Integrating multimedia into the Malaysian classroom: Engaging students in interactive learning

In recent years, with the infusion of the multimedia technology into the education arena, traditional educational materials can be translated into interactive electronic form through the use of multimedia authoring tools. This has allowed teachers to design and incorporate multimedia elements and choreograph them in an orderly sequence to convey the message in an interactive and multi-sensory learning environment. The focus in education is thus moving away from the conventional "chalk-and-talk" method to one which uses multimedia as the instructional media and a platform in teaching and learning. This presentation focuses on using the multimedia design process (MDP) to enable educators to re-design their educational curricula into an interactive and media-rich learning environment. This multimedia educational design process will reinforce and strengthen the traditional instructional communication process (ICP) and foster a number of innovative methods to communicate knowledge to the learners. In this context, there is a need to adjust the educator's approach to teaching, preparing content and delivering learning materials. As the present generation becomes more familiar with computers and the Internet, they are going to expect information in the classrooms to be delivered in the same pattern. Introduction In the traditional education realm, the role of the teacher is to provide the content and information to the students. The information or content that is presented is based on the teacher's curriculum and other relevant information for the class. In the past few decades, educators have used various types of instructional technologies for delivery of instruction to their students. Radio, film, television and video are the instructional media, which were most often used. However, the use of these media has not made any significant change in the instructional communication strategies and produced the results desired by the educators. In recent years, the advent of multimedia and the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) have rapidly transformed the scenario in using instructional technologies in the educational institutions particularly in higher education ( Roblyer & Edwards, 1998). The fusion of technology and educational content has an important bearing on our instructional methodology. The very same content can be converted into the electronic form by using multimedia authoring tools and presented on the PC. This has enabled the teacher to present his/her educational content in a multimedia format and in an interactive, multi-sensory manner rather than in the traditional single media format (text) This not only provides the teacher with a more effective way to transfer knowledge and information to students, but also enable the students to learn in a more productive way. In recent years in Malaysia, institutions of higher learning are showing a rapidly growing trend in integrating ICT into their educational curricula and are marching towards e-learning and establishing digital universities (Cheok, 2000; Ismail, 2001; Mat, 2001). The focus in education is thus moving away from the conventional "chalk-and-talk" method to one which uses multimedia as the instructional media and a platform in teaching and learning. The multimedia technologies used will transform the traditional materials into interactive multimedia content. With the introduction of multimedia into the various industries which engineered the multimedia revolution in the 1990s, many educators began to see multimedia as part of a combination of technology resources, which included media elements such as text, graphics, sound, video and animations, instructional systems and computer-based support systems. In fact, multimedia is changing the communication process and the exchange of information. The way messages are sent and received is more effectively done and better comprehended. The inclusion of media elements reinforces the message and the delivery, which leads to a better learning rate. The power of multimedia lies in the fact that it is multi-sensory, stimulating the many senses of the audience, which consequently leads to better attention and retention rates. At the heart of any digital multimedia development is interactivity. With interactivity, the audience is involved in the The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology – TOJET July 2004 ISSN: 1303-6521 volume 3 Issue 3 Article 4 Copyright  The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology 2002 32 communication process and in the navigation of the content. Research has shown that interactivity enhances retention in learning (Lindstrom, 1994) (see Table 1). Table 1 Interactivity enhances retention in learning Retention rates in learning When people see When people see and hear When people see, hear and do