Cases on Online and Blended Learning Technologies in Higher Education: Concepts and Practices

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Cases on Online and Blended Learning Technologies in Higher Education: Concepts and Practices Yukiko Inoue University of Guam, Guam

InformatIon scIence reference Hershey • New York

Director of Editorial Content: Senior Managing Editor: Assistant Managing Editor: Publishing Assistant: Typesetter: Cover Design: Printed at:

Kristin Klinger Jamie Snavely Michael Brehm Sean Woznicki Michael Brehm, Kurt Smith, Jamie Snavely Lisa Tosheff Yurchak Printing Inc.

Published in the United States of America by Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global) 701 E. Chocolate Avenue Hershey PA 17033 Tel: 717-533-8845 Fax: 717-533-8661 E-mail: [email protected] Web site: http://www.igi-global.com/reference

Copyright © 2010 by IGI Global. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or distributed in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without written permission from the publisher. Product or company names used in this set are for identification purposes only. Inclusion of the names of the products or companies does not indicate a claim of ownership by IGI Global of the trademark or registered trademark. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Cases on online and blended learning technologies in higher education : concepts and practices / Yukiko Inoue, editor. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-60566-880-2 (hardcover) -- ISBN 978-1-60566-881-9 (ebook) 1. Education, Higher--Computer-assisted instruction--Case studies. 2. Educational technology--Case studies. 3. Blended learning--Case studies. I. Inoue, Yukiko. LB2395.7.C417 2010 378.1'734--dc22 2009034981

British Cataloguing in Publication Data A Cataloguing in Publication record for this book is available from the British Library. All work contributed to this book is new, previously-unpublished material. The views expressed in this book are those of the authors, but not necessarily of the publisher.

Editorial Advisory Board Kyle Smith, University of Guam, Guam Mark Goniwiecha, University of Guam, Guam

List of Reviewers Martin Reardon, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA Roisin Donnelly, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland Roberto Di Scala, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy Katarzyna Grzybowska, Poznan University of Technology, Poland Linda De George-Walker, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Patrick Danaher, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Richard Engstrom, Georgia State University, USA Chris Morgan,Southern Cross University, Australia John J. Doherty, Northern Arizona University, USA Kam Hou Vat, University of Macau, China Paul Shield, Queensland University of Technology, Queensland

Table of Contents

Foreword .............................................................................................................................................. xi Preface ................................................................................................................................................ xiv Acknowledgment ............................................................................................................................... xxii

Section 1 Implementing Blended Learning Technologies A: Programs/Environments Chapter 1 The Nature of Complex Blends: Transformative Problem-Based Learning and Technology in Irish Higher Education ........................................................................................................................ 1 Roisin Donnelly, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland Chapter 2 Experiences and Perceptions of Learner Engagement in Blended Learning Environments: The Case of an Australian University ................................................................................................... 23 Linda De George-Walker, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Abdul Hafeez-Baig, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Raj Gururajan, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Patrick, A. Danaher, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Chapter 3 Instructional Leadership and Blended Learning: Confronting the Knowledge Gap in Practice .......... 44 Martin R. Reardon, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA Chapter 4 Blended Learning in a Creative Writing Program: Lessons Learned from a Two-Year Pilot Study............................................................................................................................................. 63 Chris Morgan, Southern Cross University, Australia Janie Conway-Herron, Southern Cross University, Australia

Chapter 5 Blended Learning for Adaptation to Needs .......................................................................................... 76 Joan E. Aitken, Park University, USA B: Courses Chapter 6 Virtual Reality or Virtually Real: Blended Teaching and Learning in a Master’s Level Research Methods Class ....................................................................................................................... 91 John Lidstone, Queensland University of Technology, Australia Paul Shield, Queensland University of Technology, Australia Chapter 7 Teaching Online: What Does Blended Learning Require? ................................................................. 112 P. Toyoko Kang, University of Guam, Guam Chapter 8 The Perfect Blend?: Online Blended Learning from a Linguistic Perspective ................................... 132 Roberto Di Scala, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy Chapter 9 Reflections: Two Years after Implementing a Blended Educational Research Course ....................... 145 Yukiko Inoue, University of Guam, Guam

Section 2 Integrating Online Learning Technologies A: Programs/Environments Chapter 10 A Case of Using Wikis to Foster Collaborative Learning: Pedagogical Potential and Recommendations ........................................................................................................................ 167 Hong Lin, Oklahoma State University, USA Kathleen D. Kelsey, Oklahoma State University, USA Chapter 11 Virtual Organizing Professional Learning Communities through a Servant-Leader Model of Appreciative Coaching ................................................................................................................... 183 Kam Hou Vat, University of Macau, Macau

B: Courses Chapter 12 Bothering with Technology: Building Community in an Honors Seminar ........................................ 208 John J. Doherty, Northern Arizona University, USA Chapter 13 Online Materials for Teaching Japanese ............................................................................................ 227 Kai Masumi, University of Guam, Guam Chapter 14 Composition Goes Online: How a Small Pacific Island is Blogging into the Future ......................... 249 Michelle Bednarzyk, University of Guam, Guam Merissa Brown, University of Guam, Guam Chapter 15 Integrating Classroom and Online Instruction in an Introductory American Government Course ............................................................................................................................ 283 Richard Engstrom, Georgia State University, USA

Compilation of References .............................................................................................................. 296 About the Contributors ................................................................................................................... 313 Index ................................................................................................................................................... 318

Detailed Table of Contents

Foreword .............................................................................................................................................. xi Preface ................................................................................................................................................ xiv Acknowledgment ............................................................................................................................... xxii

Section 1 Implementing Blended Learning Technologies A: Programs/Environments Chapter 1 The Nature of Complex Blends: Transformative Problem-Based Learning and Technology in Irish Higher Education ........................................................................................................................ 1 Roisin Donnelly, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland Qualitative data from focus groups, reflection papers, and participant observations emphasize the need for effective interaction between pedagogy and technology to ensure that both are used to best effect in implementing problem-based learning in a blended learning environment. Chapter 2 Experiences and Perceptions of Learner Engagement in Blended Learning Environments: The Case of an Australian University ................................................................................................... 23 Linda De George-Walker, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Abdul Hafeez-Baig, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Raj Gururajan, University of Southern Queensland, Australia Patrick, A. Danaher, University of Southern Queensland, Australia The authors make an attempt to extend current understandings of blended learning, and realize that ongoing challenges cannot necessarily be resolved easily or permanently because several factors influencing the challenges lie outside the control of individual course team members.

Chapter 3 Instructional Leadership and Blended Learning: Confronting the Knowledge Gap in Practice .......... 44 Martin R. Reardon, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA The course was particularly designed to engage participants, who were seeking endorsement (i.e., certification) at the school district superintendent level, in examining the instructional leadership ramifications of the effective integration of digital technology and learning. Chapter 4 Blended Learning in a Creative Writing Program: Lessons Learned from a Two-Year Pilot Study............................................................................................................................................. 63 Chris Morgan, Southern Cross University, Australia Janie Conway-Herron, Southern Cross University, Australia The authors express the strong need for a flexible learning approach offering a variety of formats to meet the needs of a diverse student body spread across the university’s three campuses, and including older students. Many challenges were exposed through the initiative discussed. Chapter 5 Blended Learning for Adaptation to Needs .......................................................................................... 76 Joan E. Aitken, Park University, USA Describing the experiences of institutions using various levels of distance learning integration, the information of this case includes the type of technology used, the way blended learning has been configured in several contexts, and questions for the future applications of blended learning. B: Courses Chapter 6 Virtual Reality or Virtually Real: Blended Teaching and Learning in a Master’s Level Research Methods Class ....................................................................................................................... 91 John Lidstone, Queensland University of Technology, Australia Paul Shield, Queensland University of Technology, Australia As the authors maintain, it may be that technology has become virtually transparent, so that people have moved from the ‘e’ to the ‘learning,’ or, in other words, from thinking of pedagogy in terms of virtual reality to a student experience that is virtually real. Chapter 7 Teaching Online: What Does Blended Learning Require? ................................................................. 112 P. Toyoko Kang, University of Guam, Guam This case shows simple ways to make currently incomprehensible input comprehended, and to increase input, with the benefit of a memory efficient approach developed from human parser learning theory (HPLT), justifying why input comprehension matters according to HPLT.

Chapter 8 The Perfect Blend?: Online Blended Learning from a Linguistic Perspective ................................... 132 Roberto Di Scala, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy This case identifies the many challenges facing the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia as it attempts to find the optimum blend of components. The University has offered blended e-learning courses for its distance learning programs to ensure that the ‘human touch’ is included. Chapter 9 Reflections: Two Years after Implementing a Blended Educational Research Course ....................... 145 Yukiko Inoue, University of Guam, Guam Based on the instructor’s observations, as well as the student self-ratings and self-narratives, this case confirms the prediction drawn from the literature that, after all, pedagogical and technological difficulties present major challenges for blended course instruction.

Section 2 Integrating Online Learning Technologies A: Programs/Environments Chapter 10 A Case of Using Wikis to Foster Collaborative Learning: Pedagogical Potential and Recommendations ........................................................................................................................ 167 Hong Lin, Oklahoma State University, USA Kathleen D. Kelsey, Oklahoma State University, USA The author argues that although wikis have increasingly been used for collaborative classroom writing and have been hailed as a learning/writing tool that is more powerful than blogs and e-mails, the pedagogical impacts of using wikis is thus far underrepresented in the literature. Chapter 11 Virtual Organizing Professional Learning Communities through a Servant-Leader Model of Appreciative Coaching ................................................................................................................... 183 Kam Hou Vat, University of Macau, Macau The author is very much interested in enhancing the student’s experience by designing a collaborative and problem-based learning environment, which relies on the virtual organizing of the various professional learning communities distributed throughout the institution.

B: Courses Chapter 12 Bothering with Technology: Building Community in an Honors Seminar ........................................ 208 John J. Doherty, Northern Arizona University, USA The author contends that instructors of honors courses, who might be predisposed to more traditional teaching methods, need to ‘bother’ with technology in order to provide their students with the combination of learning strategies that are most efficient and effective. Chapter 13 Online Materials for Teaching Japanese ............................................................................................ 227 Kai Masumi, University of Guam, Guam The author asserts that although new software has yet to show dramatic change in student learning, it clearly gives different stimuli to the student and is useful for the student’s self study, based upon the theory that technology affect the process of foreign language learning. Chapter 14 Composition Goes Online: How a Small Pacific Island is Blogging into the Future ......................... 249 Michelle Bednarzyk, University of Guam, Guam Merissa Brown, University of Guam, Guam This case provides a detailed historical background of the course development; insights from two instructors about the process of teaching this way for the University of Guam’s diverse student population; and suggestions for future successes based on current challenges and issues. Chapter 15 Integrating Classroom and Online Instruction in an Introductory American Government Course ............................................................................................................................ 283 Richard Engstrom, Georgia State University, USA The author discusses online components to provide course material that the students would otherwise have missed due to decreased lecture time, and recognizes the opportunity to add the components as a chance to address the usual limitations of large, introductory sections.

Compilation of References .............................................................................................................. 296 About the Contributors ................................................................................................................... 313 Index ................................................................................................................................................... 318

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Foreword

In the Middle Ages, the educated class consisted largely of priests and monks, who copied the Bible and missals by hand on leaves of parchment. Each hand-written book was unique, including transcription errors (some inadvertent, some maybe deliberately introduced) and even whimsical doodles. Little other than prayer books was available when the Church was in charge of information dissemination. Later on, the need for copies of business documents was filled by public scribes who worked in the town square near the office of the clerk or registrar of documents. Johann Gutenberg’s invention of printing from movable type in the 1450s changed everything about our world. Not only did he introduce the revolutionary technology to make multiple copies of a book, but also, the new medium of printing altered the content of the book product. In addition to religious works, new secular subjects, such as histories, biographies, novels, poems, and newspapers began to appear. More people learned to read as more printed literature was produced. Merchants and tradesmen wanted an education, too, creating a middle class. The number of persons attending high school increased. More universities were established. In The Gutenberg Galaxy, Marshall McLuhan (1962) explored the symbiotic relationship between the mass media, in general, especially printing, in particular, and the larger socioculture, human selfawareness, circumspection and cognizance. McLuhan’s Understanding Media (1964) and The Medium Is the Massage (1967) continued his analysis of how the medium affects the message itself. The technology is more than just the method of transmission employed. The means (the medium) alters the end (the content). At St. Clement Schools, which I attended in Center Line, Michigan, for 11 years, teachers used the latest technology available—slide projectors, filmstrips with sound, and later, movies, then referred to as “moving pictures.” In the state-of-the-art language laboratory, the teacher, Sister Francis Marie, a Catholic nun, could monitor interactively each student’s progress and oral performance—listen and repeat, conjugate a verb, demonstrate subject-predicate agreement. She could speak to one student through his headphones to attempt to improve pronunciation, or she could broadcast directions to everyone in Spanish class. Typing with carbon paper and wet mimeograph duplicators reeking of fumes gave way to dry photocopiers. Mainframe computers, then personal computers, spelled the end of the typewriter. High school yearbook classes and clubs, then newspaper and magazine production rooms, made the transition from cut-and-paste page layouts to computerized composition. The invention of electronic mail, then the Internet, changed forever the way people communicate, search for, retrieve and deliver information. Each new technological invention introduced new means, and along with that, new ways of perceiving the message itself.

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Educators have been in the forefront in the introduction and employment of new technologies in the classroom. Students utilize and master the technologies, then go on in their own careers to design new ones. Every era and every step forward have had its doomsday naysayers. Education of the masses in free public schools would make the world a more vulgar place, some claimed. Free public libraries would denigrate learning, they said. But the historical record and empirical evidence have not born out those fears. Instead, the United States Congress went ahead anyway and established the land grant university system to locate and support with federal funding a “state university” in every state and territory. Cities undertook the founding of free public libraries for everyone, city colleges and city universities, using local tax regimes approved by voters. Sons and daughters of farmers, teamsters, coopers, butchers and bakers went to college, earned degrees, became intellectually productive knowledge workers, and moved up the rungs of the economic and social ladder to join the ranks of the middle class. From personal experience, I know that the son of a factory assembly line worker can become a university professor capable of understanding complex concepts, conducting lectures, making academic presentations, producing research results, and writing them up for publication. When Barack Obama, the son of a visiting Kenyan student father and a Kansan-Hawaiian mother, can become a lawyer, professor, senator, and be elected president of the United States, almost anything is possible. American students know that, through their earnest endeavors, they can achieve higher aspirations. Other nations are studying, emulating and replicating free public schools for all children, free public libraries for everyone, and political systems that provide fair and equal treatment and suffrage for all. Dictators are afraid of open societies and the free flow of information. The introduction of the Internet promises new possibilities for educating students. Moodle and other interactive programs allow students in distant, even remote and isolated, locations to pursue courses and programs not previously offered in their areas. On small islands, such as in Micronesia, and in other developing countries, students can use the Internet and email to enroll in and complete university courses and finish entire distance education degrees successfully. Professors have identified ways to use email and the Internet in their traditional courses, by keeping in touch with their students via listservs, with course Web sites, posted syllabi, reserve readings online, and important links to explore. Students on campus can also take advantage of the new technologies, using the Internet and e-mail, to enhance the classroom experience in blended learning opportunities. Students can send in their assignments via email to the professor, or upload them to the Web page, where they can be viewed and critiqued by other readers, fostering a collaborative environment. Students can communicate with each other, and with the instructor, outside of class, using the Web page. Professors can send out questions or new assignments electronically, or return corrected assignments. In the chapters of this book of cases, researchers present their findings concerning professors’ classroom use of listservs, course Web sites, Wikis, blogs, and Moodle for teacher-student interaction and learning. The process is interactive and the learning occurs on both sides. Professors learn from the students. Students learn from the teachers and from each other. The possibilities and progress are limited only by our imagination and creativity. Research, such as that in the present work, serves to analyze, evaluate, assess, and improve some of the new functions, roles, and perceptions. Collaborations, critiques, analyses, and syntheses will develop still further uses,

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and newer methods and media, on future journeys in education. Indeed, this book of cases celebrates such new journeys. It’s a brave new world, and we are creating it.

Mark C. Goniwiecha University of Guam, Guam September 2009

Mark Goniwiecha is a professor of library science at the University of Guam. He is the author of numerous publications, including articles in Taiheiyo Gakkai Shi—Journal of the Pacific Society—(Tokyo, Japan), Government Publications Review (New York), Contemporary Pacific (Honolulu, Hawaii), Reference Services Review (Ann Arbor, Mich.), Libri (Copenhagen, Denmark), The Nation (Bangkok, Thailand), Pacific Daily News (Hagåtña, Guam), and others. He served two terms as the Guam Library Association chapter representative to the American Library Association Council. Email: [email protected]. edu

REFERENCES McLuhan, M. (1962). The Gutenberg galaxy: The making of typographic man. Toronto, Canada: University of Toronto Press. McLuhan, M. (1964). Understanding media: The extensions of man. New York: McGraw-Hill. McLuhan, M. (1967). The medium is the massage: An inventory of effects. New York: Bantam Books / Random House.

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Preface

In the Internet Age, the notion that a traditional classroom with face-to-face instruction, by itself, is no longer adequate for higher education teaching and learning as one that has considerable intrinsic merit. Institutions of higher education, therefore, realize that lecture-based teaching methods alone will not prepare students for the challenges they will face. The State University of New York and the University of Illinois, for instance, have entirely abolished the separation of online programs from campus-based programs, awarding the same degree for both programs and allowing students themselves to combine campus and online coursework as best suits their individual needs and choices (Theil, 2008). Furthermore, in Theil’s words: The move to such hybrids will be driven by students questioning why they should sit in lectures taking notes three times a week when they can go once and do the rest at their own pace online…. By combining face-to-face interaction with new online options in more powerful ways, these programs should offer the best of both worlds—rendering moot today’s debate over whether virtual or in-person degrees are best. (p. 65) In spite of both substantive and specious concerns about the pervasive ongoing role of computers in modern life, the Internet is already well established in higher education and promises to continue to fill all the crevices of the educational fabric (Rudestam & Schoenholtz-Read, 2002, p. 9). Higher education is now available at the students’ fingertips, as technology enables them to do their tasks more efficiently, effectively, comfortably, and quickly (Sethy, 2008, p. 29). Moreover, the rapid growth in the use of new technologies, particularly in the use of the Internet and Web-based communication, has provided higher education instructors and institutions with new options that enable them to experiment with the most suitable mix of instructional approaches and learning environments. An especially important aspect of today’s higher education environment is that students are more diverse than ever before. In the United States, for example, in addition to a more diversified student population in terms of ethnicity, social status, and expectation, the proportion of non-traditional university students has been steadily increasing. Higher education institutions are thus being challenged, not only by the rapidly developing information and communication technologies, but also by the non-traditional character of today’s university students as well (Orhan, 2008). These changing student demographics and expectations, as well as technological innovation and the imperatives of a lifelong learning agenda, are transforming higher education for the 21st century.

THE COMING OF THE AGE OF BLENDED LEARNING Internet-based online distance education is certainly becoming an important long-term strategy for many institutions of higher education throughout the world. However, blended learning promises to be an even

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more significant modality than an entirely online learning approach. Blended learning is not entirely new. “Back in the last century, the term ‘blended learning’ was invented, accompanied with typical e-learning hype…. It was thought that developing a blended learning solution was all about choosing from an ever-widening selection of methods and media” (LINE Communications, 2006, p. 1). In the past five years, particularly, the concept of blended learning has become widely accepted in both academic and corporate worlds: the term is now generally used to mean a structured process that involves a mix of teaching and learning activities, including e-learning, face-to-face instruction, and telephone contact (CILIP, 2008). Blended learning is viewed as having myriad possibilities for enhancing higher education instruction, primarily “because new ways of thinking about course design are required to reconcile traditional values and practices with evolving expectations and technological possibilities” (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008, p. 3). In a study by Orhan (2008) focused on blended learning and teaching, college students felt that: “the integration of face-to-face and online learning environments was more enjoyable than purely online distance learning or purely face-to-face environments” (p. 61). In Orhan’s words: Blended learning can improve students’responsibility for their own learning through online activities and improve their motivation through face-to-face interactivity. In blended learning environments, instructors may be able to spend less time delivering content and more time guiding students…when trying to implement a student-centered learning environment. (p. 64) Orhan (2008), therefore, recommends that instructors should be (1) encouraged to forego strictly traditional lecturing in favor of courses designed to incorporate blended learning approaches, and (2) trained for the dual roles of both content developer and facilitator in courses redesigned for blended learning environments. Based upon the view that the value of blended learning lies in identifying situations in which technology-enhanced learning experiences might prove more effective and efficient in supporting meaningful learning, the following success factors for blended e-learning described by CILIP (2008) are useful for instructors in designing effective blended learning courses: • work with and within the context (blended e-learning is most effective when it is designed and developed within and for a specific context); • use blended learning as a driver for transformative course redesign (the best results are obtained when blended learning is used as a driver for course redesign that includes analyzing the current course and obtaining feedback from stakeholders, especially students); • help students develop their own conceptions of the learning process (students are more likely to engage in learning and teaching activities if they understand the rationale for it); and • disseminate and communicate results of findings (the report authors highlight the importance of disseminating the findings from research about blended e-learning). (p. 3) The mixture of blended learning can incorporate a variety of teaching and learning styles, course materials, and learning technologies, such as traditional classroom settings (including lecture theaters, and laboratory environments), CD-ROMs and DVDs, e-mails, course management systems, e-books, virtual learning environments (including message boards and chart rooms), asynchronous online delivery and tools such as Wikis and blogs, and synchronous online delivery and tools such as instant messaging (Gulc, 2006). The choice of a blend is best determined by the nature of the course and its learning objec-

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tives, instructor experiences and teaching styles, and student needs. Blended learning is also concerned with effectively leveraging the strengths of differing kinds of learning activities and venues in achieving some overarching learning objectives (Howard, Remenyi, & Pap, 2006, p. 1). Insofar as the aim of blended learning is to meet the challenges of widely differing situations, the following characterization is intriguing: Blended learning isn’t really about assembling media or methods. It isn’t design by numbers. What blended learning must do is to provide an integrated environment in which to learn. It must provide an experience that is more effective than the sum of its parts. In fact, blended learning is like so much that happens in our increasingly networked world: it’s not the individual components that matter, but the way they relate. It’s not the nodes in the network, but the way they link together. (LINE Communications, n. d., p. 1) Blended learning is considered to be an effective first step toward implementing fully online learning. Even when it is the first step, “maximizing success in a blended learning initiative requires a planned and well-supported approach that includes a theory-based instructional model, high-quality faculty development, course development assistance, learner support, and ongoing formative and summative assessment” (Dziuban, Hartman, & Moskal, 2004, p. 3). This point deserves emphasis. The potential for new technologies to increase the quantity and timeliness of information from learning activities performed in different venues will be realized only if higher education instructors are motivated to use this information to improve the quality of teaching (Howard et al., 2006). That is why preparing faculty for blended and online learning is so important.

PURPOSE OF THIS BOOK Blended learning, as previously discussed, has many faces (including combining instructional modalities or delivery media, and integrating instructional methods). In this publication, Cases on Blended and Online Learning Technologies in Higher Education: Concepts and Practices, blended learning is generally understood as a balanced combination of traditional classroom-based activities with appropriately designed online learning experiences, or the convergence between traditional campus-based learning and online/distance learning. Despite the growing interest in blended learning approaches, there are few published cases that provide specific insights into how blended learning courses should be designed, implemented, and evaluated in order to maximize teaching effectiveness and learning quality. The interest “in blended learning—thoughtful fusion of classroom and online learning experiences—has surged in the past two to three years throughout higher education. The need to provide more engaged learning experiences— and greater flexibility for students and faculty—are at the core of this interest” (Rochester Institute of Technology, 2008, p. 1). Three guiding principles of the book are as follows: • Blended learning might be the solution. It is a time to think about redesigning courses for blended learning, reconciling “traditional values and practices with evolving expectations and technological possibilities” (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008, p. 3). In this regard, the cases in the book focus on the challenges and directions of redesigning courses, especially for student-directed learn-

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ing, based upon a wide range of designs, methodologies, and applications of blended and online learning—thus from course design to assessment of learning outcomes. • Experience is the best teacher, as the adage goes. This is especially true for the contributors of cases who are eager to discuss and share their real-life examples and experiences in order to make a positive impact on blended and online learning. Their examples and experiences can be applied to any other settings or institutions of higher education throughout the world. • Lifelong learning is an educational agenda. Lifelong learning is one of the most important engines driving education in the 21st century (Magoulas, 2008). Providing cases of blended and online learning technologies and environments for different needs and settings, the book discusses the role today’s higher education instructors and institutions can play as they become genuinely lifelong instructors and institutions, better helping students to survive in a technologically sophisticated society. The aim of this book of cases is to contribute to an educational transformation based upon new models of teaching and learning, and made possible by “the confluence of new pedagogies (e.g., the change in emphasis from teaching-centered to student-centered learning paradigms), new technologies (e.g., the rapid spread of the Internet, World Wide Web, and personal computers), and new theories of learning (e.g., brain-based learning and social constructivism)” (Dziuban et al., 2004, p. 2). It is hoped that the book will be a valuable resource for both the conceptual understanding and practical application of blended and online learning technologies in higher education.

ORGANIZATION OF THIS BOOK This book of cases consists of 15 chapters. A brief description of each of the cases follows: Chapter One, “The Nature of Complex Blends: Transformative Problem-Based Learning and Technology in Irish Higher Education,” discusses the case of blending technology and problem-based learning (PBL) group interaction in the context of academic staff development with two objectives in mind: (1) to establish, in a PBL tutorial setting, the factors that govern the success of blended PBL; and (2) to identify technical, academic, and interactional indicators of learning in the online and face-to-face PBL tutorial. Qualitative data from focus group interviews, reflection papers, and participant observations emphasize the need for effective interaction between pedagogy and technology to ensure that both are used to best effect in implementing PBL in a blended learning environment. Thus pedagogy and technology must work effectively together. Chapter Two, “Experiences and Perceptions of Learner Engagement in Blended Learning Environments: The Case of an Australian University,” discusses the case of a collaboration by the faculty of business and education, presenting a detailed examination of three postgraduate courses in relation to design, development, and management of blended learning as it intersects with learner engagement. The authors make an attempt to extend current understandings of blended learning: what it is, in what contexts it occurs, how its effectiveness can be maximized, and what its connections with learner engagement are and should be. The authors realize that these ongoing challenges, including issues such as student retention and attrition, cannot necessarily be resolved easily or permanently because several factors influencing the challenges lie outside the control of individual course team members. Chapter Three, “Instructional Leadership and Blended Learning: Confronting the Knowledge Gap in Practice,” discusses an initiative taken by a professor in the educational leadership department to explore the concept of blended instruction in his own delivery of a doctoral course. This course was designed to engage participants, who were typically seeking endorsement (i.e., certification) at the school district

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superintendent level, in examining the instructional leadership ramifications of the effective integration of digital technology and learning. Many challenges were exposed through the initiative discussed. It may be that the advantage of this approach from the disruptive innovation perspective was a disadvantage for those developing the program in that the very remoteness of the participants exacerbated the ill effects of the unexpected missteps encountered in developing the new program. Chapter Four, “Blended Learning in a Creative Writing Program: Lessons Learned from a TwoYear Pilot Study,” discusses the case of a two-year pilot study of blended learning in an undergraduate creative writing program. The authors express the strong need for a flexible learning approach offering a variety of formats in order to meet the needs of a diverse student body spread across the university’s three campuses, and including older students with competing family and work commitments. Drawing from the evaluation data, the case details both the successes and problems encountered in the transition to a blended learning format, along with lessons learned along the way. The author concludes that although the entrenched inequities between distance and on-campus students are no longer necessary or conscionable, achieving parity will require reform at the institutional level as well. Chapter Five, “Blended Learning for Adaptation to Needs,” discusses the author’s observation and experience with multiple blended approaches in communication arts, and emphasizes that blended learning is more than the old learning modes of correspondence and televised courses. The study describes the experiences of both state and private institutions using various levels of distance learning integration. The case information includes the type of technology used, the way blended learning has been configured in several contexts, and questions for the future applications of blended learning in undergraduate and graduate programs. The author believes that blended communication is a process of individuals’ adapting to the Internet to increase their overall communication effectiveness. Chapter Six, “Virtual Reality or Virtually Real: Blended Teaching and Learning in a Master’s Level Research Methods Class,” discusses implementing blended learning approaches in the case of a master’s level research methodology course, which was intended to help students become critical professional consumers of research reports. The authors recognize that higher education instructors are now placed in a pivotal position and are required to take up the work of designing high-quality teaching and learning for students in order to meet standards set by governments, which include demands for increased use of technology. As the authors maintain, it may be that technology has become virtually transparent, so that people have moved from the “e” to the “learning,” or, in other words, from thinking of pedagogy in terms of virtual reality to a student experience that is virtually real. Chapter Seven, “Teaching Online: What Does Blended Learning Require,” asks the following question in a study of blended learning for foreign/second language acquisition: How can the instructor increase input, and improve the comprehension of input, in a second-language classroom? Describing blended learning and teaching for foreign/second language classes, this case attempts to answer the above-stated question by showing simple ways to make currently incomprehensible input comprehended, and to increase input, with the benefit of a memory efficient approach developed from human parser learning theory (HPLT). The author justifies why input comprehension matters according to HPLT, and shows how simply the instructor can make audio files, for example. Chapter Eight, “The Perfect Blend?: Online Blended Learning from a Linguistic Perspective,” discusses the case of online degree courses offered by the communication sciences and economics faculty at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, where the author is currently a contracted professor in charge of two courses in English language. Since 2002, the University has offered blended e-learning courses for its distance learning programs that provide actual, physical links between teachers and students so as to ensure that the “human touch” is included. The study identifies the many challenges facing the University as it attempts to find the optimum blend of components, and also notes the problems posed by extraneous factors such as obsolete phone-line connections.

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Chapter Nine, “Reflections  Two Years after the Implementation of a Blended Educational Research Course,” discusses a pilot study incorporating blended learning in an introductory educational research course at an American Pacific island university, and presents a detailed overview of how the instructor applied blending learning design to this particular course. The author compares her goals for the course with the concept of blended learning, and discusses reasons why the two complemented one another. Based on the instructor’s observations, as well as the student self-ratings (quantitative data) and self-narratives (qualitative data), this case confirms the prediction drawn from the literature that pedagogical and technological difficulties present major challenges for blended course instruction. The need for future research to obtain additional empirical evidence about student achievements and outcomes is also noted. Chapter Ten, “A Case of Using Wikis to Foster Collaborative Learning: Pedagogical Potential and Recommendations,” discusses a Wikibook project involving graduate students teaching adult education in the American mid-South. Findings from this case challenge idealistic hypotheses that Wiki work, without careful design and implementation, is naturally beneficial. Although Wikis have increasingly been used for collaborative classroom writing and have been hailed as a learning/writing tool that is more powerful than blogs and e-mails, the pedagogical impacts of using Wikis is thus far underrepresented in the literature. It is the belief of the authors that the Wiki work presented in this case is consistent with is consistent with Fishman and Pea’s statement about enhancing learner’s networked learning and encourages learners to become self-directed lifelong learners through collaborative writing and public presentation of their work. Chapter Eleven, “Virtual Organizing Professional Learning Communities through a Servant-Leader Model of Appreciative Coaching,” presents the case of a set of empowerment concerns in the context of transforming classes of student and teacher learners, considered as department-wide learning units in higher education, into professional learning communities (PLCs). In particular, the author is interested in enhancing the student’s experience by designing a collaborative and problem-based learning environment, which relies on the virtual organizing of the various PLCs distributed throughout the institution. Of specific interest to the author is the generative potential of the PLCs when nurtured by the practice of appreciative coaching, adapted from the established positive change paradigm of appreciative inquiry, through a servant-leader model of student-centered education. Chapter Twelve, “Bothering with Technology: Building Community in an Honors Seminar,” discusses the use of technology to enrich the learning experiences of students in a first year honors course in critical reading and writing, and examines the framework of Web-based learning. Noting that honors courses involve an especially concentrated curriculum, the author contends that instructors of honors courses, who might be predisposed to more traditional teaching methods, need to “bother” with technology in order to provide their students with the combination of learning strategies that are most efficient and effective. The highlight of this case is an extensive discussion of four strategies to build community through interaction and engagement. The case also provides the course syllabus and teaching materials. Chapter Thirteen, “Online Materials for Teaching Japanese,” examines the merits and demerits of learning the Japanese language through blended and online instruction, based upon the theory that technology-based learning methods affect the process of foreign language learning in terms of motivation, performance, and effectiveness. Hiragana practice software developed by the author was used in teaching Japanese. The author asserts that although new software has yet to show dramatic change in student learning, it clearly gives different stimuli to the student and is useful for the student’s self study. Moreover, a blended learning course comprised of both face-to-face instruction and online learning is promising because learning a language requires both memorization and repeated exercise outside the classroom.

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Chapter Fourteen, “Composition Goes Online: How a Small Pacific Island is Blogging into the Future,” provides a historical background of the course development; insights from two instructors about the process of teaching this way for the University of Guam’s diverse student population; and suggestions for future successes based on current challenges and issues. This was the first offering of an online version of the English course at the University. As emphasized in the chapter, the authors argue that students at the University are ready for more technology in their classroom environments, and the University should accommodate their requests in order to successfully prepare them for their careers. Chapter Fifteen, “Integrating Classroom and Online Instruction in an Introductory American Government Course,” compares two sections of an introduction to American government course. One section involved both lecture and online components, while the other was taught as a typical lecture course. The author designed the online components to provide course material that the students would otherwise have missed due to decreased lecture time, and also with the intention of improving the course. The author recognizes the opportunity to add a significant online course component as a chance to address the usual limitations of large, introductory sections. The author also believes hybrid online classes will most likely be adopted on a case by case basis, depending on the interest of the instructor. The prospective audience thus includes professors, researchers, trainers, library media specialists, teachers, administrators, and educational technologists (who design instruction, produce instructional materials, and manage instructional computing services or learning resources collections) in academic communities particularly. This book will be helpful to all professionals who are enthusiastic about exploiting the potential of blended and online learning to maximize the teaching-learning process of higher education. The book can also serve as a library reference, faculty manual, course supplement, reading text, and resource for instructors. Finally, it should be emphasized that the goal of this book is to appeal to all higher education stakeholders—especially students, faculty, and administrators—with a professional interest in blended and online learning technologies and environments. Anyone working with blended or online learners, or anyone engaged in such learning, will also find this book beneficial.

Yukiko Inoue Mangilao, Guam April 2009

REFERENCES CILIP. (2008). Developing the best blend? From blended e-learning to blended learning. Retrieved January 20, 2009, from http://www/cilip.org.uk/publications/updatemagazine/archieve/archiv... Dziuban, C. D., Hartman, J. L., & Moskal, P. D. (2004, March 30). Blended learning. EDUCAUSE ECAR Research Bulletin, 7. Retrieved April 2, 2008, from http://www.educause.edu/ecar Garrison, D. R., & Vaughan, N. D. (2008). Blended learning in higher education: Framework, principles, and guidelines. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass (A Wiley Imprint). Gulc, E. (2006). Using blended learning to accommodate different learning styles. Retrieved January 13, 2009, from http://escalate.ac.uk/2916

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Howard, L., Remenyi, Z., & Pap, G. (2006). Adaptive blended learning environments. Paper presented at the 9th International Conference on Engineering Education. Retrieved January 13, 2009, from http://

www.vanth.org/docs/ICEE%20Howard%20Remenyi%20Pap.pdf/ LINE Communications. (n. d.). Blended learning. Retrieved January 10, 2009, from www.line.co.uk Magoulas, G. (2008). E-infrastructures and technologies for lifelong learning. Retrieved January 14, 2009, from http://vwresearchersgroup.pbwiki.com/E-Infrastructures+and+ Technologies+

for+Lifelong+Learning Orhan, F. (2008). Redesigning a course for blended learning environment. Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education, 9(1), 54-66. (ERIC Database #ED499473) Rochester Institute of Technology. (2008). Update on blended learning. Retrieved December 20, 2008, from http://online.rit.edu/about/newsletter/one_article.cfm?which=131 Rudestam, K. E., & Schoenholtz-Read, J. (Eds.). (2002). Handbook of online learning: Innovations in higher education and corporate training. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Sethy, S. S. (2008). Distance education in the age of globalization: An overwhelming desire towards blended learning. Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education, 9(3), 29-44. Theil, S. (2008). Tune in tomorrow. Newsweek (Aug 18- 25), p. 65.

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Acknowledgment

Producing a book of cases is an exciting but complex endeavor. I would like to thank the staff at IGI Global, especially Mehdi Khosrow-Pour, Kristin Klinger, Jan Travers, Jennifer Neidig, Kristin Roth, Andrew Bundy, and particularly Tyler Heath who worked with me from start to finish. Their assistance and expertise was invaluable to me throughout the production process—from the initial prospectus to the edited book. As always, working with the reliable and high-energy team at IGI Global was a thoroughly enjoyable experience. Producing a book of cases involves the efforts of many other individuals as well. I would especially like to thank editorial advisory board members and all those who reviewed the cases. Without such reviewers’ comprehensive, critical, and constructive comments and suggestions, this book would not have been possible. Special thanks to Mark Goniwiecha, professor of library science at the University of Guam, who wrote the Foreword to the book. His extensive knowledge and experience, not only in library/information literacy but also in the use of technology for diverse learners, made his contribution especially valuable. More than anything else, a book of cases represents the synthesis of its many contributions. I would like to express my sincere appreciation to all the case contributors who wrote, revised, clarified, and responded to my many inquiries, especially during the editing phase. Many of the case contributors were also the case reviewers. This book and its value are truly built upon these contributions, which come from countries as diverse as Australia, Guam, Island, Italy, Macao, and the United States. Most of the contributors would not identify themselves as technologists; rather, they are using new technologies, in both blended and online learning, to deliver or to reinforce the content in their areas of expertise. The case contributors have shared their real-life experiences—thus their own practices, applications, challenges, and discoveries— as they seek to improve university teaching and learning in the Internet Age of today. In closing, I would like to thank my colleagues and my students at the University of Guam for their encouragement and their countless helpful suggestions during the development of this book. Finally, I want to acknowledge and thank Kazuko Onodera, a retired educator and my academic and lifelong mentor, who has never lost faith in my scholarly endeavors and personal aspirations.

Yukiko Inoue Mangilao, Guam April 2009

Section 1

Implementing Blended Learning Technologies

A: Programs/Environments

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Chapter 1

The Nature of Complex Blends: Transformative Problem-Based Learning and Technology in Irish Higher Education Roisin Donnelly Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland

ABSTRACT This chapter discusses the complexities of blending technologies and problem-based learning (PBL) group interaction within the context of academic development in higher education. For both designers and tutors, it is important to seek best practices for combining instructional strategies in face-to-face and computer-mediated environments that take advantage of the strengths of each and avoid inherent weaknesses. A qualitative case study of the lived experiences of 17 academic staff participants in a blended PBL module over a two year period was considered likely to provide a much-needed analysis of current thinking and practice on the potential of interaction in this form of higher education professional academic development. Specific aspects of interaction (technical, peer, content, and the learning experience) within blended PBL tutorials are analysed to provide research-based evidence on the realities of delivering a PBL programme using technology. The study reported in the chapter argues that the intersection of PBL and learning technologies can offer an innovative way of teaching and learning and is a reflection of pedagogy and technology as an integrated model that can work effectively together. The findings show that the synergy from the collaborative blended PBL approach in this module can result in the coherent and comprehensive provision of training, support, and research throughout higher education institutions.

INTRODUCTION In higher education institutions (HEIs) in Ireland, as elsewhere, the use of online technologies has DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch001

become an increasingly important challenge in academic staff development. As a field, blended learning has impacted on higher education in local, national and global contexts and is fast-changing, highly fragmented, but still rapidly growing. The Internet has made it impossible for HEIs to ignore

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The Nature of Complex Blends

technology in fulfilling their strategic mission and responding to the expectations of a diverse student body. The promises of blended learning in the literature are extensive: increased learning, a reduction in the need for ‘brick and mortar,’ increased engagement, collaboration, and higher quality learning. However, there has been little examination or questioning of the interplay of new technologies and pedagogies in the context of higher education academic development. Transformative learning theory is being proposed in this study as a means to understand the complexities of education in an age where information and communication technologies (ICTs) are constantly reshaping and redefining our accepted notions of what it means to teach and learn in a HE environment. It is recognised that transformative learning is a complex process of interaction among people, the tools they use and the context in which they are embedded. By analysing the blended problem-based learning (PBL) tutorial within a framework of transformative learning in professional academic development in higher education, the purpose of this chapter is to illuminate a complex situation so as to understand it better and therefore be enabled to facilitate beneficial change. Based upon extensive empirical research in higher education in recent years, Savin-Baden (2006) has concluded that the objective of combining PBL and e-learning is in itself complex. There are two objectives of this case study: •

•

To establish, in a PBL tutorial setting, the factors that govern the success of blended PBL To identify technical, academic and interactional indicators of learning in the online and face-to-face PBL tutorial

This chapter argues for a much-needed analysis of current thinking and practice on the transformative potential of interaction in professional

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academic development in higher education; the chapter begins with an illumination on the background and context of the case study on the blended PBL module for academic development, with the associated literature review focusing on the fields of PBL, e-learning, and the convergence of the two. Special attention is given to the importance of interaction in the blended learning environment. Thereafter the case study is discussed and details provided on the research findings. Current challenges are outlined and conclusions drawn.

BACKGROUND The role of blended learning within a pedagogical approach such as PBL has been gaining international recognition among practitioners and academic educators alike. Research into the concepts, tools, and methodologies of both e-learning and PBL has increased in momentum in recent years. However, contemporary commentators have voiced concerns with the speed at which technology has been proceeding at the expense of pedagogical advances. Within the specific field of blended learning, Jones (2006) has concluded that the practice of blended learning has outpaced the research owing, in part, to the rapid increase in both the quantity in use of and the sophistication of the technology. Issues related to the design and implementation of blended learning environments have increasingly surfaced in recent years, as technological advances continue to blur the lines between distributed learning and traditional campus-based learning. This has raised questions about advances in technology during that last decade that have brought challenges and opportunities to the ways in which individuals are educated and trained, in particular through online instruction. There is a qualitative difference between ‘teaching online’ and merely ‘putting a course online’; a central feature of academic staff development involves conveying the difference between


using technology as a delivery mechanism and using it as a communications medium. The impetus for blended learning depends partly on a growing acceptance that higher educational and training programmes should be student-centred and partly on the need to develop enhanced efficiency in the provision of teaching. This case study is taking cognisance of the need for strong and effective interaction between pedagogy and technology to ensure that both are used to best effect in implementing PBL in a blended learning environment. Gredler (2005) in his consideration of learning and instruction suggests that the role of technology in learning remains an issue for theory development and research. Specifically, there is a need for research on learning principles that address teacher-student interactions, student-to-student communication and student-to-subject-matter interactions for various uses of computer technology in blended environments. There seems to be much evidence in the literature that as blends of Internet-based teaching and learning have proliferated, researchers, theoreticians, and pedagogues have recognized that an educationally viable environment requires students to interact with content and with one another. The chapter explores all these core issues in depth.

THE RESEARCH CONTEXT The focus of the research reported here is a Postgraduate Diploma module on designing elearning for academic staff in an institution of higher education, which will be referred to as the Institute. Within the context of the Irish higher educational system, a module is a unit of study on a programme. The diploma programme is typical of many in HEIs today. In this context, the demand for institutions to put e-learning initiatives and the accompanying academic staff training and development firmly on their agendas has resulted in a number of emergent issues. For example,

many academic staffs lack the online experience of the Internet generation, and so do not feel as confident in an online environment as they do in a traditional classroom setting. In this context, the problem is a social rather than a pedagogical one and lecturers may need to experience being online students themselves in order to gain the necessary confidence to move to facilitating an online environment. Putting staff training online can be one response to this problem, but making more efficient use of lecturer time is more often the reason why the online environment is used. Such moves can lead to a negative rather than a positive experience of the online environment, in some cases leading academic staff to believe that buying in to this growing phenomenon means subscribing to their own eventual redundancy. As increasingly it is also becoming important not just to make such training more accessible, but explicitly designed to produce qualitatively improved pedagogy (Ham & Davey, 2005, p. 263), it is important to ensure that the lecturer’s first experience of an online environment is positive, one that will allow her or him to see the pedagogical possibilities at her or his disposal. The institution in which the study took place is a large multi-campus, multi-discipline organization, with subjects offered within Applied Arts, Built Environment, Business, Engineering, Science, Tourism, and Food. The current and emerging higher education environment in the Institute, as elsewhere, is seeking solutions to problems of changing paradigms of learning and the influx of learning technologies. Skilbeck (2001) believes: “the essential test for such higher education institutions is their readiness to introduce policies and programmes to bring in and provide opportunity for ‘new blood’ as well as for the continuing development of the capabilities of existing staff for amongst others, mastery of the new technologies in both teaching and research” (p. 10). “Well-handled,” he has concluded, “the opportunities of online education could improve

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the relationships between staff and students and foster a better quality of learning” (p. 72). This study presents the opportunity to work with eager members of the teaching community in offering a novel approach to their academic development. As all participants on the module are self-selecting and choose to pursue this professional development opportunity themselves, arguably it is a situated reality that participants are motivated and keen to explore the blended PBL approach offered through the module. As it is important to incorporate capacity development in formal courses on higher education (Segrave, Holt, & Farmer, 2005), a postgraduate programme in higher education learning and teaching was developed in 2001, and has over 100 graduates today. The programme offered to academic staff still needs to be integrated with various levels and types of expert and peer practitioner support at faculty and institutional levels, provided through online and face-to-face encounters. In this way, translating their professional development experiences from the module into their own environments could become easier, allowing them to work effectively within a blended environment in the future. The nature of these academic staff’s varied work responsibilities today is complex, with demands on their time (ranging from lesson preparation, student support and research to staff meetings and curriculum development) pulling them in many directions. As a result of all the pressures academic staff face in today’s higher education environment, Donnelly and O’Farrell (2006) have argued that for their own professional development they need to be provided with streamlined learning experiences which deliver essential topics and learning materials in readily accessible formats. It is believed a central challenge here is to create and sustain quality learning environments of enduring value for teachers. The module used the WebCT course management system, which provided both asynchronous and synchronous interaction tools. For the former,

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the module had discussion forums where the participants posted their messages and its own email system that enabled the participants to exchange private emails. For synchronous communications, the module had ‘chat rooms’ where individuals exchanged instant messages at the same time.

Literature Review There has been a consistent thread of research into the fields of e-learning and PBL in recent years and less in blended learning and online academic development. There has not been a focused study of the potential of blended PBL to transform the quality of the learning experience for academic staff in their own learning and their subsequent classroom practice. This current research represents the convergence of three major activities in higher education today: academic development; the blending of the technologies within e-learning; and the pedagogy of PBL. There have been many practice-based studies in each of these fields, but arguably each remains under-researched in its own right and engaging in critical debate in this converging research area is much needed. Generally, there have been unexamined actions and initiatives that have entrenched the issues of PBL and e-learning and made each more intractable and less open to reasoned debate. Some of the main issues for the former centre on content coverage and use of appropriate assessment. It can impose steep learning curves on both tutors and students, and initial tutor awkwardness and student hostility to the process are common. For the latter, the use of technology in education strongly depends on a variety of different factors such as staff training, consistent support, and funding. Informally enthusiasm among academic staff for blended learning continues to grow and where explicit institutional policies are lacking pressure on lecturers to engage with new technologies is coming from students and from their own peers. Alongside this, new pedagogical approaches emerge on the educational scene to support


complex, flexible and integrated learning and the development of professional competencies. Although not new, PBL is one which appears to have captured the imagination and support of teachers; there has been a growing interest in the last few decades, particularly in the collaborative construction of knowledge through active learning and the importance of higher order skills such as problem solving. Given our increasingly networked society, interest has grown in such new educational methods and in where and when to teach them. PBL is an educational strategy that involves the presentation of significant, complex and real-world problems to students that are structured in such a way that there is not one specific correct answer or predetermined outcome. The blended PBL module at the heart of this study itself strives to be both proactive and responsive to the changing needs of all academic staff from across the Institute, and other institutions of higher education in Ireland. By giving the participants the opportunity to be an online and a face-to-face PBL tutor using principles of good practice in PBL, this study provides evidence of the online PBL tutor role and whether it can be as effective as the tutor in the face-to-face PBL tutorial. Central to the delivery of the module has been critical academic discourse in tandem with the exploration of innovations in practice. This study recognises that there is still confusion about the models, media and environments used to support PBL that use technology in some way, and is particularly concerned with illuminating current knowledge of PBL group-oriented interaction. Central to this aim is the need for a better system for delivering education and training for academic staff which Hameed et al. (2006) have recommended is paramount in the context of the move to a knowledge economy. Myers (2006) has made a case for such Internet-based courses being well suited for transformative pedagogy. He argues that online class discussions tend to be more collegial and informal than those that occur face-to-face, and thereby challenge con-

ventional notions of power and authority in the higher education classroom. McAuliffe and Lovell (2000) also propose that such online discussions result in a relatively egalitarian environment and this is appropriate for teaching approaches that critically examine societal patterns of power and dominance. Issues related to the design and implementation of blended learning environments have increasingly surfaced in recent years, as technological advances continue to blur the lines between distributed learning and traditional campus-based learning. This has raised questions about advances in technology during that last decade that have brought challenges and opportunities to the ways in which individuals are educated and trained, in particular through online instruction. McConnell (2006) suggests that a major motivating factor in the uptake of e-learning in organisations is “the professional development of trainers, course developers and teachers in the new form of learning provision” (p. 25). This echoes the sentiments of other researchers in the field (Segrave et al., 2005), and forms the core of many institutions’ e-learning strategies. In addition to technological challenges for teachers and academic developers, there are issues that arise during the change process from a traditional delivery mechanism, such as the lecture, to a problem-based educational model. Kolmos (2002) has reported that, in spite of an extensive staff development programme to introduce teachers to the new PBL model, the change in the nature of teaching caused problems with retention and curriculum. She urged academic developers to be aware of the need to facilitate the change at individual, culture and organisational levels, which is a comprehensive challenge in itself. McDonald and McAteer (2003) believe blended learning, a blend of on-campus and external education facilitated by technology, has emerged in response to the global and educational changes experienced by HEIs mentioned earlier. Arguably it has also emerged as an alternative to fully online

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programmes. As a result, research continually calls for an emphasis on pedagogy to drive the design of blended courses today. Most recently, Reinmann et al. (2007) in providing evidence from qualitative studies of blended learning in practical situations, including PBL in higher education, draws on tutors’ and students’ perspectives to argue that the introduction of blended learning requires clear decisions to be made on a number of key areas; these include the distribution of learning content, didactical approaches, ways of communicating and characteristics of learning environments. Certainly, if one text-byte can capture a trend such as blended learning, then perhaps it is the well known one by Rosenberg (2001): “the question is not if we should blend…rather the question is what are the ingredients” (p. 86). Bonk and Graham (2006) agree that the term blended learning is being used with increasing frequency in academic conferences and publications in higher education and, based on their global research perspective, the use of blended learning now seems to be omnipresent across Asia, Australia, Europe, the Middle East, and the United States. The comprehensive case studies included in their research would certainly signify this. In the midst of the current wave of enthusiasm for blended learning in higher education, consciousness should be raised about the criticism in recent years about blended learning environments that fail to create effective settings for learning. Informed by such studies as Noble (2001) and Oliver and Herrington (2003), I am aware of the ubiquitous debate about the ongoing relationship between pedagogy and technology. This study is taking cognisance of the need for strong and effective interaction between pedagogy and technology to ensure that both are used to best effect in implementing PBL in a virtual environment. In parallel with these developments, one of the pivotal debates in higher education in the last few decades has centred on what has become known as a paradigm shift towards student-centred learning. The impetus for blended learning de-

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pends partly on a growing acceptance that higher educational and training programmes should be student-centred and partly on the need to develop enhanced efficiency in the provision of teaching. Although these two forces can work in opposite directions, it is important to acknowledge what these shifts can imply in practice. McDonald and Mayes (2005) believe that in the concept of blended learning we see a measured approach to the delivery of education and acknowledge that learning technology has a role in achieving a student-centred approach. However, there remains a paucity of research on blended learning from HEIs in the United Kingdom and it is argued here that a similar situation exists in the Republic of Ireland, although in an Irish higher education context O’Donnell and Garavan (2003) have reported there is “positive recognition for the benefits of blended learning” (p. 11). Sloman (2001) has highlighted that it has widely been accepted for some time that technology has the potential to enhance and transform the traditional learning experience, for students and teachers alike. Gurrie (2003) has argued that although very little research has been conducted to determine the effectiveness of PBL in the online environment, she believes it embraces many of the concepts that have been identified as best practices in online teaching and learning. There appears to be a lack of comprehensive analysis of the activity and practices of blended PBL in academic development to have taken place. Within this, a number of outstanding issues remain to be addressed, including the nature of questioning, the character of informative feedback, the scheduling of reinforcements and the structuring of information for students. There is a pressing need to address these gaps within the use of blended PBL if academic development is going to include it as a widely accepted practice. It has been found that previous studies in the area of blended PBL have not prompted sufficiently diligent inquiry and serious debate. McShane (2006) has called for further research into academics’ perceptions


of what it is to teach in a student-centred manner in a blended environment. Similarly, Lycke et al. (2002) advocate in their ongoing project on PBL and ICTs in Norwegian higher education that up-close studies are needed to answer vital questions such as how academic teachers can promote effective e-learning strategies among their students. Panda and Juwah (2006) note that the increased use of the Web for learning and teaching has “necessitated a re-examination of some of the issues with e-learning and the professional development of academic staff engaged in an online facilitation role” (p. 207). Masie (2006) contends that blended learning has always been a major part of the landscape of training, learning and instruction; however, in reality it has only become a noticeable feature of the higher education sector in the Republic of Ireland since the beginning of this new millennium. There has been a community of practitioners studying and working in blended courses for many years; nevertheless research in the main has been inadequate. This places this current study on the continuum for revision and rejuvenation of the field of research into blended learning and a starting point for the exploration of blended PBL as a model of academic development. The study aspires to be a source of information, stimulation, and encouragement for those academics who have not fully understood or accepted the concept of blended PBL and is an attempt to capture the participant experience of learning using a blended PBL approach to their academic development in higher education and their subsequent exploration of transformation in classroom practice.

Interaction in Blended PBL The research surrounding this module is based on the notion that interaction among participants in the PBL group is the key element of a successful blended learning experience for all involved. This is based on a sociological understanding of one of the dimensions of interaction for describing

groups, coined by Wagner (2006) as interactions as transactions. Interaction has been and continues to be one of the most hotly debated constructs in the realms of distance and e-learning, instructional design and academic transformation, to name but three. The ability to interact—with tutors, students, content interfaces, features, code, channels and environments—can be argued to be analogous to being connected. Whilst this may appear simplistic, for technology-mediated learning interaction is undoubtedly a key value proposition. It continues to be perceived as the defining attribute of quality and value in a blended learning experience. Interactivity is the core of learning, and is evident at all levels of engagement. However, the term interactivity is used so loosely that in the fields of e-learning and blended learning it has become almost synonymous with the notion of learning itself. This chapter proposes that, by bringing the concept into sharper focus, real insight is gained into the nature of blended PBL. Interaction in the context of this study is explored at three levels: interaction with concepts, tasks, and people (peer learners and tutors).

CASE DESCRIPTION Interpretivism was the paradigm for this study. Interpretivism seeks to understand the complex world of lived experience from the perspectives of the participants. It draws on a broad combination from the history of ideas, which includes hermeneutics, critiques of scientism and positivism, practical philosophy and discourse analysis, and asserts that we can understand the world only by interpreting it, as reality is subjective rather than objective. Within the spectrum of interpretivism, this study was situated in a position that interprets the participants’ discussions in the blended PBL tutorials as both constitutive of the world and constituted by the world. Mertens (2005) gives an elaboration of its philosophical core and points out

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that the interpretive and constructivist paradigm emphasises that research is a product of the values of the researcher and cannot be independent of them. However, Cohen et al. (2000) highlight that there is a risk in interpretive approaches: that “they become hermetically sealed from the world outside the participants’ theatre of activity—they put artificial boundaries around subjects’ behaviour” (p. 27). Recognising that there is an interpretative, subjective aspect to the qualitative data gathered in this study; therefore, I took appropriate steps to preserve data quality, namely triangulation— cross checking data collected using different sources of information; peer consultation; and maintaining accurate up-to-date data records to assist in the establishment of a chain of evidence (Merriam, 1998). The interpretivist emphasis on meaning and the relationship between language and meaning are addressed in the concept of discourse, which in this study is a Web of statements, categories, beliefs and practices. The aim of this approach was to explore the research objectives in ways that made connections among the words from the videos and online discussion forum transcripts, the social functions these words perform and wider social practices. Interpretivism was chosen to identify the essence of human experiences concerning the phenomenon of blended PBL as a model of academic development, as described by the 17 participants in this study. It involved this small number of participants in extensive and prolonged engagement designed to provide a basis on which to understand their lived experiences and develop what Creswell (1998) calls patterns and relationships of meaning. Consequently, the motivation of this research was to gain a rich insight into the PBL nature of the blended environment rather than focus on the statistical analysis of quantitative responses by participants. In research that is very pertinent to this study, in an exploration of the theoretical debate about Mezirow’s transformative learning, Taylor (1997) has called for designs of research which

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included other methods beyond interview, such as observations and content analysis in an ongoing educational context. For this study, the analysis of written transcripts, which have been created by the participants during computer conferencing, invariably takes the form of a systematic content analysis. Donnelly et al. (2007) believe whether the analysis is used quantitatively or qualitatively, there is much to commend this type of approach by higher education tutors wishing to assess the progress of their students and further their understanding of how students learn through computer conferencing technology. The general research design was to observe the process of learning on the module in some depth. In order to ensure that sufficient observational data had been collected for a thorough analysis of what was occurring in the module; three complementary methods were chosen to provide the data relating to the experiences of the participants, in addition to my more obvious tutor role in the module delivery. Collating computer mediated conferencing (CMC) transcripts of online discussions were used to capture what was happening in the online component of the blended PBL tutorial, and textual analysis of participants’ reflective papers was used to explore transformations in learning and focus group interviews to augment the observational data. The research methods employed to collect face-to-face and online observational data from the module itself were participant observation, online discussion logs, open-ended focus group interview and self-reflective papers to capture the participant’s own thoughts and experiences of the blended PBL approach. Each method was chosen for the opportunity it could offer to explore interactions and dimensions of transformation, both of which were central to this study. Figure 1 illustrates how the research methods fitted together and have allowed me to gain deep insights into how interaction happens in a blended environment within each of the groups. The approach taken to the collection of data about the blended PBL groups was multi-faceted. A major


Figure 1. Integration of data collection methods

concern has been to provide meaningful and accessible insights into the practice of blended PBL based on the analysis of real life situations. There were two levels taken to the analysis of the data. Level One was descriptive in nature and through video observations explored the interactions among the peers, the tutors and the content of the blended PBL tutorial. Level Two was a thematic analysis of transformative learning in blended PBL and, through a combination of online logs, focus group interviews, and participant self-reflective papers, categories and themes emerged to inform the findings of the study and implications for practice. Being engaged with the events as they happened in the field and attempting to bring holistic attention to the practices as constitutive of a distinct culture were important to this study. As suggested by Hine (2000, p. 20), this study has examined those enduring practices through which

the blended PBL groups have become meaningful and perceptible to participants. Data collection took place over two years in this study, as the intention was to study more than one PBL group, and this was achieved with three groups in total. The activities of three blended PBL groups, two of which were working at the same time but separately in the 2004-05 operation of the module, and one in the 2005-06 academic year were the observed focus of the study. The intention was to carry out a detailed study of the work of each group for an extended period of time (typically ten weeks) and produce an interpretation of their academic discourse through close examination of their activities. The PBL tutorial observations for each group were transcribed. The face-to-face classroom and online observation was complemented by two focus group interviews for all three groups. It was important to observe

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the groups over the complete ten week period of the module in order to examine how the groups negotiated the problem face-to-face and online, how the group dynamics worked in the blended environment, how the life of the group unfolded thereafter and what influenced the participants in reaching a transformation in their learning. The four methods of collecting data for this study (participant observation, collation of asynchronous online discussions of the PBL groups, focus group interviews, and textual analysis of participants’ reflective papers) were continuously complemented by prolonged immersion in the literatures of the field. The sample for this study was the total population (17 participants) of blended PBL groups undertaking the PBL module in the two years that the data were collected in order to explore the lived experience of a heterogeneous population of academic staff in higher education; there were three PBL groups in this study. I now discuss the ethical and power issues involved in the process of reasonably informed consent. There are numerous sources of advice about preparations prior to embarking on fieldwork (Davies, 1999), involving the more general injunctions about intellectual preparation through familiarizing oneself with literature about the area. A number of steps were undertaken in the preparation for observation in the study. Firstly, it was necessary to arrange access and this involved the module participants, guest tutors, the Head of School and colleagues in the centre in which the module is located. A formal ethics statement and statement of informed consent were prepared and distributed to module participants and guest tutors. It concerned areas such as selecting participants, types of questions asked, agreement of participants to be involved, storage of data from the research, anonymity (pseudonyms were used throughout the study to protect the identity of the participants) and disclosure of results to participants. Inherent in this was the need for persons to review drafts to validate observations and descriptions. The video cameras were prepared and the online discussion

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software recording capabilities were checked. I then drew up a schedule of the observations, and developed a standardised procedure for how the observation would run. Finally, as part of the initial preparation, I evolved a record-keeping system involving the videotapes, and a coding system. A further challenge concerned the notion of addressivity of ‘compliant talk’ by the participants in the study. Due to the dual role in the relationship between the researcher as tutor and the academic staff who were learners on the module and participants in the study, it is acknowledged that the possibility that the participants may have said what they thought you wanted to them to could be considered a limitation. However by building triangulation into the research process this possibility was lessened.

Discussion of Findings This section of the chapter concentrates on the findings from the content analysis of the CMC discussions. With the participants’ permission, the discussion space software was also employed to capture their contributions as text files and as prints of the discussion site pages. In addition to the text entered by the participants and tutors, the files include automatic time and date stamping and an indication of the source of each message. The content of messages and the extent to which they formed patterns of interaction between peers, tutors and content of the blended PBL module were analysed. In the literature, typically analysis of CMC is at a number of different levels including the frequency and patterns of interaction, categorization of messages and thematic analysis to allow a much more detailed interactional analysis and message content. Individually, none of these allow analysis of how online collaborative learning takes place in PBL but a combination of detailed interaction plus content was very helpful in this study. Bosley and Young (2006) have suggested that ethical concerns may be among the reasons that group discussions are more commonly analy-


sed than one-to-one exchanges. There was the opportunity to access the data in these postings as messages sent through WebCT on the module were stored and retrievable. In order to analyse the dimensions of the learning process in the asynchronous data transcripts, a number of CMC analytical frameworks were considered for this study (Donnelly et al., 2007). The conferencing contributions were analysed quantitatively (the number of messages per participant and tutor to investigate the patterns of interaction) and qualitatively (content of the messages were scrutinized to investigate the extent that participants were forming, critiquing and communicating ideas online) in this study. The paper transcripts were examined and each post was free coded to generate categories. These were then refined and divided into components that signified their use was to do with building of community (that is, social) or cognitive (that is exploring content issues relevant to the module and the PBL problem). An early issue was to decide on the most appropriate and fruitful unit of analysis. Units of meaning were categorized into common themes and a list of codes devised to represent the emerging categories. Categories were modified, developed and regrouped as analysis proceeded. New catego-

Table 1. Categories used for thematic content analysis of cmc discussions Code

Category

SE

Posting is to share prior experience

SR

Posting is to share references and resources

PF

Includes positive peer feedback in response

C

Provides/seeks clarification

FI

Forms a new idea

CR

Critiques peer response (expresses reservations/ disagrees with another contribution)

GT

Interaction with the international guest tutors

M

Miscellaneous

U

Unrequited messages from peers

ries emerged and some early ones dropped. The final categories derived are given in Table 1: These categories were not exclusive and together they provided some evidence about the extent to which the contributions answered one of the research objectives of this study. Clearly the small numbers in this study do not support comparisons between the different corpuses of data in the field and it is not my intention to make such comparisons. The WebCT course management system automatically numbers, in a threaded manner, the postings of the module according to the time a text was posted and placed on the discussion forum. All the postings on the discussion forums were not modifiable by the participants and thus, all the postings remained in their originally posted forms. While the WebCT system technically organized the online environment of the PBL groups, actual interactions took place through the actions and reactions of the participants to the PBL learning setting, module materials and activities, to tutor and guest tutor directions and to peers’ ideas and actions. There were eight enumerations collated from this data and all were taken at week 10 of the module to explore the individual participant’s activity in the discussion boards and the PBL group work patterns in the online environment, so that some comparisons could be made to face-to-face (f2f) activity. Table 2 shows these findings for each participant in the study: •

•

Revealing levels of online activity for each individual participant required collation of the frequency of contributions of each participant to the online PBL group discussion forum; Exploring the development of substantive discussion amongst all the participants in each of the three PBL groups needed the average messages per thread;

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Table 2. Breakdown of statistics for online participation of each participant Participant

Frequency of Contributions

Average Messages per Thread

Amount of Time Online [per week]

Average Time Online [whole module]

Postings Repeated

Number of Messages Read

Number of threads per PBL Group

Number of Attachments per Participant

•

•

•

•

12

Ronan

73 postings

/38 = 1.92

3.5 hours

35 hours

-

245 (All)

38

31

Padraig

30 postings

/38 = 0.78

3.5 hours

35 hours

-

211

38

16

Aidan

45 postings

/38 = 1.18

3 hours

30 hours

1

202

38

26

Loirin

48 postings

/38 = 1.26

6 hours

60 hours

-

194

38

21

Aine

49 postings

/38 = 1.28

5 hours

50 hours

1

223

38

30

Niamh

47 postings

/46 = 1.02

5 hours

50 hours

1

206

46

22

Eimear

46 postings

/46 = 1

2 hours

20 hours

2

190

46

24

Sorcha

59 postings

/46 = 1.28

5 hours

50 hours

1

231 (All)

46

26

Caitlin

38 postings

/46 = 0.82

1.5 hours

15 hours

1

210

46

26

Dervla

41 postings

/46 = 0.89

2 hours

20 hours

2

198

46

23

Declan

98 postings

/55 = 1.78

4 hours

40 hours

-

365 (All)

55

14

Michael

37 postings

/55 = 0.67

2.5 hours

25 hours

-

327

55

22

Darragh

33 postings

/55 = 0.6

3 hours

30 hours

-

312

55

17

Myra

89 postings

/55 = 1.61

3.5 hours

35 hours

-

365 (All)

55

37

Caolan

32 postings

/55 = 0.58

2.5 hours

25 hours

-

304

55

13

Maeve

40 postings

/55 = 0.72

3 hours

30 hours

-

297

55

15

Ryan

36 postings

/55 = 0.65

1.5 hours

15 hours

-

284

55

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Comparing the f2f and online contact in the blended PBL tutorials required the amount of time each participant spent online; Enabling comparison with f2f activity in the PBL tutorial, the average time spent online per week for each participant was needed; Repeated postings (queries and requests for help) was collated; a low number would indicate how comprehensively the peers were responding to each other in their groups and possibly ability in searching through messages and reading them for key words and phrases; Revealing individual levels of online passive participation required the collation of the number of messages read only by individual students;

•

•

Showing the number of different conversations happening online required the collation of the number of threads created per PBL group; and Demonstrating evidence of reflection by returning to the discussion forum with work on the PBL Problem necessitated the collation of the number of attachments of learning material to postings per participant.

There was an average of 49 postings made by each participant over the ten weeks of the module. Column 3 showing the average messages per thread for all the participants in each of the three PBL groups and it indicates little development of substantive discussion with an average of 1 message posted per thread. However, Column 9 shows an average of 22 attachments of documentation


on the PBL Problem made to a posting by each participant.

very helpful to myself and Niamh who have been allocated this task.

Blended Community and Cognitive Development

Message no. 1711[Branch from no. 1704]

Results from a recent study by Dawson (2006) on online forum discussions reported that mere quantity of discussion postings is not an indicator of community development; a significant relationship is observed when contributions are codified into various discussion interaction types (learner-learner; learner-content). Earlier research by Harasim (1987) also endorsed the categorisation of forum interactions and suggested that these types of interactions were the most important for enhancing the learning process. Similarly, in this study, the online discussion forums provided the participants with an opportunity to enhance community building in their PBL group and extend the collaborative dialogue from the face-to-face PBL tutorials. Postings from the discussion boards from all three PBL groups are included below whereby the participants were working towards the building of community within their group both online and face-to-face.

Posted by Ryan on Sunday, March 19, 2006 10:06am

Subject: Re: Many happy returns

Hi Myra and everyone,

Excellent summary - you are a hard act for me to follow as Chair next week.

Asking for technical help Posted by Eimear on Thursday, December 16, 2004 10:19am

Subject: Ground Rules

Positive Peer Acknowledgment of Work Message no. 779[Branch from no. 778] Posted by Sorcha on Monday, December 20, 2004 1:39pm

Subject: Re: Philosophy statement

Hi Dervla, you are doing absolutely Trojan work and putting the rest of us to shame. I couldn’t face any of it until yesterday and all your messages were making me feel very guilty! Thanks for starting the work on the learning outcomes as it will be

Help anyone? How can I create a new thread??? I know we covered it before in class but it eludes me this morning.

Peers Expressing Concerns: Overwhelmed, Chaos, Information Overload Message no. 694[Branch from no. 675] Posted by Niamh on Friday, December 10, 2004 6:34pm

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Subject: Re: re group task

Subject: Final Group Report

Hi Sorcha, Thanks for this. I agree re the allocation of tasks. Like Eimear, I do feel adrift but I am confident that after a lengthier discussion on

Hi Everybody,

Tuesday in class we will have a greater idea about where we are going. We haven’t really had an opportunity to do that yet.

Message no. 684[Branch from no. 673] Posted by Padraig on Thursday, December 9, 2004 9:52pm

Subject: Re: Group name

I am coming late into this discussion and feel like a real “Dumbledore”. I can vouch for one thing since I came late to the f2f tutorial on Tuesday - now I feel I have missed a lot of info and direction. However, moving from my student to my teacher hat - it’s a useful lesson for me but also to be aware of it in designing online learning in the future. Similarly, the evolving of a cognitive dimension to their work in PBL can be illustrated from the data and examples are set out below.

Sharing Work Completed on Individual Task (Updating on Progress, Including Asking for a Critique of Work, and Debating Subject Issues)

Please find attached Myra’s version posted on the 27th at 9.00pm after Declan’s and Michael’s excellent tidy up job but with all the colours removed and every thing in black type. Declan, I hope you don’t mind but I thought the Evaluation piece was a bit weak and I was not sure if you would get any time to add more, so I wrote a little just in case. Essentially I feel we need to show cognizance of several models of evaluation and also include a theoretical basis for why we are doing so. Then we should link this to the philosophical rationale for our course and the instructional design model we have adapted. Please feel free to come in on this – a critical friend would be great just about now on this part of the report!

Myra, just an idea - rather than you being left to write up the conclusion by yourself, should all members of the group contribute a reflective piece of writing? We could use some of the material from our reflective journals or from the reflective thoughts we wrote during our or just after our live online chats? Maybe everyone in the group might use this thread and respond yes or no. Maybe we can discuss this further when we meet at 9 on Thursday.

Peers Sharing Resources Message no. 765

Message no. 1778

Posted by Caitlin on Friday, December 17, 2004 3:14pm

Posted by Ryan on Monday, March 27, 2006 11:24pm

Subject: Useful Journal Articles

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I have attached an article I found on the British Education Index which I thought was quite interesting and which you might like to read. It is entitled ‘When learners learn on-line, what does the facilitator do?’, so it is directly relevant to what we are doing. If I come across anything else I will post it up under this thread.

Peers Sharing Experiences

Peers Taking the Lead on the Problem, Providing Clarification and Encouragement to Each Other, Forming New Ideas, Updating a Peer on Missed Work Message no. 710[Branch from no. 708] Posted by Loirin on Saturday, December 11, 2004 9:36pm

Message no. 785[Branch from no. 748] Subject: Re: re group task Posted by Ronan on Monday, December 20, 2004 8:27pm Hi Aine, Subject: Re: Student survey

I get phone calls almost every week from students or their parents asking for tuition for those who have failed previous exams with math being their major difficulty. My line manager has asked me on numerous occasions to assist students also.

I have spoken to several colleagues in recent weeks who all believe there is a need for extra tuition for weak students and am supportive of the concept of an online module.

At the moment the evidence is anecdotal and based on opinion but it is the opinion of experienced educators so should we go with this at the moment and elaborate on the needs for our final report.

Nice to see someone else online with me on a Saturday night! Am missing Strictly Come Dancing at the mo! Getting my priorities straight! I know you missed the synchronous chat yesterday so you may feel a little out of the loop at the moment.

We need a decision emanating from our group on this issue; but don’t worry - there will be plenty of time on Tuesday morning when we all meet in the class to reorient ourselves as to the best way forward. I feel this is the important time now when as a group, we are all happy with the decision taken so we can work together on aspects that particularly interest us. It will all come together in the next couple of weeks, I’m sure.

PBL Content Interaction with Guest Tutors Message no. 1413[Branch from no. 1347] Posted by Myra on Wednesday, February 15, 2006 7:17am

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Subject: Personal greetings

• Answers to library questions

Hi all,

• Declan will be the Chair.

We now seem to understand the importance of having this kind of non-formal discussion or messages. Some of us told you about visits in Finland, and Scandinavia and I have been thinking a lot of my visit too. I think it’s really interesting to explore why we do this? I understand it is a reflective (or not conscious) process of trying to understand the other’s background and culture. And if we are trying to reach a real dialogue, we need common ground and shared understanding.

• Tuesday 21st: dry run for the guest tutor video conference - 9am.

I think we need to keep this up as language is a tool which we use to reproduce the reality.

Linking to F2F Tutorial Directly (Blended Approach)

• Questions for the guest tutor this week: thread set up in Cyber club 7

Other notes:

• Divide up Webliography between us, and report on what we find.

• Task 3 Home work: to be carried out over two weeks.

Message no. 1357[Branch from no. 1356]

• Note the Sunday night dead line!

Posted by Ryan on Saturday, February 11, 2006 12:33am

Table 3 shows the breakdown of the community and cognitive aspects of the online discussions for each of the three PBL groups. The essential elements of PBL learning conversations were provided though the sharing of multiple perspectives on experience and research, complemented by a range of individual disseminated research amongst the groups. PBL Group 1, self-titled CPD challengers are in blue; PBL Group 2, self-titled The Apprentices are in orange; PBL Group 3, self-titled Cyber Club Seven are in pink. The use of direct quotations is now used to provide evidence of both the shared enthusiasm for the blended PBL process and some real concerns voiced by the participants. Whenever possible by using the words of the participants themselves, key issues have been highlighted.

Subject: Re: Tuesday’s forthcoming f2f class

Hi all,

Well done Michael on your summary. I will reply to your experience another thread.

Things to do for class next week:

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Table 3. Community and cognitive online posts for three PBL groups Community Categories

Postings

Cognitive Categories

Positive peer acknowledgment of work

10 20 37

Sharing work completed on individual task (updating on progress, including asking for a critique of work, and debating subject issues)

16 69 31

Asking for technical help

9 (mainly in early weeks) 5 (mainly in early weeks) 5 postings and 9 peer responses helping out

Peers sharing resources

13 12 12

Peers expressing concerns: overwhelmed, chaos, information overload

5 (present in first 3-4 weeks only) 1 2

Peers sharing experiences

5 2 4

Peers simply announcing online presence

4 2 7

Peers taking the lead on the problem, responding to peers on technical problems, summarizing and weaving themselves, providing clarification and encouragement to each other, forming new ideas, updating a peer on missed work

7 32 49

Peer unrequited messages

2 0 4

PBL Content Interaction with Guest Tutors

19 44 61

Miscellaneous (Humorous)

5 5 5

Linking to f2f tutorial directly (blended approach)

3 3 6

For inclusion of all participant quotes, the following applies:FG = Focus Group Interview (either indicated by 1 or 2 for the first or second interview)RP = Reflective Paper (numbered 1-17 for each participant) Commonalities existed between all three blended PBL groups in the online discussion forums: •

•

•

Postings

The most prolonged interactions over all three groups were with the guest tutor discussions (Column 4, Row 5); Resource sharing and diffusion of experiences dominated the first 4-5 weeks of online interactions over all three groups (Column 4, Rows 2 and 3); Posting individual tasks and updating peers on progress dominated the use of the threaded discussions (all had attachments of work) conducted outside of face-to-face

•

•

•

tutorials in the last 5 weeks of the module (Column 4, Row 1); In 2 groups, there was evidence of peers taking over the tutor’s online role (Column 4, Row 4); All groups had members who felt the need to acknowledge their online presence without contributing to the discussion (Column 2, Row 4); and There were low levels of unrequited postings in all groups (Column 2, Row 5); throughout the life of these groups, it was evident that members did reply to requests and questions from other members. In the few instances where there was no response to these, the second focus group interview with ‘Cyber Club Seven’ offers a reason.

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I think there is a certain amount of maturity needed online and you have to be in touch with your own feelings so you can relate to others. If you put up something and hope for a response from others because you think it is very important and none comes, you can’t take it personally as people may have been too busy. (Ryan, FG2) If there were no postings by participants in a PBL group, it was perceived as their absence by their peers. There was a strong sense across all three groups that by making postings, participants were embodying their presence in the group and after an absence of more than a few days, some felt it necessary to post just to proclaim their online presence; reading others’ postings without this proclamation was not considered good enough by some. Reasons provided by participants about some in the group not valuing online participation as much as face-to-face and not understanding the mechanics of online communication moves into the realm of lurking, but beyond the two-pronged argument explaining such passive participation, we must be aware of the lack of knowledge that we really have about their behaviour. I mean I was in WebCT all the time and I didn’t always feel the need to contribute a posting. For me it was like people were making comments just for the sake of it and there wasn’t really anything to say sometimes. What I was doing in that time was reading a lot and then I was better equipped to contribute to the discussions afterwards. (Sorcha, FG2)

I don’t like posting messages up until I have something to say. When I did log on and unless I said - hello, it’s me, there was resentment there. I actually felt quite vetted because my name was not up there as much as everyone else’s. And why am I feeling guilty about this, and I think it is simply because your name is not up there, and

18

the others are, having more of an online presence - whatever that means. So I thought; am I contributing in class? Yes I am, and I am doing my work? – so what am I doing wrong? And there was this whole onus of guilt surrounding posting that I didn’t like. (Caitlin, FG2) The postings became the only clues that the person was present and were made with a certain goal, i.e. to inform the other participants of Caitlin’s and Sorcha’s potential inactivity or invisibility. The other two groups did not experience this: I think it was so important that we all felt comfortable if you didn’t have something to say, you didn’t have to. (Loirin, FG2, ‘The Apprentices’)

The main thing is that our group members came in online at all times, and could say, I just don’t know what I am doing this week; and you felt able to say that. (Maeve, FG2, ‘Cyber Club Seven’) The cognitive dimension of learning involved the contribution of knowledge and experience and the community dimension involved a balance of support and guidance with the creation of a pleasant learning environment. Both cognitive and community or social congruence is necessary for effective group functioning. For all three groups, at the close of the ten week period, the cognitive postings were significantly higher than the community postings. This is akin to the cognitive apprenticeship models of learning, where learning is scaffolded by both peers and experts. When one looks at the relationship between the participant contributions and the sense of community in the group, findings from all three groups indicated that a significant relationship exists between the quantity of peer-to-peer contributions and the participant reported sense of community in the group. The group composition appeared to contribute towards the cohesion within.


We had a very supportive group, almost all of us from the Apprentice trades background. I thought it really interesting from reading through these categories and examples from the data that the group who was having a less than positive experience were the ones who had the least amount of postings. In other words if you participate at a certain level you are more likely to get something out of it. Perhaps if you participate at a minimal level you are not as likely to. (Ronan, Participant Verification Session, 08/02/07)

CURRENT CHALLENGES This study was an attempt to provide insights into blended PBL in a higher education academic development context in order to encourage indepth discussion and open debate on the field. While there is much growing interest in blended PBL in practice, if this interest is not married to current research and knowledge in the field it can be argued that it will be of little, if any, transformative value for higher education. At this point, it is important to acknowledge the obstacles to, and the limitations on, the enactment of transformative learning in this case of learning environment. It is acknowledged that there are hazards in entering the choppy waters of intellectual debate on transformational learning. Transformative learning in blended PBL takes place when students elaborate old or learn new frames of reference as well as transform old or learn new habits of mind. However transformative learning is a complex process of interaction between people, the tools they use and the context in which they are embedded. It is contended that there is a need to focus on interactivity within blended PBL and its critical application. The blended format coalesces Webbased and face-to-face instruction into an entirely new model that holds potential to transform both learning and teaching in higher education. However, the improvement of educational practice is

notoriously difficult, especially when the goal is to foster transformation in thinking and practice. Tyack and Cuban (1995) have argued that pockets of effective teaching exist but they seldom last long or spread beyond a few dedicated pioneers. Clarifying the principles of effective problembased and e-learning pedagogies and sustaining the means to support its enactment in a wide range of departments and institutions constitute an abiding challenge of professional development for teachers. To meet the demands facing academic staff today, teachers need professional development opportunities that support them in a transformational process and in a sustained way. Such transformation of curriculum and pedagogy is a complex process for teachers; it is the findings of this dissertation that blending PBL and new technologies appears to hold promise in overcoming the traditional limitations of professional development which in this Institute and elsewhere in Ireland have tended to be short-term workshops, focused on general topics rather than deep knowledge of subject matter and pedagogy, disconnected from specific classroom practices and isolated from ongoing support from colleagues and tutors. Systematic, comprehensive staff development is a crucial requirement of the contemporary learning organization and there are many different ways of providing for it other than conventional short courses. Learning that involves the analysis of complex problems and issues, and more complex higher order learning generally, are not amenable to this form of packaged e-learning. Something more dynamic that addresses the complexity and messiness of real life is needed. The issue of transferability of innovative approaches and developing the capacity to respond to innovation and change remains a key area for further research. Whilst this may appear to be an unpalatable position to take at times, realisation is required that for real and not just cosmetic change to take place a whole range of well-established cultural tools needs to be re-created to transform

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the way that academic staff experience their professional development.

CONCLUSION A qualitative study of the lived experiences of 17 participants in a blended PBL module provided findings on specific aspects of interaction (technical, peers, content and the learning experience) within blended PBL tutorials which have not previously been analysed within a framework of transformative learning. It is acknowledged that there are hazards in entering the choppy waters of intellectual debate on transformational learning. Mezirow (1990) has pointed out that all learning is change but not all change is transformation. The main findings of the analysis of the data indicated that for all three groups, at the close of the ten week module, the cognitive postings were significantly higher than the community postings. However, the technology also acted as an activating event for transformation in that the online discussion forums provided the participants with an opportunity to enhance community building in their PBL group and extend the collaborative dialogue from the face-to-face PBL tutorials. The nature of the blend involved distinguishing what worked best in the face-to-face and online environments. It was important to utilize time spent online for organising work for the face-to-face tutorial and as a source of positive peer feedback. Conversely, the face-to-face tutorial was useful for clarifying any misunderstandings which took place online. Ultimately, there is no single mode of transformative learning that exists; differences in learning contexts, learners, and teachers all affect the experiences of transformative learning.

REFERENCES Bonk, C. J., & Graham, C. R. (2006). Introduction. In C. J. Bonk & C. R. Graham (Eds.), The handbook of blended learning. Global perspectives, local designs (pp. 5-15). San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer. Bosley, S., & Young, D. (2006). Online learning dialogues in learning through work. Journal of Workplace Learning, 18, 355–366. doi:10.1108/13665620610682080 Cohen, L., Manion, L., & Morrison, R. (2000). Research methods in education. London: RoutledgeFalmer. Creswell, J. (1998). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five traditions. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Dawson, S. (2006). Online forum discussion interactions as an indicator of student community. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 22(4), 495–510. Donnelly, R., Holmes, B., & Gardiner, J. (2007, March). Content analysis of computer conferencing transcripts – Which one should I use? Paper presented at CAL’07, Trinity College Dublin. Donnelly, R., & O’Farrell, C. (2006). Blended e-learning for continuous professional development of academic staff. In J. O’Donoghue (Ed.), Technology supported learning and teaching: A staff perspective (pp. 45-61). Hershey, PA: Information Science Publishing. Gredler, M. E. (2005). Learning and instruction: Theory into practice. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Merrill/Prentice Hall. Gurrie, J. (2003). What’s your problem? Increasing student motivation and quality of participation in discussions through problem-based learning (pp. 1-3). Retrieved February 9, 2007, from http:// www.elearnspace.org/Articles/contributor/pbl. htm

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Ham, V., & Davey, R. (2005). Our first time: Two higher education tutors reflect on becoming a ‘virtual teacher.’ . Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 42(3), 257–264. doi:10.1080/01587910500168017 Hameed, C., Hameed, K., & Clements, M. (2006, August 29-31). E-learning: Through the looking glass. Paper presented at the 7th Annual Conference of the Higher Education Academy Information and Computer Sciences, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. Harasim, L. (1987). Teaching and learning online: Issues in computer-mediated graduate courses. Canadian Journal of Educational Communication, 16(2), 117–135. Hine, C. (2000). Virtual ethnography. London: Sage. Jones, N. (2006). E-college Wales: A case study of blended learning. In C. J. Bonk & C. R. Graham (Eds.), The handbook of blended learning: Global perspectives, local designs (pp. 182-193). San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer. Kolmos, A. (2002). Facilitating change to a problem-based model. The International Journal for Academic Development, 7(1), 63–74. doi:10.1080/13601440210156484 Lycke, K., Strømsø, H., & Grøttum, P. (2002). PBL goes ICT: Problem-based learning in face-to-face and distributed groups in medical education at the University of Oslo (Report No.4). University of Oslo: Institute for Educational Research. Masie, E. (2006). The blended learning imperative. In C. J. Bonk & C. R. Graham (Eds.), The handbook of blended learning: Global perspectives, local designs (pp. 22-26). San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer.

McAuliffe, G., & Lovell, C. (2000). Encouraging transformation: Guidelines for constructivist and developmental instruction. In G. McAuliffe & K. Eriksen (Eds.), Preparing counselors and therapists: Creating constructivist and developmental programs (pp. 14-41). Virginia Beach, VA: Donning Company. McConnell, D. (2006). E-learning groups and communities. Maidenhead, UK: The Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press. McDonald, J., & Mayes, T. (2005, June). Pedagogically challenged: A framework for the support of course designers in an Australian distance learning university. In CRLL Conference Proceedings (Vol. 2) (pp. 397-404). The University of Stirling, Scotland. McDonald, J., & McAteer, E. (2003). New approaches to supporting students: Strategies for blended learning in distance and campus-based environments. Journal of Educational Media, 28(2-3), 129–146. doi:10.1080/1358165032000165662 McShane, K. (2006, October). Technologies transforming academics: Academic identity and online teaching. Paper presented at Institute for Teaching and Learning, University of Sydney. Merriam, S. B. (1998). Qualitative research and case study applications in education. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Mertens, D. M. (2005). Research methods in education and psychology: Integrating diversity with quantitative & qualitative approaches. London: Routledge. Mezirow, J. (1990). Fostering critical reflection in adulthood: A guide to transformative and emancipator learning. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

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Myers, S. A. (2006). Can I use transformative pedagogy when teaching online? College Teaching, 2(1), 82–94. Noble, D. F. (2001). Digital diploma mills: The automation of higher education. New York: Monthly Review Press. O’Donnell, D., & Garavan, T. (2003). eLearning in Irish Organisations? Dublin: Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development in Ireland. Oliver, R., & Herrington, J. (2003). Exploring technology-mediated learning from a pedagogical perspective. Journal of Interactive Learning Environments, 11(2), 111–126. doi:10.1076/ ilee.11.2.111.14136 Panda, S., & Juwah, C. (2006). Professional development of online facilitators in enhancing interactions and engagement: A framework. In C. Juwah (Ed.), Interactions in online education. Implications for theory and practice (pp. 83-104). London: Routledge. Reinmann, G., Macdonald, J., Donnelly, R., Fransen, J., & Poldner, E. (2007, August). Blended learning in higher education: Theory and Praxis. Paper presented at the annual symposium of the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI),University of Szeged, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest. Rosenberg, M. J. (2001). E-learning: Strategies for delivering knowledge in the digital age. New York: McGraw-Hill.

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Savin-Baden, M. (2006). The challenge of using problem-based learning online. In M. Savin-Baden & K. Wilkie (Eds.), Problem-based learning online (pp. 3-13). Maidenhead, UK: Open University Press. Segrave, S., Holt, D., & Farmer, J. (2005). The power of the 6 three model for enhancing academic teachers’ capacities for effective online teaching and learning: Benefits, initiatives and future directions. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 21(1), 118–135. Skilbeck, M. (2001). The university challenged. A review of international trends and issues with particular reference to Ireland. Dublin: Higher Education Authority. Sloman, M. (2001). The e-learning revolution: From proposition to action. London: Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. Taylor, E. (1997). Building upon the theoretical debate: A critical review of the empirical studies of Mezirow’s transformative learning theory. Adult Education Quarterly, 48(1), 34–59. doi:10.1177/074171369704800104 Tyack, D. B., & Cuban, L. (1995). Tinkering towards utopia: A century of public school reform. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Wagner, E. D. (2006). On designing interaction experiences for the next generation of blended learning. In C. J. Bonk & C.R. Graham (Eds.), The handbook of blended learning. Global perspectives, local designs (pp. 41-55). San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer.

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Chapter 2

Experiences and Perceptions of Learner Engagement in Blended Learning Environments: The Case of an Australian University Linda De George-Walker University of Southern Queensland, Australia Abdul Hafeez-Baig University of Southern Queensland, Australia Raj Gururajan University of Southern Queensland, Australia P. A. Danaher University of Southern Queensland, Australia

ABSTRACT One of the most significant challenges in learning and teaching is to maximize successful and sustainable learner engagement. The growing literature about blended learning environments and technologies provides plenty of scope for an interrogation of the intersection between learner engagement and blended learning. This chapter takes up that interrogation by presenting the case of the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. The chapter focuses on three postgraduate courses offered by the institution: two in the Faculty of Business and the other in the Faculty of Education; and each course representing a different position along the continuum from blended to fully online. The chapter presents a detailed examination of all three courses in relation to design, development, and management, informed by a conceptualization of blended learning as it intersects with learner engagement. Several types of evidence are deployed in evaluating the courses against the assembled information about experiences and perceptions of learner engagement and blended learning communicated by students, academic staff members, and program administrators. This evidence suggests some significant implications for the ongoing theorization of blended learning, how its effectiveness can be maximized, and what its connections with learner engagement are and should be. DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch002


Experiences and Perceptions of Learner Engagement in Blended Learning Environments

INTRODUCTION One of the greatest challenges in learning and teaching, regardless of delivery mode, is to maximize successful and sustainable learner engagement, whether with fellow students, teaching staff members, content, context, or the educational technologies being used to provide the instruction (Guthrie, 2001; Linnenbrink & Pintrich, 2003; McFadden & Munns, 2002; Zyngier, 2005). The complexity of this challenge derives partly from a lack of consensus in conceptualizing learner engagement (Butler-Kisber & Portelli, 2003; Vibert & Shields, 2003; Zyngier, 2008), and partly from the difficulty of establishing a direct, oneto-one correspondence between different types of inputs and the desired output of learner participation and achievement. This is certainly the case in exploring learner engagement with various educational technologies, including educational software (Bangert-Drowns & Pyke, 2001, 2002) and simulations (Davies, 2002). The burgeoning scholarship about blended learning environments and technologies provides plenty of scope for an interrogation of the intersection between learner engagement and blended learning. Elements of that literature include efforts to define blended learning (Driscoll, 2002; Osguthorpe & Graham, 2003), to explore examples in corporate, multinational, workplace, and higher education contexts (Bonk & Graham, 2006), to elicit strategies for making it effective (Rossett, Douglis, & Frazee, 2003; Singh, 2003), to maximize its facilitation of a sense of community (Roval & Jordan, 2004), and to elaborate its transformative potential (Garrison & Kanuka, 2004). Provisionally, for the purpose of orienting the discussion in this chapter, we take Graham’s (2006) account of the historical emergence of blended learning as the convergence between face-to-face and computer mediated learning environments as the starting point – although, as we shall see, by no means the finishing line – in defining blended learning.

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It is therefore timely to bring together these two streams of literature, as the chapter seeks to do. For example, it is important to integrate claims about the educational benefits of blended learning with evidence gleaned from contemporary case studies about how learners and other stakeholders view the enactment of blended learning in specific educational programs. Likewise it is necessary to highlight strategies garnered from that evidence as being demonstrably effective in moving from theory to practice in maximizing learner engagement in blended learning environments. The chapter takes up that challenge by presenting the case of the University of Southern Queensland (USQ), Australia. The chapter both links with and builds on current publications about the case site (Danaher, Gururajan, & Hafeez-Baig, 2009; Hafeez-Baig & Danaher, 2007a, 2007b) by focusing on three courses offered by the institution and not previously canvassed in those publications. As Table 1 indicates, the courses exhibit considerable diversity: while all three are postgraduate, two are located in the Faculty of Business and the other in the Faculty of Education. Furthermore, the courses occupy different positions along the continuum from face-to-face to blended to online: one course blends face-to-face, distance and online delivery; one blends distance and online delivery; and one is mainly online, with some face-to-face provision (the latter as potentially contrasting and/ or overlapping with the other two courses). What these three courses have in common is a commitment to enhancing learner engagement in varied combinations of learning environments. Indeed, the variety of the selected courses – in relation to paradigm, subject matter, and assessment – is helpful in illustrating the multiple ways in which blended learning can be implemented to facilitate learner participation and achievement. The chapter’s four objectives are as follows: (1) to outline a skeptical but hopeful conceptualization of blended learning gleaned from


Table 1. The three courses at USQ Course number

Course code and title

Faculty

Level

Learning environment type

One

CIS5001 Information Systems for Managers

Business

Postgraduate

Blended between face-to-face, distance and online

Two

EDU8317 Educational Measurement and Assessment in Inclusive Education

Education

Postgraduate

Blended between distance and online

Three

CIS8011 Emerging Information Technologies

Business

Postgraduate

Mainly online, with some face-to-face provision

the contemporary literature, particularly in relation to learner engagement; (2) to discuss the three courses in terms of their design, development, and management; (3) to evaluate the courses against the assembled evidence of experiences and perceptions of learner engagement and blended learning communicated by selected students, academic staff members, and program administrators; and (4) to contribute to the ongoing theorization of blended learning on the basis of the outcomes of the evaluation of the courses. The chapter’s intended outcome is to extend current understandings of blended learning: what it is, in which contexts it occurs, how its effectiveness can be maximized, and what its connections with learner engagement are and should be.

BACKGROUND USQ is a university in Queensland, Australia, with about 24,000 enrolled students. It is characteristic of many of the ‘new generation’ universities in Australia, having been established in 1967 and for most of its existence to date operating as an institute of advanced education, serving simultaneously its local community (a regional area west of Brisbane, the capital city of Queensland) and thousands of students throughout Australia and internationally as one of eight nationally desig-

nated distance education providers of university education. The organization was proclaimed the USQ in 1992, since when it has expanded its Australian campuses as well as its international outreach and its research activities (University of Southern Queensland, n. d.). Its success in these endeavors led to its being named Australian University of the Year in 2000-2001 by the Good Universities Guide (Smith, 2005). With the provision of distance and online education by most if not all contemporary universities, USQ has worked meticulously to maintain and even to extend its reputation in this dimension, for example winning the Commonwealth of Learning Award of Excellence for Institutional Achievement in 2004 for “its provision of flexible learning opportunities for people with diverse social and cultural backgrounds” (Smith, 2005, p. 12). Since 1977, USQ has been “a dual mode institution” (Smith, 2005, p. 1), with both on- and off-campus students, and with the developments associated with the Internet it has enhanced its “triple option teaching styles” (Smith, 2005, p. 1), offering courses on-campus, externally and online. The organization’s international standing is reflected in its study centers in many overseas countries and in its enrollment of students from over 30 countries. Blended learning is strongly represented in the increasing number of courses that combine classroom teaching, electronic discussions and sometimes intensive residential schools.

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USQ has worked hard to develop strong support mechanisms for its off-campus students. Its Distance and e-Learning Centre, which manages students enrolled to study via external and Web modes, collects and dispatches over 200,000 assignments each semester from distance students, provides learning resources through the post to students who opt to study in the external mode using printed materials and CD-Roms, helps students to identify resources on the learning management system, and directs enquiries from students to staff desktops using a special software application that can convert telephone messages into a form that is compatible with computers. This support infrastructure and the associated policies and processes are crucial to maintaining USQ’s market reputation as a strong provider of flexible learning – and thereby to enhancing learner engagement with USQ’s blended learning courses.

SETTING THE STAGE In common with all other Australian universities, USQ undergoes continual review of its expenditures and revenues, especially as these relate to learning and teaching activities. It is committed to expanding its student base, both Australian and international, and in doing so to providing the best possible combination of learning experiences and opportunities. At the same time, the real costs (including the often hidden labor costs associated with implementing new policies and technologies) indicate that retaining traditional approaches to pedagogical provision is not viable, particularly in courses with low enrollments (Smith, 2005). Consequently USQ has invested considerable resources, including time, in the development of a set of university-wide enterprise systems, which have provided the basis for coordination across the organization’s complex administrative, learning and teaching, and student support functions (Smith, 2005). The PeopleSoft enterprise software

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underpins the finance, student administration, and human resources systems, while in 2007 USQ changed its learning management system from WebCT to Moodle. A necessarily simplified representation of the intersection of these diverse enterprise systems is provided in Figure 1: A key implication of this approach to learning and teaching management is that most USQ academic staff members teach across a number of delivery modes. While it is fairly common for some academics to teach in both external and Web modes, and sometimes not to teach in the on-campus mode (with the possible exception of residential schools), it is less usual for academics to teach fully on-campus with no exposure to off-campus teaching. This trend has necessitated substantial change to academics’ roles and responsibilities and to the ways in which they enact their professional identities. This change has been accompanied and supported by university-wide training in specific aspects of the learning management system and by faculty-specific discussions of learning and teaching that take account of the technological developments. Nevertheless, the pressures to create engaging and meaningful learning environments across all three delivery modes are considerable, and are not necessarily easily accommodated within the short timelines and increased individual accountability characteristic of contemporary universities. Similar pressures have been exerted on students, who have had to adjust their learning aspirations and experiences to fit with the requirements of learning management systems. Sometimes this has included having to change delivery mode from on- to off-campus if there are insufficient numbers to operate on-campus classes. Furthermore, Australian university students are increasingly studying part- or even full-time while carrying out part- or even full-time paid employment to cover tuition and related costs (Willans, Harreveld, & Danaher, 2003). This trend places an additional burden on blended learning’s capacity to generate and expand learner engagement, because for many


Figure 1. Enterprise systems at USQ (Smith, 2005, p. 4)

students such engagement is only a part – and sometimes a small part – of a complex set of diverse activities. This is potentially complicated further in the situation of international students, whose full range of responsibilities and expectations are not necessarily known to USQ staff members. Partly in response to these kinds of pressures, the higher education environment has moved – at least rhetorically – from ‘chalk and talk’ to studentcentered, independent, and flexible learning. This development has constituted an attempt to engage with an increasingly diverse student population and has reflected the need to exploit advances in information and communication technologies (ICTs) (Palalong, 2003). Under these circumstances, the use of learning management systems has become an integral part of distance and online education in recent years (Finkelstein & Pittinsky, 2003). Morgan (2003) reported that in most cases academics use learning management systems to communicate with students, provide access

to teaching and tutorial resources, and transmit other information to students. Similar sentiments have been conveyed by Schibik, Harrington, and Gordon (2005). It is clear from these developments that combining learning management systems and ICTs in blended learning environments is no easy mission: there are lots of complexities, some of which cancel one another out in relation to maximizing learner engagement. Despite these complexities, and the diversity of the courses discussed below notwithstanding, the academic staff members involved in all three courses have been committed to using all the pedagogical and technological resources and strategies at their disposal to encourage students to use these tools for learning, to participate actively with other learners, to conduct self-evaluation, to deploy time management skills, and to enact effective teamwork in diverse learning contexts. These are the principles needed to optimize the links between

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learner engagement and blended learning environments in contemporary universities.

CASE DESCRIPTION We turn now to present the three courses that constitute the case of learner engagement in blended learning environments being analyzed in this chapter. While the courses represent considerable diversity, they have been analyzed according to a common framework incorporating: • • •

Course overview Course design, management Course evaluation

development,

and

CIS5001 Information Systems for Managers Course Overview CIS5001 Information Systems for Managers is a postgraduate core course in the Faculty of Business at USQ. This course is offered in the on-campus, external and Web delivery modes in Semesters 1 and 2 each year, and on average attracts about 500 students for each semester. Most students enroll in the course in the external mode. External and online students are supported by means of the online resources associated with the learning management system Moodle, including the EASE online assignment submission system and the Turnitin plagiarism checking system. These three systems are used extensively to facilitate the easy delivery of course materials and the students’ active engagement and participation. The course has three formal summative assessment items: an online quiz (weighting 5%) due in Week 4 of the semester; a major written report (weighting 35%) due in Week 9; and an open book examination (weighting 60%) at the end of the semester.

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Course Design, Development, and Management CIS5001 is offered with the help of printed material, such as an introductory book and a study guide, especially designed for students to facilitate their study and their weekly course commitments. A copy of this printed material is also provided online via the learning management system. External students rely heavily on the three systems identified above (Moodle, EASE, and Turnitin), whereas on-campus students are able to attend the face-to-face lectures and tutorials. Usually the course is developed and managed by a team of three academics and a group of external markers. Various discussion forums have been developed to enable students to learn and to engage with the various concepts and theories encountered in the course. Since its inception the course has received positive feedback and course enrollments have increased. The course design and development have been organized to provide maximum possible support and flexibility to students with work commitments, as most of the students in the course are working in middle to top level management positions. The basic educational philosophy underpinning the course is to help students to achieve the course objectives through active participation, by critiquing one another’s perspectives, through formal assessment items, and by sharing information. For example, weekly discussion questions provide an opportunity to share students’ experiences and knowledge, as all the questions are open ended and encourage students to build the arguments needed to justify their points of view. The major assignment report requires students to analyze real business scenarios, to evaluate problems, and to present consultant reports with in-depth analysis and focused recommendations. The Turnitin plagiarism application enables students to assess their own work and teaches them how to analyze and critique their peers’ work.


The pedagogy employed in the course communicates to students the course expectations and requirements on a weekly basis through online discussion forums, weekly discussion questions, weekly extra activities, and case studies. The course resources in conjunction with the learning management system provide an opportunity for all participants to interact in teams and individually irrespective of their location or background. These interactions are monitored and moderated regularly by the course coordinator to maximize the richness of the discussion and the peer group teaching. Most of the interactions among the students and between the students and the teaching team members are in the online mode.

•

•

•

•

Course Evaluation CI85001 is reviewed regularly to ensure that it provides students with understandings of the business world and of the implications for that world of current and developing ICTs. Student interactions were consistent throughout the semester, but understandably the intensity of those interactions was extremely high immediately before the due date of each summative assessment item. The overall analysis, gleaned from student course evaluations and the teaching team’s focused reflections on the course outcomes, was that at the beginning of the course many students lacked confidence, but that by the end of the course most students had enjoyed the learning process, with the course offering being considered flexible and enjoyable. In particular, the course evaluation elicited the following motivators associated with enhancing the links between learner engagement and the blended learning environment of the course: •

By contrast, the course evaluation explicated the following factors that potentially reduced the level of learner engagement or otherwise indicated areas where our knowledge is not yet sufficiently developed to make definitive claims about such engagement: •

• The blended learning environment and the ICT tools provided students with substantial opportunities for effective and sustaining interactions among all modes of delivery.

The blended learning environment and the ICT tools helped to reduce the overall logical costs and to make the course more effective and efficient. The blended learning environment gave students the opportunity for engagement and potentially for empowerment through different kinds of interaction and through the flexibility offered in the course by means of various ICT tools and applications. The blended learning environment enabled the course participants to focus on problem-based learning (PBL), which in turn fostered greater learner engagement. The blended learning environment provided students with a rich learning context in which they were equipped to achieve their individual goals and to experience a considerable diversity of theoretical and experiential knowledge, again enhancing the depth and breadth of learner engagement in the course.

Although students were able to interact with the course coordinator in the blended learning environment and using the ICT tools, a number of students stated their preference for the positive effects of faceto-face teaching during the course teaching visits. The ICT tools and the other techniques used in the course’s blended learning environment did not provide specific evidence of individual interaction and progression, so the evaluation of the level and types of learner engagement in the course is necessarily generalized.

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•

•

•

•

The potential of the blended learning environment was limited both by some limitations of policies and procedures at USQ and by the restrictions of the existing infrastructure. The cultural and political norms specific to the discipline in which the course is situated tended to make the students’ engagement passive rather than active, in the sense that that engagement was directed at mastering existing understandings rather than necessarily creating new knowledge (somewhat akin to the ‘master and apprentice’ analogy); this is undoubtedly true of other disciplines and paradigms as well. It is difficult to analyze and evaluate the balance among, and the most appropriate combination of, various blended learning techniques needed to optimize the students’ learning and teaching experiences. It is important to think further about engagement and interaction among all the stakeholders in the course in the process of establishing a constructive framework for the most effective and efficient blended learning environment. For example, as well as student to student and student to academic staff member interactions, it is necessary to maximize such interactions among academics and between academics and industry and community representatives, because those interactions inevitably impinge on the quality of learner interaction and hence engagement in the course.

EDU8317 Educational Measurement and Assessment in Inclusive Education Course Overview EDU8317 Educational Measurement and Assessment in Inclusive Education is a postgraduate course for Australian and international students

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enrolled in the Master of Education program majoring in either Guidance and Counseling or Special Education in the Faculty of Education at USQ. The seven course modules introduce students to the fundamentals of psycho-educational assessment and include topics about assessment processes and procedures, basic measurement concepts such as reliability, validity, and norms, standardized and informal tests and testing, assessment accommodations, ethical and legal issues, and reporting. Prior to 2005, EDU8317 had been offered in the distance education mode, supplemented with a mandatory mid-semester face-to-face residential school. With many students, particularly those enrolled overseas, finding it increasingly difficult to attend the residential school owing to time, financial, and other constraints, and an organizational imperative toward increased access and flexibility for students, the decision was made from 2005 to trial the replacement of the face-to-face residential school component with online learning and teaching strategies. Enabling this new course design was an existing online course presence via the university’s learning management system. Before 2005, the EDU8317 online course page tended to be used mostly as a resource repository and a point of administrative contact between students and staff members. If crucial learning goals were not to be lost in the shift from a face-to-face/distance blend to a distance/online blend, the use of the learning management system needed to become a teaching, learning and engagement tool.

Course Design, Development, and Management From 2005, students continued to be provided with printed study materials typical of most distance offers at the university, including an introductory book, a study guide, and a book of selected readings. Students were also expected to purchase two set textbooks. Each study guide module followed


a consistent pattern: focus questions (learning objectives); text and explanatory notes related to the topic; prompts to complete the required text reading and selected readings; and independent activities interspersed throughout the module that required learners to apply, evaluate, and synthesize the content. The face-to-face mid-semester residential school had employed the instructional strategy of PBL to simulate and engage students in the ‘real world’ of psychoeducational assessment. Thus, during the residential school students were engaged with fellow students and teaching staff in the exploration of the curriculum content but also the more generic skills of self-directed learning and collaborative problem solving – all required for real world assessment practice. From a learning perspective, it was considered essential that the PBL component be retained in the course, but it would need to be modified for online delivery. Few changes were made to the PBL content for the online version of the course. Taking a case-based approach to PBL (Barrows, 1986), students worked with a hypothetical 12-year-old learner who had been ‘referred’ to them for assessment. Students were gradually exposed to richly presented case information and associated artifacts (for example, a referral letter, interview transcripts, school records, and existing assessment data) that were available from the online course page. Students engaged with the case to determine the significance of information, synthesize that information, draw on course and other resources, formulate and adapt hypotheses as necessary, and plan for additional processes that they would undertake to progress toward making sound educational recommendations for the case. The role of the teaching staff in the online version of the PBL component of the course was also to remain as it had been for the face-to-face version and consistent with the implementation of PBL – that is, encouraging and challenging students to interrogate their thinking deeply rather

than necessarily offering solutions (Savory & Duffy, 2001). However, the change from face-to-face to online implementation of the PBL activity prompted a reconsideration of the scheduling and integration of the PBL activities with the module activities. For the previous face-to-face residential school version, students had completed four modules over approximately eight weeks before engaging with the PBL activities. With the new online approach, the PBL activities were reconfigured into three sequential phases each of about two weeks’ duration, which commenced from the start of the semester and were offered parallel with the module study. Consequently the online version of the PBL component of the course moved closer to the intentions of PBL in that from the outset learning was synthesized and organized in the context of the problem (Savory & Duffy, 2001). With the removal of the mandatory residential school, there was some concern about student engagement and participation in the online PBL. As well as considering engagement from the perspective of creating engaging learning and teaching resources, explicitly sharing the rationale for the task, and staff encouragement of participation, it was felt that assessment could play a role in fostering and sustaining engagement. With the mindset that a PBL associated assessment task should be one that not only encourages engagement in the PBL task but also enhances the learning outcomes, the assessment task that was devised involved students writing a reflective statement about what they had learned about assessment and their approach to such assessment, and a selfcritique of themselves as assessment practitioners and lifelong learners. This was accompanied by a self-assessment of their assessment knowledge and skills in terms of how prepared they felt for the final assessment item where they were to undertake an assessment of an actual student and write a psychoeducational report. Thus, the reflective statement and self-assessment task were an attempt not only to engage the students

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in the PBL component of the course but also to develop their skills as reflective practitioners. The two other items of course assessment were more content focused and included a critical review of a standardized testing instrument and a PowerPoint presentation of a self-selected assessment topic. As well as independent engagement with the online version of the PBL activity, the other aspect requiring careful consideration was facilitating the collaborative engagement with other students and staff considered crucial for student learning from a constructivist educational philosophy but also as an authentic part of the PBL activities in that consultation and collaboration are necessary processes when undertaking psychoeducational assessment. Thus, for each of the three PBL phases, students were allocated to small online teams and encouraged to use their teams’ asynchronous online discussion forums to share their ideas and to collaborate with fellow students about the case. The PBL information sheet included prompts and scaffolding for the online discussion as well as independent reflection to support what was for most students their first experience of both the content area of psychoeducational assessment and the instructional strategy of PBL (see Figure 2).

Course Evaluation Delivery and management of this course during 2005–2007 revealed to the teaching staff some consistent patterns in terms of engagement with the online version of the PBL component of the course. All students engaged with the PBL activities, as demonstrated by their completion of the associated assessment task. However, not all students chose to engage collaboratively in the online discussion with some preferring to work independently, accompanied by passive reading of the discussion forum postings. The effects of this were twofold: not only did those students potentially affect the quality of their own learning experience, but also their fellow students reported that team members’ lack of engagement in discussions meant less team

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interaction and dialogue and negatively affected the quality of the learning experience for the whole team. After the first offer in 2005, students who wanted to participate actively in the discussions were alerted to the opportunity to be additionally signed up to another, more active group if they wished to do so. However, very few students took up this offer. Overall it was observed that only a few teams were engaged in high levels of genuinely collaborative discussion from start to finish. Other teams started well but participation dwindled throughout the semester. Student feedback about the course was gained through the broad university course evaluations as well as course developed surveys and students’ comments in the reflective statement assessment item. Generally students were very positive about the course overall. More detailed analysis of the student feedback revealed consistent themes in terms of the course and other aspects that both facilitated and challenged student engagement and learning. 1.

Aspects that supported engagement and learning – Most students rated the quality of the distance module materials and resources available on the learning management system as high. The majority of respondents also reported that the PBL was important for their engagement and learning in the course as a result of the following features: the practical, realistic, meaningful, and active ‘hands on’ character of the PBL; exposure to diverse points of view that enabled them to gauge their progress through the PBL discussion forums; deeper and more applied understanding of psychoeducational assessment content and processes; the requirement for self-directed research and learning; and motivational effects that included being able to apply existing knowledge. These features as noted by the EDU8317 students are similar to those identified in the literature as being particularly well addressed by PBL


Figure 2. Phase 1 prompts for the online PBL in EDU8317

2.

instructional strategies (Barrows, 1986). Students also noted that online discussions and contact among students and between students and staff members using the learning management system were highly valued, with one student noting that s/he felt like s/ he was studying on campus. Aspects that challenged engagement and learning – Three key themes emerged relating to aspects that challenged learner engagement:

(a)

Student factors – Several students noted that full engagement with the PBL materials took considerable time. This in turn often led to posting responses to the PBL focus questions close to deadline, thus leaving no time for online discussion with peers. A few students noted that they hesitated to participate in the online discussion forums either initially or at all owing

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to a personal sense of inadequacy and self-consciousness. (b) Technical issues – The technical expertise required by students to participate was low, with students needing only to download the PBL materials and to use the discussion forums. Some students did, however, report some personal technical problems (for example, Internet service provider issues and slower dial up Internet access) that affected their ability to download the PBL documents and to participate in the discussion forums before they closed (for example, Internet service provider issues and slower dial up Internet access). (c) Pedagogical matters – Several students noted difficulties with the asynchronous discussion forum and lack of real-time discussion with peers and staff members and felt that this affected engagement and motivation. Several students overcame this challenge by initiating face-to-face dialogue and mentoring in their local contexts. Student feedback highlighted the course mechanisms that both facilitated and challenged student engagement and learning, and provided some explanations as to the patterns of engagement observed by course staff during the delivery and management of the course. Based on this evaluation, the following areas are suggested as improvements to be implemented in subsequent offers of the course: •

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At the outset provide students with more information about PBL and in particular the importance of the collaborative discussion so that they are familiar with how to derive the maximum benefit from this instructional strategy.

•

•

•

•

•

•

Assist students with their time management by providing them with a guide for participation in the online PBL – for example, “It is recommended that you begin posting to the discussion board within the first week of the PBL phase.” Open one online forum discussion for each PBL phase rather than up to 10 separate discussion areas for small teams. Additionally, the learning management system feature that requires students to make a posting before they can view other students’ postings may increase active rather than passive (reading only) engagement in forums and support those who are lacking confidence. Extend each PBL task from two to three weeks to allow students extra time to engage and also troubleshoot technical problems. To lessen downloading problems, ensure that all file sizes are as small as possible by converting from Word to PDF formats. Streamline and integrate the two separate independent and discussion forum focus questions/activities in the PBL activity prompts (see Figure 2) under a single heading of “For Forum Discussion” to simplify the process and orient students toward participation in forum discussion. Trial the use of synchronous discussion forums in addition to the asynchronous discussion forums to enable real-time engagement and collaborative dialogue.

The shift from the face-to-face/distance blend to the distance/online blend has been successful in terms of increased flexibility for students by not requiring their attendance at a residential school and replacing this with the online version of the PBL course component. Evaluation of the course has verified that equivalent learning goals can be achieved irrespective of face-to-face or online delivery, provided that students engage in all aspects of the PBL component, including col-


laborative engagement with peers and academic staff members. However, it is encouraging all students to engage in this way that presents an ongoing challenge.

CIS8011 Emerging Information Technologies Course Overview CIS8011 Emerging Information Technologies is principally an online postgraduate course in the Faculty of Business at USQ. It includes an introductory book and study guide, reading materials, Web links, peer assessment, assessment submission, and assessment marking, all in the online mode. The study resources used in the course are threaded as online content using hyperlinks to allow easy access. Paper-based material is avoided in the course content. The course operates a peer review system for weekly assessment by students of submitted journals, and it assesses students in relation to solutions that they produce for practical problems. A mandatory plagiarism check for all submitted work is also in place. Completed assessment includes a rigorous submission through three different computing environments (anti-plagiarism software, the learning management system, and the peer review system), with the emphasis being on enabling students to learn from interacting with one another. This approach has improved the overall quality of the course. The feedback received from students shows that they are satisfied with the course outcomes and are willing to recommend it to other students. The course design and delivery have offered flexibility to both the students and USQ. They have reduced the cost of producing course materials, facilitated easy delivery of study materials to students, and maximized easy access of course materials by students and academic staff members. The course allows a flexible delivery schedule, and operates a clear and transparent structure.

Course Design, Development, and Management The educational philosophy framing the course design, development, and management for CIS8011 is founded on three key principles: learning by application; learning by observation; and learning by critique. The learning by application component involves students developing solutions for real life problems provided to them. The solutions are presented in the form of a consultant’s report, a management report, and an analysis component. The idea underpinning this component is to help students to think of various alternatives and then to generate feasible solutions taking into account all the known constraints. The learning by observation component enables students to benchmark their work against that of other students. This is done through peer assessments where students are given the opportunity to evaluate one another’s work. In doing so, they are able to compare the quality of their work with that of others (see Figure 3). The learning by critique component assists students to analyze and to review critically the work of others. This stimulates in-depth thinking because the subject matter is common to all students and they therefore have a mutually understood foundation for subsequent dialogue and engagement. Furthermore, this component helps students to improve the quality of their work in two distinct ways: while critiquing the work of others, students are required to demonstrate their in-depth subject knowledge; and students also receive an indication of others’ opinions of their own work. The combination of these two aspects of quality enhancement potentially helps all students to improve their overall standard of communication in the course (see Figure 4). USQ offers courses in different modes in order to accommodate the specific needs of local and distance students. Generally the main difference among the delivery modes lies in the way that

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Figure 3. Learning by observation in CIS8011

Figure 4. Learning by critique in CIS8011

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information is delivered to students. For example, a student might be resident locally and able to be on-campus but still enroll in the distance mode. Distance mode students are provided with printed learning materials suitable for self-study, and they are able to attend the two week residential school if they happen to be in the vicinity of the campus if such a school is part of the course. Web mode students do not have access to the residential school or to printed versions of the learning materials. CIS8011 uses the Web delivery mode, which is based on online provision irrespective of study mode (on- or off-campus). As noted above, the course material is offered through several hyperlinks enabling easy online access, and the materials are delivered to enrolled students via the Moodle learning management system as the standard interface. This approach provides the following advantages: •

• • • •

Flexible timelines for the academic staff members to submit materials to the Distance and e-Learning Centre Reduced costs in terms of printing Flexibility in updating course materials Easy delivery of course materials to students Shortened delivery schedule

Moreover, when the course was refined for the third semester in 2006, the modifications were easily incorporated into the course design and delivery. Many students liked this approach because it was easy for them to have ready access to materials via the Internet instead of having to carry around printed copies. Students who enrolled late received instant access and they were pleased by the rapid delivery of materials to them. Overall the benefits were significant. An added feature was the integration of online study materials into a single book. USQ courses in information systems traditionally provide two books, one outlining the course details and the other containing the readings required for the

course. The provision of one book in CIS8001 also ensured that updates to materials could be achieved easily with access to only one source. All study materials are presented in the form of pdf files. The advantage of this approach is easy addition to the reading sources without concern for the size of the book and hence postage charges. The course materials contain a number of hyperlinks to thread the content into a continuous flow (see Figure 5). The front end is a collapsed version of the course with a ‘telescopic’ view. Students are able to expand the modules to access either reading guidelines or reading materials to see how the task for a particular week can be accomplished. This provides flexibility to students depending on their level of understanding of the course content, and hopefully provides a strong foundation for enhancing learner interaction. The materials are presented with a set of standard readings. Each week certain sections of the readings are referred to in the study guide and students are asked to go through key elements of these sections in order to comprehend the weekly materials. These are then linked to assessments, which are presented in the form of weekly journals, mainly to demonstrate students’ understanding of the weekly materials. These journals are assessed by the students’ peers, as noted above. This forms the basis for their assignment and report work. This enables students to remain focused on the same set of materials, while still having the flexibility to read other sources. The design of the course materials is intentionally simple. Each week students are presented with a topic outline and the learning outcomes expected of students in that topic. They are provided with a set of readings to help their understanding, a set of guidelines for additional resources (mainly derived from the reference section of the readers), and an assessment task to stimulate their thinking for which they are required to collect additional evidence. The students are then required to submit their work.

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Figure 5. Example of threaded discussions in CIS8011

This process is the central theme for each week, and it enables students to understand the delivery schedule of their work. Moreover, students must submit all their work through a plagiarism application and ensure that the ‘plagiarism count’ (the percentage of material from other published sources) is under 20%. This enables students to review their own work in order to avoid any allegations of plagiarism or collusion. The plagiarism software is configured in such a way that students’ work is checked with available materials on the Internet as well as with their fellow students’ work. This approach is considered a pre-requisite to enhancing learner engagement in this blended learning environment.

Course Evaluation The course was initially conducted as a pilot in Semester 1, 2006. The course was evaluated by a professional evaluator (an ex-Gartner research consultant) as well as by a group of students. The evaluation was carried out in relation to the quality of materials, presentation format, time taken to complete assessment tasks, and student workload. The course was refined by including the feedback received from these two sources. The course was rerun in the second semester of 2006 with 127 students. The student feedback re-

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ceived subsequently was encouraging. Three main themes identified from that feedback were: •

•

•

The peer review system provides students with an opportunity to see what others are doing and to compare their work with that of their peers. The mandatory plagiarism check ensures that students avoid plagiarism and collusion charges. The weekly journals enable students to study on a weekly basis and this assists them to develop a disciplined routine.

Overall students expressed satisfaction with the course and felt encouraged to recommend the course to other students. In order to ensure students’ satisfaction with the course, periodic telephone conversations were held with students studying away from the main campus to make the assessment requirements clear to them. On the other hand, students felt the burden of weekly journal submissions to be somewhat excessive, especially when other assessments were also due. Also the submissions are automated with strict date stamps and hence any delay in submission results in an unsuccessful submission. One improvement to the course can be the submission


of three journals instead of five for the first and second assessments respectively. The second improvement can be in terms of peer assessment. Currently students are given a set of criteria to assess one another’s work. The criteria are loosely defined and are in need of more exact specification. The third area for improvement is the presentation format. Despite being given guidelines, students use their own presentation styles and there is no uniformity. One possible solution could be the use of formats with strict word limits; this will provide a uniform layout and will restrict students to a fixed maximum in terms of word count. Student evaluations indicated that the delivery of teaching materials is acceptable. However, on two occasions, owing to issues with the learning management system and the USQ server, students were not able to access and submit assessment. This needs improvement. As noted above, the students are given materials in pdf format. Owing to large file sizes, there have been occasional complications in downloading materials. It might be a good idea to recognize automatically students’ access schemes and to deliver an alternative version of the materials. Dial up modems and slow broadband connections limit the academic staff members’ ability to provide resources with larger file sizes. For example, course contact material is restricted to a small file size in order to accommodate students with dial up or lower bandwidth Internet connections, and for that reason files with sounds, images, and videos are avoided. Another area of weakness in the course is the lack of examples of report formats, as the course has not been running long enough to have established a significant corpus of such examples available to students. This will be addressed in later offerings of the course. In addition, a number of overseas students struggled with the management report writing style. Despite receiving examples and links to Web sites where guidelines can be found, students had

a difficulty in this regard for the first few weeks of the semester. One possible remedy is to conduct a teaching school in the initial weeks of the course to prepare students to undertake these activities. This will hopefully lead to an overall improvement in the quality of students’ submitted work. Generally the experiences of students and academic staff members in the course can be summarized into lessons learned by all stakeholders involved in the process in relation to learner engagement and blended learning: •

•

•

•

•

Plagiarism cases were very low as students have been able to check their work before final submission. It has been noticed that students are using these skills and resources in other courses, thereby improving the quality of their learning. Peer review assessment has proved to be effective in changing students’ attitudes toward marks allocated to them and to their fellow students. Students were generally very critical of one another’s work. This encourages students to produce assessment materials of high quality. Throughout the semester students are in considerable control of their assessment activities. This enables them to plan their future assessment items and to manage their future enrollment options before the end of the semester. There is clear evidence of interaction and engagement by students as active participants in the course. Students are generally willing and able to engage and to become empowered as the course proceeds. Students are also exposed to experiences of time management, teamwork, organizational skills, project management skills, academic writing, critical analyses of a given situation, the ability to defend their judgments, and the ability to plan and guide others. These skills provide students with a range of leadership training capacities.

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Overall there was a positive experience for students and academics alike. Improvements to the next delivery of the course will include a uniform format for assessment reports, tighter marking criteria for peer assessment, and perhaps an early teaching visit to the USQ Distance and e-Learning Centre to increase students’ awareness of management report writing styles.

CURRENT CHALLENGES FACING THE ORGANIZATION This chapter has presented the case of an Australian university, USQ, in relation to multiple experiences and perceptions of learner engagement in blended learning environments. It has done this by focusing on three postgraduate courses at USQ in terms of their design, development, and management, and has canvassed such issues as technology concerns and components, management and organizational concerns, and the cultural and philosophical assumptions of the academic staff members coordinating and teaching the courses. Despite their diversity, the common focus in the courses has been on identifying and implementing strategies needed to maximize the level and types of learner engagement and thereby to optimize the potential benefits of blended learning environments. It is clear that all three courses have succeeded in highlighting this intersection between learner engagement and blended learning environments in several respects, reflected in positive experiences and perceptions communicated by students, academic staff members, and program administrators. The various types of evidence adduced here demonstrate that the strategies deployed to design and refine the courses have helped considerably to encourage students to feel ‘at home,’ regardless of their location and enrollment mode. Indeed, an important element of those strategies has been efforts to render the divisions between delivery modes invisible and seamless, and to enhance

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learning experiences and outcomes across modes of enrollment and delivery. At the same time, it is clear that a set of challenges remains with regard to integrating learner engagement and blended learning environments in all three courses. Perhaps inevitably, not all learners are fully engaged all the time. Student retention and attrition also remain a potential concern. These are ongoing issues and not necessarily resolved easily or permanently. This is so because several factors influencing these challenges lie outside the control of individual course team members, faculties or USQ as a whole – for example, students’ busy lifestyles of which university study is only a part. Even in relation to those factors that are more amenable to action at the program and course levels, some issues are highly complex and differentiated and do not admit of easy answers. A prime example is assessment, which is attended by several tensions – for instance, between assessment for and of learning, between assessment to demonstrate mastery of existing knowledge and assessment to construct new understandings, between varying levels of ownership of the assessment process. The latter is signified by concerns about plagiarism, which reflects wider debates partly about academic integrity and partly about program quality. These recurring issues are likely to remain precisely that: hardy perennials that each course team must encounter and engage within each new offering of the course. This is what we meant by our point at the beginning of the chapter: that Graham’s (2006) depiction of blended learning as the convergence between face-to-face and computer mediated learning environments is the starting point, but not the finishing line, in defining and theorizing blended learning. For one thing, convergence is neither easy nor automatic to achieve: if not quite a never ending story, it is a highly complex assemblage of rapidly moving parts – of students, academics, administrators, other stakeholders, technologies, cultural prac-


tices, political imperatives, and the like – and so any settlement implied by the notion of convergence is liable to be tentative and temporary. For another thing, convergence is a potentially limited and limiting idea, in the sense that it implies a single meeting point (and hence a lowest common denominator). There is a possible risk that focusing excessively on convergence could lead to an elision of important and valuable differences among various educational technologies and delivery modes. From this perspective, we see the further theorization of blended learning environments as needing to take account of these kinds of differences, while attending also to equally significant questions of access, equity, quality, and sustainability. The evidence presented in this case study is a ‘mixed bag’about those questions: many students have found the respective courses enabling and even empowering, while others have struggled with particular pedagogical and technological concerns – as have the academic staff members charged with designing, delivering, and managing those courses.

CONCLUSION We have asserted that Graham’s (2006) depiction of blended learning as the convergence between face-to-face and computer mediated learning environments is the starting point, not the finishing line, in understanding blended learning. A key reason for this assertion is centered on the complexities in activating and sustaining learner engagement canvassed in this chapter. As the case presented here demonstrates, bringing blended learning and learner engagement into alignment entails the development of synergies across a range of factors, some of which lie outside the control of students and staff members. Their experiences and perceptions among the three courses outlined here highlight both challenges and opportunities in mobilizing those complexities. Those experi-

ences and perceptions also help to distill certain principles and strategies that might prove useful in future efforts to maximize learner engagement in blended learning environments. All of this underscores that this chapter, along with the others in this book, has sought to extend our current understandings of blended learning and its complex and sometimes perplexing relationship with learner engagement. The courses analyzed here are three separate contexts in which that relationship is enacted. The strategies identified here are efforts to optimize the alignment between the two phenomena, while allowing full rein for the particularities of each. Learner engagement and blended learning environments have much to offer each other, with hoped for benefits for learners and educators alike.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT Professor Yukiko Inoue has been an encouraging and facilitative editor, and two anonymous peer reviewers provided useful feedback about the submitted text. The authors are grateful to the students and academic colleagues who participated in the courses discussed here for enabling the data analysis presented in this chapter.

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Barrows, H. S. (1986). A taxonomy of problembased learning methods. Medical Education, 20, 481–486. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2923.1986. tb01386.x Bonk, C. J., & Graham, C. R. (Eds.). (2006). Handbook of blended learning: Global perspectives, local designs. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer. Butler-Kisber, L., & Portelli, P. (2003). Editorial: The challenges of student engagement: Beyond mainstream conceptions and practices. McGill Journal of Education, 38(2), 207. Danaher, P. A., Gururajan, R., & Hafeez-Baig, A. (2009). Transforming the practice of mobile learning: Promoting pedagogical innovation through educational principles and strategies that work. In H. Ryu & D. P. Parsons (Eds.), Innovative mobile learning: Techniques and technologies (pp. 21-46). Hershey, PA: Information Science Reference/IGI Global. Davies, C. H. J. (2002). Student engagement with simulations: A case study. Computers & Education, 39(3), 271–282. doi:10.1016/S03601315(02)00046-5 Driscoll, M. (2002). Blended learning: Let’s get beyond the hype. Retrieved September 7, 2008, from https://www-07.ibm.com/services/pdf/ blended_learning.pdf Finkelstein, J., & Pittinsky, M. (2003, JanuaryFebruary). The evolving role of course management system providers in the transformation of education: An interview with Blackboard’s Matthew Pittinsky. Technology Source. Retrieved November 16, 2008, from http://technologysource. org/article/evolving_role_of_course_management_system_providers_in_the_transformation_of_education/

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Garrison, D. R., & Kanuka, H. (2004). 2nd quarter). Blended learning: Uncovering its transformative potential in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 7(2), 95–105. doi:10.1016/j. iheduc.2004.02.001 Graham, C. R. (2006). Blended learning systems: Definition, current trends, and future directions. In C. J. Bonk & C. R. Graham (Eds.), Handbook of blended learning: Global perspectives, local designs (pp. 3-21). San Francisco: Pfeiffer. Guthrie, J. T. (2001). Contexts for engagement and motivation in reading. Reading Online, 4(8). Retrieved September 7, 2008, from http:// www.readingonline.org/articles/art_index. asp?HREF=handbook/guthrie/index.html Hafeez-Baig, A., & Danaher, P. A. (2007a, February). Future possibilities for mobile learning technologies and applications at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia: Lessons from an academic focus group. In D. P. Parsons & H. Ryu (Eds.), Proceedings of the conference on mobile learning technologies and applications (MoLTA) Massey University, Auckland, New Zealand February 19, 2007 (pp. 16-22). Auckland, New Zealand: Institute of Information and Mathematical Sciences, Massey University. Hafeez-Baig, A., & Danaher, P. A. (2007b). Challenges and opportunities in facilitating student engagement and empowerment: Perspectives from information systems and education courses at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. In C. Montgomerie & J. Seale (Eds.), Proceedings of world conference on education multimedia, hypermedia and telecommunications 2007 (pp. 459-468). Chesapeake, VA: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education. Linnenbrink, E. A., & Pintrich, P. R. (2003). The role of self-efficacy beliefs in student engagement and learning in the classroom. Reading & Writing Quarterly, 19, 119–137. doi:10.1080/10573560308223


McFadden, M., & Munns, G. (2002). Student engagement and the social relations of pedagogy. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 23(3), 357–366. doi:10.1080/0142569022000015409 Morgan, G. (2003, May). Course management system use in the University of Wisconsin system. Retrieved November 16, 2008, from http://www. wisconsin.edu/news/2003/bor_03_mar2003/ morgan-bor-presentation.pdf Osguthorpe, R. T., & Graham, C. R. (2003, Fall). Blended learning environments: Definitions and directions. Quarterly Review of Distance Education, 4(3), 227–233. Palalong, S. (2003). Using the virtual learning environment WebCT to enhance information skills teaching at Coventry University. Library Review, 52(3), 103–110. doi:10.1108/00242530310465906 Rossett, A., Douglis, F., & Frazee, R. V. (2003). Strategies for building blended learning. Learning Circuits. Retrieved September 7, 2008, from http:// www.essentiallearning.net/news/Strategies%20 for%20Building%20Blended%20Learning.pdf Roval, A. P., & Jordan, H. M. (2004, August). Blended learning and sense of community: A comparative analysis with traditional and fully online graduate courses. International Journal of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 5(2). Retrieved September 7, 2008, from http:// www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/viewArticle/192/274 Savory, J. R., & Duffy, T. M. (2001). Problem-based learning: An instructional model and its constructivist framework. CRLT Technical Report No. 1601. Indiana University, Bloomington, IN. Retrieved October 31, 2008, from http://64.233.179.104/ scholar?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=cache:9rXZtOc3RMJ:learning.north.londonmet.ac.uk/ im214/TR16-01.pdf+a+taxonomy+of+problembased+learning+methods

Schibik, T., Harrington, C., & Gordon, S. (2005). The utilization of course management systems in business schools: Some recent evidence. In 2005 Proceedings of the Midwest Business Economics Association (pp. 163-169). Retrieved November 16, 2008, from http://business.usi.edu/mbea/2005/ files/CHarringtonMBEA%202005%20CMS%20 V1NF.doc Singh, H. (2003, November-December). Building effective blended learning programs. Educational Technology, 43(6), 51–54. Smith, A. (2005). Using integrated enterprise systems to achieve strategic goals: A case study of a dual mode university. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 6(1). Retrieved November 16, 2008, from http://www. irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/view/220/868 University of Southern Queensland. (n. d.). From the beginning. Toowoomba, Qld: Author. Retrieved November 16, 2008, from http://www. usq.edu.au/40years/beginning/default.htm Vibert, A. B., & Shields, C. (2003). Approaches to student engagement: Does ideology matter? McGill Journal of Education, 38(2), 221. Willans, J. A., Harreveld, R. E., & Danaher, P. A. (2003). Enhancing higher education transitions through negotiated engagements of learning experiences: Lessons from a pre-undergraduate preparatory program language education course. Queensland Journal of Educational Research, 19(1), 42–50. Zyngier, D. (2005). Advancing student engagement through changed teaching practice: What does it take to engage a student? International Journal of Learning, 12(1), 102–113. Zyngier, D. (2008). (Re) conceptualising student engagement: Doing education not doing time. Teaching and Teacher Education, 24, 1765–1776. doi:10.1016/j.tate.2007.09.004

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Chapter 3

Instructional Leadership and Blended Learning:

Confronting the Knowledge Gap in Practice Martin R. Reardon Virginia Commonwealth University, USA

ABSTRACT Dewey’s concept of experience as an active engagement with a process of action, feedback, and reflection permeates the setting of the case reported in this chapter. The case involves an initiative to engage a group of experienced teachers and school administrators (in the context of a doctoral level course) with reading and reflecting on a vision of the future of education in a professional learning community permeated by the experience of blended learning. While the blended learning was heavily weighted towards face-to-face meetings, issues relating to the integration of technology with education became experienced realities for the group members. These issues included pre-service teacher education, equitable access to online resources, and the creation of an environment in which contemporary approaches to curriculum, teaching, and learning can flourish.

INTRODUCTION Christensen, Horn, and Johnson (2008) argued persuasively that the traditional K-12 educational model is on the verge of a renovation so comprehensive that it amounts to something of a revolution. They typified the emerging educational model as “learner centered,” and focused on the central mediating role of online resources in enabling the management and delivery of learner-specific approaches to DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch003

education. Blended learning retains the benefits of face-to-face social interaction with fellow learners while taking full advantage of the affordances of the online environment like ubiquitous access and virtual presence. The exploration reported in this chapter was motivated by a belief that instructional leadership is an essential element in steering the implementation of blended learning in the K-12 setting. The perspective of this chapter is that contributions to the present and forthcoming discussions of the role of blended learning and the evolving educational


Instructional Leadership and Blended Learning

model will be most credible if they emanate from instructional leaders’lived professional experience and expertise. The credibility of educational leaders’ contributions is challenged by the contested concept of “digital natives” (Bennett, Maton, & Kervin, 2007; Prensky, 2001a; Prensky, 2001b), in that many of those currently in instructional leadership positions are less comfortable with technology than the younger teachers and, particularly, the students. This generational difference gives rise to an imbalanced pedagogical situation and can result in the type of discordance between words and actions so pungently summed up as “the multi-prong problem” on a recent blog post: I have found it increasingly annoying to hear from on high that we need to integrate more technology in our classroom…. (We have to) still (use) old standbys because we don’t have the time to use and troubleshoot our way through technology. (We have to make) worksheets by copying and pasting by hand. (We have to build) test questions from book programs that only work on PCs or OS 9 on (sic) macs. (We want) to use videos from the Internet only to find they are blocked. (We want to) post information to a Web site or build (our) own Web sites (only) to find that FTP is blocked, or that online-services are clunky, restrictive, and cumbersome. (Arizpe, 2008) The larger question of the integration of digital technology and education illustrated by Arizpe (2008) is not limited to just the United States. Distilling educationally related questions with respect to information and communication technology (ICT) across the broad sweep of Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, the Center for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI, 2008) asked “how far does, and should, (ICT’s) potential to personalize learning get exploited, whether in schools or in other places where learning can take place?” (p. 57).

The CERI (2008) question invokes one of the crucial advantages of the revolution foreseen by Christensen et al. (2008): learner-centered education. The Christensen et al. perspective is supported by a range of findings. For example, Howell, West, and Peterson (2008) declared that “one of the latest education innovations to go mainstream (was) online education” (Howell et al., 2008, ¶ 1). To support their claim, they cited figures from the North American Council for Online Learning (NACOL) that suggested that enrollment in online courses totaled 45,000 in 2000—a figure which had grown to 1 million by 2007. Of these online courses, according to Howell et al., 70 percent were pitched at the high school level. Along similar lines, Zandberg, Lewis, and Greene (2008) found nearly a 60 percent rise from 2002 to 2005 in the number of students enrolled in technology-based distance education programs in the U.S., with the total number of students growing from 317,070 to 506,950. Although the “technology-based” label includes prerecorded video, and interactive voice technologies (among others), Zandberg et al. found that “among districts with technology-based distance education, 41 percent reported (using) two-way interactive video and 40 percent reported (delivering) Internet courses employing asynchronous computer-based instruction” (p. 44). Commenting on likely future trends, Zandberg et al. (2008) cited the United States Department of Education Office of Educational Technology in noting that “online (Internet-based) technology is considered by some policymakers to be the cornerstone of the educational landscape of the future” (p. 3). In this regard, Singleton-Rickman (2008) reported, that “Alabama’s high school students, beginning next year, will be required to pass a distance learning class in order to obtain their high school diplomas” (¶ 4) and that, “across the 16 states that make up the Southern Regional Education Board, there are about 200,000 students taking online courses” (¶ 13), including 77,000 students in Florida.

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This chapter presents and discusses an initiative to engage a group of potential educational leaders in a blended learning environment in the context of a course in a doctoral program. The adultlearning setting and the 21st century curriculum emphasis together constitute a fresh perspective on instructional leadership and blended learning. The graduates of the focus course will be eligible for high-level school district leadership upon graduation, and, consequently, will be the ones most empowered to make strategic decisions in terms of resource acquisition and allocation in the near future. The purpose of this initiative was to encourage the participants to enrich their perspective on the role of blended learning in the K-12 setting by their engagement with a blended learning environment in this doctoral-level course.

Policy Implications Educational policymakers appear to be on secure ground in their support for digital technology. For example, to directly support their “mainstream” claim from their own survey, Howell et al. stated that “fully 69 percent of the public, and a solid majority of every subgroup, say that they ‘would be willing to have a child (of theirs) go through high school taking some academic courses over the Internet” (Howell et al., 2008, ¶ 3). Shapira (2008) reported that “online schooling…is becoming more popular among students and educators as a way to break from the traditional classroom setting” (¶ 1). Shapira’s attribution of “break from the traditional classroom setting” motivation to students and educators is not supported by the findings of Picciano and Seaman (2007) in their survey of school district administrators. They found that the reasons for implementing online learning in districts were highly pragmatic. In order of importance, the reasons were: (a) offering courses not otherwise available at the school, (b) meeting the needs of specific groups

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of students, (c) offering Advanced Placement or college-level courses, (d) reducing scheduling conflicts for students, and (e) permitting students to retake courses they failed (p. 9).

Disrupting Class Each of the five reasons listed by Picciano and Seaman (2007) conform with the theoretical position propounded by Christensen, Horn, and Johnson (2008) regarding the ways in which online learning can provide educational services for those who have no option (as opposed to trying to supplant existing face-to-face teaching). Christensen et al. argued strongly in favor of student-centered education—implemented online in some appropriately supportive framework—as the way of the future. Song (2008) detailed a real-world scenario in which pragmatism could well motivate a move to a form of online learning when he described the issues surrounding college prep program offerings in Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD)—the second-largest school district in the US. In 2005, the LAUSD Board of Education moved to ensure that all students would have access to college prep classes by 2006, “and to require (such classes) by 2012” (¶ 2). The human resource implications of this decision are daunting, but the situation could be alleviated by invoking the concept of blended learning (Picciano & Seaman, 2007). Concept presentations and appropriate learning resources could be made available on-line for students. In the absence of a fully qualified teacher, students could engage with these materials under the guidance of an in-house tutor, allowing highly qualified teachers to be used in a visiting capacity. While this situation is not ideal, to return to the Christensen et al. (2008) perspective, it is better than its alternative (which is access to few or no college prep courses).


Blended Learning Merges Old and New

Case Theme: Confronting the Knowledge Gap in Practice

Picciano and Seaman (2007) defined a blended/ hybrid course as a course that blends online and face-to-face delivery “where a substantial proportion (30 to 79 percent) of the content is delivered online” (p. 7). In this context, blended learning employed in a classroom environment is conceptualized as a way of merging the best of the old- and new-era pedagogies. Ideally, the burden of content delivery is shared by a variety of online resources, largely leaving to the face-to-face modality the creation of the social environment in which learning occurs (although the effectiveness of the virtual social environment should not be underestimated—as discussed later in this paper). The elegance of the blending of the old and the new largely determines the effectiveness of blended learning. The observed percentage growth figures cited in the introduction to this chapter accord with the expectations of Christensen et al. (2008) for the emergence of online learning from its current “beach head,” but the 1 million students involved in 2007 is small compared to the projected 15 million students in 2007 in the upper grades alone predicted by the United States Department of Education Institute of Education Sciences National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES, 2008). It appears to be inevitable that there will be many students who will not be engaged in “online learning” during their school career. However, the conceptually intermediate step between “not online” and “online” provided by “blended” learning relies on the wide array of educational resources available online, while re-defining the role of the teacher as “fellow knowledge worker” rather than “omniscient guide.”

Clearly, leadership at both the school district and school building levels is crucial for ensuring the creation of effective blended learning experiences for students. In this regard, many instructional leaders are not well versed in current online learning technologies which (in some cases) were not invented when they were encouraged to develop lesson plans of their own. The image of the knowledge gap being invoked in this case is borrowed from the work of Tichenor, Donohue, and Olien (1970) who proposed: that “as the infusion of mass media information into a social system increases, segments of the population with higher socioeconomic status tend to acquire this information at a faster rate than the lower status segments, so that the gap in knowledge between these segments tends to increase rather than decrease” (pp. 159-160). Applying the knowledge gap concept in this context, many instructional leaders are envisaged as low in “technological SES,” whereas their students are high in “technological SES.” (In support of this typology, see, for example, the undergraduate survey of Salaway, Caruso, and Nelson, 2008.) To continue the analogy in the tradition of Tichenor et al. (1970), the infusion of educational technology into a social system comprising both technological “haves” and “havenots” is likely to increase the gap in technological knowledge between the two groups—the students will take-up the new technology faster than the instructional leaders. The purpose of this chapter is to describe a semester-long, multi-session learning experience (incorporating blended learning) intended to decrease the knowledge gap of a group of instructional leaders. Participants explored the potential

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of online learning in the process of engaging in a learning community to create blended learning experiences in their fields of expertise. Gagné’s (1965) six varieties of performance associated with learning (specific responding, chaining, multiple discrimination, classifying, rule using, and problem solving) were used as benchmarks against which to measure the learning that occurred among participants, with participants collaborating amongst themselves in a learning community environment. In particular, participants considered a set of teaching models from a well-respected text commonly found in undergraduate teaching courses (Joyce & Weil, 2004), and how these could be reconceptualized in a blended learning environment. From this common experience, participants set out to create their own blended learning “units” as significant learning experiences that would enhance teaching and learning in the 21st century.

BACKGROUND The university in which this exploration of blended learning is set is a large, public, urban university in an east coast U.S. capital city. It was established in the middle of the 20th century, when two pre-existing, thriving “down-town” public universities—one focused on medicine and the health sciences, and the other focused more on the arts—were merged. This university is rated as exhibiting “high research activity” under the Basic Classification Description (The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, 2007), but the expectation that faculty will approach teaching from a learner-centered perspective is made very clear in university documentation, as well as being exemplified in the creation of learnercentered administrative structures—especially at the undergraduate level. The School of Education at this university houses six departments with a total of over 100 faculty members. The graduate Educational

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Leadership Department is one of the six School of Education departments, and it caters for several hundred masters-level participants (enrolled in administrative endorsement programs), and over a hundred doctoral-level participants in both Ed.D. and Ph.D. tracks. The vast majority of courses are delivered off-site at conveniently located school district facilities. Most of the participants are in cohort groups—which are usually at least partially supported by the participants’ school districts— although non-cohort participants are welcome. Class groupings often consist of mixed cohort and non-cohort participants.

SETTING THE STAGE Digital technologies are heavily supported in the School of Education—as they are in this university as a whole. The School of Education supports its own technology department, which houses faculty members who not only provide courses in educational technology, but also ensure that School of Education technology resources are maintained, assisted by a cadre of tech-savvy undergraduate students—most of whom are taking educational technology courses. At the university-wide level, the Center for Excellence in Teaching (CET) actively supports the integration of technology and teaching. In addition to conducting many workshops on the integration of technology and teaching, CET acts as a sounding-board for faculty who wish to “push the envelope” and explore ways of teaching that take advantage of “the proliferation of interconnectivity and interactivity of Web-delivered content” (Web 2.0, 2008). As a minimum, the university expects that faculty will utilize the course-management aspects of Blackboard, but many faculty members go well beyond that minimum expectation and integrate a range of digital technologies with the learning experiences they orchestrate for their students. The confluence of reliable and knowledgeable support for technology


and a high level of faculty motivation to engage in cutting-edge research related to teaching and learning constitutes the environment in which this case plays out.

CASE DESCRIPTION This case focuses on the initiative taken by a professor in the Educational Leadership Department in the School of Education at this university to explore the concept of blended instruction in his own course delivery of a doctoral-level course designed to engage participants in examining the instructional leadership ramifications of the effective integration of digital technology and learning. The participants in this particular course are typically seeking endorsement at the school district superintendent-level, making the focus of this course particularly salient to instructional leadership in the 21st century. This course is focused on three key tasks of instructional leadership: curriculum development, group development, and professional development (Glickman, Gordon, & Ross-Gordon, 2007). In particular, in this course participants engage with issues arising from (a) the creation and implementation of curriculum in the 21st century (b) in an academic environment which challenges them to earnestly pursue their own professional development vis-à-vis digital technologies (c) immersed in a group-supportive environment which encourages risk-taking.

Technology Concerns The main technological concerns relating to this blended learning endeavor concerned the twin problems of the expertise of the participants (the “knowledge gap”) and reliable broadband Internet access. The blended learning concept envisages online learning experiences and face-to-face meetings which complement each other.

The expertise of the participants. It is not unusual to find a large range of comfort with technology in an “adult” group of learners—even in a group of highly capable academics. The professor’s concern was that participants who were challenged by particular instructional technologies would be disinclined to persevere with them long enough to realize the benefits those technologies promised. However, while this is clearly an element to be taken into account, educational technology is one area in which the adage “action precedes learning” is borne out. In the first class meeting, participants were encouraged to seek support from each other, from the university’s technical help desk, and from the professor. While the unevenness of technological expertise was a factor, it did not detract from the overall blended learning experience—rather the opposite. As an aside, the ease of interaction focused on making things work that the participants developed amongst themselves was strikingly evidenced late in the course. On one scheduled face-to-face meeting evening, an unexpected clash at the school district level resulted in half the participants being unable to attend. The remaining participants opted to meet with the professor in a classroom at the university. The previous meeting in the appointed room ran late, so the professor and the group sat in an adjacent classroom to wait. The participants— who could all login to the university’s wireless network—began to share in small groups while they were waiting, with individuals moving freely from one small group to another depending on the software being used. The professor was reluctant to interrupt this spontaneous social constructivist occurrence when the designated room became available. Reliable broadband Internet access. Since the face-to-face meetings were scheduled to occur at a conveniently located middle school where participants would be introduced to many of the online resources, Internet access at that site was essential. The middle school in question was known to be wireless-enabled, but it was not clear

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whether the participants from other buildings in that school district would be able to use their own logins at this designated site. Even more problematic, the professor and four non-cohort course participants needed Internet access as well. Starting three months before the course was scheduled to commence, repeated phone calls and emails to individuals and to the technology help desk of the relevant school district asking for clarification regarding Internet access, and, if necessary, guest logins were unproductive. As the first meeting for the course approached with no clear response in sight, the computer room next door to the designated meeting room at the host middle school was booked. The professor, resigned to demonstrating the online experience by simulation in the designated meeting room (with participants trying the software out for themselves in the computer lab next door), printed the screens of Web sites relevant to the first class meeting to Microsoft Windows Journal on his Tablet PC. Fortunately, the professor decided on the spur of the moment to take a 50-foot roll of CAT-5 cable that had been used in an earlier project to the designated meeting room to try to “jury-rig” a solution that would enable him to demonstrate the online software live. The cable easily reached a spare “drop” in the student computer lab next door. The professor was preparing to use the generic student login and ID (provided by a helpful secretary) when the Internet connection simply went live. So, the first major learning for the professor was that all the login protection in this school resided in the computers themselves. The course participants coped adequately with sharing the one “presentation” computer during the class meetings, and the computer lab went unused in the time that was optionally available for access.

Technology Components The main “hardware” component that participants needed to procure was a set of audio-active headphones to facilitate their participation in Wimba

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(http://www.wimba.com/products/ wimba_ classroom/) sessions. Wimba is the software engine that drives the Live Classroom functionality in Blackboard (http://www.blackboard.com/). Blackboard is a learning management tool used by many colleges, as it is at the college in this case. Three “official” class meetings were conducted on Wimba, but, after the first whole class meeting, participants were encouraged to use Wimba to meet with their research partners at their own discretion to facilitate collaboration on the research project that each partnership devised. Participants were encouraged to buy an audioactive headphone set that did not incorporate a mute button. This advice was based on the experience of a professor in the CET who had found that participants in some of his Wimba sessions accidentally bumped “mute” and became frustrated when no-one could hear them. In this case, the only “can you hear me?” glitch arose when the professor did not emphasize sufficiently strongly that participants should “click and hold” on the “talk” button when they wanted to speak (The script of the first Wimba session is included in the Appendix A). In addition to Blackboard, a wide range of well-known downloaded software (e.g., Camtasia [http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia.asp], Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint, Audacity [http://audacity.sourceforge.net/]), online software (e.g., ToonDoo [http://www.toondoo. com/], Animoto [http://animoto.com/], Wordle [http://wordle.com/], Twitter [http://twitter.com/], Google Docs [accessible from http://www.google. com/], Zoho [http://www.zoho.com/]), virtual reality sites such as Second Life [http://secondlife. com/whatis/], other sites such as Flickr [http:// www.flickr.com/] and Delicious [http://delicious. com/], special purpose Web sites such as Statistics Online Computational Resource [http://www.socr. ucla.edu/], and MathScience Innovation Center [http://msinnovation.info/index.html], and the professor’s own course Web sites were utilized to varying degrees by participants.


Pedagogical philosophy. It is important to note that the philosophy of this course envisages participants sampling from a “smorgasbord” of options. Participants were not expected to delve in equal depth into every learning opportunity that was orchestrated. Participants’ were continually directed to the course assessment items as the criteria of learning. These assessment items encouraged participants to construct their own meaning around the concept of blended instruction, and create blended curriculum units that accorded with their emergent concept, even while they were experiencing the professor’s approach to blended instruction. The philosophy in this course sits well with Dewey’s (2004) concept of the active sense of learning through experience. According to Dewey, “when we experience something we act upon it, we do something with it; then we suffer or undergo the consequences” (p. 133).

THE PROJECT The project involved utilizing digital technology to re-cast into a blended learning experience an existing doctoral-level course on the creation and evaluation of K-12 (elementary through high school) curriculum for the 21st century. This project challenged the fifteen participants to produce their own interpretation of a blended learning unit of instruction. In the first class meeting, participants were encouraged to share their thoughts about the major issues currently facing K-12 education. The issues emerging from this discussion grouped naturally under the “fundable research” headings of two major national grants agency, lending credibility to the participants’ suggestions. Further discussion led to the cogency of the generic position adopted by Christensen et al. (2008): learner-centered instruction that leverages the power of the Internet and emerging Web 2.0 tools has the potential for “disrupting” business-as-usual in education. This course was situated as an opportunity for partici-

pants to take both an active and passive role in exploring blended learning as an intermediate step between business-as-usual and the cutting-edge vision of Christensen et al. The legacy course structure envisaged eleven face-to-face, four-hour class meetings. The blended learning experience envisaged seven face-toface, four-hour class meetings, and two three-hour face-to-face class meetings (see below for details concerning the three-hour meetings). The two three-hour face-to-face class meetings were held subsequent to the introductory Wimba sessions (held on the preceding afternoon), providing for quick debriefing and problem-solving. For the remaining two scheduled meetings, one (the legacy sixth meeting) coincided with an unanticipated school district requirement (mentioned above) that about half of the participants had to be available at their respective schools that evening. This meeting was cast as an optional on-campus meeting in which Camtasia would be used to generate podcasts of the participants’ discussions, with the added option of students who remained off-campus participating real-time via Wimba. The podcasts were uploaded to the course Web site for later access by all participants. For the legacy eighth meeting, participants were expected to collaborate with their research partners. They were urged to collaborate online, since by then they were very familiar with Wimba. Although participants were encouraged to become stakeholders in guiding their own learning throughout the course by selecting from a wide range of online learning components, there were some compulsory components with which all were expected to engage. The three compulsory online components of this project were: (a) participation in two, one-hour Wimba “training” meetings online, (b) accessing the analysis of the course text (Christensen, Horn, & Johnson, 2008) from the course Web site, and (c) engaging in online dialog concerning the course text in the course blog, establishing and using their own personal

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reflective blogs, and contributing to specified colleagues’ blogs.

Participation in Wimba Meetings In the initial class meeting, participants were instructed to procure a set of audio-active headphones to enable them to participate in a Wimba session scheduled for the afternoon prior to the third class meeting. Scheduling this first Wimba session for the afternoon prior to a class meeting ensured as quick a face-to-face debriefing as possible, thereby preventing too much accumulation of frustration in the event of “glitches.” This first Wimba session was scripted (see Appendix A) to walk participants through some of the Wimba functionality in a non-threatening way. In the one-hour session which followed two weeks later, participants were invited to view a pertinent online video from within the Wimba environment, which proved to be an interesting exercise that exposed the deficiencies of the participants’ mental models of how Wimba worked. Following the initial one-hour Wimba meeting, the participants’ research collaborative pairings were given their own meeting rooms (with “presenter rights” for all), and encouraged to use this medium for collaboration. This two-pronged approach (combining compulsory short sessions for all with optional access to facilitate collaborative discussions) contributed to making the Wimba experience an educational one for about half the participants. The remaining participants battled with Internet bandwidth issues and/or their unease with the concept of a virtual classroom, and found Wimba frustrating to use. Overall, the Wimba experience in the context of this project was disappointing, since a trial project in the previous semester had resulted in all except two of a similarly sized group of participants operating with confidence in the Wimba environment and expressing enthusiasm for the concept. An intervening update to the Wimba engine within Blackboard may have impacted

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on the issues that this group experienced. Differing levels of comfort with the virtual classroom concept may also have accounted for some of the difference between the trial group and this group—at least one of the earlier trial groups was a “power user” of an alternative virtual classroom tool, and forthrightly endorsed the technology to her colleagues.

Increasing Engagement with the Course Text One of the points made strongly by Christensen et al. (2008) concerned the over-reliance of businessas-usual education on text-based materials, and how this reliance mitigates against learners with learning styles less amenable to text-based material. In response to this critique, this author decided to create a Web site on which each chapter of Christensen et al. would be précised and integrated with visually compelling graphics. Further, instead of conducting more conventional discussions in the face-to-face meetings, participants were encouraged to respond to the many questions incorporated into the text précis on a course blog, and/or on their own personal reflective blog. A deep level of engagement with the course text outside of the face-to-face meetings was evidenced in the way that many participants referred to ideas in the text as touchstones of good practice or counter-examples of points they were making, rather than as ideas they were encountering for the first time.

Online Dialog Throughout this course, participants were encouraged to perceive of themselves as growing into the role of public intellectuals. In this regard, blogs are integral to this course in that they empower a market-place of ideas. Participants’ initial experiences with blogs were very diverse—ranging from the majority who had not established a blog, through those who had established one but had


not really used it, through to some participants who were very much at ease with this medium (including one participant who maintained a wellpatronized, professional blog). In addition to participating on the course blog, participants were encouraged not only to establish and use their own blog, but also to contribute to the dialog on specified colleagues’ blogs. To facilitate this, each participant sought the collaboration of at least two others to respond to their blogs. In this way, every participant was assured of at least two different perspectives on the five blog entries they were required to write throughout the course. Participants were free to choose their own topics for their blogs, or, alternatively, write in response to any of the questions and issues raised concerning the course text on the course Web site.

“UNIT” DEVELOPMENT The unreservedly active part of this course required participants to develop a blended “unit” of instruction of their own in their field of expertise, based on their experience as learners in this blended course. The extent of the “unit” was deliberately left open. Two “deliverables” were required: (a) a scope and sequence storyboard, and (b) a unit of instruction incorporating the participant’s concept of blended learning.

Scope and Sequence Storyboard Again in deference to the Christensen et al. (2008) critique of text-intensive documents, participants were required to convey the scope and sequence of their blended unit of instruction in a storyboard. Participants were introduced to the concept of a storyboard using the actual storyboard developed by the New York-based advertising agency in the process of creating a television advertisement for well-known firm that produces condiments. (This author wishes to express thanks to the advertising agency executive for providing this resource. As

an added bonus, the actual television advertisement was airing on some local channels during this course.) The professor’s intention was that participants would produce their storyboard using the table functionality of Microsoft Word, but one of the participants (a “technology integrator” in a local school district) suggested the use of ToonDoo to produce the storyboard. This free, online software was used by all except two of the participants to produce storyboards that conveyed the scope and sequence of their units in a visual-intensive format. Figure 1, developed by the author of this chapter, shows the first page of a ToonBook (made up of three ToonDoo cartoons linked together by that software into a three-panel page). This page sets out the beginning of a scope and sequence description of a unit that envisages a set of students (the “dreamers”) reading the book Barkbelly (Weatherill, 2005) with a mentor, and then writing their reflections on a blog. Another participant discussed the potential for using the free online software available from Animoto for this same task. Animoto produces short videos (the free versions are 30 seconds long) which can also incorporate small amounts of text. (See the online resources in Appendix A.) ToonDoo and Animoto are examples of online software that teachers could well integrate into their teaching repertoire. In this instance, this software enabled course participants to produce scope and sequence documents that were relatively free of text, but their potential use by K-12 students in responding to higher-order prompts is clear. For example, one of the participants introduced ToonDoo to her Grade 5 class and was thrilled when one of her students spontaneously used it overnight to document the opening chapters of what she knew of the story of her adoption. As a further example, many of the participants found themselves initially “talking” to the students who would be potentially involved in learning from their unit in their scope and sequence products,

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Figure 1. The Opening Page of a ‘ToonBook’ Scope and Sequence Description

not the instructors (the latter being the traditional audience for scope and sequence documents). An unintended consequence of using a “text-light” scope and sequence product was a discussion of the subtleties of “voice.”

Unit of Instruction Incorporating Blended Learning Many participants produced exemplary units which effectively integrated digital technology and learning. Table 1, produced by Wendi Moss who was a participant in the course, shows one such unit, designed for “exceptional education” Grade 9 English students. The unit aims to engage students in a 21st century technology environment by utilizing Wordle, Twitter, and Animoto.

Outcomes and Feedback Throughout this project, participants engaged in educationally profitable ways with 21st century digital technology, and transferred their learning to the units that they, in turn, constructed in their individual fields of expertise. In this process, there were numerous instances of participants’ learning, as indicated by Gagné’s (1965) six performances associated with learning, with the emphasis on the

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higher-order performances. For example, there were few occasions on which specific responding was required, but much problem solving. One participant commented “I initially wanted to use only a CD (for presenting the unit), but, during our class discussions I realized I missed the point. This realization led me into a new direction with the integration of the Internet Web sites for a wonderful unit to teach general and exceptional education students.” This response attests to the type of conceptual re-alignment which the professor hoped to engender through this project. A couple of participants commented spontaneously on their encounter with the knowledge gap in practice. One referred to successful implementation in a classroom where students are more technologically adept as requiring a “cultural shift…on the part of the teacher—overcoming fear.” Another participant also spoke of the role that fear plays in hindering the “embrace” of technology. This participant went on to extend the reach of fear beyond the knowledge gap by referring to fear as a significant element that constrains “turning control (of their learning) over to the students.” Another participant referred to the parents’ knowledge gap in pointing out that “this learning experience will also be very new for parents…because of their previous school days.”


Table 1. A sample blended unit of instruction (Used with permission from W. Moss) Objectives: The student will… • Make planned oral presentations by using relevant detail to support main ideas. • Explain the relationships between and among elements of literature: characters, plot, setting, tone, point of view, and theme. • Describe the use of images and sounds to elicit the reader’s emotions. • Explain the influence of historical context on the form, style, and point of view of a written work. • Identify a position/argument to be confirmed, disproved, or modified. Activities: • Each student will write a short opinion of the book, The Watsons Go to Birmingham-1963 (Curtis, C. P. [2004], Thorndike Press). Students will include a list of at least 30 words that stand out to them in the novel. These words can be taken from the novel or can be words the student feels is appropriate in describing the novel. • Students will type their chosen words and opinions into <www.wordle.net> and create a graphic depiction of their words. • Students will, with a partner, pick a favorite scene from the novel and a character in that scene. They will log on to <www.twitter.com> and write a tweet from their chosen character’s point of view. Once they are finished with their tweet, they will read two other tweets and try to guess the scene about which others tweeted. • Students will search the internet for various images of segregation, Civil Rights movement, Flint, MI, Birmingham, AL, Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, etc. Once students have compiled their images, they will use them to create a music video on <www.animoto. com>. • Students will present their Wordle creations as well as their music videos to the class. Students must be prepared to defend their creations.

Students found the Wimba experience both exciting and frustrating—sometimes for the same participant. For example, one participant commented that “I found the Wimba sessions to be the most valuable (of the course).” However, the same participant went on to describe as “frustrating” the participant’s research partnership’s attempts to collaborate online, commenting that “after an hour of trying and emailing back and forth, we had to give up.” Another participant commented that “I like the concept of Wimba. I didn’t like the technical difficulties.” Another participant provided an assessment that “I can see how (Wimba) could be extremely effective when functioning at peak and (this is) certainly an area worth investigation for future use.” Participants found blogs to be of mixed value. One participant offered a theoretical perspective that “teacher blogging is a very valuable endeavor because (blogs) provide a medium for reflection and community building with stakeholders in all areas of education, including the media and policymakers.” At the practical level, the response was that “I was excited during the creation of my personal blog, but disappointed about the usage.”

One participant was really enthused about the potential of podcasting, and appreciated the power of Camtasia. This participant commented: “I would love to use (Camtasia) in my classroom as a way to (record) PowerPoints and presentations (for) absent students.” A range of insightful comments were submitted in response to the prompt regarding blended learning as an instructional medium. Using the concept of disruption in the sense employed by Christensen et al. (2008), one participant highlighted the existence of the knowledge gap directly as an issue to be addressed: “This (experience) has been disruptive, in (the) sense of moving from a monolithic, structured perspective to a flexible ‘let’s try it’ perspective. The disruption came in the form of being overwhelmed and concerned that the technological advances have not been distributed equally throughout the school (districts).” While local preferences with regard to the prominence given to technological advances would be expected, the above comment clearly focuses in on the crux of the knowledge gap. This resource availability issue was also evidenced in a number of other comments including this: “I think part of the issue is the availability

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within my school (district)” of Wimba (the virtual classroom tool) and other online resources—a number of which were “blocked” by particular school district Internet use policies. The availability issue was also evident in a comment that reflects the blog entry quoted in the introduction to this paper: “Sometimes I feel like in my job I am not given the time to explore the new technologies so that we can use them in our current settings.” This comment raises a negative outcome of this particular session in that there was a sense among the participants: “I have learned many useful and innovative tools that I am excited to work with in my classroom.” While this is a welcome comment, it focuses on the practical application of the technology rather that exhibiting the enthusiasm for developing a research agenda that would be more appropriate to participants in a doctoral level course. However, given the makeup of the group, this tendency to focus on the practical is not unexpected, but it is something that needs to be taken into account by the professor. Overall, while a couple of participants referred to themselves as initially “overwhelmed,” there was a strong consensus that blended learning is destined to play a role in the future of education. One participant nicely captured this line of thought in commenting, that “the methods used for instruction will need to find ways to compete with current technological innovations that vie for attention through bold advances in graphics and audio.” The lone, self-described pessimist among the participants commented that “although I see the value, the constraints of time, money, and utilization have been a barrier for many quality ideas, theories and practices.” In response to the “big picture” question about the future of blended learning as a concept, one participant chose the “path of inevitability” approach. I think that many educators have no choice but to turn to blended learning in order to reach this new generation of learners. Many of them are

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so engrossed with video games and online chat rooms, that it makes sense to incorporate this into their curriculum. We talked tonight about cultural relevance. If these students think that computers and technology are the norm, why not use them as teaching tools. A more nuanced “bottom line” comment also emerged from the specifically human concerns in education, suggesting that “the main power of blended learning (is) in its power to connect people across divides and in its social capacities, not in its ability to create learning....(because) programs will never be as nimble as real people trying to communicate in person.” Finally, two enthusiastically supportive comments will serve to nicely round out this feedback section. The first again picks up on the role played by effective instructional leadership in providing an environment in which the integration of technology and education can flourish—from equitable access, through provision of adequate pre-service education, to the provision of time and resources. Blended learning will continue to evolve as new technology is invented, existing technology is improved upon and perfected, and technology is made accessible for everyone. Because of this, it is imperative that colleges and universities evolve their teacher preparation programs to keep up with the emerging technology. The technology is often not used because teachers do not have time or do not have the resources to learn on the job. The second enthusiastic comment is more in the visionary realm, but foresees the tension inevitable as parents who expect schools to look like it did when they attended wrestle with the implications of blended learning for the way schools are organized. The future blended unit will be completely student directed. The classroom teacher will serve as


a facilitator for students. Initially, the younger students will require more support, but eventually they will become very independent. This learning experience will also be very new for parents to understand because of their previous school days. Even though this project on blended learning was not devised as a test case, it bears strongly on the current challenge which the Educational Leadership Department (of which the professor is a member) has given itself.

CURRENT CHALLENGES The Department of Education for the state in which the professor’s university is situated has recently released a set of performance standards for educational leaders. The impetus behind the development of these standards was a desire to make it clear that the successful completion of a certain number of hours of coursework was not necessarily a strong indicator of the potential of an aspiring educational leader. The Educational Leadership Department of which the professor is a member has recently set itself the task of endorsing the spirit of the state’s new performance standards by essentially setting out to “disrupt” (Christensen et al., 2008) its own traditional post-masters-level leadership endorsement program that is based on a set number of courses, each with a set number of hours. The new program the Department is envisaging will be learner-centered. This implies that, at the outset, the level of proficiency of each future participant on each of the standards will be assessed, with the participant then being directed to tailored instructional units. Further, the intention is to deliver this tailored instruction in a blended learning modality that fully leverages online, 21st century learning tools. In addition to the technological complexity of creating such a program, there are other challenges. For example, at the state Department of Education

level, there appears to be some shifting of ground from the original intention of those who advocated a performance-based approach (but who have since moved out of the roles they once held). There is clearly more political security in stipulating a set number of hours in a set number of courses than in supporting a truly performance-based approach. In this sense, adopting a performance-based approach would truly disrupt business as usual. A procedural challenge arises from the conundrum that, according to Christensen et al. (2008), to be successful, a disruptive innovation should not attempt to usurp the established order. According to Christensen et al., the niche most conducive to the endurance of a disruptive innovation involves providing something for those who otherwise have nothing. The niche for such an online blended leadership endorsement program would involve potential leaders in school districts that are geographically remote from the Department’s established centers. The advantage of this niche from the disruptive innovation perspective is a disadvantage for those developing the program in that the very remoteness of the participants exacerbates the ill-effects of the missteps that are not unexpected in the development of a new program. Thus, for more effective program development, the participants should be in the local area—within the range of the established centers. The professor’s department is certainly not the first university department to develop online course offerings. The pool of instructional leadership offerings based on performance rather than course-work completion is more restricted. As the professor’s department develops its online presence in this direction, the experience gained from the project on blended learning described here provides valuable insights. As one of the project participants commented, the blended learning project was an approach to “understanding leadership from a learning perspective.”

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CONCLUSION The concept of blended learning represents an intermediate step between business as usual in education (an approach which seems destined to exacerbate the knowledge gap), and the “far horizon” perspective espoused by Christensen et al. (2008). In a world in which the impact of digital technology is profound, educational leaders wrestle with a number of intractable issues. It is imperative that those who will be making the decisions that will bear on the design and implementation of curriculum in school districts have the experience and confidence to advance a realistic agenda for education in the 21st century. A strong contribution to future leaders’ accruing of appropriate credibility involves their engagement as learners with appropriate settings that will afford them with the opportunity to cycle through a sequence of action, feedback, and reflection. In this context, the setting incorporated blended learning in the supportive environment of a professional learning community. The outcome of this initiative was encouraging.

REFERENCES Arizpe, A. (2008). Teacher’s productivity hampered by technology: No love. Retrieved January 14, 2009, from http://www.43folders. com/forum/2008/01/27/teachers-productivityhampered-technology-no-love Bennett, S., Maton, K., & Kervin, L. (2007). The ‘digital natives’ debate: A critical review of the evidence. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(5), 775–786. doi:10.1111/j.14678535.2007.00793.x Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. The. (2007). Basic classification description. Retrieved November 11, 2008, from http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/classifications/index.asp?key=791

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Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI). (2008). Trends shaping education: 2008 edition. OECD Publishing. Retrieved January 14, 2009, from http://213.253.134.43/oecd/pdfs/ browseit/9608081E.PDF Christensen, C. M., Horn, M. B., & Johnson, C. W. (2008). Disrupting class: How disruptive innovation will change the way the world learns. New York: McGraw-Hill. Curtis, C. P. (2004). The Watsons go to Birmingham-1963. Waterville, ME: Thorndike Press. Dewey, J. (2004). Democracy and education. Mineola, NY: Dover. (Original work published 1916) Gagné, R. (1965). The conditions of learning. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. Glickman, C. D., Gordon, S. P., & Ross-Gordon, J. M. (2007). Supervision and instructional leadership: A developmental approach. Boston, MA: Pearson. Howell, W. G., West, M. R., & Peterson, P. E. (2008). The 2008 education next-PEPG survey of public opinion. Retrieved August 13, 2008, from http://www.hoover.org/publications/ednext/26380034.html Joyce, B., & Weil, M. (2004). Models of teaching (7th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson. National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). (2008). Fast facts. Retrieved July 8, 2008, from http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=65 Picciano, A. G., & Seaman, J. (2007). Online learning: A survey of U.S. school district administrators. Needham, MA: The Sloan Consortium. Prensky, M. (2001a). Digital natives, digital immigrants. Horizon, 9(5), 1–6. doi:10.1108/10748120110424816


Prensky, M. (2001b). Digital natives, digital immigrants, part II: Do they really think differently? Horizon, 9(6), 1–6. doi:10.1108/10748120110424843 Salaway, G., Caruso, J. B., & Nelson, M. R. (2008). The ECAR study of undergraduate students and information technology, 2008. Boulder, CO: EDUCAUSE. Shapira, I. (2008, July 24). For more N.Va. students, the classroom is on the computer. Wahington Post. Retrieved July 25, 2008, from http:// www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/ article/2008/07/23/AR2008072301180.html Singleton-Rickman, L. (2008, November 15). Next year, students must take distance learning course to graduate. TimesDaily.com. Retrieved November 20, 2008, from http://www.timesdaily.com/ article/20081116/ARTICLES/811160343/1011/ NEWS?Title=Next_year__students_must_take_ Internet_course_to_graduate Song, J. (2008, August 13). L. A. Unified college prep goal sees little progress. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved August 15, 2008, from http://www. latimes.com/news/education/la-me-classes132008aug13,0,1234916.story?track=rss Tichenor, P. J., Donohue, G. A., & Olien, C. N. (1970). Mass media flow and differential growth in knowledge. Public Opinion Quarterly, 34(2), 159–170. doi:10.1086/267786 Weatherill, C. (2006). Barkbelly. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Web 2.0. (2008, November 7). Retrieved November 11, 2008, from http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Web_2.0 Zandberg, I., Lewis, L., & Greene, B. (2008). Technology-based distance education courses for public elementary and secondary school students: 2002-03 and 2004-05. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics.

ONLINE RESOURCES Animoto.http://education.animoto.com/ Delicious. http://delicious.com/ Flick. http://www.flickr.com/ Google Docs. ttps://www.google.com/accounts/ ServiceLogin?service=writely&passive=true&n ui=1&continue=http%3A%2F%2Fdocs.google. com%2F%3Fhl%3Den%26tab%3Dwo&follow up=http%3A%2F%2Fdocs.google.com%2F%3 Fhl%3Den%26tab%3Dwo<mpl=homepage& rm=false MathScience Innovation Center. http://www. msinnovation.info/index.html Statistics Online Computational Resource. http:// www.socr.ucla.edu/ ToonDoo. http://www.toondoo.com/ Twitter.http://twitter.com/ Wordle. http://www.wordle.com/ Zoho. http://www.zoho.com/

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APPENDIX A Script of Initial Wimba Session Welcome to Wimba Type the above welcome message on the eBoard, along with: If all else fails, close Blackboard and try again. Click and hold the “Talk” button to talk. In this session I will walk you through some of the capabilities of Wimba by asking you to interact with me as we use them. I’m not going to try to tell you everything about Wimba —just enough to give you a working knowledge of what gives. Look at the whiteboard (called the eBoard in Wimba) where I wrote the welcome message. The presenter can write here with the mouse (Write “HI”) But, as you can see, it is ugly. So it’s best to type. (Type “HI”) You can’t see how I did that, because you aren’t presenters in this room. I will share this tool with you a little later in this session. At present, you know it exists. The next thing to look at is the window down the bottom headed “People” with my name in red at the top. You should also be able to see your name on this list, though you might have to scroll down to see it. At the bottom of this window, there are a number of icons. Click on the check mark, and see what happens. A check mark appears against your name under the column headed with the check mark and cross. This gives you a way of saying “I agree” or “Correct” or, by clicking on the “x” you can say “I disagree” or “Wrong.” The next icon is a little hand. Click on it and see what happens. A little hand appears against your name under the column with a little hand on top of it. This gives you a way to tell me that you have a question, and automatically puts you in order to get an answer. YOU HAVE TO CLICK ON THIS AGAIN when we have dealt with your question TO LOWER YOUR HAND. Even if you have a question right now, please click to lower your hand. I’ll take questions in a minute. Directly above this class list box is a horizontal bar. At the left hand end is the button with TALK on it. Don’t talk right now. As in any classroom, if everybody tries to talk at once, bedlam ensues. Raise your hand, and I’ll invite you to comment in order. Don’t forget to lower your hand after you have commented. Somebody please raise your hand and make a comment or ask a question when I call on you. Look again at the list of icons under the class list. The fourth button from the left gives you a dropdown menu with what are called “emoticons” on them. This gives you a way of telling me how you are feeling. Click on the “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” emoticon and observe that your choice shows against your name in the column with the smiley face above it.

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Next click on the “Options” button and see what your options are. Notice the one to lock your talk button. At present, that won’t work for you because I didn’t give you that option in this room. I have my microphone locked on—which is why I can talk over the top of whoever is talking—like in a phone conversation. When you get your own room I will enable that option because there will only be two of you (or three) and you can dispense with the hand raising procedure. In the bottom left hand corner there is an area which probably reads “Connected to server…you have connected successfully…” This is the text message area. Underneath this text message area is a very small box to the right of where you see a dropdown box which reads “Main Roon.” Click in the box, type a short message like “Hi” and hit the “return” key on your keyboard. This gives you a way to interact with each other and me on a stream of consciousness plane. The secret is to type very few words before you key “return,” and then develop a tolerance for getting a full message which is split up by lots of other part messages. If you wait to type a full sentence, often the “conversation” will have moved on by the time you chime in. This is definitely an acquired skill—and not one that I claim to have acquired fully yet. I still find it quite demanding. The presenter can disable this text message area. Let’s try to use the functionality we have discussed so far. Look at the eBoard area again. Supposing I have a graphic that I have come across that I want to share with you. I will import it so you can see it. Please give me a check sign when you can see the graphic. Send me a smiley face if you are following. Now take your smiley face off. Please raise your hand if you have a question or comment. Don’t forget to lower your hand when your question or comment has been addressed. This graphic represents the learning gains of students of different socio-economic status over a number of years of primary school. What do you conclude? Please raise your hand if you have a question or comment. Don’t forget to lower your hand when your question or comment has been addressed. For the following, I will use the tool bar which, at present, you don’t have. I will turn it on for you shortly. Supposing I wanted to highlight some part of this graphic. I could use the ellipse tool. If I make a mistake, I just click on erase and whatever I added goes away. Or I could click on the arrow, and then click on the graphic to draw your attention to what I’m talking about. Again, just click the eraser to make the arrows go away. I could also click on the upper-case T and type in the box. I can see what I type as I go in grey. What I type turns black and you can see it after I key “return.” Send me a smiley face if you are following. Now take your smiley face off. Please raise your hand if you have a question or comment. Don’t forget to lower your hand when your question or comment has been addressed. Now I’m going to enable the tool bar for you to see. I will describe the functions for you and then call on each of you to use a tool. Please don’t all use a tool at once, or no-one will be able to tell which mark is theirs.

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“Enable” everybody. Describe the tools. Call down the list for Watch while he/she uses the tool bar. Now I’m going to disable everybody. When you are in your own rooms, everybody will be presenters, which also means you can lock your talk buttons on. This isn’t a problem with just two or three people, so you can do away with the hand raising process too. The next two functions you also need presenter rights to be able to see, so I am just going to demonstrate them so you know this functionality exists, and I will show you more in class. If I wanted to preserve what this slide looks like before we move on, I would click on the “Save” button in the tool bar, and the slide with all the annotations would be saved in a “Snapshots” folder, which you will be able to see to the right in a drop-down menu when you have presenter rights. Let’s do that. Now, to clean the whiteboard, I click “Clear slide” and everything goes away. Let’s get the whole screen back. Look at the right hand side where there is a dropdown button beside a box that reads “Default Content Folder.” Click the dropdown button and select “Snapshots.” Then click on “Go” to make it happen. Select the slide you want to get back and presto—it is on the whiteboard. Send me a smiley face if you are following. Now take your smiley face off. Please raise your hand if you have a question or comment. Don’t forget to lower your hand when your question or comment has been addressed. The last thing I want to do today is to show you that you can use a PowerPoint presentation in Wimba. In fact, this is one of the best ways to share and discuss information in Wimba. Again, you need presenter rights to do this. Let’s load last week’s Session PP. I browse to it, and choose the option to display it in the eBoard. Click on “Import.” If all goes well, you will see a set of little squares being filled up as the upload proceeds. If it doesn’t work, just try it again. In the right hand window, you will now see the PP with each slide in the PP listed separately. Click on the one you want to appear on the eBoard and use the tool bar tools to help you discuss whatever you want on it. Send me a smiley face if you are following. Now take your smiley face off. Please raise your hand if you have a question or comment. Don’t forget to lower your hand when your question or comment has been addressed. Send me a hand clap if you are following. Feel free to sign off now and thank you for making it to our session today. If you want to ask some more, or practice what we did above, then stay online.

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Chapter 4

Blended Learning in a Creative Writing Program: Lessons Learned from a TwoYear Pilot Study Chris Morgan Southern Cross University, Australia Janie Conway-Herron Southern Cross University, Australia

ABSTRACT This case study reports on the results of a two-year pilot study in blended learning in an undergraduate creative writing program at Southern Cross University in Australia. It documents the development and implementation of a blended delivery model that dispenses with outdated divisions between face-to-face and distance modes of delivery, creating a converged, blended learning experience for all students. Findings from the pilot provided important data in relation to student satisfaction, pedagogical considerations, institutional constraints, teaching technologies, faculty workload issues, and costs associated with blended learning. These findings will contribute to a University-wide move to converged, blended learning in 2009.

INTRODUCTION This chapter documents the results of a two-year pilot study in blended learning in an undergraduate creative writing program at Southern Cross University (SCU) in Australia. The pilot study was conducted over three semesters, between 2006 and 2008, with formative and summative evaluation points, and was completed in July 2008. Drawing from the evaluation data, this chapter will report

in detail upon both the successes and problems encountered in the transition to blended learning, along with lessons learned along the way. It will also report on ways forward for this program in the light of pilot evaluation results.

BACKGROUND SCU is located along the east coast of Australia with three campuses spread over a distance of 600

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch004


Blended Learning in a Creative Writing Program

kilometers. It is a relatively small university with a current enrolment of around 12,000 students. The student population is predominately mature aged and is generally drawn from a comparatively low socio-economic grouping. Approximately one half of the students study via distance education, while the other half attends one of the three campuses for face-to-face education. There is a strong expressed need for flexible learning in a variety of formats to meet the needs of mature students often with heavy competing family and work commitments, and a wide geographic spread. The subject of this pilot study was the undergraduate creative writing program. The program was established in the mid-1990s and has been offered in traditional ‘dual mode’ delivery – students either enroll as internal students and attend traditional weekly lectures and tutorials on campus, or as distance education students, and undertake a combination of print-based home study supported by online activities and interactions. However, the division between on-campus and distance students has not always been entirely clear-cut. On-campus students have always been encouraged to access the distance study materials and online discussion to assist their study, and conversely, distance students have been encouraged to attend classes wherever possible. With the addition of newer technologies, such as videoconferencing, Web conferencing, and lecture podcasting, the boundaries have further blurred, and the duplication of teaching in the separate modes has proliferated (Oliver, Omari, & Herrington, 1998; Samarawickrema & O’Reilly, 2003).

locations at key times in semester, supported by print-based study materials, Web conferencing, and a variety of asynchronous online activities and interactions. Students were encouraged to make their own decisions about how they would interact with the program, given their own preferences, learning styles, and other life commitments. The weekly traditional on-campus lectures and tutorial classes were significantly reduced. The pilot project was funded by SCU to explore new models of blended learning and report to SCU community on its methodologies, strengths, weaknesses, obstacles, and potential ways forward for other programs wishing to proceed down this pathway.

A New Blended Delivery Model Blended learning is often conceptualized as the addition of a variety of computer-mediated learning options to face-to-face teaching (Graham, 2004). In this instance, the ‘blending’ also ensured that there were no longer any separate internal and distance categories of students, each with their own entitlements. Rather, a new single flexible mode of delivery, with a variety of study choices, was available to all students irrespective of location. Converged modes of delivery have long been the ‘holy grail’ of distance education providers (Tait & Mills, 1999); yet it has only been in relatively recent years that technologies have become sufficiently pervasive to be accessed by the vast majority of students, regardless of socio-economic status and location (Challis, 2005). The blended delivery model was designed with the following ideas and principles in mind:

SETTING THE STAGE • It was decided, therefore, in 2006 to blend the on-campus and distance students into one, flexible mode of delivery, offered in the same manner to all students irrespective of location. The learning encounter comprised intensive one day face-to-face traveling workshops held in multiple

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to eliminate any unnecessary or duplicated teaching activities that were not considered to be particularly productive (e.g., the lecture/tutorial format); to develop and strengthen the key pedagogical tools in the program (e.g., the writers’ workshop);


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to ensure that all students, irrespective of location, have equitable access to program teaching and resources; to provide as much choice as possible to the many mature students who are struggling to balance work, family and study commitments; and to develop expertise in and evaluate the efficacy of new teaching technologies in the context of this program.

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Planning Key issues to be addressed in the planning phase included: •

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pedagogy – how to reconfigure delivery strategies in the program to engender the best possible learning outcomes for all students. What to keep? What to discard? What to blend? What to re-develop? sustainability – how to cost new arrangements and ensure that teaching budgets and workloads are appropriate and sustainable student satisfaction – how to create and fulfill appropriate and realistic expectations in students who are experiencing altered delivery arrangements technological capacity – what interest and capacity exists with the student body to move towards more technologically mediated forms of learning institutional culture – how to inspire staff who are resistant to change and reticent to let go of traditional ‘tried-and-true’ delivery patterns administration – how to navigate through administrative structures and systems which are not currently geared for this kind of delivery

Major activities in this planning phase included:

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Consultation with stakeholders – Key stakeholders were initially consulted, including teaching staff in the writing program, the Head of School andAdministrative Officer, Student Services, the Library, and the Information Technology Committee. Discussions focused on practical issues in designing and conducting the pilot studies, including enrolment categories, use of new teaching technologies, and a consideration of the range of blended options that could be offered to students, along with associated costs and workload issues. Investigation of other convergence or blended learning activities within the higher education sector – A survey of all writing courses in Australia was conducted by telephone and email. While twelve other universities were delivering writing programs in distance or dual mode, no universities had plans for converged or blended delivery. It alerted us to a competitive advantage for SCU in attracting students who wish to study creative writing in a flexible mode, but with many more options and attractions than just traditional print-based distance education. Investigation of literature and reported studies of convergence – While there is a significant international body of literature on blended learning, which focuses on the use of information and communication technologies to enhance or replace face-toface instruction, there is only a very modest literature in relation to convergence of distance and on-campus modes in higher education There are very few studies that exemplify the kinds of complex convergence required here with large external enrolments blended with face-to-face teaching commitments on multiple campuses. Student needs analysis – There was no formal student needs analysis conducted before commencement of the pilot studies.

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However, the issues of student needs and preferences in relation to study modes, as well as interest in and capacity for greater use of technology in learning (e.g., Web conferencing, podcasted lectures, and asynchronous online workshops) were central to the pilots, the feedback provided by students, and the cyclical development of the blended learning model over the three semesters of piloting. Course demographics analysis- Course demographics were analyzed along with other sources of data such as student feedback, enrolment, growth and lecture attendance patterns. A principal concern in this analysis was the existing inequity in resources between on-campus and distance delivery: Although on-campus students consisted of about one-third of the total enrolment, it was calculated that they consumed approximately 80% of the course resources, when costs of lecturing by full-time staff are included. And yet, in recent years, the on-campus enrolments have been marginally in decline, while distance enrolments represent the program’s best growth potential. This prompted a consideration of ways in which we could make a more considered investment in the learning experience of the cohort as a whole.

The needs and patterns of existing on-campus students were also considered. Although weekly face-to-face delivery is still clearly regarded as a first option by many students, the reality of attendance patterns tells another story. Attendance at weekly lectures in writing often falls away dramatically as semester progresses, as students struggle with balancing work, family and study commitments, and the often significant costs associated with driving to a campus from outlying regions. It suggested to us that internal students are also, to varying degrees, seeking more flexible delivery options.

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Clarifying pedagogical principles and developing a new delivery model– For the purpose of this exercise, we considered pedagogical issues under three key headings as follows:

Content Provision A primary pedagogical principle in the design of the blended units for this pilot was to use each medium for its particular strengths in meeting students’ learning needs. It was considered that the existing high quality print-based materials very effectively provided the content of the unit. Previously, internal students experienced a mixture of weekly lectures and tutorials; however, weekly lectures were mostly repeating what was already contained in the printed distance materials and could therefore be dispensed with. The printed material was therefore made available to all students free of charge, and the additional costs of this were factored into the delivery mix.

Interaction and Dialogue Workshopping is the primary pedagogical strategy in creative writing. Students come together, either online or face-to-face, to present drafts of creative work for discussion and feedback from peers and the teacher. Face-to-face workshops had previously been available to internal students only – those studying at a distance workshopped online using asynchronous discussion threads. Distance students had commonly expressed some dissatisfaction with online workshops, concerned that it entailed a lot of reading on screen at night, that it was passive, and not nearly as engaging as its face-to-face counterpart. It was therefore decided to expand and strengthen this face-to-face component by the use of traveling writers’ workshops. An analysis of student demographics revealed that approximately 75% of students lived along the eastern seaboard from Brisbane to Sydney and were within com-


muting distance of at least one of the three SCU campuses, or a Sydney destination. In addition, the Sydney destination provided an inexpensive opportunity for those located in other parts of Australia to fly in for a one-day intensive. Utilizing cost savings from the deletion of weekly lectures, the traveling writers’ workshops were introduced as a key component of the new delivery mix. For those students unable or unwilling to attend a writers’ workshop, the online version was still available. Weekly on-campus workshops were also discontinued, in favor of the same one-day traveling workshops. In effect, this created a single, flexible, equitable mode of study for all students, with significantly increased opportunities for students formerly categorized as ‘distance.’

Assessment and Student Support Although there was no necessity to significantly alter assessment tasks, it was necessary to consider how effectively students would be supported to fulfill assessment requirements given the changes in the delivery mix. We expected that the printbased study guide, which includes activities and prompts, combined with workshops and online interactions, would provide an adequate basis for student preparation and support for assessment. However, we were aware that on-campus students, who had previously experienced weekly lectures and workshops, would feel the loss of that structure and weekly interaction. It was decided to schedule a weekly un-facilitated drop-in time, in a designated room, where on-campus students could meet, discuss issues and assessment work-in-progress. This time also coincided with the faculty student consultation time, in which students could consult in person about any issues or difficulties.

Evaluation Design A mixture of qualitative methods were employed in gathering data from the pilots, including focus groups of students during and after the travel-

ing workshops, and extensive individual phone interviews with those unable to attend. Teaching staff involved in the delivery of the relevant units were also interviewed at the end of each teaching period providing detailed feedback on perceived successes, problems, issues to be addressed, and overall impressions of the new delivery mix. Quantitative data (such as distribution of grades, student satisfaction data, and attrition statistics) was analyzed at the end of each teaching period to provide further insight into student performance and satisfaction with the altered delivery mix. Evaluative data was gathered and analyzed to allow cyclical improvements during the course of the pilots, and to enable lessons learned to be incorporated into the design and planning for the next iteration of the pilot.

CASE DESCRIPTION Pilots of the new converged mode of delivery were conducted in four units over three semesters, from Semester 1, 2007 to Semester 1, 2008 inclusive. These included two upper level units and two introductory first year units. Pilot details are as follows:

Pilot 1 (Semester 1, 2007) The advanced unit Writing from the Edge was selected for the first pilot. In previous years it had been offered as a conventional dual-mode unit; internal students offered weekly lectures and workshops, and externals receiving a print-based study guide, set of readings and online interactions. In the new converged mode, students were encouraged to make their own decisions from the following flexible mix of resources and events: • free supply of print-based study materials; • a one-day workshop at choice of four locations (attendance at one strongly encouraged);

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• • •

online workshops for those unable to attend; online discussion and support for all students; and a weekly un-facilitated drop-in space oncampus for students to enable social interaction and group work.

Students undertaking this unit were a mix of second and third year students with considerable existing academic skills and were therefore judged capable of a reasonable level of autonomy without the need to be ‘driven’ by weekly lectures and tutorials.

Written Texts and Introduction to Creative Writing. These two units work with a complimentary focus that provides foundation reading and writing skills for beginning creative writing students. The units are pre-requisites for all other writing units and the cohort in each is generally large (100+ students). Special care was taken when introducing the converged learning mode to these first year students: (1) to ensure introductory units had enough face-to-face contact to provide optimum learning conditions for novice students; and (2) to ensure that commitments were met for those who had enrolled as face-to-face students. The following delivery design was arrived at:

Pilot 2 (Semester 2, 2007) • A further unit Writing Project was piloted in converged mode in the second semester of 2007 with similar delivery arrangements to Pilot 1. Writing Project is an upper level unit designed to be the last unit in the writing major. It is significantly self-directed and has only ever been offered in distance mode. As a variation to the traveling workshop, we designed a one-day intensive workshop held at a key location to which all students were invited. The workshop was scheduled in the period between the submission of the first draft and the final draft of a significant creative piece. The piloted unit consisted of: • • • •

free supply of print-based materials to all students; a one-day workshop available to all students (but not compulsory); online workshops for those unable to attend the workshop; and online discussion and support for all students.

•

•

•

•

all students received a full set of printbased study materials; all students had access to online workshops, staffed by casual(short-term contract teaching/ lecturing staff) and/or permanent staff; there were no lectures, but 3 hour seminars were delivered in each unit that included both writers’ workshops and tutorial-style discussion. These workshops were held in four locations and were run four times during the semester for both units; Web conferencing (Elluminate) sessions were also provided for those students who were are unable to travel to the centers where the workshops were held; and the Study Guide exercises and assessment were shaped to support the four seminars with a modular approach to the material that fitted with the workshop schedule.

Findings from the Pilots

Pilot 3 (Semester 1, 2008)

Theme 1: Student Satisfaction with Blended Delivery

In the first semester of 2008, we piloted two introductory units in the writing major Introduction to

Although there were minor thematic variations in the evaluative data between the three pilots, there

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were clear and consistent patterns of student feedback on the blended learning experience. Students who would have normally experienced weekly classes on campus felt somewhat cheated by this experience. There was a spectrum of responses from these students but the majority felt that they were being ‘turned into distance students,’ and that the motivation declined without the weekly stimulus of lectures and workshops. On the other hand, students who would normally be classed as distance students, and who now had access to face-to-face workshops found the experience to be quite transformational, and greatly appreciated the opportunity for attendance. Clearly students are alert to a shift in resources, and the politics of ‘who gets what.’ While oncampus students in the unit understood and even supported the principle of equitable delivery and improved services for distance students, they were actively opposed in principle to any diminishment in their own ‘entitlements.’ Distance students, in contrast, found the opportunity to attend traveling workshops as a significant improvement to their prior status as ‘second class citizens’ of the program. The polarity of these results is not surprising. The pilots have significantly interrupted an established delivery pattern and learning culture for students whose expectations are already firmly set. Current enrolment categories do not provide for a ‘converged’ or ‘blended’ mode of study, and so the students were enrolled in the piloted units, at random, as ‘internal’ or ‘external,’ only to discover their particular delivery arrangements in Week 1. This resulted in some initial confusion among on-campus students and a lingering dissatisfaction that was very difficult to ameliorate during term. However, student preference for regular faceto-face contact is a perplexing one. Despite their vocal demands for maintenance of a traditional face-to-face experience, the on-campus students’ attendance at the four scheduled half-day workshops during Pilot 3 was unexpectedly poor. When

asked about non-attendance, a variety of reasons were given including other commitments such as work or holidays, lack of transport, and some students simply forgot. It seems there is a distinction to be drawn between students’ ‘in-principle’ demands and the reality of their lives. However, we also acknowledge that the writing program contains a highly diverse student body with seemingly endless varieties and combinations of motivation, needs and preferences in relation to their study. This student body included a certain percentage of students who needed and wanted a rich oncampus experience, at least in their first year of study, with all the structure, direction and social interaction that this entails.

Theme 2: Pedagogical Considerations The Traveling Workshop Almost all students who attended the writers’ workshops, irrespective of location, found it to be a highly rewarding experience and well worth the effort of attendance (which in some cases was considerable). This reaffirmed our belief that, in Creative Writing, the intensive workshop is the best way in which to provide a face-to-face experience that is immersive, interactive and highly developmental for students, not only in relation to their writing skills, but other graduate attributes such as peer- and self-review, and interpersonal communications. Attendance at workshops, however, was significantly below expectations at all sites. During the pilots we experimented with different scheduling options to allow part-time distance students (the majority of students in the program) maximum choice in relation to attendance. Student feedback revealed a plethora of issues in relation to timing, competing commitments, travel expenses, and an unexpected theme: a fear of attendance and exposure of one’s creative work in a public space. Efforts were made to accommodate these issues, and to create a ‘buzz’ around the workshops

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that would encourage distance students to participate in greater numbers. Yet it seems that in the same way that some students will need and demand a highly directed on-campus experience, so too will some demand a ‘purely distant’ experience and will choose not to attend scheduled events unless they are made compulsory. The Printed Study Packages Students were almost universally very happy with the quality and role of the print-based study guides. On-campus students were very happy to be accessing them free of charge. Students generally found the study materials to be engaging, stimulating and relevant and provided good direction and support in relation to the assessment tasks. Online Participation and Online Workshops There were typically three functions within the online component of the units: (1) threaded discussion of key unit issues and themes; (2) a help forum in which questions could be posed for a tutor’s response; and (3) online workshops of creative writing drafts for those who did not attend a writers’ workshop. Students’ responses to the online components were typically mixed – those distance students who were familiar with the format and protocols of online interactions were essentially satisfied, whereas on-campus students who were experiencing it for the first time found it of limited value, particularly when considered as a substitute for face-to-face interactions. Common concerns included: too much reading on screen; a lack of spontaneity that comes from face-to-face interactions; and too much irrelevant ‘chat’ between students. For many, the online components function as an integral part of their teacher and peer communications and workshops, while for others it is a minor, almost irrelevant aspect of their study. Web Conferencing It was proposed that the synchronous Web conferencing software (thus Elluminate) be employed as

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another tool for student interaction and workshop, particularly for those who were unable to attend live workshop events. Initial trials proved to be problematic for both faculty (who required more staff development to be able to run a sophisticated Web conferencing session) and students who experienced a range of technical difficulties in getting started. While we are optimistic that Elluminate will prove to be a useful addition to the flexible delivery mix, it requires more time and investment than we were able to give it in these pilots. Summary Despite the variety of issues that arose in relation to each of the components of the delivery mix, we felt that the range of options provided students with a sound pedagogical structure to their study, and a reasonable series of choices associated with how they engaged in the learning. Despite the evident discontent of the on-campus students, there was no greater than normal attrition rate from any of the units offered as part of these pilots (attrition hovered typically around 20%, which came largely from part-time distance students who tend ‘drop-in and drop out’ of study). Significantly, there was no noticeable difference in relation to quality of work produced for assessment during the pilots, when compared with previous years.

Theme 3: Institutional Constraints Institutional Timetabling Reform to current timetabling approaches is essential to the delivery of units that adopt a blended and converged learning mode and current moves towards a more user-friendly timetabling system is required, particularly with a whole-of-university approach towards more flexible modes of course delivery. •

Room allocation and event attendance: With the move away from standardized weekly scheduling of lectures and tutorials,


•

to a more event-based schedule of intensive workshops, event attendance and room allocation proved inordinately difficult. Timetabling: Classes offered outside of the standardized weekly patterns of delivery pose particular problems with booking rooms that are utilized on an irregular basis. Moves to student-centered online booking and more flexible systems of timetabling will improve this situation, but the challenge is still there to move away from the mindset that still privileges lecture/tutorial format.

Enrolment Categories It has been very difficult to conduct these pilots in the absence of a formal enrolment category that gives legitimacy and effectively describes to students this mode of delivery. By default, students must enroll in either on-campus or distance mode, even though there is no practical distinction between the two. We considered offering the piloted units in ‘distance only’ mode, however this was not an accurate descriptor given the rich face-toface options on offer, and we feared a significant exodus from the program if students perceived they could only study in this mode. The expectations of students upon enrolment in programs and units are directly linked to their ongoing satisfaction with the program. The oncampus/distance divide immediately sets up false expectations in students’ minds, particularly for those who enroll on-campus, which then must be quickly dispelled when term commences. This creates considerable risk for faculty, who will need to contend with student confusion, complaints, and highly variable student feedback.

Theme 4: Teaching Technologies The move towards blended learning is intricately connected to new teaching technologies such as Web conferencing, Web-based discussion, online submission of tasks, online assessment and feed-

back, podcasting, Webcasting, and videoconferencing. Although most of these technologies were employed at some point during the pilots, in at least an exploratory way, there is still much to be learned from both a teaching and learning perspective. Student feedback from these pilots indicates that interest in and uptake of new learning technologies is highly variable and generally conservative. We need to know much more about students’ current technological capacity and learning preferences before we can confidently make a serious investment in particular technologies. It should be recognized that teaching in a converged mode makes complex demands on teachers, and requires confident mastery of a range of technologies. Although staff development opportunities at SCU are growing in relation to new technologies in teaching, a more systematic approach is required if these are to move into the mainstream. The issue of staff development for casual and sessional staff is particularly critical, given the volume of teaching that they conduct and the minimal current allocations for staff development.

Theme 5: Workload Issues A key motivation for this pilot project was the elimination of unnecessarily duplicated teaching practices that is now inherent in dual-mode delivery. While historically on-campus and distance have been separate, parallel modes, technology has enabled us to significantly bridge the divide. In this program, there is no longer any point in delivering lectures when the content is fully explicated in study guides available to all. Similarly, there is no point in limiting the writers’ workshops to on-campus students, when it could be readily made more widely accessible. There is no longer any logic in restricting online forums to distance students only, when all students are seeking greater flexibility. A considerable amount of duplication in teaching can eliminated, while strengthening and giving new vigor to the pedagogical strengths of the program.

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Yet there is a range of stumbling blocks apparent in current workload models that create significant disincentives for staff to become more flexible in their teaching: •

•

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Workload models: Current workload models represent very traditional notions of teaching. Lecturing is still accorded a privileged status over a cluster of activities referred to as ‘facilitation of learning’ – workshops, online teaching, Web conferencing sessions, one-on-one phone support, and so on. Yet in flexible learning these activities are primary, higher order and comprise the substance of the learning encounter. They need to be undertaken with considerable professionalism and expertise to engender student engagement and satisfaction. While these activities retain their lower order status in the hierarchy of teaching, academics will have little incentive to re-conceptualize their teaching. Lectures will remain the cornerstone of teaching, irrespective of its pedagogical appropriateness. Sessional staffing and payment: In dualmode programs, casual and sessional staff are often corralled into distance teaching, as these activities (e.g., online facilitation, Web conferencing sessions, and phone contact) can be outsourced most cheaply. It reinforces the now quite artificial divide and the inequities between on-campus and distance provision. Ironically, sessional staff may find that under flexible learning arrangements their pay drops, yet expectations of them in terms of time and expertise is greater than ever. If moves towards flexible learning represent a diminished return for sessional staff, as was sometimes the case in this pilot, it will be difficult to retain their goodwill, energy and expertise.

Theme 6: Comparative Costing An important principle in the move to blended delivery is to work within existing budgets. Clearly blended learning will not deliver any wholesale cost savings to SCU, but we need to ensure that any new arrangements are no more expensive than the existing modes and will not create additional cost burdens. All new delivery arrangements in these pilots, including travel, accommodation, hire of facilities, and staffing were costed in advance and were approved by the Head of School prior to implementation. However it is very difficult to quantify how these altered arrangements, in total, compared with standard costs of running a unit in traditional dual mode. While it is recognized that money was saved by withdrawing the weekly delivery of lectures and workshops on-campus, and at least some of those savings were passed on to blended delivery arrangements, the final balance of cost is still very unclear. This situation highlights the difficulties faced by faculty when altering their delivery mix in the absence of clear guidelines in relation to the cost of various existing and new elements. We see particular advantage in being able to make a strategic investment in certain units in the program, such as core and first year units, with less intensive and therefore less expensive delivery patterns in upper level units, where students may be expected to be a little more self-directed.

CURRENT CHALLENGES It is clear from these pilots that blended learning provides a vehicle for universities to make a generational leap in relation to flexible delivery of courses. It is apparent that older forms of delivery such as traditional face-to-face and distance education no longer suit our students well and are becoming increasingly unsustainable from a teaching perspective.


The following implications are discussed in relation to a more widespread institutional move to blended learning:

and learning that requires a whole-of-institutional effort to reform.

Sustainability of Blended Learning An Institutional Vision of Blended Learning It was apparent in this study that student perceptions of what constitutes a ‘university experience’ are very closely linked with their responsiveness to and satisfaction with blended learning. Student perceptions and expectations, we have found, are relatively traditional in nature, and are culturally formed long before entry into higher education. Any erosion of traditional forms of teaching, such as lectures and tutorials, in favor of technologically-mediated delivery, will be met with skepticism and dissatisfaction unless the new arrangements are demonstrably and readily meeting their needs, both academically and socially. Universities need move away from ‘ivy league’ images and actively promote these new kinds of learning and engagement patterns as part of the university experience of the 21st Century. Students need to understand, upon entry, that old forms of didactic teaching and delivery have given way to a new set of standards in relation to student engagement and the ways learning is mediated. They need to understand that learning is now a lifelong responsibility requiring a skill-set that includes the ability to use a variety of contemporary technologies to advance their self-management of learning. Universities, for their own part, must be able to remove institutional impediments to blended learning. In this study, institutional impediments to the widespread adoption of blended learning were considerable and included a range of issues such as academic workload models, staffing patterns, recognition for innovation, and administrative issues such as timetabling systems, enrolment categories, and classroom allocations. Much of the SCU’s infrastructure, it was realized, is predicated on very outdated notions of teaching

Blended learning can potentially burden the teacher with an ever-increasing array of new teaching commitments to add to an already over-burdened teaching role. This pilot was enacted with the principle that there was no extra money or staff time available to do more teaching. If something is added into the delivery mix, something else has to go. This principle provoked some productive ongoing discussions amongst both teachers and learners regarding the components of the delivery mix that offered the best value, best aided learning, was sustainable, and ultimately produced the most effective learning outcomes. These are complex issues and are not easily resolved. It was considered in this study that iterative experimentation and evaluation was the only way to really shed light on these issues, accepting that both students and teachers need time and experience to familiarize themselves with new technologies employed and to be able to form a considered view on their efficacy. Having experimented for three semesters, we feel that there are still further adjustments to make in achieving a sustainable balance in relation to affordability, quality learning outcomes and student satisfaction. During this pilot, some faculty members expressed suspicions that blended learning is a cost cutting exercise by stealth: a way of cutting back on teaching and delivery costs and associated infrastructure. In this pilot, the costs associated with the new blended delivery model proved to be significantly more than normal arrangements, both in terms of staff time and expenditure. However, in the longer term, the aim is to finesse the delivery model to the degree that blended learning is essentially revenue neutral. Certainly, there are few, if any, opportunities in a quality blended learning model such as this to actually reduce costs when

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compared with normal arrangements, nor was there any pressure from any quarters to do so.

Quality Pedagogy It is clear that there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ pattern of blended learning that can be generalized across a particular university, or discipline, or sector. We realized that decisions made about the particular components of the delivery mix are very context dependent, and related to variables such as: the student context and demographics; the demands of the discipline; the socio-economic context; the technological literacy of teachers and learners; the learning preferences of students; the teaching preferences and strengths of staff; to name but a few. To achieve quality pedagogy, blended learning models should grow from the ground up, having regard to the needs of and interactions between teachers, students, the curriculum, and the discipline. Some faculty expressed concerns during the pilots that the move to blended learning represented an attack or an erosion of face-to-face teaching, at the expense students who become more isolated in their study. From the results of this pilot, we firmly believe that face-to-face teaching remains centrally in the mix of delivery methods, recognizing the important motivational and inspirational qualities of fine lecturing, along with the spontaneous interactions that may arise. Yet much of one’s lecturing is perhaps a little more routine than this, and certainly students report a range of experiences in their lectures from the sublime to the ridiculous. Blended learning, we argue, provides faculty with the opportunity to step back from the routines of teaching, and to examine methods such as lecturing from a fresh perspective. What are their strengths as a teacher? What is the value of the lecturing they are undertaking? What do students think of it? We argue that it is important to retain the richness of quality face-to-face

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teaching, particularly when it is appropriate for the subject matter and aligned with our teaching and learning objectives. Yet much routine lecturing – those grinding monologues of content delivery – could be re-conceptualized with the use of blended learning to more engaging, interactive events, enabling students to become a little less spoon-fed and a little more self-directed in their acquisition of knowledge.

Staff Development We learned that ongoing and systematic staff development is critical to the success of an institutional move to blended learning. This pilot revealed the need for two layers of staff development as follows: To enable planning for a move to blended learning, a first phase of staff development is required to develop an understanding of: • • • •

contemporary student needs and preferences in relation to study; changing student demographics and the mix within programs; current student technological preferences and capacity; and pedagogical strengths and weaknesses of elements available in the blended learning mix.

This phase of staff development is relatively generic and can be conducted on a universitywide basis. A second phase of staff development relates to actual hands-on skills development in selected technologies and new delivery elements, and requires iterative, just-in-time support. This staff development should be situated at the ‘coal-face,’ with maximum use of techniques such as staff learning circles and peer support, where best practice is identified, and expertise is incrementally developed and shared among staff over time.


CONCLUSION Blended learning initiatives are by no means new to the higher education sector in Australia or internationally. However, the form of blending undertaken in this study, which removes outdated divisions between on-campus and distance students, and draws together disparate and far-flung cohorts of students into a single, equitable mode of study, is still relatively uncharted territory. We have concerns that, among the student cohort, there are winners and losers. Clearly, the winners are students who would formerly have been disadvantaged by the isolation of distance education, and who now have access to a significantly expanded set of study options, including attendance at specialized face-to-face events and a new array of computer mediated events and communications. The losers are students who expect and need a traditional on-campus education with scheduled weekly face-to-face tuition. While there is a reduction of weekly teaching on campus in this model, and a developing reliance on independent learning for all students, it is vitally important that we don’t erode the ongoing vitality of a campus experience, and we must retain a viable core of on-campus teaching that provides structure, engagement and motivation for those who need it, particularly in their first year of study. In the light of these pilot results, it is intended that SCU move gradually to a fully blended and converged model of delivery across all its programs. Above all, it is considered that the entrenched inequities between distance and on-campus students are no longer necessary or conscionable. However, there is much reform at the institutional level to successfully make this move, and we have learned that universities cannot ‘dabble’ in converged or blended learning. At SCU, the current institutional constraints, such as enrolment systems, workload models, staffing arrangements, and inadequate staff development will cause enthusiastic faculty to revert, chastened, to conventional delivery arrangements. It requires

a whole-of-university approach, underpinned by a vision for the university as a ‘next generation’ flexible delivery provider, and actively promoted to students, to bring this to fruition.

REFERENCES Bonk, J., & Graham, C. R. (Eds.), Handbook of blended learning: Global perspectives, local designs. San Francisco, CA: Pfeiffer. Challis, D. (2005). Eroding distinctiveness: Blurring the boundaries between on- and off-campus students by the adoption of learning management systems. Open and Distance Learning Association of Australia Forum Conference Proceedings 2005. Retrieved February 10, 2009, from http://www. odlaa.org/events/2005conf/referred-papers.htm Graham, C. R. (2004). Blended learning systems: Definition, trends, and future directions. In C. Oliver, R., Omari, O., & Herrington, J. (1998). Developing converged learning environments for on and off-campus students using the WWW. Conference proceedings of the Australasian Society for Computers in Learning in Tertiary Education (ASCILITE) 1998. Retrieved February 10, 2009, from http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/wollongong98/asc98-pdf/ ascpapers98. html Samarawickrema, G., & O’Reilly, J. (2003). A converged learning environment to support all learners. 16th Conference Proceedings of the Open and Distance Learning Association of Australia Forum Conference – Sustaining Quality Learning Environments, 2003. Retrieved February 10, 2009, from http://www.odlaa.org/ publications/2003Proceedings/abstract.html Tait, A., & Mills, R. (Eds.). (1999). The convergence of distance and conventional education: Patterns of flexibility for the individual learner. London: Routledge.

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Chapter 5

Blended Learning for Adaptation to Needs Joan E. Aitken Park University, USA

ABSTRACT Blended learning is an instructional method that opens the channels of communication in the learning process so that there are increased communication strategies. This chapter discusses two different approaches to using blended learning as a way of adapting to program needs. In one example, pharmacy instruction is provided by top faculty to distance sites. In another example, blended learning is used to reduce instructional costs and increase student enrollment in a graduate program in the humanities. The differences in approaches are because of the different purposes for the use of blended learning. Blended learning can be useful in this time of dwindling resources and budget constraints as a method for improving instruction designed to reach more students and distance locations.

INTRODUCTION Blended Learning may be the traditional learning method of the future. Blended learning has been called a “total mix of pedagogical methods, employing a combination of diverse learning strategies, both with and without the use of technology” (Verkroost, Meijerink, Lintsen, & Veen, 2008, p. 499). In essence, blended learning combines traditional learning methods with technological support. Some educators believe that blended learning can DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch005

be a way to optimize effective instruction (e.g., Balram & Dragicevic, 2008; Ho, Lu, & Thurmaier, 2006; Mason, 2005). Blended learning—sometimes called hybrid or web-assisted learning—is as diverse as the faculty and institutions that support the combination approach (e.g., Lee, Yeh, Kung, & Hsu, 2007; Schober, Wagner, Reimann, & Spiel, 2008). Typically, one or more technological elements—individualized e-instruction, self-paced e-instruction, asynchronous e-instruction, synchronous e-instruction—are combined with face-toface instruction. For the discussion in this chapter, blended instruction is defined as teaching that uses


Blended Learning for Adaptation to Needs

a combination of traditional face-to-face and computer-mediated communication. The purpose of this chapter is to present ideas about how to employ blended learning to adapt to the particular instructional context. By considering examples, implementation possibilities for blended learning are discussed. In one example context, a professional program in pharmacy uses blended learning so that faculty and staff can offer the program on another campus. In another example context, a graduate program in the humanities uses blended learning to adapt to student needs and increase student enrollment in a new and growing program. In both examples, the use of blended instruction has offered a valid approach in a time of fewer resources to hire fulltime faculty. The chapter includes an explanation of the type of technology used, the way blended learning has been configured, and questions about the future applications of blended learning. The chapter offers answers to this question: How can students, faculty, and administrators adapt blended learning to achieve goals for their particular contexts?

BACKGROUND This section will consider historical information that has led to blended learning. In the professional pharmacy example, technology use has evolved over many years through the leadership of Information Technology (IT) and Academic Affairs. In the graduate humanities example, the university developed two administrative branches of instruction—onground and online—which operate separately. Blended learning has become a challenge that requires collaboration between two different administrative units. Across higher education contexts around the world, the lack of institutional support and financial restraints have prompted universities to seek ways to improve and transform education (Vega-Jurado, Fernandez-de-Lucio, & Huanca,

2008). Given the global economic crisis, more institutions may turn to blended learning. Sometimes blended learning is considered little more than a way of updating education, while in other cases, it is considered a way to provide financial support to an institution (Boyle, 2005). Clearly, blended learning is more than the old distributed learning modes of correspondence courses or televised courses and more than the one-way teacher lecture course. Optimally, blended learning should improve both face-to-face and online instruction. The model of blended learning--which uses technological support rather than replacement of traditional instruction—holds promise for student learning (Condie & Livingston, 2007). Enrollment in distance education courses is exploding (DeNeui & Dodge, 2006), sometimes to the point of seeming out of control with limited faculty training or supervision, faculty beyond of their comfort zone, and other concerns. So in a time when the quality of e-courses is sometimes questioned, blended learning has become an increasing popular way of improving the quality of online instruction (e.g., Boyle, Bradley, Chalk, Jones, & Pickard, 2003; Oravec, 2003; Schweizer, Paechter, & Weidenmann, 2003). Concurrently, resources for education are dwindling during the economic hard times, so blended learning may be a stimulus that takes advantage of the resources available, encourages faculty creativity, and adapts to students with special needs (Marschark, Sapere, & Pelz, 2008). From the perspective of the communication scholar, technology channels are intertwined with potential for new ways for faculty and students to interact. Scholars in other fields conceptualize the concept of communication differently from scholars of communication (Fraser & Schalley, 2009), but for people who study communication, everything about mediated learning includes opportunities to improve communication. E-learning has changed communication in education, for example, particularly from the standpoint of so-

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cial interaction (Slevin, 2008). Blended learning uses more channels of communication than does face-to-face instruction. When one considers the communication devices involved in blended learning, the approach seems to be about blended communication. In blended communication, the professor and students can use multiple interactions, which include the following: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13.

Blog Chat and instant messaging Course management system Electronic course environment Electronic files Email Listserv Podcasting Social networking software Teleconferencing Video Web page Wiki

The variety of communication options may help students to feel engaged in the learning process through a sense of connectedness. This connectedness comes through the immediacy and interpersonal nature of online communication. Face-to-face instruction in a traditional classroom is often public communication, but online interaction is more similar to interpersonal communication than other types of communication (Wang, Walther, & Hancock, 2009; Walther, 1992). This interpersonal nature is what gives the potential for informal and personal communication in these learning situations. In some cases, the communication is similar to intrapersonal communication or self-talk (Smith & Kurthen, 2007), as when the computer acts as a second self (Turkle, 1984). Sometimes online journaling, for example, engages a student intrapersonally. The journals of bloggers seem to share the feeling that their communication allows them to develop self-identity and expression (McCullagh, 2008).

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In addition, blended communication may use the Internet to communicate information, values, and ideas through technology. In some ways, this communication through a blended learning approach may make the acquisition of knowledge easier. If one considers learning preferences, for instance, blended communication allows the instructor to provide adaptive instruction that can reach all students (Wall & Ahmed, 2008). Thus, we can conclude that blended communication involves communication process of expressing, sharing, gathering, disseminating, and collaborating online. Some students like computer learning. In fact, they may consider the conventional oneway communication of traditional classes to be old fashioned or boring. Although faculty have complained about the television and video game generation’s shortened attention span of students for years, the Internet may take the problem to a whole new level (Jackson, 2008). Students may be very adept at using technology and distracted during online learning by “50 million Web sites” and “75 million blogs” (p. 13). Other students may be reluctant to use new technologies. Understandably, student attitude can affect the success of using technology in learning (Lee, Yeh, Kung, & Hsu, 2007). In the traditional one-way face-to-face course, some students may have difficulty engaging actively in the learning process. Of course, most faculty use an array of face-to-face learning approaches, but one potential way for increasing active classroom involvement is to use laptop computers for e-discussion during oral discussion. This kind of approach can encourage students to engage in communication channels that make them feel comfortable in the learning process. Consistent with research on the topic, technology provides diverse channels of communication for educators (Verhoeven & Graesser, 2008). By way of illustration, a student may feel embarrassed if the professor thinks an oral answer is wrong, but feel reassured after checking with a classmate through instant mes-


saging. This observation is consistent with a study by Shen, Wang, and Pan (2008), which found that blended learning in classrooms may increases student engagement and interactivity. In their analysis of real-time blended learning, they found mobile support increased student questions and suggestions. Effective communication seems difficult in the best of circumstances, so adding to the communication channels during the educational process of blended classes seems like a potentially useful idea. In addition to the difficulty of asynchronous conversation, the online format for communication may affect the depth of conversation. People expect emails to be short and quick to read, which also may transfer into online instructional assignments. A 750 essay assigned to be posted for peer response may seem long in the online format, when students skim and speed read posts. This expectation for brevity may affect the depth of thought and conversation in mediated environments. Motteram (2006) discussed the importance of engaging students for depth of discussion online, however, and how success is more a function of the nature of the conversation and less with the method of conversation.

SETTING THE STAGE In this section, the adaptive use of technology for the two example programs is discussed. Technology may be seen as a way of supporting students and faculty, and the investment in equipment and software may grow out of concern for good instruction and effective adaptation to students. To illustrate how blended learning can improve learning, the method can motivate teachers to change and improve their instructional practices (Owston, Sinclair, & Wideman, 2008). Blended learning also can improve collaboration, which may be one of the most effective learning strategies for the widest number of students (Lim & Yoon, 2008). Because of the demands on nontraditional

students, programs for graduate students may be more popular if they use an approach that provides online collaboration and less classroom time (Cox & Cox, 2008). Using blending learning to adapt to the context is consistent with research about e-learning, which has demonstrated creative approaches in virtually every field of academics (e.g., Black, Beck, & Dawson, 2007; Knobel & Lankshear, 2008; Michinov & Michinov, 2008; Rush, 2008). A fundamental element in creating blended learning may be the course environment software, such as Blackboard, WebTycho, First Class, and eCollege. The course environment provides content, testing, group, chat, and other e-options. As DeNeui and Dodge (2006) explained: One of the main benefits to students is the unfettered access to virtually anything an instructor presents in the classroom. For example, access to syllabi, course notes, interactive demonstrations, handouts, audio or videotaped lectures are all possible via this interface. (p. 256) Even if course environment software is not available, there are other options for blended learning. Faculty can create tutorials, which they put on external Web services. In addition, teachers can use many free Internet services in their classes. Faculty can use Facebook.com, for example, and set up a Facebook group to add another dimension to the course. With the graduate program example, faculty and students used the following free online Internet services: Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, SurveyMonkey.com, Glogster.com, Dandelife.com, Secondlife, Squidoo.com, Blogger.com, Squidoo.com, YouTube.com, PBwiki. com, Code.Google.com/p/YouTeach, and Video. YouTeach.de. These kinds of communication strategies can enhance instruction and are consistent with research on the topic. In a study by Vaughan (2007), students indicated that they found more time flexibility through blended learning. Fur-

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ther, students believed their learning improved in the blended context. That finding supports the idea that the blended approach may enhance a variety of instructional approaches so that they better adapt to student needs. The faculty in the Vaughan study thought that a blended learning approach improved chances for faculty to interact with students. In the graduate program example, some students used a combination of learning approaches, including face-to-face, blended, and totally online instruction. These students could fit the instruction to their needs and improve flexibility in ways similar to the students of the Vaughan study. Similarly, although the blended approaches required considerable work, faculty were willing to provide the instruction to meet student needs and increase class size in a growing department.

Responsible Parties Involved At both example universities discussed in this chapter, they are considering changes in their use of courseware as a cost saving measure. One university is considering using an open source courseware such as https://open.umich.edu/ or http://ocw.mit.edu/ Faculty are upset at the prospect of the changes this approach will require. The other university is considering passing the course environment costs directly to the student. In both universities, these cost saving measures are being made at the upper administrative level. Regarding the way blended courses are taught, developed, and support within the School of Pharmacy at the one university, the process is controlled by the faculty. At the other example university, the way blended courses are taught, developed, and supported takes place primarily within an administrative unit separate from the academic departments and separate from the IT department. In this second case, both administrative units are responsible. First, the academic department is responsible for content. Second, the online learning department is responsible for (3)

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making sure certain types of content is present, (1) supervising faculty, (2) seeing that course content is uploaded into master courses, and (4) coping the appropriate classes. An online learning instructional designer is knowledgeable about putting the materials into the course shell. The idea is that the designer will work with the individual faculty member, who supplies the course content. There are online learning supervisory staff members who are responsible for administrative tasks related to working with the online courses. The program director is responsible for the program in the department. The director selects faculty to provide course content. At the end of the process, the director can review the course and approve content before the instruction begins. There are academic administrators involved in encouraging online courses and overseeing the process. Faculty involved in the process may be full or part-time. The faculty are hired by the program director, who then turns the process over to the online learning department. As Boyle (2005) explained about using a course development team: The design/development team needs to have an appropriate mixture of roles, and in academic settings, clarity about the commitment of people working part-time on the project. There should be a clear plan for tackling the design and development tasks. The plan involves breaking the overall problems into sub-tasks and allocating these to groups and individuals within the group. There needs to be regular group meetings to discuss the progress against targets. Good design requires a creative and motivated group. (p. 228)

CASE DESCRIPTION In this section, the blended learning adaptations of the two example programs are described. The programs are (1) a professional program in pharmacy and (2) a graduate program in the humanities. Both programs are about three years old. The


professional program has used a blended approach from the beginning. The graduate program still has not decided if or how blended instruction will be used long-term in the program.

Example One: Launching a New Professional Program in Pharmacy A state university with a well-established school of pharmacy decided to launch a professional program at other state universities. Blended learning research suggests the approach is appropriate in health care education (Duque, Roberts, Hui, Posel, Fleiszer, & Chiu, 2006; Espey, Ogburn, Kalishman, Zsemlye, & Cosgrove, 2007). This program required substantial investment in new facilities which contained large lecture halls with built-in projection screens and recording facilities. A few faculty members are located at the distance campuses, but nearly all of the faculty are located at the main campus site. The faculty provide lectures and academic guidance to students, but staff are hired for advising functions. In addition to using a course environment with extensive peripheral supports, the faculty teach synchronous courses to students. A large lecture hall contains multiple screens, a microphone for every two students, and an onsite video-operator. The lecture is Internet-broadcast to the distance campuses, where students can see the projected images and interact with the faculty member. The video-operator at the main campus location records the professor and any students who interact in that space. The video-recorded lectures are then made available to students as podcasts. The information technology services provide an open-instructional lab for faculty once a month. Faculty can receive individualized, face-to-face instruction on any software or hardware they desire. The online supports show the kinds of add-ons available for course environments. 1.

Blogs and wikis software is added to the course environment.

2.

Course environment management system software is available for all course delivery, staff training, and organizational collaboration. This system contains a request function so that instructors can make special copying requests or create a new organization site. 3. Some classrooms with special technology have technology for large lecture classroom interactivity through quiz formats, attendance-taking, learning games, and student answers to synchronous questions. 4. Instant messaging is available inside the course environment software. 5. Learning Object Creation enables various media resources, such as document scanning and video streaming. 6. Listserv electronic mailing list use L-Soft’s LISTSERV software to provide communication lists to any interested people, including faculty and students. 7. Podcasting is available for recording in many classrooms. In addition to videorecording faculty lectures and PowerPoints, students can use a search function based on PowerPoint content. The system allows multi-way audio, video, application sharing, polling, and content display. 8. Test-making software allows transfer from commonly used software to the course environment. The software also allows test security so that students cannot print tests or go to another URL during the exam. This process is particularly valuable during proctored exams. 9. The courseware provides collaboration software available to the university community. In addition, VideoPresence life-size, highdefinition meeting abilities are available. 10. Turnitin is a plagiarism detection and prevention system available to the university community. 11. A voice board is available for learning oral language, vocal instruction, collaboration, and coaching Voice Board allows students

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to post and listen to voice messages within discussion boards. Voice Email-send allows audible email. There are also voice recorder, podcasting, and presentation services available.

Example 2: Launching a New Graduate Program in the Humanities Based on program goals, courses were developed for both online and onground formats. Typically, a faculty member would teach the course onground, create materials, and then develop the course in an online course environment shell. The courses were developed so that the content can be used by other faculty. Both part-time and full-time faculty develop the courses. For this program, experimentation with the blended approach enabled more flexibility for onground students and allowed for both distance and local students to attend a class together. In a new program--where not every course would have enough students to make, the idea was to see if distance (online) and local (onground) students could work together in a blended class format. In this example, the professor tried three blended approaches. A multiple course trial of this approach was implemented as a way to adapt to program needs and student needs. First, the professor used synchronous blue tooth telephony with an online course shell. In some courses, the faculty member arranged to use a telephone call-in service. While meeting with some students face-to-face, other students telephoned in through a conferencing system. Probably the main disadvantage of this approach was the inability of all students to hear the students on the phone. The communication was primarily one-way from the professor to the students. When students tried to interact in discussion, the professor was the only one who could hear distance students. The administration ended this approach because of the high cost of the telephone conferencing system.

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In the second trial, the professor used synchronous Skype.com voice-over freeware. In their instructional study using Skype, Pan and Sullivan (2005) found that student reaction toward the system was positive. The study suggested that students were better able to better work with abstract topics. Skype worked well to augment group interaction. Typing is not needed, so students can focus their mental energy on the topic, which helped them stay motivated and on task. Skype seemed particularly effective with virtual teams, including immediate input and feedback (27-30). They provide the following recommendations for using Skype: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Divide students into groups of four for conference calling. Encourage headsets and other useful tools. Encourage tools such as Blackboard Chat, which record conversations. Organize a pro-class training session for a subset of the entire class. Provide protocols for disconnects. Schedule the students’ Skype subscription in the class orientation.

This study was consistent with case here, adding support to the idea that Skype can be a useful learning tool (Jaya, 2008). Thus, Skype and the course environment system were used to provide a video connection between the onground and online course. The University supplied a motion-activated camera for the classroom. This approach allowed freedom lecture and discussion as usual. Although the approach worked, it seemed a temporary and haphazard solution. In the third trial, the professor used asynchronous online instruction combined with face-to-face instruction. In other words, shortened face-to-face class meetings were supplemented by course environment software use between class meetings. One configuration of this approach includes coordination between two universities. In fact, a blended approach can work well when developing


an international instructional program (Mathur & Oliver, 2007). The two universities have decided to work together in a program where students in one country will receive a graduate degree from both their own and a US university. A key advantage of using international students or multinational locations in e-learning is that students learn effective international public discourse. Students from the other country will be taking online courses and faculty from the other country will be teaching students from the e-courses developed by US faculty. Further, by having students from both countries in the classes, faculty hope to use online technology in collaborative learning as it has been done successfully elsewhere (Cho & Lee, 2008). The courses will be conducted in English, and the faculty believe that the questions of training faculty, recruiting students, creating community, and cultural differences may necessitate some kind of blended approach. E-learning has taken shape according to cultural and national expectations (e.g., Thomas, 2008; Van Bauwel, 2008), so requires adaptation to the opportunities and styles in both countries. The cost of flying faculty and students back and forth has become prohibitive, so the need for adaptation to international faculty and students is a major consideration in this case.

CURRENT CHALLENGES FACING THE ORGANIZATION In this section, the needed problem-solving for the example programs in this case are synthesized. To make the examples relevant to other contexts, they are discussed in a general way, so they are consistent with research findings on the topic. After a general overview of challenges, relevant questions will be considered. Clearly, e-learning is a complicated process with paradoxical ups and downs, pros and cons, strengths and needs regarding e-communication during course instruction (Shedletsky & Aitken, 2001). If students, faculty, and administrators are

using available communication technology to enhance instruction and learning, blended learning may be successful. A key challenge, however, is finding ways to use these complicated communication channels so they enhance the educational process. One challenge in using blended learning is that it requires careful planning and practices (McAndrew, 2006). When perceived as a way to bring better resources to students—as in the pharmacy school example—all parties seem onboard. When perceived as a power grab by a technical or academic unit—as in the humanities program example—a transition to blended learning may develop slowly, if at all. Another challenge in using technology in education may be the focus on technical details that take away from an academic focus on theoretical issues (Slevin, 2008). Academics may have to become experts on communication technology in addition to course content. Nearly any faculty member can give examples of students asking them technical questions about the communication technology instead of asking Instructional Technology staff. Some students may expect their faculty to know it all. Although a way of saving money in some cases, blending learning may be quite expensive too. The professional pharmacy program in this case had extensive planning, cost, and technology requirements. These costs are less than setting up a second program at another campus, however. With a financial crisis requiring cost cuts, both example programs in this case are trying to find new ways to pay for the communication technology they want to use in instruction. Thus, similarly related to the financial restraints of challenging economic times is whether or not communication technologies are affordable. Determining whether technology investments will pay off may be a challenge. Blended teaching can be a way of repurposing resources (Davis & Fill, 2007), which may be needed when resources are limited.

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Another challenge of using blended learning is faculty resistance to change (Vaughan, 2007). A study conducted in Australia and Canada suggested that there are many similarities between teaching philosophies of online and onground faculty, which may mean blended learning is a valuable trend (Stacey & Wiesenberg, 2007). Yet in the humanities example, there is a sense of competition, where the online faculty pay the bills and the onground faculty are the content experts. Perhaps in a time of dwindling resources, faculty will need new ways of working together and adapting to change. Universities may need to find ways to help students adapt to the communication technologies they will use in their course work. Some students may have troubling keeping motivated and up-to-date with their work in a blended approach. The advantage for students of flexibility and increased learning has the challenge of time management and learning complicated technologies (Vaughan, 2007). Many full-time faculty see their work expectations and responsibilities expanding. Enticing faculty to do the work of adopting new technologies and teaching methods for blended instruction can be difficult (Davis & Fill, 2007). Thus, full faculty participation in blended learning may be a challenge. It tends to be administrators and students—more than faculty—who believe in the ability of blended learning to improve instruction and student access to education (Condie & Livingston, 2007). Faculty may have concern over some of the work-intensive elements—time, resources, and course redesign--of providing instruction through both the online and face-toface formats. The examples in this chapter are consistent with research that suggests that faculty and administrators have many issues to solve regarding using technology, including how to use social networking, games, and mobile services (Milliron, Plinske, Noonan-Terry, 2008). Staying up-to-date with continually changing technology can increase work and stress.

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CONCLUSION The pharmacy program example in this case clearly sees blended learning as a viable learning approach. The humanities program example seems to lack clear direction for using blended learning because the online and onground approaches remain distinctly different. The different results suggest that the complexities of organizations, faculty, staff, students, and contexts determine if and how blended learning will be used. Appropriate adaptations need to be made to fit program purposes. So how might the example programs in this case provide ideas for other contexts? A key advantage to using communication technology in instruction is that it allows learning to be personalized for students. Virtual resources can enhance usability and task completion by enhancing other instructional methods (Mackey & Ho, 2008). Although the original expectation was that computer learning would become more impersonalized, online instructional support can facilitate multimedia adaptation to student needs and learning styles through individualized instruction. For the blended course, this means that additional communication channels are opened to the instructional process. Abrahmov and Ronen (2008) contended: “The Web-based component enabled us to engage the students in individual activity, where each student, in his own time, can develop” (p. 13). Some of the cited research in this case suggests that blended learning may work better than online learning in international or global contexts. This finding is relevant for the international component under development in the humanities example in this chapter. In a study of courses in Denmark, for instance, Heilesen and Josephsen (2008) found that challenges of holistic and individual user perceptions have led to a growing disillusionment about learning through technology. They believe that a potential result may be the use of technology as augmentation, which is consistent with some types of blended instruction. Ryan and


Kopischke (2008) also found that Internet technology can provide opportunities and the ability for globalization. Research suggests that opportunities for blended learning should recognize that different countries have implemented government policies about the Internet. In blended learning courses taught internationally, the faculty will need to adapt to any governmental restrictions. Although openness may not be experienced in all national contexts, research does suggest that the users in China, for instance, seek a balance of freedom and self-restraint (Giese & Muller, 2007). International blended learning will need appropriate adaptations. “Information and communication technologies are here to stay and are expected to enhance learning” (Donnelly, 2006, p. 95). Blended learning tries to use all available means of communication to improve instructional effectiveness. New technologies are already available and on the horizon, and those technologies can facilitate blended learning. As new computer technologies make downloading a video-lecture to an iPod inexpensive and easy, for example, a convergence of mediated communication approaches can be blended to benefit students. Perhaps a trend toward blending course instruction is primarily about using all available means of communication. Blended learning can be a flux of frustration and fun, while administrators, faculty, and other stakeholders work together to make education more effective. We can expect that as communication technology develops, many challenges lie ahead for educators to use technology to meet the needs of learners. Note that Appendix A is a list of further reading.

REFERENCES Abrahmov, S., & Ronen, M. (2008). Double blending: Online theory with on-campus practice in photography instruction. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 45(1), 3–14. doi:10.1080/14703290701757385 Balram, S., & Dragicevic, S. (2008). Collaborative spaces for GIS-based multimedia cartography in blended environments. Computers & Education, 50(1), 371–385. doi:10.1016/j. compedu.2006.07.004 Black, E., Beck, D., & Dawson, K. (2007). The other side of the LMS: Considering implementation and use in the adoption of an LMS in online and blended learning environments. TechTrends, 51(2), 35–39. doi:10.1007/s11528-007-0024-x Boyle, T. (2005). A dynamic, systematic method for developing blended learning. Education Communication and Information, 5(3), 221–232. doi:10.1080/14636310500350422 Boyle, T., Bradley, C., Chalk, P., Jones, R., & Pickard, P. (2003). Using blended learning to improve student success rates in learning to program. Journal of Educational Media, 28(2/3), 165–178. doi:10.1080/1358165032000153160 Cho, H., & Lee, J. (2008). Collaborative information seeking in intercultural computer-mediated communication groups: Testing the influence of social context using social network analysis. Communication Research, 35(4), 548–573. doi:10.1177/0093650208315982 Condie, R., & Livingston, K. (2007). Blending online learning with traditional approaches: Changing practices. British Journal of Educational Technology, 38(2), 337–348. doi:10.1111/j.14678535.2006.00630.x

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Cox, B., & Cox, B. (2008). Developing interpersonal and group dynamics through asynchronous threaded discussions: The use of discussion board in collaborative learning. Education, 128(4), 553–565. Davis, H., & Fill, K. (2007). Embedding blended learning in a university’s teaching culture: Experiences and reflections. British Journal of Educational Technology, 38(5), 817–828. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00756.x DeNeui, D., & Dodge, T. (2006). Asynchronous learning networks and student outcomes: The utility of online learning components in hybrid courses. Journal of Instructional Psychology, 33(4), 256–259. Donnelly, R. (2006). Blended problem based learning for teacher education: Lessons learnt. Learning, Media and Technology, 31(2), 93–116. doi:10.1080/17439880600756621 Duque, G., Roberts, A., Hui, J., Posel, N., Fleiszer, D., & Chiu, W. (2006). From the facts to the screen: A blended model of teaching basic hospital skills to 2nd year medical students. Medical Teacher, 28(8), 729–733. doi:10.1080/01421590601032450

Heilesen, S., & Josephsen, J. (2008). E-learning: Between augmentation and disruption? Computers & Education, 50(2), 525–534. doi:10.1016/j. compedu.2007.09.006 Ho, A., Lu, L., & Thurmaier, K. (2006). Testing the reluctant professor’s hypothesis: Evaluating a blended-learning approach to distance education. Journal of Public Affairs Education, 12(1), 81–102. Jackson, M. (2008). The erosion of attention and the coming Dark Age. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books. Jaya, R. (2008). Skype voice chat a tool for teaching oral communication. Language in India, 8(12), 9. Knobel, M., & Lankshear, C. (2008). Remix: The art and craft of endless hybridization. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 52(1), 22–33. doi:10.1598/JAAL.52.1.3 Lee, C., Yeh, D., Kung, R., & Hsu, C. (2007). The influences of learning portfolios and attitudes on learning effects in blended e-learning for mathematics. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 37(4), 331–350. doi:10.2190/EC.37.4.a

Espey, E., Ogburn, T., Kalishman, S., Zsemlye, M., & Cosgrove, E. (2007). Revitalizing problem based learning: Student and tutor attitudes towards a structured tutorial. Medical Teacher, 29(2/3), 143–149. doi:10.1080/01421590701316522

Lim, D., & Yoon, S. (2008). Team learning and collaboration between online and blended learner groups. Performance Improvement Quarterly, 21(3), 59–72. doi:10.1002/piq.20031

Fraser, H., & Schalley, A. (2009). Communicating about communication: Intercultural competence as a factor in the success of interdisciplinary collaboration. Australian Journal of Linguistics, 29(1), 135–155. doi:10.1080/07268600802516418

Mackey, T., & Ho, J. (2008). Exploring the relationships between Web usability and students’ perceived learning in Web-based multimedia (WBMM) tutorials. Computers & Education, 50(1), 386–409. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2006.08.006

Giese, K., & Muller, C. (2007). Ethical-moral limits of public communication -- Neglected dimension within the discourse on Internet censorship in China. China Aktuell, 36(4), 74–95.

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Marschark, M., Sapere, P., & Pelz, J. (2008). Learning via direct and mediated instruction by deaf students. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, 13(4), 546–561. doi:10.1093/deafed/ enn014


Mason, R. (2005). Blended learning. Education Communication and Information, 5(3), 217–220. doi:10.1080/14636310500350406

Pan, C., & Sullivan, M. (2005). Promoting synchronous interaction in an elearning environment. T.H.E. Journal, 33(2), 27–30.

Mathur, R., & Oliver, L. (2007). Developing an international distance education program: A blended learning approach. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration, 10(4).

Rush, A. (2008). The design of online tertiary courseware for a blended learning, project-based, e-business management program in the Middle East. International Journal on E-Learning, 7(4), 667–701.

McAndrew, P. (2006). What is needed for global e-learning in higher education? Information Technology . Education and Society, 7(1-2), 5–24. McCullagh, K. (2008, March). Blogging: Self presentation and privacy. Information & Communications Technology Law, 17(1), 3–23. doi:10.1080/13600830801886984 Michinov, N., & Michinov, E. (2008). Face-to-face contact at the midpoint of an online collaboration: Its impact on the patterns of participation, interaction, affect, and behavior over time. Computers & Education, 50(4), 1540–1557. doi:10.1016/j. compedu.2007.03.002 Milliron, M., Plinske, K., & Noonan-Terry, C. (2008). Building for a new generation of learning: Conversations to catalyze our construction. Planning for Higher Education, 37(1), 7–14. Motteram, G. (2006). Blended education and the transformation of teachers: A long-term case study in postgraduate UK higher education. British Journal of Educational Technology, 37(1), 17–30. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2005.00511.x Oravec, J. (2003). Blending by blogging: Weblogs in blended learning initiatives. Journal of Educational Media, 28(2/3), 225–233. doi:10.1080/1358165032000165671 Owston, R., Sinclair, M., & Wideman, H. (2008). Blended learning for professional development: An evaluation of a program for middle school mathematics and science teachers. Teachers College Record, 110(5), 1033–1064.

Ryan, K., & Kopischke, K. (2008). Blurring the lines: Leveraging Internet technology for successful blending of secondary/post-secondary technical education. Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 32(11), 877–879. doi:10.1080/10668920802394784 Schober, B., Wagner, P., Reimann, R., & Spiel, C. (2008). Vienna e-lecturing (VEL): Learning how to learn self-regulated in an Internet-based blended learning setting. International Journal on E-Learning, 7(4), 703–723. Schweizer, K., Paechter, M., & Weidenmann, B. (2003). Blended learning as a strategy to improve collaborative task performance. Journal of Educational Media, 28(2/3), 211–224. doi:10.1080/1358165032000165699 Shedletsky, L. J., & Aitken, J. E. (2001). The paradoxes of online academic work. Communication Education, 50(3), 206–217. doi:10.1080/03634520109379248 Shen, R., Wang, M., & Pan, X. (2008). Increasing interactivity in blended classrooms through a cutting-edge mobile learning system. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(6), 1073–1086. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00778.x Slevin, J. (2008). E-learning and the transformation of social interaction in higher education. Learning, Media and Technology, 33(2), 115–126. doi:10.1080/17439880802097659

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Smith, G., & Kurthen, H. (2007). Front-stage and back-stage in hybrid e-learning face-to-face courses. International Journal on E-Learning, 6(3), 455–474. Stacey, E., & Wiesenberg, F. (2007). A study of face-to-face and online teaching philosophies in Canada and Australia. Journal of Distance Education, 22(1), 19–40. Thomas, P. (2008). Managing the change towards a blended learning model at the University of Botswana. Nawa: Journal of Language & Communication, 2(1), 106–125. Turkle, S. (1984). The second self: Computers and the human spirit. New York: Simon and Schuster. Van Bauwel, S. (2008). Media literacy and audiovisual languages: A case study from Belgium. Educational Media International, 45(2), 119–130. doi:10.1080/09523980802109563 Vaughan, N. (2007). Perspectives on blended learning in higher education. International Journal on E-Learning, 6(1), 81–94. Vega-Jurado, J., Fernandez-de-Lucio, I., & Huanca, R. (2008). University-industry relations in Bolivia: Implications for university transformations in Latin America. Higher Education, 56(2), 205–220. doi:10.1007/s10734-007-9098-9 Verhoeven, L., & Graesser, A. (2008). Cognitive and linguistic factors in interactive knowledge construction. Discourse Processes, 45(4/5), 289–297. doi:10.1080/01638530802145353 Verkroost, M., Meijerink, L., Lintsen, H., & Veen, W. (2008). Finding a balance in dimensions of blended learning. International Journal on ELearning, 7(3), 499–522.

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Wall, J., & Ahmed, V. (2008). Use of a simulation game in delivering blended lifelong learning in the construction industry -- Opportunities and challenges. Computers & Education, 50(4), 1383– 1393. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2006.12.012 Walther, J. B. (1992). Interpersonal effects in computer-mediated interaction. Communication Research, 19(1), 52–90. doi:10.1177/009365092019001003 Wang, Z., Walther, J., & Hancock, J. (2009). Social identification and interpersonal communication in computer-mediated communication: What you do versus who you are in virtual groups. Human Communication Research, 35(1), 59–85. doi:10.1111/j.1468-2958.2008.01338.x

ADDITIONAL READING Bejerano, A. (2008). The genesis and evolution of online degree programs: Who are they for and what have we lost along the way? Communication Education, 57(3), 408–414. doi:10.1080/03634520801993697 Falconer, I., & Littlejohn, A. (2007). Designing for blended learning, sharing and reuse. Journal of Further and Higher Education, 31(1), 41–52. doi:10.1080/03098770601167914 Gunga, S., & Ricketts, I. (2008). The prospects for e-learning revolution in education: A philosophical analysis. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 40(2), 294–314. doi:10.1111/j.14695812.2007.00332.x Open Courseware, M. I. T. (2009). Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Retrieved August 27, 2009, from http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/ home/home/index.htm


Open Source. (2009). Open source software development. Irvine, CA: Institute for Software Research, University of California. Retrieved August 27, 2009, from http://www.isr.uci.edu/ research-open-source.html Park, Y., & Bonk, C. (2007). Synchronous learning experiences: Distance and residential learners’ perspectives in a blended graduate course. Journal of Interactive Online Learning, 6(3), 245–264.

Sloan-C Blended Learning. (2006). Sloan-C blended learning research perspectives. The Sloan Consortium. Retrieved Augutst 27, 2009, from http://www.blendedteaching.org/ Tang, M., & Byrne, R. (2007). Regular versus online versus blended: A qualitative description of the advantages of the electronic modes and a quantitative evaluation. International Journal on E-Learning, 6(2), 257–266.

Shedletsky, L. J., & Aitken, J. E. (Eds.). (2010). Cases on online discussion and interaction: Experiences and outcomes. Hershey, PA: IGI Global.

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B: Courses

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Chapter 6

Virtual Reality or Virtually Real: Blended Teaching and Learning in a Master’s Level Research Methods Class John Lidstone Queensland University of Technology, Australia Paul Shield Queensland University of Technology, Australia

ABSTRACT This paper examines the enabling effect of using blended learning and synchronous internet mediated communication technologies to improve learning and develop a Sense of Community (SOC) in a group of post graduate students consisting of a mix of on-campus and off campus students. Both quantitative and qualitative data collected over a number of years supports the assertion that the blended learning environment enhanced both teaching and learning. The development of a SOC was pivotal to the success of the blended approach when working with geographically isolated groups within a single learning environment.

INTRODUCTION In recent decades, educational reform has become a catchword in the Anglo-American world, including the United States, Canada, Australia, and England and Wales, as well as in the Confucian Heritage Areas such as Mainland China, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Of particular interest is the remarkable consistency of political statements to the effect that in order for a nation to remain internationally competitive, its education systems must focus on producing skilled graduates for the workforce and DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch006

that henceforth, educational reform will ensure that any particular country will become “a smart state” or a “clever country.” Across the world, the educational reform measures being implemented are surprisingly similar. On the implementation side, educators are placed in a pivotal position and are required to take up the work of designing high-quality teaching and learning for students to meet standards set by governments including demands for increased use of technology. Lankshear and Snyder (2000) point out, teachers [at all levels] are pushed to adopt Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in their teaching. National leaders frequently pronounce


Virtual Reality or Virtually Real

that since societies are changing, so also should education (Hargreaves, 2003; Kelly, 2004). The rhetoric usually includes statements to the effect that in the “Information Age,” the skills of the populace needed for national (economic) survival must adjust accordingly. There is almost always reference (at least until the full ramifications of the U.S. sub-prime mortgage crisis were felt) to international competition in “global markets.” Perhaps because of the perceived economic benefits of technologically mediated pedagogies, educators themselves have often adopted new technologies with sometimes breathless enthusiasm. Hartman, Dziuban and Moskal (2007), for example, assert the impact of the World Wide Web attributes of ubiquity, interactivity, multimedia capability, multilingual capacity, multiplatform capability, multi-protocol capability and synchronous and asynchronous communication on learning. However, despite the undoubted benefits and future potential of the virtual world to enhance education, there are signs that some equilibrium in expectations may be returning with Jasinski (2007) suggesting that there may be a shift from the “e” and back to the “learning” with e-learning seen as just one of a suite of useful models to explore in enhancing professional educational practice leading to what has become known as “blended learning.” This chapter presents a case study of the development and impact of a Master’s level research methodology unit (officially coded as EDN611: Professional Applications of Research) in the Faculty of Education at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane, Australia. Professional Applications of Research is a core unit in a number of the Faculty’s suite of Master’s courses and is intended to help students to become critical professional consumers of research reports. The development of this unit in recent years illustrates many of the stages in the emergence and development of blended learning implied above.

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BACKGROUND: THE ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL CLIMATE IN WHICH THE UNIT WAS INITIATED The economic and political climate that formed the backdrop and in some measures the catalyst for the development of the blended learning environment has been summarized by Singh, Atweh and Shield (2005). These authors identified the Australian Government policy document Our Universities. Backing Australia’s Future (Nelson, 2003) as of particular interest in terms of teaching and learning. This document listed a number of significant problems facing Australian universities at the time that are still current, particularly: • •

•

• • •

considerable increases in course provision costs; access to increased resources in the longer term, including those from additional income streams; significant duplication in some university activities and course offerings and far too many units across universities and faculties with very small enrolments; under-representation of students from disadvantaged backgrounds; large numbers of students not completing university studies (approx. 30%); and over-enrolments of students leading to overcrowding and adverse impacts on quality. (Nelson, 2003, p.10)

The document then moved on to present a vision statement of reform underpinned by four key principles. These were as follows: •

Sustainability: Maximum opportunity given to institutions, consistent with public accountability and social responsibility, to develop innovative responses to rapidly changing environments in teaching and learning.


•

•

•

Quality: A renewed emphasis on teaching and learning outcomes … to ensure that students develop knowledge and skills that are relevant to their own needs and to those of employers, professional associations, labour markets and society. Equity: Targeted intervention measures and new approaches to student financing to encourage participation and retention of under-represented groups, particularly indigenous students. Diversity: Institutions encouraged forging distinct missions within the overall system and through greater collaboration between individual universities and other education providers, industry, business, regions and communities (Nelson, 2003, pp. 10-11).

Finally, the policy document signaled the formation of a central institution and regulatory framework aimed at measuring teaching and learning performance outcomes: the National Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education. Some of the responsibilities of this Institute included: •

•

•

•

liaison with the sector about options for articulating and monitoring academic standards; improvement of assessment practices throughout the sector, including investigation of the feasibility of a national portfolio assessment scheme; facilitation of benchmarking of effective teaching and learning processes at national and international levels; and development of mechanisms for the dissemination of good practice and professional development in learning and teaching. (Nelson, 2003, pp. 29-30)

As a direct result of these regulatory and policy changes Australian universities were compelled both to improve the quality of the learning ex-

perience and to increase accessibility while at the same time improving efficiencies in terms of cost-benefits. It is probably unsurprising that many embraced the idea of the open learning concept in an effort to increase market share and improve efficiencies. What was probably little understood or even considered at the time was the shift in the pedagogical space that would be required to generate a quality learning experience for students and a satisfying teaching space for academics. The immediate consequence of this for that designing university curricula/pedagogy was that academic workers had to manage the tensions between two positions – the outwardly oriented, prospective identities constructed by market forces and state regulatory frameworks; and the inwardly oriented, introspective identities of disciplinary knowledge. This pedagogic position is Janus-faced – with one face always looking outwards to market and state regulatory forces, and the other face looking inwards to the introspective demands of disciplinary knowledge (Bernstein, 1999). At the turn of the century, a number of higher education researchers talked about changes to academic work brought about by three significant factors, namely: (1) growth in higher education participation rates; (2) accelerated growth in knowledge production; and (3) the transformation of teaching by information communications technology (Coaldrake & Stedman, 1999; Stromquist, 2002; Tyler, 2001). Changes to academic work, in particular, changes to teaching and learning were also the subject of numerous policy discussion papers. The Nelson (2003) reforms of Australian higher education emphasized the importance of teaching and learning in developing generic graduate skills and the need for higher education workers to accommodate to the needs of a large, diverse clientele of learners. In particular, the revolution in ICTs was viewed by some as the panacea for dealing with the growth in student numbers, including the diversity of the student clientele (in terms of academic preparation,

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language, socio-economic background, and other factors), and the move to ‘student-centred’ learning. As Coaldrake and Stedman (1999) argued, the growth in student numbers was not accompanied by relative increases in state funding. Rather, students were and are expected to contribute to the costs of higher education which resulted in the concerns of students becoming increasingly important in this user-pays model of education. ‘Now students are more concerned about flexibility and convenience, quality of teaching, ensuring the status and quality of their awards, obtaining more attention and feedback from staff, and having access to high quality facilities’ (Coaldrake & Stedman, 1999, p. 3). This ‘student-centred’ learning, with its teaching focus on ‘flexibility’, ‘convenience’, and ‘quality’, was thus the higher education context in which EDN611: Professional Applications of Research was initially designed. It sought to develop a student/learner focus mediated through a ‘community of learning’ populated by both oncampus and off-campus students.

SETTING THE STAGE: THE HISTORy OF THE UNIT DEVELOPMENT Daniel Chandler (1995) invites us to question whether socially driven change in pedagogy leads the application of technology or whether advances in technology drive change in pedagogy. The possible mismatch between “conventional” pedagogy and “technology mediated” pedagogy is also worthy of examination. We now consider the history of events that laid the foundation for the pedagogical approaches adopted in this unit of work and then discuss some of the questions posed by Chandler (1995). In the mid 1980s, a Graduate Diploma in Computer Education, primarily directed at teachers, was developed with the objectives to retrain general or subject teachers as computer studies teachers and to introduce the application of com-

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puter technologies across the curriculum. The course was very successful and there was pressure to offer the course in external mode. Delivery of units in external mode at that time was invariably print based and it soon became obvious that there was a mismatch between the technical, hands on, content being presented in the on-campus course and this form of remote pedagogy. At about this time Australian Telecom (now Telstra) released its electronic e-mail system, KEYLINK. A memorandum of understanding was reached with Telecom to make this system available to both students and lecturing staff in order to provide more immediate and personalized help to students studying at a distance. This approach was only partially successful due to system instability, rudimentary telephone networks in country areas and Subscriber trunk dialing costs (long distance phone calls costed on a time basis) associated with dialing into a city based mail server. This was a clear case of pedagogical design leading the ability of the technology to deliver. The rapid growth of the Internet during the early 1990s prompted a second attempt to develop a pedagogy more suited to students studying at a distance. A Web-based On-Line Teaching system (usually called by its acronym OLT) was developed by QUT in-house. This system was database driven and had similar functionality to systems in popular use at present. It allowed for synchronous (chat room) and asynchronous (Web board, e-mail lists) communications. It also allowed the structuring and delivery of learning materials albeit mostly print based. The advent of this system heralded the “blurring” of the distinction between on-campus and off-campus students, as both had access to the system. In this instance the technology led the pedagogy which had been primed by previous exposure to the KEYLINK system. By this time PowerPoint presentations started to appear as a core component of on-campus teaching, replacing the ubiquitous overhead transparencies. It seemed a natural extension to make these available to off-campus students. Closer exami-


nation of the way in which PowerPoint presentations were used in teaching revealed deficiencies in this strategy. Most lecturers used PowerPoint presentations as prompts for monologue and sometimes dialogue with their students; at best they were used to summarize key points. Remove the verbal backdrop and the presentations were devalued as a component of a pedagogy tailored to off-campus students. Lack of effective audio compression, small bandwidth and lack of audio streaming technologies precluded packaging audio with the presentations for use across the internet. In this instance, pedagogical specifications led the ability of the technology to deliver. Over a period of several years a variety of strategies were tried to overcome this hurdle, including the development of new presentations that were coded in Flash or developed as Java applets. Both formats proved suitable and enabled students with relatively slow dial-up connections to access the material in an acceptable way. The problem with this approach was that a high level of technical expertise was required to produce the presentations. Furthermore, the strategy did not tap into the existing resource of already prepared PowerPoint presentations available for most on-campus units. This limitation was finally overcome through the release of some commercial products that convert PowerPoint presentations with embedded or linked audio directly into flash movies or java applets. This process was trialed extensively in the unit and with some reservations was found satisfactory. Once again the technology lagged the pedagogical specification for some time. This journey also encouraged us to examine the nexus between conventional on-campus faceto-face pedagogy and the technology-mediated off-campus pedagogy we were attempting to implement in the unit. Initially the consensus was perhaps that the on-campus experience was the optimum and the challenge was to graft as much of that type of experience as we could on to the off-campus experience. As the development of the unit progressed there was a fundamental

shift in that philosophy. The imperative started to become: What type of pedagogy mediated by the technology best suits both on-campus and offcampus students given the conceptual difficulty of the material we were trying to teach and the threshold understandings of our students? Deliberation on this question first manifested itself in the decision not simply to video the oncampus lectures and stream these to the off-campus students. It was judged this would be detrimental to the formation of a learning community (Palloff & Pratt, 1999) across the unit as the off-campus students would experience a measure of disconnectedness. This decision proved a catalyst for us to examine whether face-to-face lectures really added anything to the learning mix. The outcome was that traditional face-to-face lectures were replaced with a combination of on-line scaffolded asynchronous resources and a bounded mixedmode (on-campus, off-campus) synchronous experience. This approach is described elsewhere in the chapter and anecdotal evidence suggests it has been successful.

CASE DESCRIPTION: THE CURRENT MANIFESTATION OF EDN611- PROFESSIONAL APPLICATIONS OF RESEARCH The on line blended offering of the unit EDN 611, Professional Applications of Research was designed and first implemented in Semester 1, 2005. It is the initial postgraduate research training unit offered in the Master of Learning Innovation course in the Faculty of Education at QUT. The unit outline states that: This Unit focuses on the needs of professionals for reading, understanding and evaluating professional research both within and across different paradigms. It assists students to develop skills in understanding and appreciating the process and techniques used in research in order to critically

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read and interpret a wide range of research studies. … This Unit focuses on the needs of professionals to seek research knowledge that addresses specific problems or issues in their practice and to develop a positive attitude towards research in general. It assists students to search databases and other sources to locate published research reports in their field and evaluate them critically. Further skills in planning and conducting research projects are developed in a follow up unit within the Faculty. As a compulsory unit at the postgraduate level, it also aims to ensure that students develop sufficient information literacy and academic writing skills to complete the remaining postgraduate units in the Master of Learning Innovation course successfully. Open to master’s and doctoral students, the Unit or its predecessors have been offered to students for about fifteen years in three different modes: (1) internal, (2) external, and (3) block mode conducted during school vacations. However, the pedagogical experiences provided in the three modes were often quite distinct. In addition, the instructional content (knowledge and skills) varied depending on the specific focus of the different lecturers responsible for teaching the different modes. In particular, internal modes of offering of this unit have employed pedagogies that allowed the development of collaboration between students and were successful in developing a sense of community (SOC) between them and the teaching staff – pedagogies not easily achieved in the other mode of teaching. Moreover, when offered in external mode, the unit relied on printed materials and assessment submission with minimal use of a Web site. In addition, the external notes were based on one specific textbook which meant that updating or changing the textbook could prove difficult and expensive as the print materials had to be rewritten. Furthermore, the numbers of students enrolled in internal and block mode continued to decline, while the numbers in external mode increased

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substantially. This change in enrolment pattern was a consequence of declining numbers of local clients plus a demand by students for a flexible mode of delivery more in line with their busy life styles. This latter concern was particularly evident with female students (representing the majority of enrolments) who were trying to balance the commitments of work (full-time or part-time), family and child-care as well as study. In 2005, the three modes (internal, external, block) were combined in a single mode where all students shared the same pedagogical experiences based on the same access to a unit Web site hosting the lecture notes, resources, and activities that were necessary to complete the unit. Further, it provided off-campus students with the opportunity to participate in synchronous bi-weekly tutorials together with on-campus students. Off-campus students utilizing a chat room can view the on campus “physical” classroom, other students and lecturers via live video feed as well as receive audio of proceedings in the tutorial. Further, they can participate in the discussion by typing their comments and questions which appear in the chat message window projected on a large screen at the front of the classroom. The video feed is in the form of a “postage stamp” size image of the room and is meant only as a “cueing” device to give off campus students a sense of “connectedness.” It is not intended to act as a transmission medium for content or interaction. Restricting the size of the image has the added advantage of consuming minimal bandwidth – an important consideration given that some students still have only dial-up access. While this situation could be seen as restrictive for off-campus interactions it does have several advantages. Firstly the moderation of the discourse is greatly simplified allowing a single lecturer to manage all aspects of the interaction. This is of particular importance given that there may be 30 on-campus and 40 off-campus participants. It also eliminates the technical hurdles associated with catering for limited bandwidth and audio feedback


problems. Far from curtailing the interaction between on-campus and off-campus participants this arrangement actually seems to enhance it perhaps due to the filtering effect of having to type queries which seems to result in highly directed and relevant questions that often prompt heated debate amongst all participants. It also results in an enduring list of questions and comments that can be referred to at any time during the tutorial. Lastly, just as in a face-to-face classroom, off-campus students can be allocated to small discussion groups and enter virtual “breakout rooms” to engage in an activity in-depth and then return to the main chat room “lobby” for reporting their deliberations to other groups including on-campus groups. Four pedagogical principles underpinned the development of the unit: increased autonomy of the learner; the creation of a community of learners; providing a supportive teaching and learning environment; and maintaining rigor in discipline knowledge. First, we sought pedagogical practices that were removed from the traditional transmission model where lecturers and texts are the sole sources of knowledge. By providing students with a range of lecture presentations in the form of Flash-encoded movies, references and relevant Web sites, and reflective activities on the Web site, students have the opportunity to utilize as many or as few of the resources as required to develop their knowledge and confidence in the content. Although the material is structured on a week-by-week basis, all material is presented in total at the start of semester allowing students to control the pace appropriate to their individual learning styles and circumstances. Second, through the formation of small groups and the use of synchronous and asynchronous communication tools, we provided students with the means to share their questions and concerns with each other. These communication tools could be accessed at two levels – the Class Group level and the Small Study Group level. The communication facilities in the Class Group Area were

monitored regularly by the lecturers who respond to students’ questions and comments in an open manner for the benefit of the whole class. On the other hand, the communication mechanisms in the Small Study Group areas are not regularly monitored and students are free to discuss their concerns amongst themselves. Thirdly, a great deal of attention was focused on improving students’ direct and flexible access to help. Several lecturers have always been assigned to the unit not only to access expertise in specific discipline areas but to strengthen the likelihood of responding to student queries in a more than timely manner. The bi-weekly tutorials were also designed primarily to provide a forum to address difficult aspects of the Unit in depth and to allow students to discuss their queries directly with teaching staff and their peer group rather than to present new material. Fourth, during the on-going development process, the depth and spread of the discipline knowledge required in the unit is fore-grounded. The content of the unit covers a range of theoretical and methodological topics necessary for critical engagement with published research. The content and the supporting material reflect historical as well as current debates in educational research. Care is taken not to allow innovation in presentation to occur at the expense of academic content and rigour. Further materials to develop information literacy and academic writing are integrated within the week-by-week activities and addressed in assessment items. A by-product of the above design features is increased flexibility in the way students engage with the learning materials and environment. This has been evidenced by the following sample of comments from students: •

really enjoyed the blend of on line and classroom facilitation in the one session. It created equality for those who were unable to attend in person due to family commitments or geographic location.

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•

•

I had to be in London to arrange my father’s funeral and was still able to ‘attend’ the tutorial. On the day of the funeral, I missed the tutorial but was able to download the audio later. Great use of the information technology. I really like the mode of delivery. Very flexible catering for a wide range of family situations.

CURRENT CHALLENGES: BARRIERS AND BOOSTERS TO IMPLEMENTATION OF THE CASE STUDy

in communication with other adopters” (cited in Gilbert, 1995, p. 43). This relationship can be expressed as a function: A=f(R, PV, C) This function describes a 3-dimensional space within which an environment for developing elearning initiatives can be placed. It is a useful construct as it allows the examination of sociocontextual parameters as well as technological and other infrastructure resources. Each of the variables can be discussed in terms of positive and negative contributors. However, it is important to keep in mind that acceptance overall is a function of the interplay between the three variables not just one variable in isolation.

Perceived Value (PV) Publications by workers from Gilbert (1995) and Leggett and Persichitte (1998) to Mishra and Koehler (2006) suggest that barriers to using technology to support teaching and learning have remained virtually unchanged for several decades. Mishra and Koehler suggest that we should think in terms of appropriate levels of content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge and technological knowledge, with all three forms required for success both in designing and learning from technologically mediated learning experiences. Jasinski (2007) also emphasizes the importance of targeted support in implementing innovative practice. These contentions are supported by our experiences in implementing the technology mediated learning and teaching environment of EDN611. Frayer (1999) identified some strategies to increase the uptake of e-learning in faculties with an aim to improving teaching and learning. Frayer used a model developed by Jane Marcus (cited in Gilbert, 1995) to help conceptualize factors which impact on the development, implementation and uptake of on-line learning environments. In Marcus’s model, the decision to adopt a particular innovation “is a function of available resources, the perceived value the individual ascribes to the innovation, and whether the individual engages

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Marcus (cited in Gilbert, 1995) defined PV as a “subjective cost/benefit analysis” where the pros and cons of adopting new technology are weighed. The positive indicators to PV in this unit include: strong commitment by the unit coordinator, a desire by the teaching team to improve the learning experiences of off-campus and on-campus students in what is perceived as a conceptually difficult unit, the strategic decision of the Faculty to place all off-campus units on-line and the placement of the unit within a re-conceptualised post-graduate course. The negative indicators include: lack of recognition for the effort required for effective implementation, lack of an environment that encouraged “risk taking” by academic staff and uncertainty as to whether the return would justify the effort.

Communication (C) Marcus (cited in Gilbert, 1995) defines C as the measure of the ability to communicate with “earlier” adopters. In this context we expand the definition to include communication between the


developers, support personnel, clients and the wider university community. Positive indicators to C include: good rapport with high levels of trust between teaching staff; formal communication channels established with university Audio-Visual services; Library and Teaching and Learning Support Services; formal dissemination of outcomes to the wider University community and in-built extensive evaluation of the final teaching-learning experience. Negative indicators include: no single conceptual model of the final product held by all stake holders prior to implementation; no common universe of discourse between academic/ developers, support personnel/developers and technical support; no easily accessed directory of where to obtain assistance in a timely fashion and lack of opportunity to consult students/clients as part of the design process.

Resources Marcus (cited in Gilbert, 1995) describes the availability of resources as the “controlling variable.” While this may be the case, it needs to be emphasized that it is the interplay between the three variables that ultimately controls the success or otherwise of the enterprise. The resource variable embodies aspects of technology, expertise, infrastructure and funding. The e-learning environment for the unit was initially constructed within the OLT system developed in-house by QUT. The positives associated with this included: a sense of ownership by the technical support staff which tended to simplify problem resolution and a feeling that any feedback on performance of the system would be taken seriously and feed into the design cycle. On the negative side the system tended to be constraining and in some ways actually inhibit innovation. Some examples included; the inability to upload multiple interdependent media files to the streaming server without first packaging them as a single application; the inability to resize Flash presentations easily within OLT pages;

non-intuitive techniques needed to format some Web pages as required; file size upload limitations that were restrictive; static file management procedures that were complex and non-intuitive and some aspects of the chat room operation that were dysfunctional. There were six members of the teaching and developmental team all with considerable expertise and experience spread across the areas of content, pedagogy, e-learning environments, audio-visual, computer technology and computer programming. Other people were involved by invitation when specific problems needed to be addressed. Having this level and breadth of expertise available was essential to the success of the project. The negatives were the overheads associated with coordination and the aspects of communication discussed earlier. The blended on-line/face-to-face presentations have always taken place in a computer enabled classroom (CEC) containing a computer, internet connection, projection facilities and serviced by a wireless network. While the space is adequate and the equipment is usually reliable, this level of infrastructure could be considered the minimum level required. One major negative aspect initially was that the computer image was not customized to support the activities. This required a time consuming manual configuration of the operating environment and loading of hardware drivers and adapters before each teaching-learning event. This was a recurrent process as the machines are re-imaged with the university standard operating environment on shut down. A typical configuration sequence would include: disable the agent that automatically switches audio input to line in, install drivers for Web cam, disable USB audio adapter for Web cam, switch audio recording to microphone, adjust audio levels, adjust mixer for multiple microphone feed and finally load Web site. This level of intervention is obviously undesirable and acts as a barrier to implementation in a wider context. More recently, this process has been simplified. However the software drivers still have to be loaded manually and are lost when the

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machine is re-imaged as happens several times each semester. The project was initially funded by the Faculty of Education as part of the redesign of the Master program. While the positive was that this commitment was made, the negative was that the money was withdrawn at a later date. There were no funds made available centrally to purchase software or hardware to support the project. Software to convert power point presentations with audio to flash movies and a Web cam were sourced by “alternative means” (purchased by one of the teaching team). In conclusion it is worth reiterating that it is the interplay between the three variables in the model proposed by Marcus that determines the success or otherwise of these forms of project, not any one element alone. The lack of any one element will jeopardize the whole. Evaluation of the Unit – Quantitative Evaluation All such innovations are undertaken for a variety of reasons, ranging from the personal technology challenge of teachers via desires to meet emerging needs of students to responses to institutional policy decisions. In this context, we will focus primarily on the pedagogical intentions underlying the initiative and their evaluation.

Outcome 1: Development of SOC in the Blended Space As indicated earlier, one of the underlying pedagogical principles in the development of the blended environment was to encourage the establishment of a community of learners within the unit. In particular we wanted to break down the feelings of isolation that had been expressed in the past by the off-campus students. One of the mechanisms chosen to do this was the instigation of the on/off-campus synchronous tutorials described previously. The term ‘community of learning’ is taken from the work of social psychologist Lev Vygotsky and refers to the social institutions in which ‘thinking occurs as much among as within individuals’

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(Cole & Engestrom cited in Bourne, 2003, p. 505). From this perspective, communities of learning, whether they take the form of a class of students working face-to-face with one teacher or a virtual classroom, are crucial sites for the development of conceptual thinking. The class of students as a cohort moves together in their learning by listening and engaging with each other, as well as the teacher/instructor. The discourse of learning is thus generated by all members of the class or group, rather than just one individual learning alone. The principles of communication in a learning community are specifically oriented to ‘induction into a system of knowledge’ (Bourne, 2003, p. 509). SOC and Learning Traditional pedagogies associate with supporting learning at a distance in tertiary based units were constrained by circumstances to, at best, a constructivist approach (Brook & Oliver, 2003) and at worst, a transmission model. Learning experiences were packaged in a text environment and scaffolded in an attempt to assist students to internalize the concepts and processes which formed the basis of the unit. Little attempt was made to address the social component of the learning process. An important component of a learning network is an underlying SOC (Dueber & Misanchuk, 2001). The use of the term community in an educational context is common but the meaning of the concept is not well articulated. However, most commentators agree that the construct of SOC is multi-dimensional and the dimensions will map feelings of connectedness, communication, belonging and common purpose (Dueber & Misanchuk, 2001; Long & Perkins, 2003; Rovai, 2002). How the dimensions are operationalised depends on the context and environment in which the community is formed. Operationalising the dimensions of a SOC for a learning network built in a “face-to-face” environment differs from one supported by synchronous and/or asynchronous technologies. This happens for a variety reasons including differences in the way text and speech are processed, absence or otherwise of visual


cueing and query-response time expectation. Learning communities also differ in the way in which their boundaries are mapped (Wilson, Ludwig-Hardman, Thornam, & Dunlap, 2004). In an unbounded system, acceptance into the community is based on some common interest or goal. A community of natural vegetation regenerators might be indicative of such a system. As long as a member is interested in learning or teaching about vegetation regeneration they will remain a member of the community. Once this is no longer their goal, they will leave the community; the life span of the community is indeterminate and member participation dependent. In a bounded system community membership is activated by some external body and the life span of the community is likely to be predetermined. A community of learners within a tertiary unit of study is an excellent example of this latter community. The dynamics of a community are therefore likely to depend not only on the method of communication but also on the bounded or unbounded state of the system. The challenge for this evaluation project was to construct an instrument which would give a measure of SOC for a bounded, blended learning community.

The Instrument The design considerations in the construction of the instrument included: • defining SOC space specific to the bounded, hybrid context described earlier; minimising the number of dimensions mapping the space; maximising orthogonality between the dimensions; and • minimising the number of questions underpinning the dimensions without compromising construct or content validity. An instrument was constructed (Shield, Atweh & Singh, 2005) in the form of a survey of 12 questions that map to three underlying dimensions (4 questions per dimensions). The three dimensions were labeled: community identity, learning (through discourse) and emotional support. The questions were rated on a Likert scale 1 (strongly

disagree), 2 (disagree), 3 (undecided), 4 (agree), 5 (strongly agree). An index was calculated for SOC overall and for each dimension. This was done by summing the score on each question and calculating the mean. While it is recognized that a Likert scale is technically an ordinal scale which precludes the calculation of means, in this context it is treated as being of interval level of measurement which is in line with common practice in educational research (Lehman, 1991). Face validity was established through review by peers who were either experienced in on-line teaching and learning or were knowledgeable about learning communities or both. Construct validity is argued on the grounds that since the SOC space is mapped in an on-line and face-to-face hybrid context that the constructs should be able to be identified in a synthesis of the existing literature that describes SOC in an on-line learning context or in a face to face context. This was found to be the case (Dueber & Misanchuk, 2001; Long & Perkins, 2003; Rovai, 2002). Internal reliability was measured by calculating a cronbach alpha across questions for each dimension. The values for community identity, learning (through discourse) and emotional support were 0.82, 0.80 and 0.85 respectively. This compares well with the commonly accepted minimum level of 0.70 for cronbach alpha for short scales with five items or less (SPSS Inc., 1998).

Method The instrument was administered to 71 postgraduate students undertaking the unit previously described. The response rate was 51%. This consisted of 13 students who attended all tutorials on line, 10 students who attended all tutorials face to face, 4 students who attend in mixed mode (sometimes on line sometimes face to face) and 9 students who did not attend any tutorials. For the purpose of this study the 4 students who attended in mixed mode were reallocated to either the face to face or on line groups based on which mode they

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employed most. In all cases the distinction was quite clear. The final categorization then became 15 on line, 12 face to face and 9 non attendees. A quasi-experimental design was utilized with the non-attendees acting as the control group. It was expected the control group would still register positively on the SOC index as all students: • were required to participate in two group work assignments collectively weighted 30% of the total assessment with most groups being a mix of on and off campus students; had access to asynchronous communications (e-mail lists, discussion boards) at the small study group, class and unit level; and • had access to synchronous communications (chat room) at the small study group level. The broad question therefore became: “Did the synchronous form of the tutorials contribute in an incremental way to the SOC experienced by those students who participated?” In particular the following null hypotheses were tested across the three categories of participation in tutorials i.e. none, on and off campus attendance: • •

there was no difference in the mean SOC index among the three categories; and there was no difference in the mean score on each dimension of the SOC among the three categories.

Descriptives and box plots were initially used to explore these relationships. The hypotheses were then tested using a multi-variate analysis of variance (MANOVA) with level of significance predetermined at 0.05. If there was no statistically significant difference indicated between the on and off campus students it was intended to increase the power of the test by relaxing the level of significance to help support the argument of no actual real difference in SOC experienced by these two categories.

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Analysis of Results An analysis of the means and standard deviations of the SOC index and constituent dimensions displayed in table 1 might seem to indicate a small difference between the face to face and on line categories on these measures. There would appear to be a difference between no attendance and face to face and no attendance and on line on the same measures. This impression is reinforced when the box plots (figures 1, 2, 3, 4) are examined. The observed differences were tested for significance (p ni adjective-i: i ---> ku

The following are the examples of Japanese become-construction; compare them with English counterparts: (12) i) English ii) Japanese a. i) He became quiet. ii) sono hito-wa shizuka-ni natta. That person-topic quiet became

This exhibits the same pitfall of “input comprehension” method or approach as (2) above. Let us proceed to discuss this example in terms of output comprehension. Native speakers of Japanese can comprehend this utterance, as en-ga takaku natta, ‘Yen became expensive,’ correcting the mistakes of the adjective’s lexical categorization and inflection; this development causes tremendous extra burden on the addressee’s short-term memory, forcing the addressee to reanalyze/reprocess the ungrammatical utterance. The output can be comprehended, but with more difficulty than in the case of (2) above. The teaching methodology or approach issuing from HPLT is MEA (Kang 1993), as mentioned above, which recommends FL/L2 teachers “eclectic” methods in the sense of Higgs (1984). Kang (1993) did not consider the addressee’s short-term memory burden. However, the present chapter does address this problem because the learner’s generator and parser mutually influence each other--unless, that is, the learner strongly refuses to speak TL for some kind of sociolinguistic reasons. One way to know whether the parser is functioning well with its lexicon is to check whether the learner understands input in TL. Moreover, a method for determining whether the generator is functioning well with a lexicon is to

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Teaching Online: What Does Blended Learning Require?

observe if the learner’s utterance is comprehended without causing the addressee extra short-term memory burden.

How Can Currently Incomprehensible Input be Comprehended, and Hard-toComprehend Output Become More Easily Comprehended by BLT? This section raises the following issues: (1) repetition; (2) recasting; (3) negotiation of meaning and linguistic form. With regard to the negotiation, we refer to Gass (1997): “Negotiation refers to communication in which participants’ attention is focused on resolving a communication problem” (p.107). In the literature (e.g., Pica et. al., 1987; Swain, 1985), as mentioned above, interaction is one of the ways to make incomprehensible input/output comprehensible. According to Gass (p.150), “interaction is a priming device, allowing learners to focus attention on area that they are working on.” In other words, through interaction learners have opportunities to negotiate their problems of form or/and meaning with their interlocutors, which encourages the students to make a transition from the developmental stage n to n + 1. In our terms, interaction is one of the ways to make not only currently incomprehensible input comprehended, but also hard-to-be-comprehended output easy-to-be-comprehended, as in typically understood “interaction,” conversational or taskoriented. The following interesting conversation was observed at a restaurant. The NNS was not sure about her interpretation regarding chili (incomprehensible input for the NNS), and the NS repeated the phrase, pronouncing of more clearly, putting stress on it (which shows in bold in d of the following), to enable the NNS to understand what he ordered (the NS made the incomprehensible input comprehended as the result of negotiation).

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(14) a. b. c. d. e.

Waitless: what would like to order? NS: I’ll take a hot dog with [sku:bə] chili. NNS: SCUBA (diving/diver’s) chili? (being surprised) NS: Well, no, but a scoopof chili. NNS: Oh.

The above case seems self-evident. However, we need to look at this process of comprehension more carefully. The NNS has a problem in comprehending the input by the NS. Then, by virtue of the NS’s adjusted pronunciation, the NS realizes that what is perceived originally was wrong. Parsed in (i) of the following (treating the problematic prosodic phrase like a compound noun), it should be parsed as (ii) of the following, because of is cliticized to scoop; [sku:bəv]. Here it is behaving like an affix of scoop (see also Shelkirk, 1984, about the cliticization of English function words). When the NS re-pronounced the noun phrase into three prosodic phrases--[a scoop] [of] [chili]--the NNS’s parser processed it after negotiating the form, as in (iii) of the following. But this is not the case as in (ii), which poses another problem involving the input comprehension approach. The NNS’s parser probably will not be able to process the cliticized of as in (ii) unless the NNS perceives a cliticized of. The present chapter suggests that English learners (like this NNS) be provided with plenty of input with cliticized function words (I like’ em, how’d you do it? etc.) including of (a cup of [ək/\bəv] tea, a group of [əgru:bəv] people, etc.), with explicit grammar instruction about the cliticization. (See Figure 10) According to Duff (2000), the term “repetition” is not interpreted as behaviorist “habits,” but rather, “…repetition is viewed as a way of providing learners greater access to language forms” (p. 109). In other words, this is a way of providing learners with more relevant input. Recast is a mode of repetition for corrective feedback. The


Figure 10.

importance of having learners reproduce forms they have heard to help them notice gaps between their own and other’s production is understood in several current accounts of language acquisition (Duff, p.109). L2 researchers have not evaluated recast highly because their findings indicate that it is not so effective for the students learning TL as teachers expects. According to Ohta (2000), in learner-centered classroom settings, recast/corrective feedback functions effectively because in learner-centered settings, private speech occurs; in such private speech, learners effectively realize their own errors. The following excerpts of classroom conversations evince adjective inflection: (16) Excerpt 4, Candance, January 24 (Ohta p. 61-62) 1. T: Hai soshite (..) suteeki suteeki wa? (..)= longer pause Yes and (..) the staek staek was?

2.

3. 4.

6.

7. 8.

Ss: Chiisakatta desu ne. = portion of special note to the current It was small, isn’t it analysis is underlined T: Oishikatta desu ne. Demo It was delicious, right. But Ss: Chiisakatta [desu] = overlap with similarly bracketed It was small ((correct from)) portion in neighboring turn = transcriber’s comments →5. C: [Chiisai deshita] → =indicated line of excerpt It was small ((wrong form)) T: [Chiisakatta desu. Ne? Chiisakatta desu It was small. Right? It was small ((right form))→ C: “ah” reduced volume—soft voice T: Ne. Chiisakatta desu ne? Ookiku arimasen deshita. Ne? Hai, ja rokubann

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Right. It was small, Right? I was not big. Right? Ok, number six Candance kept producing the wrong form chiisai deshita for ‘it was small,’ even if she heard several students correctly say chiisakatta. But, finally due to the teacher’s repeated recast of the correct form, she realized the discrepancy “as evidenced by her utterance of the change-ofstate token…‘ah’ in Line 7” (Ohta, p. 62). This is a case of recast, or teacher’s negotiation of forms. In our terms, the teacher tried to help the student make hard-to-be-comprehend output easy-tocomprehend by negotiating the form. There is another interesting case of recast repeated by a non-native speaker (NNS) to another NNS in Gass and Varonis (1994, p. 288): (17) a. b. c. d. e. f. g. h. i.

Ana: Can you tell me where is the train station? Keiko: Can you tell me where the train station is? Ana: Can you tell me where is the train station? Keiko: Can you tell me where the train station is? Ana: Can you tell me where is the train station? Keiko: Can you tell me where the train station is? Ana: Can you tell me where the train station is? Keiko: Can you tell me where the train station is? Ana: Can you tell me where the train station is?

Here, Keiko helped Ana make hard-tocomprehend output easy-to-comprehend due to a syntactic over-generalization problem, by repeatedly providing her with the correct input. To put it more simply, we can make this kind of recast leading to self-correction, self-repair as online

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learning, combined with FFLT. Moving forward, the following subsection demonstrates collaborative learning and self-study activities the present author has designed and implemented for online learning in the second and the third semester of Japanese classes--JA102 and JA201, respectively-to make not only incomprehensible input comprehensible, but also hard-to-comprehend output easy-to-comprehend.

Practice Collaborative Learning for Fully Online JA201 Class In BLT, I designed collaborative learning for FFLT, but self-learning for online learning. However, in this context of total online learning and teaching, I switched to both for online learning. I implemented two collaborative works: (1) nazo nazo (riddles) relay by email (asynchronous), and (2) the task of describing the story of the pictures, using 4-koma manga ‘Japanese 4 panel cartoons’ (synchronous).

Conducting Nazo nazo (riddles) Relay by Email Nazo nazo (nazo means ’mystery, puzzle, enigma, etc,’ and is a Japanese language game) for this class consists of two, or more than two, sentences, or one sentence with a simple relative clause, or a subordinate/coordinate clause and come up with the correct answer. Some of the examples are in the following: (18) Examples of nazo nazo for the relay. 日本に行ったら、見られます。日本で一番( ばん)高いです。きれいです。 いつも一番( ばん)上に雪があります。夏になったら、登 (のぼ)れます。 何ですか。 ‘If you go to Japan, you can see it. It is the highest in Japan. It is beautiful. It always has


snow on the top. When it becomes summer, we can climb it. What is it?’ (Answer: Mt. Fuji) Why nazo nazo or puzzles? To come up with the right answer, one must correctly comprehend the sentences describing things, people, or places. This is one of the ways to check whether the students’ parsers are capable of processing the sentences in one question, by observing whether they come up with the right answer or not. In the case above, when a student answered correctly, he/she has successfully comprehended the input sentences of a nazo nazo, which indicates that his/her parser has processed input correctly, i.e., successfully. However difficult, this is the way to measure input comprehension or parser’s successful processing. If a nazo nazo question is given with spoken input, the students have to use “first come, first interpreted/parsed’ in real time processing speed. That is what I have been doing with students in JA102, although the sentence structures are less complicated than those in this class.

Narrative of Nazo Nazo (riddles) Relay I sent ten questions of nazo nazo to the class (twelve students) to find out how good they are or not. I made the nazo nazo by using vocabulary, Chinese characters (kanji), and sentence structures they were supposed to know. Even so, they could look up dictionaries whenever they required them. First come, first served, so to speak, but the first student had to answer my ten nazo nazo, and make at least five his/her own nazo nazo to email to the class. The rest of the runners should answer the previous student’s nazo nazo and make at least five his/her own nazo nazo and then email to all of us. They had to answer in Japanese. I sent them on Saturday of the first week of my instruction, but surprisingly on the following day I found that one of the students had already emailed us her answers with her five nazo nazo. And soon after that (on the same day), another student emailed us the following message (the student name is kept in blank).

hey, () your 5th riddle was kind of hard to understand. i dont think your second sentance is correct. can you clarify it for me, so i can change my answer if you made a mistake on your number 5? thanks! have fun, everyone! Actually, the second runner’s 5th nazo nazo (riddle) is not so bad, but this student had a hard time comprehending it. Here we can see “negotiation of form and meaning” of input sentences, although the question was presented in English. This student gave me another surprise; she made 10 questions of nazo nazo, and emailed us soon after her email message above. My surprise did not end with that. The following day, Monday, when I stopped by the class between my two classes, another student was upset because she had not received my email message with 10 questions of nazo nazo. I sensed her competitiveness. Indeed, soon after that, the class received this student’s answer to the 10 riddles by the previous student with five her own riddles. After that episode, four students participated in the relay without any surprises. However, what bothered the present author was that five students did not participate in this activity. Those five students did not submit homework on time, nor come to see me in my office for oral interaction or oral recitation of dialogues in the textbook, although all of them took paper exams or quizzes administrated by a part-time teacher or staff. I was sure that the production of TL is harder than the reception of TL, but no questions I was asked from those five silent students. Every class day, I visited the class about 5 minutes between my two regular classes to try to connect them, and nicely remind them the participation in the relay, and homework, but nothing happened for a while until the last week of my instruction. In that week, finally two of the five students participate in this relay. On the third week of my instruction of the class, I gave the class another collaborative work, “Tell us a story of your 4 panel cartoon” adopting “Establishing the sequence of a picture story in

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four acts,” in Brandl (2005, p. 21). This activity revealed that two of the five students were well motivated to learn Japanese, but their Japanese language knowledge was just not as high as the seven students who participated in the relay much earlier. One of these two students was able to participate in the relay on the last week (the 4th week) of my instruction. In FFLT, I could have found out much earlier about these five silent students’ problems or difficulties.

Tell Us a Story of 4-koma Manga (4-panel cartoon) Since the class has twelve students, this activity worked well in terms of grouping; each group has four students for four-panel cartoon. Each student received an URL to see his/her panel of cartoons by email. I used the Moodle’s “Forum” with the technical assistance of my colleague, Brian Millhoff. I scanned each panel of three 4-panel cartoons for three groups, and emailed them to Brian, who in turn emailed each one of the 12 students an URL where each student could find a panel of cartoon. Each student individually described his/her cartoon, and posted it in his/her group’s forum. When everyone posted his/her description, the team started to find the correct sequence of four pictures. In this collaborative work, more interaction is observed than in the nazo nazo relay. There are four types of problems which caused more interaction, generating more input and output for the participants: (1) unknown kanji; (2) unknown vocabulary; (3) a incomprehensible sentence; and (4) insufficient information for the completion of the task. To collect enough information (due to insufficient information for determining the order of each cartoon) the students interacted with each other most frequently. The following is a case of unknown kanji, while (15) involves negotiating the description of the picture to determine the order of 4 panels/ pictures. To understand the interaction in the

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following, the story of a 4-panel cartoon---being adopted from a textbook Genki II; this class employed another textbook called Yookoso---is depicted as follows: An 8-10 year-old boy walking along the street to go to the bakery to buy bread. He has a shopping bag in one hand and some bills in the other hand. At the bakery, he bought bread, but forgot to pay, and he still holding money in his hand. The baker realized that he did not get paid from the boy. Then, he ran to the boy’s house. Then, Mother and the boy came out, and the boy’s mother standing at the entrance of the house paid to the baker. (p. 297) (19) Incomprehensible kanji usage (because wrong one was used) J: パン家でこの男の子はパンを買いました。The boy bought bread at the bakery パンやのてん印はとてもうれしいです。The bakery worker is very happy. L: Can you use kanji that we know please? Sorry, I just don’t understand some parts. Thanks! (The kanji she was talking about is underlined in the sentence above.) J: パン家でこの男の子はパンを買いました。The boy bought bread at the bakery パンやの店員はとてもうれしいです。The bakery worker is very happy (The corrected kanji is marked with underline.) “note” 前の漢字は違いました。 I used a wrong Chinese character. でも、いま漢字がいいです。but now my Chinese characters are correct. (20) negotiation of description of a picture N: 男の子は何かを持っていますか? Does the boy have something?


J:

男の子の右の手に紙をも持っていません。The boy does not have paper in his でも店員はかばんを持っています。 right hand, but the bakery worker has a bag.

In addition, it is worth noting, this kind of activity promotes understanding of Japanese culture because of the usage of Japanese 4-panel cartoon. In the bakery cartoon, for example, the bakery worker/owner wears Japanese traditional wooden sandals called geta.

Online Self-Study Blended for JA201 & JA102 Classes “First (prosodic phrases) Come, First Interpreted” In both of the classes, JA102 and JA201, the textbooks used are titled Genki; Genki I is for JA102, and Genki II for JA201. The textbooks have good reading comprehension materials; however, no audio files for the reading materials are included. Be this as it may, as I argued above, if one teaches a language in which the phrasal head-position is different from the learner’s L1, one does so to prevent them from processing in the way “first come, last interpreted/comprehended.” Remember that only spoken input tacitly force the students to follow “first come, first interpreted/ comprehended.” The following contents have been recorded in the audio files for “first come, first interpreted/parsed”: (21) Contents of audio files as spoken input for JA102 and JA201 i)

each reading material in the textbooks, by reading it aloud. ii) my own questions about the content of each reading material. iii) my own questions about the content of the dialogs in each lesson.

It is important to set the number of trials to “unlimited,” to let our students try until they can find out the correct answer. In other words, let them try and try again until incomprehensible sentences are comprehended. I employed the grading scale for these quizzes lower than the activities involved other three skills (speaking, reading and writing) to reduce my students’ anxiety, but also to motivate them to challenge their listening comprehension skills. As for recording my own reading of the reading material of the textbook, for JA102 students, I recorded one batch of reading material in two ways: one, by reading slower, and the other by reading at my normal speed. In slower reading, I do not change any prosodic boundaries, but try to insert more prosodic phrase boundaries. As for the questions for the reading comprehension materials, although textbooks have printed questions, it is desirable the questions in audio files are given, and that the questions are not the same as those written ones in the textbooks. The questions about the dialogs of each lesson are created for the following two reasons: (1) I want to check whether they have studied and understand what they are talking about in each dialog, although the dialogs have English translation; and (2) I want to provide my students with more authentic spoken input.

Self-Negotiation of Form and Meaning I made more audio files for JA102 than for JA201. This is mainly due to the following: (1) JA102’s the students in JA102 there are not so many listening comprehension materials, except for “real world” Japanese http://www.ajalt.org/rwj/, and (2) In the outcomes assessments, as mentioned above, the students’ learning of both adjective and verb inflections is as difficult as learning of writing the correct kanji corresponding to a given reading. In (a- I-1) of the following “fill-in questions,” I speak “before I was healthy, but,” and a student

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type in their answer in Japanese. In order to come up with the correct answer, what I am speaking in the audio file needs to be comprehended through self-negotiating of meaning and forms. (22) Fill-in questions a. For JA102 i) To learn adjective inflection: To fill an adjective in the blank, switching the tense and positive/negative of the pre-noun adjective 1) 元気だったお母さんが______!(answer: 元気じゃない) Mother who was healthy is not healthy (Surprise)! 2) 難しくないテストが______!(answer: 難しかった) The test that is usually not difficult was/has turned out difficult (Surprise)! ii) To learn “want-construction” 1) 帰りたくなかった。でも、 ______ 。(answer: 帰った) I do not want to go back, but went back. 2) 心配する。でも、______。 (answer: 心配したくない) I worry, but I do not want to worry. b. For JA201 To learn “give/receive-construction” 1) お金がなかったから、父にお金を貸して______。 Because I do not have money, I loaned money from Dad. 2) 漢字が分からなかった。でも、友達が教えて______。 I did not understand the kanji, but my friend kindly teaches it to me.

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In the case of the following “translation of verbal expression” in only one prosodic phrase, the students have to type in an English correspondent, listening to my pronunciation of each verbal expression; again, by self-negotiation of form and meaning. (23) Translation of complex verbal expressions for JA102 1) つかれなかった (was not tired) 2) ならいたくない (do not want to learn) 3) のぼった (climbed) 4) あかかった (was red) 5) やめたかった (wanted to quit) The following is an example of teaching grammar with songs. The following is not a quiz, but encourages my students to listen and sing the songs whose lyrics I made, inspired by one of my colleagues, Yoko Morimoto. The idea here is to use a melody of a song learned by our students in L1, and put Japanese words in it. The following one in (24) was made accordingly. The decision was made that for learning a “had-better” construction, it would be effective to adopt a Christmas song, “Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” I made not only an audio file of my singing, but a slide show to show the sentences and English translation, and then put them in Moodle. This song has three parts, so I made three slides for it. Each slide was displayed during my singing of each part; this is the third part (#3) of the song. Songs are also good for latent learning of “first come, first interpreted/parsed.” Japanese characters in the songs persist in Moodle because the lyrics are inserted as slides. (24) Songs for learning the relevant structures for JA102 (See Figure 11)


Figure 11.

CURRENT CHALLENGES FACING TECHNICAL IMPLEMENTATION There are two challenges regarding Moodle. As mentioned above, one is that Japanese characters are no longer readable, unless I use pdf format, or picture (JPEG) format. Secondly, even if this problem is solved, instructors take note that Moodle availability is subject to the financial conditions of one’s home institution. Quia, unfortunately, lacks two functions. First, it cannot replace “Forum” in Moodle. Second, it cannot present slide shows like the song’s slide shows in (24) above. Even if I use Moodle, Japanese characters typed in are, as mentioned above, no longer readable. Therefore, my students are no longer able to engage in some meaningful collaborative tasks like “Tell Us a Story with 4-panel cartoon”. Even if I give up using Moodle for collaborative tasks, I need to use both Quia and Moodle. That is, Quia is used for quizzes and Moodle for the songs to learn grammar and the strategy of “first come,

first interpreted”. I also found that it is quite a challenge for the instructor to let the majority of the students log into Moodle only for the song’s slide shows.

CONCLUSION In conclusion, the present chapter repeats its endorsement of BLT because it significantly reduces psychological and social distance in FFLT. Furthermore, instructors need to produce audio files to provide students with spoken input so they can self-negotiate form and meaning, and so that students’ parsers process in the manner of first (prosodic phrase) come, first served. The outcome is important: incomprehensible input becomes comprehensible, and hard-to-be-comprehended output becomes easy-to-comprehend output. The question in the title of this chapter, “Does More Input Improve Comprehension?” can be answered as follows: if input is relevant or effective for the

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students’ developmental stage to move up to one step higher, the answer is “Yes.” “More input” and its comprehension takes place as the result of the students’ parsers invoking processing principles like RA or LA, depending on TL’s phrasal heading parameter. However, this chapter claims that input comprehension is not good enough, but output development also contributes L2 acquisition. It needs to be said in all modesty that this chapter has not conducted assessment of the self-negotiation of form and meaning, and leaves it for future work.

REFERENCES Bonno, E., Ohno, Y., Sakane, Y., & Sinagawa, C. (1999). Genki I: An Integrated course in elementary Japanese. Tokyo, Japan: The Japan Times. Brandl, K. (2005). Are you ready to “Moodle”? Language Learning & Technology, 9(2), 16–23. Chomsky, N. (1982). Government and biding theory. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Colpaert, J. (2006). Pedagogy-driven design for online language teaching and learning. Computer Assisted Language Instruction COnsortium (CALICO) . Journal, 23(3), 47–498. Conger, J., & Lawler, E. (2005, August 26). People skills still rule in the virtual company. [London.]. Financial Times (North American Edition), 10. Duff, P. A. (2000). Repetition I: Foreign language classroom interaction. In J. K. Hall & L. S. Verplaetse (Eds.), Second and foreign language learning through classroom interaction (pp. 108-138). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Gass, S. (1997). Input, interaction, and the second language learner. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

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Gass, S., & Varonis, E. M. (1994). Input, interaction, and second language production. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 16(3), 283–302. doi:10.1017/S0272263100013097 Hauck, M., & Sticler, U. (2006). What does it take to teach online? Computer Assisted Language Instruction COnsortium (CALICO) . Journal, 23(3), 463–476. Higgs, T. V. (1984). Introduction: Language teaching and the quest for the holy grail. In T. V. Higgs (Ed.), Teaching for Proficiency, the Organizing Principle (pp. 1-9). Lincolnwood, Chicago: NTC Publishing Group. Kang, P. T. (1993). Parser strategies of adult English speakers learning Japanese as a second language: Theory and Application. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Texas at Austin. Kang, P. T. (2000). A digital classroom for a foreign language course; A case study of Japanese language courses. PIALA 2000: Selected Papers from the 10th Pacific Islands Association of Libraries and Archives Conference Joint with the 13th Annual Regional Language Arts Conference, 74-80. Kang, P. T. (2003). Surface X-bar theory, prosodic structure and first language acquisition. Paper presented at the conference of UG Principles and Input: How do we get Plato’s heaven into Skinners box? the LSA Linguistic Summer Institute, Michigan State University. Kang, P. T. (2007a). Technology, lifelong learning, and effective foreign language instruction under the memory efficient approach. In Y. Inoue (Ed.), Online education for lifelong learning. (pp. 73-98). Hershey, PA: Information Science Publishing/ IGI Global.


Kang, P. T. (2007b). Left association for a headfinal phrase. Paper poster-presented at the International Conference on Processing Head-final Structures at Rochester Technology Institute, Rochester, NY. Kang, P. T. (2008). First come, first interpreted and a performance-based Assessment for advanced L2 (Japanese) parser development. Paper presented at the conference, The 20th Annual Meeting of the Central Association of Teachers of Japanese at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, May 31-June 1. Kimball, J. (1973). Seven principles of surface structure parsing in natural language. Cognition, 2, 15–47. doi:10.1016/0010-0277(72)90028-5 Krashen, S. D. (1985). Input hypotheses. New York: Longman. Kubozono, H. (1993). The organization of Japanese prosody. Tokyo: Kuroshio. Ohta, A. S. (2000). Rethinking recasts: A learnercentered examination of corrective feedback in the Japanese language classroom. In J. K. Hall & L. S. Verplaetse (Eds.), Second and foreign language learning through classroom interaction. (pp. 47-72). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Omaggio, A. C. (1984). The proficiency-oriented classroom. In T. V. Higgs (Ed.), Teaching for proficiency, the organizing principle (pp. 43-84). Chicago, IL: NTC Publishing Group. Pica, T., Young, R., & Doughty, C. (1987). The impact of interaction on comprehension . TESOL Quarterly, 21(4), 737–756. doi:10.2307/3586992

Pierrehumbert, J. (1980). Phonology and phonetics of English intonation. Doctoral dissertation. MIT. Reprinted Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Linguistic Club in 1987. Selinker, L. (1972). Interlanguage. IRAL, 10(3), 209–231. Selkirk, E. O. (1984). Phonology and syntax: the relation between sound and structure. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Swain, M. (1985). Communicative competence: Some roles of comprehensible input and comprehensible input in its development. In S. Gass & C. Madden (Eds.), Input in Second Language Acquisition (pp. 235-253). Rowley, MA: Newbury House. Swain, M. (2000). The output hypothesis and beyond: Mediating acquisition through collaborative dialogue. In J. P. Lantolf (Ed.), Sociocultural theory and econd language learning (pp. 97-114). Ocford, UK: Oxford University Press. Tohsaku, Y. (1999). Yookoso! Continuing with contemporary Japanese. New York: McGraw Hill. VanPatten, B. (1996). Input processing and grammar instruction: Theory and research. Norwood, NJ: Alex publishing. Wegmann, S. J., & McCauley, J. K. (2007). Can you hear us now?: Stance towards interaction and rapport. In Y. Inoue (Ed.), Online education for lifelong learning (pp. 29-50). Hershey, PA: Information Science Publishing/IGI Global.

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Chapter 8

The Perfect Blend?:

Online Blended Learning from a Linguistic Perspective Roberto Di Scala University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy

ABSTRACT This chapter tackles the implementation of the way online courses of English language are structured within the on-line degree courses of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia in Italy. Moving from a double theoretical framework grounded on the links between e-learning and communication and between e-learning and multimedia learning, The author will outline the basic features of the course the author is currently teaching. Besides the standard tools provided by the university platform (the course portal and forum and the course content slides), he has added some ‘external’ tools to offer students further possibilities to interact and take an active role in the learning environment which thus becomes actually ‘blended.’ By making practice of the language through posting comments on a dedicated blog and by exchanging impressions and making queries at a number of Skype-mediated meetings, instructor and students can further interact and create a stronger ‘studying community.’

INTRODUCTION This case deals with the online degree courses of the Faculty of Communication Sciences and Economics of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia where I am currently working as a contracted professor in charge of two courses in English Language.

A few years ago, the notion of “online universities” (in Italian, università telematiche) began to take shape and today there exist a number of such institutions. Their main characteristic is the fact that the courses are exclusively taught on line, while exams are taken in the venue of the university. These universities are extremely new and lack the history of more ancient, traditional universities. Nevertheless, they are official institutions providing higher education.

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch008


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The same could be said for the so-called “traditional” universities which, due to a reformation of the Italian university system of about a dozen years ago, are now in the need of attracting students as though they were private institutions rather than state-owned places of culture. Leaving aside any political and educational comment on this aspect, it is now a fact that most universities in Italy (not to say all of them) are offering their students some form of online learning. In most cases, it is not a whole substitution of traditional, in praesentia courses for e-learning programmes, as traditional teaching is still practiced (and so far it is the dominant method of teaching at universities). The novelty is that many information and parts of the programmes are published on the university’s platforms for elearning. The downside of this aspect is, though, that often it is just a sort of “cut-and-paste” procedure which leads to the sharing of very simple files to the community of students who can access online material. This technological, advanced form of “note taking” cannot be considered as “real” e-learning. Nonetheless, a growing number of faculties are offering their students actual online courses whose contents are devised for distance teaching/learning.

BACKGROUND The University of Modena and Reggio Emilia was one of the first to opt for this kind of distance learning courses which it has been offering his students through dedicated, Moodle-based platform and portals (see http://www.laureaonline.unimore.it) since 2002. Since then, it has been the policy of the University to offer blended e-learning courses for its distance learning programmes. The reason behind this choice is the belief in the need to provide actual, physical links between teachers and students so as to prevent the creation of learning environments lacking the ‘human touch.’

The standard structure of online courses at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia consist of (1) opening meeting where teachers explain details of the programmes to the students (before the academic year officially begins); (2) first meeting between the teachers of each course and their students (namely, the first lesson); (3) a set of ten video-lessons (once a week, usually from 7pm to 8pm); (4) closing meeting between teacher and students; and (5) examinations. Events (1), (2), (4), and (5) take place in the rooms of the faculty in Reggio Emilia. All the meetings, though, are broadcast live via the Web and the corresponding files are published to the portals so that students may download them for their convenience. In order to fully understand and appreciate the importance attached to its e-learning programme by the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, readers should be made aware of the existence of a department dedicated to online teaching which was set up thanks to the joint efforts of the existing structures (i.e. the departments and the faculties involved in the project). Their common goal was to create a structure which could be made responsible for everything concerning and related to e-learning with a reference person (in this case, the head of the department) and a dedicated team of technicians and staff of secretary to cope with the more and more demanding tasks of the whole e-learning system of this university. The department is called Centro e-Learning di Ateneo (CEA) (the University’s e-learning centre) whose Web site can be reached at the following address: www.cea.unimore.it . The aim of the work done every day by the people involved in this and in similar projects at universities scattered throughout Italy (and not only Italy, of course) is to make clear that the lack of classroom interaction in online education is basically a way of enriching and enhancing learning, rather than being considered a limit to that. Technology must be matched by the quality of the information provided, the skill of teachers

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and/or tutors in involving their students in the teaching process, as well as by the creation of the awareness of belonging to a reference structure among the students. Universities providing online education must never cease being communities which are able to offer their members (in particular, students) both solutions to problems and the instruments through which students can form their critical conscience by learning how to learn in an autonomous, active, and proactive way, where by ‘autonomous’ it is meant learning through one’s personal initiative, and through co-operation and confrontation with the other students. In such context, teachers must be able to: (1) do team work along with tutors and the technical staff; (2) offer their teaching in a non-traditional, transmissive way; (3) manage multimedia contents; and (4) manage the times and modes of the teaching process (course planning, class teaching). Therefore, teachers and researchers who wish to contribute to the development of this kind of teaching as well as to give added value to their university’s educational offer in e-learning should possess a fairly wide knowledge of state-of-theart technologies and theoretical references in the field. Also, if they are used to more traditional ways of teaching, they must be willing to question such methods and to adapt their teaching framework to the evolving teaching and learning environments.

Blended Learning in English Courses From a more particular point of view, I will now touch upon the course which serves as the practical case for the following analysis, namely the course of English which I teach. I started working as a contracted professor of English at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia in 2003, and have been in charge of two of the three on-line English courses of the Faculty of Communication Sciences and Economics. The

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structure of on-line programs has undergone some minor restructuring due to some changes at national level in the offering of Italian universities, and as I will focus on my present-day courses (which are somehow new in their structure and names), I feel necessary to offer the reader a brief but exhaustive overview of the contents and of the structure of the courses of the previous years. When I first started teaching on-line courses, I chose to focus on grammar. The whole structure of the course was centred on the rules of English grammar, providing a traditional syllabus ranging from present simple to the passive in order to offer students the chance to reach a B2 level of knowledge of the language. The course material comprised descriptions of the main tenses and grammar functions, and it was in no way different from a traditional course which might be taught at traditional university courses. The only difference was the medium employed the channel through which the information was conveyed: namely, the blended learning environment, which was in its second year of existence at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia. For the following year, I chose not to change anything in the course content and material, but I started to feel that something should be done in order to implement the course itself and to meet the students’ real needs in learning a foreign language in a semester. Even though it is extremely hard to find out what the ‘real needs’ of the students may be, I tried to restrict myself to dealing with a limited set of issues. So, for my third year, I taught a course on how to write a resume in English together with the corresponding covering letter. The grammar rules (i.e., the content of the previous years’ courses) were turned into a rather huge file of information which students could find on the course portal. To such material I added a number of files containing the basic information on how to write a standard business letter in English as well as some useful terms and expressions of business English. For the following year’s course I decided I would change the contents once again, and I ap-

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proached the world of e-mail English. In doing so, I tackled for the first time the issue of non-native speakers and their role within the communicative exchange in English. Again, the tools I relied upon were the traditional instruments available for online teachers: the portal of the course (comprising a forum between the teacher and the students), the platform for virtual classes, and the occasional exchange of e-mail messages with the students. In 2007, I eventually proposed a course which had nothing to do with learning a particular aspect of the language. I decided it was time I offered something different, both in terms of course contents and in the way I delivered them. The course for the 2007-2008 academic year was therefore centred upon the use of English as a ‘social language,’ something which draws upon the concept of English as a lingua franca and which tries to provide a set of practical suggestions for non-native speakers who are absolute or false beginners in dealing with English.

SETTING THE STAGE The main feature of the ‘new’ course was the use of two different sets of interactive tools which I will term ‘internal’ and ‘external.’ ‘Internal’ tools are the course portal and the slides, which are the standard tools provided by the university. Though slides are not a proper interactive tool in themselves, it is their use and the context in which they are used which make them interactive. The portal, on the other hand, offers a place for interaction between teacher and students and among students, i.e. the forum. There, teachers can post information about the course and reply to their students’ queries and students can make enquiries, make suggestions and post comments on course material/topics. The ‘external’ tools I decided to add are a dedicated blog and a further meeting with the students via Skype. Skype is a free program that everyone

can download and use to speak with other Skype users through a computer and a Web cam. The blog, which can be reached at unimorenglish.splinder.com, is called UnimorEnglish (from the acronym Unimore, which stands for University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, plus English). It is a place where students can practice the use of written English in dealing with issues related to the course. Generally, I post a brief text on the current week’s topic of the virtual class, and I invite students to post comments on the issue. I encourage them to take an active part in the discussion without worrying too much about the mistakes they can possibly make (especially if they are beginners). I wish them to practice the language and to be part of the studying community without feeling compelled to pay too much attention to the grammar. On a second moment, I will correct their mistakes so that they may learn from them and try not to make them a second time. From last year’s experience, it emerged that not all the students enrolled on the course were active users of the blog, but those who were produced very interesting discussions and also proposed issues and produced relevant documents for the course. Even though there are no official figures about the evaluation on this part of the course by the students yet, I feel the students appreciated this implementation. Some of them, after taking their exam, wrote me to say they found the possibility of practicing the language very useful. Though the blog does not provide an answer to those students requesting oral interaction and practice, I believe it is a first step towards offering a more complete approach to language teaching and transmission so much that for the current year I have decided not to change the general structure of the course and to re-open the blog to the students who will be able to exchange opinions with a mother-tongue supporting teacher as well. The other ‘external’ tool was (and will be also for this year) a weekly meeting with the students made via my Skype account. Every week at a given time, I opened my Skype account to the students

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for about one hour during which time they could pose me questions, made suggestions, ask for further explanations on the course contents and/ or structure, or simply chat or talk in English to practice the language. Compared to the blog, the weekly Skype meetings were less popular among the students. Sometimes no-one called, or maybe I had one or two persons on line. This was probably due to the time I chose to hold the meeting, which were sometimes from 6.30pm to 7.30pm and sometimes from 7pm to 8pm. At that time, students were probably engaged with other virtual classes, or were busy with family life (8pm is or is nearly dinner time in Italy). But, as many students are workers, I envisaged that time might be the best time for them to devote some extra time to the subject. This is the major downside of the Skype side of the course, but nonetheless I will keep the meetings going on for this current year. Due to their being ‘external’ tools, both the blog and the Skype meetings need no technical assistance from the staff working on the on-line programs of the university, and therefore they do not constitute a ‘burden’ for the organization. They are something shared by the teacher and the students alike, the occasion on which both the instructor and the learners can actually ‘blend’ and interact, thus adding further meaning to blended e-learning.

CASE DESCRIPTION Online Degree Courses Before moving to the detailed description of the case, I need to point out some major characteristics of the course as they arise out of the abovementioned operational indications.

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Course contents The course is part of the educational offer concerning the university degrees in ‘Marketing and Business Organization’ and in ‘Communication Sciences’. As I have already made clear, I chose to focus the attention on the practical uses of the language rather than let’s say on grammar or syntax exclusively. The course, therefore, may be said to be somehow more pragmatics-oriented. It aims at providing the students with basic elements on the use of the language in order to have them communicate by using English as a lingua franca (or ‘social language’, see Di Scala, 2008).

Reference Target The course is designed for beginner students who are non-native English speakers. Online students are basically working adults who study in their spare time in order to obtain either a better position/ job or to complete their studies, and are therefore motivated and eager to learn.

Course Main Features Characteristics Interactivity. Classes are given through interactive channels, and are devised so that students can interact with the teacher and with other students. Besides the ‘traditional’ video-classes, the course features in fact a blog where students can practice English writing and exchange ideas and impressions on course topics. Skype is also used as a further means of communication between the teacher and the students (besides more ‘traditional’ email exchanges). Dynamism. Class material can be easily upgraded by the teacher (and made available to the students), and added to by the students in the form of further files/documents on course topics.

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Modularity. Class material is divided up in learning modules which, in their turn, comprise different learning units (which somehow may be regarded as Learning Objects). The content of each ‘object’ is designed to meet the needs of the typical student the course was devised for.

Learning Methods Self-learning. Students download each lesson and revise the teaching materials wherever and whenever they feel like to. Synchronous learning. Students participate in live, real-time classes. Collaborative learning. Students may cooperate through the Web even though they live in distant places. Multimedia learning. The whole idea of elearning is based on multimedia learning, and the English course is no difference.

Aspects Comprised Learning how to use technologies and technology mediated learning. Technology is obviously the core feature of e-learning, and students should be computer literate at least the very basic level before starting the course (and most of them are indeed computer skilled).

Net-Based The Internet. The Internet is the means e-learning mostly lives on. The Net is the physical channel through which e-learning is provided. Course material can be derived from Net searching. Also, blogs and Skype-mediated contacts between the teacher and the class are made possible only through the Net. Exchange of information. The students attending the course end up by creating a networked community based on the exchange of information as well as of experiences.

A Means of Social Cohesion Even though online classes are actual moments of social sharing, blended learning allows for further social sharing when the students and the teacher physically meet at the beginning and at the end of the course, as well as during examinations. All this can be better understood in the light of the theoretical issues I have drawn upon in structuring the course.

The Theoretical Framework: E-Learning and Communication In a previous paper (Di Scala, 2007), I wondered whether it was possible to think of a non-traditional way to devise e-learning programmes which could then be used for teaching different subjects. Starting from linguistic considerations, I tried to give a first, tentative answer to the question. In particular, I focused my attention on text linguistics which, in my opinion, might serve as the starting point from which to build a theoretical layout in such direction. In so doing, I investigated the way the theories of text linguistics could be applied to e-learning programme structuring, and I ended up with providing a sketchy frame of reference for analysing e-learning from the linguist’s perspective. On the grounds of those assumptions (and especially from a semiotic perspective), I regarded e-learning as a “text” within the broader sign code of educational systems and outlined its following characteristics pertaining to communication: e-learning as a “text” (1) is a communicative occurrence, (2) has a communicative function, (3) has a communicative goal, and (4) is a communicative exchange between the producer and the receiver of the “text” (broadly speaking, between the teacher and the student). It is important to underline how many critics point out that e-learning must be thought of as closely linked to the communicative context and that is can hardly be separated from the commu-

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nicative exchange (e.g., Ardizzone & Rivoltella, 2003; Baracco, 2002; Calvani, 2001; Eletti, 2004; Fata, 2004; Felix, 2004; La Noce, 2002; Mammarella, Comoldi & Pazzaglia, 2005; Porcelli & Dolci, 1999). As Thompson (1995) has it, communicating is a social activity comprising the production, transmission, and reception of symbolic forms. Therefore, communication possesses two dimensions, one which is symbolic (i.e. the production of material bearing some meaning), and another which is social (i.e. the production and circulation of said material by human beings). The Internet can be viewed as an immense symbolic arena where meanings are produced, circulated, and negotiated by the subjects involved (Rivoltella, 2003). The basic feature characterising these phenomena is interaction. On the Internet, interaction is ‘strong’ as there exists a relationship between active entities. This means that the symbolic and the social dimensions overlap. This makes sociality the message itself. In this view, Slevin (2000) proposes a model of interaction where people are involved as both producers and receivers of the message, and are part of a rather complex production activity as the Internet is and where anybody can publish contributions or create Web sites. The Internet, therefore, must be considered from a pragmatic point of view, i.e. as a system of actions where the transmission of meanings is devised more as an activity rather than as just a transfer. As a consequence, the Net is more than just a physical place, and it emerges as a social place where people can interact (Meyerowitz, 1985).

The Theoretical Framework: Multimedia Learning Within the distance education programmes of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, online material is prepared by each teacher to fit the structure of their course. There is a standard

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template (.ppt format) for the slides, which can be any number for each subject taught. Slides are projected during online classes as well as in praesentia lessons to support the explanation by the teacher. In devising the slides and their content, the so-called ‘dual coding theory’ (Paivio, 1991) should be taken as the basis for constructing materials. According to said theory, there exist two different coding systems used to process information. The human verbal system processes verbal and linguistic information, whereas our nonverbal system processes both visual information and verbal images. In the process, verbal and/or linguistic inputs are compared to logogens, i.e. basic representation units making up the representation of a word in a man’s long-term memory. As for non-verbal inputs, the representation units for images are called imagens. This leads to a first, well-established truth about multimedia presentations of course material, namely that they are more easily remembered than unimodal presentations (e.g., verbal presentations) (see also Mammarella et al., 2005). On the grounds of all this, Mayer (2000) formulated his theory of multimedia learning which is based on three basic principles: 1.

2.

3.

Dual coding (Paivio, 1991): visual and auditory information is processed through two different channels; Cognitive load (Chandler & Sweller, 1991): the quantity of information which can be processed through each channel is limited (therefore, excessive loads result in defective processing); ‘Active’ processing: the students take active part in the learning process.

Afterwards, Mayer’s further investigations in the field led to his cognitive model for multimedia learning (Mayer, 2001), as seen in Figure 1. Note: (1) words and images are kept as faithful visual and auditory images in the corresponding sensory systems for about one second; (2)

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Figure 1. Diagram for Multimedia Learning (Source: Adapted from Mayer, 2001)

it actively regulates the temporary storage of short-term information and its processing; and (3) it organises and integrates previously obtained information. Mayer’s model entails six standards of multimedia learning: 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

Multimedia: learning is enhanced when the presentation of material associates words and images thus favouring an integrated mental model; Spatial and temporal closeness: learning is favoured when words and the corresponding images are disposed orderly and close to one another on the screen; Relevance and cohesion of material: learning is best performed when no irrelevant and not cohesive words/chunks of information are present; Different modes: learning is at its best when images are accompanied by oral explanations as this contributes to engaging both the auditory and the visual channels; Redundancy: learning is affected when the information is presented in too many formats at the same time (e.g. figures, written text and oral explanations); Customization: learning is favoured by a non-formal style of the presentation which

is likely to meet the learners’ needs and expectations. Lucchini (2005) offers further insights into the way online course material should be written. First and foremost, he thinks the contents and the format of any online programmes must be of high quality. He then moves on to recommend the use of short, to-the-point, simple texts written using a language which is both active and interactive, and designed bearing in mind the actual receivers of the text. He also claims particular attention for beginners: the person(s) preparing the material for a course should never take for granted that anything they are assembling/writing is clear for everybody.

Presentation of Course Material On the basis of the theoretical implications described so far, I have tried to present the content of each slide accordingly. Figure 2 shows the number of slides from the course of English Language for the academic year 2007-2008. A brief commentary on the slides presented here is necessary. The first slide has been created on the basis of the standard template provided by the e-learning staff of the University of Modena and Reggio

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Figure 2. Slide 2

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Figure 3.

Emilia. Students will see more than just this portion of the presentation. As can be seen in Figure 3, there is further information available in the form of notes. The standard template, in fact, comprises also additional text which serves as explanation to the information contained in the slide. This adds to the oral explanation by the teacher, and is a reminder to the students of what has been said during the virtual class. (Also, it serves as a kind of textbook for those students who cannot listen to/view the recording of on-line meetings.) (For clarity’s sake, I will provide non-Italian readers with the translation of the sole content of slide 1): ENGLISH AS A GLOBAL LANGUAGE • • •

English as the global language of the 21st century English as a global language: creation of communities Social networking)

While slide 1 is consistent with the standard, basic template common to all on-line courses at the Faculty of Communication Sciences and Economics of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, the last two have been devised without taking into account such layout. As a matter of fact, they reflect more directly the informal spirit which permeates the way the contents of the course are offered to the students. Slides 2 and 3 do not have notes. Therefore, the only additional explanation provided is the oral presentation by the teacher. Furthermore, the very aspect of the slides, the way the information provided is presented and distributed on the screen is aimed at making the students feel at ease and somewhat relaxed. The (hopefully) balanced mix between text and images, the short and strictlyto-the-point quantity of information contained by each slide, and the use of unusual images (at least, unusual for an academic, standard course in English) add to the meaning conveyed and will (hopefully, again) linger in the students’ minds

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longer than more greyish, ‘standard’ information which can be found in traditional textbooks. The lack of notes and detailed explanation, though making the slides ‘slimmer’ and ‘easier to use,’ has a downside as well. In fact, students cannot print them out in the hope of finding more details than the bare text in the slide. Therefore, if they do not have the possibility of listening to the recordings of the video lessons, their study might be affected. This fault, though, ceases being a problem if one considers that, in this way, students are ‘obliged’ to strengthen up the relations with the other participants in the course, thus reinforcing the very idea of networked community and adding to the social aspects and functions of on-line courses. Again, for clarity’s sake, I feel now obliged to provide the English translation of slides 2 and 3 as well. Slide 2 reads as follows: ENGLISH 2.0 The Web as a ‘social place’ English as the language of the Web English as a ‘social language’? While slide 3 reads as follows: English = Latin? The bitten slipper makes reference to the practical uses and misuses of English by people across the world: the language, in this way, ends up by being chewed up as an old slipper in the mouth of a playing beagle. The non-formal character of the slides is matched by a non-formal approach to both the subject and course contents. The adoption of ‘colloquial style’ in presenting the topics as well as problem-solving methodologies are intended to favour empathy in distance education (Holmberg, 2003) along with multimedia interaction (e.g., forums, blogs) characterized by informal, non-bureaucratic exchanges between teacher and students and among the students.

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Concluding Remarks on the Case There is a final point which needs to be taken into consideration as well, and which plays an important role in deciding whether the structuring of the course has been successful, namely, the students’ feedback. As far as my course is concerned, students’ outcomes at exams have been more than satisfactory, with a fairly large percentage of people getting from high to very high marks. (Readers are informed that, in Italy’s universities, a student has passed her or his exam if she or he has obtained a mark from 18 to 30, the top mark being 30 e lode [i.e. 30 cum laude]. Marks lower than 18 mean that a student has failed her or his exam and can take the same exam again at a later time.) From this point of view, then, the feedback can be said to be extremely positive. From the point of view of the students’ satisfaction with the course, it must be noted that not every student is willing to provide a comment on the subjects taught and the way the course has been devised. Those who do, though, express their appreciation and/or discontent both during the period classes are being given and after they have taken their exam. In most cases, they provide the teacher with their opinion on the experience as well as with suggestions on how the course might be improved in the future. They are likely to underline both the things they have liked more and the things they would have liked to find in the course. Also, they express their opinion on how they would have liked the course to be taught, and many times this has proven to be an extremely helpful piece of advice on the students’ part. In fact, each year I try to implement my course contents and teaching methodologies by taking into account suggestions and indications by students of the previous year.

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Unfortunately, figures and facts on the course evaluation on the part of the students for the academic year 2007-2008 are not available yet; therefore, any comment on the effectiveness of my course is grounded on purely empiric estimates based on the students’ unofficial feedbacks. It is true that the changes in the basic organization of the English language course seem to have been appreciated. While, according to the figure for the academic year 2002-2003, the English language course scored 46% in terms of students’ overall positive evaluation, as of the academic year 20032004 (when I started working at the university) the same course ranked among the most popular with overall positive evaluation of 85% and 81% in 2003-2004 and 2004-2005 respectively (figures and data for the following years are not available yet). Lastly, it must be stressed that informal and non conventional presentation of course material and contents is made possible mainly by virtue of the familiar atmosphere which the persons working at the CEA have been able to create. In this way, teaching expertise, research, and innovation are matched by a warm, welcoming atmosphere so that the university can offer effective and rigorous teaching to distant-learning students without lacking the ‘human factor’. And, according to figures, students seem to enjoy and appreciate it all, as their perception of the usefulness and effectiveness of virtual classes of the entire on-line courses is very high: 50% of the students say that virtual classes are an ‘extremely effective’ teaching tool (while 46% say it is ‘rather effective’, 3% say it is ‘little effective’ and 1% say it is ‘ineffective’).

CURRENT CHALLENGES FACING THE ORGANIZATION In closing this chapter, I feel like mentioning some of the challenges that the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, along with the rest of Italian

universities, is about to face in the near future. Thanks to the know-how and state-of-the-art technologies of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (which is in part funded by the higher fees students pay for this kind of education), besides getting value for money, students can profit from an extremely advanced, hi-tech environment. Nonetheless, problems may be posed by outer factors such as obsolete phone-line connections the students may have at home which sometimes affect the quality of data transmission during live broadcasting. Also, the entire educational system in Italy is about to undergo further reformation, and this holds true for universities in particular. Therefore, at the time of writing, it is not possible to predict what the future will hold for the whole university system in Italy. A reduction in the number of degree courses seems most likely, which in part is meant to avoid spending public money on courses where only a few students are enrolled. This should not be the case for online courses at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, which are constantly attracting people from all the country. Again, though, at present no one can predict what the figures will be for the next academic year.

CONCLUSION Nonetheless, even though the problem just hinted at is actual and dramatically important, the tendency at the CEA – and therefore at the whole of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia – is not to give in to pessimistic views and to continue to promote e-learning as one of the innovative teaching solutions which are likely to get over any present difficulties. The case I have just described is not an isolated experiment which can be considered as concluded and completed. It is part of a larger system of online, blended learning in higher education which needs to continue and to live on dedicated research and experimentation.

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The Perfect Blend?

REFERENCES Ardizzone, P., & Rivoltella, P. C. (2003). Didattiche per l’e-learning. Metodi e strumenti per l’innovazione dell’insegnamento universitario. Roma: Carocci. Baracco, A. (2002). La comunicazione mediata dal computer. In C. Bazzanella (Ed.), Sul dialogo: Contesti e forme di interazione verbale (pp. 253267). Milano: Guerini Associati Calvani, A. (2001). Educazione, comunicazione e nuovi media. Sfide pedagogiche e cyberspazio. Torino: UTET Libreria. Chandler, P., & Sweller, J. (1991). Cognitive load theory and the format of instruction. Cognition and Instruction, 8, 293–332. doi:10.1207/ s1532690xci0804_2 Di Scala, R. (2007). Where linguistics meets e-learning: Towards a linguistic approach to eLearning. In A. Colorni, M. Pegoraro, & P. G. Rossi (Eds.), eLearning tra formale e informale, Atti del IV congresso della Società Italiana di e-Learning (pp. 168-169). Macerata: EUM – Edizioni Università di Macerata. Di Scala, R. (2008, October). E-nglish 2.0. L’inglese come ‘lingua sociale.’ Paper presented at the 5th congress of the Italian e-Learning Society, Trento, Italy.

La Noce, F. (2002). E-learning, La nuova frontiera della formazione. Milano: Franco Angeli. Lucchini, A. (2005). Efficacia e calore nei contenuti scritti per l’e-learning. In S. Panini, & R. Padroni (Eds.), E-learning nella scuola, nell’università, nel lavoro (pp. 132-148). Milano: Franco Angeli. Mammarella, N., Cornoldi, C., & Pazzaglia, F. (2005). Psicologia dell’apprendimento multimediale. E-learning e nuove tecnologie. Bologna: il Mulino. Mayer, R. (2000). Intelligence and education. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of intelligence (pp. 519-533). New York: Cambridge University Press. Mayer, R. (2001). Multimedia learning. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press. Meyerowitz, J. (1985). No sense of place. The impact of electronic media on social behaviour. New York: Oxford University Press. Paivio, A. (1991). Dual coding theory: Retrospect and current studies. Canadian Journal of Psychology, 45, 255–287. doi:10.1037/h0084295 Porcelli, G., & Dolci, R. (1999). Multimedialità e insegnamenti linguistici. Modelli informatici per la scuola. Torino: UTET.

Eletti, V. (Ed.). (2004). Che cos’è l’e-learning. Roma: Carocci.

Rivoltella, P. C. (2003). Costruttivismo e pragmatica della comunicazione on line: Socialità e- didattica in Internet. Trento: Erickson.

Fata, A. (2004). Gli aspetti psicologici della formazione a distanza. Milano: Franco Angeli.

Slevin, J. (2000). The Internet and society. New York: Routledge.

Felix, U. (2004). Orchestrated vision. Language Magazine, 4(2), 24–29.

Thompson, J. B. (1995). The media and modernity: A social theory of the media. Cambridge, MA: Polity Press.

Holmberg, B. (2003). A theory of distance education based on empathy. In M. G. Moore & W. G. Anderson (Eds.), Handbook of Distance Education (pp. 79-86). Mahwah, NJ: Erlabum.

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Reflections:

Two Years after Implementing a Blended Educational Research Course Yukiko Inoue University of Guam, Guam

ABSTRACT This chapter discusses the case of a pilot course implementing blended learning at an American Pacific island university. This case provides a detailed overview of how the instructor applied blending learning design to an introductory educational research course. The author compares her goals for the course with the concept of blended learning, and discusses reasons why the two complemented one another. Analysis of student self-ratings (quantitative data on achievement) and student self-reflection narratives (qualitative data on satisfaction) revealed that, overall, student blended learning experiences were positive. Students liked the course and indicated that they had achieved their learning objectives, although they clearly indicated dissatisfaction with some aspects of blended learning. The case further confirmed the prediction drawn from the literature that pedagogical and technological difficulties present major challenges to providing quality blended courses. Surmounting these challenges enhances both the effectiveness and efficiency of learning experiences in blended courses.

INTRODUCTION

have infiltrated our lives so thoroughly in such a short time. (Beekman, 2005, p. 33)

In Such a Short Time Computers are everywhere, and our lives are affected in all kinds of ways by their operation—and non-operation. It is truly amazing that computers

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch009

In 1993, there was no World Wide Web; but now it seems as if it is everywhere (Ko & Rossen, 2004). “There was a time, not many years ago, when word processing was the most popular computer activity among students….Today, a PC can be a window into the global system of interconnected networks


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known as the Internet” (Beekman, 2005, p. 16). Indeed, the change came with the development of the Internet and Web-based communication. University faculty increasingly rely on the Internet to support the activities of teaching and to supplement face-to-face class time: for example, by disseminating course information and resources, providing space for students to upload assignments, and providing students with an online discussion forum. Certainly the future looks increasingly digital, wireless, and networked (Koohang, Briz, & Seymour, 2006). Rudestam and Schoenholtz-Read (2002) note: “From stepchild to wunderkind, technology that spawned the Internet has moved online distance learning to the forefront of educational innovation…. Sensing an opportunity to reach more students and supplement flagging tuition revenues, major educational institutions have expanded their mission to include activities in online education” (p. 3). A. W. (Tony) Bates (2000), project leader for a study on cost-benefit analysis of online teaching for the Canadian National Center of Excellence in Tele-learning, has identified six rationales for the use of technology in higher education: (1) improving the quality of teaching (using technology is seen as one way of alleviating problems such as increased student-to-teacher ratios and increased teaching loads); (2) providing students with information technology (IT) skills they will need in their work and life (integrating technology into the learning environment is a way to develop such skills); (3) widening access to education and training (the trend toward lifelong learning and the need for reeducation and retraining are leading to a changing student population); (4) responding to the technological imperative (those who believe that technology can play a valuable role in teaching and learning see ar-

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guments against the technological imperative as valid but insufficient to deny it); (5) reducing the costs of education (using technology, however, is more likely to lead to increased rather than reduced costs, at least, in the short term); and (6) improving the cost-effectiveness of education (technology is unlikely to reduce absolute costs but can improve the cost-effectiveness of operations in higher education by freeing faculty members for more productive use of their time). (pp. 16-20) Educational technologies definitely play increased roles, “partly driven by students’ expectations, but also because they demonstrably improve the quality of teaching and learning and represent an efficient use of resources” (Ryan, Scott, Freeman, & Patel, 2001, p. 169). Furthermore, “students are now not only more diverse following the massification of higher education but also more consumer-minded….Students increasingly seek choice—in the subjects to be studied, in delivery modes, in assessment, and in the time spent on campus” (James & Beckett, n. d., p. 2). Kim and Bonk (2006) conducted a survey in both higher education and corporate training to explore the future trends of online learning. Most of the respondents (N = 562) expected huge growth in online programs and predicted that ‘monetary support’ and ‘pedagogical competency’ of online instructors would most significantly affect the success of the online programs. The respondents further predicted that emphasis would be placed less on fully online learning, and more on blended learning: a balanced mix of traditional face-toface instruction with adequately designed online activities. Why blended learning? According to Lorenzo (2004): Because blended learning is an important topic related to where educational technology, in general, is heading. It aims to please all higher education stakeholders—students, faculty, and

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institutional administrations—by offering the best of online and face-to-face teaching and learning environment. Institutions that learn how to provide blended learning courses and programs sensibly and effectively will save dollars, use their physical space intelligently, generate better student learning outcomes, and satisfy more faculty and students. (p. 1)

From ‘Instruction’ to ‘Production’ Institutions of higher education now must address “changing expectations associated with the quality of the learning experience and the wave of technological innovation. Those who have grown up with interactive technology are not always comfortable with large lectures as an approach to transmitting information. Students expect a relevant and engaging learning experience” (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008, p. ix). Technological innovations have provided a new option of learning to a class of learners and it is imperative to strike a balance between student expectations and instructor perceptions of higher learning (Bedi, 2006). To maintain the quality of online programs, as Badi argues, the instructor has to perform a multi-faceted role, providing the ‘human’ touch to the whole process of online learning. To the extent that intimate process produces quality instruction, many academics believe that online learning places the instructor at an inherent disadvantage. Basically, Bedi’s argument is that in partially or fully online courses, ‘instruction’ becomes a ‘production’ in which the instructor plays the roles of producer, director, and leading actor. Blended learning technologies and environments, realistically speaking, are still in their early stages. Few published cases provide insights into exactly how blended learning should be implemented to optimize learning in higher education courses—both undergraduate and graduate courses. There is also extensive confusion and

much optimism about blended learning due to multiple definitions of and approaches to blended learning (Bonk & Shi, 2005): “Some instructors might blend in order to address different learning styles. Others might blend to take advantage of face-to-face and virtual learning opportunities. Still others might blend to combine synchronous and asynchronous technologies to best meet student needs” (p. 1). And yet, it is true that some disciplines are more difficult to convert to online formats than others; for example, chemistry, biology, and statistics are all inherently difficult to teach online (Lorenzo, 2004).

BACKGROUND As the largest of some 2,000 islands that make up Micronesia, the island of Guam is about three hours flying time from Tokyo, Manila, Taipei, Hong Kong, and Seoul and occupies a major strategic location for the United States, which operates large Navy and Air Force bases. The University of Guam (UOG), the major institution of higher education in the western Pacific, is a U.S. land grant institution accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. UOG has students from the U.S. mainland, the various Micronesian islands, the Philippines, India, Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Malaysia, though approximately one-half of UOG’s students are from Guam and are of indigenous Chamorro or Filipino descent.

The Faculty Survey of 2006 Historically, UOG has lagged in its implementation of online and distance education. However, its recently revised IT policy emphasizes the use of new and emerging technologies to enhance teaching and learning. A 2006 survey of UOG faculty, for instance, identified nine cases illustrating frequent uses of IT in teaching (Inoue & Bell, 2006):

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(1) PowerPoint slides for images in psychology: striking images illustrating the concepts keep students engaged in the classroom lecture, and help them to remember the concepts. (2) Digital classroom for Japanese language courses: language instructors with basic knowledge of computer literacy can establish a digital classroom with minimal funding. (3) Multimedia instruction and course design: the best ways for students to learn is to create presentations that can be shared, evaluated, and integrated into their own learning. (4) Course Web site in biology: Web pages for chatting are excellent because they challenge foreign students, requiring students to develop both spontaneous writing skills in a target language, and the skills required to read and quickly comprehend what the other participants have written. (5) Library bibliographic instruction: this orientation covers online catalog, OCEAN (Online Catalog Easy Access Network), as well as articles in online full text subscription databases and Internet search engines through a physical tour of the library building. (6) CD-ROMs for distributing information in courses: a typical CD contains the course syllabus, meeting calendar, assignments, reading requirements, term projects, and exam information. (7) Original online newsletters in economics: posting interactive study guides is important for the study of economics, which requires students to interpret graphs and data. (8) Computers and music education: maintaining computers for students to use for ear training and for listening to examples of performance material. (9) E-mail communication: student teachers have found the e-mail daily conversation a very positive and effective means of communication with their master teachers. (pp. 99-118)

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In follow-up interviews, many UOG faculty admitted that a lack of familiarity with IT made them unsure of what new technologies might benefit their teaching: illustrating the necessity of faculty training in and technical supports for the use of instructional technology. Such faculty training related to teaching with technology, however, should emphasize good pedagogy rather than good technology (The Center for Teaching and Technology, 2006).

Online Edition of English Course A report by Jackson and Lubuag (2008) describes an online English course (EN110) that was first offered at UOG in 2008. Students enrolled in the course are complete assignments at their own pace but, before each deadline, are required to post their work to an online blog called LiVEJOURNAL. The online EN110 course provides the same knowledge and skills as the regular EN110 course, except that students in the former never sit in a classroom. As the report highlights, (1) online courses allow students to develop their Internet and computer skills, providing individualized attention from instructors through personalized electronic communication, and (2) the asynchronous communication can eliminate the barriers that inhibit students from expressing themselves in the face-to-face classroom settings. According to the report, the instructor believes that online learning is not an easier way to get through a course, but instead, requires that students have or develop organizational skills. The instructor makes it clear that this course provides an additional option for students. The instructor’s online course readiness questionnaire (see Appendix A for 15 questions) helps students to determine whether the online EN110 online course is the right option for. In a personal communication with the author of the present chapter, the instructor summarized the online course readiness questionnaire as follows:

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“My EN110 online setup Web site (where those interested could follow the proposal/approval process) is http://www.geocities.com/merissa_brown/ en110online. The original online course readiness questionnaire was the 48 question survey and I gave to 10% of UOG students prior to developing the online version of EN110 course to determine whether online course options were really something that UOG students wanted and were capable of taking (i.e. Was the needed technology available to them?). The registration questionnaire was a mini 15-question version I developed from the larger survey to help students when registering to determine whether online learning was really a classroom environment where they could expect success” (M. Brown, personal communication, December 23, 2008).

higher education based on its advantages, its challenges, and its designs, and its future directions” (Koohang et al., 2006, p. 156). According to the MU News Bureau (2008):

Hope for Developing an Effective ‘Blended’ Course

In the above research conducted at the University of Missouri, two respiratory therapies courses —one using a traditional approach, the other, a blended approach—were taught by the same professor. Students who completed the course in a traditional classroom with face-face instruction were more pleased with the course outcomes than the students who completed the blended course. Yet the final examination and course grades for both approaches were almost identical, indicating that there is hope for developing an effective ‘blended’ approach to learning. Can blended learning continue the trend commenced by online learning? According to Vignare (2006), “the answer is a guarded yes but certain conditions need to be fostered, mainly because reviewing current blended learning course activities as written by faculty researchers indicates they chose online learning because they felt it will improve student communication” (p. 6) and, indeed, online learning environments:

The School of Education (SOE) at UOG is accredited by the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE). Its mission is the provision of teacher education to meet the multicultural and educational demands of the island’s school system as well as providing for education systems in the region as a whole. Higher education instructors today must describe how the virtual and real worlds intersect in the process as teaching online (Ko & Rossen, 2004): “Is it any wonder that so many instructors are both anxious and apprehensive as they try to make sense of this new phenomenon?” (p. xv). SOE is committed to encouraging faculty to model positive technology usage by seamlessly infusing these tools into their curriculum and instruction. After discussions among faculty and administration, SOE decided to experiment with blended learning. Blended learning “is not a novel nicety but, as blended learning becomes more popular among higher education settings, it is imperative to draw attention to cases of online learning in

In today’s online era, the concept of a classroom extends beyond a walled room with desks and chairs and into the realm of cyber space. Computer screens are replacing the blackboard and keypads are replacing chalk. To provide learners with the best experience, many educators are opting for a blended approach: a traditional classroom with face-to-face interaction supplemented by online resources. One University of Missouri researcher has found that while this approach is currently not necessarily more effective, there is hope for developing an effective hybrid approach to learning. (¶ 1)

•

offer new pedagogical approaches for learning content;

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•

• •

offer students with different learning styles more approaches to meet their needs, be more flexible for students; offer students more practice through online assessments; and offer more active student participation than a lecture and provide a better “real” world experience for students. (pp. 6-7)

Pointing out that none of the above is particularly groundbreaking, Vignare continues: …but they are recognized as learner centered and good instructional practices…. The learning innovations are allowing higher education to get better at teaching and thus more productive. It remains to be seen whether blended learning is better but clearly it is spurring innovation that is sustainable. Bringing online learning into the classroom through blended learning gives higher education a very easy way to adapt, innovate and become more productive. (¶ 7-8)

selected for this course, primarily because of its flexibility, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness. Briefly, Moodle was developed by Martin Dougiamas of Curtin University as an educationally sound alternative to Blackboard, so that it can be used to implement, modify, and experiment with an interactive Internet-based course as easily and as flexibly as possible (Corich, 2005). Moodle, an open source Course Management System (CMS), is a server-based software package designed to allow the instructor to provide collaborative activities, critical reflection, and learning resources to online students as well as supplementing face-to-face instruction. The rising cost of education is demanding a change from the traditional, space-and-time bound institutions to ones that offer increasingly cost-effective, technologically enhanced programs; as institutions of higher education turn to the Internet-based technology to address these challenges, the use of open source CMS is increasing (Minielli & Ferris, 2005).

Case Description THE BLENDED LEARNING COURSE UOG’s School of Education has been an early adopter of the Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment (Moodle) for blended learning. Moodle training has been offered with small-groups assistance to provide faculty, including the author of this chapter, the skills needed to prepare course materials for online activities. The case reported in this chapter was SOE’s first blend of online activities with face-to-face classroom instruction in a graduate research course. Important factors affecting blended learning are related to technical constraints of the delivery platform, network, and software; cultural factors in institutions such as the acceptance of and routine familiarity with technology, and pragmatic constraints are related to budget, time, and management expectations (Clark & Mayer, 2008). Moodle has been

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Using a Moodle-based blended format, a graduate course entitled “Introduction to research methods” has been offered since Spring 2007, incorporating classroom instruction (35%) and online instruction (65%), and thus, reducing face-to-face classroom lectures and tutorial time. The three main tasks of online instruction are: (1) to provide students with guidance for their weekly online exercises, reading, discussion, and assignment submission; (2) to provide feedback on student online assignments; and (3) to provide answers to students’ daily online questions. Moodle is introduced to students during the first stage of the course in each semester. The introductory research course provides an overview of the concepts and applications of educational research, with a focus on knowledge of research methods necessary to obtain valid and reliable

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outcomes as solutions to educational problems. The learning objectives are: • • • • •

•

•

understanding of the nature and characteristics of educational research; summarizing and critiquing applied research or evaluation studies; gaining an in-depth knowledge of research designs and methodologies; understanding of research problems, research questions, and research hypotheses; understanding of basic statistical analysis and interpretation with the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) program; understanding of the American Psychological Association (APA) writing style and rules for the preparation of manuscripts; and developing the quantitative or qualitative research proposal based upon the APA style.

The course syllabus provides details of the instructor’s learning objectives and student practice, as well as how mastery is assessed. By incorporating an active learner model and a constructivist approach—demonstrating new knowledge to the learner and revisiting prior knowledge and expe-

rience as a foundation for new knowledge—the instructor hopes to convey the material effectively, so that students feel satisfied with their in-class and online activities. Three instructional methods are emphasized in the course: (1) active demonstrations of skills; (2) student-centered teaching based on participatory classroom and online activities, active learning, and cooperative interaction; and (3) encouraging students’ progressive mastery of skills by providing them with many opportunities to practice and to apply what they learn. The instructor provides timely feedback, especially in the hopes of increasing faculty-student interaction. At the beginning of the course, students complete the student information form (see Appendix B), which includes questions such as: Why do you think some teachers are better in teaching? Typical answers include the following: “because they are open to change and try to adapt through their own professional development”; “because they update themselves by utilizing all available resources that might be of help”; “because they have organized systems to deliver the information”; and “because they are great planners and can hold the students’ attention.” Regarding the question, What are your expectations for the course?, typical answers include: “to learn about the process of conducting a scientific

Table 1. Moodle Features and learning activities (Source: adapted from Ko & Rossen, 2004) Categories

Learning Activities

Moodle ‘Building Blocks’

Instructor presentation

This includes lectures, simulations, charts, and graphs, as well as computer assisted presentations using tools like PowerPoint slides.

News Forum-- Instructor’s welcome message Resources -- PowerPoint slides for each week’s lecture

Discussion

Guided discussion is common format for discussion. In seminars, instructor presentation and discussion are often combined.

Forum -- Students participate in a weekly online discussion as well as a weekly online exercise

Group-oriented and individual projects

Collaborative activities are included here, in addition to group and individual projects presented to the entire class.

Assignment: Students work on weekly assignments and submit online

Research

Research may be conducted either by individuals or in groups (e.g., practical applications, fieldwork, and interviews).

Students develop and submit their individual research proposal online

Assessment

This involves exams, essays, and projects; portfolios that combine different types of work; and evaluation for participation.

Scoring guidelines and rubrics are used; all assignments are submitted online and are graded via Moodle

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investigation”; “to gain research skills and knowledge that will support a master’s thesis”; and “to become a better researcher.” Most activities in college courses can be divided into the following categories: instructor presentation, discussion, group and individual projects, research, and assessment (Ko & Rossen, 2004). Moodle–supported components of the course are based on these categories (see Table 1). Smith (2003), for instance, observes that traditional methods of assessing student learning outcomes have typically employed multiple choice exams which measure recognition memory but do not measure the way students learn in the course. Authentic assessment, which includes both unstructured (e.g., student work samples, and journals) and structured informal assessments (e.g., checklists, and observations), is considered a more valid approach to assessment. Although unstructured methods are not as easy to evaluate, they provide valuable information concerning the student’s skill level and learning process as well. Writing a research proposal was one of the major assignments in the course. The assessment rubric for this assignment was developed by the instructor based on the NCATE standards (see Appendix C for the entire rubric). At the end of the course, students submitted their self-ratings (quantitative data on achievement) and self-reflection narratives (qualitative data on satisfaction).

Appendix D). The mean differences between preassessment (N = 29) and post-assessment (N = 27, because two students dropped) were statistically significant in the following five areas: • • • • •

Similarly, data in Fall 2008 indicated significant improvements (for the detailed results, see Appendix E). Mean differences between preassessment (N = 29) and post-assessment (N = 29) were statistically significant in the following nine categories: • • • •

•

Student Self-Ratings This assessment, addressing 12 areas derived from the course learning objectives, was conducted both at the beginning of the course (pre-assessment) and at the end (post-assessment). Students anonymously rated the degree to which they agreed with each statement (5 = very much, 4 = much, 3 = some, 2 = little, and 1 = very little). The data from Fall 2007 indicated significant improvements during the semester (for the detailed results, see

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Q3: know primary and secondary resources (Mpre = 2.93; Mpost = 4.13) Q8: know the steps in conducting research (Mpre = 3.00; Mpost = 3.87) Q9: know a variety of research designs and methods (Mpre = 2.87; Mpost = 3.93) Q11: know the human subject application procedure (Mpre = 2.33; Mpost = 3.67) Q12: know the APA style (Mpre = 2.60; Mpost = 4.27)

• •

• •

Q2: have a sense of self-efficacy in writing a proposal (Mpre = 2.66; Mpost = 4.00) Q3: know primary and secondary resources (Mpre = 2.83; Mpost = 4.21) Q4: know qualitative and quantitative studies (Mpre = 2.41; Mpost = 4.03) Q6: know the purpose and process of reviewing literatures (Mpre = 3.31; Mpost = 4.59) Q7: know how to get research materials through the Internet (Mpre = 3.69; Mpost = 4.72) Q9: know a variety of research designs and methods (Mpre = 3.49; Mpost = 4.21) Q10: identify intrinsic/extrinsic rewards conducting research (Mpre = 2.76; Mpost = 4.07) Q11: know the human subject application procedure (Mpre = 2.28; Mpost = 4.21) Q12: know the APA style (Mpre = 3.07; Mpost = 4.28)

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In fact, students felt that they had achieved in most of the areas in Fall 2008. Yet one explanation for the consistencies in improvements (especially on Criteria Q3, Q11, and Q12) observed in Fall 2007 and Fall 2008 might derive from the fact that students participated in three learning events during each semester: (1) the UOG library information literacy tour; (2) the Institutional Research Board (IRB) seminar; and (3) the APA style writing workshop. Apparently the library tour helped students to maximize their skills in using library resources, both print and electronic, including primary and secondary resources. The IRB seminar conducted by the UOG’s IRB committee chair also helped students, since a research plan (including objectives, methodology, and data collection and analysis) involving human subjects has to be reviewed and approved by the IRB examiner prior to data collection. Finally, the APA style workshop conducted by the instructor of this course helped students, as one student precisely indicated: “This course has particularly strengthened my knowledge and skills in the APA style writing to the extent that I am much more confident in referencing various citations for my research paper.” The above results confirm Frank, Lavy, and Elata’s (2003) observation: human beings are active learners who construct their knowledge on experience and on their efforts to give meaning to that experience, and that doing (such as hands-on practice, and interactive workshops) is important to constructing learning. Therefore, the results are reasonable as well as understandable, supporting the well known Chinese proverb: “I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.” This proverb can be exactly applied to learning in the Internet age as follows: What I hear, I forget; What I see, I remember; But what I do, I understand” (Learning Quotes, 2007)

Therefore, even in a graduate course (and even in a blended course), it may be that the instructor’s approach, incorporating active teaching and active learning enhances active listening (students fully attend to a message) which, in turn, enhances students’ professional demeanor. In this course, professional demeanor includes being prepared for class meetings, engaging in discussions and activities, listening attentively to other students (and expecting that others will listen attentively to the instructor and to one another), and demonstrating respect for differing points of view.

Student Self-Reflection Narratives Throughout the course, students submitted all assignments to the Moodle Web site, creating files and participating in weekly online discussions. At the end of the course, students submitted a onepage narrative evaluation of their experiences, including their opinions of the future trends in online learning. Representative student reflections are summarized below.

Learning Experiences in a Blended Course •

•

•

I was reluctant to take this course, but blended learning gave me the opportunity to experience online learning. The assignments were communicated and administered through the Internet using Moodle, which helped creating effective online learning communities. Blended learning worked well for me. I studied at my own pace and submitted online assignments. Feedback from the professor was always prompt for each assignment. The only thing that I had trouble with was Internet connectivity and occasionally the submission files did not go through. Sometimes the e-mail system was still not reliable.

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•

•

If I had questions, I could e-mail the professor. But I need the structure and strict demands that regular courses usually entail. It is difficult to find the motivation for studying. Blended learning provides an opportunity. It gives us a chance to experience a classroom way of learning and online learning. That is, it gives us the best of both worlds.

Future Trends of Online Learning •

•

•

•

•

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I think universities will offer a more diverse and wide-ranging scope of educational opportunities to meet the growing need for higher education. Its flexibility and accessibility help to make learning more effective, meaningful, and practical. The world is driven by convenience because everything that surrounds us is centered on getting what we need in the shortest amount of time (thus we are living in a fast paced society). It seems the next conceivable step is to apply that same mentality in education. Through the experience of this blended course, I can say that blended learning might be the solution for future higher education. I think there are many benefits in blended learning incorporating traditional classroom environments with distance learning strategies. Online learning is a fresh welcome to many graduate students, even undergraduate students. It will continue to grow in the future for one particular reason—its convenience. Future online learning will be cost effective and time efficient, and supplies an opportunity for higher education for many low income people, especially in less developed countries.

Based upon the reflection papers, satisfying aspects of blended learning include: (1) learning that can be done any time of the day; (2) opportunities for students to interact with the professor and classmates in class and through online; (3) a format that makes the learning process more helpful for individual students with different learning styles; (4) submitting and storing assignments electronically, using any computer that can connect to the Internet; and (5) online communication with classmates that enriches the process of learning by collaboration. (Note that one goal of this course is to develop of a climate of cooperation and not competition.) Challenging aspects of blended learning include: (1) accessing the Internet; (2) the fact that students must be motivated and disciplined to complete all the assignments; (3) reduced opportunities for in-person social interaction; (4) the fact that students must be technologically literate enough to use the computer and its applications; and (5) the fact that instructors must have technological skills. It should be emphasized that this course maintained faculty-student interactions through timely feedback, as a student wrote: “I am grateful that my professor demonstrated such efficiency through timely grading and immediate constructive feedback.”

CURRENT CHALLENGES Blended courses may represent the future of online higher education. But the nature of blended learning—an integration of formal (lecture-based classroom) learning and informal (self-based online) learning—presents many difficulties and challenges. The pedagogical challenges are so closely intertwined with the technological challenges that it is almost impossible to discuss one without discussing the other.

Reflections

Pedagogical Challenges The term ‘pedagogy’ refers to strategies or styles of instruction: addressing the processes and skills used in teaching content knowledge. In terms of pedagogy, as Garrison and Kanuka (2004) maintain, blended learning should be consistent with the values of traditional higher education institutions, and has the proven potential to enhance both the effectiveness and efficiency of meaningful learning experiences. With this in mind, it is useful to compare the instructional strategies used in this blended course with the course learning objectives, as summarized in Table 2. In addition to mini-lectures on specific topics, as recommended by Regan (n. d.), the instructor used face-to-face meetings times for activities, such as technology overview (including computer lab work), collaborative small-group work, advanced discussions, project presentations,

guest speakers, question and answer sessions, and demonstrations. Moreover, during class meetings, the instructor worked to maximize her direct interactions with students, and to support on-task interactions between students, with the goal of enhancing a sense of community in the class. To support the reduced number of classroom lectures, PowerPoint slides (summaries of the text chapters), along with chapter exercises developed by the instructor, were posted on the Moodle site. The course tried to make best use of the following Moodle components noted by Baskerville and Robb (2005): •

Submission and retrieval system: there is a common area for students to submit files (‘To Teacher’) in the administration block, and to retrieve files from the teacher (‘From Teacher’).

Table 2. Instructional strategies to help students accomplish learning objectives Learning Objectives

Learning Supports and Resources via Moodle

Understanding of the nature and characteristics of educational research

• PowerPoint slides (text chapter summary) • online activity (text chapter exercise) • suggested readings (PDF and Web site) • library services and resources

Summarizing and critiquing applied research or evaluation studies

• the detailed critique guidelines • samples of research summary and critique • suggested readings (PDF and Web site)

Gaining an in-depth knowledge of research designs and methodologies

• PowerPoint slides (text chapter summary) • online activity (text chapter exercise) • suggested readings (PDF and Web site) • mini-lecture materials on the text topic

Understanding of research problems, research questions, and research hypotheses

• PowerPoint slides (text chapter summary) • online activity (text chapter exercise) • suggested readings (PDF and Web site) • mini-lecture materials on the text topic

Understanding of basic statistical analysis and interpretation with the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) program

• introduction to SPSS (student work at the computer lab with a combination of lecture and hands-on activities using actual data) • mini-lecture materials on the text topic

Understanding of the American Psychological Association (APA) writing style and rules for the preparation of manuscripts

• the APA style writing workshop • PowerPoint slides (examples of in-text and reference citation) • library services and resources (including the APA writing publication manual)

Developing quantitative or qualitative research proposals based upon the APA style

• PowerPoint slides (detailed writing guidelines including the assessment rubric) • research proposal guidelines and examples

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Reflections

•

•

•

•

•

•

•

Attendance: this feature logs the time of initial access to a course area. The instructor can view a student’s record of attendance for the entire semester. Class resources: this feature provides data that students need to complete an assignment. Class activities: activities are to reinforce what students have been learning and to help them with current assignments. Calendar: notes can be posted to the calendar to remind students of assignment due dates. Participants: students and teachers in the course are shown on this page along with how much time has elapsed since they last accessed the site. Forums: this area allows communication among students or between students and teachers. Logs: the feature is flexible enough to report the results of all activities for all students down to checking one particular activity of an individual student.

Implementing blended learning in proactive way creates real changes in the teaching-learning process. A blended course “must constantly determine the balance between face-to-face and technological components in using blended learning as a didactical method. The use of technology, however, does not automatically make any teaching process pedagogically better, the teachers have to take care that the process is pedagogically sound” (Tiirmaa-Oras, Pilt, & Villems, n. d., p. 2). The ultimate challenge is to make sure that the blended format-based learning is pedagogically sound, so that students can “benefit from the advantages of both traditional and modern ways of learning in higher education” (Tiirmaa-Oras et al., n. d., p. 2).

156

Technological Challenges A constructivist perspective views learners as actively engaged in making meaning, and teaching with that approach looks for what students can analyze, investigate, collaborate, share, build, and generate based upon what they already know, rather than what facts, skills, and processes they can parrot (Dougiamas, 1998). In this regard, Moodle is grounded in situated cognitive theory: providing the opportunity for an instructor to create a constructivist and constructionist environment to enhance teaching and learning. Resources for designing student-centered learning are embedded in Moodle and its modules (Antonenko, Toy, & Niederhauser, 2004). ‘Student-centered’ learning associated with self-directed learning is a beautiful concept, but this becomes a challenge or a dilemma for students when the course makes extensive use of technology. Most of the students in the course were full-time schoolteachers or administrators. It is true that graduate students are responsible enough to study on their own; perhaps in part for this reason, blended learning worked well for the students in this course: they felt that Moodle easy to use and appreciated the way that Moodle presented materials week by week, and how they could upload their assignments to the server, which were then date-stamped. Surprisingly, or not surprisingly, however, finishing assignments in a timely manner was a real challenge for these students and at no time during the semester did all the students submit their assignments on time, even though SOE provided them with technical supports and extended its computer libratory hours to help students who had no computer at home or no Internet connectivity. Compromised infrastructure presents particular challenges to a blended course. Students in Guam have to cope with frequent inabilities

Reflections

to access the Internet, the occasional power outage, and network downtime. The power surges, brownouts, and blackouts people experience in this Pacific tropical island promote more than the usual amount of wear and tear than equipment normally receives, even with proper protection. In addition, lack of adequate air conditioning can allow damage due to moisture, heat, mold, and even insects. Maintenance and replacement parts can be difficult to come by and are expensive. Eventually this blended course will implement various strategies to enhance content interaction: including animations, short video segments, and interactive activities embedded in the lecture material. In order to do that, the instructor has to be technologically trained in computer-based multimedia programs for the development of presentation, instructional design, media production, and message design, for instance. This is another challenge.

Design Research for Empirical Evidence One major concern in blended or online learning is the lack of empirical evidence for learning enhancement (Macdonald, 2008). To effectively utilize open-source CMSs (Moodle in this case), design research is very important (Reeves, Herington, & Oliver, 2005). Design really means the shape and direction the instructor wants the course to take, and the instructor has to keep in mind two design principles: to make sure that course objectives are defined in terms of the desired learning outcomes, and that all activities, assignments, and assessments must be aligned with those expected learning outcomes (Ko & Rossen, 2004). According to Reeves et al. (2005), Design research requires that instructors should define pedagogical outcomes and create learning environments that address them; emphasize content and pedagogy rather than technology; give special attention to supporting human interactions

and nurturing learning communities; modify the learning environments until the pedagogical outcomes are reached; and reflect on the process to reveal design principles that can inform other instructors and researchers, and future development projects. (pp. 109-110) It is clear that the above requirements are necessary to enhance teaching effectiveness and learning quality in the use of the CMS for blended learning. The real challenge is to examine the core ‘values’ of blended higher education courses in order to improve the design, the facilitation, and the direction of meaningful learning experiences. To enhance and maintain high quality blended instructional practices, it is essential for instructors to develop and implement assessments that evaluate the effectiveness of the teaching-learning process. Future studies of this blended course should examine actual student performance with concrete learning tasks—not perceptions or preferences— in order to see whether these are consistent with teaching and learning effectiveness in the use of course management tools such as Moodle.

CONCLUSION The notion that a traditional classroom with face-to-face instruction is no longer sufficient for higher education teaching and learning is one that has considerable face validity. Online learning is becoming an important long term strategy for institutions of higher education, and blended learning is considered to be a more significant growth area than fully online learning. Blended learning is “the organic integration of thoughtfully selected and complementary face-to-face and online approaches and technologies” (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008, p. 148). As discussed in the present chapter, now is a time of unparalleled promise for higher education in general. It does appear that blended approaches to online learning can enrich classroom-based

157

Reflections

education, and that there is no longer any reason to use lectures simply to transmit information. Students should engage in the critical and creative process of making sense of the information, and then explore its implications and applications (“The Future,” 2008). In today’s Internet age, “new ways of thinking about course design are required to reconcile traditional values and practices with evolving expectations and technological possibilities” (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008, p. 3). Garrison and Vaughan continue as follows: “The primary measure of the impact of blended learning will be the qualitative shift in the process and outcomes of learning itself. The results will be most readily determined by the satisfaction of our students and the success of our graduates” (p. 148). Thus, although student reflections cannot be the only measure of success, they are among the most useful indices of success.

NOTE The author is grateful to Kyle Smith, professor of psychology, and Mark Goniwiecha, professor of library science (both of the University of Guam) for their thoughtful and critical suggestions on an earlier draft of this chapter.

REFERENCES Antonenko, P., Toy, S., & Niederhauser, D. (2004). Modular object-oriented dynamic learning environment. (ERIC Database #ED485088) Baskerville, B., & Robb, T. (2005). Using Moodle for teaching business English in a CALL environment. PacCALL Journal, 1(1), 138–151. Bates, A. W. (2000). Managing technological change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

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Bedi, K. (2006). Balancing learner expectations and educator perceptions in online MBA course for exemplary learning. Retrieved November 8, 2008, from http://www.u21global.edu.sg/PartnerAdmin/ViewContent?module=DOCUMEN TLIBRARY&oid=157354 Beekman, G. (2005). Computer confluence exploring tomorrow’s technology. Upper-Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Bonk, C. J., & Shi, S. (2005, August). A galaxy of blended learning examples, models, and implications. Paper presented at the preconference workshop of the 21st Annual Conference on Distance Teaching and Leaning, Madison, WI. Center for Teaching and Technology. The. (2006). Technology trends in higher education. Retrieved November 20, 2008, from http://oms.educ.msu. edu/ctt/index.php?title=Technology_Trends_in_ Higher_Education Clark, R. C., & Mayer, R. E. (2008). E-learning and the science of instruction. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons. Corich, S. (2005). Is it time to Moodle? Retrieved January 8, 2009, from http://www.naccq. ac.nz/conference05/proceedings_05/concise/ corich_moodle.pdf Dougiamas, M. (1998). A journey into constructivism. Retrieved January 7, 2009, from http:// dougiamas.com/writing/constructivism.html Frank, M., Lavy, I., & Elata, D. (2003). Implementing the project-based learning approach in an academic engineering course. International Journal of Technology and Design Education, 13, 273–288. doi:10.1023/A:1026192113732 Future, The. (2008). Tommorrow’s professors plog. Retrieved November 15, 2008, from http://amps-tools.mit.edu/tomprofblog/ archives/2008/11/904_the_future.html

Reflections

Garrison, D. R., & Hanuka, H. (2004). Blended learning: Uncovering its transformative potential in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 7(2), 95–105. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2004.02.001 Garrison, D. R., & Vaughan, N. D. (2008). Blended learning in higher education. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Inoue, Y., & Bell, S. (2006). Teaching with technology in higher education: The case of the AsianPacific region. Hershey, PA: IGI Global. Jackson, S., & Lubuag, E. (2008, December). EN-110 offered online. Triton’s Call (UOG student newspaper), p. 2. James, R., & Beckett, D. (n. d.). The changing expectations of university students and the implications for learning. Retrieved November 8, 2008, from http://www. cshe.unimelb.edu.au/people/staff_pages/James/ James&Beckett=Singapore.pdf Kim, K. J., & Bonk, C. J. (2006). The future of online teaching and learning in higher education: The survey says…EDUCAUSE Quarterly Magazine, 29(4). Retrieved January 23, 2009, from http://connect.educause.edu/ Library/EDUCAUSE+Quarterly/TheFutureofOnlineTeaching/40000 Ko, S., & Rossen, S. (2004). Teaching online: A practical guide. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin. Koohang, A., Briz, J., & Seymour, T. (2006). Hybrid/blended learning: Advantages, challenges, design, and future directions. Proceedings of the 2006 Informing Science and IT Education Joint Conference (Salford, UK, June 25-28). Retrieved August 8, 2008, from http://informingscience.org/ proceedings/InSITE2006/ProcKooh121.pdf Learning Quotes. (2007). Big dog’s learning quotes. Retrieved March 5, 2009, from http://www. skagitwatershed.org/~donclark/hrd/learnqt.html

Lorenzo, G. (2004). Revisiting blended learning. Educational Pathways, 3(11). Retrieved November 11, 2008, from http://www.edpath. com/2004/1204/12040.htm Macdonald, J. (2008). Blended learning and online tutoring. Aldershot, UK: Gower Publishing Company. Minielli, M. C., & Ferris, S. P. (2005). Electronic courseware in higher education. First Monday, 10(9). Retrieved January 9, 2009, from http:// firstmonday.org/issues/issue10_9/minielli/index. html MU News Bureau. The. (2008). MU researcher studies effectiveness of traditional and blended learning environments. Retrieved October 13, 2008, from http://munews.missouri.edu/newsreleases/2008/0916-strickland-blended-learning. php Reeves, T. C., Herrington, J., & Oliver, R. (2005). Design research: A socially responsible approach to instructional technology research in higher education. Journal of Computing in Higher Education, 16(2), 97–116. doi:10.1007/BF02961476 Regan, L. (n. d.). Best practices in online teaching: Pulling it all together - teaching blended learning courses. Retrieved January 4, 2009, from http:// cnx.org/content/m15048/latest Rudestam, K. E., & Schoenholtz-Read, J. (Eds.). (2002). Handbook of online learning: Innovations in higher education and corporate training. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Ryan, S., Scott, B., Freeman, H., & Patel, D. (2001). The virtual university: The Internet and resource-based learning. London: Kogan Page. Smith, C. B. (2003). Alternative forms of assessment. (ERIC Database #ED482404)

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Tiirmaa-Oras, S., Pilt, L., & Villems, A. (n.d.). Easy blending: Performance support system for blended learning in higher education. Retrieved November 11, 2008, from http://www. ut.ee/blearn/orb.aw/class=file/action=preview/ id=358631/EPSS+workshop_+Stockholm.pdf

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Vignare, K. (2006). Blended learning: Education innovation and productivity. Retrieved November 9, 2008, from http://connect.educause.edu/ term_view/Hybrid+or+Blended+Learning?time =1218671208

Reflections

APPENDIX A Online Course Readiness Questionnaire Are you ready for an online course? Honestly answer the questions below. If you cannot answer YES to at least 12 of the 15 questions, taking EN110 online is not the right option for you. I often get things done ahead of time.

Yes

No

When an instructor hands out the directions for an assignment, I prefer figuring out the instructions on my own.

Yes

No

I am willing to commit 6-12 hours per week to a traditional full semester length course and 12-18 hours per week to a summer or intersession course.

Yes

No

I am comfortable and competent sending e-mail and using the Internet.

Yes

No

I am self-motivated and self-disciplined.

Yes

No

I enjoy working independently.

Yes

No

I could benefit from direct, personal written instructor feedback.

Yes

No

I have touch typing skills to produce at least 25-30 words per minute.

Yes

No

I know how to create, send, forward, and attach documents to e-mails.

Yes

No

I can use a search engine to find information on the Internet.

Yes

No

I know how to instant message using the Internet.

Yes

No

I currently post to or have read an online weblog or online journal.

Yes

No

I can configure my browser to accept cookies.

Yes

No

I can download software upgrade and install them.

Yes

No

I have reliable access to the Internet and Microsoft Word software.

Yes

No

Source: Jackson & Lubuag, 2008, p. 2. Used with permission from Merissa Brown.

APPENDIX B Student Information Course Title: Introduction to Research Methods 1. Name: 2. Phone: 3. E-mail: 4. Native language: 5. Major: 6. Other courses you are currently taking: 7. Is this a required course for you? [ ] Yes [ ] No 8. Why do you think some teachers are better in teaching? 9. What does education mean to you? 10. Have you conducted research? If so, what methods were used in your research? 11. What are you expectations for this course? 12. What are your future goals (professionally or personally)? Thank you… Enjoy the course!

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Reflections

APPENDIX C Assessment Rubric for the Research Proposal Writing Component

Target

Acceptable

Unacceptable

Introduction A. Problem B. Review of the Literature C. Research Questions D. Significance of the Study

• title is clearly stated • the rationale for the importance of the research focus is clearly stated • research problems and questions are clearly defined • at least 8-10 readings from journals/Web are cited • review is well-organized with subheadings • sources are correctly cited in text based on the APA style • reference list is in correct form and complete • the significance of the study is clear and well written

• title is clearly stated • the rationale is presented but one or more elements may be ambiguous • research problems and questions are of marginal • at least 5-7 readings from journals/Web are cited • review is organized, but has no subtopic structure • all sources are cited, but style problems may exist • reference list is complete but shows problems with format • the significance of the study is reasonably well written

• title is missing or ambiguous • rationale is missing or one or more elements may be missing • research problems and questions are unclear • fewer than 3-4 readings from journals/Web are cited • review is disorganized, shows no logical order • citations are confusing • some or all references are missing: many format errors • the significance of the study is either not present or very poorly described

Points Available 40

40-30

29-11

10-0

Method A. Participants B. Data Collection C. Data Analysis D. Limitation

• participants and sampling are clearly described • data collection methods specifically described and related to research questions • methods are appropriate for research questions • time line is reasonable • analysis procedures described and clearly linked with the research questions • appropriateness of data analyses is discussed • strong connection is made between data collection and data analysis • limitations for undertaking the study are clearly described

• participants and sampling are reasonably described • data collection methods are related to research questions, but description needs more specificity • methods are appropriate for research questions • time line is reasonable • analysis procedures are described, but not fully linked to research questions • connection is made between data collection and data analysis but not fully developed • limitations for undertaking the study are described but lack clarity

• participants are not clearly described • data collection methods are unclear or unconnected to research questions • methods are dubious for research questions • time line is not reasonable • analysis procedures are missing or confusing • little or no connection is made between data collection and data analysis • limitations are not described

Points Available 20

20-16

15-8

7-0

Format and style References

• proposal is clearly written • it is well-organized • no distracting spelling or grammatical errors • all elements of research questions are addressed • paper contains only few errors in using the APA style

• proposal is clearly written • well-organized but contains some clarity problems • few distracting spelling or grammatical errors • most elements of research questions addressed • paper contains several errors in using the APA style

• writing unclear • poor organization • distracting spelling or grammatical errors • some elements of research question are addressed • paper contains many errors in using the APA style

Points Available 40

40-30

29-11

10-0

TOTAL 100

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Reflections

APPENDIX D Pre-Assessment and Post-Assessment Comparison of Student Self-Ratings for Achievement (Fall 2007) Pre-Assessment Assessment categories

M

Post-Assessment SD

M

SD

1

I understand what makes an effective researcher in education

3.3333

1.04654

3.7333

.70373

2

I feel I have established a sense of self-efficacy in writing a research proposal

2.9333

1.03280

3.6667

.89974

3

I know the differences between primary and secondary resources

2.9333**

1.22280

4.1333**

.83381

4

I know the characteristics of both qualitative and quantitative studies

3.4000

1.18322

4.2000

1.01419

5

I know how to identify the research problem and to establish research questions and/or hypotheses

3.1333

.99043

3.8667

.74322

6

I know the purpose and process of reviewing literatures

3.7333

1.16292

4.3333

.81650

7

I know how to get research materials and references through the Internet.

4.0000

.84515

4.3333

.72375

8

I know all the necessary steps in conducting research studies

3.0000*

1.13389

3.8667*

.91548

9

I am prepared to use a variety of research designs and methods

2.8667**

1.18723

3.9333**

.79881

10

I have identified which intrinsic and extrinsic rewards have attracted me to conduct research

3.0667

.96115

3.6667

.89974

11

I know how to get research instrument (involving human subjects) approved

2.3333**

1.29099

3.6667**

.81650

12

I know the APA style writing and how to cite in-text and references

2.6000***

.91026

4.2667***

.59362

APPENDIX E Pre-Assessment and Post-Assessment Comparison of Student Self-Ratings for Achievement (Fall 2008) Pre-Assessment N=29 Assessment categories

M

Post-Assessment N=29 SD

M

SD

1

I understand what makes an effective researcher in education

3.2759

.75103

3.5862

.68229

2

I feel I have established a sense of self-efficacy in writing a research proposal

2.6552***

1.00980

4.0000***

.59761

3

I know the differences between primary and secondary resources

2.8276***

1.22675

4.2069***

.77364

4

I know the characteristics of both qualitative and quantitative studies

2.4138***

1.01831

4.0345***

.65841

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Reflections

5

I know how to identify the research problem and to establish research questions and/or hypotheses

3.0345

1.01710

3.4828

.57450

6

I know the purpose and process of reviewing literatures

3.3103***

1.10529

4.5862***

.68229

7

I know how to get research materials and references through the Internet.

3.6897***

1.00369

4.7241***

.45486

8

I know all the necessary steps in conducting research studies

3.0690

.70361

3.3448

.48373

9

I am prepared to use a variety of research designs and methods

3.4828*

1.27113

4.2069*

.77364

10

I have identified which intrinsic and extrinsic rewards have attracted me to conduct research

2.7586***

1.15434

4.0690***

.75266

11

I know how to get research instrument (involving human subjects) approved

2.2759***

.92182

4.2069***

.81851

12

I know the APA style writing and how to cite in-text and references

3.0690***

1.27982

4.2759***

.64899

164

Section 2

Integrating Online Learning Technologies

A: Programs/Environments

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Chapter 10

A Case of Using Wikis to Foster Collaborative Learning: Pedagogical Potential and Recommendations Hong Lin Oklahoma State University, USA Kathleen D. Kelsey Oklahoma State University, USA

ABSTRACT In recent years, Wikis, an open Web-based editing tool, have increasingly been used for collaborative writing projects in classrooms. Hailed as a collaborative learning and writing tool that is more powerful than blogs and e-mail, the pedagogical impact of using Wikis in the classroom is underrepresented in the literature. This case reviews the design and implementation of a Wikibook project for graduate students at a major land-grant university in the mid-South United States. Our findings challenge idealistic hypotheses that work using Wikis, without careful design and implementation, is naturally beneficial. The case also provides design recommendations for educators who are interested in using Wikis to enhance collaborative writing.

BACKGROUND Wiki, as one of the Web 2.0 tools, provides Webbased features to co-write and edit. As such, Wikis have increasingly been used in classrooms to foster collaborative writing and learning in recent years. Emerging literature also documents studies on pedagogical effectiveness of using Wikis for collaborative learning. This case summarizes the design and development, students’ adjustment, and

perspectives of collaborative learning in a Wiki environment. It also shares recommendations for educators who are interested in adopting Wikis in their classrooms. This case was conducted at a major public landgrant university in the mid-South United States. The university is a research extensive institution that offers degrees through the Doctor of Philosophy. The university is considered a traditional university, offering the majority of coursework face-to-face at five campuses. Distance education technologies and

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch010


A Case of Using Wikis to Foster Collaborative Learning

innovative technological teaching methods are a recent addition to traditional course offerings and constitute less than five percent of courses taught. By November 2008, the university offered over 650 online courses via its course management system Desire2Learn®. In addition to online courses, many distance education courses are enhanced by videoconference. CDs and DVDs are available to distant students as well. The university highly values teaching as a central mission of the land-grant university. University administration encourages faculty to adopt technology integration across the curricula and provides continuing support for pedagogical training and technological assistance as a result of the demand of online and blended instruction in recent years. At the course level, more faculty members are using emerging technologies such as Podcasts, Wikis, Camtasia, Google Apps, and Voicethread in their teaching and learning. Among these tools, Wikis have received increasing attention for collaborative writing, which often poses particular challenges for instructors and students alike in traditional writing classes or courses that aspire to improve collaborative learning. Prior to the initiation of this case study, Wikis were lauded in the literature as an emerging instructional technology tool that could be used to enhance collaborative writing in the classroom. This case study concludes with implications for design and implementation of technological tools to facilitate writing and collaborative learning. Overall, university administration and faculty see the need to reach both traditional and non-traditional students by providing quality educational experiences using a variety of media. To this end, instructional technology is used as a tool for increasing the reach of the university and improving instructional design and delivery. This case is a snapshot of how a faculty member used innovative technology to add value to the curriculum by using Wikis for collaborative learning in a graduate level course.

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SETTING THE STAGE Collaborative Learning Collaborative learning is defined as “an instructional method in which students at various performance levels work together in small groups toward a common goal” (Coutinho & Bottentuit, 2007, p. 1787). Collaborative learning asks students not only to be responsible for their own learning, but also to be responsible for working with other students to co-create knowledge. In collaborative learning, knowledge transfer and creating is not a one-way transmission in which the instructor is the only source of knowledge. Instead, instruction is student-centered and knowledge is viewed as a social construct which is enhanced by both the instructor and peers (Harasim, 2000). As such, the concept of learning shifts from instructor-oriented instruction to student-oriented collaboration. Collaborative learning emphasizes that students and teachers are not simply engaged in developing their own information but actively involved in creating knowledge that will benefit others, hence, constructing knowledge for the community, not just the self, a concept presented by Holmes et al. (2001) and referred to as communal constructivism. There is a growing body of literature that discusses using new technologies, for example, blogs, Wikis, social networks, tagging, mash ups, and cloud computing, to foster collaborative learning. Some researchers note the advantages of using these technologies to create social and educational experiences beyond the classroom. Reigeluth (1994) and Romiszowski and Ravitz (1997) indicated that computer technology had changed the traditional instructional model to an information-age conversational model of learning where the learner is actively engaged in co-creating meaning and knowledge with peers. Jonassen, Peck, and Willson (1999) stated that new technologies make individualized learning more powerful


and more important in that students participate in conversation and collaboration, forming learning communities. Similarly, Fishman and Pea (1994) noted that “the network’s true power comes from the synergy of many dispersed minds working together to solve problems and discuss issues” (p. 26). Pea (2004) argued that computer technologies can scaffold complex learning that enables more advanced performances through interactive features that allow the learner to manipulate and participate in knowledge construction Gone are the days of teacher directed instruction where only the instructor can lay claim to new knowledge and control its dissemination. In this remix world, learners are now empowered to create, edit, collaborate, and construct new knowledge independent of the traditional instructional boundaries of the classroom. This case study elaborates on the theory of communal constructivism as the conceptual framework and explains how students come to a point of productive knowledge construction within a Wiki environment. In line with Holms et al.’s discussion, Wikis can be used to move learners toward a state of conversation and collaboration, where they are able to write, edit, version, and discuss next to the content in Wikis. The theoretical underpinnings and pedagogical promise of using Wikis as collaborative writing tools was the motive for asking students to create an online textbook using a Wiki interface and how the case was developed.

Communal Constructivism Communal constructivism is built upon the notion of social constructivism or social construction, which became prominent in the U.S. with Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann’s book, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge, in 1966. Social constructivism considers how individuals and groups construct and develop their social reality as the theory argues that social phenomena developed within social

contexts. In particular, individuals and groups engage in an ongoing and dynamic process and therefore, reproduce reality as their interpretations and knowledge of reality are redefined constantly (Berger & Luckmann, 1966). Communal constructivism is also situated within the theory base of knowledge building and was well-documented from 1990 to 2000. Scardamalia and Bereiter (2003) noted that knowledge building in collaborative learning is seen as creating or modifying individual and public knowledge, thus inhibiting continual idea improvement. Woodruff and Meyer (1997) indicated that community dynamics help foster and encourage knowledge advancement. Similarly, Bandura (1997) argued that people learn through observing others’ behavior, attitudes, and the outcomes of those behaviors, known as vicarious interaction. Vicarious interaction is a powerful learning tool in social contexts such as university courses, especially when Web 2.0 tools are in use as students can observe a variety of interactions between teacher and student and student-tostudent, in a face-to-face setting, and by reading discussion board, blogs, and Wikis. In particular, Holmes and Gardner (2006) stated that the role of learners and the process of learning in a communal learning environment give people as follows: The opportunity to reinvest in learning environment as a form of communal construction, a process in which learners put their learning back into the community to benefit others, which will promote an evolution of learning and teaching… Everyone is constantly called upon to learn and create new knowledge, learn new ways of doing things and, at a deeper level, new ways of learning itself. (p. 17) While Holmes and his colleagues (2001; 2006) did not specify postulates for their theory, they made several assertions that if teachers create a communal constructivist learning environment,

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then students will demonstrate enhanced learning outcomes. They further suggested that the advent of new educational technologies warrants a new kind of educational theory, communal constructivism, to guide technology enhanced learning environments. In the following section, we take a closer look at Holmes et al. assertions and briefly examine how Wikis have the potential to situate themselves in the following assertions. In this case study, we tested whether these assertions situate in a Wiki environment. 1.

2.

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“If the student learning processes and their work could be captured, then courses might instead build on knowledge rather than simply repeat it” (Holmes, et al., 2001, p. 4). Student work in Wikis can be published in an open Web environment where future students continue to build knowledge. By asking students to write articles in an online textbook, that knowledge is archived and reusable. By asking students to edit each other’s work from semester to semester, students are constructing new knowledge collaboratively regardless of time or place. “To create an environment where students leave their imprint on the course, and the field, as an integral part of their learning not only benefits their own learning, the learning of their colleagues in their classes and those that will come after them but more importantly … provides a teaching apprenticeship for all those who come through the school system” (p. 4). Apprenticeships can be created by assigning groups to co-create articles and chapters in a Wikibook, also leaving an imprint of their work for future generations to use and edit for improvement, contributing to the discipline. Presenting students’ work on the Internet creates an expectation that their work is valued, reusable, and dynamic. Consistent with the apprenticeship model, an article created one year should be improved upon the following year by the next cohort.

3.

4.

5.

6.

Students learn that their work is more than just another assignment, only read once by the teacher for a grade. It is part of a larger creation that exists to teach others. “The communal constructivist approach requires that the course be dynamic and adaptive… the method of delivery must be capable of adapting to new information and new techniques as they emerge from within the course itself and from the discipline at large” (p. 4). The course syllabus and structure in a Wiki environment must be openended and flexible to allow for changing conditions. Students must believe that they have the ability to impact the curriculum through their intellectual contributions. By allowing students to create a rubric for grading the Wiki articles, students are able to determine quality expectations for peer’s work, giving ownership to the process as well as the product. Students must be allowed to “see themselves as producers and not just consumers of information” (p. 5) and to “become publishers… of information through the use of information and communication technology (ICT)” (p. 4). Wikis provide an open environment for co-creating content which is automatically published to the Internet when saved and is accessible (and editable) to future generations of learners, putting student produced work front and center in the curriculum Students must be “involved in the process of constructing knowledge and that construction is a communal affair” (p. 5). Group work in this case study required students to create a project-based Wikibook, a process which necessitated class discussions, peer-tutoring, mentoring, co-authoring and co-learning, all contributing to a communal constructivist course. Students were actively engaged in knowledge construction as authors. “Communal constructivism is about empowering the learner to allow them to reclaim


7.

a role in their own education. The advantage to the learner is in taking part in deep meaningful (activities) and allowing them to have a role in society throughout their formative years and not just after graduation” (p. 6). The Wikibook project in this case study constantly infused students with the responsibility to co-author and co-learn by creating original content for the Wikibook, resulting in civically engaged, lifelong learners. Learners challenged each other to put their articles in Wikipedia and monitor the number of hits received as a measure of quality. “Communal constructivism stresses that learners should be listened to and be important to others…They must be included and their work should be valued by others. Their learning tasks should be useful and recognized as such. They have a right to be needed” (p. 6). Using Wikis to create online books and other learning materials that are accessible by anyone with an Internet connection provides an opportunity for students to be seen and recognized by others. Reflective journals echoed the theme of realizing the importance of this assignment as student work was shared with the world, not just the teacher. Students reporting working more diligently on the Wiki articles knowing that they would become a part of the course knowledge base.

Overall, communal constructivism provides a framework for adopting Wikis in courses. Our educational goal was not only to provide a medium in which to store and make available the knowledge created by the learners, but also to promote one-to-one, one-to-many and manyto-many interactions within a Wiki environment that would tremendously magnify learning opportunities for learners themselves and for others in the community (Holms & Gardner, 2006). As such, the following section takes a closer look at

literature concerning computer-supported learning environments in Wikis, pedagogical claims and applications of Wikis in classrooms.

Wikis for Collaborative Writing Wiki is a collection of interlinked Web pages (or articles) that allows users to create and present content collaboratively in a hypertext system using open source software. EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (2005) notes as follows: Wikis permits asynchronous communication and group collaboration across the Internet. Variously described as a composition system, a discussion medium, a repository, a mail system, and a tool for collaboration, Wikis provide users with both author and editor privileges; the overall organization of contributions can be edited as well as the content itself. Wikis are able to incorporate sounds, movies, and pictures; they may prove to be a simple tool to create multimedia presentations and simple digital stories. (p. 1) In particular, because of its browser-based access in Wikis, passwords, permissions, special client software, and Web masters are unnecessary. For this reason, the learners can quickly create a Web-based page in Wikis, start to write on it and publish it to the Internet. In the Wiki environment, shared responsibility for the quality and accuracy of the content and building a reusable repository of knowledge are the goals of Wikis (Godwin-Jones, 2003). Since Wikis document page history, the learners can work collaboratively without worrying about losing documents and correspondence history. Lamb (2004) summarized the functionalities of Wikis that make collaborative writing and editing possible and easy: •

Anyone can change anything. Authoring software, permissions, or passwords are typically not required.

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•

•

•

Wikis use simplified hypertext markup. New users need to learn a few formatting tags, but only a few. Most Wiki tags significantly streamline and simplify their tasks. WikiPageTitlesAreMashedTogether. Wiki page titles often eschew spaces to allow for quick page creation and automatic, markup-free links between pages within (and sometimes across) Wiki systems. Linking to related pages is easy, which promotes promiscuous interlinking among Wiki pages. Content is ego-less, time-less, and never finished. Anonymity is not required but is common. With open editing, a page can have multiple contributors, and notions of page “authorship” and “ownership” can be radically altered.

In practice, there are emerging studies investigating the use of Wikis for supporting collaborative and inquiry-based learning. Engstrom and Jewett (2005) studied 400 students with 11 teachers who used Wikis for an inquiry-based project in a professional development teacherpreparation program. They found that students posted and edited insufficiently in their small research groups, which primarily reflected surfacelevel learning in the inquiry process and that the teachers did not model or facilitate an exchange of ideas, questions, or provide feedback to students required to build Wiki articles. Wang et al. (2005) investigated students’ editing behavior and their performance in Wiki. They explored the effects of students’ frequency of editing usage in Wikis on their final exam performance and found that students with low usage on the Wiki performed better than those with high Wiki usage on the final exam. Bold (2006) incorporated Wikis in a Masters online course to support collaboration. The study reported that Wiki allowed students to be in charge of joint posting, editing, reporting, and maintained work without burdening a single individual to serve as the project coordinator.

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Chong and Yamamote (2006) investigated a group of 20 people who had not met prior to the study, yet felt comfortable in exchanging ideas in a Wiki writing project. Their study suggested that anonymous writing gave students a private space; therefore, collaboration between strangers could facilitate independent thinking, clear understanding of the team members and contributed to high quality outputs. Similarly, Hewitt and Peters (2006) asked their 15 students to construct Wiki articles on an array of topics in a graduate-level distance education course. They found that the students considered building a knowledge base in a Wiki project was not only an authentic task for themselves but also a value-added activity for future classes. These studies laid the groundwork for this case study. However, literature about how students interact and collaborate in a Wiki is still underrepresented. Instead, speculative discussions focus on the functionality of a Wiki and its pedagogical promises. This case study addressed the gap in the literature regarding whether students can co-write using Wikis and whether the potential of Wikis – effective collaborative learning – can be realized.

CASE DESCRIPTION Context of the Study The case study represents two years of data collection from two student cohorts who were involved in creating an online textbook using a Wiki interface. The course was Adult Education Planning and Evaluation and the Wiki project was All Things Adult Education Wikibook. Cohort one had five graduate students in the course face-to-face and cohort two had 13 graduate students online. Both cohorts were given the same directions and support for developing several Wiki articles in an online Wiki-based textbook called All Things Adult Education (http://adulteducation.Wikibook.us).


The case was situated in a graduate level course about adult education, offered at a major land-grant university in the mid-south. The instructor built the shell for a Wikibook using MediaWiki® software (www.mediaWiki.org) and posted it online, purposefully public and accessible. Students from cohort one (a traditional, oncampus course) were required to write five articles using Wiki as the writing and presentation tool. Students were to work individually to create two original articles, collaboratively to create two original articles, and were asked to edit another student’s article for the fifth assignment. In addition, students were given a detailed rubric for completing the assignments along with face-toface instruction about the project. Students could create an article under the instructor-defined headings or create a new topic. The teams were assigned by the instructor to increase heterogeneity in regard to culture, age, and discipline. The instructor met with students weekly to provide feedback on the article content and to monitor and support the cohesiveness of teams. In addition to creating Wiki chapters, students were required to submit their weekly reflective journals when working on the projects. The journals were graded by the instructor and provided immediate feedback for the improvement of the next Wiki article. After gathering feedback from the students in cohort one, the Wiki assignment was adjusted to better address the goal of collaborative writing for the second cohort. Students from cohort two

(an online course) were required to write three articles using Wikis. Students were to create one original article solo, one with a partner, and to edit another student’s article. The instructor provided a handout containing the directions and coached the students via the discussion board on the assignment. In cohort two the students chose partners, they were not assigned as with cohort one. Table 1 summarized details of two cohorts.

Design and Implementation of Wikibook Since the deliverables in the two cohorts were the same – Wiki articles, we will take cohort one as an example to demonstrate how students developed their Wiki articles. First, the instructor worked with the students to design a content menu as indicated in Figure 1, which serves as the Wiki-based textbook front page. On this page, the instructor provided 20 chapter topics to students. These topics were based on the goals of the course and the textbooks for the course. After the class designed a content menu indicated in Figure 1, students were asked to choose four topics in the menu and develop four Wiki chapters (two collaboratively and two individually) for the Wiki textbook consequently. Figure 2 is an example of an article co-created by two students. After two collaborative Wiki chapters and two individual Wiki chapters, students were asked

Table 1. Summarized the efforts of two cohorts Participants

Wiki Articles Required

Wiki Practice Page

Weekly Reflective Journals

Students’ Prior Wiki Experience

Students’ Prior Internet Experience

Cohort 1 (N=5, face-to-face)

5 (2 collaborative; 2 individual; 1 edited)

No

Yes

No

Yes

Cohort 2 (N= 13, online)

3 (1 collaborative; 1 individual; 1 edited)

Yes

Yes

No

Yes

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Figure 1. Image of the All Things Adult Education wikibook interface

to edit another student’s article. Wikis, as an open editing tool, not only keep an updated end product online, but also document the history of editing so that the student author of the article can reverse back to the original text. Figure 3 shows the editing history from a student on another student’s article. As seen from the figures, Wikis, when compared with first generation Web tools such as e-mail and discussion boards, are considered superior to second generation Web-based social tools because of the increased capacity for collaborative work. Collaboration, however, did not automatically occur in this project for either cohort. After analyzing the data from four sources: the content of the Wiki articles, student interviews, students’ reflective journals, and meeting notes taken by the researchers in the classroom, it is clear that students moved through three phases when learning to write collaboratively. The phases are described as series predicaments that eventually

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lead to comfort with true collaborative writing. This transition was not without challenges.

Student Use of Wikis Phase One: In the first phase of the project where students were asked to co-write an article in Wiki, the majority of the students decided to divide the assignment into smaller parts, complete their part, then cut and paste the article together after it was written individually. The Wiki was used as a presentation tool rather than as a writing tool and the results were awkward at best. Participant 1 said (Excerpt 1), “At first, I didn’t really want to use the Wiki. It really intimidated me, and so I did everything outside of it and just cut and paste [my finished article into Wiki].” Participant 6 noted that (Excerpt 2), “You can feel the rough transition between each part because it was created as separate pieces and merged at the end. There’s not a good flow in the chapter.”


Figure 2. Example of a team article in All Things Adult Education wikibook

Figure 3. Example of editing history for peer work in a wiki chapter

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In this phase, the participants did not use the discussion feature in the Wiki (see Figure 3, notice tab labeled discussion, which is a white space for writers to discuss their ideas before they are included in the article). Students indicated that they used e-mail and phone calls to communicate, and they had difficulty communicating with each other in a timely manner. In addition, the participants felt territorial about their work and were not comfortable rewriting others’ work when presenting their content in the Wiki. In other words, Wiki was not used as a collaborative writing tool, rather a presentation tool. These findings do not support the literature that Wiki naturally encourages team writing and editing. Phase Two: When working on the second article, participants continued to test and adjust their relationship with their peers. In this manner, they became more familiar with using Wiki as a software tool and the collaborative writing process. As a result, they reported an improved experience with communication, writing, and collaboration. Participant 1 said (Excerpt 3), “Not understanding the Wiki, we wanted to get everything situated before we posted it. I guess it’s just the mentality that when you post it on there and that’s the final product, you get it done. As we’ve learned more about Wikis, we’re able to do everything in Wikis.” Participant 6 indicated that (Excerpt 4), “I do feel that working with a partner in Wiki allows for group collaboration on a more efficient level, and that I am able to brainstorm ideas more efficiently this way.” These comments indicate that when communication channels were open, writing was less stressful as collaboration was improved by knowing how to use Wiki more effectively and understanding the shared value of co-editing, improving each other’s writing for the sake of the article. Phase Three: After completing two articles, students were asked to edit another student’s article. In this phase, given the promise of Wikis for open editing and collaborative learning, the participants were asked whether they took full

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advantage of the Wiki to learn personally and collaboratively. Participant 3 said (Excerpt 5), “I think that it’s really better than in class because it actually forces you to choose a research topic. I think I learned a lot better because you are actually forced to go out there and search for materials and then by letting your classmates know via Wikis.” Participant 6 compared the unique collaborating experience in Wiki with other tools such as encyclopedias. She said (Excerpt 6), “The idea of cooperation in Wiki allows everybody else to read it online, and they are welcome to edit it. No other encyclopedias have this feature.” Two other participants pointed out that group collaboration helped generate ideas and enhance creativity. In addition, it was mentioned that different viewpoints and backgrounds were beneficial for learning. Participant 1 said (Excerpt 7), “In the group you’re going to have more ideas because you have more people, different viewpoints, and different backgrounds. I think I tend to be less creative working on a project individually. I don’t spend as much time generating ideas. I just go with what I know.” Participant 5 said (Excerpt 8), “I thought it was great to see people from different backgrounds. It added new ideas.” Unlike the first and second phases, the participants used the discussion board feature in the Wiki to communicate in the third phase, as indicated in Figure 4. The findings suggest that using Wiki for collaborative learning became more productive and constructive for the participants over time as they learned how to use Wiki and the elements of a high quality article. The findings support discussions in the literature that networked learning fosters conversation and collaborative learning (Fishman & Pea, 1994; Reigeluth, 1994; Romiszowski & Ravitz, 1997). In this case, we certainly found that students moved toward a state of conversation and collaboration gradually as students practiced and gained confidence using Wiki as an open editing tool as well as a space for collaborative writing. If the


Figure 4. Example of discussions among students working in wikis

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initial phases of using Wiki as a collaborative tool were underrepresented in the literature, the last phase began to unearth the promise of writing in an open environment constructively. The promise demonstrated in this case is in line with Holmes et al. (2001) communal learning environment, where students were not simply engaged in developing their own information but actively involved in creating knowledge that will benefit others.

Students’ Perspectives of Collaborative Writing in Wikis As indicated in the previous section, students adjusted communications, writing, and collaboration in the Wikibook project. Regardless of the adjustment, of 18 students in two cohorts, the majority of them had positive experience with collaboration in the Wikibook project. The following quotes, which were from students’ interviews and reflective journals, provided evidence that students had not only positive feedback but also challenges in collaborative learning in Wikis. Students’ perspectives were framed under the assertions of communal constructivism (Holmes et al., 2001). 1.

If the student learning processes and their work could be captured, then courses might instead build on knowledge rather than simply repeat it.

2.

Positive Feedback: “There is a wealth of knowledge available in our Wiki chapters and that will only continue to grow for future students when they take this course” (Excerpt 9). ◦ Challenge: “I had a problem with submitting anything to Wiki that I do not see as perfect, and when I work on an assignment over several sessions, I do not want the world to see anything till I am finished with it” (Excerpt 10). To create an environment where students leave their imprint on the course, and the field, as an integral part of their learning not only benefits their own learning, the learning of their colleagues in their classes and those that will come after them but more importantly … provides a teaching apprenticeship for all those who come through the school system. ◦ Positive Feedback: “I found it very motivating mainly because other people were going to have the opportunity to see and edit my work. With traditional assignments you feel like you are just doing the work for the teacher; however, Wiki projects let me do the work for my peers, which in my case was very motivating” (Excerpt 11).

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4.

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Challenge: “I felt like I was one of those adult learners who were being subjected to a process that wasn’t applicable to what I am doing right now in my career, so it made the project more frustrating” (Excerpt 12). The communal constructivist approach requires that the course be dynamic and adaptive, the method of delivery must be capable of adapting to new information and new techniques as they emerge from within the course itself and from the discipline at large. ◦ Positive Feedback: “I like that this is a work in progress and that it can be added to as more information is reported. New research is being completed all the time. The flexibility with the Wikibook is really amazing” (Excerpt 13). ◦ Challenge: “Although I really enjoyed working with a partner in Wikis, my schedule is very random at some times, and it is easier for me to work on my projects at my own pace because there are some days when I can sit down and have my project done, while my partner may or may not be on the same page as me” (Excerpt 14). Students must be allowed to see themselves as producers and not just consumers of information and become publishers… of information through the use of ICT. ◦ Positive Feedback: “I like working on Wikis. It is a break from the traditional term paper or project that most classes push. You can go in, change and edit as you want” (Excerpt 15). ◦ Challenge: “I still find it amazing that anyone can assess the information in our Wiki project. Maybe that is why I never feel the project is complete. And I am concerned someone will

5.

6.

7.

read it and think that it does not make sense” (Excerpt 16). Students must be involved in the process of constructing knowledge and that construction is a communal affair. ◦ Positive Feedback: “Doing a Wiki project is probably one of the best ways to help students to learn together and add up that knowledge to future students” (Excerpt 17). ◦ Challenge: “Collaboration was not easy. I think if I hadn’t had a reliable partner what was interested in the same subject or maybe assigned to do the work together, I’d like to work alone” (Excerpt 18). Communal constructivism is about empowering the learner to allow them to reclaim a role in their own education. The advantage to the learner is in taking part in deep meaningful (activities) and allowing them to have a role in society throughout their formative years and not just after graduation. ◦ Positive Feedback: “I hope that my Wiki chapters will help others. I think this is a great project and one that I would like to add to my online classes that I teach” (Except 19). ◦ Challenge: “I have some reservations about Wikipedia and the use of it for education. Although most is documented information, there is still the chance that the information is just bogus” (Except 20). Communal constructivism stresses that learners should be listened to and be important to others…They must be included and their work should be valued by others. Their learning tasks should be useful and recognized as such. They have a right to be needed. ◦ Positive Feedback: “I think using the Wiki chapters are above and beyond any conventional teaching methods


◦

I have experienced. I enjoyed being able to relay my own thoughts and knowledge on a subject while combining peer-reviewed information into the document. I believe my peers thought the same about their projects” (Excerpt 21). Challenge: “What complicated the process for me was the fact that is was going to be considered a ‘working textbook.’ I put my name there and my fear is that it is open to the public, and they will be able to view it with my name on it. It is intimidating to offer my work up for criticism (even constructive criticism)” (Excerpt 22).

CURRENT CHALLENGES Wikis are a new computer-mediated communication tool that holds much promise for collaborative writing projects in the educational setting. Even though students may have been exposed to other tools such as email, blog, course management system, and e-portfolio, we found that students experienced a steep learning curve and did not work effectively on the first Wiki article assignment. The learning curve included technical operation of the software as well as knowing how to truly write collaboratively (Brandon & Hollingshead, 1999). The students were anxious and uncertain about editing others’ writing initially, and required a paradigm shift in regard to working alone to working collaboratively to overcome their reservations about changing another author’s work. The instructor coached the students in Wiki ways of working, including open editing behaviors and striving for a high quality product regardless of individual authorship. Through coaching and rewarding open editing behaviors the students learned to trust that editing other’s work was desirable for producing a high quality article.

Consistent with the literature on using Wikis (McKay & Headley, 2007; Qian, 2007), we suggest that instructors design a practice article at the beginning of the course to teach students how to use the software and to encourage re-writing others’ text in an ungraded assignment. Many Wikis contain a sandbox, but further coaching may be necessary to resolve the student apprehension regarding editing other’s work as they have been long taught to not interfere with other’s words. A practice article will allow students to become familiar with Wiki functionality and will model the practice of interacting with peers within the Wiki. Instructors are also encouraged to model collaborate writing to prompt students’ critical thinking and decision-making skills (Engstrom & Jewett, 2005). During the writing process the instructor posted comments to the students in the Wiki discussion page to demonstrate a pluralistic presence in Wiki. The instructor occasionally edited the student’s work while in progress to role model the desired behavior and commented on the work in progress to encourage collaborative and interdependent writing versus the cut and paste practice of many team projects. Repeated Wiki article assignments were also necessary to obtain the benefits of collaborative writing in Wiki. Cohort one was required to write five articles, four original (two solo, two in teams), and one edited. The benefits of using Wiki as a collaborative writing tool were not realized until the third article assignment when the quality of the articles improved and students felt more secure about co-writing versus the traditional cut and paste style of working. Cohort two was asked to create three articles, and the benefits of Wiki work were noted in as few as three articles. It is recommended that instructors use several Wiki assignments to reinforce the skills of collaborative writing infused with feedback on quality expectations of the articles. While this case represents the first attempt with creating an online textbook using Wiki as

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the interface, future cohorts will be required to go back and edit previously created articles to teach the skill of re-writing and co-writing, and quality control. The instructor has also adopted Turnitin. com® and requires students to submit the final version of their Wiki article to check for correct use and citation of other’s work. Students are required to edit another complete article and check for plagiarism and correct any found errors as part of teaching students about collaborative work and responsibility for a group project that is neither time nor place bound. Students are taught that All Things Adult Education Wikibook is a community construction that was created before they joined the class, will include their creations, and will continue to grow with future cohort creations and will serve as a resource for the public. The instructor practiced a pluralistic approach to creating the Wiki and framed it as a studentcreated project for other learners. Data are being collected from cohort three to strengthen the findings from the first two cohorts. Our initial findings for cohort three indicate a continued theme of pleasure in creating work that is shared publicly and reusable. The students reported being proud of their Wiki articles. Cohort three has adopted new criteria for measuring the quality of their articles. To enhance the notion of co-creating the learning environment, students in cohort three created a rubric for grading the Wiki articles. The rubric was used by the instructor to grade completed articles, and was found to be more rigorous than the instructorcreated rubric. In this case, peers held each other to greater account when evaluating their work than the instructor. In cohort three, one student suggested that after posting their article in All Things Adult Education Wikibook, they are to post the same article in Wikipedia.com and monitor the article to see how it fairs in that environment. The students report weekly on the status of their Wikipedia.com articles, if it was deleted or edited. This approach allowed students to experience an authentic as-

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sessment of their writing skills. Throughout the semester students would comment on the number of hits their articles received as a source of pride. Several months after the course was over, a student told the instructor his article had received over 1,000 hits on Wikipedia.com and he continued to edit his article.

CONCLUSION The case study investigated students’ experience of collaborative learning, working, and writing in a Wiki environment. Using communal constructivism as a framework, this case identified students’ adjustment and adoption of Wikis for collaborative learning. The data, which were collected from two cohorts of 18 students in a graduate course, indicated that Wiki work, without careful design and implementation, is not naturally beneficial for collaborative learning. In particular, before students adjust to a computer-mediated environment like Wikis, collaborative learning does not happen naturally even though Wikis provide tools for it. The case also presents some recommendations for teacher educators who would like to explore or adopt Wikis. As more educators explore and adopt the use of Wikis, we hope that this case lays the groundwork for further study on team editing behavior to advance the artifact evaluation of human interactions within a Wiki environment, other than its technical interaction. As Fishman and Pea (1994) noted: “Whatever the medium, learning must remain fundamentally personal, genuinely interactive, and indelibly humane” (p. 21). We believe that the Wiki work presented in this case study has met Fishman and Pea’s statement for enhancing learner’s networked learning and has encouraged learners to become self-directed lifelong learners through collaborative writing and public presentation of their work. Future empirical studies are needed to investigate whether the effectiveness of collaborative


learning in Wikis is dependent on course level (introductory or advanced), nature of the learning content (experimental or conceptual), nature of disciplines (social science or life science), or the role of instructor (instructor-led or instructorfacilitated).

REFERENCES Bandura, A. (1997). Social learning theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Berger, P. L., & Luckmann, T. (1966). The social construction of reality: A treatise in the sociology of knowledge. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books. Bold, M. (2006). Use of Wikis in graduate course work. Journal of Interactive Learning Research, 17(1), 5–14. Brandon, D., & Hollingshead, A. B. (1999). Collaborative learning and computer-supported groups. Communication Education, 48(2), 109– 126. doi:10.1080/03634529909379159 Chong, N., & Yamamoto, M. (2006). Using many Wikis for collaborative writing. In Proceedings of World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications 2006 (pp. 2188-2191). Chesapeake, VA: AACE. Coutinho, C. M. P., & Bottentuit, J. B., Jr. (2007). Collaborative learning using Wiki: A pilot study with master students in educational technology in Portugal. In Proceedings of World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia e Telecommunications (ED-MEDIA), pp. 1786-1791. EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative. (2005, July). 7 things you should know about Wikis. Retrieved January 8, 2009, from: http://net.educause.edu/ ir/library/pdf/ELI7004.pdf Engstrom, M. E., & Jewett, D. (2005). Collaborative learning the Wiki way. TechTrends, 49(6), 12–68. doi:10.1007/BF02763725

Fishman, B., & Pea, R. D. (1994). The internetworked school: A policy for the future. Technos: Quarterly of Education and Technology, 3(1), 22-26. Retrieved November 15, 2008, from http://telearn.noe-kaleidoscope.org/warehouse/ A77_Fishman_Pea_94.pdf Godwin-Jones, B. (2003). Blogs and Wikis: Environments for on-line collaboration [electronic version]. Language, Learning and Technology, 7, 12-16. Retrieved June 27, 2006, from http://llt. msu.edu/vol9num1/emerging/default.html Harasim, L. (2000). Shift happens: Online education as a new paradigm in learning. The Internet and Higher Education, 3, 41–61. doi:10.1016/ S1096-7516(00)00032-4 Hewitt, J., & Peters, V. (2006). Using Wikis to support knowledge building in a graduate education course. In Proceedings of World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications 2006 (pp. 2200-2204). Chesapeake, VA: AACE. Holmes, B., & Gardner, J. (2006). E-learning: Concepts and practice. London: Sage. Holmes, B., Tangney, B., FitzGibbonn, A., Savage, T., & Mehan, S. (2001, March). Communal constructivism: Students constructing learning for as well as with others. Paper presented at the 12th International Conference of the Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education (pp. 3114-3119). Charlottesville, VA. Jonassen, D. H., Peck, K. L., & Willson, B. G. (1999). Learning with technology: A constructivist perspective. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Merrill/Prentice. Lamb, B. (2004). Wide open spaces: Wikis, ready or not. EDUCAUSE Review, 39(5), 36-48. Retrieved January 4, 2009, from http://connect. educause.edu/Library/EDUCAUSE+Review/ WideOpenSpacesWikisReadyo/40498

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McKay, S., & Headley, S. (2007). Best practices for the use of Wikis in teacher education programs. In C. Crawford et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education International Conference 2007 (pp. 2409-2412). Chesapeake, VA: AACE. Pea, R. D. (2004). The social and technological dimensions of scaffolding and related theoretical concepts for learning, education, and human activity. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 13(3), 423–451. doi:10.1207/s15327809jls1303_6 Qian, Y. (2007). Meaningful learning with Wikis: Making a connection. In C. Crawford et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education International Conference 2007 (pp. 2093-2097). Chesapeake, VA: AACE. Reigeluth, C. (1994). Learning communities through computer networking. In J. Greeno & S. Goldman (Eds.). Thinking practices: Math and science learning. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

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Romiszowski, A., & Ravitz, J. (1997). Computer mediated communications. In A. Romiszowski & C. Dills (Eds.), Instructional Development: State of the Art (pp. 347-379). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Educational Technology Publications. Scardamalia, M., & Bereiter, C. (2003). Knowledge Building. In J. W. Guthrie (Ed.), Encyclopedia of education (pp. 1370-1373). New York: Macmillan Reference. Wang, Y., et al. (2005). Advanced Technologies (ICALT 2005), 155-157. Woodruff, E., & Meyer, K. (1997). Explanations from intra and inter group discourse: Children building knowledge in the science classroom. Research in Science Education, 27(1), 25–39. doi:10.1007/BF02463030

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Chapter 11

Virtual Organizing Professional Learning Communities through a Servant-Leader Model of Appreciative Coaching Kam Hou Vat University of Macau, Macau

ABSTRACT This case investigates a set of empowerment concerns in the context of transforming classes of student and teacher learners (considered as department-wide learning units in higher education) into professional learning communities (PLCs). In particular, we are interested in enhancing student learning through designing a collaborative learning environment in support of problem-based learning, based on the concept of virtual organizing the various PLCs distributed throughout a higher educational institute. Of specific interest in our exploration is the generative potential of a servant-leader model of student-centered education in support of the PLCs nurtured by the development practice of appreciative coaching adapted from the established positive change paradigm of appreciative inquiry.

ORGANIZATION BACKGROUND The department of computer and information science (CIS), as a constituent unit of education under the Faculty of Science and Technology at the author’s affiliated university, is installed to offer degree programs in both the undergraduate and graduate levels in software engineering. The department has a current population of about 150 undergraduates and 30 graduate students (mostly part-time). It has to coordinate per academic year, the enactment of DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch011

about 20 graduate and 40 undergraduate courses. There are currently five laboratories installed for the information technology (IT) education of our students: software engineering laboratory, e-commerce technology laboratory, distributed systems laboratory, computer graphics and multimedia laboratory, and the motion capture laboratory. Besides, there are over two hundred PC’s distributed on campus, to offer 24-hour computer service to our students, including Internet access. To help manage course delivery, the university also provides course management systems, such as WebCT (since 1998) and MOODLE (since 2008) to teaching staff for their


Virtual Organizing Professional Learning Communities

course enactment. Currently, the means of education delivery in our department has largely been didactic; yet, we are quite willing to blend the best of our old values of good teaching through the instructivist approach with the modern-day constructivist way of thinking such as problembased learning (PBL) (Amador, Miles, & Peters, 2006).We are also interested in the continuing efforts to extend our curriculum and instructional practice over the Internet, through some continually renewed electronic (mostly Web-based) course support, both for the teaching staff and for the students.

SETTING THE STAGE The following case description recounts the action research experience of some bottom-up course-support initiative sustained by individual staff members from the Department of CIS over the years in reshaping our undergraduate learning landscape through the integration of some ICT-enabled (information and communication technologies) environments to enhance student learning. In particular, this report is based on the experience acquired through the experimentation of a Web-enabled course support environment called REAL (Rich Environment for Active Learning) initiated in 1999, and reactivated in 2008 with a renewed title as REALSpace (Vat, 2009b) to nurture an emergent interest of professional learning community (PLC) (Dufour & Eaker, 1998) to be properly described as follows. It is our lessons learned that if student learning is to improve, staff should be well informed of the PLC potential and develop the capacity to function as PLC. If students are to benefit from the PLC, they must develop a collaborative culture. If students are to develop a collaborative culture, we must overcome the tradition of teacher-centered education (teacher as sage on the stage). If schools are to overcome their tradition of teacher-centered education, teachers must learn to work in collab-

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orative teams (as coaches by the side). If schools are to support effective teamwork to enhance student learning, there must be some technologyenhanced environment to enable learning among teachers and students. And the concept of virtual organizing fits right in to provide the mechanism of a learner-centered appreciative knowledge environment (AKE) to stimulate and facilitate a learning-centered culture of knowledge sharing to enhance student achievements. The impact of a servant-leader model of education (Greenleaf, 1977) should serve as a transformative path to enable the learning cycle of appreciative coaching (AC) (Orem, Binkert, & Clancy, 2007) on the part of teachers to enable students to tap into or rediscover their own sense of wonder about their present and future possibilities.

The Context of PLC The premise in our discussion of PLC (Dufour, Dufour, & Eaker, 2008) lies in the assumptions of the meaning behind the three words: professional, learning, and community. It is believed that a professional is someone with expertise in a specialized field, an individual who has not only pursued advanced training to enter the field, but who is also expected to remain current in its evolving knowledge base. The term learning suggests ongoing action and perpetual curiosity. It is expected that if students are to learn, those who educate them must engage in the ongoing study and constant practice of their field. The term community suggests a group linked by common interests that provide members with a sense of identity, belonging, and involvement that result in a Web of meaningful relationships with moral overtones (Sergiovanni, 2005, p55). Communities (or communities of practice) form around common characteristics, experiences, practices, or beliefs that are important enough to bind members to one another in a kind of fellowship (Wenger, 1998). Successful communities should provide members with broadly shared opportunities to


participate, promote collective responsibility, and foster a strong sense of belonging (Clinton, 2007). In a PLC, all of the above characteristics are evident. Educators create an environment that fosters shared understanding, a sense of identity, high levels of involvement, mutual cooperation, collective responsibility, emotional support, and a strong sense of belonging as they work together to achieve what they cannot accomplish alone. The essence of the PLC is a focus on and a commitment to the learning of each student (Dufour & Eaker, 1998). To achieve this shared purpose, members of a PLC are expected to create and are guided by a clear and compelling vision of what their school (or teaching) must become to help all students learn. This often requires of the PLC members to make collective commitments that clarify what each member will do to contribute to creating a PLC, and to use results-oriented goals to mark their progress. Still, one of the major challenges in the implementation of the PLC concept is convincing educators to move beyond the question, “Was it taught?” to the far more relevant question, “Was it learned?” This case description advocates for a new culture of learning that addresses how educators will work to improve their teaching, and subsequently student learning.

The Servant-Leader Model of Education The term servant-leadership was first coined in a 1970 essay by Robert K. Greenleaf entitled The Servant as Leader (Greenleaf, 1977; http://www. greenleaf. org). As a lifelong student of how things get done in organizations, Greenleaf distilled his observations in a series of essays and books on the theme of servant leadership – the objective of which was to stimulate thought and action for building a better, more caring society. The idea of the servant as leader came partly out of Greenleaf’s half century of experience in working to shape large institutions. The central meaning of servant leadership was interpreted by Greenleaf

as follows: The great leader is first experienced as a servant to others, and that this simple fact is central to his or her greatness. True leadership emerges from those whose primary motivation is a deep desire to help others. In all of his works, Greenleaf discusses the need for a better kind of leadership model, a model that puts serving others – including students, employees, customers, and community – as the number one priority. Servant leadership emphasizes increased service to others, a holistic approach to work, promoting a sense of community, and the sharing of power in decision making. In The Servant as Leader, Greenleaf wrote (Beazley, Beggs, & Spears, 2003): It begins with the natural feelings that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant – first to make sure that other people’s highest priority needs are being served. The best test is: do those served grow as persons; do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? (p. 16) Thereby, at its core, servant leadership is a long-term, transformational approach to life and work – in essence, a way of being – that has the potential for creating positive change throughout our society. In the setting of education, the context of servant leadership brings forth the concept of teacher as servant, carrying the connotation that student-centered education serves to shift from a focus on teaching to a focus on student learning.

The Potential of Appreciative Coaching The practice of AC attributed to (Orem, Binkert, & Clancy, 2007) is developed from the established change management paradigm of appreciative inquiry (AI) whose philosophy is based on the

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assumption that inquiry into and dialogue about strengths, successes, hopes and dreams is itself a transformational process (Cooperrider & Whitney, 2005). AC describes an approach to coaching that shows individuals how to tap into or rediscover their own sense of wonder and excitement about their present life and future possibilities. Rather than focusing on individuals in limited or problemoriented ways, AC is meant to guide individuals through different stages of appreciative development: discovery, dream, design and destiny – that inspire them to an empowering view of themselves and their future. The core process of AC begins with the selection of a topic. In the context of our discussion, the topic chosen for student-centered education has been “enhancing student learning through implementing a PLC of problem-based learning.” At the outset of the coaching relationship such as in the discovery stage, core questions serve to explore the client’s strengths, past successes, work and personal values, and the one or two things he or she longs to have more of or to have being different in life. From the answers to these questions come the tools for learning and change. In practice, trust should begin to build in the coaching relationship when clients can experience some positive feelings about themselves and their situation. In the dream stage, client and coach come together to make sense of the answers to the core questions so that they may apply these answers to the topic. In this stage, we are using the client’s proudest accomplishments, core skills and strengths, and deepest values to create something with which we can explore and experiment. Once the client could bring his or her dream into clear view, it is time to design a plan for the dream. The design stage relates to the ongoing dance between coach and client of defining, performing, and assessing experiments. Design implies a plan or an impression or a mock-up of some future reality. There is no assumption that an initial design is the final design. Experimentation is the order of the day. The ultimate design should incorporate as many of the skills and strengths of the client

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as is possible or appropriate. Typically, clients step into the destiny stage once they have begun to implement the concrete actions and practices they identified and designed in the design stage for realizing their desired future. The destiny stage is a time for clients to acknowledge and celebrate the accomplishments they are making in either moving toward or actually realizing their dream. At the conclusion of this stage, clients may choose to move to a second cycle of AC by expanding on other elements of their dream or creating a new dream. This is an excellent opportunity for coaches to help client reflect on the work they have done and appreciate the result they have achieved. This AC process of emphasizing the positive seems in most cases to generate positive feelings, increased energy, and a deeper connection to oneself. It is nonetheless true that exploring one’s innermost desires should turn out to be a pleasurable experience.

The Flexibility of Virtual Organizing The idea of virtual organizing, attributed to Venkatraman and Henderson (1998), can be considered as a method of operationalizing a PLC, dynamically assembling and disassembling nodes on a network of people or groups of people, to meet the demands of a particular learning context. This term emerged in response to the concept of virtual organization, which appeared in the literature around the late twentieth century (Byrne, Brandt, & Port 1993; Davidow & Malone 1992; Hedberg, Dahlgren, Hansson, & Olve 1997). There are two main assertions associated with virtual organizing. First, virtual organization should not be considered as a distinct structure such as a network organization in an extreme and far-reaching form (Jagers, Jansen, & Steenbakkers 1998), but virtuality is a strategic characteristic applicable to every organization. Second, IT is a powerful enabler of the critical requirements for effective virtual organizing. In practice, virtual organizing helps emphasize the ongoing process nature


of the organization, and it presents a framework of achieving virtuality in terms of three distinct yet interdependent vectors: virtual encounter for organization-wide interactions, virtual sourcing for asset configuration, and virtual expertise for knowledge leverage. The challenge of virtual organizing is to integrate the three hitherto separate vectors into an interoperable IT platform that supports and shapes the new organizational initiative, paying attention to the internal consistency across the three vectors.

CASE DESCRIPTION The teaching of SFTW 300 Software Psychology, a junior core course more properly renamed as human-computer interactions (HCI) (Vat, 2001) in the undergraduate curriculum of Software Engineering offered by the Department of Computer and Information Science, has always been a challenge as it is composed of such a mix of elements as human factors, user expectations, man-machine interfaces construction, cognitive psychology, computer science, and those latest developments on contextual design in interactive systems (IS). In the case of the author’s teaching experience, since 1998, the pedagogy adopted to deliver such a course has been shifted from a conventional instructivist approach to the constructivist method of problem-based learning (PBL) (Greening, 2000). Besides, with the increasingly accumulated course materials to cover in a single semester, the idea of scenario-based design (Carroll, 2000) has also been incorporated starting from 2000 with an attempt to help undergraduate Software Engineering students deepen the idea that HCI is concerned with understanding, designing, evaluating and implementing interactive computer systems to match the needs of people. It is our experience that the constructivist’s ideas of PBL (Barrows, 1986) revolving around a focal problem, group work, feedback, skill development and iterative reporting, with the instructor playing the coach

by the side, guiding, probing, and supporting student-groups’ initiatives along the way, could help students develop a unified team-based approach to better manage the underlying software requirements. Methodically, we still need some working scenarios to try out the iterative learning process involving researchers (instructor) and practitioners (students) acting together on a particular cycle of activities, including problem diagnosis, action intervention, and reflective learning. In particular, our action research approach should involve evaluating how well the students playing the role of practitioners, could function as self-directed work teams (SDWTs) of software professionals, following the constructivist’s tenets of PBL, in performing group-based software development for specific user scenarios. Against this backdrop, the use of AC has demonstrated quite a promise in enhancing the student-practitioners’ learning to deal with the design difficulties typified in the complex domain of ill-defined problem situations.

Recognizing the PBL Potential of Student Collaboration PBL, (Greening, 2000; Ryan, 1993; Barrows, 1986), as a pedagogy, is designed to actively engage our students, divided in groups, in opportunities for knowledge seeking, for problem solving, and for the collaborating necessary for effective practice. At the heart of PBL are some complex real-world problems used to motivate students to identify and research the issues and principles they need to know to work through those problems (Boud & Feletti, 1997). The design of a PBL-based curriculum addresses directly many of the recommended and desirable outcomes of an undergraduate education; specifically, the ability to do the following (Boyer, 1998): •

think critically and be able to analyze and solve complex, real-world problems;

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• • •

•

find, evaluate, and use appropriate learning resources; work cooperatively in teams and small groups; demonstrate versatile and effective communication skills, both verbal and written; and use content knowledge and intellectual skills acquired at the university to become continual learners.

Since PBL is often designed to enable groupbased project work among small teams of students around a set of teamwork activities, including climate setting, starting a problem, following up the problem, and reflecting on the problem, a brief description of the PBL cycle of collaboration is thereby helpful to understand its potential for student collaboration:

The Climate Setting Phase At the outset, before the PBL group work begins, students must get to know one another, establish ground rules, and help create a comfortable climate for collaborative learning. Meeting in a small group for the first time, students typically introduce themselves, stressing their academic backgrounds to allow the facilitator (instructor) and each other to understand what expertise might potentially be distributed in the group. The most important task is to establish a non-judgmental climate in which students recognize and articulate what they know and what they do not know.

The Problem Initiation Phase The actual PBL episode begins by presenting a group of students with minimal information about a particular problem. Students then query the given materials to determine what information is available and what they still need to know and to learn to solve the problem. During this phase, students typically take on specific roles.

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An example is the scribe, who records the group’s problem solving, including listing the facts known about the problem, students’ ideas, additional questions about the problem, and the learning issues generated throughout ensuing discussion. Such written record helps the students keep track of their problem solving and provides a focus for negotiation and reflection. Throughout the problem-solving process, students are encouraged to pause to reflect on the data collected, generating additional questions about that data, and hypothesizing about the problem and about possible solutions. Early in the PBL process, the facilitator may question students to help them realize what they do not understand. As students become more experienced with the PBL method and take on more of the responsibility for identifying learning issues, the facilitator is able to fade this type of support, or scaffolding. After the group has developed its initial understanding of the problem, the students divide up and independently research the learning issues they have identified. The learning issues define the group’s learning goals and help group-members work toward a set of shared objectives. These objectives can also help the facilitator to monitor the group’s progress and to remind members when they are getting off course, or alternately, to ask if they need to revise their goals.

The Problem Follow-up Phase In the problem follow-up phase, students reconvene to share what they have learned, to re-consider their hypotheses, or to generate new hypotheses in light of their new learning. These further analyses, and accompanying ideas about solutions, allow students to apply their newly acquired knowledge to the problem. Students share what they have learned with the group as they interpret the problem through the lens of their newly accessed information. At this point, it is important for the students to evaluate their own information and that of the others in their group. In the PBL


group, information is not often accepted at face value. Students must discuss how they acquired their information and critique their resources. This process is an important means of helping the students become self-directed learners.

The Problem Reflection Phase During post-problem reflection, students deliberately reflect on the problem to abstract the lessons learned. They consider the connections between the current problem and previous problems, considering how this problem is similar to and different from other problems. This reflection allows them to make generalizations and to understand when this knowledge can be applied. Finally, as the students evaluate their own performance and that of their peers, they reflect on the effectiveness of their self-directed learning and their collaborative problem solving. Consequently, PBL acknowledges the possibility of prior knowledge held by the learner. Further knowledge is acquired on a need-to-know basis, enabling the learner to diagnose his or her own learning needs. Knowledge gained is fed back into the problem in an iterative loop (Margetson, 1994). PBL allows the synthesis of topics and subjects. According to Woods (1994), one specific advantage of this approach is increased motivation; namely, learners learn because they are interested. More importantly, Woods maintains that because of the way in which knowledge is acquired in PBL, links are provided with experience which help in future recall. This is invaluable for students’ future professional life (Barrows, 1986).

Supporting PBL Online In the context of our PBL learning design elaborated in the following course scenario, the basic online support comes mainly from the MOODLE environment (www.moodle.org) which is an ongoing open-source development project to support a social constructionist framework of

education. Simply stated, this style of learning and teaching from MOODLE, short for modular object-oriented dynamic learning environment, is based on four main concepts (http://docs.moodle. org/en/Philosophy): Constructivism: The constructivist believes that students actively construct new knowledge as they interact with their environments, including their course activities and other students. Constructionism: The constructionist asserts that students learn more when they construct learning experiences for others. We might be familiar with the learning pyramid (http://homepages. gold.ac.uk/polovina/learnpyramid/index.html) which states that students remember 10% of what they read, 20% of what they hear, 30% of what is demonstrated to them, 50% of what they discuss, and 75% of what they practice. That same pyramid also states that students retain 90% of what they teach others. Social Constructionism: This extends constructionism into social settings where groups construct knowledge for one another, collaboratively creating a small culture of shared artifacts with shared meanings. When students become part of a culture, they are constantly learning. For example, in the context of ballroom dancing, there is a large difference between watching a video showing people dancing, and practicing in a class with other students and possibly a variety of teachers. The latter would enrich and accelerate our learning process. Separate and connected behavior: The context of connected and separate behaviors come from the study of human motivations: separate behavior occurs when people try to remain objective and factual, tending to defend their ideas by pinpointing holes in their opponents’ ideas. Connected behavior is the empathic approach that accepts subjectivity, trying to listen and ask questions in an effort to understand others’ point of view. It is convinced that a healthy amount of connected behavior within a learning community is a very powerful stimulant for learning, because it not

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only brings people closer together but promotes deeper reflection and re-examination of their existing beliefs.

Defining the Course Scenario of Student-Centered Education At each semester when SFTW 300 Software Psychology is offered, our course scenario begins when the instructor helps the class evolve into its team-based organization. Typically, students embark on the PBL cycle of learning through organized groups of 4-6 members (one being the team leader). Each PBL group will be given a dual role to explore as client and as developer within a specified period of time. Namely, each team, acting as the developer, is to complete an interactive systems (IS) design and prototype for another team acting as the client. Yet, the same team is the client of another group, responsible for clarifying the project, and resolving ambiguities as they arise, but in any pair of PBL teams (say, A and B), they cannot be the client and the developer of each other at the same time. It should be noted that an even number of teams is desirable to facilitate pair-wise client-developer interaction. Meanwhile, the instructor, more appropriately called the facilitator, acts as project sponsor for each client team, and as project supervisor for each developer team. Each client team is handed a design project by the sponsor. It is then given some inception time to elaborate on the specifics of the project. At the end of the inception period, each client team is assigned a developer team from among the remaining client teams. After a developer team has been identified, the working and performance of the developer team is guided and monitored by the project supervisor played by the instructor. In a typical semester, there might easily be six to ten PBL teams of students, with each team composed of four to six members each. Essentially, each design project invites our PBL student-groups to embark on a journey to develop some IS that meets customers’ real needs in Web-

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based development. The general requirement is for each PBL team to create and maintain a review Web-site to keep all team members up-to-date on all possible aspects of the project. It is also where the PBL team will work (report) collaboratively on the project. Through the review Web-site, our PBL teams can conduct reviews with their clients, who can view their project in progress, give feedback on a design, get in touch with the developer PBL team, and check the project schedule. The review Web-site contains numerous information such as: the roles and responsibilities of the project team, contact information for all team members, the project mission, the vision document, the project schedule, and all design reviews. It is designed that the first thing our PBL teams have to learn is a systematic approach to eliciting, organizing, and documenting the requirements of the system to be built for the client team. Also important is a process that establishes and maintains continuous agreement between the client and the developer teams (Curtis, Krasner, & Iscoe, 1988) on the changing requirements of the system. Individual PBL teams have to understand users’ problems in their culture and their language and to build systems that meet their needs. Practically, the HCI context for the course is designed around four core development processes to be experienced by our PBL student-groups within the semester’s duration constraint. Analyzing the Problem. This involves a set of skills to understand the problem to be solved before application development begins. It is the process of understanding real-world problems and user needs and proposing solutions to meet those needs. We consider a problem as the difference between things as perceived and things as derived (Gause & Weinberg, 1989). Accordingly, if the user perceives something as a problem, it is a real problem, and it is worthy of addressing. Understanding User Needs. Software teams are rarely given effective requirements specifications for the systems they are going to build. Often they have to go out and get the information they


need to be successful. Typical methods include interviewing and questionnaires, requirements workshop, brainstorming and idea reduction, storyboarding, role playing, and prototyping. Each represents a proactive means of pushing knowledge of user needs forward and thereby converting fuzzy requirements to those that are better recognized. Defining the System. This describes the process by which the team converts an understanding of the problem and the users’ needs to the initial definition of a system or application that will address those needs. Our PBL teams should learn that complex systems require adaptive strategies to organize information for requirements. This information could be expressed in terms of a hierarchy, starting with user needs, transitioning through feature sets, then into the more detailed software requirements. Managing the Project Scope. Project scope is presented as a combination of the functionality to be delivered to meet users’ needs, the resources available for the project, and the time allowed in which to achieve the implementation. The purpose of scope management is to establish a high-level requirements baseline for the project. The team has to establish the rough level of effort required for each feature of the baseline, including risk estimation on whether implementing it will cause an adverse impact on the schedule. Throughout the course delivery, each PBL team is required to present their work in progress, and lead class forums to elicit students’ discussions. The team leader, equivalent to project manager, has to coordinate the team activities, and ensure effective team communications. And team members have to help set the project goals, accomplish tasks assigned, meet deadlines, attend team meetings and participate in editing project documents and integrating work-products to be combined as the final project report. At the end of each project milestones, each member of the respective PBL teams is required to make a presentation of his or her project involvement, with a question and

answer session for the client team and the whole class. The instructor, acting as the project sponsor for each client team, and as the project supervisor for each developer team, designs the necessary scenario details to guide, motivate and provide feedback to the PBL groups. Also, the instructor has to evaluate how well students perform in the PBL groups and how well such groups behave as SDWTs in managing software requirements (Conklin & Burgess-Yakemovic, 1991), and provide the necessary adjustments for the scenarios. Typically, there are a number of milestones set for project teams throughout the semester. In particular, there will be a milestone for all client teams to present their systems of interest, followed by the milestones for all developer teams to fulfill the system design, prototyping, and final delivery. At the completion of each milestone, each PBL team will be assessed according to their performance, in terms of the necessary deliverables produced, and the presentation made by the whole team. Records of the team’s work should also be available from the team’s review Web site for evaluation purpose. There will be a group grade and an individual grade for each member of the team. The group grade is the same for all members, but the individual grade is different. The group grade is given by the instructor and by the whole class, except for the group being evaluated. The individual grade is given through peer evaluation among members of the PBL team. Specifically, a peer evaluation form is created by the group, which is used by each member of the team to rate every other member in the same team. The rating is often divided into three aspects: qualitative comments of the member’s work throughout the milestone, the ranking of the member in the group including the evaluator-member, using the scale of 1-to-5 (5: highest performance; 1: lowest performance), and the bonus distribution among all the members, of a specific amount, say, how much each member gets allocated out of 1000 dollars of bonus. In the specific instance of client-developer pair, each developer-team should

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also be evaluated by the client-team using a more detailed format because of the direct relationship between the two PBL teams.

Tackling the Issues of TeamBased Collaboration Students engaged in the attempt to build Web-based support for specific user situation, are reminded of the delicate business of creating a conglomeration of various human activity systems. This endeavor requires the effort and commitment on the part of everyone (client and developer) involved, as well as a good imagination in the mind of those charged with directing its implementation (Fisher, 2000; Ginac, 2000). In the instance of a project team charged with the mission of creating IS support for group-based project work, what makes the team work is people’s mutual understanding of their own and others’ interests and purposes, and the recognition that their interests are somehow bound up in doing something to which they all contribute. In a strict sense, it is in the course of interaction that people’s sense of purpose and even their contributions, come to be defined. As collaborators in an IS team, PBL teams face the tremendous challenge of how team members move from being individual spokespeople to a unified, collaborative body. In his book on group decision-making, Kaner (1996) calls the transition from the divergent zone of the individual to the convergent zone of the team member the “groan zone.” In a team, even though every member wants to contribute to success and to get the project going, each has a different perspective, a different experience, or a different context to bring to the project. Each person’s thinking is divergent, bringing diversity to the process, but not much agreement. Convergence occurs as the group’s individual ideas are integrated into a whole solution. This process of integration does not entail compromise (Fisher, Ury, & Patton, 1991), in which every one gives up something

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and no one is happy with the result, nor does it mean that everyone is in complete agreement. What convergence means is that everyone has participated and will support the final decision. Kaner calls this period between divergence and convergence the groan zone because it is the time during which team members groan and complain. In the divergent zone, most group members voice their opinions to make sure their ideas being heard by the group. In the groan zone, however, an individual digs behind other people’s ideas to try to uncover their reasons, assumptions and mental models. Difficult problems and wrenching decisions cause teams to spend time in the groan zone because of the required interchange, sharing, and resolution of ideas, and viewpoints. Likewise, the groan zone is also used to describe the transition zone in which innovative, emergent (or unexpectedly desirable) results are generated. Indeed, collaborative groups, especially those in fast-paced environments, groan a lot. They struggle to create the services that converge on the mission profile. They struggle to integrate their own, and others’ diverse perspectives. Rather than focusing on individuals in limited or problem-oriented ways, it is here that AC should guide students through different stages of development, including discovery, dream, design, and destiny – that inspire them to an appreciative and empowering view of themselves and the team’s future. By an AC model of student (or team) empowerment, the underlying belief is the experiencing of the situation by beginning with a grounded observation of the best of what is, articulating what might be, ensuring the consent of those in the system to what should be, and collectively experimenting with what can be. This formulation, in terms of enhancing student learning in group-based project work, could be considered as the open source philosophy behind a school’s collaborative core with her constituents – teachers and students; namely, the PLC seconded by the teacher-as-servant state of mentality and practice.


Soothing the Growing Pains of Team Buildup It certainly takes time and discipline to transform a PBL team of student members into a SDWT of professional software practitioners. In the short span of each SFTW300 Software Psychology semester of about three and a half months, there are many soft skills a PBL team needs to acquire. The following represents a useful set of selected concerns worthy of attention in the team buildup process: Process Focus: The average student has little background in actually accomplishing process steps within a project schedule and more often no background in doing so in a team with the added requirements of several milestones of prototyping and an inflexible delivery date, as well as being a client expected to be process-aware. During the early stages of the class, each PBL team is given upfront lectures on typical software development processes, such as the dynamic systems development method process, the open unified process, and the extreme programming process. The students are invited to try out a process of their own for their development scenario and the team coordinator is encouraged to keep the team focused on the selected process during subsequent project milestones. Students’ feedbacks often indicate that their experience with the pressure of the delivery schedule, client involvement, and prototypes development, has taught them that the chosen process must be flexible enough to accept change but the balance between consistent application of a process and responsiveness to the client is not easy to maintain and this know-how is not likely to be acquired through mere lectures alone. The client experience during the semester also demonstrates to each team the expected learning a new college graduate in the field of software development should encounter after graduation, and the lessons learned through the project should remain with them far longer than their conventional individual examinations.

Team Dynamics: Students embarking on SFTW300 have had one semester’s PBL style of collaboration in SFTW241 Programming Languages Architecture (I). However, the grouping arrangements of SFTW300 invite each newly formed PBL group to discover whom they can rely on, capitalizing on individual skill sets, and finding a way to work together. Students often tend to be mistrusting at first (still very comfortable with individual efforts) and become leery of having to rely on others. The beginning lectures then become essential occasions to conduct what will be the first of many activities that should promote positive group interactions. Examples of such activities include: writing a group portfolio expressing the profiles of individual team members in terms of their individual technical expertise; engaging in mental games that require the skillful use of teamwork to complete or that make a point about the distinction between individual and group-centered learning (or working) styles. This understanding acquired becomes instrumental when different roles are being taken by members of the group: one role taken up by one member, or one role shared by two or three members, or roles being taken by members through rotating turns. The idea is to achieve coordination to get the project work done through a suitable mix of individual work, cooperating work (different tasks done by different members so as to integrate the pieces), and collaborating work (same portions of work done jointly by different members). Planning Concerns: Throughout the semester’s work, there are several essential milestones (essential due dates) that have to be met by each PBL group. Yet, the only hard and fast date that must be rigorously met is the final delivery. Deliverables required of each PBL team include a concept of operations document, a design document, a test plan, and the final prototype comprising site architecture, schematics, and navigation guide in the specific context of a collaborative Web project. In the client-developer relationship established by the instructor, each team coordinator is permitted to

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make arguments for extension of any deliverable due date (except for final delivery) knowing that each extension granted added additional difficulties later in the course for an on time delivery of other documents. This procedure forced each team to evaluate their scheduling philosophy and to perform an informal risk assessment for the entire project. The policy of assigning the same project (group) grade to each member of the team is seen as a strong motivator for each student to take seriously the project activities. Following the industrial model of shared responsibility (the team fails or the team succeeds) seems to provide a far more memorable learning experience in the context of planning a process and maintaining a schedule. Rigorous discussions have often been observed over issues of planning milestones and still leaving enough time to produce the remaining deliverables with reasonable quality and timeliness.

Establishing the Collaborative Context of Project Support It has been our experience in conducting SFTW 300 Software Psychology that some electronic project-based support such as a Web portal is needed to manage collaborative project development. This portal should lead to a Web-based organizational space for each project, OSProject, which renders a number of peculiar services to client and developers, in the form of distributed applications customizable to their project-related activities. In a specific project context, there must also be a number of Web-based collaborative spaces, CSGroup, to enable group-based project work to be performed. For example, there is respectively a CSGroup for each of the client PBL team and of the developer PBL team. Besides, to support the interactions among project members and between the project manager (mostly played by PBL team leader) and specific team members, the provision of a personal electronic space for each of the project members, PSParticipant (PSClient,

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or PSDeveloper) is essential to facilitate individual work. The linkages from the project space, to the respective collaborative spaces, to the individual personal spaces, must be closely coordinated to support the Web-based auxiliary processes of collaboration in project development. The challenge is to ensure that the sites should complement the project work by enabling both client and developer teams to interact asynchronously or synchronously through the different customizable services offered. An expression for this project-based electronic support (Vat, 2004a) could be written as follows: Project::= OSProject + { CSGroup } + { PSParticipant }, where the braces {} represents the repetition of the element embedded. It is intended that the provision of the project spaces, the collaborative spaces, and the personal spaces in the Web portal for collaborative project work could facilitate the formation of specific sets of IS support for different human activity systems originated from different project scenarios (Vat, 2006a). To elaborate on the design of collaborative IS support we hereby consider the respective project scenarios of planned and unplanned communication events.

The Scenarios of Planned Communication Planned communication events in project development are scheduled points in time during which participants exchange information on a specific topic or review a work product. Such events are often formalized and structured to maximize the amount of information communicated and to minimize the time participants spend on communication. Typical planned communication events (Bruegge & Dutoit, 2004) include problem presentation, client reviews, project reviews, peer reviews, and status reviews. Problem Presentation: The focus here is the presentation of the problem statement which describes the problem, the application domain, and the desired functionality of the system. It should


also include some non-functional requirements such as usability and platform specification. The problem statement in general does not include a complete specification of the system. It is meant to be a preliminary requirements activity that establishes common ground between the client and the developer team. Client Review: The goal of client reviews is for the client to assess the progress of the development and for the developer to confirm or change the requirements of the system. The client review is used to manage expectations on both client and developer sides and to increase the shared understanding among participants. A client review is conducted as a formal presentation during which developers focus on specific functionality with the client. The review is preceded by the release of a work product, such as a specification document, an interface mock-up, or an evaluation prototype. At the outcome of the review, the client provides feedback to the developers. This feedback may consist of a general approval or a request for detailed changes in definition, functionality or schedule. Project Review: The goals of a project review are for the project manager (PBL team leader) to assess status and for team members to review subsystem interfaces. Project reviews can also encourage the exchange of operational knowledge across teams, such as common problems encountered with tools or the system. A project review is typically conducted as a formal presentation of individual developer teams during which each team presents its subsystem to the management (project sponsor and supervisor) or to other teams that depend on the subsystem. The review is usually preceded by the release of a document describing the aspects of the system under review. At the close of the review, the specific developer team may negotiate changes in the interfaces and changes in schedule. Peer Review: The goal of peer review is to increase the quality of a work product produced by any designated team member. It is composed

of two steps: the walkthrough and the inspection. During the walkthrough, a member of the developer team presents to the other members of the same team, his or her artifact, say, the line-by-line code, or a sequence of user-interface mock-ups. During inspection, the other members challenge any suspicious area and attempt to discover as many issues as possible based on a predefined list of criteria. Communication among participants is artifact-based. The peer review is similar in nature to the project review (typically involving more than one teams), except that they differ in their formality, their limited audience, and their extended duration within a single team of project members. Status Review: The focus of status review is the tasks distributed among team members. Status reviews are primarily conducted within a team (say, weekly) and aimed to detect deviations from the task plan and to correct them. Status reviews encourage developers to complete pending tasks. The review of task status encourages the discussion of open issues and unanticipated problems, and thus encourages informal communication among team members. Often, solutions to common issues can be shared and operational knowledge disseminated more effectively when discussed within the scope of a team. Increasing the effectiveness of status reviews normally has a global impact on the team performance.

The Scenarios of Unplanned Communication In an ideal project, all communication takes place during planned communication events. In practice, it is difficult to anticipate all information needs and plan all communications. In general, issues resulting from a combination of seemingly isolated facts from different areas of the project are difficult to anticipate because no participants could have a global overview of all the facts. Consequently, a project should be prepared to deal with unexpected situations, often under pressure.

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We call the communication resulting from such crises unplanned communication events, including requests for clarification, requests for changes, and issue resolution. Request for Clarification: This request represents the bulk of the communication among developers, clients, and users. Such requests are largely unplanned. A participant may request for clarification about any aspect of the system that seems ambiguous. These requests may occur during informal meetings, e-mails, or any other communication mechanism available to the project. It is worthy to note that if most information needs are handled through requests for clarification, such situations represent symptoms of a defective communication infrastructure. And the result could lead to serious failures downstream owing to misunderstandings and missing and misplaced information. Request for Change: This request represents a channel to report any problems with the system itself, including its documentation, the development process, or the project organization. Typically, a change request contains such details as the classification (say, severe, moderate, or annoying), a description of the problem (say, rationale, or communication), a description of the desired change (say, a proposed solution). Requests for change are often formalized when the number of participants and the system size is substantial. Issue Resolution: An issue represents a concrete problem, such as a requirement, a design, or a management problem. To each decision in project work represents an issue to be solved so that development can proceed. Alternatives are possible solutions that could address the issue under consideration. Criteria are desirable qualities that the selected solution should satisfy. During requirements analysis, criteria include nonfunctional requirements and constraints such as usability. During system design, criteria include design goals such as reliability. During project management, criteria include management goals and tradeoffs such as timely delivery versus quality. A deci-

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sion is the resolution of an issue representing the selected alternative according to the criteria that were used for evaluation and the justification of the selection. Typically, it is only after much discussion (or argumentation) that a consensus is reached or a decision imposed, covering all aspects of the decision process, which includes criteria, justification, explored alternatives, and tradeoffs. Using these issue-modeling concepts in the context of capturing project rationales in review meetings, we often write an agenda in terms of issues that we need to discuss and resolve. We state the objective of the meeting (formal or informal) to be a resolution on these issues and any related sub-issues that are raised in the discussion. We structure the meeting minutes in terms of proposals that we explore during the meeting, criteria that we agree on, and arguments we use to support or oppose proposals. We capture decisions as resolutions and action items that implement resolutions. During subsequent meetings, we review status in terms of the action items that we produced in the previous meetings.

CURRENT CHALLENGES FACING OUR WORK From the discussion built up so far, it is not difficult to foresee that PBL is the kind of group-based project work which has many educational and social benefits, in particular providing students with opportunities for active learning. However, teaching, directing and managing such project work is not an easy process. This is because projects are often: expensive demanding considerable supervision and technical resources; and complex combining design, human communication, HCI, and technology to satisfy objectives ranging from consolidation of technical skills through provoking insight into organizational practice, teamwork and professional issues, to inculcating academic discipline and presentation skills. In preparing our students to get started, familiar and comfortable


with group-based project work, we need some sort of course support which goes beyond what typical course management systems such as WebCT or MOODLE could accommodate currently. Indeed, the specific characteristics required of such a blended learning environment must be carefully delineated and thoughtfully designed with a practical continual learning scenario in order to stimulate any learner-centered involvements. This section discusses the challenges behind providing such course support, through describing an effort in virtual organizing an AKE in support of the PLC comprising our PBL students.

Devising the Appreciative Knowledge Environment (AKE) Our major focus of student-centered AC lies in the installation of an appreciative knowledge environment (AKE) in which electronic support for AC to enable collaborative knowledge work among students and between teachers and students is made available, especially in their respective work and study settings. In particular, we can consider the AKE as the creative units for knowledge sharing for people on a number of scales. The smallest is perhaps the environment surrounding one individual trying to solve a problem in his or her course assignments, or a small team or work group, collaborating to find creative solutions in its search for innovations, such as a PBL team seeking innovative ways to satisfy client requirements. Nonetheless, if the motivation behind our AKE were to encourage student responsibility, to make learning meaningful, and to encourage active knowledge construction in the specific curricula of students’ study, the naturalistic creation of virtual communities of student-learners in the process of using the underlying AKE services, must be well supported. As a knowledge-support environment, there are many possibilities for services identification. Currently, the challenges of how to enhance the value of course-specific knowledge work have rendered, at least, three main design reflections:

1) support the actual practices and daily tasks of the participants (teachers and students); 2) collect experiences and represent them in an accessible and equitable manner; and 3) provide a framework to guide the knowledge process.

Support the Actual Practices and Daily Tasks of the Participants The AKE environment should support the actual practices and daily tasks of teachers by helping them guide students’ learning process through the creation of a visible history of student work. For students, the AKE should support learning practices and tasks by making the thinking of their peers more visible and by illustrating the process of collaborative problem solving through both individual and group inquiry activities (say, through the installation of various Wiki-based applications). Moreover, from a knowledge integration perspective, the practice of teaching and learning involves developing a repertoire of models for explaining situations (say, in the form of various podcasts). What type of knowledge integration framework can best help students and teachers in their daily practice?

Collect Experiences and Represent them in an Accessible and Equitable Manner The AKE environment should collect experiences and represent them in an accessible and equitable manner to promote the process of connecting ideas so that participants (students and teachers) can use them in subsequent tasks such as during follow-up clarification and illustration. Communities, if viewed as a network of relationships and resources, can be structured to elicit ideas, develop shared understanding, and promote the integration of a diverse set of perspectives. It is important to investigate the potential of structuring discussions in different ways based on the type of discussion and the associated pedagogical goals.

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Linking different types of pedagogical goals to design strategies is a challenging task because most of the students are yet to get accustomed to reflecting on the nature of their contributions.

Provide a Framework to Guide the Knowledge Process The AKE environment should encourage participants to make sense of their learning by creating a culture where people ask each other for justification and clarification. It is essential to investigate how participants adjust their learning behavior as their peers prompt them to support their ideas with evidence. One strategy is to create some commonly agreed upon criteria and to examine how these criteria are adopted and transformed by community members (mostly students) as they interact with one another. For communities to maintain coherence and develop a sense of what is desirable behavior, it is important that a strong community culture be established with a common set of values and criteria for making contributions. Student communities need a general framework to help define the mission and vision for their knowledge process.

Meeting the Virtual Organizing Challenge for AKE In order for knowledge sharing within an organization (SFTW300 PBL teams of students) to be successful, it is convinced that the people involved must be excited about the process of sharing knowledge. Thereby, an appreciative sharing of knowledge must be viewed as the non-threatening and accepting approach that makes people realize what they do can make a difference. One common example is the communities of practice (COP) (Wenger, 1998) (be it physical or online) mentioned earlier in the context of PLC. Many organizations today are comprised of networks of interconnected COPs through which knowledge is

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created, shared, organized, revised, and passed on within and among these communities. In a deep sense, it is by these communities that knowledge is owned in practice. In anticipation of our students’ knowledge challenge in a real-world organization, it is useful to conceive of an AKE based on the context of virtual organizing described earlier, and experiment with how the ideas of its three vectors can be applied to nurture online the growth of different COPs (Wenger, 1998) (or, in our case, more properly called communities of learning (COL) scattered throughout an organization.

Virtual Encountering the AKE From a nurturing perspective, it is important to identify what COLs are desirable in the organization, and how, if they already exist, but are not already online, to enable them to be online in order to provide more chances of virtual encounter of such communities, to the organizational members. For those communities already online, it is also important to design opportunities of interaction among different online communities, to activate their knowledge sharing. Since it is an important COP practice not to reduce knowledge to an object, what counts as knowledge is often produced through a process of communal involvement, which includes all the controversies, debate and accommodations. This collective character of knowledge construction is best supported online with individuals given suitable IS support to participate and contribute their own ideas. An IS subsystem, operated through virtual encounter, must help achieve many of the primary tasks of a community of learning, such as encouraging student participation, establishing a common baseline of knowledge and standardizing what is well understood so that people in the community can exercise their creative energies on the learning issues of interest to the community’s collective growth.


Virtual Sourcing the AKE From the discussion built up in the first vector, it is not difficult to visualize the importance of identifying the specific expertise of each potential COL in the organization (in our case, the Department of Computer & Information Science), and if not yet available, planning for its acquisition through a purposeful nurture of expertise in various COLs related to different curricula of studies. This vector focuses on creating and deploying intellectual and intangible assets for the organization in the form of a continuous reconfiguration of critical capabilities assembled through different relationships in the network of COLs distributed within and across the department(s). The mission is to set up a resource network, in which the COL is part of a vibrant, dynamic network of complementary capabilities. The strategic leadership challenge is to orchestrate an organization’s position in a dynamic network where the organization can carefully analyze her relative dependence on other players in the resource coalition and ensure her unique capabilities.

Virtual Expertising the AKE It is important to understand that not everything we know can be codified as documents and tools. Sharing tacit knowledge requires interaction and informal learning processes such as storytelling, conversation, coaching, and apprenticeship. The tacit aspects of knowledge often consist of embodied expertise – a deep understanding of complex, interdependent elements that enable dynamic responses to context-specific problems. This type of knowledge is very difficult to replicate. In order to leverage such knowledge, an IS subsystem, operated through virtual expertise, must help hooking people with related expertise into various networks of COLs, in order to facilitate stewarding such knowledge to the rest of the organization.

Preparing Students’ Blended Learning in PBL Online Today, many educational institutions across the world have implemented electronic learning (elearning) environments, implying that learners and teachers increasingly are integrating both physical and electronic resources, tools and environments within mainstream educational settings. Still, these new environments are yet to have a major impact on learning. This is partly because the blending of real and virtual domains in teaching and learning is challenging for most teachers; yet, it is becoming an essential skill for effective teaching. On the one hand, this new way of teaching and learning has the potential to extend learning methodologies, to open up opportunities for flexible online learning as well as to challenge more traditional methods of course delivery (Vat, 2009a). At the same time, it adds a degree of complexity to educational development and curriculum design. It is experienced that the key to success is to concentrate on not merely thinking of how to integrate different sorts of content resources, but also on developing educational processes that blend online with face-to-face interactions. In this regard, the idea to support PBL online is to empower students to learn through various Web-based materials including text, simulations, video demonstrations, and such resources as chat rooms, message boards, wikis, podcasts, and RSS feeds that have been purposely built for problem-based learning. Indeed, the increasing adoption of PBL and the growth in online support has reflected the current shift away from teaching as a means of transmitting information towards enabling learning as a student-generated activity. PBL online is a timely example of a blended e-learning experience for both teachers and students. In fact, the context of blended e-learning (Eklund, Kay, & Lynch, 2003) offers the possibility of changing our attitudes not only as to where and when learning takes place, but in terms of what resources and tools can sup-

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port learning and the ways in which these might be used. In particular, blended e-learning fosters integration of different spaces, allowing students to learn from university, or from home or on the move. It can offer flexibility in the time when learners can participate in courses, reducing or removing restrictions arising from the balancing of school or home commitments with study. It opens up the range of media resources that can be used for learning. The blend of space, time and media offers new possibilities as to the sorts of activities students can carry out and the ways they can collaborate, using available electronic tools. Literally, the integration of physical and online spaces means that communities can form and interact in ways that were previously unimagined. It introduces the possibility of interacting in real time (synchronously) in conjunction with opportunities to collaborate over a period of time (asynchronously). This in turn allows exploration of different forms of dialogue and new types of learning. New media resources and tools open up possibilities for students to create their own resource banks, integrating self-generated intellectual assets with more formal materials sourced from libraries around the world. This brings into question some of the traditional values of education, such as who owns, creates and controls resources and knowledge. New types of learning activities thereby challenge our thinking as to how learning might be facilitated, creating new etiquettes of learning and teaching, and shifting the locus of control from the teacher to the learner.

Lessons Learned for a Teacher-as-Servant On integrating the essential context of servantleadership in support of implementing a PLC through virtual organizing the vehicle of AKE for classes of SFTW300 Software Psychology students over the past years, it is the author’s experience that there are three basic empowerment practices (Vat, 2004b) which should preferably be performed

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by the teacher-as-servant in order to apply AC to facilitate the PBL style of student collaboration. Meanwhile, the use of electronic portfolio (eportfolio) (Vat, 2009a) as an ongoing formative assessment tool to keep track of student learning is also found to be very promising.

The Three Practices of Student Empowerment Enable Students to Determine what they need to Learn through Questioning and Goal Setting It is convinced that students should work to identify their knowledge and skill deficits, and to develop strategies in the form of personal learning goals for meeting those deficits. Also, they should learn to relate what they know to what they do not know and ask questions to guide their quest for new knowledge. The emphasis is to foster a sense of students’ ownership in the learning process. If teachers, through the AKE, can guide the students in the identification of what they already know and what they need to learn, then knowledge gaps and mistakes can be viewed in a positive way such as another opportunity to learn. And students can assume more responsibility in addressing their own learning needs during any instructional unit.

Enable Students to Manage their own Learning Activities It is convinced that students should be enabled to develop their learning plans, which should describe priorities, instructional tactics, resources, deadlines, roles in collaborative learning situations, and proposed learning outcomes, including presentation and dissemination of new knowledge and skills, if applicable. Traditionally, these instructional events are arranged by teachers to be followed by students throughout a semester or school year, in order to accomplish a specified set


of pre-determined learning or assessment objectives. Yet, in that case, it is not advantageous for students to learn to take the initiative. To manage their own learning activities, students must be guided and supported by the teacher in the AKE, slowly taking on more and more responsibility of their own learning.

Enable Students to Contribute to each other’s Learning through Collaborative Activities It is convinced that students should be motivated and supported in discussing and sharing information. Particularly, we should enable students to become co-builders of the course- or subjectrelated resources through evaluating and refining the entries their peers put into the AKE. Collaborative learning is quite appealing to achieve that purpose; however, it involves not just creating a group and then dividing up the work. Students must be educated to recognize what they are trying to learn in teamwork, value it, and wish to share that value with others. Teachers must provide this sense of accountability by structuring the group work to include both individual and group assessments.

The Educational Potential of Student e-Portfolios In order to support the frequent formative assessments of students’ work in the PLC culture of learning, it is important not to ignore the educational potential of student e-portfolios as a tool for learning in the PLC. In fact, different portfolios (Stefani, Mason, & Pegler, 2007; Bangert, 2004) have been used by students at traditional universities and colleges where face-to-face teaching is the dominant mode of instructions. For example, course portfolios are those assembled by students for individual courses. They document and reflect upon the ways in which the student has met the outcomes for that particular course. Instructor’s

endorsement is often required to authenticate the course portfolios. Program portfolios are developed by students to document the work they have completed, the skills they have learned, and the outcomes they have met in an academic department or program. The mentor or appraiser could add comments. It could be a requirement for graduation. Oftentimes, students might use a selection from their program portfolio to show to prospective employers. Whatever the primary focus of engagement with students, the use of eportfolios inevitably adds a strong online element to the teaching and learning. Institutions need to provide electronic support and services; teachers need access and skills to integrate the e-portfolio application into their overall course design, and students need a wide range of electronic abilities in order to develop their e-portfolios. The underlying pedagogy of e-portfolio use is considered the most significant link with student learning. Our experience has indicated that constructivism (Vat, 2009a) does seem to be the approach worthy of repeated experimentation. The aim of constructivist principles as applied to e-portfolio is to engender independent, self-reliant learners who have the confidence and skill to use a range of strategies to construct their own knowledge (Stacey, 1998; Slavin, 1994). Where students are required to develop and maintain an e-portfolio, they are usually expected to reflect on their learning, consider how to give evidence of their learning and possibly even develop a plan (or a learning contract) of what they would like to learn. In other words, an e-portfolio implementation of constructivism usually implies a considerable level of learner autonomy and initiative, of learner responsibility for their learning and of opportunities to refine their learning based on feedback from the teacher and their peers. More importantly, e-portfolio use can be the basis for several student-centered initiatives (Batson, 2005), including: creating a system of tracking student work over time, in a single course, with students and faculty reflecting on it; having a more fully informed and constantly

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updated view of student progress in a program, which is very helpful in formative assessment; aggregating other students’ work in a particular course to see how the students as a whole are progressing toward learning goals; and assessing other courses in similar ways that are all part of one major and thus assessing the entire program of study.

Remarks for Continuing Challenge The software engineering workplace of this century requires professionals who not only have an extensive store of knowledge, but also know how to keep that knowledge up-to-date, apply it to solve problems, and function as part of a team. This view of the software industry compels educators to rethink and reinvent the ways in which software practitioners are prepared. In particular, schooling must extend beyond the traditional preparatory goal of establishing a knowledge base. Schooling must actively engage our students in opportunities for knowledge seeking, for problem solving, and for the collaborating necessary for effective practice. To realize such experiences, educators have looked to the potential of PLC to shift the focus on teaching to a focus on learning, seconded by the constructivist pedagogical designs that are based on the assumption that learning is a product of both cognitive and social interactions in problem-centered environments (Greeno, Collins, & Resnick, 1996; Savery & Duffy, 1994). The adoption of PBL in SFTW300 is an example of such a design (Vat, 2006b), and the support of PBL online is always a challenge of innovation in learning design because the interrelationship of technology and pedagogy always renders such question as what it means to be a problem-based learner in an online setting. In fact, there has been much criticism in recent years about blended learning environments that fail to create effective settings for learning (Oliver & Herrington, 2003). One plausible reason is due to the peculiar focus on technological rather than pedagogical design.

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It is suggested that there is a need to revive the concept of learning design rather than to do a simplistic repackaging of the course content into blended learning formats (Mason, 1998). The idea of blending different sorts of media and learning tasks is not a new concept; however, blending e-learning has an added degree of complexity because e-learning allows the blending of different spaces. For example, we can use electronic learning environments within physical teaching spaces; we can work across time zones in real time or asynchronously. For effective blending, we need to have a clear idea of what we want to blend and what we might blend. To understand how to design engaging tasks within blended e-learning, we have to have some knowledge of why we might design specific learning activities in particular ways. Why is one sort of activity appropriate for one learning situation, but not so effective in another? What sort of student activity are we expecting to see online and how might this differ from what we are accustomed to? Once teachers have decided what sort of learning activities they require, they face a further problem.This is the question of how to plan so that there is integration of these activities with appropriate resources, electronic tools and environments, using a range of teaching methodologies. Thinking through all the possible combinations and solutions is complex and demanding. It is experienced that students are motivated by solving authentic problems based on real-world activities that may be carried out non-sequentially and iteratively. Such problems contrast with the sequential orchestration of tasks frequently planned in teacher-centered education. Planning non-sequential activities is more complex and may involve integrating a variety of media and electronic tools across real and virtual spaces. More importantly, blended e-learning brings with it a new order. With effective learning design, the locus of control should shift from the teacher to the learner. This shift, combined with the free flow of information, requires the development of new sorts of relationships and


trust. Ethical issues are of primary importance, and institutions may need to develop or revise strategies to reflect this fact.

CONCLUSION To conclude this case description, I hereby render some of my perspectives behind adopting PBL in the teaching of SFTW300. The educational literature warns against compartmentalized units of study that produce students who cannot integrate the different parts of their knowledge. Although a fully integrated degree was beyond the scope of discussion, many of our conventional (teachercentered) courses had compartments that bore out the literature’s predictions. In effect, any new course designed in the Software Engineering program must be as integrated as possible, if we want our students to bring all their knowledge to bear on solving real-world problems in software development. In this regard, the nurture of independence and collaboration becomes important. Indeed, our conventional courses have been widely criticized for stifling students’ initiative in learning. Yet, through PBL, we offer an approach to learning where curricula are designed with problem scenarios central to student learning in each curricular component. Students working in small teams examine a problem situation and, through this exploration, are expected to locate the gaps in their own knowledge and skills in order to decide what information they need to acquire in order to resolve or manage the situation. Lectures, seminars, workshops or laboratories support the inquiry process rather than transmit subject-based knowledge. The starting point should be a set of problem scenarios regardless of whether a module or a whole program is being designed. The scenarios enable students to become independent inquirers and help them to see learning and knowledge as flexible entities. Students should discover they can learn by themselves, using a range of resources. They are aided in learning to

do this by the PBL cycle of collaboration, which develop in them their social and mega-cognitive skills. Consequently, students’ critical thinking and problem-solving abilities are sharpened. These are crucial to effective project (software) development, especially at the higher levels of analysis and design. In the specific case of SFTW300, students have to go through the process of understanding, designing, implementing and evaluating interactive computer systems to match the needs of client. This is a teamwork development exercise requiring students to work in groups. This is important to prepare their future careers; nonetheless, fresh graduates today are expected to have the ability and experience to perform effectively in groupbased project work. SFTW300 supports groups by identifying specific roles for group members, providing class time and guidelines on group management, monitoring group planning and progress, and conducting formative assessments for group management and reflection on group processes. Students working in a group naturally learn to communicate with one another, which is another goal highly valued by the software industry. In particular, at the end of each problem, PBL students need to turn in a report and to give a presentation, during which each student must demonstrate his or her work with justification, followed by a session on question and answer. All these require the students to have good command of communications skills. Overall, PBL fosters in our PLC of SFTW300 students such generic skills as group work, planning, problem-solving, independent learning, research skills, writing, and oral presentation. These are university goals and also highly valued by employers in the computing industry. What is needed to support the continual nurture of such PLCs is to realize the generative potential of the engine of servant-leadership in sustaining the concomitant application of appreciative coaching (AC) to help our students to tap into or rediscover their own sense of wonder about their future possibilities.

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Gause, D., & Weinberg, G. (1989). Exploring requirements: Quality before design. New York: Dorset House Publishing. Ginac, F. O. (2000). Creating high performance software development teams. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Greening, T. (2000). Emerging constructivist forces in computer science education: Shaping a new future? In T. Greening (Ed.), Computer science education in the 21st century (pp. 47-80). New York: Springer. Greenleaf, R. K. (1977). Servant leadership: A journey into the nature of legitimate power and greatness. New York: Paulist Press. Greeno, J. G., Collins, A. M., & Resnick, L. (1996). Cognition and learning. In R.G. Calfee, & D. C. Berliner (Eds.), Handbook of Educational Psychology (pp. 15-46). New York: Simon & Schuster Macmillan. Hedberg, B., Dahlgren, G., Hansson, J., & Olve, N. (1997). Virtual organizations and beyond: Discover imaginary systems. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Jagers, H., Jansen, W., & Steenbakkers, W. (1998). Characteristics of virtual organizations. Retrieved March 3, 2009, from http://primavera.fee.uva.nl/ PDFdocs/98-02.pdf Kaner, S. (1996). Facilitator’s guide to participatory decision-making. Philadelphia, PA: New Society Publishers. Margetson, D. (1994). Current educational reform and the significance of problem-based learning. Studies in Higher Education, 19, 5–19. doi:10.1 080/03075079412331382103 Mason, R. (1998). Models of online courses. ALN Magazine, 2(2). Retrieved February 4, 2009, from http://www.aln.org/publications/magazine/v2n2/ mason.asp

Oliver, R., & Herrington, J. (2003). Exploring technology-mediated learning from a pedagogical perspective. Journal of Interactive Learning Environments, 11(2), 111–126. doi:10.1076/ ilee.11.2.111.14136 Orem, S. L., Binkert, J., & Clancy, A. L. (2007). Appreciative coaching: A positive process for change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Ryan, G. (1993). Student perceptions about self-directed learning in a professional course implementing problem-based learning. Studies in Higher Education, 18, 53–63. doi:10.1080/03 075079312331382458 Savery, J. R., & Duffy, T. M. (1994). Problembased learning: An instructional model and its constructivist framework. Educational Technology, 35(5), 31–38. Sergiovanni, T. (2005). Strengthening the heartbeat: Leading and learning together in schools. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Slavin, R. (1994). Student teams and achievement divisions. In S. Sharon (Ed.), Handbook of cooperative learning methods (pp. 3-19). Westport, CT: Greenwoeed Press. Stacey, E. (1998). Learning collaboratively in a CMC environment. In G. Davies (Ed.), Teleteaching 98: Distance learning, training, and education (pp. 951-960). Proceedings of the XV IFIP World Computer Congres, Vienna and Budapest. Stefani, L., Mason, R., & Pegler, C. (2007). The educational potential of e-portfolios: Supporting personal development and reflective learning. New York: Routledge. Vat, K. H. (2001, June 25-27). Teaching HCI with scenario-based design: The constructivist’s synthesis. Proceedings of the Sixth Annual ACM Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education (pp. 9-12), Canterbury, UK.

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Venkatraman, N., & Henderson, J. C. (1998). Real strategies for virtual organizing. Sloan Management Review, 40(1), 33–48. Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity. New, York: Cambridge University Press. Woods, D. (1994). How to gain the most from problem-based learning. McMaster, Canada: McMaster University.

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Chapter 12

Bothering with Technology:

Building Community in an Honors Seminar John J. Doherty Northern Arizona University, USA

ABSTRACT This chapter discusses the role that technology can play in a first-year Honors seminar. For the purposes of the chapter, blended learning is defined as re-tasking face-to-face time or out of class time to build community and meet course objectives more effectively. The challenge in an Honors seminar, however, is to apply this when technology is not considered a viable solution to potential course challenges. The chapter presents four strategies to build community through interaction and engagement: (1) icebreakers can be moved online to build more student interaction; (2) online journals can facilitate better engagement with the course and the texts; (3) documents can be delivered online to model good practice and promote sustainability; and (4) quizzes can be used to develop metacognitive skills outside of class. Technology, it is concluded, allows instructors to explore effective and engaging mediated instruction in multiple formats.

INTRODUCTION The inherent emphasis of any Honors program in the United States is a face-to-face interaction between faculty and students (NCHC, n. d.). Many Honors programs or colleges across the nation see this as essential to any Honors experience for their students. It is an emphasis in need of re-examination when one considers the benefits that technology can DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-880-2.ch012

provide the Honors instructor and student. However, it is also an emphasis ingrained in Honors, which reflects a bias in education generally that assumes online education is somehow less rigorous than face-to-face traditional instruction. Technology in higher education has become more of a given than an exception—especially as instructors try to leverage student interest in technology to engage them in learning. There has also been a concomitant rise in research discussing the ways in which instructors can leverage these technologies


Bothering with Technology

to better engage their users in learning. Moore et al. (2008), for example, refer to what they term as “new learning” which is student-centered and technologically enriched. In saying this, it does need to be emphasized that students are not homogeneous. Thus, while I will argue in this chapter that engaging students and Honors students in particular, with technology is a must in contemporary higher education, it should be remembered that there needs to be support built into the learning of and use of technology. This chapter will review the author’s uses of technology to enrich the learning experiences of students in a first year Honors course in critical reading and writing. I will show through an examination of this case that Honors instructors can use technology in order to engage their learners in the work of a busy course. As the 2003 National Learning Initiative Annual Review notes: Technologies ... enable learners and teachers to enhance their learning and to learn different things in different ways. Technologies make it possible for us to envisage different strategies that help learners learn and to organize learning experiences that address areas likely to be difficult to master. This is why we bother with technologies: they have the potential to expand choices about how we teach and learn. (Educause, 2003, p.10) As an aside, I would like to distinguish between face-to-face, Web-enhanced, blended, and fully online instruction. The first and last of these terms are generally obvious: the first is a class where instruction occurs in the classroom and through activities such as reading and homework outside of class; the last is a course that is delivered completely online, where the students never formally meet face-to-face. The other two terms are not so obviously dissimilar. Both refer to instruction that falls somewhere in between the first and last terms. However, for the purposes of this chapter I define Web-enhanced as instruction that makes use of Web resources or a course management system

to deliver support and perhaps activities without replacing face-to-face time. Blended instruction takes on a slightly less more accepted definition of using online resources and experiences to actually re-task (rather than formally replace) face-to-face time. Indeed, I would argue that such a definition also allows us to consider blended learning where homework or out of class activities can also be re-tasked to accomplish course objectives that might traditionally be placed in class. In this chapter, the strategies to be discussed fall into these latter two categories. I have replaced instruction time in class with online activities to build community. Below I discuss the use of the Blackboard Vista discussion tool to replace in class icebreakers. I also use the discussion tool’s journal feature to create more engagement with the texts and the teacher. In many instances these also replace some preliminary discussions in class. I was also able to replace activities such as the “syllabus dump” that can overwhelm students on day one of the class. Rather, I use Vista to quiz students on the syllabus, asking them to read it outside of class. The quiz tool can also be used to build metacognitive skills, and I describe an example of that in writing instruction. Finally, for Web enhanced, I share how a course management system can be used to not only deliver documents, but to build on that ideal to make a course more student centric through enhancing turnaround times on graded assignments.

BACKGROUND Hays (2004) suggests that case study and ethnographic research methods are similar, except that the latter asks broader questions, is more culturally focused, and can involve more time in the field. Yin (2003) shows that the former gets at the rich data of ethnography through multiple methods, including the examination of documents and reports, interviews, observations, and quantitative methods such as surveys. This

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chapter is an amalgam of both, in part predicated by the fact that what is here described is based on my own practice. I have argued elsewhere that case studies can represent the researcher more than the case (Doherty, 2008, p. 33). Thus, it is important to reiterate here that what is described below is part of my own practice. Where quoted, information from the students has been edited only to maintain confidentiality; I have obtained release to use all such quotes or I am drawing on anonymous surveys or end of semester evaluations. All references to the institution where the program is taught are also deliberately vague in order to maintain confidentiality.1 The framework for my argument is student centered learning, which should be at the core of any learning experience, and certainly that of an Honors experience. There have been many buzz terms doing the rounds of higher education forums, such as learner or learning centered, that seek to reinforce the constructivist belief that the student belongs at the center of any learning experience. All further refine these terms to focus on life-long learning skills, emphasizing both the student and learning together at the core of the higher education mission—which is why I prefer the term studentcentered as it is rhetorically putting the student first by placing the instructor in a facilitation role that acknowledges the diverse learning needs and skills of students (for a technology-based examination of this term, see Motschnig-Pitrik & Holzinger, 2002). The Honors program in which I have taught since 2004 draws upon William Cronon’s “Only Connect” as a core document in its introductory seminars to explain just this idea to the students. Cronon seeks to redefine the term liberal education by fronting the program-based definition that many students experience—for example, at this institution liberal education is in part seen as a 35-credit hour requirement of all undergraduate students, and these credits are met from a cafeteria of courses, required and elective. For Cronon, however, a liberal education has a much more

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humanist focus; he provides a list of ten qualities of a liberally education person that can lead to this goal, such as the ability to read and understand, listen and hear, write clearly and movingly, and be able to talk to anyone (Cronon, 1998). By using this document as a guiding philosophy for the program, it suggests that an overall goal is one of creating intentional learners, as well as lifelong learners that have a deep understanding of the human condition. Honors at my institution are part of a program, not a college. As of writing, it was staffed by a faculty Director, Associate Director, two Instructors, two staff specialists, and a varying number of part time instructors and student peer mentors and staff. 2 The program has about 550 students in total, a fraction of the overall university population of 22,000 undergraduate and graduate students. The university, with a Carnegie ranking as a Doctoral I institution, has about 6,000 of the total population in distributed learning programs. The Honors program, however, is campus based. In my years of teaching all students have been traditional college age first years, mostly graduates of high school advanced placement or Honors programs, and in the throes of dealing with typical first year experience and college transition issues. For the first time, this last semester (Fall 2008) I had one sophomore. The program works as a liberal studies replacement, with students expected to take up to 21 Honors hours minimum. The remainder of their liberal studies hours can be elected at Honors or regular undergraduate levels. The university thus provides many cross-listed courses or courses with a designated Honors component that can meet a student’s Honors requirement.

CASE DESCRIPTION As one of the part-time instructors, I teach one of two required courses in the program—first year courses that are considered replacement for the uni-


versity writing requirement. This course, always offered in the fall semester, has worked for years from a relatively standard syllabus (see Appendix A), across 8-10 sections of about 15 students per section. In my four years I have taught sections with 12, 15, 18, and 17 students. The syllabus has opened up more recently to allow instructors a greater variety in choosing texts, but we are essentially asked to choose texts and films that cover a broad chronological range. The intent of the range is to give students an historical context of the reading materials, to make connections between past and present, and to understand the thematic, conceptual, literary, historical, cultural, and philosophical roots of their reading materials. Students are expected to read an average of 30-60 pages per class period. More details are available in Appendix A. The majority of the grade assigned in the class is based on student writing, so there is also a requirement to include a writing text and to devote a significant amount of course time (I use this phrase deliberately here as opposed to “class” time) to writing and writing instruction. These assignments include three formal papers, each of 5-7 pages in length; 13 informal writing assignments (i.e. non-graded writing practices) that can be up to 2 pages in length; an annotated bibliography; and a self-assessment piece that introduces a portfolio of student writing at the conclusion of the course. From a requirement perspective, this is a very intense course, and many students over the years have expressed their outright fear after perusing the syllabus. For example, one student wrote: “When I first entered the room for this rigorous Honors course, I was scared. I was not sure of what was expected of me.” Therefore, an emerging challenge in this course was to make it more student-centered and less assignment focused—a major challenge considering the grade-driven approach of these students.

I used “Seven principles for good practice in undergraduate education” (Chickering & Gamson, 1987) as a guiding document in implementing this philosophy. Chickering and Gamson share guidelines that could significantly impact how students learn and how faculty communicates with their students and each other in support of learning. This interaction has been a part of educational literature and theory for a very long time (see, for example, Moore, 1989; Schwab et al., 1978) has applied these specifically to online learning, where he focuses on the interactions between learners and learners, learners and instructors, and learners and content. Gunawardena and McIsaac (2003) later added the milieu of Schwab et al. (1978) to this model as learner to technology interactions. It is, therefore, through a focus on interaction that technology can be used as a tool to support and, I would argue, help us re-think our pedagogy when it comes to face-to-face learning. Garrison and Anderson (2003) note that technology can support and even somewhat enhance traditional practices such as the lecture; however, they suggest technology also can take us back to the future, to a learning theory framed on communities on inquiry, or, as they note, a “community where individual experiences and ideas are recognized and discussed in light of societal knowledge, norms, and values” (p. 4).

CURRENT CHALLENGES Such a community is very difficult to create. One of my own goals in teaching first year classes is to introduce the complexity and variety of a university experience. Through that I can also open up the opportunities presented by a liberal education, especially in the light of Cronon’s humanistic definition of liberal education as a place to begin making connections. Such a goal, however, requires a group of students to make those connections amongst themselves and with their texts. And it places the onus on the instructor

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to sometimes make situations strange or uncomfortable. But doing this necessitates a classroom of trusting students. I have tried a variety of ways to build such communities. As a university, we had made the decision to deliver all electronic readings through our course management system (initially WebCT Vista, then Blackboard Vista) a few years ago (from the Honors Program Self Study, Appendix E, Library Support). This necessitated the need for all courses to have a Vista shell each time they are delivered. In other words, even though my class was a face-to-face class, I still had access to Vista—and, indeed, needed my students to access Vista in order to get some of my supplemental readings. That opened up opportunities to do more with Vista, such as delivering paper prompts, the syllabus, handouts, and other activities such as those documented above. But it also suggested ways in which I could rethink my pedagogy through enhancing my face-to-face time, and even, at times, re-tasking some faceto-face activities to Vista—thus freeing up my in class time to focus on areas I felt more in need of face-to-face time. I describe here some strategies that I’ve used in my Honors seminar that have at their core a student-centered use of technology to blend or enhance my face-to-face instruction. This study is necessarily descriptive in focus. I have tried to connect what I have been learning from implementing some of the strategies here presented with what is being discussed in educational literature. What is evidenced here may not necessarily be generalizable to another course or program, even in an Honors program similar to the one here described. In saying this, however, the four strategies I have outlined here are, I think, very effective ways to interact with students through the use of technology.

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Strategy One: Icebreakers Icebreakers are important to the establishment of the learning community and climate (Knowles, 1980). I have used in class icebreakers during my first few sessions, but I have had resistance to that when it becomes the umpteenth icebreaker students have experienced. It is interesting to note that when I initially began my teaching in Honors I had the first class of the program at 9 AM on a Monday morning. For a majority of my students, this was also their first university course. But for all students (over the course of three semesters) it was their third or fourth icebreaker of the weekend. They had gone through these activities in various orientations, and by that point had developed a cynical attitude towards them. Such an attitude was a barrier to the development of the community necessary for success in this class and program. Technology, however, can help here. The purpose of an icebreaker is to begin to build a community of learners. However, does it need to happen in the first class, and if so, should it only happen in the first class? A community cannot form in one day, never mind one 50 or 75 minute class. Conrad and Donaldson (2004) note four phases of engagement in online learners that are equally applicable to the traditional classroom: the newcomer, the cooperator, the collaborator, and the initiator or partner (p. 11). Essential to this is the newcomer, which they argue takes at least two weeks to negotiate through, with the instructor acting as the social negotiator. One activity that I adapted from Conrad and Donaldson involved moving the icebreaker to Blackboard Vista, the course management system that I was using to deliver documents and have students deliver documents to me. Following some brief peer led introductions during our first meeting I assigned students a Name That Movie activity in a Vista based discussion (see Appendix B).


The discussion tool we used was in the Blackboard Vista course management system, which can allow for threaded discussions, blogs, and journals. For this discussion I used the threaded tool, in part to also introduce the tool to the students. Also, this assignment was not graded, yet still received such phenomenal interactions. It generated 307 messages from a class that initially had 18 students (one later dropped out) over the course of 5 days, between our Thursday meeting and our next meeting on the Tuesday following. My only adaptation to this activity was to have the students come to class to discuss their final responses. Walking into the Tuesday class after this activity was a different experience from the week before—I had a very noisy room, students visiting with their neighbors, discussing their movie titles and music tastes.

Subject: A Long Way Gone Date: September 3, 2008 1:57 PM

Strategy Two: Journals

This then led to the following interaction in the journal between the same student and myself:

Almost immediately following, we entered into our first major writing assignment, a critical reading of Ishmael Beah’s A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier—chosen as a part of our campus summer reading program, and seen by many of our faculty and staff as somewhat controversial due to its violence and general subject matter. I decided to begin our class discussions online—but considering the controversial nature of the book I also wanted to make this interaction between me at each individual student. For this reason, I used the journal feature. Appendix C-1 is a copy of a section of my syllabus introducing the online journal and explaining its purpose. As can be seen from this, the journal was an integral part of my strategy to engage students in the texts and in class activities. All were asked to post one question to the journal about their text, and to try to write an answer too. With A Long Way Gone, for example, one student wrote:

I guess the thing that surprised me the most in “a long way gone” was when they brought all those boys to the recovery center thing, they continued to fight each other. I would have thought that the war and the fighting was something they were trying to escape but it seems that it was part of their life for so long that it became ingrained in their nature.

I guess I sort of lost a little hope for the human race when I read that because how are we supposed to stop wars if the people in them just accept it as a way of life.

Author: Doherty, John Joseph Date: September 4, 2008 9:05 AM

Or, what if it becomes so ingrained that we cannot escape it without help. We hear a lot today about the PTSD our troops suffer from when they return from the war zone -- we are better able to recognize this today, but I’d argue all returning troops have that problem -- even our WWII grandparents and great-grandparents.

As adults we perhaps have a little more ability to control this -- though even then we still need a lot of help. What about children?

Author: STUDENT Date: September 4, 2008 1:50 PM

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I don’t think anything can erase memories of what happened to someone. Eventually they just become a part of who they are. It’s a big problem and I can’t really thing of a solution other than stopping wars all together which is probably impossible. This particular student chose to examine the idea of societies disintegrating in a paper he later wrote about this book—clearly influenced by his reading of this text. He also shared in class some interesting reactions to hearing Beah speak when he visited our campus a few weeks after this interaction. Technology here, I think, changes the pedagogical use of a journal. Journals are relatively typical in humanities and education classes, and are especially good at promoting self-reflection. Mills (2008), for example, documents that journaling as a pedagogical tool came from out of English in the 1980s. However, she also notes that students can tend to view journaling as busy work. Drawing on the Kiersey Temperament Model (cited in Mills, 2008), she suggests a number of strategies to overcome this, including allowing for expediency/ cleverness and focusing on immediate needs and issues. For the former, I would also add that one should allow for creativity—one of my students recently complained about the restrictiveness of the college paper structure. I opened up the journal to allow him an outlet for his more creative tendencies. This led to an increased effort in trying to use his perceived creative strengths work within the confines of the academic journal. My online journal was a little more structured than most (see Appendix C-1). Doing it online, however, allowed me to browse it more frequently, and to keep an eye on the students’ progress in the course. Indeed, sometimes reading the journal entries on a Monday evening would suggest ways I would have to change class on Tuesday to deal with emerging misunderstandings. Also, I was able to read and interact with the students’ journals without having to remove the journal from

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them—such as if they had been keeping a physical journal that they would have to submit. Students were also required to do two reflective writings that drew on their journal content, one at mid-semester and one at the end. Both were the same assignment, except the end of semester one was cumulative for the entire semester. The end of semester prompt for this assignment is presented in Appendix C-2. Students averaged a posting a week in their journals, which is confirmed by my doing a similar assignment in the previous year and by an evaluation survey conducted by another instructor also using the Journal feature. In this latter survey, students suggested they tended to access their journal once a week (see Appendix D). In saying this, however, in my most recent (Fall 2008) class, 7 students were averaging more than two entries per week. Indeed, for quite a few of these students the journal replaced email and in class questions as the primary mode of contact between me and them. All initially resisted the journals—as suggested by Mills (2008) they saw the journals as busy work. However, by the end of the semester, and the aforementioned reflective writing prompt, the value of the journal was universally acknowledged, even by students who had not completed as much of the work as others. These latter students actually expressed regret in not using the journal more, as they had heard anecdotally from their peers that the journals became an effective place to document their ongoing development as critical readers and writers.

Strategy Three: Documents Management Using these tools effectively requires the instructor to model the value of using the tools to the students. I would argue that this could also build in some of the learner support mentioned briefly above. It is important to introduce the tools noted here in a low stakes manner—for example, if students are going to be required to make extensive use of the


discussion tool then the icebreaker activity could be built to also introduce the discussion tool. A major goal of our university is sustainability. Also, this generation of students has a very strong sense of the value of sustainable activities. It was a comment on a previous end of term evaluation that suggested to me ways in which I could use the course management system and other tools to improve my own use of paper—and coincidentally save the program some printing costs. I decided to make all my papers due in Vista, not in class. This meant fewer actual pieces of paper—though it did require me to become more comfortable grading writing assignments online, using the MS Word Track Changes feature. As an aside, I also had to learn how to create PDF documents in order to create versions of the paper to return to the students in a way that required them to read my comments and edits rather than just accepting the changes in Word. There are also other ways to do this, such as using a Tablet PC in order to write margin comments, but I fast became comfortable in doing it the Word way. And, importantly for the students, even I have a hard time deciphering my own handwriting (see Bridge & Appleyard, 2008, p. 648). This also allowed me to explore the option of making papers due closer to the time when I would be actually grading them, thus closing the feedback loop by getting my graded versions back to students when the work was still relatively fresh in their minds. My class would run from 2.20 to 3.35 PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays. However, I usually would get to my grading on Saturday mornings. Therefore, instead of the papers sitting on my desk for two days or more, I made them due on Vista at 9 AM on Saturday, usually about an hour before I was to grade them. I could then return them before class on the following Tuesday, and students soon learned to look over my graded comments and to come prepared to discuss some of the writing issues I was noticing. Indeed, they came to prefer the online feedback, especially as they saw it happening much faster than in other

classes with more traditional paper submissions and returns.

Strategy Four: Quizzes I also used the course management tool to deliver the syllabus. For much of the same reasons as I spoke of above when speaking of icebreakers, I do not cover the syllabus on the first day of class. Rather, students are expected to read it online and then complete an online quiz that addresses the essential issues I would normally have addressed. Also, by introducing the quiz tool in a low stakes but essential assignment such as this, I had the added bonus of building student comfort with the tool and was therefore able to use it more frequently. This might on first blush seem a little strange in an Honors writing course. However, using the quiz tool allowed me to push some of my writing instruction from in class to online. I was using a writing text that had a good test bank supporting it. The publisher allowed me to download a Vista compatible set of questions covering some of the major issues the text itself explicates. In each of my major assignments I had the students focus on particular components of the writing process. For example, in their first formal assignment the most significant portion of the grade was in their thesis and introductions, typically an area in need of work with first year students. Students were therefore required to do these readings in complement to classroom activities, and then to take the online quiz. The quiz was not worth any points in the final grade, but success on the quiz did mean that students would then get access to the Assignment Drop Box for the paper they were writing (see a sample of this quiz in Appendix E). In other words, until the students completed the quiz to 90% satisfaction they would not be able to submit their paper (worth a significant amount of points). Students were allowed two tries, and if on the second they were still having issues, there would be an intervention by myself

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or one of my upper-class peer mentors, where we could work on that writing issue and then manually release the Assignment Drop Box. A metacognitive component to this—adapted from the work of Lovett (2008)—was also added, where students had to complete a journal entry with the paper that discussed their process in completing the paper, what they learned from the text, handouts and quiz, and how they applied those lessons to their paper. A follow up entry would follow, where the students would review my grade and make a plan for their next formal paper.

CONCLUSION These strategies are examples of where technology can help with interaction and engagement in a very busy seminar. The essential point here is that they need to be predicated on the idea of a community of inquiry. This class was so successful in building community that their engagement became intrinsic to their motivation to attend class. By the end of the semester one student had dropped out due to circumstances beyond her control. Of the remaining 17, not one was absent for the entire semester. So, why bother with technology? The four strategies outlined here were designed to refocus the course on the students. Therefore, it is fair to hear from the students, via an end of semester evaluation. Students were asked to rate how effectively their class time was used. Of 15 respondents (out of 17 in the class), 67% rated it at least Mostly or Always. In regards to interaction, 80% rated participation from the class and instructor at Mostly or Always encouraged. In saying this, some noted in open comments that the documents management though the course management system was a hindrance. An equal number reported that using the system was effective. I have given relatively short shrift to the need for student support in the use of technology. There is a basic assumption that first year students are

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technologically savvy. However, my students were not prepared to use Blackboard Vista and needed some scaffolding to build their comfort level in it. That needs to be a part of my practice in future iterations of this course. In saying that, however, I saw a great deal of student engagement. I have already noted that I did not register one absence the entire Fall 2008 semester. I only really became aware of this record about 8 or 9 weeks into the course—when students have usually discovered the absence policy in the syllabus (see Appendix A) and begin to take advantage of it. I suspect that students saw their in class time as being more effectively used, and that the out of class online activities, such as the Journal, prepared them well for what we did in class. In some ways, I feel that they started to become more intentional learners. The overwhelming response to the icebreaker activity was certainly something that proved invaluable to both the in class discussion of Cronon’s Only Connect and Beah’s A Long Way Gone. By the end of the semester this was a group fully connected with and respectful of each other. Activities that demanded trust, such as peer review, became much more invaluable and engaging, in that the students saw their success as intertwined with that of their peers. From a student perspective, therefore, there was a sense that the technology helped with interaction and engagement, but they were relatively undecided as a group to the uses in respect to documents management. For the former, one student did think there should have been more interaction online, noting in the end of semester evaluation that: “The [upper class peer mentors] kind of fostered a sense of community. … They made announcements about fun things going on at NAU. I think they should’ve utilized VISTA more and interacted with the students through that media.” For the latter, the ambivalence was mostly due to the barriers that the course management


system put in the students’ way when they were submitting assignments: “Much of the assignments posted on Vista hindered me, as well as the Wiki portfolios. Online assignments are not my strong points.” Technology can provide a way to not only enhance the classroom experience. It can allow instructors to explore mediated instruction outside of the context of the classroom time by using a course management system. Even a course as intensely classroom based as an Honors seminar can utilize technology in pedagogically appropriate ways that will make it worth bothering with.

REFERENCES Bridge, P., & Appleyard, R. (2008). A comparison of electronic and paper-based assignment submission and feedback. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(4), 644–650. doi:10.1111/j.14678535.2007.00753.x Chickering, A., & Gamson, Z. (1987). Seven principles of good practice in undergraduate education. AAHE Bulletin, 39, 3–7. Conrad, R.-M., & Donaldson, J. A. (2004). Engaging the online learner: Activities and resources for creative instruction. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Cronon, W. (1998). Only connect: The goals of a liberal education. The American Scholar, 67(4), 73–80. Doherty, J. J. (2008). Facilitating interaction: A case study on the role of the reference librarian in online learning environments. Saarbrucken: VDM.

Educause. (2003). The new academy: The NLII annual review 2003. Retrieved January 21, 2009, from http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/html/ nlii_ar_2003/index.asp Garrison, D. R., & Anderson, T. (2003). E-learning in the 21st century: A framework for research and practice. New York: RoutledgeFalmer. Gunawardena, L., & McIsaac, M. (2003). Theory of distance education. In D. H. Jonassen (Ed.), Handbook of research for educational communications and technology (pp. 355-395). New York: Simon and Schuster Macmillan. Hays, P. A. (2004). Case study research. In K. deMarrais & S. D. Lapan (Eds.), Foundations for research: Methods of inquiry in education and the social sciences (pp. 217-234). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Knowles, M. S. (1980). The modern practice of adult education: Andragogy versus pedagogy. (2nd ed.). New York: Association Press. Lovett, M. C. (2008, May 5). Metacognition and monitoring: Understanding and improving students’ skills for learning: Educause learning initiative events. Retrieved January 21, 2009, from http://net.educause.edu/eliweb085 Mills, R. (2008). It’s just a nuisance: Improving college student reflective journal writing. College Student Journal, 42(2), 684–690. Moore, A. H., Fowler, S. B., Jesiek, B. K., Moore, J. F., & Watson, C. E. (2008, April 17). Learners 2.0? IT and 21st century learners in higher education. ECAR Research Bulletin, 2008(7). Retrieved January 21, 2009, from http://connect.educause. edu/Library/ECAR/Learners20ITand21stCentur/46519. Moore, M. G. (1989). Three types of interaction. American Journal of Distance Education, 3(2), 1–6.

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Motschnig-Pitrik, R., & Holzinger, A. (2002). Student-centered teaching meets new media: Concept and case study. Educational Technology & Society, 5(4), 160–172.

ENDNOTES 1.

National Collegiate Honors Council (NCHC). (n. d.). What is honors? Retrieved December 19, 2008, from http://www.nchchonors.org/whatishonors.shtml. Schwab, J. J., Westbury, I., & Wilkof, N. J. (1978). Science, curriculum, and liberal education: Selected essays. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Yin, R. K. (2003). Applications of case study research (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

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2.

Thanks must go to the many students and staff of this program, especially to the students of my Fall 2007 and Fall 2008 courses. A special appreciation is due to Kevin Ketchner for not only working through some of the ideas in this chapter with me but for helping with the final version of this chapter. Much of the data describing the program is from a Spring 2007 Self Study created in support of the program’s seven-year review by the National Collegiate Honors Council. This 43-page document and accompanying appendices (A through P) are not included here in order to maintain confidentiality of the institution and program herein described.


APPENDIX A Common Syllabus for First Semester Honors Course Note: this has been edited to delete any identifying information [ - - ] University University Honors Program Honors 1--: Seminar in Critical Reading and Writing, I Instructor: Office Hours: Class Meeting Time: Phone/Office: Course Prerequisites: Admission to the Honors Program

Course Description: Honors 1-- is a reading- and writing-intensive course designed to introduce you to a liberal studies education. An important part of this course is your acquisition of specific skills: close (i.e., critical) reading, analytical writing, cogent speaking (i.e., effective oral communication), attentive and active listening, and critical thinking. The readings for this class, as well as the tasks required of you, have been carefully chosen and arranged in order to make possible your attainment as well as enhancement of these skills within a learning environment that encourages your understanding and appreciation of key issues at the heart of a liberal studies education. Your 1-- instructors come from a variety of disciplines and professions. They will help you define and explore these key issues in a manner that reflects their unique training, specialties, and perspectives.

Course Orientation and Goals: In this course, your readings, writings, and class discussions will address, both broadly as well as specifically, the theme of the human condition and the ideas and issues arising from this theme: e.g., the nature and function of being human; societies, communities, and communication; morals, ethics, and ethnicities; power; gender; or identity, to name a few. We will explore this theme through literature spanning a number of centuries and across disciplines. Through your readings, written assignments, and discussions this semester, you will work to clarify these issues, refine your thoughts and attitudes about them, and consider these issues within the context of the world around you. By the end of this course, you will: •

• •

Demonstrate improved and refined capabilities in essential lifelong skills, including close (critical) reading, analytical writing, cogent speaking (effective oral communication), attentive and active listening, and critical thinking. Recognize the complexities of the human condition from a variety of perspectives: literary, historical, cultural, moral, social, and so on. Appreciate the role that you play as a member of the Honors, [University], and [local] communities,

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and as a citizen of the 21st century.

Course Requirements: The following requirements are common across all sections of HON 1--. 1. 2.

HON 1-- and HON 1-- may be taken in any order. If, within the first two-three weeks of classes, your instructor deems that you need extra writing instruction, you will be required to register for ENG 100, a 1-credit-hour, pass/fail course designed to help you improve your writing skills. You must take and complete this course during this current semester. We also encourage any students to take this course if they believe they need extra writing instruction during the semester. 3. You will read the syllabus carefully and familiarize yourselves with the HON 1-- attendance policy. 4. You will read materials – books, essays, articles, chapters, etc. – that cover a broad chronological range and a number of important themes. Individual instructors will tailor the reading materials according to these guidelines as well as to their specific needs in each section of HON 1--. 5. You will write a 3-page paper during the first 2 weeks of classes on the [University] Summer Reading Program text, A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, by Ishmael Beah. You will submit 2 copies of this paper to your instructors. 6. You will write 3 formal, analytical essays (5-7pp. each) that explore topics and issues related to your readings and discussions. The second and third papers may also introduce you to the rudiments of research-paper writing. You will also revise each of these papers through a peer-review process. 7. You will complete a minimum of 13 pieces of informal writing, each 1 ½-3 pp. long. 6 of these 13 informal exercises and writing assignments will address the categories of composition – introduction/thesis, paragraphing, style/voice, mechanics, analysis/logic, and supporting evidence – that will be part of your formal writing assignments all semester long. 8. You will complete an annotated bibliography on a topic, book, or issue related to your class readings or discussions, which contains a minimum of 5 secondary sources. 9. You will submit a collection or portfolio of writing at the end of the semester that consists of (a) your first draft and revised copies of your Summer Reading text assignment, (b) all of your first draft and revised informal writing assignments, (c) your first draft and revised copies of your formal papers, (d) 1 copy of your best formal paper, and (e) a 1-2pp. “Self Statement.” 10. You will be expected to participate thoughtfully and intelligently in all class discussions.

Assessment and Grading: The goals and objectives listed above will be assessed and/or graded in the following manner: 1. 2. 3.

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15% of total grade: 1 5-7pp. formal essay on 1 text/reading. 20% of total grade: 1 5-7pp. formal essay on 2 texts/readings. 20% of total grade: 1 5-7pp. formal essay on 2 or more texts/readings.


4.

15% of total grade: 1 5-item (minimum) annotated bibliography on a topic related to class readings/ discussion. 5. 15% of total grade: participation. This portion of your grade will include some or all of the following: class attendance; active and informed class discussions; active and informed participation in study groups; write-ups of your study group meetings; on-time submission of formal and informal writing assignments; diligent attention to peer reviews of essays; an awareness of and respect for differing opinions; one 10-minute book report; submission of writing assignments for the Honors Program Assessment procedure. Individual instructors will specify the requirements for this aspect of your grade. 6. 15% of total grade: your portfolio (see number 9 above). TOTAL: 100% Note: each instructor will be responsible for providing a rubric or formula for grade justification. In addition, each instructor will responsible for providing students with handouts on writing instruction, prompts, and so forth.

Attendance, Academic Dishonesty Policies: Seminars such as this are joint enterprises and it is crucial that we come to speak, to listen, and to contribute. Students who learn the most do so, among other reasons, because they participate and involve themselves consistently and earnestly in class discussions with their instructor and with other students. Therefore, attendance is extremely important, and students who miss class will be penalized as follows: If a student has 4 absences, his or her participation grade will be lowered; if a student has more than 4 absences, his or her final grade will be lowered according to the requirements specified by individual instructors. Academic dishonesty in all forms violates the basic principles of integrity and thus impedes learning. More specifically, academic dishonesty is a form of misconduct that is subject to disciplinary action under the Student Code of Conduct and includes the following: cheating, fabrication, fraud, facilitating academic dishonesty, and plagiarism. Academic dishonesty, as defined in the Student Handbook, will not be tolerated in this class, and will be handled in the manner prescribed by this handbook.

Texts and Readings: All students will purchase the books required for their specific section of HON 1--. They will also purchase a writing manual as specified by their instructors. Please note that instructors may also provide you with additional photocopied materials, materials available on [Course Management System], and materials obtained on-line. Finally, all students will purchase the [University] Summer Reading Program text, A Long Way Gone, if they haven’t already received a copy through Summer Orientation.

Course Schedule: Week Reading Assignments Writing Assignments Week 1: Summer Informal Writing #1 Reading Text; Selection of Education Readings Week 2: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #2

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Week 3: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #3; Rough Draft of Formal Paper #1; Peer Review Week 4: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #4; Final Draft of Formal Paper #1 Week 5: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #5 Week 6: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #6 Week 7: (instructor choice)informal Writing #7 Week 8: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #8; Rough Draft of Formal Paper #2; Peer Review Week 9: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #9; Final Draft of Formal Paper #2 Week 10: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #10 Week 11: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #11 Week 12: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #12; Bibliography Due. Week 13: (instructor choice) Informal Writing #13; Rough Draft of Formal Paper #3; Peer Review Week 14: (instructor choice) (instructor choice for informal writing); Final Draft of Formal Paper #3 Due Week 15: (instructor choice) (instructor choice for informal writing) Guidelines for choosing readings for your individual HON 1-- sections and for creating your syllabi: 1.

2.

3. 4.

5. 6.

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Instructors should choose readings (and films, if desired) that cover a broad chronological range. In other words, instructors should not create syllabi that look solely at contemporary literature or events. This broad chronological range is intended to give students a historical context of the reading materials, to make connections between past and present, and to understand the thematic, conceptual, literary, historical, cultural, and philosophical roots of their reading materials. Instructors should include a paragraph after the boiler-plate HON 1-- information about the content of their specific sections of HON 1--. The paragraph should address what kinds of readings will be assigned, why these readings have been assigned, how they relate to one another, and the themes, issues, and (historical, literary, cultural, and philosophical) concerns that these readings might well address. Students can and should be expected to read 30-60 pages per class period of assigned materials. The assigned readings should touch upon several themes related to the Human Condition, such as Education, Politics, Gender, Community, Class, Ecology, and the Environment, Science, Psychology, Ethics and Morals, Philosophy, Post-Colonial Thought, Ethnicity, Gender, among others. Ideally, these themes will connect with one another in some meaningful way. Choose readings that you know will stimulate good discussion and that will lead to interesting prompts, paper assignments, and out-of-class conversations. Reading materials can be, but need not be, typical “English Department” fare, i.e., novels, short stories, poems, plays, and the like. Reading materials can include collections of essays on a certain topic, materials from journals, newspapers, and magazines, and readings specific to certain departmental interests (history, sociology, psychology, ethnic studies, etc.) In other words, syllabi can reflect an interdisciplinary perspective.


7. 8.

In addition, syllabi can reflect content that is cross-cultural. Finally, all faculty agree to assign and teach reading materials on Education and to teach the Summer Reading text at the beginning of the semester. (For new instructors: please ask the director for a list of education readings often used by HON 1-- instructors.)

APPENDIX B Name That Movie Adapted from Conrad, R-M and Donaldson, J. A. (2004). Engaging the online learner: Activities and resources for creative instruction. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass (p. 53). By the end of Wednesday, August 26th: 1.

Post a 2-3 sentence discussion response to the following: If you were to write the score to the movie of your life, which two songs would you pick and why? Please pick one song that represents your life as a whole and another that gives a more recent picture. 2. By the end of Sunday, September 1st: Based on the answers to 1, above, suggest a movie title for each person, followed by a one sentence explanation of why you chose that title. Do this by responding to their initial posts. 3. By the beginning of class, Tuesday, September 2nd: Consider all the suggested titles for your movie (by reading all of your responses). Select the one title that would best fit your movie and note it in your discussion thread, followed by a 1-2 sentence explanation of why you chose it. Also, bring this response to class.

APPENDIX C-1 Journal Assignment [Section redacted] Participation Journal: (Worth 170 points) Participation Journal 1 up to 10/12/2007: 85 points, incl. Informal Writing 5 Participation Journal 2 from 10/15/2007: 85 points, incl. Informal Writing 13 Note: The Participation Journals are available in the Vista Discussions section. Here you will weekly post your discussion questions and engage in a 1-to-1 dialogue with me. No one else has access to this Journal. At Mid-Term and Finals week I will review the Journals and the Summative Journal essays (i.e. informal writing assignments 5 and 13) and assign the 85 points accordingly.

In Class Participation: I will frequently ask you to present your views on different subjects during class discussions. You will be expected to come to class ready to fully participate. Failure to do this will result in the lowering of the

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