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NAPP 2022

Digitally Enabled Education:

Conversations with a learning designer

22 July 2022

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Agenda (60 mins)

Challenges in blended/online teaching and learning	15
Teaching as a design science and CILT learning design process	10
Humanising online learning and People Mgt Example	15
Share ideas about designing a space where students feel like they belong	15
Examples of activities to foster interaction / engagement / belonging (for later)
Check out & Closing	5

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What are your biggest challenges when it comes to blended / online learning?

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SEP-TLF survey

CHE-USAf-UFS Staff Experience of, and Perspectives on Teaching and Learning and its Future (SEP-TLF) survey
1,851 responses from 24 institutions (3.4% of the sector)
Two main perspectives:

Staff experiences during the pandemic (e.g., wellbeing, support and training, resilience and adaptability, access to resources, and successes and challenges)
Future of teaching and learning e.g., reflections on impact of the pandemic, quality, training and support

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Biggest challenges during ERT for staff

Challenges during ERT	Count	Percent
A lack of students’ engagement/participation	113	77%
Students not having access to the necessary resources/infrastructure	113	77%
Experiencing difficulty in ‘switching off’	104	71%
Keeping up with my research	103	70%
Adapting from face-to-face learning	95	65%
Lessons or activities not translating well to a remote environment	87	59%

“Remote teaching works to a certain extent. However, it is hard to judge class preparedness or understanding when you cannot see people”

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Biggest challenges during ERT for students

What students are struggling during remote teaching and learning	Count	Percent
Connectivity (including network difficulties, a lack of appropriate devices, and/or a lack of data)	112	76%
Engaging in independent learning/ self-directed learning	104	70%
Developing discipline-specific skills and values	100	68%
Developing general academic skills and values	97	66%
Grasping the content	80	54%
Balancing academics and social time	80	54%
Communicating with classmates (not because of connectivity challenges)	77	52%

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Why is interaction/

engagement so important?

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Community of Inquiry

Garrison et al 2020

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Teaching as a Design Science - Diana Laurillard

“Teaching is now a design science. Like other design professionals – architects, engineers, programmers – teachers have to work out creative and evidence-based ways of improving what they do. Yet teaching is not treated as a design profession…Every day, teachers design and test new ways of teaching, using learning technology to help their students. Sadly, their discoveries often remain local. By representing and communicating their best ideas as structured pedagogical patterns, teachers could develop this vital professional knowledge collectively.”

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T-E-D-D-I-E

Explore

Implement

Design

Evaluate

Think/ Feel/ Be

Develop

Starts with ADDIE
Draws on various models, including:

Dabbagh and Bannan-Ritland (2005)
Mor and Mogilevsky’s (2012) Design Inquiry of Learning (DIL) model
Agile development models

Puts learning designer at the centre / reflexivity

DG

For the purposes of this course, we have adapted the Dabbagh and Bannan-Ritland (2005) model and Mor and Mogilevsky’s (2012) Design Inquiry of Learning (DIL) model as a conceptual framework for practice. We also draw on ideas from rapid learning design models (Boulet n.d.) such as the SAM learning design model to show the iterations of the cycle and the repeated small steps rather than a linear process. We call this the design for learning online model. Our design for online learning includes five iterative processes, underpinned by a continuous emphasis on “thinking in designerly ways”:

Oval arrow: Icons made by <a href="https://www.flaticon.com/authors/freepik" title="Freepik">Freepik</a> from <a href="https://www.flaticon.com/" title="Flaticon"> www.flaticon.com</a>

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“Design is a living practice, not a done thing. It is a medium for building relationship between ourselves and those who will benefit from or be harmed by our design choices; and as such, design is iterative, a praxis—a process of doing, examining, reflecting, doing... and of never getting so set in our ways that we forget there are always new things to try”.

(Morris, 2021)

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How do we create online classrooms where students feel like they belong?

In humanized online courses, positive instructor-student relationships are prioritized and serve "as the connective tissue between students, engagement, and rigor" (Pacansky-Brock et al., 2020, p. 2). In any learning modality, human connection is the antidote for the emotional disruption that prevents many students from performing to their full potential and in online courses, creating that connection is even more important (Jaggars & Xu, 2016).

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http://www.cilt.uct.ac.za/cilt/resources/humanising-your-classroom

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Predictability, flexibility,

connection and empowerment

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Key principles of trauma-informed pedagogy

Work to ensure your students’ emotional, cognitive, physical, and interpersonal safety
Foster trustworthiness and transparency through connection and communication between and among students in your class
Intentionally facilitate peer support and mutual self-help
Promote collaboration and mutuality by sharing power and decision-making
Empower voice and choice by identifying and helping build on student strengths.
Pay attention to cultural, historical, and gender issues

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v

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Sharon Ravitch (2020)

Inquiry Stance pedagogy

Trauma/healing informed pedagogy

Radical Compassion and Radical Self-Care

Emergent Design, Student-Centered, Active Pedagogy

Critical Pedagogy

Racial Literacy Pedagogy

Brave Space Pedagogy

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What do you do to create a space where students feel like they ‘belong’ online?

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Check out

What did you find most useful?

What surprised you?

What can you use immediately in your teaching?

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Next steps

Examples of interactions (compiled by Widad Sirkhotte, LD at CILT)
Resources on the CILT website
CILT webinars & workshops
CILT Design Studio
Book a consultation with a Learning Designer
EDN4501 Online and Blended Learning Design course (July / August 2023)

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Formative

Graded

Synchronous

Asynchronous

Group-based

Written / typed

Verbal

Pair-ed

Types of interaction - for later (compiled by Widad Sirkhotte, Learning Design at CILT)

Face-to-face

Interactions can further be categorised as group-based, pair-ed; written, verbal, formative, graded and can happen synchronously and asynchronously.

Q: How do you decide or know when to make the activity async / sync / written / individual, etc?

Consider PURPOSE. Think about the PURPOSE of the interaction and how it will help the student to reach the Learning Outcomes or AIms and Objectives in your course. It should NOT be to “keep them busy” or “to fill up time”, but to help them make work and to develop skills
It is about knowing one's students - knowing what kinds of challenges or barriers they may have. Student learning needs analysis? Student Dimensions

For example, if most students cannot join live sessions due to internet availability or due other work commitments... then activities should be async.

For the PGDip Emergency Care course - students are SHIFT WORKERS, so they could not have regular scheduled synchronous meetings, so we had to design asynchronous activities accordingly.

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Key considerations:

How to make students feel welcomed / sense of belonging
Providing spaces for students to share their knowledge, experiences and voice from the start
Setting the atmosphere for your course
“Liquid syllabus” (Pacanksy-Brock, 2020)

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Example: Student Intros using Profile-Cards

Questions to guide responses and to learn more about the student:where they are from, their interests, career goals and how they think

Names and faces

This is an example of an Intro activity that can be used in the BEGINNING of a course (First week or before you actually start teaching content).

This idea is based on the student card, where the lecturer said ‘that students are MORE than the student CARD and we must get to know them’.

So they some prepared questions for students to respond to in order to learn who they are in terms their names, where they are from, how they think, their interests, career goals.

Questions = Students learn about each other as much as teaching staff learn about who their students are.

Names and photographs were also included - so that people can associate names with faces; as well as to begin to learn to pronounce names properly. It also helps to make students feel included when you address them by name (rather than ignoring them because you cannot pronounce their name, or worse, you change their name to a nickname that they don’t appreciate).

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Example: Student Intros using Padlet Boards

Teaching staff introducing themselves and acknowledging posts made

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Example: Lesson / Week Starters

Questions to engage and guide responses

Activities to share prior knowledge and experiences

Instructional text: How/What to do and choice of expression

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How a student has found usefulness in reading peer responses to understand a concept in the Health context

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During the course / lesson

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Key Considerations:

Opportunities for students to contextualise
Opportunities for students to express what they are learning (formative assessment)
Opportunities for clarity and feedback
Motivate / Keep students interested

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Example: Annotating readings

Posing questions

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Student responses

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Example: Commenting

Comment button feature used for short comments

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Example: Discussions

Another common activity in the DURING stage, is having DISCUSSIONS.

But, there are challenges such as no-one responding; forums coming across as boring.

Ideas on how to start the conversation?
Lecturer posting first as a way to break the ice
Allow students to post in the form of AUDIO NOTES, IMAGES or Videos rather than only text as perhaps students don’t feel strongly about expressing themselves through the medium of written language.
Make the forum “grade-able” or count as a percentage towards their DP / overall course mark.
Change the instruction so that you get students to reply to at least 2 other posts made by peers. In this manner, “a culture of responding and interacting” is encouraged.
As the lecturer you also need to “acknowledge posts made”; so by the end of the week - you can post a reply in which you highlight main discussion pointers and to encourage further thinking.

Ideas on how to make the discussion lively?
Re-work questions so that it appeals to students.
You can even use images and videos as points of discussion instead of questions only.
Provide multiple questions for students to CHOOSE to reflect on rather than ONLY ONE. In this way, students have options to respond to. (For example, do you think ALL your students would be able to respond to this question: “Tell me about your best overseas experience?”)
Place forums strategically in the course (Don’t overuse forums as the novelty can easily be worn off). Alternative tools you can try out to get student responses include: Polls, Comment Button for short responses; Padlet boards.

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Example: Polls

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Example: Quizzes

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Key considerations

Consolidate what was learnt
Create opportunities for students to reflect on their learning
To extract key learnings
Clear up any misunderstandings / misinterpretations
Improvement / Feedback

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Example: Additional Resources / Post-Readings

Encouraging students to add to the list = building a community of sharing and involving students in the teaching process

Descriptions = connections

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Example: Discussion or Q&A

Guiding questions

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Example: Checklists

Based on LOs

Based on Tasks

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Example: Micro Course Evaluations

Let students know if it is anonymous or not

Involve students in making decisions about the course

After each week / section / module / mid-way

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Next steps

CILT teaching online portal - JIT resources

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Register for webinars

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Join the design studio

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Book a consultation with a Learning Designer

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Find this resource and more at:

www.cilt.uct.ac.za/cilt/remote-teaching�

Follow @CILT_UCT on Twitter ��Contact help@vula.uct.ac.za for support

Unless otherwise stated, this resource is licensed

under a CC BY 4.0 International license

Remote Teaching 2020

Centre of Innovation in Learning and Teaching