implementation and evaluation of interactive, browser
TRANSCRIPT
University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover
Implementation and evaluation of interactive, browser-based graphics in veterinary education
INAUGURAL-DISSERTATION
In fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of
Doctor of Veterinary Medicine
-Doctor medicinae veterinariae-
(Dr. med. vet.)
submitted by Pamela Liebig
Herzberg am Harz
Hannover 2021
II
Scientific supervision: Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Klaus Jung Institute for Animal Breeding and Genetics University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover Germany 1st supervisor: Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Klaus Jung Institute for Animal Breeding and Genetics University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover Germany 2nd supervisor: Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Heike Pröhl Institute of Zoology University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover Germany Day of the oral examination: 17.05.2021 This research was funded by the Ministry for Science and Culture of Lower Saxony, Germany within the digitalization project “DigiStep”.
III
To my partner in crime
IV
Results of this dissertation have been presented in a talk at the IBS-DR-
Workshop
• “Statistik lebendig lehren durch Storytelling und forschungsbasiertes
Lernen“
28.-29.11.2019, Berlin
The following manuscripts have been submitted to journals with peer-review
system:
• Pamela Liebig, Heike Pröhl, Nadine Sudhaus-Jörn, Julia Hankel, Christian
Visscher, Klaus Jung (2021). Interactive, browser-based graphics in
veterinary eduction, submitted for publication.
• Pamela Liebig, Viviane Filor, Marina Scheumann, Martina Buchholz, Klaus
Jung (2021). Teaching Academic Staff to Implement Interactive Graphics for
their Courses, submitted for publication.
V
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY ......................... 1
1.1 The role of graphics in education ........................................................... 2
1.1.1 Static versus dynamic graphics ......................................................... 3
1.2. Interactive learning modules in higher education ............................... 4
1.3. Technology adoption in education ..................................................... 5
1.4. Introduction to R and Shiny ............................................................... 8
1.4.1 Relevance of shiny apps in research and education .......................... 8
1.5. Aims of this work .............................................................................. 9
2. MATERIAL AND METHODS ..................................................................... 10
2.1 Implementation of interactive graphics in veterinary education ................ 10
2.1.1 Topic identification ........................................................................... 10
2.1.2 App development ............................................................................ 11
2.1.3 App integration ................................................................................ 13
2.1.4 Evaluation study ............................................................................. 13
2.2. Online workshop for faculty members ............................................... 14
3. SUBMITTED MANUSCRIPTS .................................................................. 15
3.1 Interactive, browser-based graphics in veterinary education ................... 15
Abstract ...................................................................................................... 16
1. Introduction ........................................................................................ 17
2. Methods ............................................................................................. 19
3. Results .............................................................................................. 27
4. Discussion ......................................................................................... 34
5. Conclusion ......................................................................................... 36
6. References ........................................................................................ 38
VI
3.2 Teaching Academic Staff to Implement Interactive Graphics for their Courses
.................................................................................................................. 41
Abstract ................................................................................................... 41
1. Introduction ..................................................................................... 43
2. Methods .......................................................................................... 46
3. Results ........................................................................................... 50
4. Discussion ...................................................................................... 61
5. References ..................................................................................... 64
4. GENERAL DISCUSSION ......................................................................... 68
4.1 Students’ perception .............................................................................. 68
4.1.1 Effect on interest ............................................................................. 68
4.1.2 Perceived usefulness and ease of use ............................................. 69
4.1.3 Effect on information processing ...................................................... 70
4.2 Lecturers’ perception ............................................................................. 71
4.2.1 Opinion towards digital media .......................................................... 71
4.2.2 Perceived ease of use and usefulness ............................................. 72
4.2.3 Workshop effect on teachers ........................................................... 73
4.2.4 Age effect ....................................................................................... 75
4.3 LIMITATIONS ........................................................................................ 75
5. ZUSAMMENFASSUNG ............................................................................ 76
6. SUMMARY .............................................................................................. 79
7. REFERENCES ........................................................................................ 82
8. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................... 92
9. APPENDIX .............................................................................................. 93
9.1. Students‘ questionnaire (English) .......................................................... 93
9.2. Students’ questionnaire (German) ......................................................... 95
VII
9.3. Lecturers’ questionnaire (English) ......................................................... 97
9.4. Lecturers’ questionnaire (German) ........................................................ 99
9.5 Pre-workshop questionnaire (English) .................................................. 101
9.6 Post-workshop questionnaire (English) ................................................ 105
9.7 Pre-workshop questionnaire (German) ................................................. 107
9.8. Post-workshop questionnaire (German) .............................................. 111
VIII
LIST OF FIGURES
Figures in the general part of this work are labelled continuously, while figures in
the manuscripts are labelled as Figure M x.x.
Figure 1 Screenshot of ui.R from an exemplary shiny app................................ 11
Figure 2: Screenshot from the server.R. .......................................................... 12
Figure 3: Screenshot of the exemplary shiny application to visualize the weight of
different dog breeds according to age in month. .............................................. 12
Figure M1.1:Screenshot of the user panel of the interactive teaching tool for the
animal nutrition. ............................................................................................. 21
Figure M1. 2: Screenshot of the bar plot indicating relevant components in struvite
stone formation after selecting the feed components. ...................................... 22
Figure M1.3: Screenshot of the panel with additional information regarding
background information about the taught contents. .......................................... 23
Figure M1.4: Answer distributions for Likert-Scale questions on the interactive
graphic in the zoology course ......................................................................... 29
Figure M1.5: Answer distributions for Likert-Scale questions on the interactive
graphic in the animal nutrition course. ............................................................. 29
Figure M1.6: Answer distributions for Likert-Scale questions on the interactive
graphic in the food science course. ................................................................. 30
Figure M2.1: Comparison of the influence of the invention of letterpress, the
internet or the occurrence of the COVID19 pandemic on the development of
digital teaching in higher education……….………………………………………… 52
Figure M2.2: Overall high agreement to the statements that interactive graphics
are positive for students (left) and lecturer (right) did little change during the
workshop. ...................................................................................................... 54
Figure M2.3: After the workshop, only participants with prior programming skills
agreed to have the intention to program interactive graphics by themselves ..... 55
Figure M2.4: Sketch from a workshop participant for an interactive graphic in a
pharmacology lecture (left) and implementation as interactive graphics with
checkboxes as regulator elements (right). ....................................................... 58
IX
Figure M2.5: Screenshot of interactive graphic for zoology module. ................. 60
Figure 4: Screenshot from the website, where the interactive graphics which have
been implemented within the framework of this project can be accessed. ......... 73
X
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
1
1. GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
Graphics, such as line charts, boxplots or histograms are frequently used in higher
education to present complex data to students. The intention of presenting data
as a graphic is to ease access to information and improve data readability (Zentner
et al., 2019). However, graphics are mostly shown as static figures depriving
readers from exploring the underlying data (Perkel, 2018). The potential of
interactive graphics in scientific publishing has already been subject of discussion
amongst researchers (Weissgerber et al., 2016; Ellis & Merdian, 2015; Krumholz,
2015). Interactive graphics allow the reader to examine the data and offer
additional information that cannot be presented in a static figure (Weissgerber et
al, 2016). However, in most literature and scientific journals static graphics are
presented. In return, teachers who use these resources for supplementing their
educational material are either forced to stick with the static nature of those
graphics or invest additional time to make them more accessible. In the past,
knowledge of programming languages such as JAVA, HTML or CSS were
necessary to develop dynamic graphics (Ellis & Meridan, 2015). Usually, these
programming languages are not familiar to members of the academic staff in non-
computer-based sciences and in the medical field. In contrast, R, a programming
language for statistical analysis (Team R.C, 2020), is more frequently used in
academic environments. Interactive visualizations can be customized with basic
R skills using the web application framework Shiny (Chang et al., 2018). The
interactive graphics developed within the shiny environment, are also known as
“shiny apps”. These apps have recently gained relevance in research and have
also been employed for statistic education (Fawcett, 2018; Williams & Williams,
2017; Potter et al., 2016). However, up to this date interactive graphics are rarely
used in veterinary education.
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
2
1.1 The role of graphics in education
In the past hundred years oral and written speech has been the dominant form for
conveying instructional information (Li et al., 2019). Historically, the additional use
of pictures draws back on the pioneering work of Comenius (1658). His “Visible
World in Pictures” (lat. Orbis sensualium pictus) is supposed to be one of the first
textbooks especially designed for educational purpose to include illustrations
(Murphy, 2009). Early research on pictorial illustrations revealed that pictures are
“effective interest-getting devices” (Spaulding, 1955), which can facilitate recall
(Alesandrini, 1984) and promote comprehension (Glenberg & Langston, 1992).
Especially in science education, where most of the concepts and phenomena are
explained through models, visual aids frequently support text material (Herrlinger
et al., 2017). Learning from pictures has been analysed from different theoretical
perspectives (Höffler & Leutner, 2007). The idea that “people learn more deeply
from words and pictures than from words alone” (Mayer, 2005) is the rationale
behind the idea of multimedia learning. Multimedia has become prominent in the
academic environment, since several e-learning modalities are based on
multimedia systems (e.g. Zhan & Zhou, 2003; Alsadhan, et al. 2014). While e-
learning can be referred to as learning through electronic devices (Sangrà et al.,
2012), multimedia is defined as the combination of written or spoken words and
pictures. These pictures can be static, such as diagrams and photos, or dynamic,
such as animations and videos (Mayer, 2005). The theoretical basis for designing
effective multimedia in e-learning is represented within the “cognitive theory of
multimedia learning”. The information transmitted through multimedia enters
through an auditory and a visually channel into the information processing system.
Learning occurs when words and images from the presented material is
transferred from the sensory memory to the working memory, where information
is selected and organized into a coherent verbal and pictorial representation
(Mayer, 2017). Finally, the learner activates prior knowledge from long-term
memory for the learning process to be completed (Sorden, 2012). These three
cognitive processes (selection, organization, and integration) must be considered
when designing a multimedia message. The challenge is not to overload the visual
and auditory channel (Mayer & Moreno, 2003; Mayer, 2017).
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
3
1.1.1 Static versus dynamic graphics
The progression of computer graphic technologies made it possible to produce
accurate graphical representations of almost any target content. With this variety
of graphic possibilities, finding the appropriate type of depiction for each top ic,
audience and purpose can be challenging (Lowe, 2017). There are several
reasons for believing that both static as well as animated pictures can benefit
learning (Höffler & Leuter, 2007). Static instructional graphics, such as diagrams
and flowcharts are frequently used in educational print material (McElvany et al.,
2012) to make content more “comprehensible”, “memorable” and “generalizable”
(Lowe, 2017). However, several teaching contents include important dynamic
aspects. Particularly in the medical field several processes have a dynamic nature.
Examples range from pharmacodynamics, where drug availability is visualized
depending on time and administration route (Rowland, 1972), to physiology, where
dynamic cellular process, such as oxygen binding of haemoglobin are studied.
Here students need to understand how changes take place over time. In the past,
due to limited technical means, dynamic processes could only be addressed with
a series of static graphics depicting successive states of the subject of matter
(Lowe, 2017) or with arrows indicating the movement (Hegarty et al., 2003).
However, the spatial and temporal dimension cannot be fully depicted this way.
Another limitation is the narrow space a static graphic can offer, leading to a
restricted amount of information that can be conveyed. Informational overload can
be the consequence, when all or many aspects are illustrated within one static
graphic. The advent of computer capacities gave rise to further visualization
possibilities. Videos, animations, or interactive models have made it possible to
illustrate dynamic processes which include change over time and/or location. For
veterinary education 3D animations have been used to add dimensionality to
anatomic presentations (Clements et al., 2012, Gao et al., 2020, Scherzer et al.,
2010). Instructional videos can provide additional support for learning clinical skills
(Müller et al., 2019), preparing students for laboratory courses (Al-Khalili &
Coppoc, 2014) and reviewing practical techniques (Hawkins et al., 2003).
Animations and videos can offer certain control over the learning pace through
pause-, play- and repeat-functions, but they rarely provide the opportunity to
interact with the teaching content.
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
4
1.2. Interactive learning modules in higher education
Higher education aims to prepare graduates to meet the expectations of their
future working lifes (Chan, 2016). The need to bridge the gap between formal
academic instruction and job training has led to the search for appropriate
teaching methods (Kim et al., 2002). In traditional classroom settings, students
are often taught in frontal teaching in form of lectures and seminars, frequently
accompanied by wall presentations. One mayor issue of this teaching form is the
rather passive engagement of students as mere receiver of information (Craig &
Amernic, 2006). Today several opportunities to actively engage students in the
learning process exist. In large classroom contexts active learning can be
promoted using student response systems (Chan et al., 2015) These systems
work through remote-like devices and transmit students’ response to the
instructor’s computer. Here students get encouraged to participate in classroom
activities, while their level of understanding is captured (Ghilay, Y., & Ghilay, 2015).
Another way to engage students is through interactive learning materials, which
respond dynamically to the learner’s action. Research supports the argument that
meaningful student-content interaction is a critical factor for learning effectiveness
(Dunlap et al., 2007; Nandi et al., 2015, Murray et al., 2012). As stated by
Muirhead & Juwah (2004), interactivity provides diverse functions in the
educational process. It enables students to acquire “higher order knowledge”,
such as problem solving, critical thinking and decision-making skills. For
veterinary education, these features are especially important. The veterinary
profession requires a problem-oriented approach (Lane, 2008) and individual skills
such as decision making (Hodgson et al., 2013). Several universities have
integrated problem-based and case-based learning (CBL) modalities to address
these needs (e.g. Sawras et al., 2020; Crowther & Bailllie, 2016; Newman, 2005).
In CBL students get presented real or realistic case material (Sawras et al, 2020)
and are required to solve the case based on the presented data. It has been
demonstrated that this teaching approach can promote student’s clinical reasoning
(Petterson, 2006) while providing the possibility to apply clinical knowledge
(Sawras et al., 2020). When reviewing the underlying systems, CBL is developed
using a feature which displays content to the user, based on a set of rules provided
by the instructor (Allenspach et al., 2008). Students experience the outcome of
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
5
their decision-making but cannot directly manipulate the content. According to
Schulmeister’s (2003) taxonomy of multimedia component interactivity,
interactivity can be classified in six levels. Starting with the lowest interactivity
form, where users are provided with “pre-fabricated” multimedia components to
the highest being the construction of these objects by users themselves. When
users get the chance to generate own representations of content, so called
“discovery learning” takes place (Schulmeister, 2003). This learning model allows
students to build their own knowledge by discovering rather than by memorizing
what was said by the teacher (Rahman, 2017).
1.3. Technology adoption in education
With institutions’ growing interest in incorporating e-learning into the course
programs, many administrators have expressed concerns regarding faculty
members’ lacking technology skills (Dysart & Weckerle, 2015). Teachers
themselves have identified and experienced the lacking confidence and
competence as an obstacle for technology integration in class (Hutchison &
Reinkind, 2011; Alenezi, 2017, Windiarti et al., 2019). In the past, several theories
tried to explain technology acceptance and usage based on a generational
construct. Prensky (2001) for example popularized the idea of dividing generations
into “digital natives” and “digital immigrants”. He suggested that digital natives
constitute a new generation of students, which were born and raised with
technologies and therefore demand an education adapted to their technology
affinity. Lecturers on the other hand were labelled as “digita l immigrants”, which
were not fully fluent in the digital language and therefore struggle to teach digital
natives. A similar concept had Tapscott (1989) which introduced the term “net
generation” and Howe and Straus (2000) with their “millennials” concept . Even
though these concepts lack empirical evidence, it still resonates with many
academics (Judd, 2018).
The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) introduced by Davis (1986) in turn
attempts to explain and predict determinants of behavioural intention to make use
of technology. This model has evolved into the key model for studies regarding
information technology acceptance (Lee et al. 2003) and is still widely used to
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
6
understand technology usage in the educational environment (e.g. Scherer et al.
2019; Salloum et al., 2019; Joo et al. 2018). Davis proposed that two specific
beliefs determine the intention to make use of technology: the perceived
usefulness (PU) and the perceived ease of use (PEU). PEU captures the degree
to which a person believes that using a system will be free of effort, while PU is
the degree to which a person believes that using a system will enhance job
performance (Grover, et al. 2019) or offers a “better value over alternative
methods of carrying out the same tasks” (Liu, et al. 2009). When assessing
teachers’ job performances, teaching effectiveness and teacher-student
interaction are important factors to be considered (Cai & Lin, 2006). A common
method used in research to evaluate teaching effectiveness has been through
student ratings. Mart (2017) concluded that “student evaluations cannot only be
used as a feedback to modify teaching practices but also course content and
structure”. The original TAM was expanded by so called “external variables”, which
influence the beliefs of the person towards a system. Training of the user was
recognized as one of those external variable influencing users’ attitudes towards
technology (Burton-Jones & Hubona, 2006). Gold (2011) summarized the
importance of training teachers in using technology in education as follows: “even
though technology may change the way students learn, it will have no impact
without teacher support, and one of the most important reasons for the lack of
faculty support is lack of faculty preparation. Teachers must be trained in using
this new technology”. More recently, Kalonde & Mousa (2016) investigated factors
that influence teachers’ technology decisions. Lack of familiarity and training was
stated by 43% of the respondents to be an obstacle for using technology in the
classroom. In this context, several professional development programs emerged,
aiming to address this problem (e.g.,Watson, 2006, Carlson & Gadio, 2002).
Historically, the principle aim of professional development (PD) is to change
teacher’s practice (Lee et al., 2017). However, the success of PD programs is
frequently measured in terms of participant’s satisfaction (Lee et al., 2017,
Rienties et al., 2013) rather than on evaluating the impact on teacher ’s practice.
One possible way to capture this impact is by using pre- and post-training
questionnaires. Lau & Yuen (2013) for example used this questionnaire format to
investigate the impact of a technology workshop for mathematics teachers,
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
7
yielding that participants showed higher perceived efficiency using information and
communication technologies (ICT) for teaching and learning than before. Similar
did Harsell et al. (2009) and Watson (2006), who affirmed the positive impact of
technology training on teacher’s technology usage in class using pre-and post-
training questionnaires. Most of these professional development programs are
conducted in face-to-face classes. However, the internet has become an important
medium to offer “flexible”, “cost-effective” and “wide-scale” online professional
development programs for teachers (Powell & Bodur, 2019). More recently, in light
of the constraints imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, online teaching has
become increasingly relevant not only for students’ education, but also for
teachers’ professional development (Hartshorne et al., 2020). Teachers generally
receive training in using educational technologies, but they do not receive
systematic support in designing interactive online learning content (Hartshorne et
al., 2020). One possible way to customize interactive learning content is through
R and shiny.
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
8
1.4. Introduction to R and Shiny
R is a “system for statistical computation and graphics” (Team R.C, 2020), which
is widely used in academic environments. The large amount of user-contributed,
freely available packages has turned R into an extensible, current, up-to-date
software. Packages are collections of related functions and data, which address a
specific problem (Gentleman, 2008). Researchers of almost all fields use different
R packages for diverse tasks, such as machine learning (Molnar et al., 2018),
meta-analysis (Schwarzer, 2007; Owen et al., 2019), model simulations
(Wojciechowski et al., 2015) and others. The shiny package (Chang et al., 2018)
contributes to the multifunctionality of R, by allowing to create interactive graphics,
which can be displayed in a web-browser. The graphic, for example a histogram,
boxplot, or line chart, can be manipulated by the user through different regulator
elements. Results of these adjustments are displayed in real-time. Several design
options such as different colour layouts, font types and the possibility to add texts
and pictures, turn this tool into a visually appealing way to transmit knowledge
embedded in a livid graphic.
1.4.1 Relevance of shiny apps in research and education
In the last years shiny apps have increasingly been used in research, especially
in bioinformatics (Brink et al., 2018, Ekiz et al., 2020; Badgeley et al., 2019), but
also in the biological field (Abhilash & Sheeba; 2019; Cenek et al., 2020;
Cichewicz, & Hirsh; 2018). Despite of their wide distribution in research, shiny
apps are rarely found in education. Fawcett (2018), Williams & Williams (2017)
and Potter et al. (2016) were one of the few to recognize the educational potential
of these web-tools. Fawcett pointed out, that students “seemed more engaged in
lecture when demonstrated techniques via the apps” (Fawcett, 2018). Even though
the authors of these studies commonly agreed for the shiny apps to be beneficial
for teaching and learning, the usage in education have been mostly limited to
statistic courses. More recently, Hanč, et al. (2020) analysed the perception of
physic schoolteachers regarding R Shiny as a digital teaching tool and found a
“very positive acceptation of R Shiny web apps” amongst teachers.
GENERAL INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE SURVEY
9
1.5. Aims of this work
Although graphics are frequently used in education to ease access to information,
they usually lack the opportunity to explore underlying concepts. For dynamic
processes where spatial and temporal changes are an essential feature of the
learning content, animated graphics have been employed. While students here
get a certain control over the learning pace, active interaction with the content is
generally not provided. In turn, interactive e-learning modalities respond to
students’ actions and allow them to experience the subsequent effects in real-
time. For veterinary education mostly case-based learning have been employed
to promote interaction. To my knowledge, so far, no attention has been paid to
make the underlying scientific data of graphical representations more accessible
to veterinary students. Within the framework of the “DigiStep” project, this work
aims to provide teachers and students of veterinary education an application tool
for interactive data visualization. Other institutes of our universities participated at
this digitalization project, too. Each with own approaches for promoting digitization
in veterinary education and partially collaborating with each other. So far, an
identification tool for poisonous plants of veterinary interest, instructional videos
for animal dissections, graphical physics simulations and case-based e-learning
modalities have been developed. The results of our contribution to this project are
described in two manuscripts, which were submitted for publication and presented
in chapter three of this work. The aim of the paper “Interactive, browser-based
graphics for veterinary education” was to study for the first time the acceptance
and applicability of interactive graphics in veterinary education. In close
collaboration with the course instructors, interactive graphics for two veterinary
medicine lectures and one seminar were developed and evaluated. The second
paper “Teaching Academic Staff to Implement Interactive Graphics for their
Courses” aimed to gain insight into the acceptance and impact of a two-day online
workshop for teachers. Up to this date, no workshop for teaching faculty members
the implementation of own interactive graphics customized on their teaching
needs in veterinary education have been conducted.
MATERIAL AND METHODS
10
2. MATERIAL AND METHODS
This work includes two studies, which were conducted in 2019 and 2020 at the
University for Veterinary Medicine in Hannover. For the first study, interactive
graphics were implemented and evaluated amongst course instructors and
students. In the second study, academic staff were taught basic programming
skills to develop those interactive graphics on their own. In the following the
individual work steps will be explained in more detail.
2.1 Implementation of interactive graphics in veterinary education
The implementation of interactive graphics at our university was achieved in four
steps. (1) Topic identification took place, where lecturers and seminars were
scanned for content to be implemented as interactive graphics. (2) App
development was planned in close collaboration with the lectures. (3) App
integration into the lecture and (4) evaluation through questionnaires was
accomplished.
2.1.1 Topic identification
In the first step veterinary medicine lectures and seminars were scanned for
appropriate topics to be implemented as interactive graphics. Therefore, static
graphics were reviewed for limitations, such as lack of clarity and content
overload. Lectures were also scanned for dynamic and complex contents, which
lack graphical representations. In the next step, interactive graphics addressing
these limitations were programmed and introduced to the lecturers. In close
collaboration with the course instructors, layout, appearance, and functional
possibilities were discussed.
MATERIAL AND METHODS
11
2.1.2 App development
Shiny apps consist of two components, which communicate with each other: a
user interface (ui.R) and a server script (server.R). The ui.R encodes instructions
for the user interface such as layout and design. Here the input objects (user
regulator elements) and the output object (e.g., table, plot, or text) are defined
(Figure 1). The server.R includes instructions for processing user input and
generates output objects (Figure 2). In the following an explementary R script will
be shown to explain the code structure and the resulting app (Figure 3).
Figure 1 Screenshot of ui.R from an exemplary shiny app. The title is specified within the
titlePanel. The code for the user interface must be within the layout function. The
sidebarLayout function containts a mainPanel and a sidebarPanel. The sidebarPanel
contains user input controls (here selectInput and numericInput). The mainPanel contains
outputs (here a plot).
MATERIAL AND METHODS
12
Figure 2: Screenshot from the server.R. Here the server’s logic is defined in 4 steps: (1)
Data is loaded with a read-function. Several formats of data such as the commonly used
.csv files are supported. (2) Data is filtered according to user’s input. (3) Underlying
mathematical formulas are applied on the filtered data (here an arbitrary formula for
weight calculation is used). (3) The output object (here a histogram) is generated using
the renderPlot function.
Figure 3: Screenshot of the exemplary shiny application to visualize the weight of
different dog breeds according to age in month. The ui.R generates the sidebar panel on
the left, where different user regulator elements can be displayed. Here users can select
different dog breeds and filter the weight according to age. In addition, on the right side
a main panel for the output is generated. The server.R calculates the distribution of weight
according to user provided input parameters and sends the resulting plot to the main
panel.
MATERIAL AND METHODS
13
2.1.3 App integration
The lecturers were provided a hyperlink which directs them to the app via web
browser. The apps were uploaded to the university servers, so no additional
software or hardware was necessary. Lecturers can access the apps directly from
any computer and/or incorporate them into their slides. In addition, students can
access them from any computer connected to the university servers.
2.1.4 Evaluation study
The acceptance of interactive graphics was evaluated through questionnaires,
which included multiple choice, open field and 5-point Likert scale questions. A
total number of n=327 students in their first and forth study year as well as n=5
lecturers participated. Students and lecturers completed the questionnaires in
absence of the app developers directly after the session with interactive graphics.
Students were asked to estimate user-friendliness and the impact on their learning
experience. Furthermore, students’ use of digital media for education and their
attitude towards digitalization in higher education were asked (see Appendix 9.1-
9.2). The course instructors were asked to rate the user-friendliness, the perceived
impact on students and their previous use of digital media for teaching (see
Appendix 9.3- 9.4). The questionnaire survey was approved by the data security
office of the University for Veterinary Medicine in Hannover. In both questionnaires
no personal identifiable information, except gender and age, was captured and
the data obtained was stored anonymously.
MATERIAL AND METHODS
14
2.2. Online workshop for faculty members
Faculty members at our university were invited to participate at a two-day online
workshop through MS Teams. This workshop was structured as follows: In the first
workshop session R and shiny were introduced and interactive data visualization
possibilities were explained. Here interactive graphics implemented at our
university were used as examples to describe the layout, functionalities, and the
basic components of shiny apps. At the end participants received templates for
developing three different graphic types (histogram, pie chart and boxplot). These
templates consisted of ready to use R-scripts with explicatory comments.
Additionally, worksheets with step-by-step guide through the code and voluntary
tasks were provided. These tasks were designed to increase in difficulty and base
on each other. Beginning with simple tasks, such as “change the title of the app”,
participants got the chance to understand the syntax. Afterwards, tasks increased
in difficulty up to the point that participants customized ui elements and server
functions. After the first workshop session, participants were encouraged to
develop own ideas for interactive graphics. Several faculty members provided
hand-written drafts or basic R-scripts. These ideas and related implementation
possibilities were discussed amongst all participants and the course instructors in
the second workshop session. Faculty members were asked to complete an online
questionnaire through google forms prior to the workshop and after completing it
(see Appendix 9.5- 9.8). The questionnaire included 5-point Likert scale and open
field questions for additional comments. In both questionnaires, participants were
asked to evaluate the impact of interactive graphics on teaching and learning.
Furthermore, it was asked whether participants could imagine using interactive
graphics in their courses and programming them on their own. Moreover, the
impact of the workshop on participants’ opinion towards digital media usage in
education was asked. Both questionnaire surveys were approved by the data
security office at the University for Veterinary Medicine in Hannover. Again, no
personal identifiable information was captured, excepting gender and age. The
data obtained was stored anonymously.
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3. SUBMITTED MANUSCRIPTS
Following manuscript was submitted on March 2nd, 2021 in the Journal for
Veterinary Medical Education.
3.1 Interactive, browser-based graphics in veterinary education
Pamela Liebig, Heike Pröhl, Nadine Sudhaus-Jörn, Julia Hankel, Christian
Visscher, Klaus Jung*
Pamela Liebig, Veterinarian, is a doctoral student, Institute for Animal Breeding
and Genetics, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover
Germany
Heike Pröhl, Dr. rer. nat., is Associate Professor of Zoology, Institute of Zoology,
University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover Germany
Nadine Sudhaus-Jörn, DVM, is a postdoctoral researcher, Institute of Food
Quality and Food Safety, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation,
Hannover Germany
Julia Hankel, DVM, is a postdoctoral researcher, Institute of Food Quality and
Food Safety, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover
Germany
Christian Visscher, DVM, is Professor of Veterinary Medicine and Director of the
Institute of Food Quality and Food Safety, University of Veterinary Medicine
Hannover, Foundation, Hannover Germany
Klaus Jung, Dr. rer. nat., is Professor of Genomics and Bioinformatics, Institute
for Animal Breeding and Genetics, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover,
Foundation, Hannover Germany
* Corresponding Author
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung
University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation
Institute for Animal Breeding and Genetics
Bünteweg 17p
30559 Hannover
E-Mail: [email protected]
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Abstract
The research described here aims to discover how veterinary medicine students
and their lecturers respond to and accept interactive graphics as new digital
teaching tool. In the last decades, technology advances have led to growing usage
of digital teaching media in veterinary education. Interactive graphics, which allow
to dynamically change data and related graphics, however, have rarely been
considered as teaching tool in veterinary education so far. For evaluating such
interactive teaching tools, study contents from three different courses were
implemented as interactive graphics. Therefore, the Shiny environment, a web-
based application framework for the statistic software R was used. In total n=327
students and n=5 lecturers participated in the evaluations study. The
questionnaires revealed an overall high acceptance amongst veterinary medicine
students and lecturers. In total, 71% of the students affirmed that interactive
graphics led to an increased interest for the presented study contents and 76%
expressed the wish to discuss more topics with interactive graphics. All teachers
involved also perceived to have reached more students through teaching with
interactive graphics. Furthermore, most lecturers agreed that the experience of
teaching with interactive graphics had a positive influence on their opinion towards
digital media teaching.
Keywords
interactive graphics, dynamic visualization, R-Shiny, Veterinary education, Web-
based learning
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1. Introduction
The advances of computational capacities and graphic design technologies have
made it possible to produce animated visualizations of dynamic processes1. Within
the educational context, computer visualizations are increasingly being used as
part of learning material to depict scientific phenomena which include change over
time. Especially in multimedia learning environments, computer visualizations are
becoming prevalent2. Computer-assisted learning has paved the way for
transforming education at universities and has become an important part in
medical education3. The growing integration of web-based applications into
academic environments has converted the internet into an important educational
instrument4. In consequence, universities worldwide have extensively
incorporated e-learning into their curriculum5, offering students time and place
flexibility6. In veterinary education e-learning has also become an integral part of
the curriculum7. This includes lecture recordings and instructional videos as part
of blended learning environments8, where face-to-face teaching is combined with
technology-based modalities. Furthermore, case-based e-learning systems9,
simulations10 and virtual reality tools11 can help veterinary students to overcome
the gap between theorical knowledge and clinical applications. Access and use of
such learning modalities are usually restricted to the own faculty. However, there
has been a growing trend in sharing learning resources as open educational
resources.12
At our university, most study contents are taught in form of frontal teaching using
wall-projected presentations. Although multimedia elements such as videos or
audio material can be included into the presentation, the individual slides usually
remain static. Digital teaching material such as video lectures, a heart sound
library and virtual microscope can provide the opportunity to deepen and
complement the knowledge acquired in the lecture. However, most of those
materials are not modifiable and therefore rarely encourage students to question
or reason the shown information. In contrast, interactive graphics can be
manipulated in several ways and encourage students to actively participate in the
learning process. This is of particular interest, since it is well known that active
inclusion of students is important for learning motivation and long-term retention
of information.13
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Academic staff has already recognized the potential of this interactive applications
as teaching resource. Since several years, the shiny package, a web-based
framework for the statistics software R, allows to integrate interactive graphics in
a website.14 In veterinary medicine data from experiments and observations are
often displayed as graphs that are used as teaching material for students. These
graphs often have complex underlining formulars and models. Interactive
regulators such as sliders, click boxes or select lists can be used to change
parameters. These changes are displayed in real time and can give the user a
better understanding of how a specific parameter is affecting the outcome. This
interactivity can invite students to explore complex data and dynamic processes.
Fawcett introduced interactive shiny apps to incorporate research-informed
learning and teaching into statistic courses, concluding that the method benefited
the students in terms of their confidence in their understanding.15 In a similar
direction, Williams and Williams and Potter et al. used R shiny apps to enhance
learning experience of statistic students. 16,17 Previously such interactive dynamics
visualisations were done with other programming languages such as HTML or
Flash. These languages are unfortunately not widespread among academic staff
in veterinary medicine. In contrast, R is widely used in science to do a variety of
analysis and thus is much more common among academic staff. With basic R
skills, shiny apps can be customized to specific topics. Due to the web-based
framework these apps can be displayed independently of hardware and software,
which makes them easy to integrate in lectures. However, shiny apps are rarely
used in the context of veterinary education so far. As part of the digitalization
strategy of the State Lower Saxony (Germany) we implemented several teaching
contents from the curriculum of veterinarians as interactive graphics. The aim of
the article is to evaluate the acceptance of interactive graphics amongst veterinary
medicine students and lecturers through a case-study. Three interactive graphics
were implemented into different veterinary medicine lectures. The functionalities
and didactic aims of these graphics as well as the evaluation study design will be
described in the following.
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2. Methods
2.1 Local Setting
The University for Veterinary Medicine in Hannover is one of five institutions of
higher education for veterinary science in Germany. The education consists of a
scientific-theoretical component and a practical component. The teaching and
examination of the scientific-theoretical part is divided into three stages: first and
second preclinical examination, including basic natural science such as physics,
zoology, chemistry. The last stage, the veterinary state examination, consists of
subjects like food science, animal nutrition and pathology. These subjects are
taught in form of compulsory lectures, seminars, laboratory courses and others.
For this study we chose one course from the pre-clinical examination and two
courses from the veterinary state examination taught in form of lectures and
seminars to integrate interactive graphics into the veterinary education of our
university. The first module was integrated in the zoology lecture; the latter two
modules were animal nutrition and food science. We describe the implementation
methods as well as the individual contents of each module in the following. The
three modules were primarily designed to support the lecturer during the course,
but they can also be used by the students for learning after the course within a
web-browser.
2.2. Shiny environment for implementation of interactive graphics
We implemented the interactive graphics using the Shiny environment (Version
1.4.0) (Beeley, 2016) based on the statistic software R (R Core Team, 2019). This
environment converts R scripts into user-friendly, visually appealing Shiny
Applications, which allow to display interactive graphics in the web browser.
Regulator elements can be used to change the data basis behind the graphic.
Besides interactive graphics, interactive tables can be integrated, too.
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2.3. Implemented modules for selected courses
2.3.1 Zoology module: The effect of the pH on the Haemoglobin oxygen
affinity curve
The implemented graphic for this module provides the lecturer an environment to
explain the pH effect on the oxygen affinity of blood haemoglobin step by step
(Supplementary Figure 1). When invoking the interactive graphic, the oxygen-
haemoglobin dissociation curve is displayed for a physiological pH environment.
The lecturer can now choose whether to acidify or alkalize the environment, which
in return leads to changes in the dissociation curve. These changes in
haemoglobin oxygen affinity can now be discussed with the students. For further
interactive teaching, different explanations that clarify the shift of oxygen affinity
are implemented. Thus, the lecturer can first discuss possible answers with the
students and then select the answers from a selection list. Furthermore, users
may obtain additional information about oxygen carriers by clicking on a second
tab located on the top of the application.
2.3.2. Animal nutrition: A tool to design a diet for bladder stone prophylaxis
This web tool allows users to design a specific diet for bladder stone prophylaxis
in dogs. The aim of this interactive graphic is to impart students the influence of
the chemical and mineral composition specific to certain feed materials on the
urine pH level and struvite stone formation. Users of this tool choose out of a
selection of feed materials and one complementary feed as well. They decide
which ingredients to add and the amount in percentage of those components
within the ration. At first, users select a main component, which will be the primary
ingredient in the diet. This main component covers 100 per cent of the dog´s daily
energy requirement. Afterwards, users can decide how many percent of other
ingredients to add to the diet, by activating the sliders (Figure M1.1).
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Figure M1.1:Screenshot of the user panel of the interactive teaching tool for the animal
nutrition. The lecturer can use numeric input, selection list and sliders to demonstrate
the effect of a created diet for dogs on mineral supply. A German version was used in the
evaluation study
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A bar plot immediately displays the chosen components that are essential for a
struvite stone formation. As the formation and dissolution of struvite stones in the
urinary bladder depends on the urine pH, which in turn depends on the cation-
anion balance, the urine pH is estimated and displayed based on the food
composition at hand. Different coloured lines and rectangles, as depicted in
Figure M1.2, indicate whether the maintenances requirements of a dog referred
to its bodyweight and the recommended mineral supply for struvite stone
prophylaxis in the bladder are reached. A second tab located at the top of the
application allows access to additional information (see Figure M 1.3). These
panels provide the student with background information and explanations on how
to read the plot.
Figure M1. 2: Screenshot of the bar plot indicating relevant components in struvite stone
formation after selecting the feed components. Additionally, a table displays the amount
of feed components, the energy content and the estimated urine pH level.
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Figure M1.3: Screenshot of the panel with additional information regarding background
information about the taught contents. This panel can be accessed by clicking on the
information icon.
2.3.3. Food Science: Thermal destruction of microorganisms in food cans
The interactive graphic for the course food science was designed to simulate a
practical scenario. The lecturer presents a case of an inadequate heating
treatment of a food-can. In cooperation with the lecturer, students can modify the
heating curve by selecting the maximal core temperature and heating duration.
Instantly, the F-value, a sterilization value for food cans (Ohlsson, 1980), is
calculated and displayed beside the heating curve. Afterwards, students have four
possible answers to determine the degree of durability for their theoretical cans.
The durability depends on the F-value the students achieved with their different
temperature and heating duration combinations.
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2.4 Access to interactive graphics
The raw files of all presented interactive graphics are freely available from the
Github repository https://github.com/klausjung-hannover for any person interested
in trying them out. A ReadMe file added to the repository adds information about
the functionalities of the web applications, as well as instructions on how to install
necessary R-packages and to run the R-Scripts. At our own university, the
interactive graphics are hosted within the university server, and students and
lecturers can easily access the web-application via a web browser at a faculty
computer. We are working currently with our IT department to install a virtual
machine so that ready-to-use interactive graphics are online accessible to
everyone. We comment this current limitation in the discussion section.
2.5 Evaluation Study
A paper-based questionnaire was distributed to veterinary students that attended
the three above-described courses in the winter term 2019/2020. The participation
in this study was voluntary and no personally identifiable information except for
gender and age was captured. The data security office of the University of
Veterinary Medicine Hannover approved the evaluation study, and all data were
stored anonymously. The lecturers informed the students about the evaluation
before the lectures and students completed the questionnaires afterwards. In total,
n=327 students returned filled questionnaires. In the zoology course n=89
students participated, all in their first study year. In the animal nutrition and the
food technology course n=215 and n=23 students, respectively, returned the
questionnaires. In addition, n=5 lecturers filled out questionnaires on their
experience while teaching with the interactive tools. Four of these lecturers are
co-authors here (HP, CV, JH and NSJ), however, they were not involved in the
data analysis, which was done by PL and KJ, only. Students and lecturers’
questionnaires are available in the Supplementary Material. In the courses
German version were used but were translated into English here. Their contents
will be described in the following.
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2.5.1. Students’ questionnaire
The student’s questionnaire included two demographic questions (gender and
age) and nine questions regarding categorised into the subtopics:
• B) Interactive graphics in teaching and it´s handling
• C) Effects of the interactive graphic on the learning experience
• D) Digital media usage
Students were asked to rate on an ordinal scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5
(strongly agree) following statements:
• B1: I can imagine that the majority of students will handle easily interactive
graphics.
• B2: I´d wish to have more interactive graphics in veterinary school.
• B3: I can image using this tool because it ́s intuitive.
• C4: I was previously familiar with the taught content.
• C5: I understood the teaching contents taught by the interactive graphic.
• C6: The interactivity of the graphic had a positive impact on my interest
about the taught content.
• C7: The interactive graphic had no benefit to the course.
• D9: Digitalization is a chance to improve academic education.
Additionally, students were asked to provide information if and which other digital
media they have been using for learning so far.
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2.5.2 Lecturers questionnaire
We also asked participating lecturers to complete a questionnaire after teaching
with interactive graphics. The questionnaire had a similar design to the student’s
questionnaire. Professors were asked to rate on an ordinal scale from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 5 (strongly agree) the following statements:
• A1: I felt secure handling this teaching tool
• A2: I can imagine that the majority of lecturers will handle easily this teaching
tool
• A3: I wish to have more interactive graphics in my classes
• B4: In my opinion the interactive graphic provided no benefit to the course
• B5: I feel like I could have reached more students by teaching with an
interactive graphic
• C6: I have used digital teaching tools (e.g. CASUS, online lecture etc.) in my
class before
• C8: Digitalization is a chance to improve academic education.
Furthermore, professors were asked (yes/no question) if the usage of interactive
graphic had a positive effect on their opinion towards digital media usage in
academic education. An additional open comment field allowed lecturers to
express improvement wishes, comments or future design ideas.
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2.6. Data Analysis
Answer distributions of all questions were analysed graphically and descriptively,
separately for each course and separated by gender and age. Effects of age and
gender were assessed using the Mann-Whitney U test and the Kendall’s
correlation test, respectively. Correlations between the general usage of digital
learning media (on a nominal scale) and several questions (with ordinal scale of
answers) in the questionnaire were also studied using the Mann-Whitney U test.
The significance level was fixed at alpha=5%, in the case of multiple testing the
method of Bonferroni-Holm was used to adjust p-values. All analyses were
performed using the statistic software R.
3. Results
3.1. Student’s response
In general, we observed similar answer distribution in all three describes courses
(Figures M1.4- M1.6). Absolute and relative frequencies for each answer are
presented in the Supplementary Table S.T1 – S.T3.
3.1.1. Demographic results
In the zoology module, 72/89 (80.9%) participants were female, 16/89 (18%) were
male. One student (1.1%) did not provide gender information. In the animal
nutrition course, 185/215 (86.0%) were female and 26/215 (12.1%) were male,
while 4 (1.9%) students did not answer the gender question. Finally, only women
participated in the food science course (23/23). Thus, there was a similar gender
distribution in the first two courses, but a different distribution in the last one. In
general, large proportions of women is very typical among veterinary students.
Age distribution (mean+/-standard deviation years) was 20.3+/-2.7 (minimum: 17,
maximum: 29) for the zoology module, 24.5+/-4.6 (minimum: 21, maximum: 57)
for the food science module, and 21.9+/-2.8 (minimum: 20, maximum: 29) in the
animal nutrition course. Thus, the food science course was visited by older
students compared to the two other courses.
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3.1.2 Interactive graphics in teaching and it´s handling
In general, we found a high acceptance of interactive graphics as new teaching
tool amongst all students in the three studied courses. Not less than 70% of
students from fourth year agreed or strongly agreed to the statement “I´d wish to
have more interactive graphics in veterinary school”. For students from first year,
we found over 80% agreement to that statement. Regarding the handling of the
web-tool, most students are confident to be able to use easily the interactive tools
themselves and estimate that other students will do so, too (over 70% agreement
or strong agreement to answers of question B1 and B3 in all three courses).
3.1.2 Effects of interactive graphics on learning experience
The previous knowledge about the taught topics was low among students in all
courses. In the zoology course, 62.92% of the students strongly disagreed or
disagreed to the statement “I was previously familiar with the taught topic”. In food
science and animal nutrition lectures 91.3% and 62.5% of the students,
respectively, negated (strongly disagree/disagree) that statement, too. Despite
that the observation, students mainly agreed in all three courses to have
understood the subject taught by this new teaching tool.
Regarding the effect of interactive graphics on the learning experience, the
findings of the questionnaire yielded, that students consider the interactivity of the
graphic to have promoted their interest on the taught contents. In the food science
course 95.6% agreed or strongly agreed to this statement. Zoology and animal
nutrition students agreed to 71.9% and 68.4%, respectively, to that statement. To
correct the acquiesce tendency, we included a negative worded statement. In all
courses students mostly disagreed or strongly disagreed the assertion “The
interactive graphic did no provide benefit to the course”.
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Figure M1.5: Answer distributions for Likert-Scale questions on the interactive graphic in
the zoology course
Figure M1.4: Answer distributions for Likert-Scale questions on the interactive graphic in
the animal nutrition course.
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Figure M1.6: Answer distributions for Likert-Scale questions on the interactive
graphic in the food science course.
3.1.3 Digital media usage as learning resource
The student’s questionnaire evidence a positive perception of digitalization in
academic environment amongst veterinary medicine students. Most students
consider digitalization as a chance to improve the academic education. Students
in general seem to have a high acceptance for e-learning offered by the university
and seek for other digital media to support their learning advances (Table 1).
Besides online videos and forums, students use some other digital media, such
as online libraries, multimedia websites and 3D-models. The number of students
which do not use any digital learning material was low. Those students who do not
use other digital learning media as a learning device tended to have a more neutral
attitude regarding digitalization in higher education (Supplementary Tables S.T4-
S.T5). More detailed, 30 (14%) of the students in the animal nutrition course that
stated not to use other digital media, showed a significantly lower agreement to
question D9 (‘Digitalization is a chance to improve academic education’)
compared to 183 (85%) of students who use other digital media for learning
(adjusted p=0.03). Likewise, the 3 (13%) of students in the food science course
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who stated not to use digital media showed also a significantly lower agreement
to question D9 (adjusted p=0.03).
Course n e-learning at university
videos online-forum
others none
Zoology 89 55 (62%) 51 (57%) 7 (8%) (1%) 16 (17%)
Animal Nutrition
215 101 (47%) 152 (71%)
29 (13%) 27 (13%) 30 (14%)
Food Science
23 18 (78%) 16 (70%) 3 (13%) 3 (13%) 3 (13%)
Table 1: Percentages of students who use other digital media for learning as asked in
the three courses.
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3.2.1 Students response by gender and age
We found no evidence for differences between females and males in their opinion
towards interactive graphics and digital media usage. There was also no evidence
for age effects in the distribution of answers in all three courses. We only observed
a tendency for a difference (adjusted p=0.06) in the negative worded question
asked in the zoology: males found more often no added value by the new teaching
tool (Table 2).
B1 B2 B3 C4 C5 C6 C7
Gender F M F M F M F M F M F M F
1 0 6 0 6 1 6 31 44 1 6 3 12 39
2 1 0 1 6 1 0 29 31 1 0 4 6 34
3 8 6 14 12 14 25 24 19 7 31 21 12 14
4 39 50 40 25 42 44 8 6 43 12 35 38 8
5 51 38 44 50 42 25 8 0 47 50 38 31 4
n 72 16 72 16 72 16 72 16 72 16 72 16 72
p 0.32 0.88 0.13 0.18 0.42 0.51 < 0.0
1
pHolm 1.00 1.00 0.91 1.00 1.00 1.00 0.06
Table 2: Percentage distributions of response (grade of agreement: 1 – 5, ranging from
strongly disagree to strongly agree) for Likert-Scale questions asked in the zoology
course, separately for males and females. For question C7 (“no benefit to the course”)
there is a tendency that males see less benefit of the interactive graphic than females
(50% versus 12% of answers agree or strongly agree).
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3.3. Rating of interactive graphics by the lecturers
Asking the participating lecturers about their option, we found a general
acceptance towards the usage of interactive graphics in teaching (Table 3). All
participating lecturers felt to have reached more students through this new digital
teaching tool. Most lecturers (4/5) claimed to never have used digital media in
their classes before, even though they commonly agreed or strongly agreed to
consider digitalization as a chance to improve academic education. The open field
section in the lecturer’s questionnaire revealed little improvement wishes. One
lecturer rated the interactive graphics to have a high potential and ideal
environment to develop a case-based scenario but criticized the missing
opportunity for students to self-manipulate the graphic in class. Other lecturers
considered a stable internet access and high-quality beamers as important for a
reliable usage of this teaching tool.
Question State of agreement (n=5)
1 2 3 4 5
I felt confident using this teaching tool 2 3
I can imagine that the majority of teachers will handle easily this teaching tool
1 1 1 2
I wish to have more interactive graphic in my clas-ses
2 3
The interactive graphic provided no benefit to the course
3 2
I feel like I could have reached more students by teaching with interactive graphic
2 3
Digitalization is a chance to improve higher school education
2 3
I have used previously digital teaching tools Yes: 1
No 4
The usage of interactive graphic had a positive effect on my opinion towards digital media in higher school education
Yes 4
No 0
NA 1
Table 3: Answer distributions (grade of agreement: 1 – 5, ranging from strongly disagree
to strongly agree) for lecturers involved in teaching with interactive graphics.
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4. Discussion
In this study, interactive graphics were implemented for veterinary medicine
courses. Their impact on students and educators was captured through
questionnaires. Summarizing the results of all three courses, 71% (233/326) of
the students claimed that the interactivity of the graphics led to an increased
interest for the presented study contents. Lecturers also agreed to have reached
more students through teaching with interactive graphic. Researchers in the field
of educational psychology studied the role of interest in the learning process and
revealed that interest is linked to motivation for learning and can also promote a
deeper learning approach18. This is especially important in veterinary education,
where students get instructed in a wide field of disciplines, such as diverse
knowledge of several animal species and their diseases, as well as basic natural
science, food hygiene, animal production and others19. Obviously not all
disciplines can be of particular interest for the individual student and the workload
is known to be quite high. Students facing a high workload, eventually adopt a
surface learning approach,20 where facts are just memorized, and the meaning of
the studied contents may not be entirely understood21. To conduce students into
a deep learning approach a “stimulating learning environment”22 must be
promoted. We believe to have contributed to such a stimulating learning
environment by integrating these interactive teaching tools into the veterinary
medicine lectures. However, studies comparing animated versus static images
reveal inconsistent results regarding their effects on learning23. One common
concern is the possible high informative content, which can lead to an overload.
According to Hegarty (2004) it is unclear whether all students have the
metacognitive skills to effectively learn from interactive media24. Nevertheless, the
here presented graphics were designed to be explored in collaboration with the
professor during the lecture. In class the teacher manipulates certain parameters
through regulator elements while asking students to predict the outcome. This way
students are encouraged to actively participate and think of the fundamental
principles behind the presented graphic. After the class students can manipulate
the interactive graphics at their own pace by accessing a PC connected to the
server of our university or by accessing the shiny apps uploaded on the GitHub
account. Considering that in total 76% of the students wish to discuss more topics
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with interactive graphics, it is worthwhile to analyse whether teachers in veterinary
education would use interactive graphics for their classes. Even though the
advances in online technology have reached veterinary medicine education and
diverse e-learning options are available25 not all lecturers choose to implement
them into their teaching26. Previous studies revealed that academic staff often
remains attached to traditional ways of teaching, even though new technologies
are fully integrated into the educational system27,28. This matches the findings of
our survey, which affirm that most of the participating professors (4/5) have never
used digital teaching media in their class before. By involving the participating
university professors actively into the development process of these teaching
tools, we believe to have contributed positively not only on their general opinion
towards digital media but also on their confidence in handling interactive graphics.
Past educational studies suggest that students respond positively to digital media
in addition to traditional teaching (Sharpe et al., 2016). Therefore, one further aim
of this work was to provide a positive handling experience and consequently
stimulate digital media usage in class. After using interactive graphics for their
class, 4/5 lecturer strongly agreed to the statement that this experience had a
positive influence on their attitude towards digital teaching. Lecturers nowadays
can currently choose out of a large collection of existing teaching applets and
digital media resources in the web. However, they might not always find an existing
teaching tool, which matches their individual needs15 and consequently might
renounce to digital media for teaching. For this study we cooperated closely with
the lecturers to build a teaching tool adopted to their individual wishes. The Shiny
environment allows to display interactive graphics within a web browser and
therefore can be easily integrated into lecturers’ presentations. Since its handling
doesn´t require any background knowledge in programming nor hardware or
software installation, interactive graphics can be considered as user-friendly
teaching tools. This assumption is confirmed by all lecturers involved (5/5), who
claimed to have felt confident using interactive graphics during the class. When
observing students’ perception towards the ease of use, in total 78% (254/327) of
the students agreed or strongly agreed to the statement that they would feel
confident using interactive graphics by themselves. 86% (279/326) of the students
further believe their fellow students would do so too. This positive attitude can be
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explained by the high acceptance for digital media and digitalization we yielded
amongst the survey students. Only 49/327 of the students claimed to not use any
digital media for learning. Those who do not support learning with digital resources
also had a more neutral perception towards the effect of digitalization on higher
education. Nevertheless, most students (86%; 280/327) and all lecturers (5/5)
agreed that digitalization can improve higher education. Still a lack of training and
programming skills can be an impediment for lecturers to use and develop further
interactive graphics for their courses. Training teachers basic programming skills
can be one possible way to spread interactive graphics through veterinary schools
and other academic fields. Considering the time-consuming development process
in addition to already high workload amongst teachers, the possibility of
distributing already existing shiny apps through openly available internet hosting
services, such as GitHub, gains special importance. Shiny apps can be shared as
open educational resource which in return reduces the development efforts.
5. Conclusion
The findings of our study revealed a high acceptance for this web-based teaching
tool amongst veterinary students and lecturers. Students commonly agreed for the
interactivity of the graphics to have a positive effect on their interest about the
taught contents. This complies with the lecturer’s perception, to have reached
more students by teaching with an interactive graphic. The lecturer’s positive
perception towards this web-tool is also a promising finding of this study in terms
of promoting digital media usage at our university. Shiny applications facilitate
data visualization and its modification in a user-friendly, visually appealing
environment. We believe to have evidenced the potential of this web tool, to create
an enhanced learning and teaching experience in veterinary medicine education,
where interactive graphics have rarely been integrated so far. Further work must
be done, to examine if the integration of more interactive graphics in this field is
feasible.
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37
Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Culture of the State Lower
Saxony, Germany [grant ‘DigiStep’].
Data Accessibility
The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in Mendeley
at https://data.mendeley.com/datasets/6th5cts43p/1
(DOI: 10.17632/6th5cts43p.1).
SUBMITTED MANUSCRIPTS
38
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of Computing in Higher Education, 15(1), 3–26.
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The following manuscript was submitted 2021, February 2nd in the Journal of
Computing in Higher Education:
3.2 Teaching Academic Staff to Implement Interactive Graphics for their Courses
Pamela Liebig1, Viviane Filor2, Marina Scheumann3, Martina Buchholz4, Klaus
Jung 1*
1) Institute for Animal Breeding and Genetics, University of Veterinary Medicine
Hannover, Foundation, Hannover, Germany
2) Department of Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmacy, University of
Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation, Hannover, Germany
3) Institute of Zoology, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation,
Hannover, Germany
4) Institute for Food Toxicology, University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover,
Foundation, Hannover, Germany
* Corresponding Author
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung
University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover, Foundation
Institute for Animal Breeding and Genetics
Bünteweg 17p
30559 Hannover
Phone: +49 511 953-8878
Fax: +49 511 953-8582
E-Mail: [email protected]
Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Culture of the State Lower
Saxony, Germany [grant ‘DigiStep’].
Abstract
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This study analyses the respond of academic staff to an online workshop to learn
how to develop interactive graphics as digital teaching device using R-Shiny. The
need for training teachers in the field of educational technologies has gained
increasing relevance in the past decades. More recently, the COVID-19 pandemic
has led to the urgent need of preparing teachers’ for digital education. However,
studies regarding workshops for teachers mostly centre on the learners’
satisfaction rather than the workshops’ impact on the teaching practice. Moreover,
no study regarding teaching academic staff the development interactive graphics
on their own has been conducted before. The n=25 participants were academic
staff from the fields of medicine or natural sciences. Pre- and post workshop
questionnaires were used to identify the impact of the workshop on their opinion
towards digital teaching devices and their willingness to program own interactive
graphics. Furthermore, their opinion towards the role of the corona crisis in
education was asked. The findings indicate that most participants had little
programming skills but showed strong interest in using interactive graphics for
their classes. After the workshop, the intention to program interactive graphics was
only given by participants who had prior programming skills. The workshop had a
positive impact on the participants’ opinion towards digitalization in higher
education. The impact of the COVID- 19 pandemic was rated to be an accelerator
of the digitalization process. No gender or age correlation was observed.
Keywords
COVID-19; Interactive graphics; Workshop; R-shiny; Professional development
Data Accessibility
The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in Mendeley
at http://dx.doi.org/10.17632/4zsggk9swp.1 (DOI: 10.17632/4zsggk9swp.1).
SUBMITTED MANUSCRIPTS
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1. Introduction
Graphics are widely used in education to visualize patterns, correlations, and big
amount of data. Typically, these graphics are presented as a static image.
However, the advances of computer and network technologies have added new
ways for data presentation. Various visualizations tools have emerged, which
allow additional features, such as interactivity (Ali et. al, 2016). This interactivity
enables the user to explore data in more detail (Perkel, 2018). The open-source
software R and the package Shiny allows to program such interactive graphics,
which can be displayed within a web browser. These so-called Shiny apps have
increasingly gained relevance in research (Chiu et al., 2017; Di Filippo et al., 2019;
Ekiz et al., 2020) and have also been employed in education with promising results
(Fawcett, 2018; Potter et al., 2016; Hanč, et al., 2020). According to Wishart
(2019) “a great way to demonstrate data to students […] is by extending use of
the digital learning environment”. He found that interactive graphics build with R-
Shiny can be a way to achieve this. However, to master any digital learning
environment the educational staff needs to get trained in this field. As already
stated by Fulton (1988) training the use of technology is one important factor that
determines whether teachers use technology in class or not. More recently the
COVID-19 pandemic has evidenced the importance of technology trained teachers
and academic staff. When the global lockdown and quarantine policies forced
educational institution worldwide to close, teachers had to move from traditional
face-to-face to online education (Bao, 2020; Murphy, 2020). Under these
circumstances, the focus has been laid on assuring technology-equipment, rather
than on training teachers (Gyimah, 2020). One possibility to provide educators
training can be achieved through workshops. In this paper a workshop for training
academic staff the implementation of interactive graphics for their courses using
the statistical programming environment R and the Shiny package is described.
The impact on teachers’ practice is measured by questionnaires.
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1.1. Relevance of workshops in teachers’ professional development
The term workshop is used to describe a ‘usually brief intensive educational
program for a relatively small group of people that focuses especially on
techniques and skills in a particular field’ (Merriam-Webster, 2021). Georgina and
Olson (2008) did a survey on more than 1000 faculty members of higher education
regarding their perception towards technology training. They yielded that most
faculty members agreed that learning “new computer-based technologies” could
be achieved the best in small groups instructed by a trainer. According to Chris
Rust (1998) from the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development,
workshops are a common tool for “staff and educational development […] in higher
education around the world”. Workshops do not only serve to transmit knowledge.
As stated by Ørngreen, & Levinsen (2017), a workshop can also be used as a
research methodology, when it’s designed to teach participants something related
to their specific interest and to answer at the same time a research question. Even
though different perspectives exist, all workshops share some basic features, such
as active participation and an expected outcome (Ørngreen, & Levinsen, 2017).
Usually, the expected outcome of teachers’ workshop is the improvement of
teachers’ skills. This can also lead to an improvement of students’ achievement
since it has been suggested that both; teachers’ skills and students’ achievements;
are deeply linked (Darling-Hammond, 2000; Rice, 2003). Literature review
revealed that students in higher education can benefit from teaching technologies
(Concannon & Campbell, 2005), yet some academics remain reluctant to adopt
these (Corard et. al, 2006). A lack of training has been discussed in diverse
educational studies as one of the barriers to the adaption of these technologies
(Brownell & Tanner, 2012; Bingimlas, 2009; Pajo & Wallace, 2001; Abdal-Haqq,
1995; Kurt & Ciftci, 2012). Schneckenberg (2009) further discussed a lack of
interest in technology amongst academic staff as a reason for a slow integration
of learning technologies. In the past years, there have been some studies
regarding workshops to improve teachers’ technology skills. For example, Lai
(2010) discussed the positive reaction of schoolteachers towards an interactive
whiteboard training (IWB). After the workshop, all teachers valued the importance
of IWB training workshops and recognized the potential of using IWB in class.
Furthermore Liu et al. (2011) demonstrated that a computing workshop for
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teachers can significantly increase their confidence level in computing
technologies. Although the research done in this field has added knowledge to the
teaching literature, most of them centre on the learners’ satisfaction and the
immediate workshop outcome rather than on the impact of those workshops on
the teaching practice (Stet et al., 2010). Watson (2006) for example studied the
long-term effect of a workshop to train the integration of internet in class. He
revealed that after years the workshop still had positive impact on teachers’ self -
efficiency level. These studies have in common that they all analyse the effects of
training educators in already implemented computer-based teaching modalities.
No previous study has been conducted to analyse the effect of teaching academic
staff to develop own interactive graphics.
1.2. Research questions
For the present work, academic staff at our institution were offered to participate
in a workshop to learn how to program interactive graphics as a digital teaching
tool. Those interactive graphics were already employed at our university and found
broad acceptance amongst teachers and students. Previous studies regarding the
usage of this type of interactive graphic in education have also shown a broad
acceptance amongst students (Potter et al., 2016; Fawcett, 2018). Fawcett argued
that a large amount of teaching apps is already available for teachers nowadays.
However, none is specifically designed on the teachers need. Teachers know the
best which topics are difficult for students. A teaching app basing on teachers need
can therefore be beneficial for students’ achievement. Furthermore, the perceived
usefulness of technologies has been identified as one key variable affecting users’
intention to use technology (Davis, 1993). In our study we want to answer the
following questions: 1) Is academic staff willing to learn programming techniques,
in which they are mostly unfamiliar with, to provide digital teaching media for their
students? 2) Does gender, age or previous knowledge in this field have an
influence on the willingness to learn? 3) Does a workshop in teaching technology
influence teachers’ opinion on digital media and promote a further use of the
taught teaching tool. 4) Does the COVID-19 pandemic influence the opinion
towards the digitalization process of higher education?
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2. Methods
2.1. Local setting and program of the online workshop
Academic staff from different institutes at the University for Veterinary Medicine
Hannover were invited to participate at our workshop. Our University established
in 2005 an e-learning consulting centre to promote the usage of digital teaching
technologies. Additionally, in January 2019, the university launched the project
‘DigiStep’ to advance digitalization at our institution. The departments of physics,
general radiology, chemistry, zoology, botany as well as the institute for genetics
are partners of this project. In addition to online learning modules and case
studies, video material and lectures as well as lecture recordings are used so that
e-learning concepts such as blended learning and inverted classrooms can be
implemented. In addition, the zoological exercises, in which dissections are
carried out on dead animals, will be changed with the project, thereby significantly
reducing the number of animals used. Our working group contributed to this
project by implementing interactive graphics for several lectures in the field of
medicine and natural sciences during the past winter term 2019/2020.
2.2. Program of the online workshop
The workshop was imparted using the online-conference tool Microsoft Teams.
The program of this two-day workshop included, at the first day, a presentation of
previous experiences using interactive graphics as a teaching device at our
university and an introduction to the statistic software R (R Core Team, 2019). The
central part of the workshop consisted of teaching basic programming skills in R
Shiny. The Shiny environment (version 1.4.0) is based on R and allows to convert
R scripts into visually appealing Shiny applications within a web browser. After day
one of the workshop, participants received several R scripts as templates and
study material to create different interactive applications for their classes and self-
study material. Next, participants were given one week to develop idea, concepts,
or sketches for interactive graphics for teaching propose in their own courses. At
the second workshop day, we discussed these ideas and implementation
possibilities.
2.3. Study design
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Workshop participants were asked to answer an online questionnaire before and
after the workshop. The questionnaires were created using the platform Google
forms and were approved by the data security office of our university. No personal
identifiable information except for gender and age was captured and all data was
stored anonymously. In total, n=25 lecturers and members of the academic staff
completed the first questionnaire and n=15 of them also completed the second
questionnaire. Some participants left some questions unanswered. This is shown
in the result sections through the absolute numbers.
The questionnaires included two demographic questions (gender and age), open
field, multiple choice and 5-point Likert Scale questions ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Participants were asked before the first workshop
day about their programming skills and their knowledge in R. We also asked
participants about their opinion towards digital media in teaching and especially
interactives graphics as a teaching tool. Furthermore, we included some questions
to evaluate the participant’s perception towards the importance of the corona crisis
in the digitalization process in higher education (Table 1). The second
questionnaire was completed by the participants after the second workshop day.
Lecturers and academic staff were questioned if they can imagine using such
interactive graphics for their teaching purpose and if they feel able to program
such graphics after the workshop session. We also included a question to evaluate
the workshop´s effect on their opinion towards digital teaching media (Table 2).
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Item Answer options
1. Age Open field
2. Gender female, male, no information
3. Have you already used digital media for your class (video-conferences tools such as Microsoft-Teams and Zoom are not meant)?
Multiple choice: Video/audio-files, smartphone application, CASUS (case-based learning system), virtual microscope, Interactive graphics, podcasts, others, none
4. For how much time (in percent) is it reasonable to use digital teaching tool in higher education?
Open field
5. I find the increasing use of digital teaching media in higher education for students …
5 point-Likert-scale question ranging from 1(negative) to 5 (positive)
6. I find the increasing use of digital teaching media in higher education for lecturers…
7. Interactive graphics facilitate teach-ing
5 point-Likert-scale question ranging from 1(fully disagree) to 5 (fully agree) 8. Interactive graphics facilitate learning
9. I´m experienced in programming. Yes or no If yes, please specify
10. I have knowledge in using R. 5 point-Likert- scale question ranging from 1(fully disagree) to 5 (fully agree)
11. I have already used interactive graphics before.
Multiple choice: on webpages (e.g. online journals) In my class
12. The invention of the letterpress in the 15th century reduced in my opinion the need for traditional face-to-face class
5 point-Likert-scale question ranging from 1(fully disagree) to 5 (fully agree)
13. The invention of the internet in the 20th century will fundamentally pro-mote a permanent shift into digital teaching in higher education.
14. The COVID-19 pandemic will funda-mentally promote a permanent shift into digital teaching in higher educa-tion.
Table 1: Questionnaire distributed to workshop participants before the first
workshop day.
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Item Answer options
1. Age Open field
2. Gender female, male, no information
3. Interactive graphics facilitate teach-
ing
5 point-Likert-scale question ranging
from1(fully disagree) to 5 (fully agree)
4. Interactive graphics facilitate learn-
ing
5. I can imagine using interactive
graphics in my classes in the future.
6. I can imagine programming interac-
tive graphics for my classes in the
future.
7. The workshop promoted my interest
for using digital teaching media
8. Further comments and ideas Open field
Table 2: Questionnaire distributed to the workshop participants after the second
workshop day.
2.4. Data analysis
Answer distribution of all questions were analysed descriptively, separated by
gender, age groups and groups of prior programming skills. Differences between
groups were further analysed using Fisher’s exact test (categorical answers) or
the Mann-Whitney U test (ordinal answers). Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used
to compare ordinal answers from 1st and 2nd questionnaire. Correlation between
these answers were determined using Kendall’s tau. The significance level was
set to α=0.05. Analyses were performed using again the software R.
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3. Results
3.1. Workshop participants
Workshop participants were members of the academic staff and lecturers from
natural science and the medical field. 80% (20/25) participants were females and
20% (5/25) were males. Age distribution (mean+/- standard deviation years) was
40.7 years +/- 10.5 (minimum: 26, maximum: 61 years). Most participants (68%,
17/25), had no previous programming skills. Only a few had some knowledge in
HTML (2/25) or Python (1/25). Furthermore, 20% (5/25) participants had prior
experience in R. The statement ‘I am fully experienced in R’ was fully disagreed
by 60% (15/25) workshop participants. Only 3 participants rather or fully agreed
to be experienced in R (Supplementary Table 1).
3.2. Opinion on digital teaching media in class
We found that most members of the participants have already employed digital
teaching media before the workshop. Mostly used media specified by the
participants were video/audio-files (72%; 18/25) and a case-based learning
system, called CASUS (24%; 6/25). Furthermore, 20% (5/25) have never used any
digital teaching media before. Most of the participants (9/25) found that digital
media should take up to 50% of the time in class. The rest of the participants would
rather employ less time in class using digital media. Only 3/25 responders found
it accurate to spent more than half of the time in class using digital devices to
teach. The mean time in percentage to spend with digital teaching technologies
rated by all participants was 41.2%. Analysing these opinions separately by age
we found out, that younger participants (less than 40 years old) rated for slightly
less time using educational technologies in class than the older participants (older
than 40 years old).
Asking about their opinion towards the effect of digital media in teaching, 48%
(12/25) strongly agreed the statement ‘I find the increasing use of digital media in
higher education to be positive’, both for lecturers and students. Comparing their
perception on the benefits of digital media in higher education, we found that
members of the academic staff rated its effect slightly more positive on students
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than for themselves: 20% (5/25) had a neutral perception on the benefit for
lecturers and 8% (2/24) rather disagreed to the statement digital media would be
positive for lecturers in teaching. In comparison: only 4% (1/25) disagreed the
statement related to students benefits of digital teaching media.
Regarding interactive graphics, 95.8% (23/24) participants found that they
facilitate students to learn study content and 91.7% (22/24) find interactive
graphics to be beneficial for lecturers to teach this content. In total, 40% (10/25)
participants have already used interactive graphics before the workshop, 6 of them
in their own class and 4 on webpages. The remaining 15 participants did not
provide an answer to this question. We found no significant difference in the
opinion towards the usage of digital teaching media between the age groups less
than forty and over forty years old (Supplementary Table 1) nor between female
and male (Supplementary Table 3) or previous programming experience
(Supplementary Table 5).
3.3. Influence of letterpress, internet and COVID19 pandemic on
development of digital teaching
Lecturers and academic staff agreed for the pandemic crisis to promote further
digitalization in higher education (Figure M2.1). In total, 92% (23/25) agreed or
fully agreed to the statement ‘The corona pandemic crisis will lead fundamentally
to a permanent shift into digitisation in higher education’. 72% (18/25) participants
agreed or fully agreed for the invention of the internet to cause a permanent shift
into digitalization in higher education. There was significantly less agreement to
the statement that the invention of letterpress in the 15th century had a strong
effect on the necessity of on-site lectures (letterpress versus internet: p<0.01,
letterpress versus COVID-19: p<0.01). The effect of internet versus the effect of
COVID-19 in digital teaching was rated as significantly different: p=0.04. (Table
3). We found no significant difference towards that opinion regarding age
(Supplementary Table 2), gender (Supplementary Table 4) and previous
programming skills (Supplementary Table 6).
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Figure M2.1: Comparison of the influence of the invention of letterpress, the
internet or the occurrence of the COVID19 pandemic on the development of digital
teaching in higher education. Levels of agreement are from 1 (no agreement) to
5 (strong agreement).
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Item Levels All
participants
The invention of the letterpress in the 15th
century reduced in my opinion the need for
traditional face-to-face class
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
3 (12%)
9 (36%)
10 (40%)
2 (8%)
1 (4%)
The invention of the internet in the 20th
century will fundamentally promote a
permanent shift into digital teaching in higher
education.
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
7 (28%)
11 (44%)
7 (28%)
The COVID-19 pandemic will fundamentally
promote a permanent shift into digital
teaching in higher education.
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
0 (0%)
1 (4%)
1 (4%)
12 (48%)
11 (44%)
Table 3: Results from first questionnaire regarding the influence of letter press,
internet and COVID19 pandemic on development of digital teaching .
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3.4 Success of the workshop and responds by the participants
The second questionnaire, distributed at the end of the workshop, revealed that
the positive opinion towards interactives graphics as teaching and learning tool
remained unchanged (Figure M2.2). There was no significant location shift in the
strength of agreement (easier learning for students: p=0.77; easier learning for
lecturers: p=0.42), although answers were only moderately correlated between 1st
and 2nd questionnaire (Kendall’s tau=0.44, p=0.08 and tau=0.57, p=0.02). Most
participants (85.7%, 12/14) affirm to be interested in using interactive graphics in
their course, but only those who had previous programming skills (20%, 3/15) had
intention to program a graphic on their own (Figure M2.3, Table 4). The
significance of the latter effect (p=0.018) would not survive a multiple testing
correction but it shows a tendency. We also asked lecturers and academic staff
about the impact of this online workshop on their opinion towards digital teaching.
According to this, 73.3% (11/15) agreed to the statement ‘the online workshop had
a positive impact on my opinion towards digital teaching’ and 26,7% (4/15) had a
neutral perception to this statement. Again, we found no significant difference in
the opinion of the workshop participants by age (Supplementary Table 7) and
gender (Supplementary Table 8).
Figure M2.2: Overall high agreement to the statements that interactive graphics are
positive for students (left) and lecturer (right) did little change during the workshop. X-
axis shows agreement before workshop, y-axis agreement after workshop.
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Figure M2.3: After the workshop, only participants with prior programming skills agreed
to have the intention to program interactive graphics by themselves.
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Item Levels All
participants
(n=15)
No
programming
experience
(n=12)
Programming
experience
(n=3)
p-
value
Age Mean +/- SD
Median (Min,
Max)
38.73 +/-
12.17
34 (26,61)
40.3 +/- 13.14
36 (26, 61)
32.67 +/- 4.16
34 (28,36)
0.47
Gender Female
male
12 (80%)
3 (20%)
10 (83.3%)
2 (16.7%)
2 (66.7%)
1 (33.3%)
0.52
Interactive
graphics
facilitate
learning
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (6.7%)
7(46.7%)
7 (46.7%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (8.3%)
6 (50%)
5 (41.7%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (33.3%)
2 (66.7%)
0.47
Interactive
graphics
facilitate
teaching
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (6.7%)
9 (60%)
5 (33.3%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (8.3%)
7 (58.3%)
4 (33.3%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (33.3%)
2 (66.7%)
1 (33.3%)
0.93
Use inter-
active
graphics
for course
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
2 (14.3%)
5 (35.7%)
7 (50%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
2 (18.2%)
4 (36.4%)
5 (45.5%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (33.3%)
2 (66.7%)
0.49
Program
interactive
graphics
for course
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
2 (13.3%)
3(20%)
4 (26.7%)
4 (26.7%)
2 (20%)
2 (16.7%)
3 (25%)
4 (33.3%)
3 (25%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (33.3%)
2 (66.7%)
0.018
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57
Table 4: Results from the second questionnaire, divided according to previous
programming experiences.
3.3 Examples of implemented concepts submitted by the workshop
participants
After the first workshop day, participants were encouraged to send us their own
ideas, drafts or concepts of interactive graphics, they want to employ in their
courses. In total, 7 participants made submissions, which ranged from mere topic
identification, to handwritten sketches and fully programmed Shiny applications.
In the second workshop session, we discussed implementation possibilities with
all participants. In the following the development of two Shiny application for
teaching purpose are described.
3.3.1 Interactive graphic showing bioavailability of drugs for different types
of administration
Figure M2.4 is usually used as static graphic in the lecture of general
pharmacology at our university. It is intended to give an overview of how important
the chosen administration of a drug can be in terms of bioavailability and drug
level (Chausseaud and Taylor, 1974). The message behind this figure is simple,
but fundamental and important for a first understanding of pharmacokinetics. It is
the first figure shown in the lecture and since it can be confusing due to multiple
curves, it was the idea to transform the figure into an interactive graphic. This
should give students a better overview, as the individual curves in the Shiny
application can now be viewed in a more differentiated way by individual selection
and give students the opportunity to try things out in order to consolidate a first
understanding of pharmacokinetics.
Workshop
positive im-
pact on
opinion for
digital
teaching
Fully disagree
Rather disagree
Indifferent
Rather agree
Fully agree
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
4 (26.7%)
3 (20%)
8 (53.3%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
5 (41.7%)
2 (16.7%)
5 (41.7%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
0 (0%)
1 (33.3%)
2 (66.7%)
0.31
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58
Figure M2.4: Sketch from a workshop participant for an interactive graphic in a
pharmacology lecture (left) and implementation as interactive graphics with checkboxes
as regulator elements (right).
The lecturer involved in the development of this application descripted her first
experience using R and Shiny as follows: ‘After the idea was developed and the
first workshop took place, I could implement the idea in small steps. Since the
program always showed you the errors, I was able to convert the basic structures
of my idea into the Shiny app according to the trail-and-error principle.’
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59
3.3.1 Interactive graphic showing temperature-dependent sex
determination in reptiles
In some reptiles, the sex of the offspring is triggered by the incubation temperature
during a critical period of the embryonic development (Mitchell et al., 2006).
Thereby, three patterns exist. In the first pattern, males were produced at cooler
temperatures than females (Ia). In the second pattern, females were produced at
lower temperatures than males (Ib). In the third pattern, males were produced at
intermediate temperatures whereas females were produced at both extremes,
below and above the intermediate range (II). Within this study, a static line plot of
a textbook (Gilbert & Sunderland, 2000) was transferred to an interactive graphic.
Here the user can regulate the temperature over a temperature slider and, thereby,
the effect of incubation temperature on the sex ratio of the respective reptile
species will be plotted in a pie chart (Figure M2.5). Moreover, by plotting several
species, the different pattern of sex determination can be additionally visualized.
Since the interactive graphic links simultaneously the movement of the
temperature button to the sex proportion in the pie charts, the user can recognize
on the first look and experience very fast and intuitive the mechanisms without
extensive explanation, which would be necessary by using the static line plot. The
lecturer involved in the development of this application descripted her first
experience with Shiny as follows: ‘After the first day of the workshop, I got
interested to implement an interactive graphic to my lecture. Since I had prior
experience with R and due to the guiding of the workshop organisations it was
quite easy to implement this graphic by myself. But of course, it takes more time
than just using static graphics from the textbook. However, for the visualisation of
dynamic processes interactive graphics are very well suited and can help to
simplify complex relationships.’
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60
Figure M2.5: Screenshot of interactive graphic for zoology module. The temperature-
dependent sex determination for different reptile species is illustrated by pie-charts.
Through the slider users can manipulate the incubation temperature. The outcoming
proportion of female (pink) and male animals (blue) is shown by the p ie charts. A grey
coloured pie-chart appears if no information is available or no descendants are hatched
at the given temperature.
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61
4. Discussion
The present study investigates the respond of academic staff towards a training
workshop to learn how to program interactive graphics with R-Shiny. As Stes et al.
(2010) emphasized, most studies regarding teachers workshop mostly centre on
participants’ satisfaction, rather than on the workshops’ impact on teacher
practice. To assess the impact of our workshop, we used a pre- and post-workshop
questionnaire design. The results of this work indicates that academic staff were
open-minded towards expanding their programming skills and learn how to employ
a new digital teaching tool. Between the different age groups, we found no
evidence for different perception towards digital teaching tools or the willingness
to use such. Interestingly, older workshop participants had a higher interest in
investing more time using digital teaching devices in class than the younger ones.
This finding contradicts the theory of a ‘digital generation gap’ (Buckingham, 2006;
Kelty, 2002). This term refers to an inter-generational, inequality in the usage of
technology and suggest that older generation have a harder time adapting to new
technologies. The average age of our participants was 40.7 years. Our participants
therefore cannot be categorized as ‘digital natives’ (Jones et al. 2010). A lack of
interest or motivation among academic staff towards technology as stated by
Lazar (2015) or Schneckenberg (2009) was not confirmed in this study. Most of
the lecturers and members of the academic staff, who participated at our
workshop, had no previous programming nor basic R skills, but they got fully
engaged to the topic and had own ideas and drafts of interactive graphics for their
teaching purpose.
We yielded, that most of the participants were interested in using interactive
graphics for their classes after the workshop, but still couldn´t image programming
them. The reason for this can be linked to the short workshop duration and the
consequent low self-efficiency feeling of the participants. In a personal feedback
some participants outlined the need for a second workshop or further support.
These findings are in line with Watsons’ (2006) study results regarding the effects
of a 5-day workshop to train teachers the internet usage in class. He proved that
teachers had a higher level of self-efficiency after attending to online courses in
addition to the workshop, than those who just participated to the workshop.
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62
Another reason why participants may remain reluctant to program their own
interactive graphics might be due to the time-consuming development process.
Some studies have already thematized that digital teaching added workload to
lecturers (Bright, 2012; Waycott et al., 2010,;Young et al., 2004). Lai (2010)
further stated that some teachers expressed doubts regarding the time and energy
investment linked to the design of interactive features for lesson. However, there
has been growing evidence for the value of interactivity in enhancing learning
experience (Evans & Gibbons, 2007; Zhang et al., 2006; Teoh & Neo, 2007).
In science and for education graphics are often used to visualize complex facts
and big amount of data. Static graphics are usually limited to visualize just one
aspect of the content. Interactive graphics contain regulator elements which allow
to manipulate the data behind the graphic. The subsequent effects are shown
immediately. This synchronicity has been stated as one important aspect of
interactivity (Liu & Schrum. 2002). Teacher can benefit from using interactive
graphics since they can explain gradually the content of the graphic.
Regarding teachers’ opinion towards the impact of the corona crisis on education,
most participants assigned the corona crisis an important role in advancing
digitalization in higher education. It´s impact was rated by the respondents to be
even higher than the invention of the internet at the end of the 20th century. This
results somehow contradicts educational pre-corona studies, which assign the
internet a crucial role in digitalization in higher education (Cookson, 2000,
Pittinsky, 2003; Stošić, & Stošić, I., 2015; Twigg, 2002). In a ‘future of the Internet’
survey conducted in 2012, digital stakeholders were asked to imagine education
in 2020. 60% agreed with the scenario “By 2020, higher education will be quite
different from the way it is today. There will be mass adoption of teleconferencing
and distance learning […]. There will be a transition to "hybrid" classes that
combine online learning components with less-frequent on-campus, in-person
class meetings.” (Anderson, Boyles & Rainie, 2012). The corona-crisis has
demonstrated that this future vision did not became fully true. In the current
situation universities often simply offer text-file and lecture captures to the
students, providing rather “remote” than online education (Gardner, 2020), raising
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63
the question of how online teaching technologies can get promoted and
successfully implemented in the future. The corona crisis has shown the urgent
need for lecturers to get training and coaching in online teaching technologies
(Houlden & Veletsianos, 2020). Garder (2020) went further and declared the
corona crisis as a ‘wake-up call’ for universities to think of a ‘long-term digital
strategy’.
Our survey took place half a year after the corona outbreak and most of the
universities are finding their way to adapt into digital learning and teaching
methods. The aim of this paper was not to provide a solution to the rushed shift
into digital learning under this outstanding circumstance, but rather to reveal the
motivating fact, that lecturers indeed are willing to acquire knowledge in a field
they are still unexperienced in. Although our survey consists of a small sample
size, these participants represent a diverse range of age, institutes and
specialisation. They are all from different academic backgrounds, where
programming is not a common skill. As discussed before, the current
circumstances demand online teaching, but it is common for lecturers to lack
experience in this field. We recommend providing further coaching and support for
teaching staff to get actively involved in the development of digital teaching tools.
Funding
This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Culture of the State Lower
Saxony, Germany [grant ‘DigiStep’].
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64
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GENERAL DISCUSSION
68
4. GENERAL DISCUSSION
The aim of this work was to provide scientific insights into the acceptance of
interactive graphics amongst teachers and students, and the overall applicability
of such graphics in veterinary education. This was evaluated in two studies
performed at the University for Veterinary Medicine in Hannover. For the first
study, interactive graphics were implemented into the veterinary medicine
lectures. In the second study, a two-day online workshop was conducted, where
members of the academic staff were taught basic programming skills to learn how
to develop interactive graphics. In both studies teachers and students were asked
to participate in voluntary questionnaires. In the following students’ and lecturers’
perception of teaching and learning with interactive graphics and the effect of the
online workshop on faculty members will be discussed.
4.1 Students’ perception
4.1.1 Effect on interest
Overall, 71% (233/326) of the students affirmed that interactive graphics had a
positive impact on their interest for the topic. Lecturers, who delivered class with
interactive graphics, confirmed the apparent positive influence on students’
interest, too. All lecturers involved (5/5) agreed or strongly agreed to have reached
more students while teaching with interactive graphics. Weissgerber et al. (2016)
suggested that integrating interactive graphics in scientific journals can be ‘an
effective strategy for increasing interest in published research’. The here
presented study provides evidence that this positive effect can also be seen when
employing interactive graphics for education. A common belief linked to
interactivity is the idea that it promotes active learning (Anderson, 2002; Muirhead
& Juwah, 200; Draper & Brown, 2004). Prammanee (2003) argued that interaction
can maintain and stimulate students’ motivation and interest. This is of particular
importance, since students’ interest has been recognized as a decisive factor for
learning success (Renninger et al., 2014; Hidi, 1990; Harp & Mayer, 1997). Studies
in this field confirm that interest is strongly related to long term retention and
motivation for learning (Schiefele, & Krapp, 1996). For veterinary education,
maintaining and promoting interest for the taught contents can be challenging.
GENERAL DISCUSSION
69
The curriculum covers a wide range of disciplines, offering students career
possibilities in diverse fields (Pritt & Case, 2018). Consequently, students get
confronted with multiple study contents which at first do not seem relevant for their
future career perspectives (Lane, 2008). In an investigative study amongst first
year veterinary students, Serpell (2005) yielded that more than 90% of the
respondents aimed to work in small-animal practice. A similar finding made
Cornish et al. (2016), who surveyed more than 800 students and revealed an
increased interest on companion animal practice. The three interactive graphics
employed in the presented study were designed for lectures where the link to this
career ambition might not be immediately apparent to students. Integrating
interactive graphics for these courses can possibly provide a way to increase
student engagement in these topics.
4.1.2 Perceived usefulness and ease of use
Simply promoting interest does not ensure students’ acceptance for interactive
graphics as digital teaching tool. The acceptance of web-based learning tools
amongst students has frequently been measured within the Technology
Acceptance Model (TAM) (Tarhini et al., 2013). In this model, perceived ease of
use is one determinant of the intention to make use of technology. When observing
the ease of use, students expressed confidence regarding their own handling
abilities. In total, 78% (254/327) agreed or strongly agreed to be able to use
interactive graphics by themselves and 86% (279/326) could imagine most of their
fellow students would do so too. The other determinant, perceived usefulness, can
be defined as the degree to which a student believes the technology will improve
his or her learning (Park, 2009). When analysing the effect on students’ learning,
82% (267/ 326) of the students claimed to have understood the topics taught with
interactive graphics. In total, 64% (210/326) disagreed or strongly disagreed the
statement “I was previously familiar with the taught content”. Moreover, 95.8%
(23/24) of the faculty members participating at the workshop believe that
interactive graphics facilitate learning. This finding shows a tendency towards the
didactic potential of interactive graphics. Subsequent studies need to be
conducted to evaluate whether integrating this interactive tool leads to mental
processing in the student’s mind and to learning during lecture, as suggested by
GENERAL DISCUSSION
70
Draper & Brown (2004). The promising result that interactive graphics promote
interest in students, can constitute here a solid basis and justification for further
studies.
4.1.3 Effect on information processing
According to the “cognitive theory of multimedia learning” the verbal and visual
information processing systems have limited processing capacities. When
designing instructional material, special attention must be paid to not overload
these systems (Mayer, 2017). When too much content is depicted within one static
graphic it can lose clarity. In consequence, the amount of information conveyed
through a static graphic must be limited or simplified. For concepts, which include
dynamic processes or complex relationships, limiting informational content is not
always the right approach. Animations and videos can be used to visualize such
dynamic processes. One important characteristic is their transience (Ainsworth &
VanLabeke, 2004). As stated by Hegarty (2004) “when one views an animation or
video, one views one frame at a time, and once the animation or video has
advanced beyond a given frame, it is no longer available to the viewer”. According
to the cognitive load theory, this places heavy demands on the working memory,
since information seen in videos and animations must be integrated with previous
and the subsequent shown information (Hegarty, 2004).
Interactive graphics can prevent students from cognitive overload in multiple ways.
Students have the chance to explore information step by step either through
adding, modifying, or removing information at their own pace or being guided
through the content by the teacher. This is made possible through different
regulator elements, which allow to highlight, label, or hide certain aspects or parts
of the graphic. Furthermore, tooltips, that are placed over regulatory elements or
additional tabs can provide further information such as user instructions, guides,
background knowledge about the current topic and references. These possibilities
can be used to construct an app that at first seems minimalistic in regards of
information content. These features can provide students that prefer learning at
their own pace a tool that is self-explanatory and easy to use, where underlying
principles can be explored freely. However, to achieve this positive effect, special
GENERAL DISCUSSION
71
attention must be paid to the user ’s interface design. With the variety of regulator
elements and the possibility to display several plots simultaneously, risk of
cognitive overload is still present.
4.2 Lecturers’ perception
4.2.1 Opinion towards digital media
Participating members of the academic staff had different experience backgrounds
regarding the usage of digital media for educational purpose. While lecturers from
the first study mostly had never used digital media for teaching before (4/5), more
experienced members of the academic staff participated in the second study.
Overall, 80% (20/25) of the workshop participants had already used digital media
in educational context before. A promising result was the positive influence
interactive graphics had on teachers’ opinions towards digital teaching in both
studies. In absolute, 80% (4/5) of the teachers from the first study claimed that
teaching with interactive graphics had a positive impact on their opinion towards
digital media usage for education. In the second study, 73,3% (11/15) of the faculty
members agreed to the statement “the online workshop had a positive impact on
my opinion towards digital teaching”. This finding supports the idea of Mahdizadeh
et al. (2008), who concluded that teachers’ attitude towards e-learning depends
on their first-hand experience using it. They recommend that “any program for
enhancing the actual use of e-learning environments should focus on teachers’
attitude towards e-learning”. Therefore, educators should be “assisted in preparing
useful content for their courses” (Mahdizadeh et al., 2008). In this work, lecturers
were supported actively in preparing useful content for their courses. First, by
implementing interactive graphics for their teaching purpose and second, by
teaching them in an online workshop how to do so on their own.
GENERAL DISCUSSION
72
4.2.2 Perceived ease of use and usefulness
Beside of the forementioned influence on teachers’ opinion towards digital
education, interactive graphics also had an impact on their teaching. In total,
91.7% (22/24) of the academic staff stated that interactive graphics facilitate
teaching and 95.8% (23/24) assessed that interactive graphics can help students
learn content. In the context of the TAM, these findings suggest that teaching with
interactive graphics lead to a positive impact on teachers’ job performance and
thus, can be perceived as useful. When analysing ease of use, the two groups of
involved lecturers had different roles in the development process of the interactive
graphics. While lecturers from the first study received a finished app based on
their functionality and layout wishes, members of the academic staff from the
second study were asked to implement these interactive graphics by themselves.
Since only 20% (5/25) of the workshop participants stated to have used R before,
most had to acquire knowledge in a field they were mostly unexperienced in. This
might explain why most participants did not feel able to program interactive
graphics on their own after the two workshop sessions. Only participants who had
programming skills in R (20%; 3/15) felt they were able to implement further
graphics for their own teachings. Here, the effort put on implementing an
interactive graphics equals an increased difficulty regarding ease of use within the
TAM framework.
GENERAL DISCUSSION
73
4.2.3 Workshop effect on teachers
After the first workshop session, where visualization possibilities and
functionalities of shiny apps and basic programming skills were introduced,
participants showed a high interest in interactive graphics. Several participants
put their newly acquired programming knowledge into practice and developed own
app ideas. In this process they received constant support and feedback from the
instructors and several apps were created (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Screenshot from the website, where the interactive graphics which have been
implemented within the framework of this project can be accessed. The hyperlink directs
the user to the apps. Several interactive graphics were implemented after the workshop.
GENERAL DISCUSSION
74
Active learning, coaching, support, and feedback has been recognized as
important features of effective professional development (Darling-Hammond et al.,
2017). In absolute, 85.7% (12/14) confirmed to be interested in using interactive
graphics for their teaching after the workshop. However, only those who had prior
programming skills (3/15) expressed the intention to implement own interactive
graphics. In a personal feedback several lecturers and members of the academic
staff expressed the wish for additional training and support in implementing
interactive graphics for their courses. Some investigative studies have confirmed
the potential of additional support after a teachers’ workshop. Watson (2006) for
example found out, that teachers who received additional support felt more
confident than those who just participated in the workshop. Carlson & Gadio
(2002) further stated that traditional one-time teacher training is not effective in
helping teachers to feel comfortable using technology without providing ongoing
pedagogical and technical support. It is likely, that given the chance to offer
subsequent workshops with additional coaching, teachers will be able to
implement own interactive graphics in the future. In line with other studies
regarding technology training, a pre- and post-design questionnaire was used to
measure the impact of a workshop on the teachers’ attitude towards interactive
graphics. Participants already had a positive opinion towards interactive graphics
before attending the workshop. This positive attitude remained unchanged after
completing the workshop. This finding is somewhat predictable, since attendance
to the workshop was voluntary and only those who perceived interactive graphics
to be beneficial for teaching would attend a training in this field. Here it is important
to revise the cost-benefit ratio. Acquiring the programming skills necessary to
implement own interactive graphics as well as the development process itself is
time-consuming. However, the effort put on implementing interactive graphics
bears no relation to the actual usefulness. Once an interactive graphic is designed,
it can be incorporated into e-learning modalities, shared with other institutions,
and be used repeatedly. Content or functions can be updated or improved to
accommodate any new insights and needs.
GENERAL DISCUSSION
75
4.2.4 Age effect
In this work no evidence was found that the attitude towards technology usage for
education is influenced by age. Workshop participants were asked to rate how
much time they would like to use digital media in class. Surprisingly, the older
participants (>40 years) voted for more time, than the younger ones. This
contradicts common beliefs that technology adoption is linked to age (Morris &
Venkatesh, 2000; Gilbert et al., 2004; O'bannon, & Thomas, 2014). However,
several educational studies have concluded that teachers’ technology adoption or
attitude is not age-related (e.g. Tweed, 2013; Guo et al, 2008; Mahdi & Al-Dera,
2013; Papadakis, 2018).
4.3 LIMITATIONS
Although a high agreement for interactive graphics amongst veterinary students
and lecturers was evidenced, this work raised some issues that need to be
reflected on. With only 5 participants in the first study and 25 in the second, the
sample size of the academic staff was quite small. Due to the study design, only
educators interested in interactive graphics participated at the survey. When
assessing the extent to which the results presented in this work are generalizable,
it should be kept in mind, that they might only be applicable for similar populations.
It is probable that a different attitude toward interactive graphics would emerge
when asking educators, which were not involved in the development process. One
possibility to strengthen the findings of this work would be through replicating the
study with a randomly selected group of educators. In turn, students’ participation
was not influenced by their interest towards interactive graphics. The integration
of interactive graphics into the classes was not announced previously. Students
attended class without knowing interactive graphics will be used. Therefore, their
participation in the survey was not biased by previous opinions and interests. A
further limitation of the study relates to measurement errors in attitudinal
questionnaire surveys. Several biases, such as the acquiesce and extreme
respond bias can lead to wrong conclusions. In the acquiesce bias, the respondent
tends to agree to all or most statements in the questionnaire. The incorporation of
negative worded items in the questionnaire can force respondents to disagree with
some statements (Qasem & Gul, 2014). This approach was adopted in
ZUSAMMENFASSUNG
76
questionnaires used within this work. However, questionnaires with a mix of
positive and negative worded statements have been critic ized for lowering the
reliability and validity (Qasem & Gul, 2014). The implementation of additional data
collection methods such as in-depth interviews or focus-groups studies could lead
to richer data and greater insights. This work reports on students’ and lecturers’
feedback regarding the use of interactive graphics. It needs to be considered, that
no claims on actual learning outcomes can be made. The here described overall
positive feedback of students and lecturers, however, can justify future studies,
where students’ performance is measured to address whether interactive graphics
have a didactic potential.
5. ZUSAMMENFASSUNG
Pamela Liebig (2021): Implementierung und Evaluierung interaktiver,
browser-basierter Grafiken in der tiermedizinischen Lehre
Im Rahmen des Digitalisierungs-Projekts „DigiStep“ wurden an der tierärztlichen
Hochschule Hannover erstmalig interaktive Grafiken für die tiermedizinische
Lehre implementiert. Ziel dieser Arbeit ist es, Akzeptanz und Anwendbarkeit
interaktiver Grafiken innerhalb der tiermedizinischen Ausbildung zu evaluieren.
Die Ergebnisse dieses Forschungsprojekts wurden in zwei Manuskripten
zusammengefasst und zur Veröffentlichung eingereicht. Grafiken sind häufig
Bestandteil tiermedizinischer Lehrveranstaltung, da sie Zahlendaten und
komplexe wissenschaftliche Zusammenhänge in einer Abbildung
zusammenzufassen. Der Informationsgehalt einer statischen Grafik ist jedoch
meist auf die Darstellung eines Aspekts beschränkt und dynamische Prozesse,
die eine Veränderung über Zeit beinhalten, lassen sich hierdurch nur schwer
darstellen. Heutzutage stehen Videos und Animationen bereit, um dynamischen
Zusammenhänge zu veranschaulichen. Meist fehlt hier jedoch die Interaktion
zwischen Studierenden und Lehrinhalt. Interaktive Grafiken verfügen über
zahlreiche Steuerungselemente, wodurch sich die Datengrundlage hinter einer
Grafik manipulieren lässt. Muster und Beziehungen werden hierdurch leicht
ersichtlich. In Vergangenheit waren zur Programmierung interaktiver Abbildungen
Kenntnisse in Java, HTML oder CSS nötig. Für diese Arbeit wurde jedoch auf die
ZUSAMMENFASSUNG
77
Programmiersprache R zurückgegriffen, die im akademischen Rahmen häufig zur
statistischen Auswertung und graphischen Visualisierung genutzt wird. Mittels der
Erweiterungsbibliothek „Shiny“ lassen sich diese interaktiven Grafiken in einem
Webbrowser darstellen und teilen. Diese so genannten „Shiny Apps“ wurden mit
positivem Ergebnis bereits in Forschung und in der Statistik Lehre eingesetzt,
fanden aber in der tiermedizinischen Lehre bisher noch kaum Anwendung. In
enger Zusammenarbeit mit den hiesigen Hochschuldozenten wurden Lehrinhalte
identifiziert, die mittels einer interaktiven Grafik gelehrt werden können. Dies
waren Themen, die zuvor mit statischen Grafiken gelehrt wurden oder zu denen
es bisher noch keine Abbildung gab. In der ersten Studie wurden drei interaktive
Grafiken für den Einsatz in tiermedizinischen Lehrveranstaltungen entwickelt.
Zwei davon wurden im klinischen Abschnitt (Tierernährung und
Lebensmittelkunde) eingesetzt und eine in der Vorklinik (Zoologie). Insgesamt 327
Studierende und 5 Dozierende wurden zu diesen Grafiken befragt. Die
Fragebögen ergaben eine breite Akzeptanz für interaktive Grafiken. Insgesamt
71.5% (233/326) der Studierenden gab an durch die interaktive Grafik mehr
Interesse für das vorgestellte Thema entwickelt zu haben und 76.1% (249/327)
bestätigten sich mehr interaktive Grafiken in der Lehre zu wünschen. In
Anbetracht des breit gefächerten Curriculums der tiermedizinischen Ausbildung
ist die Möglichkeit das Interesse für einzelne Lehrinhalte zu fördern von
besonderer Bedeutung. Die Tatsache, dass Studierende sich weniger für
Lehrinhalte interessieren, die scheinbar nicht direkt auf die zukünftige berufliche
Praxis vorbereiten, ist ein weit bekanntes Problem. Studierende mehr für diese
Themen zu interessieren, war unter anderen eines der Ziele des
Digitalisierungsprojekts. Die befragten Studierende und Dozenten gaben an,
gegenüber der Digitalisierung der Hochschullehre positiv eingestellt zu sein.
Bezüglich der Einstellung gegenüber interaktiven Grafiken sowie anderen
digitalen Lehrmedien konnte keine Geschlechts- oder Alterskorrelation festgestellt
werden. Studierende zeigten sich zuversichtlich selbst eine interaktive Grafik
bedienen zu können und trauten auch ihren Kommilitonen den Umgang zu.
Bezüglich der Lehreffektivität stimmte die große Mehrheit (81.9%; 276/326) damit
überein, das gelehrte Thema verstanden zu haben. Diese positiven Ergebnisse
können weitere Studien zur Untersuchung des didaktischen Potenzials
ZUSAMMENFASSUNG
78
interaktiver Grafiken rechtfertigen und eine solide Basis darstellen. Dozierende
zeigten sich ebenso positiv eingestellt gegenüber interaktiven Grafiken. Sie
stimmten zu, mehr Studierende durch interaktive Grafiken erreicht zu haben und
sahen einen klaren Vorteil in ihrem Nutzen. Auf diesem Ergebnis aufbauend
wurden Dozierenden und wissenschaftlichen Mitarbeitern ein zweitägiger Online-
Workshop zur Vermittlung grundlegender Programmierkenntnisse in R und Shiny
angeboten. Dozierende erhielten zur Erstellung eigener interaktiver Grafiken
fertige Programmiervorlagen und Arbeitsblätter. Insgesamt nahmen 25 Mitarbeiter
der Hochschule teil. Diese wurden gebeten vor Beginn und nach Ende des
Workshops einen Online-Fragebogen auszufüllen. Die Teilnehmer hatten
mehrheitlich keine bis sehr geringe Programmiererfahrung, hatten jedoch bereits
digitalen Lehrmedien verwendet. Auf die Frage, zu wie viel Prozent digitale
Lehrmedien im Unterricht eingesetzt werden sollten, gaben die Teilnehmer im
Mittel 41.2% an. Im Hinblick auf das Alter der Befragten fiel auf, dass die über 40-
Jährigen mehr Zeit mit digitalen Lehrmedien unterrichten wollen als die unter 40-
Jährigen. Dies widerspricht der landläufigen Meinung, dass der Umgang und
Wunsch nach Technik in der Lehre altersgebunden sei. Bezüglich interaktiver
Grafiken gaben 95.8% (23/24) der Teilnehmer an, dass interaktive Grafiken
Studierenden das Lernen erleichtern und 91.7% (22/24) fanden interaktive
Grafiken zur Vermittlung von Lehrinhalten hilfreich. Nach dem Ende des
Workshops gaben nur diejenigen mit Programmierkenntnisse an sich die
Entwicklung eigener interaktive Grafiken zuzutrauen. Ursächlich hierfür kann die
kurze Dauer des Workshops sein. Trotz der gegenwärtigen Zurückhaltung der
Dozierenden, selbst interaktive Grafiken zu programmieren, kann der Workshop
dennoch als Erfolg angesehen werden. Im Rahmen des Workshops sind bereits
einige interaktive Grafiken entstanden, die als Teil des E-Learning Programms der
hiesigen Hochschule angeboten werden. Hochschuldozenten zeigten ein breites
Interesse am Einsatz interaktiver Grafiken in ihren Lehrveranstaltungen. Seitens
der Studierende konnte auch ein großes Interesse am Einsatz interaktiver
Grafiken festgestellt werden. In Anbetracht dessen, ist anzunehmen, dass die
Implementierung weiterer interaktiver Grafiken durch zusätzliche Workshop
Angebote und technischen Support erreicht werden kann. Von diesem Angebot
könnten sowohl Studierende als auch Dozierende klar profitieren
SUMMARY
79
6. SUMMARY
Pamela Liebig (2021): Implementation and evaluation of interactive, browser-
based graphics in veterinary education
Within the framework of the digitalization project “DigiStep” interactive graphics
were implemented at the University for Veterinary Medicine in Hannover. The aim
of this work is to evaluate for the first time, the applicability and acceptance of
interactive graphics amongst students and lecturers in veterinary education. The
results of this work are described in two manuscripts, which were submitted for
publication. Graphics are frequently used in veterinary education to visualize data
and complex scientific relationships. However, the information content of a static
graphics is limited to depict one certain aspect of the target content. Dynamic
processes, which include change over time, can barely be visualized. Nowadays,
videos and animations can be employed to make dynamic processes more
accessible to students. However, student-content interaction is rarely provided.
Interactive graphics in turn include several regulator elements, which allow to
manipulate the data behind a graphic. Thus, students can explore and recognize
relationships and patterns more easily. In the past programming knowledge in
JAVA, HTML or CSS was necessary to develop interactive graphics. In this work
the programming language R, which is commonly used in academic environment
for statistical analysis and graphical visualizations, is used. With the package
“shiny” these graphics can be displayed and shared within a web browser. The so
called “shiny apps” have found broad acceptance in research and in statistic
education but are rarely used for veterinary education.
In close collaboration with the local lecturers, appropriate learning content was
identified. These topics were previously taught using static graphics or lacked a
graphical visualization. In the first study, three interactive graphics were
implemented. Two were employed in the clinical part (animal nutrition and food
science) and one in the preclinical part (zoology) of the veterinary curriculum. In
total, 327 students and 5 lecturers were asked to evaluate interactive graphics.
The questionnaire revealed a broad acceptance for interactive graphics amongst
students and educators in veterinary education. Overall, 71.5% (233/326) of the
students affirmed to be more interested in the topics taught with interactive
SUMMARY
80
graphics, and 76.1% (249/327), stated to wish to discuss more topics with
interactive graphics. Considering the broad curriculum in veterinary education, the
possibility to promote interest in certain topics is of special importance. The fact
that students are less interested in topics which at first seem to not prepare them
for their future career, is a well-known problem in veterinary education. Promoting
interest in these topics was one of the objectives of this digitalization project.
Students and lecturers were open minded towards digitalization in higher
education. Regarding their attitude towards interactive graphics and other digital
teaching tools, no age or gender correlation was demonstrated. Students
expressed confidence regarding their handling of interactive graphics and
estimated their fellow students would do so, too. Regarding the effect on learning
experience, most students (81.9%; 276/326) affirmed to have understood the
taught contents. These positive findings can constitute a justification and solid
basis for further studies regarding the didactic potential of interactive graphics in
veterinary education.
Lecturers also had a positive attitude towards interactive graphics. They agreed
to have reached more students using interactive graphics and saw a clear benefit
in using interactive graphics. Basing on these results, an online workshop for
teaching basic R and shiny skills was offered to the local faculty members. In total
25 faculty members participated. After first being introduced to R and shiny,
participants received ready to use programming templates and work sheets to
develop own interactive graphics. Participants mostly had no prior programming
skills but had used digital teaching media before. Regarding the question how
much time they would like to spend with digital media in class, the mean time was
41.2%. Surprisingly, older participants (>40 years) wished to discuss more topics
with digital media than the younger ones. This contradicts the popular opinion that
technology acceptance and usage amongst educators is linked to age. Regarding
interactive graphics, 95.8% (23/24) of the participants agreed that interactive
graphics help students understand teaching content and 91.7% (22/24) think they
are helpful in teaching them. After completing the workshop only those with prior
programming experience claimed to feel able to develop own interactive graphics.
The reason for this can be the short duration of the workshop. Even if participants
were reluctant to program interactive graphics on their own, the workshop still was
SUMMARY
81
successful. Within the framework of this workshop, several interactive graphics
were developed and now complement the e-learning selections at our university.
Considering lecturers’ and students’ high interest for interactive graphics, it is
likely that further training and technical support would promote and encourage the
implementation of more interactive graphics. Students and lecturers could clearly
profit from this offer.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
92
8. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First, I would like to thank Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung for the great opportunity to do this
work. I am grateful for the excellent supervision, the continuous support, and the
possibility to acquire knowledge in a new field.
Many thanks go to Prof. Dr. Heike Pröhl, Dr. Nadine Sudhaus-Jörn, Dr. Julia
Hankel and Prof. Dr. Christian Visscher whose collaboration were essential for this
project to be successful. I am thankful for your interest and help in implementing
the interactive graphics in your courses. I also want to express my gratitude to all
the members of the academic staff who participated at the online workshop,
especially to Dr. Viviane Filor, Dr. Marina Scheumann and Dr. Martina Buchholz,
for your helpful feedback and your support.
Additionally, I would like to thank the Ministry for Science and Culture of Lower
Saxony for the financial support of this work.
Thanks to Jörn Wrede for his technical support and to Magdalena Kircher, Moritz
Kohls and Jessica Krepel for the nice working atmosphere. I wish you all the best
and success for the future.
Babak Saremi, there are not enough words to express my gratitude for your
constant help, your infinite patience, and your encouragement. Thanks for being
my stress reliever, my laughter therapist, and my partner in crime. I am deeply
grateful to have meet you through this project.
Un gracias enorme para ti mamá. Estoy agradecida por tú apoyo incondicional,
por siempre creer en mi y por tú amor. Me alegra poder compartir cada momento
importante de mi vida contigo. Sin ti nunca hubiera llegado tan lejos. Me siento
afortunada de tenerte como mi mejor amiga. Gracias!
APPENDIX
93
9. APPENDIX
9.1. Students‘ questionnaire (English)
Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover
Evaluation interactive graphics in veterinary education
Dear Sir or Madam,
Thanks for your participation!
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung
Pamela Liebig, Veterinarian Promoted by:
1/2
Institute for Animal Breeding and Genetics Department of Genomics and
Bioinformatics of Infectious Diseases
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung Bünteweg 17p 30559 Hannover Tel. +49 511 953-8878
Fax +49 551 953-8582
within the project DigiStep our work group develops interactive graphics for teach-
ing in veterinary education. With this questionnaire we want to evaluate this
new teaching tool and ask for your participation. The information will be used
exclusively for project´s purpose.
APPENDIX
94
A) Demographic questions
Gender: ⃝ male ⃝ female ⃝ not specified Age: ______ years
B) Questions regarding interactive graphics
1. I can imagine that the majority of students will handle easily interactive graphics.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
2. I´d wish to have more interactive graphics in veterinary school.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
3. I can image using this tool because it´s intuitive.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
C) Effects on learning behaviour
4. I was previously familiar with the taught content.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
5. I understood the teaching contents taught by the interactive graphic.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
6. The interactivity of the graphic had a positive impact on my interest about the
Taught content.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
7. The interactive graphic had no benefit to the course.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
D) Digital media usage
8. I also use following digital media (multiple selection possible).
□ e-Learning at university □ online-videos □ forum □ none □else (_____________)
9. Digitalization is a chance to improve academic education.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ strongly agree
2/2 www.tiho-hannover.de
APPENDIX
95
9.2. Students’ questionnaire (German)
Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover
Evaluierung interaktiver Grafiken
in der tiermedizinischen Lehre
Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren,
Vielen Dank für Ihre Teilnahme!
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung Pamela Liebig, Tierärztin
1/2
Gefördert durch:
Institut für Tierzucht und
Vererbungsforschung AG Genomics and Bioinformatics
of Infectious Diseases
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung Bünteweg 17p 30559 Hannover Tel. +49 511 953 8878
Fax +49 551 953-8582
im Rahmen des Projekts DigiStep entwickelt unsere AG interaktive Grafiken zum Einsatz in der tiermedizinischen Lehre. Mit dieser Umfrage möchten wir dieses neue Lehrmedium evaluieren und bitten Sie um Ihre Teilnahme. Selbstverständlich werden Ihre Angaben ausschließlich für Projektzwecke verwendet.
APPENDIX
96
A) Fragen zur Person
B) Fragen zu den interaktiven Grafiken 1. Ich kann mir gut vorstellen, dass der Mehrheit der Studierenden der Umgang mit
interaktiven Grafiken leicht fallen könnte.
2. Ich würde mir mehr interaktive Grafiken in den Lehrveranstaltungen des
Tiermedizinstudiums wünschen.
3. Ich kann mir gut vorstellen selbst dieses Tool zu nutzen, da es intuitiv zu bedienen ist.
C) Auswirkungen auf das Lernverhalten 4. Mit dem dargestellten Sachverhalt in der interaktiven Grafik war ich bereits vor der
Lehrveranstaltung vertraut.
5. Die in der interaktiven Grafik gelehrten Inhalte habe ich verstanden.
6. Durch die Interaktivität der Grafik wurde mein Verständnis für die Thematik positiv
beeinflußt.
7. Ich finde, dass die Integration dieser Grafik in die Lehrveranstaltung keinen
Mehrwert im Hinblick auf die Lehre des dargestellten Sachverhalts mit sich bringt.
D) Nutzung digitaler Medien 8. Ich nutze in meinem Studium noch folgende digitale Lehrmedien (Mehrfachauswahl
möglich)
9. Ich sehe die Digitalisierung als Chance zur Verbesserung der Hochschullehre
2/2 www.tiho-hannover.de
Geschlecht: ⃝ männlich ⃝ weiblich ⃝ keine Angaben Alter: ______ Jahre
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
□ E-Learning-Angebote der TiHo □ Online-Videos □ Foren □ keine □sonstige
(___________________)
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
APPENDIX
97
9.3. Lecturers’ questionnaire (English)
Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover
Evaluation interactive graphics in veterinary education
Dear Professors,
A) Question regarding the handling of interactive graphics.
1.I felt secure handling this teaching tool.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ agree
2. I can imagine that the majority of teachers will handle easily this teaching tool.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ agree
3. I wish to have more interactive graphic in my classes.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ agree
1/1
Institute for Animal Breeding and Genetics Department of Genomics and
Bioinformatics of Infectious Diseases
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung Bünteweg 17p 30559 Hannover Tel. +49 511 953-8878
Fax +49 551 953-8582
you used an interactive graphic in your lecture. With this questionnaire we want
to evaluate this new teaching tool and ask you for your participation. Of course,
your information will be analysed anonymously and exclusively used for project
propose.
APPENDIX
98
B) Effects on teaching
4. In my opinion, the interactive graphic provided no benefit to the course.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ agree
5. I feel like I could have reached more students by teaching with interactive graphic.
strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ agree
C) Usage of digital teaching tool
6. I have used digital teaching tools (e.g. CASUS, online lecture) in my classes before.
⃝ Yes, following ________________ ⃝ No
7. The usage of interactive graphic had a positive effect on my opinion towards digital media
in higher school education.
⃝ Yes ⃝ No
8. Digitalization is a chance to improve academic education.
Strongly disagree ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ agree
D) Please indicate here your improvement wishes or future design ideas.
2 / 2 www.tiho-hannover.de
APPENDIX
99
9.4. Lecturers’ questionnaire (German)
Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover
University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover
Evaluierung interaktiver Grafiken
in der tiermedizinischen Lehre
A) Fragen zum Umgang mit interaktiven Grafiken
1. Ich habe mich im Umgang mit dem Lehrtool sicher gefühlt.
2. Ich kann mir gut vorstellen, dass der Mehrheit der Dozierenden der Umgang mit diesem Tool leicht fallen wird. 3. Ich würde mir mehr interaktive Grafiken in meinen Lehrveranstaltungen wünschen.
1/1
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
Institut für Tierzucht und
Vererbungsforschung AG Genomics and
Bioinformatics of Infectious Diseases
Prof. Dr. Klaus Jung Bünteweg 17p 30559 Hannover Tel. +49 511 953 8878
Fax +49 551 953-8582
Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren,
in Ihrer Lehrveranstaltung haben Sie eine interaktive Grafik eingesetzt. Mit dieser
Umfrage möchten wir dieses neue Lehrmedium evaluieren und bitten Sie um Ihre
Teilnahme. Selbstverständlich werden Ihre Angaben anonym und vertraulich bearbeitet
und ausschließlich für Projektzwecke verwendet.
APPENDIX
100
B) Auswirkungen auf die Lehrtätigkeit 4. Der Einsatz interaktiver Grafiken in meiner Lehrveranstaltung bringt meiner Meinung nach keinen Mehrwert im Hinblick auf die Vermittlung des dargestellten Sachverhalts.
5. Ich habe den Eindruck, dass der gelehrte Inhalt durch den Einsatz interaktiver Grafilken mehr Studierende erreicht haben könnte, als durch den Einsatz statischer Abbildungen. C) Nutzung digitaler Lehrmedien 6. Ich habe bereits früher andere digitale Lehrmedien (z.B. CASUS-Fälle, Vorlesungsaufzeichnungen,) für meine Lehrveranstaltungen eingesetzt. 7. Die Nutzung interaktiver Grafiken hat meine Meinung zu digitalen Lehrmedien positiv beeinflußt. 8. Ich sehe die Digitalisierung als Chance zur Verbessung der Hochschullehre. D) Bitte geben Sie Ihre Verbesserungswünsche zur eingesetzten interaktiven Grafik und ggf. zukünftige Gestaltungsideen an.
2 / 2 www.tiho-hannover.de
⃝ Ja ⃝ Nein
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ trifft voll zu
trifft gar nicht zu ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ ⃝ tri fft voll zu
⃝ Ja, folgende ________________ ⃝ Nein
APPENDIX
101
9.5 Pre-workshop questionnaire (English)
APPENDIX
102
APPENDIX
103
APPENDIX
104
APPENDIX
105
9.6 Post-workshop questionnaire (English)
APPENDIX
106
APPENDIX
107
9.7 Pre-workshop questionnaire (German)
APPENDIX
108
APPENDIX
109
APPENDIX
110
APPENDIX
111
9.8. Post-workshop questionnaire (German)
112