End of Module Reflections

The module, Supporting the Blended and Online Student Experience, is drawing to a close and it is time for me to look back over the weeks and see what I have taken from this.

We looked at various areas throughout the module and I was particularly looking at it for my Distance Learning Programme.  There were 2 main areas that particularly grabbed my attention, Digital Literacies and Online Social Presence.  Don’t get me wrong, I did find all areas interesting but these 2 are ones I can “use” straight away while improving the distance learning programme.  I also found the experience of designing a student led seminar very challenging but in a good way.

Digital Literacies

The activity of creating our own Visitor and Resident map and looking at my digital presence opened up my eyes to how much technology I am using in my professional and personal life and where these tools overlap.   This is something I would like to do with my class based students and introduce them to some useful technology for their studies and getting them to share ideas on this.  I am hoping this will get them to think about their digital footprint at the same time, which will be important as they will be coming to the end of their time at college and moving to University or employment.  I want to also do this with my HNC Distance Learning Programme, but not sure when I would do this or how yet.

Digital Natives was a term I came across in the previous module and it outlines the assumptions made about the skills of the students coming into college/university based on their age.  At the time I didn’t really question it but the literature in this module made me think and realise that we cannot make any assumptions about students abilities, especially when it comes to using online tools, just because they grew up in a time where technology surrounds them does not mean they can easily learn new or different technology.

Online Social Presence

This is something I have never really considered for my own practice till it was one of the themes our team’s seminar.  It was interesting to see how small things can help to improve the tutor’s relationships with online students.  This also goes for the relationships between students, something that has never really been thought about for the HNC programme by myself or previous tutors.  I think the students getting to know each other will help them support each other, just like my on campus students, through their studies.

I am in the process of implementing a student induction unit where the student will hopefully start to develop their own online social presence and start to engage with each other and help each other out.  I have managed to start this process with some students who have been studying with me for a while so are more comfortable with the online system and each other through the online meetings.

Another aim of the induction is to give the students a chance to use some of the features in Moodle that are in the course so that they are familiar with their functions before starting, meaning they can concentrate more on the content and not worrying about if they are submitting assignments correctly.

Student Led Seminars

The preparation of the student led seminars was a very challenging time, trying to juggle participating in the other groups seminars as well as designing our own one (on top of a full time teaching timetable), but surprisingly good.  It is surprising how focused we were and the volume of work that was completed in the short period of time.  I think the motivation was there as we would be assessed on this but I think in future projects I will be suggesting the online meetings/collaboration to focus everyone on the task.

This experience allowed me to develop an online unit with no prior materials and using the tools to allow a more engaging student experience, although this was at a much higher level than I am delivering, I found some useful tools and activities I can adapt to suit the student groups I have.

 

Overall…

What I am finding is the topics we are learning about I am able to put into practice straightaway without making major changes (although some are on the cards for the future).  This is also having an impact on some of my fellow colleagues as they are seeing the positive outcomes from these small changes.

Although my motivation has diminished at time I am still determined to finish as I am seeing a positive change in my own working practices, which in turn has had a positive impact on my students so far.

 

Jenga Revision Game

This is a game I use with my students to help them revise for their end of year exam.

We invested in 5 sets of Jenga (a large outdoor version).  I labelled 15 of the bricks 1 with the numbers 1 – 15 so that they were ready for the students to use.  Basically they will play Jenga but some bricks they take will have a question they must answer.  If the question is answered correctly then the brick does not go back on the tower, if not then it does and they can have another opportunity to answer the question.  This is a timed activity so if they knock the tower down they have to rebuild and start again.  The team with the most points wins.

Lets break this down on what you need to do:

Preparation

1. Split the class into groups of 4 or 5 (I sometimes ask them to create a team name)
2. Assign each team a subject
3. Each team creates the questions required for their version of the game.
4. One member of the team is nominated to be the “Quiz Master” for their game. They will ask the questions and keep score for each team playing their game.
5. The team sets up their Jenga set ready for one of the other teams to play.

 

Game Rules

1. Remove 1 brick from the tower using only 1 hand
2. You cannot remove any bricks from the bottom 2 and top 2 complete levels
3. If the brick contains a question:
   – Person who removes the block answers the question correctly = 2 points
   – Team answers the question correctly = 1 point
   – Brick can remain off the tower
4. If the brick is blank or question is answered incorrectly replace the brick on the top of the tower.  You must completely rebuild a level before starting another.
5. Correct the position of any block you accidentally moved out of place before touching any other blocks.
6. If the tower falls and you have enough time rebuild the tower and continue playing.

 

Playing the Game

The students will play each Jenga game once, this is sometimes done the following week if time is short (it’s surprising how good the attendance is in the following class!).  We then tally up all the scores and the team with the most wins a prize, a box of sweets seems to be the popular choice.

 

 

Gamification

Gamification is the last student led seminar in the module.  I already use games in the classroom but mainly for revision.  When it comes to my online students the most they get are quizzes to complete, which can’t be very engaging after a while.

I feel most games work as a revision aid but not to the evaluation and analysis level that most of my students need to do as part of assessments or in their end of year exam.  Even though they don’t do this it still allows them to almost let off steam at stressful parts of the year and can kick start their studies if they are in a slump (this is based on feedback I have had from my own students in the past).

Domínguez et al., (2013) define gamification as “the use of game design elements and game mechanics in non-game contexts” and with games being extremely popular with all age groups (how many of us play those silly games on Facebook to pass some time but then become slightly addicted?).  In 2014 it was estimated that there were approximately 20 million mobile gamers, which was just in the UK!  Imagine what that figure is now.

Now you might be thinking, why is gamification not something all educators are using?  I would say we are in the classroom, to a certain extent, but it’s the online courses where we are maybe missing something.  Gone are the days where adding a quiz or three to an online course made it fun, there are only so many matching, hotspot, multiple choice questions someone can do before it becomes more of a chore to complete than being fun.  If we could transfer some of the games we use in the classroom to online then this would be great, but there are quite a few challenges to doing this (some would just be impossible!):

• Time – how long did it take to come up with the game and create the resources for the games in the classroom?
• Technology – Can the existing technology do what we would want it to?
• Expertise – would you know where to start to create your game for use online?
• Will the students actually use these tools?

I use a variation of the game Jenga as a revision tool with my HND students to help them prepare for their Graded Unit exam (Jenga Revision Game). This is only used to help them prepare for the restricted response paper they sit as it does not allow for the level of analysis they need to do on the 2nd paper of the exam.  The game is very much a group activity and interactive so coming up with ideas on how I can do this with my online students has been very difficult, until the seminar led by Team David BOE introduced us to their Reading Game.  I know it’s not like Jenga but the students create the questions that they would use for revision and the quiz.

This would allow them to take part at a time that suited them but how could I ensure that all students took part to make it more beneficial?  How would we actually motivate the students to participate?  Would the offer of rewards actually decrease the motivation for students to complete the activity?

Hanus and Fox (2015) found that students who participated in a gamified classroom based course “tended to decrease in motivation, satisfaction, and empowerment”.  If this what can happen in a traditional classroom setting I would imagine this would happen with online learners and my fear would be it would put them off and potential lose them from the course.

The big question for me is whether we should (or could in the current climate) invest the time/money/etc on gamifying activities for online courses if students are not going to use them?

My initial answer is to trial it out with a couple of different activities, you have to remember this will not work for all activities.

In my experience, from introducing co-operative learning activities, I have found that if you ask the students for their thoughts on something before they actually see or experience it they tend to be more negative compared to the feedback you could get after they have experienced it.

Based on the feedback, I always ask for suggestions of improvements too, you can then take this forward but you have to be careful and have a good variety and balance of activities.  If the SBOSE module was full of these “games” I think I personally would lose interest very quickly (no matter how much of a gamer I am).

Gamification has been an interesting topic to look at showing the pros and cons, the research showed what my initials thoughts were but it is something I will add to my ever growing list for my distance learning programme.  Initial thoughts are trialling one or 2 gamified activities in the drier theory subjects and taking it from there.  I will need to utilise the expertise of the Learning Technologies team, I don’t have access to all the software I may need, and show case these to the rest of the team and then cross college once some of the issues are ironed out.

 

 

References:

Domínguez, A., Saenz-de-Navarrete, J., de-Marcos, L., Fernández-Sanz, L., Pagés, C. and Martínez-Herráiz, J. (2013). Gamifying learning experiences: Practical implications and outcomes. Computers & Education, 63, pp.380-392.

Dredge, S. (2014). Why Angry Birds are slightly miffed… 10 key facts about mobile games in 2014. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/may/03/mobile-games-ten-things-you-need-to-know [Accessed 7 April 2016].

Hanus, M. and Fox, J. (2015). Assessing the effects of gamification in the classroom: A longitudinal study on intrinsic motivation, social comparison, satisfaction, effort, and academic performance. Computers & Education, 80, pp.152-161.

 

Interesting Reading

Attali, Y. and Arieli-Attali, M. (2015). Gamification in assessment: Do points affect test performance?. Computers & Education, 83, pp.57-63.

Bartel, A. and Hagel, G. (2014). Engaging Students with a Mobile Game-Based Learning System in University Education. International Journal of Interactive Mobile Technologies, 8(4), pp.56-60.

 

Student Motivation

What motivates us to complete online/distance learning courses?

With it being the start of the Easter break from the course I thought I would look at the motivation to complete online or distance learning courses.  The reason for this is my motivation to complete as much work as what I have at the start of the module has declined.  Work is very busy with deadlines and home life has its own demands (and there seems to be plenty of those at the moment!).  Although I am finding the course very useful and relevant to my work as well as interesting I seem to be lacking the time to sit down and actually complete all the readings and participate in the online activities as much as I would like.  I know there may be a simple answer, I just need to look at my time management but this is not the case, I know I have the time.  It is a very busy time of year at work with exams coming up for the students and deadlines that are set by external awarding bodies that are not negotiable, its the same every year and I have built this into my scheduled study times during the week but I’m concerned I am not getting through as much work as I should.  I know I will get the work done, the deadlines are a good motivator for me and the fact that I do not want to let myself and my tutors down by not completing the work.

How many of us have had that one student (or maybe a few) who never seems to get the work in on time (even though they are more than capable!) and always has an excuse? I have a few every year in my face to face classes but only have the odd one with my distance learning cohorts.  So what is the difference between on-campus students and off-campus students with regards to motivation?  Or is there a difference?

When looking into research on this topic I came across Self-Determination Theory (SDT) in quite a few papers.  Learning Theories (2014) summerises SDT as “a theory of motivation and personality that addresses three universal, innate and psychological needs: competence, autonomy and psychological relatedness.”  For someone to reach their full potential then all of these needs should be met.  Tanaka (2013) outlined 3 broad categories of motivation:

• Intrinsic – completing a tasks because it is fun and enjoyable
• Extrinsic – completing a task as there is some kind of benefit attached to it, or to avoid punishment
• Amotivation – the lack of motivation

Tanaka (2013) also detailed the four sub components of Extrinsic motivation as being:

•  External Regulation
  Learner completes tasks for rewards or avoid punishment if the task is not completed.
• Introjected Regulation
  The learner feels obliged to complete the tasks to avoid feeling guilty/shame/etc.
• Identified Regulation
  Attaching importance to the tasks to achieve the goals of the individual.
• Integrative Regulation
  This is similar to identified regulation but is completely autonomous, this only theoretical.

Although intrinsic motivation is key to learning and development it all comes down to the activities on what category of motivation is more important.  For example intrinsic motivation will be less important with a boring activity but identified regulation becomes more important as the activity needs to be completed to achieve the individual’s goal.

I think my motivation at the start of the module was lying more towards the intrinsic and identified regulation areas as the tasks were fun and they contributing towards achieving my goals but I think they are slipping down the scale slightly towards the introjected regulation category as I do not want to let me tutor and peers down but they are still important tasks to help achieve my goals.

Going back to my initial question, I don’t think there is a definitive answer to say what motivates us as individuals, at the end of the day we are individuals and the motivators will be personal.  However, if we are more aware of the various ways in which people can be motivated we can use this to design the activities they need to complete to prepare them for assessments/exams.

As for my second question, I think there is a difference in motivation between on-campus and off-campus students in the sense that the off-campus students do not have that constant contact with tutors so need to be more focussed in completing the tasks on their own and “just get on with it”.  Most of the on-campus student will probably be the same but from personal experience I find that there is a higher concentration of on-campus students becoming “lazy” and rely on the reminders from tutors to complete their work.

In conclusion, I have not really answered my questions in full (I don’t think anyone will be able to be honest) but I have become more aware of how people can be motivated and this will help me when preparing my activities for next the next cohort of students, whether it is online or face to face.

 

 

References:

Learning Theories.com, (2014). Self-Determination Theory (Deci and Ryan) – Learning Theories. [online] Learning Theories. Available at: http://www.learning-theories.com/self-determination-theory-deci-and-ryan.html [Accessed 24 March 2016].

Tanaka, M. (2013). Examining kanji learning motivation using self-determination theory. [online] Sciencedirect.com. Available at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0346251X13001139 [Accessed 24 March 2016].

Seminar Reflections

#Team_STEAM  (yes, we changed our name) were tasked to create an online seminar for our fellow peers and tutors to participate in.  Th unit we were assigned was Reaching the Online Learner.  Now I have already reflected on the group work element of this just as we had finished pulling together everything for the seminar. This time I am going to reflect on the  whole process from making our choices to the designing and delivering of the seminar.  I will also outline the main points I have taken from this experience.

Making Our Choices

Right back at the beginning of the module we were asked to choose which unit we would like to do in order of preference.  I’m not sure how anyone else chose their preferences but I looked mainly at the dates on when the seminar would be running (all the themes were interesting so it would be extremely hard to choose based on that alone).  I knew the holidays for the uni were completely different to the ones we have at work so as the last seminar would be running I would be on holiday and more than likely away for part of this, I felt this would not be fair on the group that I would be working with so this was my last choice.

When I was notified that I was given my first choice I then looked more into the themes.  The themes we were given for he Reaching the Online Learner were:

• Retention, articulation and widening access
• Institutional and pedagogical systems and models
• Online social presence
• Tutor time-management and team teaching strategies

I thought this would fit in perfectly with what I was doing at work, or so I thought.  It highlighted what I was not doing and what I should be doing.

Getting Together

At our first meeting we decided that online meetings once a week would be the best way to get together to decide what to do each week.  We also came up with our team name, we initially decided to use Some MOOCs Are Extra Tricky but as we grew closer to finishing the seminar and ready for launch we changed it to #Team_STEAM (it worked better for Twitter).  In our next meeting we had decided on our main them to be centred on retention but this soon evolved over the next few meetings to look at online social presence and tutor time-management and team teaching strategies.

 

Designing the Seminar

We designed the core tasks first, from here we could structure the seminar around what we wanted everyone to do.  I suggested using a case study and questions as I found relating the theories to a particular situation worked best for me, the team like the idea and we used my current distance learning programme for this.  It outlined where it started and the changes made to improve the retention and attainment of the students but I knew there was still a lot more that could be done (this would be a good opportunity to get input from others for me). We also had to think about those who were not necessarily in a teaching role but the themes would still be of importance to them in their current role so designed open thought discussions for those to participate in.  We kept everyone’s options open and asked them to participate in at least 2 of the discussions, whether it was the 2 case study questions or the 2 thought discussions or they could mix and match.  We wanted them to participate in the areas that most interested them or applied most to their current workplace.

Matt suggested a really interesting induction task using padlet that allowed everyone to get involved straight away without having to complete all the reading first.  Allowing students to express their thoughts in a visual way allows them to put their point across in a different manner to the traditional written text.  This is something that I really liked when I saw how it was working and think it’s is something I would be implementing in the course introduction for my own students.

A summary task was also used in the seminar to allow the participants to reflect on the themes and it allowed us, as facilitators, to see what each person took from the seminar.  As one of our themes was online social presence we thought having a podcast as the instructions to the task would be a good idea (Sophie recorded this for us), we also agreed that we would do our own team reflection podcast at the end and post this to the reflections forum so that the participants could see what we have taken from the seminar.  In hindsight we should of had a transcript for this (it was one of the comments in the reflections) but made sure there was one for the reflection podcast.

The last thing that was designed was the welcome element to the seminar, only once we were sure what was going to happen could we have our expectations in writing.  This was a mixture of text as well as a video to introduce the facilitators (we all provided Sophie with a picture of us as well as a short introduction), to give that human element, to tie in with our themes.  We also thought that using a collage of the images posted as part of the induction task for the week 2 welcome would tie in everyones thoughts to the themes.

 

What am I Taking From This Experience?

Below is my portion of the reflection podcast created for the seminar:

 

I think the main thing is to get others involved the designing of the online materials as you can’t think of all of the ideas on your own.  You can also draw on each others expertise instead of wasting time trying to learn all of these new skills when you don’t necessarily have the time to do so.  This is something I will find difficult for my current distance learning programme as I am the only one delivering the units (yes, all of them!) and not many staff have the time or the interest to deliver materials online (many of them are using the current VLE as a “dumping ground” for notes/presentations/etc).

I have been struggling on where to start to change the units I currently deliver but this has given me a fair few ideas and think I will have to almost start from scratch with the materials to a certain extent, definitely with the activities so that the students are interacting with each other more.  This is going to be a bit more difficult for my practical IT based subjects but I will take one subject at a time.

This will take time but now that I have had the opportunity to create an online unit this way I have a better idea on what I can do, I just need to get help!

 

Online Social Presence – Why Do We Need It?

Online Social presence is one of the key themes in Unit 3: Reaching The Online Learner and in short it plays a significant role within online learning, whether that is for the tutor or the student.  In fact I think this plays an important role regardless of how your course is delivered.

I deliver online courses as well as teach in a classroom and some of my classes I will only see for 2 hours in the week and even then I will only have them for 1 semester in the year (total of 32 hours).  Looking at the physical classes I have that started in January (5 new groups of students) these groups were completely new to me and at a different campus to where I normally taught.  It may have helped them knowing a bit more about me prior to meeting me for the first time when I walked into the the classroom (it probably didn’t help that none of the tutors they were used to came along to introduce me).  This may have alleviated some of the “tension” in the first few weeks while they got to know me and were comfortable coming to me for help or even speaking out when they did not understand something I was explaining.  Actually this could be good for all students prior to when they start their chosen course and possibly coming to college for the first time (must write this down for a proposal to the course leaders in the team!).

If you look at how you support the students in a face-to-face environment, you build a relationship with them and they see you and their peers as real people.  This community forms very quickly and they start to support each other.  The question is, for those of us who deliver online courses, how can we help build this community when we rarely, if ever, physically meet the students and most of our interactions are done through email or Virtual Learning Environments.  In traditional distance learning courses I have experience with this can take a long time to do just with the relationship between the tutor and students (never mind between students, this almost never happened in the past).

I was introduced to a “conceptual framework that identifies the elements that are crucial prerequisites for a successful higher educational experience” by Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2000).

 

Cognitive presence is the interaction by the students with the course content, teaching presence is the interaction by the students with the tutors and social presence is the interaction by the students (and the tutor) with the other students on the course.  All 3 of these added together is the whole educational experience of the student.  This is something we don’t really need to work at too much to happen in a face to face teaching environment, but in an online environment where you do not physically meet each other some of these need more work than others.

Changing the online content to be more interactive and engaging would take time and creativity but is not too hard to do with help from the eLearning technologists, teaching presence naturally happens as the student becomes more comfortable in the mode of study and the regular contact made by the tutor, but social presence is the one that I think would be more difficult, at the end of the day we are all names on a computer screen.

Armellini and De Stefani (2015) made a new version of the Community of Inquiry framework.  The research they conducted found that the teaching and cognitive presence were “become social”.  They kept the three overlapping presences and “kept the learning experience at the heart” (where it should be) but the new diagram shows social presence at the centre of the diagram overlapping both teaching and cognitive presence.

Apart from learning about this through the BOE programme it was something that one of my students said that made me realise how important this is and the impact it could make on my students experiences.  Two of my distance learning students came into college to sit a supervised assessment and had arranged to meet me.  They did not realise that they were both standing next to each other while they were waiting (they both commented on this too!).  Through comments during the seminar and from my students I have started to create tasks for the students to do prior to starting the online programme, a bit like what we did at the beginning of the BOE but with more of the online tools that will be used throughout the various modules they need to complete.  This will hopefully mean that the students will be more comfortable using these features in the actual modules as part of their studies (this may mean plenty of instructional videos to help them out).

I think the first steps would be getting the student to upload a photo and add a bit of information about themselves to their profile page to give that sense that name on the computer screen is real (this is the bit I am “stealing” from the course).  I will also need to develop my own social presence to show the student that yes I am human (regardless of how late I reply to emails and mark their work!) and this will hopefully help with the teacher presence element too.  I will leave it up to them on how much they want to share about themselves but will ask them to revisit their profile periodically to see if they want to update any of the information or include more (oooh this could be included as part of the PDP process, cue light bulb moment!).

In discussions with my line manager I will hopefully have this induction/orientation ready for implementation for the start of the next academic session.  I’m going to start with just a few tasks and gauge on what to add/amend based on student feedback.

I may even create a staff version for the team, help them build their online social presence as well as getting them to interact more with the VLE and to see some of the potential (they are going to love me!).

 

 

References:

Armellini, A. and De Stefani, M. (2015). Social presence in the 21st century: An adjustment to the Community of Inquiry framework. British Journal of Educational Technology, pp.1-15.

Garrison, D., Anderson, T. and Archer, W. (2000). Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment: Computer Conferencing in Higher Education. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2-3), pp.87-105.

 

Group Work Without the F2F Contact

I am a few days late in posting this up so assume I am writing this prior to the start of the student led seminar (as this is when I started writing it!).

When we initially were split into groups I was a bit anxious, I did not know the people I would be working with and there was no chance of us actually meeting up in person due to the various locations all over the UK.  I have been involved in project work where part of the team are not local so could not meet up regularly but there was still some face to face contact so we could develop as a team.  I was not sure how this was going to go.

The initial “meeting” was good, I felt we got to know a bit more about each other and there seemed to be a basic understanding that there was a set goal to work towards.  The online meeting allowed us to make decisions quickly and we could instantly voice our opinion without waiting for everyone to respond to an email or forum post.  After this meeting we tried to keep in contact using the forum set up for the group but the group felt it was more difficult as it was an extra place to check for communicating.  We had decided to use email as the main form of contact with online meetings once a week.  This worked well for us as we could get the time to work on our tasks then meet up and discuss our progress but if we needed advice or support in between we could email each other.

There was a few times I felt like I was being pushy (but I hope I wasn’t) due to the timescales we were working to as well as the workload with participating in the other seminars and my ever increasing marking pile.  I know I can be quite controlling at times and do have a tendency to want things done my way and my way alone.  I tried very hard to let everyone have their input and let them control different aspects of the seminar activities, and I think I did very well for me.  I just hope the rest of the group feel the same way.

The group had a variety of skills and knowledge which is what I think helped in the success.  I think we produced a well-constructed Moodle page with a good variety of activities, the proof will be in the level of engagement of the participants and that they can take something away from the seminar that they can implement in their own working practices.

Looking back I don’t think I would change anything, except getting in contact with my group a lot sooner than I did.  There are a few things that I have taken from this experience that I may implement when working on future projects, for example using more online meetings instead of physical meetings to save time travelling as the same decisions can be made without the face to face contact.  I also found that the meetings were more focused and we achieved more in less time.  Saying this, I do see the benefits of the face to face meeting to build the relationships.

Last thing I want to say is thank you to the group for meeting late at night due to work schedules and all the hard work to pull together all the elements of the seminar.  Here is Team_STEAM, you can follow our work using #team_STEAM on twitter:

What Assumptions Do You Make On Your Students Use Of Technology?

Our students today are all “native speakers” of the digital language of computers, video games and the Internet (Prensky, 2001).

When I first started teaching I would have agreed with this statement (I started teaching in 2008).  What opened my eyes were the number of students coming in to college who had very little IT skills or any interest in it (and they ranged from school age to around my age), I would of thought that they would be ok on a computer but I would need to show them how to use the various applications.  How wrong was I!  So, from personal experience I know that not all students can learn to use technology just by using it, they need support and guidance.

I had not heard of the terms Digital Native or Digital Immigrant till I read Selwyn (2011) as part of the Introduction to Blended and Online Learning module.  Selwyn outlined what Digital Natives and Immigrants were but promptly points out the flaws within the theory.  He also indicated what we would need to do as educators to support the technology use of our young students.  Everyone is an individual and so is how they utilise technology.

Team DigiLiterati looked at the Digital Native argument and highlighted a project undertaken by Jisc, Evaluating digital services: a visitors and residents approach, that looked at a different approach to looking at how individuals interacted with their digital environment.  It introduced the notion of visitor mode and resident mode when engaging with technology.

“When in visitor mode, individuals have a defined goal or task and select an appropriate online tool to meet their needs. There is very little in terms of social visibility or trace when online in visitor mode.

When in resident mode the individual is going online to connect to, or to be with, other people. This mode is about social presence.” (Jisc, 2014)

The guide also goes into discussing what different activities would be considered Visitor mode and what would be residents mode.  Team DigiLiterati asked us to create our own Visitor/Residents map to show how we used technology and it was interesting to see how I engaged with technology.  I did not include everything (or I would be there forever) but included what I was using for work and this course.  Although I did not get time to contribute in the discussion, I did upload my map and had a look at others. It was interesting to see how different we all used technology.

This would be an interesting task to do with students at induction (this would help with planning classroom lessons or adapt online material), halfway through the academic year then at the end of the year to see the distance they have travelled in developing their use of technology.

If you would like to try and create your own VR map, this video explains how to do it.  Feel free to share yours in the comments.

 

 

References

Jisc. (2014). Evaluating digital services: a visitors and residents approach | Jisc. [online] Available at: https://www.jisc.ac.uk/guides/evaluating-digital-services [Accessed 16 February 2016].

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants. On the Horizon, 9(5), pp.1-6.

Selwyn, N. (2011). Educating the ‘Digital Native’?. In: Education and Technology. [online] London: Continuum International Publishing Group. Available at: http://media.bloomsbury.com/rep/files/et1.pdf [Accessed 15 October 2015].

 

What Does It Take To Be An Online Tutor?

The S.M.A.E.T (Some MOOCs Are Extra Tricky) Team are in full swing of designing our tutor led seminar.  I feel the need to have a look at the skills/qualities needed to support our “students” through the 2 week seminar (our tutors are going to join in as students too!).  I’m not going to go into detail on what we will be doing (don’t want to ruin the surprise for those joining in).

I deliver online courses but they are not anything like what we are doing on the BOE or with the seminar. The online spaces are very much a place where schedules and handouts are stored along with links to online resources and weekly online meetings are used to go over the areas and give support.  This, in my opinion is by far better than what we previously offered.  After starting the BOE in September I am already seeing where I can improve the online elements and encourage the students to interact with each other more (just need to find the time to implement some of the changes!).  Enough about course design for the time being (will no doubt look at this in a later post) and lets look at the online tutor role and the qualities/skills they need.

White, Murphy, Shelley,  & Baumann (2005, p.83) state ‘Tutors who work within distance education differ markedly from their classroom counterparts in terms of the roles they assume, the ways they interact with students, and the attributes and expertise required of them’.   I completely agree with this and believe that those who will be delivering on online/distance learning courses need to be aware that they won’t be “teaching” the students (this is why the materials are online) but to facilitate and guide their learning as well as provide the necessary support to help them reach their goals.  This can take up just as much time as preparing and teaching a group of students in the classroom.

White et al (2005) conducted research in to the knowledge, attitudes and skills required by distance learning language tutors.  Although they primarily looked at the teaching of languages I feel that the broad categories they identified will apply with most subject areas:

• Qualities and affective orientation
• Pedagogical expertise
• Subject matter expertise
• IT skills
• One-to-one interactive support skills
• Self-management
• Group support and management
• Professional skills and responsibilities

These categories don’t seem that different to if you were tutoring a class face-to-face.  White et al furthered their research and devised a set of tutor maxims that were specific to distance learning tutors.

The Maxim of Empowerment:
This (in my own interpretation) is the ability to help the student to believe in themselves and help them to succeed, no matter how long it takes.  I know that we try and do this in the classroom but this is so much more important for a distance learner as they do not have conventional support group of their peers.  Although in the BOE I do not feel isolated as peer communication is encouraged and the activities have helped us build some relationships and the feeling that everyone is willing to help each other.

The Maxim of Appropriateness:
This is finding way to support the students that is appropriate for them as an individual.  The distance tutor takes on more of a support and guidance role than that of the traditional teacher role.  Finding the appropriate help can be extremely difficult but sometimes just someone to talk things through can be enough.

The Maxim of Honesty:
Most of the one to one communication will be in the form of feedback on the students performance and ensuring the feedback is honest and supportive will help build better relationships.  I operate a feedback and feedforward system that gives feedback on their work submitted and feedforward will point out skills/areas they can improve and how to do this.  If the student has not covered all areas required by the assessment this gives them guidance on what they need to change or add to their work.  If they have covered all areas and passed the assessment I will use this opportunity to help them improve skills or areas they may be assessed on in a later assessment.

The Maxim Of Openness:
Being approachable to students is very important in distance learning.  Most students are reluctant to contact their tutor even if they know the tutor is there to help.  Establishing and maintaining communication with students is key and how this is done needs to be taken into consideration.  I often come in on a Monday morning to email from my distance learning students having a rant or melt down by email at the beginning of the weekend but then another on a Sunday night saying everything is OK and they just needed a rant.  I will always follow this up with a phone call or email to make sure everything is OK.  These emails are normally from those student who have been studying with me for a while and know I will help where I can.

I suppose you can say any tutor needs these qualities/skills but I feel these are more important to the online tutor who does not have that face-to-face contact with their students where trying to identify the support the student requires can be a challenge.

References:

White, C.J., Murphy, L.M., Shelley, M.A. and Baumann, U., 2005. Towards an understanding of attributes and expertise in distance language teaching: Tutor maxims. Research in distance education, 6, pp.83-97.

Other Reading:

Palloff, R. and Pratt, K. (2003). The virtual student: a profile and guide to working with online learners. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. (Chapter 5)

Shelley, M., White, C., Baumann, U. and Murphy, L., 2006. ” It’s a unique role!” Perspectives on tutor attributes and expertise in distance language teaching. The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 7(2).

Simpson, O. (2012). Supporting students for success in online and distance education. New York: Routledge. (Chapter 3 and 4 are useful for looking at the various support needs of an online student)

 

What does it take to be an Online Learner?

This is something that I have been trying to pin point since starting this course.  I must admit I am not the best at studying without the traditional face-to-face interaction.  I have been delivering a distance learning program for a few years now, but in the beginning I did not understand (or appreciate) what it took for my learners to complete the course work and assessments without that regular contact.  Through experience and working with the learners I have come to appreciate the amount of work and the juggling act they need to do to complete the work I have asked them to do.

People who choose to complete a course through distance learning because of various reasons, and from experience this could be from one or more of the following (these examples are from my past learners):

• Working patterns do not allow commitment to a set class each week
• Single working parent with no reliable child care
• Parent looking after a disabled child or children
• Husband/partner works off-shore
• Cannot afford to give up full-time work to gain a qualification
• Course they want to study is not available locally
• Lack of reliable transport links
• Health issues
• Phobias

It is not easy to juggle work, study along with the complications of life in general.  To do this there are qualities an online learner must possess (or develop as they progress through their course).  The Illinois Online Network (cited by Palloff & Pratt, 2013, p.136) published a list of qualities of a successful online learner:

• Open minded to share life, work, and educational experiences as part of the learning process
• Able to communicate online
• Self-motivated and self-disciplined
• Willing to speak up if problems arise
• Willing and able to commit four to fifteen hours per week per course
• Able to meet minimum requirements of the program
• Accept critical thinking and decision making as part of the learning process
• Have unlimited access to a computer and the internet
• Able to think ideas through before responding
• Feel that high quality learning can take place without going to a traditional classroom

From reading the text I have had a look at myself as an online learner and if I have these qualities.  Sharing my experiences is not something I struggle with as we are asked to do this quite often at work but communicating online in a learning environment is not something I find easy, I’m hoping blogging will increase my confidence in this area.  I am committed to completing this course but am finding the juggling act difficult at the moment.  I am behind with Unit 1 but do find it difficult to speak up (was made to feel “stupid” at school when asking for help as I was “one of the brainy pupils” and shouldn’t need help).  The student led seminars are important as my participation has a direct impact on the others on the course this is an area I will (no matter what) keep on target and will catch up on what I have not been able to complete so far in any spare time I have.  I do have unlimited access to the internet, using my phone or tablet where I am not near a PC or laptop (even as far as using the Bluetooth in my car to participate in a VOH so I did not miss it!).  Although I do think before I post online or comment on other posts I probably over think and take too much time (its taken 3 days for me to complete this post and get it posted online!).

I believe not every online learner will have all of these qualities when they start to study online but as they progress through their course and are exposed to new experiences (and help from their peers and tutors) they will develop these skills and more to succeed.

References:

Palloff, R. and Pratt, K. (2003). The virtual student: The virtual student: a profile and guide to working with online learners. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Other Readings:

Palloff, R. and Pratt, K. (2003). The virtual student: a profile and guide to working with online learners. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. (Chapters 1 and 2)

Palloff, R. and Pratt, K. (2013). Lessons from the virtual classroom. San Fransisco: Jossey-Bass. (Chapter 7)

Simpson, O. (2012). Supporting students for success in online and distance education. New York: Routledge.(Chapters 1 – 3)

Stavredes, T. (2011). Effective online teaching. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. (Chapter 1)

van Rooij, S. and Zirkle, K. (2016). Balancing pedagogy, student readiness and accessibility: A case study in collaborative online course development. The Internet and Higher Education, 28, pp.1-7.