The 5I’s of Virtual Technologies in Laboratory Teaching for Faculties of Higher Education in Kerala

Abstract

In this paper, the effectiveness of training faculty in laboratory teaching (the teaching of science in a laboratory setting using experiments and similar exercises) through the use of Information and Communications Technology (ICT)—virtual technologies for faculties in institutions of higher education in the Indian state of Kerala—was evaluated and measured. The efficacy of employing ICT to train teachers in higher education is important, and we have identified 5I factors (innovative, interactive, involvement, informative, and influential) to help ascertain the effectiveness of such technology training during pandemic teaching. The laboratory learning using VL can describe the student’s engagement in the online learning process. This work more specifically identifies how ICT helps in laboratory teaching and identifies the critical pedagogical aspects of the ICT. If the technology has these 5I factors, then it will be an effective teaching method for laboratory learning. Here, we used the ICT-virtual labs in science as the technology to evaluate these five factors. The research first began by conducting an ethnicity profile of science teachers in the middle and high/secondary stages of school consisting of classes VII, IX, and X (i.e., students of ages 11 to 15). To evaluate the use of VL in the 5I framework, the faculties in science were divided into experimental and control groups (n = 101). The experimental group practiced in a virtual lab in the first stage, but the control group did not. Test I was then performed on both groups. In the second stage, both groups practiced with real lab equipment, and test II was conducted on both groups. The tests and other data from the two groups were statistically analyzed using independent t tests. There were notable differences between the experimental and control groups: in terms of time for understanding the concepts behind the experiment, time for doing the experiment, and accuracy in results, with the experimental group performing significantly better. On the other hand, there was no significant difference between the two groups in task completion accuracy. Overall, there was a beneficial transfer of training from the virtual lab exercise to the real lab, with the experimental group’s average score being higher.