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2007: ASCILITE 2007 Conference Proceedings

 

 

 

 

The proceedings of the 2007 ASCILITE Conference.

R. J. Atkinson, C. McBeath, S. K. A. Soong, & C. Cheers (Eds) (2007).

ICT: Providing choices for learners and learning.

Proceedings ASCILITE 2007.

Centre for Educational Development, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

December 2-5, 2007.

Published: 30 November 2007

ASCILITE Conference - Concise Papers

  • Practitioner’s task design considerations and choices for blended mode large language classes

    Yaw Yuen Loi, Yik Sheng Lee

    In recent years there have been works on developing generic and reusable frameworks, or design patterns and pattern language to facilitate learning designs. No doubt such works have contributed tremendously to the reusing and sharing of useful learning designs and improve their transferability to other similar contexts. However, even though such high or medium-level descriptions of learning designs provide useful guidelines and models for practitioners to source and reapply into their unique contexts, decisions of which designs to employ, for what kinds of learner, and in which educational contexts remain complex design decisions to make for practitioners everyday. The appearance of learning technologists in many higher education institutions with the aim to assist the teaching staff in learning design may ease some of the contextualisation and localisation issues, especially for a fully online course, but in blended-learning environments, the face-to-face classroom contexts are inaccessible to anyone but the teaching staff themselves. Thus there is a need to explore and document the common considerations made by such practitioners teaching in a blended mode and the design constraints for them. The paper intends to documents the experiential knowledge of design by the practitioner at such ground level.

  • Digital design and student learning through videoconference collaboration

    Joshua McCarthy

    This paper reports on a pilot study involving a long distance learning experiment between the University of Adelaide and Penn State University through a six-week videoconference program. The program involved staff and students from digital media courses within each University, including Dr Dean Bruton, Senior Lecturer in the School of Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Urban Design at The University of Adelaide, and Associate Professor Madis Pihlak, Director of The Stuckeman Center for Design Computing, School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, Penn State University. Using Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) for teaching digital design processes has many advantages and disadvantages. Instant communication between groups and individuals across the world, defies the barrier of distance. Interdisciplinary exploration and collaborative action allow the expansion of design curriculum possibilities and the sharing of information and experience, while technical skills and standards rise as students find new levels of potential in response to more diverse audiences. Disadvantages with such design experiments include time differences between two continents, technical constraints and the availability of technical assistance. The project was largely successful, evident through positive feedback from staff and students, and the emergent relationship between the two schools. Through this pilot study, and the resulting research, new possibilities are now being explored, including cross- continental design collaboration with design schools in Canada, Malaysia and India. The University of Adelaide, has supported the project by supplying a AUS$48,000 grant to purchase the test equipment, used in the pilot study, and establish a dedicated videoconference facility.

  • A blended approach in a graduate teaching assistants’ pre-service course to promote self confidence

    Joanne W. McClure

    The employment of postgraduate students as graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) to help in the delivery of undergraduate teaching, particularly in laboratories and tutorials has been used for many years throughout higher education institutions, including North America, UK, Australia, and New Zealand and is currently being used in Singapore. However, despite GTAs’ sound subject knowledge, research has shown that with their increasing numbers, it is important to provide an effective training course to adequately prepare them for the task of teaching ahead of them. This paper reports on a GTA Preparation Course undertaken by 166 participants in 2006, at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. The course employed a blended learning approach using video-recorded ‘mini-lectures’, PBL videoed critical incidents, reflective learning, as well as self study materials through an online Blackboard platform. The blended learning environment facilitated a friendly cooperative space that allowed the flow of the learning process to proceed at its own pace. This environment encouraged self reflection and self evaluation, supported collaborative learning and problem solving skills, and facilitated tasks requiring analyses and evaluation of ‘real life’ teaching situations. It was considered important that participants experience the blended learning approach modeled in the course in order to encourage them to use a similar model in their own teaching. The course encouraged the use of technology to enhance and enrich student learning and to model active learning activities through video, group work, online materials and recorded presentations. Participants’ ratings of the course suggest that this was an effective pedagogy for promoting innovative educational technology and self-confidence in GTA’s teaching practice.

  • Facilitating student interaction in a group project: Experience with the use of Blackboard

    Alemayehu Molla

    This paper aims to reflect on the experience of using Blackboard’s “Group Pages” functionality to facilitate students’ interaction in a group project assessment. The unit used in this project is an Information Technology Strategy course. It is a post-graduate level course. Preliminary findings indicate that there appears to be a strong association between the use of the tools and the group marks. However, we can’t claim that the use of the tools was the only or even the major factor that has affected group marks. The paper concludes with some observations.

  • Engaging undergraduates with podcasting in a business subject

    Padma Nathan, Anthony Chan

    This study is based on an investigation into the implications of the use of talkback radio- style podcasts in a final year business subject. The authors contend that face-to-face teaching can be supplemented by such podcasts and prove to be a valuable learning experience among these undergraduate students. Beginning with the objectives of the study, the paper continues with a description of the research methodology before addressing the findings derived from a questionnaire over a semester of podcasting efforts. It concludes with suggestions for other business educators interested in undertaking similar efforts with the intention of contributing towards best practice in the field of academic podcasting.

  • Online role plays and the virtual placement: Aiding reflection in work integrated learning

    Alan Ogilvie, Kathy Douglas

    This paper presents the framework for an online role play which forms part of the student learning experience in a virtual placement. The virtual placement is complementary to a Work Integrated Learning (WIL) Professional Internship concurrently undertaken in a criminal justice agency. Whilst completing the Professional Internship, students conduct an Occupational Health & Safety (OH&S) risk assessment of the workplace, in consultation with industry supervisors and academic staff. The outcome of the risk assessment forms the foundation of the role play which involves the student advising, consulting and negotiating with various stakeholders to implement OH&S improvements to the workplace. Laurillard’s (2002) “conversational framework” provides the theoretical underpinning for the role play. The online role play will be implemented and evaluated in first semester of 2008 at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia.

  • Introducing mobile technologies: Preparatory staff development issues

    Ian Olney, Geraldine Lefoe

    This paper explores some of the staff development issues relating to the implementation of a mobile technology project involving academics and students in a Faculty of Education at a regional university. This project has been established to explore new pedagogies that may be associated with the use of mobile learning technologies in teaching and learning activities. The staff development process was approached through the provision of opportunity for staff to own and use mobile technology in their professional and personal contexts prior to their engagement with students. These provided a lead-up time for staff to think differently about how they could engage their students in the completion of assessment activities. We explore the process of how staff members became familiar with smartphones and ipods and examine some of the issues relating to this development and readiness for using them with students. The work required to adequately prepare staff to be comfortable with their implementation with students allowed us to identify issues that would enhance the use of new and or unfamiliar mobile technologies.

  • Using evidence and avoiding plagiarism e-learning module: Scaffolding academic integrity

    Alisa Percy, Venkata Yanamandram, Sandra Humphrey

    This paper describes the collaborative design, implementation and evaluation of a discipline-based eLearning module (eLM). The eLM was piloted as a mandatory but ungraded assessment task in five subjects across all years of study in the Management and Marketing specialisations, four in the Bachelor of Commerce, and one in the Master of Commerce, at the University of Wollongong. The eLM was developed in the subject’s eLearning space within the learning management system, Blackboard Vista and included a streamed lecture which provides a range of instruction and examples of how to use evidence, a link to the University’s Harvard Referencing Guidelines and an online quiz. The evaluations indicated that the design of the module and its embedded nature, in terms of both content and location, provided students with explicit instruction on using evidence and referencing that in general most students are required to acquire through a process of osmosis. Explicit instruction and assessment allowed students to be more strategic about their selection and use of evidence and apply these newly acquired skills to other subjects of study.

  • What is happening in my first year pre-service teachers’ online learning environment?

    Quek Choon Lang

    Online learning environment is a complex and dynamic learning space for learners to experience social and cognitive processes of knowledge and meaning construction. It has brought about educators’ re-designing of instructional approaches for the emerging constructivist environment Heinich, Molenda, Russell & Smaldino, 2002),translating classroom-based instructions to the Web, incorporating of asynchronous and synchronous communication as well as evaluating web-based instruction (Lynch, 2002). This study investigated 19 pre-service teachers’ learning in an online learning environment. These teachers’ online activities were analysed using their individual written reflection logs (end of the module) and a planned forum of discussion notes (out of the three planned forums). Out of the 17 emerging facilitation strategies used by these teachers in this planned forum, 3 highly rated strategies were: Initiating discussions (15.22%), prompting (14.13%) and summarising discussions (10.87%). These teachers also reported 20 facilitation strategies learnt (either by observing their peers’ action taken or acquiring on their own through readings as well as trials and errors) and of which 3 were highly rated: Asking questions (14.71%), summarising (12.75%) and demonstrating leadership (9.8%). It was also found that teacher-facilitators used more strategies than the five strategies introduced to them and they also learnt other facilitation strategies from observing their peers rather than those that they used to facilitate.

  • Beyond a participation focus

    Alan G. Roberts

    Sustaining participant engagement within collaborative online learning environments has proved problematic in a range of educational settings. It is not surprising then, that much of the literature around collaborative online learning has pointed to a pressing need to stimulate levels of participation and engagement. The underlying assumption seemingly being that increased participation will, in and of itself, lead to better learning outcomes within online environments. This paper argues that being overly concerned about participation and enjoyment levels may result in approaches that, at best, promote shallow forms of constructivism, rather than affording opportunity for deep knowledge building. The study reported in this paper draws on a body of research that has shown that levels of participation are inconsequential to the quality of knowledge building that occurs. Thus, when working with online groups there is a greater need to scaffold for the quality of interaction and output rather than the quantity of interaction.

  • Piloting social networking and Web 2.0 software at Deakin University

    Gayani Samarawickrema

    Deakin University piloted social networking software in order to complement and add a new dimension to its online learning and teaching efforts. In the first semester of 2007 eight teaching academics adopted three software applications. Six were used with students for learning while the other two were used by staff for professional development and research. This paper reports on the first attempt at providing institutional support for Web 2.0 and what was learned through the experience of these eight teaching academics which is essential to the ongoing development and decisions related to the future take up of these software applications.

  • Avatar and Olly: Discovering the impact of ICTs on youth social engagement

    Stefan Schutt, James Cartledge, John Martino, Justin Schmidt, Miles Menegon

    This paper presents preliminary research work of the Avatar Project, a Victoria University and VicHealth project dealing with young people’s use of technology within an online multi-user environment. The paper outlines the Avatar project, reports on experiences in establishing a 3D online world for youth participants, and presents the project’s research protocol/methodology for its in-depth three-year study. The paper also presents the Olly Tool, a new browser-based instant messaging tool that enables researchers to establish a secure [closed] instant messaging network for collaborative classroom work-shopping in an online setting.

  • Exploring Web 2.0 for virtual design studio teaching

    Yun-Ju Shao, Linda Daley, Laurene Vaughan

    Following the development of e-learning platforms, the virtual design studio (VDS) has become a new method for implementing studio-based design education in online environments. With the rise of Web 2.0, the ways in which people engage with digital technologies has been transformed. The studio model of teaching and learning is a dymanic area of e-learning development. Although this is a broad-brush term for a model of constructivist learning across art and design fields, it is not as generic as it may seem. The unique skills and knowledge of different design fields necessitates diversity resulting in subtle differences in the form of studio teaching and environments. This paper presents the position of a working doctoral research project that is concerned with the design of web 2.0 online environments for VDS teaching. The scope of the PhD investigation is to understand the needs of teachers within VDS teaching environments in the hope of enhancing the teachers’ experience and encouraging the usage of such e-learning systems. Drawing on Broadfoot and Bennett’s pedagogical guidelines, with an integration of Donald Schön’s physical design studio, and Thomas Kvan’s virtual design studio theory, this paper argues for the importance of observing the teacher’s role in both the physical and virtual design studio. This paper then aims to identify the research position and related theories that are informing the project’s evolution.

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