#ocTEL Week 9 Risk Management

This week's activity is called"Cheating Murphy's Law". I was about to embark on the first activity - reviewing a previous project and saying where it had gone wrong, what I would do differently etc when real life intervened and I was suddenly confronted with a possibly very risky turn in the development of the Scale Up project.

It may not seem like a big deal, but the IS people have decided they want to get Mac Books for the new classroom.

Now admittedly, some staff in certain specialist areas do use Macs with their students. And some students may well be au fait with the operating system and key board in the Mac environment, but the vast majority of my students are not. I can immediately see a big risk of students being turned off, anxious and frankly perplexed - especially when all of the computers they are able to access in the University's public spaces (such as the library) are Windows based PCs. And let's not even start on staff reactions! Apart from that handful of Art and Design lecturers involved in the project, the majority are Windows PC users: that's the kit we have on our desks at work (and usually at home). It is hard enough getting staff to engage with technology without adding a further obstacle.

Of course IS have reassured us that the Mac Book has "dual boot" (OK so long as we know how to do that) but it doesn't have a dual keyboard...... Is it just me or does this seem a bit daft?

So: Murphy's Law - what can go wrong, will (and especially if the decisions affecting teaching and learning are left to people who don't actually teach or interact with learners). My Risk Log is embedded below -

#ocTEL Week 8 Enhancement

If you didn't already realise it, I am a big fan of virtual learning, TEL, MOOCs, PLEs etc so I have enjoyed this week's assignments - especially the videos about Saylor and Udacity.

I admit I haven't  really thought in terms of reducing costs as far as my project goes, although I know that in my previous job, the decision to deliver the course for NHS managers using a predominantly e-learning approach was based on cost factors.The decision to use more technology in my teaching is really about increasing the sense of fun and interactivity that students get from it and decreasing the amount of time I stand up  in front of them reading from slides.

Weirdly the climate in HE now is so heavily influenced by NSS, Unistats and KIS data that any curriculum decisions which reduce f2f contact in favour of more online, problem based, collaborative, digital approaches are actually being overturned. We are being required to add in hours of lectures and seminars in modules where you would actually be expecting much more independent learning of the students (a final year dissertation, for example) despite the huge cost in terms of staff hours (which are scarce) and rooms (even scarcer).

But cost is of course a factor in many decisions. This week I have been involved in discussions about using a MOOC-like resource as a way of attracting teens into my subject area - a pre-university taster delivered on line. Attracting more students is going to be essential for some courses to stay economically viable. And arguably it is more cost effective all round if students end up choosing the right course first time round.

So... back to the week's activity: the enhancement I am most hoping for from the redesign of my module is that it will actually be much more fun, more media rich and more interactive, both in the classroom and out of it. One thing I have really appreciated from my involvement in three MOOCs since January is the wealth of freely available educational material (ie no cost!), including games, simulations and videos, which can be integrated into the learning environment.

I do think that the redesign of the module is going to be fairly costly in terms of time that I and my team spend in planning sessions and building the learning room on line, but hopefully this will have a long term benefit.

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Today I have been at a workshop discussing how to embed Ditgital Literacies in the curriculum. As part of this - and in connection with the Scale Up project - I have recently helped put together a bid to fund student mentors to work with new undergraduates on the development of digital literacies in transition. The use of students as change agents to mentor other students (and staff) is an exciting idea and if successful I hope to engage the student mentors alongside other teaching team members to contribute to a project blog. Recording and reflecting on our progress through the project is going to be an essential part of all of our learning.

I was also inspired by a conversation I had with a colleague about engaging students in decisions about assessment design, something which I think has real potential to increase student engagement - in fact involving students more as partners in all aspects of the curriculum design is a challenge I think I'd like to give more thought to.

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Finally, some news - related to all of the above - I am going to the PLE conference in Berlin in July. I attended the inaugural one in Barcelona three years ago so it will be interesting to see how the debate has moved on. I used to think in terms of a dichotomy between VLE and PLE but I now feel that digital literacy implies the management of a PLE (personal learning environment) which actually includes the institutional VLE among its many components. I also used to think that PLE as a concept was a long way from where my students were (or vice versa) but now I see these converging as I witness more and more students arriving with mobile devices and we as a University start to think about digital enhancements to the curriculum that extend beyond the VLE. 

ps: random picture from my recent holiday in Tarragona - street furniture which has been "enhanced" at minimal cost by local graffiti artists: I thought it was a good metaphor for the week's topic! :)

#ocTEL Designing Active Learning

I am getting very excited after a week of meetings and discussions about the SCALE UP project we are going to be running in the university next year. I have proposed two very different modules for the pilot - one is already very much a collaborative, tech based module but the other has been taught in a traditional way up until now and I am going to have to rethink learning activities.

The idea behind SCALE UP is large group teaching with students organised into round tables of nine, with 3 internet connected devices to share (3 to a device). Teaching is meant to be inquiry or problem based with students teaching themselves and presenting work to one another. While some might complain that here the technology is driving the pedagogy (I am rethinking activities to fit the environment) in reality, it is the other way round. I feel I have been constrained by timetabling and room restrictions to teach in a way that is really uncomfortable for me, boring for the students and increasingly irrelevant. (A lecture on Harvard Referencing conventions???) I have secretly been dreaming of a large, flat space with round tables and excellent wifi - and here it comes!

So in the week when ocTEL is asking participants to design a learning activity, I have this environment and the changes needed in mind.

My activity is going to be for very new undergraduates to whom I introduce research and digital literacy skills. One of my favourite moments in (usually final year) tutorials is when I reveal to some poor student, struggling to find the memory stick or email on which they have their dissertation backed up, the wonders of cloud storage.

So I have decided to make this a key part of early undergraduate education.

The learning activity I have designed has some elements of group collaboration built in and relies on the students accessing the internet to read and discover, practice and reflect. (Absorb, Connect, Do)

If you would like to read through the activity - and better still participate in it - please visit this link:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wHwaOciE4Zxy8jf3ZKZzEzHTPzcybogQQsfFBtKaAmU/edit

#ocTEL Week 1: reflecting on my practice

Well this is timely. In our institution we are just reflecting on module feedback, marking final assignments, planning for the coming year. I am also personally involved in compiling a portfolio for professional recognition.

Reflecting on my practice is something I do as a matter of course through this blog in particular and I think that in itself tends to shape the way I teach, as well as reflect some of my beliefs.

I trained, many years ago, as a person centred counsellor and later took on the role of facilitator in a course that trained other counsellors. It is only recently, reading about various pedagogical approaches and learning theories that I have come to acknowledge that my approach is essentially person centred.

I generally have a great trust in students' ability to think and decide for themselves  I talk to them as equals and I expect them to respond with equal respect and honesty. Of course at times I am disappointed - first year students in particular struggle with the transition to University and a student/tutor relationship  that may be very different from what they have previously experienced. They seem to either sit quietly expecting to be fed knowledge or switch off from the class and turn on their social networking sites: they don't see themselves as learners so much as hostages trapped in some great anonymous institution.

Getting students to accept responsibility for their own learning is the first, most vital task in year one. So how do we accomplish this?

In my level one module we offer a range of learning activities from sit and listen to the lecture; go away and read something then comment on it in the discussion board; in class paper- or computer-based activities guided by tutor/worksheet;  to a final collaborative group project.

On the teaching styles matrix I would say that over the year I move from directed individual towards social autonomous. It can be a painful journey, but having just marked their group projects, I believe it has succeeded.

For collaborative work to be meaningful there has to be some advantage for the students - although these may not be immediately apparent to them. By working collaboratively, weaker students can get to see how other, perhaps stronger, students write and organise themselves. (Learning by proxy). In my view, lurking can be positive. Equally though it is possible to see quieter students coming to the fore when communication is in small groups and especially in virtual communication. (This has been evident in informal student led social networking groups). They also learn how to work together in teams - the hard way.

The other modules I teach are for final year students. From the outset the module is social/autonomous as students form small groups to research and create an online resource. They get very minimal input from me about the technology - they have to go away and pretty much learn this stuff for themselves  I provide on line learning materials related to the subject, which are a springboard for further research. I ask that they also maintain a personal blog or reflective journal about the process the group goes through. The final grading for the module is split into a peer assessment of the final online project - including leaving feedback via the discussion board for one another - and a short reflective individual piece, based on their blogs, which I grade.

Carl Rogers'  Freedom to Learn is a great read for educators. His basic precepts are:

We cannot teach another person directly; we can only facilitate his learning.The structure and organization of the self appears to become more rigid under threat; to relax its boundaries when completely free from threat...
The educational situation which most effectively promotes significant learning is one in which 1) threat to the self of the learner is reduced a minimum, and 2) differentiated perception of the field of experience is facilitated.

The greatest buzz I get out of "teaching" is when I am not - that is, when students are discovering for themselves and feel proud of their own achievements. I don't win plaudits from my students about the brilliance of my lectures, but they do say that I am supportive, that I treat them like adults, that they have fun and that they learn stuff without really realizing they are doing so.

I use a lot of tech  in my teaching - videos to bring in other voices and views; Facebook and Twitter to connect to the outside world; blogs, wikis, Diigo, Dropbox and Evernote for reflection and information management. At the moment this is all fairly chaotic (my students also notice that and tell me about it!) and I hope to use the ocTEL course to become more systematic in the way I share my love of tech with my students.