kift altc senior fellowship: articulating a...

KIFT ALTC SENIOR FELLOWSHIP: ARTICULATING A TRANSITION PEDAGOGY

December 2008

Yoni Ryan

Commentary on first year curriculum case studies: Technology perspective

Author:Professor Yoni Ryan is Director of the Institute for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning at the

Australian Catholic University, a six campus national university spread over the eastern states.


2 Kift ALTC Senior Fellowship: Articulating a Transition Pedagogy

Author01.Professor Yoni Ryan is Director of

the Institute for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning at

the Australian Catholic University, a six campus national university spread over the eastern states.

02. Her strong interest in the First Year Experience comes from her extensive experience as a promoter of ‘student-centredness’ in staff development. Since she has had a long-term interest in the use of innovative educational technologies, she has also researched and published on Web 2.0 as an emerging platform for student learning in the 21st century. She has also contributed in a number of universities in Australia and the Pacific, as well as Sub-Saharan Africa to staff development in the area of curriculum design and development.

03. Her publications span these areas: ‘Teaching and learning in the global era’ in King, R. (ed) 2004 The University in the Global Era; ‘Borderless education and business prospects’, In Evans, T., Haughey, M. & Murphy, D. (2008) International Handbook of Distance Education; with Robert Fitzgerald, ‘Exploring the role of social software in higher education’ (in press). She has also presented at a number of the FYE forums organised mainly through Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and their associated staff.

The First year curriculum perspective04.I was asked to comment on these

case studies from the particular perspective of the integration of

new technologies in learning design and development to ensure the ‘seamless’ connection of ‘in-class’ and ‘out-of-class’ first year experiences. A colleague and fellow commentator on these studies, Dr Noel Meyers from the University of Tasmania (from early 2009, Head of School of Science

and Education, University of the Sunshine Coast), had in 2007 undertaken a survey of Australian and US university websites on ‘The First Year Experience’ (FYE), and found that, in almost all cases, the websites were designed for students, and ‘problematised’ them. So there were directions on how to deal with financial crises, academic writing skills, time management, and loneliness. There was almost no use of Web 2.0 to support students, with the exception of a couple of First Year Coordinators at more well-endowed universities promoting blogging as a means of enhancing a first year social network. Only one or two universities included specific professional development activities for staff working with first years, or for principles that would assist staff teaching FYs in designing appropriate learning curricula during the transition year.

05. We were perplexed: clearly, the evidence accumulated over several years of FYE fora and within universities, as well as in the national surveys on the FYE, demonstrated the close links between persistence at university, and students’ relationships with their peers, their teachers and efforts to ‘engage’ them through imaginative and coherent curricula. Surely, we thought, universities confronted with contestable funding in the form of the Australian Learning and Teaching Performance Fund (LTPF), which partly depends on retention and progress, would respond with specific guidelines that assist staff in considering the importance of the design of the first year curriculum, and the teaching and learning practices that enhance student engagement? And surely university staff would recognise that some uses of new technologies could support both design and teaching practices?

06. My comments on these cases then represent my interests in learning from specific examples of design and practices that support learning using new technologies, and considering whether these examples have wider applications outside the local context of the case. How can we use new technologies to increase the integration of student learning experiences within and outside class? This is one of the greatest challenges for the teachers of ‘new

Ryan Commentary: Technology perspective

3Kift ALTC Senior Fellowship: Articulating a Transition Pedagogy

generation students’ who increasingly are ‘detached’ from the campus, who have other social networks than their traditional ‘learning communities’, and who spend a high proportion of their lives in paid work.

07. My investigations with another colleague at the University of Canberra, Dr Robert Fitzgerald, revealed that while young students were avid users of Web 2.0 applications in their social lives, they perceived an increasing divide between the static technologies (Learning Management Systems employing content dissemination) and the dynamic applications they were using to construct and communicate with social networks. This situation deepens the divide between the ‘world’ and the ‘world of learning’ that students experience.

The case studies

Education Case Study (Healy, Queensland University of Technology)

08. This case represents a thorough and systemic approach to design of a whole of program first year curriculum which encompasses a planned, ‘intentional’ curriculum and learning design, and a professional development program for staff, underpinned by a faculty interpretation of university-wide principles for first year teaching.

09. Like most programs in universities today, this one relies heavily on the use of a Learning Management System (LMS) to provide flexibility for students in relation to access to program information and content knowledge outside class time. The introduction and use of student e-portfolios is ‘encouraged’ in first year subjects, though it is not clear how much uptake there is of this opportunity. It might be useful for students to have this element of their program mandated, at least in embryonic form. Wikis are included in the program design, although it is not clear how they are used or how extensively.

The program makes excellent use of audio files for writing guides and other student support activities, and the use of a module for student peer assessment is an excellent innovation in training students to develop their self-critique skills.

10. Another element of this case that is noteworthy is the use of online technologies for staff development, through uploading examples of good practice in each of the QUT six principles for first year teachers.

11. This is a very new program, and it will be fascinating to follow its evaluation and further refinements of the program as it evolves.

Applied Sciences (Techone) Case Study (Fee and McCracken, Simon Fraser University)

12. A particularly productive use of online technologies in this new program is the use of a ‘community portal’ for all students enrolled in the TechOne program, so students can communicate across the content areas and themselves forge the integration of their ‘inside and outside class’ experiences. The facility allows them to create a community of learners in what is a new program and a new campus, and must be particularly effective with the non-traditional learners the program wished to attract. Providing a ‘Q&A’ page is always a helpful source for new students, since it allows them to ask the ‘dumb question’ they may fear to ask in class. The use of a blog to examine a particular technology of the student’s choice in the core subject ‘Everyday Contexts’ also represents an imaginative way to engage students with and in new technologies! The retention rates of 85 per cent into second year are testimony to the hard work of staff and the power of an integrated and planned curriculum.



Arts And Social Sciences (Explorations) Case Study (Marchbank and Fee, Simon Fraser University)

13. From my perspective of seamlessness, I have nothing to say about this case.

Writing and Communication (Bilby) Case Study (Radbourne and LeRossignol, Deakin University)

14. All foundation subjects are critical in the development of the Graduate Attributes we expect our students to develop over the course of their programs, yet anecdotally, it is clear that few first year curricula make an explicit attempt to immerse students in the concept of the Graduate Attributes they will develop over the degree program.

15. The Bilby website is an imaginative and thoughtful planned technology application that provides flexibility in terms of access to a variety of learning resources out of class, allowing students to practise their skills in job applications and graduate career planning for example, in their first year. Such skills are normally taught in the last year of a program, but this timing acknowledges that students are already job-focused in first year, and it also supports the subject ‘content’ of writing.

16. Given the high proportion of international students in our universities today, and their initial difficulties with accents and academic English in the first weeks of their Australian programs, audiostreaming the four core lectures for later review is an excellent use of a variety of technologies for first year programs. Further, the introduction of the Honey and Mumford Learning Styles Questionnaire allows students to develop that critical capacity

of ‘meta-learning’, learning how they learn, early in their university experience, thus capitalising on their self-interest at that stage, and making them conscious of approaches to learning they favour. This is completed well by having the Study Guide provide exercises for each learning style.

17. The use of a ‘Breaking News’ section on the website ensures that the site remains alive and is re-visited, while allowing staff to work ‘on the run’ with certain aspects of the program. Another program learning design that I think demonstrates in and out of class seamlessness is the requirement that students take on personas in writing their letters to the editor of the Bilby newspaper: this mimics the role playing that occurs in Web 2.0 applications such as MySpace, Facebook and SecondLife, favourites of Net Gen.

18.It also encourages the community engagement common in Graduate Attributes in most universities.

Information Technology Case Study (Nelson, Queensland University of Technology)

19. Like most of the programs in these cases this is a new program, with all the advantages that confers in conceptualising a ‘whole of program’ approach. I particularly appreciated the use of the metaphor of the ‘student journey’ through a program as a frame for the learning design.

20. The use of just-in-time emails to remind students of key dates is an excellent idea! These can be generated before the semester starts for automatic release at appropriate intervals. The unmoderated but monitored discussion board feature also allows staff to check student concerns without ‘intruding ‘on their space. There is a good spread of learning activities using technologies across the subjects in the program: for example, blog entries in one subject, and an e-portfolio in another, as well as weekly

Ryan Commentary: Technology perspective

5Kift ALTC Senior Fellowship: Articulating a Transition Pedagogy

online activities that must be completed as a mechanism to engage students on a regular basis, and ensure ‘time on task’. Another feature of program design and delivery that integrates new technologies in a thoughtful way is the use of pre-class PowerPoint slides with audio comments and print notes, forcing students to prepare for a coming class.

Science (Biology) Case Study (Gleeson, University of Melbourne)

21. This case is an example of a centralised transition program to university by a Group of Eight University that is the source of much FYE research work, and demonstrates the power of education research to effect change at the institutional level.

22. Unlike the other case studies here, it represents the support programs universities can put in place, rather than a curriculum approach: the focus is on developing student–student social networks. It also includes learning support online modules for important skills students must develop: self-paced ‘Independent Learning Tasks’ at both remedial and extension levels for practising and furthering writing skills, etc. Two other elements of the approach that assist students are the online module ‘AirPort’ to guide essay writing in biology, and a rubric for marking an assignment so students can learn to self-critique by ‘marking’ three assignments. This skill of self-assessment is one of the least developed components of university programs, as evidenced by the number of later year students who cannot estimate ‘how they went’ in an assignment. This is one of

the few cases reported that explicitly refer to working with Student Support staff in the design of learning tasks and approaches.

Law Case Study (Westcott, James Cook University)

23. This case study incorporates a ‘blawg’ for social networking in one subject, but as there is no further information it is hard to comment on the seamless integration of technologies.

Overarching observations of case studies24.While the programs and

approaches reported here are relatively recent initiatives,

it is gratifying to see that the work of the Centre for the Study of Higher Education at the University of Melbourne in the FYE research, and of Professor Sally Kift and

her colleagues at QUT and Griffith University for the FYE Conferences, and of countless individual academics and support staff in Australian universities is being applied systematically in at least some program design. However, the reports of the fragility of programs at QUT (Information Technology) and at Simon Fraser (TechOne) give us pause for thought. So many first year initiatives depend on the enthusiasm and dedication of one or a few individuals and a small amount of seed money. The pressure to reduce costs (for these

programs are usually labour-intensive and demanding to sustain) at institutional

... rubric for marking an assignment so students can learn to self-critique

by ‘marking’ three assignments. This skill of self-assessment is one of the least

developed components of university programs,

as evidenced by the number of later year students who cannot estimate ‘how they

went’ in an assignment.



level makes them especially vulnerable to cutbacks and staffing pressures.

25. The key elements of these approaches would appear to be:

a. a careful and informed planning of program within an evidence-based framework, mindful of the particular cohort of students involved

b. the appointment of dedicated personnel with a commitment, not just to the program and its relevance for first years, but also a belief that professional development for staff is key to the program’s success

c. the understanding that the FYE is critical, not merely for the ‘brownie points’ that accrue to a university if it demonstrates good retention and progression rates, but also for the individual student who can develop the confidence in their ability to complete the ‘journey’ that is university learning.

26. There are few discipline-specific approaches reported here; the points to note are that a discipline is best supported when there is an institution-wide understanding, or at least a set of well-enunciated principles for approaching first year curriculum design, as at QUT.

Additional comment27.The cases all employ the ‘set pieces’

of websites and LMS subject sites in order to provide students

under time pressure with out-of-class access to important ‘content’ resources, links to support resources, and in many cases, online modules for the development of ancillary learning skills and Graduate Attributes. A few, such as the Bilby case study (Radbourne and LeRossignol) cleverly capitalise on the SecondLife possibilities of contemporary ‘invented’ cultures to engage students in ‘serious’ learning.

28. All recognise in some way through the use of new technologies, that students are time poor and need out-of-class and online opportunities to learn.

29. However, it is clear that we are still some way from a ‘seamless’ integration of in- and out-of-class learning through newer forms of web technologies. These are relatively new programs, as noted, and, if they survive, they will undoubtedly evolve and be sufficiently mainstreamed and ‘bedded down’ to allow further refinement and experiment with newer forms of technologies; ones that allow knowledge to be created and accreted by specific student cohorts, so that first years can identify themselves as learners and researchers within a university program that recognises its students no longer operate in the ‘closed community’ of the medieval university, but instead are learners in the world.

... it is clear that we are still some way from a ‘seamless’ integration

of in- and out-of-class learning through newer forms of web

technologies.

SupportforthispublicationhasbeenprovidedbytheAustralianLearningandTeachingCouncilLtd,aninitiativeoftheAustralianGovernmentDepartmentofEducation,EmploymentandWorkplaceRelations.TheviewsexpressedinthispublicationdonotnecessarilyreflecttheviewsoftheAustralianLearningandTeachingCouncil.

FurtherresourcesdevelopedunderthisALTCSeniorFellowship,Articulating a TransitionPedagogy,areavailableathttp://www.altcexchange.edu.au/first-year-experience-and-curriculum-design

http://www.altcexchange.edu.au/first-year-experience-and-curriculum-design

kift altc senior fellowship: articulating a...

Documents