Category Archives: 3. Prof. Skills & Abilities

The Flexible Learner – Blended Learning

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Blended learning

What is it?

This term is generally applied to learning and teaching that occurs both face-to-face and through an online interface. The majority of the courses on which I teach have this blend of approaches to a greater or lesser degree. Most of the PGDE and MA modules are face-to-face with materials collated onto the University’s virtual learning environment (VLE) My Dundee to provide further exemplification of ideas and concepts discussed in lectures and workshops or to provide a place to share and store helpful resources and suggestions for practice.

The M.Ed modules use the online environment more extensively, providing opportunities for the students to communicate with each other and their tutor in a collaborative way and to engage in the majority of their learning online.

According to TeachThought (2013, no page) using technology in blended learning should ‘not just supplement, but transform and improve the learning process’. It could therefore be argued that the ‘taught’ Education programmes do not blend learning as technology is often used to supplement not transform learning and indeed the M.Ed ‘distance learning’ programmes probably do not fit TeachThought’s definition either in that there is a lack of face-to-face contact and therefore limited opportunities to develop strong, purposeful communities of learning. How my colleagues and I use the VLE is effective and utilises the majority of its functionality, however, it cannot really be described as blended learning, yet!

Why blend learning?

According to the U.S. Department of Education (2010) studies contrasting blended learning (online and face-to-face instruction) with face-to-face instruction have shown blended learning to be more effective, whilst using online learning or face-to-face instruction singly are no more or less effective than each other. Torrisi-Steele and Drew (2013), however, identify that whilst some studies did agree with the U.S. Department of Education’s contentions, there were no comprehensive explorations of the reasons for the noted effectiveness; for example, the teaching strategies employed or the quality of resources. The U.S. Department of Education’s meta-analysis and review of online learning goes on to identify that online learning which has a collaborative aspect, whether that be with other students or with a tutor, is more effective than independent online learning (U.S. Department of Education, 2010).  The above arguments provide a reason for blending learning but not necessarily a clear picture as to whether the main reason for the effectiveness of blended learning is the ‘blend’ of the learning or whether there are other issues at play.

Torrisi-Steele and Drew (2013, p. 378) suggest that blended learning needs to ‘exploit the attributes of technology and face-to-face teaching… to achieve enriched learning experiences or perhaps create better learning experiences not possible through the use of face-to-face teaching or technology alone’. Whilst their research clearly emphasises how transformational blended learning can be they raise some important issues regarding the ability of staff to use technology to enhance learning and teaching not just supplement it. Hew and Cheung (2014) agree, saying ‘It is not sufficient to merely put course contents on a web site for students to download for a blended-learning course to be successful’ (Hew and Cheung, 2014, p. 5). One of the main issues Torrisi-Steele and Drew (2013) highlight surrounds academics having to expand their knowledge of the technological tools and appreciate the advantages and disadvantages of these tools. Alongside this the introduction of technological tools often requires a complete overhaul of teaching strategies and course design to take account of different modes of delivery and assessment and this is no easy task.

So how could I use blended learning and what benefits would it bring?

In terms of blending learning I have already started to integrate aspects of online learning into my learning activities. The next step is to structure this learning to provide meaningful, integrated activities which use technology for a purpose rather than just a fancy way of collecting information or sharing course content. In considering key activity 3 (see appendix 4), the use of technology has to also incorporate students taking an active role in their own learning and being co-creators of it. For this to be manageable and relevant for everyone then using technology to facilitate tutor-directed tasks (TDTs) in the form of a Glow blog seems a sensible place to begin and for my guinea pigs to be my secondary mathematics students. My reasons for choosing my secondary mathematics students are three-fold: they will be a small group that I can support and monitor more easily; I see them regularly throughout the academic year and therefore this can be become an iterative process of change and improvement; and anything they do using an online learning space contained in Glow can be used as evidence towards their Standards for Provisional Registration (SPR) and continued when they leave university to be used for their professional update.

References

Assessment Reform Group (1999) Assessment for Learning: Beyond the Black Box. Cambridge: University of Cambridge School of Education.

Education Scotland (no date) Curriculum for Excellence: Principles for curriculum design. Available at: http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/learningandteaching/thecurriculum/howisthecurriculumorganised/principles/index.asp (Accessed: 13 June 2016).

General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) (2012) Standards for Registration [Online]. Available at: http://www.gtcs.org.uk/web/FILES/the-standards/standards-for-registration-1212.pdf (Accessed: 14 June 2016).

Grow, Gerald O. (1991/1996) ‘Teaching Learners to be Self-Directed’, Adult Education Quarterly, 41 (3), pp.125-149. Expanded version available online at: <http://www.longleaf.net>.

Hannan, A. (2001) ‘Changing Higher Education: teaching, learning and institutional cultures’, Annual Conference of the British Educational Research Association, Leeds, 13 September. University of Leeds. Available at: http://www.leeds.ac.uk/educol/documents/00001855.htm (Accessed: 13 June 2016).

Healey, M., Bovill, C. and Jenkins, A. (2015) ‘Students as partners in learning’, in Lea, J. (ed.) (2015) Enhancing Learning and Teaching in Higher Education. Maidenhead: OUP.

Hew, K.F. and Cheung, W. S. (2014) Using Blended Learning: Evidenced-Based Practices. Singapore: Springer.

TeachThought (2013) The Definition of Blended Learning. Available at: http://www.teachthought.com/learning/blended-flipped-learning/the-definition-of-blended-learning/ (Accessed: 16 June 2016).

Torrisi-Steele, G. and Drew, S. (2013) ‘The Literature Landscape of Blended Learning in Higher Education: the Need for Better Understanding of Academic Blended Practice’, International Journal for Academic Development, 18(4), pp. 371-383.

Lecture observation

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Now that took me back…having someone sitting in my ‘class’ watching me teach. That has not happened for a good few years (accept when I was observed working with the PGDE(S) maths students just before Christmas). It was different though being observed by someone who does not know me on a personal or professional level.

I spent an inordinate amount of time preparing for the input making sure that the lecture flowed, made sense, did what I wanted it to do plus incorporated the use of resources to keep the students motivated and engaged. They probably did not know what had hit them!

Comfortingly though as soon as the students walked into the lecture theatre they made lots of ‘ooow’ noises when asked to take multiple choice cards plus a whiteboard and pen – know thy audience – they have always reacted well to the whiteboards in particular and today was no exception – a good start.

The initial YouTube clip seemed to have the desired effect and there was a buzz around the room when the majority of the group ended up on the smiley face. Perhaps on reflection though it may have been an ideal opportunity to delve into some of the mathematics behind the clip rather than taking a superficial look at the activity being related to probability – something to consider for next year; alternatively maybe come back to it at the end once the students have had an opportunity to consider the progression/skills of chance and uncertainty and be able to appreciate how to use it as a stimulus. I have already re-titled the slide ‘Chance or Certainty?’ which I think adds another dimension to what the clips represent. So doubly good start!

Admission time…I totally forgot to print off the multiple choice card slide, which I had wanted to display on the visualiser so that I did not have to keep reminding the students what each letter represented – note to self, go back to putting a resources slide on the PowerPoint to keep track of things I need!

The next few slides with their activities and interactive and discursive opportunities worked well but the main strategy which helped enormously at this point in the input was that I have started to learn more of the students’ names providing me with the opportunity to engage more specifically with them. I tried not to use this in a threatening way but boy did it make everyone sit up a little more! As I see the MA2 students for a significant number of inputs this is going to be a priority for me for next year and in fact I am already making in-roads to learning the names of the MA1s. This hadn’t actually been a priority for Semester 1 as with teaching the 180 PGDE(P) students there was no way I could remember everyone’s name. Also there had been no need to learn names up until this semester as I had not really taught an entire cohort of students in a lecture situation and was able to use my table names and number cards to ensure participation in the workshops. Working in a lecture theatre environment has been a steep learning curve as it is so unlike a classroom teaching environment. Saying this it has really spurred me on to think about and investigate ways to ‘make’ people interact with me, although this is still a work in progress.

So, returning to why today was different from my observation before Christmas. It was potentially because there were more students today and I have not built up as close a relationship with them as I have with my PGDE(S) mathematicians and therefore am not as relaxed working with them? As hinted at earlier perhaps it is the difference in my relationship with the two observers. I was more nervous today and perhaps need to reflect a little bit more about why that was. However, it is amazing how once you get started your instincts and experience kick in and eventually you forget that there is someone there, watching.

The one thing that I have really loved about coming to the University is that I am again experiencing that buzz you get from planning interesting activities and seeing them work (or not!) and taking chances and trying things out. Although my job as a senior leader in a school was rewarding and challenging I came into teaching to teach and that is what I am doing again and I love it!

Every day is a learning day, folks! Every day!

Enthusiasm, knowledge or experience

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I had a really interesting experience this week that has made me think about perception, my practice and whether experience and enthusiasm for one’s subject is enough.

I had the opportunity to work with the MA2 students this week, not in my capacity as a lecturer in education but as someone talking about their experience as a headteacher.

My perception of this input was that the students were more engaged in what I had to say, they interacted more willingly and there seemed to be an atmosphere in room of genuine interest in the subject matter. One group even intimated that they felt that they should have given me a round of applause. I suspect this has not ever crossed their minds at the end of a mathematics lecture!

This flagged up several questions for me about what was different between this input and my others:

  1. Was it the subject matter?
  2. Was it the fact I was speaking about my experience as someone the students respect, i.e. a headteacher?
  3. Was it the fact the students were sitting in TDT groups rather than their usual friendship groups?
  4. Was I imagining things and was it more to do with how I was feeling rather than the students’ responses?

Subject matter – well…this is a whole other post I suspect. Mmmm…learning about maths as opposed to thinking about aspects of multi-agency working? I always try to think of ways to make what I’m saying and what the students are doing in my mathematics lectures/workshops interesting and engaging but perhaps that’s what I think I’m doing and is not the reality of the situation. However, perhaps the students have a different mind-set going into mathematics lectures than they do for other subjects and even if I was to do exactly the same in mathematics as I did for the multi-agency input they still would react differently. There were more opportunities to discuss things in the multi-agency input but that was the nature of input and during mathematics inputs there are different pressures and things to get through. Saying this I had a workshop with the MA2s later the same day which was completely practical in nature with very little direct teaching but lots of opportunities for talking, discussing, asking questions and engaging in mathematical activities. Whilst the vast majority of the students seemed to enjoy and participate enthusiastically in the activities, I perceived the engagement not to be as widespread as in the morning’s multi-agency input. This makes me wonder whether my third question above has a part to play in this as the students get to choose who they sit with, interact with and work with in my workshops – perhaps I should mix things up a little?

Did the fact I was speaking from experience as a headteacher make a difference to the students’ willingness to participate? This is a really interesting question as I would contend that I have far more experience and knowledge about mathematics learning and teaching to share with the students than I do about my time as a headteacher. Is it that they get me regularly in my role as their maths lecturer and familiarity breeds contempt?

Unfortunately, through all of this I seem to have more questions than answers and questions that will probably never be answered.

My next steps? Well…I can only do what I can do and I cannot make people be enthusiastic about my subject or love it the way I do. I can show my enthusiasm, which I think I already do, and prepare learning which motivates and encourages students to see the value in our time together; however, as face-to-face contact is so precious and limited sometimes there has to be ‘telling’ and not as much ‘experimenting’.

I wholeheartedly believe that mathematics is a subject where children should learn through activities that stimulate thinking and discussion about strategies and which young people can see has relevance to their day-to-day lives whilst also being:

“…beautiful, intriguing, elegant, logical, amazing and mind-blowing; a language and a set of systems and structures used to make sense of and describe the physical and natural world” (Ollerton, 2003, p.8).

This being said, it is my job as a university lecturer to teach our student teachers how to teach mathematics, how to plan activities and learning which will engage their learners not necessarily for the students to engage in the same activities; I can only ultimately provide the kindling and matches for the fire and it is up to them to decide to light it or not!

References
Ollerton, M. (2003) Getting the buggers to add up.  Chippenham: Antony Rowe.

Student roles and mathematical competence

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Just been reading an article from the Mathematics Education Research Journal about student roles and mathematical competence. I’m not quite sure what to make of it and what the article was ultimately trying to conclude. It describes how mathematics is taught in two different ways in a first grade and second grade class in an American school. The children who were part of the study had been taught one way in the first grade class and were now experiencing a different way of being taught in the second grade class. I suppose I was expecting to read that the more discursive, investigative way of teaching in first grade was going to come out as a better way of teaching and that the children would not enjoy being taught in a more traditional manner in second grade. It doesn’t seem to be that way. However, it has made me wonder if the children had been taught in the traditional way in first grade and then in a more problem solving based way in second grade if this would have made a difference to their feelings of security and success.

I think the one message that does, however, come clearly through is that the attitude of the teacher towards the children and their answers is similar in that both teachers treat incorrect solutions as learning opportunities and don’t discount the children’s answers, right or wrong.