Interactive Television: Teaching and Learning Viewed Through a Feminist Perspective

Another feminist classroom practice is what bell hooks refers to "engaged" teaching - education, she says, should be a practice of freedom, student expression should be valued, and "teachers must be actively committed to a process of self-actualization that promotes their own well-being if they are to teach in a manner that empowers students." 5 To involve the students, I had them compose essay exam questions outside of class as well as answer them. I was engaged myself in research on stuttering during the semester I taught this course, and I think the associated intrinsic rewards and "self-actualization" I felt were reflected in at least some of my lectures. Perhaps these activities are why the two highest-rated course-related items on student evaluations were: "Exams are creative and require original thought" and "This course is up-to-date with developments in the field." Although hooks suggests that feeling "well" allows us to be truly "engaged" in our teaching/learning practices, unfortunately, the reverse is also true. For about thirty minutes at the beginning of one class day and fifteen minutes of another, the WONDER network was "down." Although technicians at UWEC and UWSP actively worked on it, finally fixing the problem by turning the system off and back on again (similar to what I do when I give up on my computer), the situation consisted of mostly women waiting to use what Lenskyj has pointed out is, after all, a "man-made" technology. Students' responses on course evaluations indicated problems beyond the responsibility of the distance teacher. Three of the most differently rated aspects of the technology between the sites seem to reflect feminist teaching/learning issues of ownership, choice, and a comfortable learning environment. First, UWEC students were likely to disagree with or respond "not applicable" to the item "This system has made it possible to take courses I otherwise would not have been able to take," whereas this item was the most strongly agreed with by UWSP students. Similarly, UWSP students responded much more favorably to the idea of taking another course delivered this way. The only item UWEC students rated substantially higher than UWSP students concerned the classroom as a good physical learning environment (size, temperature, comfortable seating, etc.). Crowding thirty-one students into a distance education classroom designed for fewer resulted in lower rating of physical setting than from students arrayed more comforta