--- Forwarded Message from "Read Gilgen" <[log in to unmask]> ---

>Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2003 09:25:07 -0500
>From: "Read Gilgen" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: #7135.4 lab attendance tracking (!)

Some time ago (like 15-20 yrs) we decided to get out of the business of
monitoring student lab attendance.  First, all you're doing is verifying
that they're checking in/out, not what they're doing while there.
Second, the only way to really tell if the student has been working with
the assigned materials is to quiz, test, or get them to use in class
what they've learned.

Too many instructors appease their conscience by getting these
attendance stats but never take the time to know what the students have
learned in the lab, or even what the lab materials are.

Fast forwarding to today, nearly all of our materials are digital and
online.  Obviously having tracking software for who attends the lab
makes even less sense.  Building in a check-in method for online work
(i.e., when someone logs in and logs out) would take care of that, but
then who's to say who actually checked in or what they did while checked
in.

Bottom line... we don't track attendance.  Period.

>>> [log in to unmask] 4/29/2003 7:49:26 AM >>>
--- Forwarded Message from "Pons, Julia (Packard)" <[log in to unmask]> ---

>From: "Pons, Julia (Packard)" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: "'Language Learning and Technology International Information
Forum'"            <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: RE: #7135 lab attendance tracking
>Date: Fri, 25 Apr 2003 18:31:50 -0400

Do you have anyone who checks the students in as the enter the lab?
I've
experimented with several different tracking programs, but the most
reliable
one so far has been to simply create an excel workbook with
spreadsheets for
individual classes and students. As students come in the lab, the
student
workers take their IDs and enter the day and times on their
spreadsheets.

It's easy as pie to add their total time spent in the lab this way!

------------------------------------
Julia Packard Pons
Language Lab Coordinator
410-532-5558
College of Notre Dame of MD



-----Original Message-----
From: LLTI-Editor [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Friday, April 25, 2003 3:19 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: #7135 lab attendance tracking


--- Forwarded Message from TennesseeBob Peckham <[log in to unmask]> ---

>Date: Thu, 24 Apr 2003 15:08:17 -0700
>To: [log in to unmask]
>From: TennesseeBob Peckham <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: lab attendance tracking

------------------
We are looking for a good way to track attendance in our 30-station
networked lab.  Student use is approximately 840 use hours per week
because of a 2-hour per week lab requirement for students in all of
our 111, 115, 122 and 222 language classes.  This is a Mac lab
running OS9, but as soon as I can convince people to dump some old
software, we will move to OSX.  Our university will have a 9.2% cut
in budget next year, so we will need to find something very cheap.

TBob


--
==========================================================
Look it up in the Andy Holt Virtual Library
http://www.utm.edu/vlibrary/vlhome.shtml
==========================================================
Robert D. Peckham, PhD
Director, the Globe-Gate Project
Director, the Muriel Tomlinson Language Resource Center Department of
Modern
Foreign Languages Univ. of Tennessee-Martin
http://globegate.org/french/globe.html