Engaging Mature Students: Locally and Nationally.

I am reflecting on a session I attended at a local university which focused on engaging mature students. Our table had the case study 'Claire' to explore. The table agreed that the scenario is well known and applies to quite a number of mature students.

Claire was the first person in her family to go to university. My table immediately started to discuss that aspect before reading on. It became clear that there can be quite serious pressures from the family to question why Claire wishes to go to university. “We never went and we did alright”; “do you think you are better than the rest of us” and “you are putting your family at risk if you don't earn money” were comments made by the table. Clearly, enrolling onto an university course can have additional pressures on some students even before starting. In addition, the logistics of traveling, balancing home/family life with study, issues such as traveling to university for one lecture is both costly in both time and money.

The case study described Claire as feeling isolated as she has been unable to attend social events or meet many other mature students to share the experience of balancing demanding aspects of their student life. Clearly, Claire does not appear to have strong support framework at university and home. Phil Race explores “What keeps learners going when the going gets tough?” (Race, 2007) identifies that 1 out of 10 are kept going by strong support and encouragement; 3 out of 10 by 'not wanting to be found lacking' and 6 out of 10 gave 'need' , e.g. “it was a necessary step” and “I need to be able to do it”. These interesting facts does confirm that support is one aspect that an educational organisation can help make a positive difference to the success of the student. The next activity explored how support could be provided.

Each table was provided with the 'What Works?' grid to identify how each aspect of the students' life cycle at university can be supported. The life cycle started from pre-entry to post graduation (or exiting). Opportunities for each target life cycle was provided by the 'system' i.e. Academic, Social, Professional and organisational.

The entries identify for the grid by my table had a social networking theme and identified a need for improved information provided by new communication conduits. The aim of the communication conduits are to help join students, tutors and the organisation together. A strong communication conduit based on research was presented at the end of the session. The research focused on a local university which identified that the communication conduits need to start at pre-entry via the website which revolves around a new and developing mature student section. This section provides information focused on mature students needs and offers the opportunity to connect with other mature students to aid a feeling of inclusiveness.

My own research suggests that barriers can be overcome by providing clear and transparent communication conduits, which leads me to consider... how can all the current communication conduits in an educational organisation be identified and even more importantly be assessed for effectiveness and efficiency?

Reference:

Race, P. (2007) Making Learning Happen, SagePublication, London

Change of Emphasis!

I have been exploring how students can study a course without attending. I have two students who are unable to attend a course and are studying away from the class. I am uploading all the learning content we use in the session as well as a video recording of the session.

If they do succeed I am wondering what effect this will have on any future session I teach. I am wondering if I should provide the learning material and then use forums for the students to discuss the topic and any questions posed. The class time can then be spent exploring what the students have learned from the material and discuss the issues it raises.

This turns my normal sessions on it's head. I normally provide homework/questions on the subject explained in class for the student to consider at home. The distance learning model I am using appears to require the student to learn the topic away from the class and bring questions and issues to the session. This can be used as a discussion opportunity for all.

I am in deep thought... is this the natural way courses should be delivered whether the student can attend the session or learn at distance.

I am reconsidering my learning and teaching methodology. Time for more reading on the subject.

Reflecting on a workshop session I attended at a university

My reflection is on a workshop that I attended at a university. I suggest that technology could provide an increase in class size for Further Education (FE) colleges and reduce barriers to learning by providing access to a 'live' lecture from various locations. I would be very interested in comments on this reflection, especially those that address quality in terms of presentation, interaction, bi-directional feedback and post lecture support.

The workshop session “In conversation with... Personal experiences of teaching at [name withheld]” was a very informative session which allowed me to hear first-hand what it is like to teach at an university. I found that the very large increase in class size and the method of providing a Graduate Training Assistance (GTA) to provide small group tutorials or follow up laboratory work to be a major difference between FE and Higher Education (HE) methods of learning and teaching. While reflecting on this method of learning and teaching I posed myself the question... could this be provided by a FE college?

I do believe it is possible to have large classes of students learning core subjects such as mathematics and to provide the opportunity to have tutorials that will contextualize the subject to the students' own specialism. And this does happen in some curriculum areas but the class numbers will be in the tens, not the hundred or so (in some cases hundreds) that can be found in universities. To reach the numbers mentioned, curriculum areas will need to work closer together to obtain the class sizes in the hundreds. If this was achieved there could be an infrastructure design issue... many colleges do not have rooms designed for that number of students.

On further reflection there may be a technology solution... the lecture could be streamed to a number of classrooms and displayed on a screen at the front of the room. Student feedback could be obtained through the use of services such as Twitter or Textwall and displayed for the tutor and students to see and respond as appropriate. This could be taken one step further by streaming it to students' at home and therefore making a truly (inter)national course. The video stream could be recorded and made available to the students for revision or to provide an opportunity for learning if they were unable to attend the live session.

Thank you in advance for your comments.

Shhhh: don't mention Technology Enhanced Learning!

I have just seen the updated policies and planned learner inductions for our college and noticed that there is very little mention of technology in a positive sense.

Thankfully the policies and planned activities are shared using technology to communicate them(Social Networking?) and I have used the available comment feature to highlight this omission.

Question... do we need (more) teacher and learner involvement in the development of policies and planned activities such as Induction? Could a Facebook page and surveys be part of the answer :-) to improve learner and tutor voice as well as another opportunity to become more comfortable with the use of Social Networking?

Random thought: colleges are big ships, but if you lean on the tiller hard enough it will eventually turn.

Engineers Exploring Technology Enhance Learning

I have been pleasantly surprised with the amount of support I have received from other tutors on the new HNC Engineering course. I am focusing on moving the programme of study to a more blended/distance learning approach. The first stage of embedding the use of Moodle in their delivery was actively embraced. Now we have moved on from just myself recording sections of their sessions for upload to Moodle/YouTube to one of the tutors' using a FLIP camera to record the session without my assistance.

This is incredible progress in such a short period of time. The next challenge is to show them how to "top and tail" their recordings and upload to Moodle and/or YouTube without the need for my support at all.

Time to start sharing this good practice with other curriculum areas!

Putting pedagogy into Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL)

I am expanding my focus from removing the infrastructure barrier(s) (real and perceived) to TEL onto exploring how pedagogy can be used in this digital age. The title of the essay I am writing is: Beyond the computer screen:Enhancing differentiation through the merging of electronic and human interfaces

The essay focus on how a tutor working face-to-face with a learner in an individual tutorial in the 'real' world can be replicated at a distance through the use of Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL). The 'quiz' is the vehicle used to identify the learners' understanding of a particular topic and the one-to-one tutorial is the methodology used to ensure all feedback from the quiz is understood and that misunderstanding are rectified to enable the learner to succeed.

Our Cascade Model using PDAs and TLCs.

National and in-house research has identified barriers to using technology in learning and teaching include a lack of information and a lack of clarity about what teachers can and cannot use. From September 2010 we will be using a cascade model to improve communication both up, down and across the organisational structure to develop a Community of Practice.

The Professional Development Advisor (PDA) and Technology Learning Coach (TLC) roles are the building blocks of a framework to monitor and have influence on the decision process to utilise Technology Enhanced Learning (aka e-Learning, ICT and ILT). The decision process will be lead by pedagogy.There will be two main roles in each Centre:-

1. PDA
a) One for each curriculum centre (more if curriculum is offered in other campuses).
b) Trained by Advanced PDA with continuous updating (weekly)
c) Key driver is the use of e-learning/technology in Curriculum Centre
d) Ensures communication within Centre, with TLCs (see below) and with Advanced PDA, PDAs and national Communities of Practice
e) Evaluate perception of technology/e-learning in Curriculum Centre (using government supplied on-line survey (Generator) which will enable comparison of trend across curriculum areas and across colleges)
f) Audit what resources are available in the Curriculum Centre and where they are
g) Identify areas of need from all Curriculum Centres
h) Ensure resources are where they are needed
i) Identify good practice to share
j) Meet with Advanced PDA once a week – cascade of information (including demonstrations of TEL) to and from Advanced PDA including the sharing of good practice by PDAs (beginning of a Community of Practice)
k) Makes sure TLCs have training and resources they need
l) Each PDA have three TLCs at a time
m) Take realistic steps – the most important tasks will be identified and clear SMART goals set for completing them
n) Hopefully, the role will attract time (remission) next year, but this is nowhere near definite.

2. TLC
a) Someone who wants to use technology in teaching
b) Someone other teachers come to for help (peer support)
c) 2-way communication with PDA
d) Identify a project that they wish to develop and complete (could be as simple as a set of interactive PowerPoints)
e) Receive training in technology they want to start using
f) Advanced PDA has small funds to help buy some of their time to release them to complete agreed projects. Other possible sources of funding could be the Research and Scholarly activity fund.


The PDA training has been contextualised to the needs of our college and will be delivered by the Advanced PDA, with support from members of the TEL- Community of Practice

We currently have seven PDAs and twenty one TLCs I am hoping to have at least five more PDAs for the second wave of PDA training (July) with all Curriculum Centres and Campuses represented with PDAs and TLCs in the third and final PDA training sessions in the new term.

Issues not being reported!?

Interesting meeting on Friday. It has become clear that issues with technology are not always reported as often as they should be as staff feel they are not looked at in a timely manner. Staff are finding strategies to work around the issues.

I have decided to focus on a few particular issues and take them forward on their behalf to try and see the whole picture.