How did people write University assignments before computers??!!

[mgarl10024]

I used to make all my notes in 2B pencil on thin lined A4 pads, then handwrite the essays in ink on the same kind of paper. There was at least one department where if you made an error in ink doing the final version, you might as well chuck that sheet because they would not mark it if it came in with either the error or a tippexed correction.

I do half my thinking in my head and half on the computer screen!

These quotes sum up what I see as the improvement here.
In the past, there was too much emphasis on getting everything neat and tidy. For example, my parents remember learning times tables parrot fashion. Rewriting an entire page because of one typo is a waste of the student's time and resources when they could be learning new things.
Thanks to computers, we no longer need to do this - ok, mental arithmetic and handwriting suffer, but instead we get much more creative thinking, problem solving, and enhanced knowledge. Being able to write your ideas electronically and edit them yourself on the fly without the restrictions of it being written down and difficult to change has led to a massive increase in the quality (both in text/ideas and produced format). Being able to research and communicate with like minded people over the Internet in seconds rather than wasting time in a dusty old library hunting out some other book that someone else has, has revolutionised research.
We've come along a huge way, and that's thanks mainly to IT.

As a result I think there is now an unpleasant emphasis on how good your IT and keyboard skills are, perhaps at the expense of marking good ideas.

I disagree (above) that this is at the expense of good ideas.
With respect to IT skills, as I see it, the idea of a degree is to prepare you for the workplace. So, if most workplaces use IT, then this approach prepares you well (better, in my opinion, than parrot fashion learning).

 

[Amheirchion]

It's amazing how quickly it changed. In my first year (1996) all of my assignments were hand written, yet I don't think anyone hand wrote their dissertations by the time I left in '99. I remember that our lecturers were always on at us to make better use of the web as a research aid. I wonder if they still feel the same way?

My lecturers hammer home the point about using online resources, such as Science Direct, Ingenta Connect, Wiley interscience, and others like them. They're vast libraries of journals that are searchable and immensely useful, no more relying on how many back issues of a journal the library has, or thumbing through them to find out if they have an article in that may be relevant.
It also means we're expected to be much more up to date (depending on the field of study I guess) my last institution didn't like us using resources older than 2000, which meant most books were out (lecturers at both institutions both like stating that books are out of date as soon as they are published) and we were expected to use cutting edge new research in the form of papers published.
For my current course I don't think I've opened a book in earnest yet, all of my research is done online through journal papers.

 

[XmisterIS]

I use a combination of books (some as old as the 19th century - e.g. Also Sprach Zarathustra by Nietsche, 1883) and modern research papers. It's great to have electronic resources, all you need do is get the computer to search for words and phrases in a matter of seconds!