learned, and stu-
dent performance during the integra-
tion of laptops in teaching and learn-
ing psychology in the traditional
classroom. The goals behind introduc-
ing the laptops were to enhance teach-
ing practices and efficiency and posi-
tively influence student learning and
attitudes toward psychology.
We initially attempted to integrate
laptop technology into the classroom
during our summer teacher training
sessions. We soon discovered that the
returning faculty members participat-
ing in these training workshops were
not very motivated to integrate the
technology. Many instructors felt
uncomfortable teaching students who
were actively pounding keyboards to
take notes. Additionally, many faculty
members believed that students would
engage in activities not related to the
class. Giving up this control in the
classroom was not acceptable to some
faculty. One faculty member stated
outright, “My students won’t be using
those laptops in my classroom.” Initial
faculty attitudes had an adverse impact
on our attempts to get students using
laptops in the classroom.
Another critical limitation influenc-
ing faculty adoption of laptops was
whether faculty members actually
owned a laptop. During our faculty
training, we used loaner laptops, return-
ing them before classes started. We soon
discovered that faculty members were
much more likely to attempt using lap-
tops in the classroom if they actually
had a laptop. Fortunately, we acquired
four laptops for the four instructors
who participated in this study. Subse-
quently, when we issued laptops to the
six new instructors o