Group items tagged

complex, challenging, and sometimes even messy problems that closely resemble real life

active inquiry and higher-level thinking

engage students, cut absenteeism, boost cooperative learning skills, and improve academic performance

In order to change to a learner-controlled instructional system and to maximize interaction, I had to change my role from that of a teacher at the front of the classroom and the center of the process to that of facilitator who is one with the participants and whose primary role is to guide and support the learning process.

The result was a course designed as a learner-centered system based on dialogue and cooperation among students (1992, p. 61).

Such a move engenders a radical shift in the power and interaction structures in the classroom as the students must accept the responsibility for their own knowledge creation, and the instructor must relinquish a certain amount of control over the process.

. In this environment, teachers become mentors and guides rather than the "all knowing" authority often associated with the traditional face-to-face format. In addition, new issues and challenges have begun to materialize from this new paradigm, prompting investigations related to the quality of online instruction:

engage distance students in their local communities through experiential learning opportunities.

provide community service as part of their academic coursework, learn about and reflect upon the community context in which the service is provided, and develop an understanding of the connection between service and their academic work.3

  E-Pedagogy: Does e-learning require a new pedagogy?  5 The emergence of e-learning  As part of the technological revolution, the use of e-learning, or blended learning, isincreasing. This is particularly true of Higher Education, which offers most programmespartly or wholly online. In the future, e-learning is likely to be more widely used in thetertiary and school sectors. Another driver for e-learning is life-long learning, whichrequires on-going training and re-training of the adult workforce.In many cases, e-learning is delivered through a virtual learning environment (VLE),which is a custom built environment designed for online learning. VLEs, such as  Blackboard and Moodle , typically provide all of the software tools required for onlinelearning such as communication and file sharing facilities. These environments are oftenmodelled around the traditional campus, providing ‘virtual staff rooms’ and ‘onlinecommon rooms’. E-portfolios provide the digital equivalent to the traditional paperportfolio; these typically provide online storage for a range of media types (such asdrawings, photos and videos). Dedicated e-assessment systems, such as Questionmark ,facilitate large-scale online testing, providing many of the question types that arefamiliar to teachers.Some academics have pointed out the potential of e-learning to improve current practice.Garrison and Anderson (2003) write:“E-learning has significantpotential to alter the nature of theteaching and learning transaction.In fact, it has caused us to face upto some of the current deficienciesof higher education, such as largelecturers, while providing somepossible solutions or ways tomitigate these shortcomings. Seenas part of pedagogical solution, e-learning becomes an opportunity toexamine and live up to the ideals of the educational transactiondescribed previously.” New learning opportunities The changing environment facilitates new kinds of learning. Teachers have traditionallyfocussed on content; indeed, many consider the identification and delivery of learningmaterial to be their prime role. But it has been argued that the traditional skill of contentcreation is redundant in the information-rich learning environment. Some of this contentis very high quality, even world class, and certainly superior to a hurriedly producedhandout of the type often used by busy teachers.It has been suggested that the contemporary teacher should be more “guide on the side”than “sage on the stage”. The ready availability of information makes  facilitation moreimportant than direction . The pedagogic issue is not too little information but too much:the contempora

changing learning landscape poses fundamental epistemological questions about thenature of knowledge and how it is acquired. Dede (2008) writes: “In the Classicalperspective, knowledge consists of accurate interrelationships among facts, based onunbiased research that produces compelling evidence about systematic causes […]Epistemologically, a single right answer is believed to underlie each phenomenon […]The epistemology that leads to validity of knowledge in Web 2.0 media such as Wikipedia  is peer review from people seen, by the community of contributors, as having unbiasedperspectives. Expertise involves understanding disputes in detail and proposingsyntheses that are widely accepted by the community

hatever new theory of learning emerges in thenext decade, it will likelybuild upon thesepedagogie

The primary goal is information acquisition

Examples are traditional classroom lectures, reading assignments, and watching educational television.

high degree of instructional support, feedback and reinforcement — with limited learner control

it helps remove the filter.

Alex mentioned her desire not to allow students to unsubscribe from the posts.

introduction post counted (which apparently it didn’t) that now I am behind.

I did that wrong too

Students are empowered to learn on their own and even to teach one another.

Students served as instructors to their classmates, and together they worked toward learning goals more effectively than if they had been provided with the answer by the instructor.

There is considerable evidence showing that assessment drives student learning. More than anything else, our assessment tools tell students what we consider to be important. They will learn what we guide them to learn through our assessments.

Assessment is more than grades To many, the word "assessment" simply means the process by which we assign students grades. Assessment is much more than this, however. Assessment is a mechanism for providing instructors with data for improving their teaching methods and for guiding and motivating students to be actively involved in their own learning. As such, assessment provides important feedback to both instructors and students. Assessment is Feedback for Both Instructors and Students Assessment gives us essential information about what our students are learning and about the extent to which we are meeting our teaching goals. But the true power of assessment comes in also using it to give feedback to our students. Improving the quality of learning in our courses involves not just determining to what extent students have mastered course content at the end of the course; improving the quality of learning also involves determining to what extent students are mastering content throughout the course.

Assessment Drives Student Learning The types of assessment usually performed in first-year science, math, engineering, and technology (STEM) courses--giving students tests--merely inform students about their grade, or ranking, after they have received instruction. In addition, these common testing techniques--which typically test for fact-based knowledge and algorithmic problem solving--tell our students that this is the type of knowledge we think is most important. That is, we appear to value the understanding of concepts at a relatively low level. Given that this is the type of assessment our students most frequently encounter, and that it will eventually lead to their final course grades, students learn to study the content in our courses in an expeditious way that allows them to succeed in passing many first-year STEM courses without necessarily developing deep understanding of concepts. It is our assessment that drives students learning.

The problem with Prensky's assumption is that it's based on age--on the idea that, because you were born in a certain era, you must be a certain way.

measurable criteria that can be counted or marked as present or not present in the work that is being evaluated. 

This allows the rubric to be used as an ongoing dialog between the teacher and student and allows the student to know when each criterion has been met and then make improvements as needed. (Lockett, 2001)

Although allowing student involvement in creating rubrics is time consuming, by allowing students a voice in creating their own rubric, the students have more ownership over their own learning and evaluation.