Microcomputers as a tool in grading subjective papers

The problem of the quasi-experimental research was to determine if the microcomputer can serve as a tool in enhancing objectivity and in saving time when nurse educators grade nursing care plans. Norbert Wiener's general theory of behavior organization known as cybernetics formed the basis for the study.

The convenience sample consisted of faculty members of 24 National League for Nursing accredited baccalaureate nursing programs in Minnesota and Texas. Results of the study are based on N's of 113 and 94. The instruments used were Apple microcomputers, the OLGA(c) software programs, a videotape and an evaluation tool.

Packets of material containing instructions and homework were sent to each subject prior to a scheduled grading session. Faculty members were requested to grade a set of four nursing care plans by hand and to calculate some descriptive statistics (human system) prior to the session. At the workshop, participants viewed a videotape demonstration of the OLGA(c) software after which they graded a set of four more nursing care plans and performed a statistical analysis using the microcomputer as a tool (mechanicohuman system).

The results indicated no significant difference in reliability of scoring of nursing care plans graded by a mechanicohuman system and those graded by a human alone. However, there was a significant savings of time with the mechanicohuman system when a minimum of descriptive statistics were calculated. When the statistical analysis was excluded from the number of minutes to grade by each method, there was no significant difference at the .001 level. Yet instructors wrote a significantly greater number of comments by microcomputer than by hand. The level of microcomputer and typing skills was not significant in explaining the variation in the amount of time required to grade the papers by the mechanicohuman system.

Implications are that instructors will enjoy more student contact for nourishment in the human element of nursing, building interpersonal relationships. Student-teacher time could be used for clarification and discussion leaving routine transmission of data to microcomputer printouts. Prime time learning will more likely be achievable.