Group items tagged

Enhancing Learning Using Generic and Specific Aspects of Knowledge Formation Peter Petocz University of Technology, Sydney, Australia Peter.Petocz@uts.edu.au Anna Reid Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia Anna.Reid@mq.edu.au Abstract: Recognising and understanding the diverse ways that students learn is an important step in setting up effective environments for learning. A traditional way of getting this information is to observe the quality of assessed work and classroom interactions. An alternative and more direct method is to actually ask students to tell you about their own learning. While some students will be less successful than others in articulating their ideas, an overall picture will emerge of the variety of ways in which students understand what it means to learn. Such an approach has been used to investigate students' experience of learning in a variety of contexts. One practical effect of this line of enquiry has been the discovery of the dichotomy between teacher focused, content orientations to learning associated with a surface approach to learning and student focused, learning orientations associated with a deep approach to learning. These qualitatively different conceptions of learning result in discernible differences in learning outcomes. While some aspects of learning seem to be universal, others depend on the context of learning. In this paper, we look at two parallel studies of students' conceptions of learning in statistics and in music, areas quite different both in content and traditional methods of pedagogy. Research in these and other academic disciplines suggests that there is a strong relation between students' (and teachers') perception of professional work and their conceptions of their discipline and learning within that discipline. We discuss how this 'Professional Entity' is apparent in statistics and music, and how an appreciation of the Professional Entity can help teachers enhance their students' learning in other

The Scholarship of Teaching: New Elaborations, New Developments By Pat Hutchings and Lee S. Shulman Note: This article was originally published in Change, September/October 1999. Volume 31, Number 5. Pages 10-15. It's the middle of June as we begin this article, and our writing faces serious competition from the spirited company of 43 faculty in residence here at The Carnegie Foundation. Members of the Carnegie Academy for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (CASTL), these "Carnegie Scholars"selected through the Pew National Fellowship Program, one of CASTL's components-examine teaching and learning issues in their fields in order, as our program materials say, to 1) foster significant, long-lasting learning for all students, 2) advance the practice and profession of teaching, and 3) bring to teaching the recognition afforded to other forms of scholarly work. One Scholar is studying "moments of difficulty" as opportunities for student learning; another is pilot-testing a new model for teaching accounting; several have focused their work on ways to make students more purposeful, self-directed learners.

The Knowledge Media Laboratory works to create a future in which communities of teachers, faculty, programs, and institutions collectively advance teaching and learning by exchanging their educational knowledge, experiences, ideas, and reflections by taking advantage of various technologies and resources. The KML is currently working with its partners, including Carnegie Foundation programs, to achieve the following goals: * To develop digital (or electronic) tools and resources that help to make knowledge of effective teaching practices and educational transformation efforts visible, shareable and reusable. * To explore synergy among various technologies to better support the scholarship of teaching and learning. * To build the capacity for faculty and teachers independently to take advantage of information and communications technologies that enable them to re-examine, rethink and represent teaching and student learning, and to share the outcomes in an effective and efficient way. * To sustain communities of practice engaged in collaboratively improving teaching and student learning by building common areas to exchange knowledge and by building repositories for the representation of effective practice.

How to Teach These pages are complementary to the theory pages on Learning, which address various �why?� questions about learning. These address �how?� questions about teaching (teaching adults, that is). I suspect they will be consulted more than the others. (You can switch between the two parts of the site by clicking on the appropriate part of the logo in the top left-hand corner) I feel a bit presumptuous writing all this, because although I have been teaching for almost 35 years, man and boy (literally, because in that distant past I had my own primary-school class, as a temporary unqualified teacher, in what is now called the �gap year� before I went to university � poor souls, I wonder what became of them), I have not cracked it yet. I still have lousy classes, without understanding quite why. Going by the results of my evaluation questionnaires, my students think I have even more of them than I do!

'Constructive alignment' starts with the notion that the learner constructs his or her own learning through relevant learning activities. The teacher's job is to create a learning environment that supports the learning activities appropriate to achieving the desired learning outcomes. The key is that all components in the teaching system - the curriculum and its intended outcomes, the teaching methods used, the assessment tasks - are aligned to each other. All are tuned to learning activities addressed in the desired learning outcomes. The learner finds it difficult to escape without learning appropriately.

Introduction The concept of preferences to different individual learning styles was introduced in an accompanying document. (See learning styles). In this document we look at the associated concept of approaches to learning. The original work on approaches to learning was carried out by Marton and Saljo (1976). Their study explored students' approaches to learning a particular task. Students were given an academic text to read, and were told that they would subsequently be asked questions on that text. The students adopted two differing approaches to learning. The first group adopted an approach where they tried to understand the whole picture and tried to comprehend and understand the academic work. These students were identified with adopting a deep approach to learning. The second group tried to remember facts contained within the text, identifying and focusing on what they thought they would be asked later. They demonstrated an approach that we would recognise as rote learning, or a superficial, surface approach.

Enhancing Learning through Technology (ELT) We are increasingly aware of how technology can enhance the student learning experience. Our work with institutions indicates a shift towards an overarching approach which uses technology to enhance core activities, e.g. using technology in assessment to improve feedback to students. This shift has been taking place within institutions over the past few years since the release of the original 2005 HEFCE e-learning Strategy, as reflected in the Welsh HEFCW (Higher Education Funding Council for Wales) Enhancement of Learning Strategy. More recently, on 26th March 2009 HEFCE released their Enhancing Learning and Teaching through Technology (ELTT) Policy Statement. This Policy Statement includes an Implementation Framework to support our stakeholder institutions for the development of their own L&T strategies - this Framework was developed through evidence collected from a range of Academy and JISC programmes. To reflect this emphasis, and in line with our remit to support the student learning experience, the Academy has developed an Enhancement of Learning through Technology (ELT) programme. We are in the process of developing this website to reflect this shift and to map our menu structure onto the HEFCE Implementation Framework, i.e. to support institutions on the interpretation of the Framework - to be completed by mid June 09 (JISC are undertaking a similar exercise). We are also developing an additional resource through EvidenceNet. Currently, to support institutions and in collaboration with the JISC we have developed a joint search tool, as below - Academy resources can also be accessed using the menu on the left.

Practice and Evidence of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education\nThis journal offers an opportunity for those involved in University learning and teaching to disseminate their practice. It aims to publish accounts of scholarly practice that report on small-scale practitioner research and case studies of practice that involve reflection, critique, implications for future practice and are informed by relevant literature, with a focus on enhancement of student learning. This publication thus offers a forum to develop and share scholarly informed practice in Higher Education through either works in progress or more detailed accounts of scholarly practice. There will be opportunities for discussions/comments regarding works in progress to be shared with journal readers on the journal site. The journal is published twice a year (April and October).

Assessing How Students Learn Bill Cerbin In higher education the dominant mode of assessment is to measure what students have learned in a course or program. By measuring what students learn educators can monitor student progress, determine learning gaps and gains, and document achievement. But measuring what students learn is of limited use if our goal is to improve their future performance. It is akin to taking a person's temperature. You may learn the individual has a fever but the measurement produces no insight into the cause. Suppose we find that students score in the 60th percentile on a standardized test or that half the students in a course have significant writing problems. What should we do to improve future performance? Unfortunately, the assessment data provide little direction. The result is a kind of guesswork by which we consider alternative teaching practices or programs without understanding how or why they would work better than standard approaches.

Professional standards The UK Professional Standards Framework (UK PSF) for teaching and supporting learning, launched in February 2006, is a flexible framework which uses a descriptor-based approach to professional standards. There are three standard descriptors each of which is applicable to a number of staff roles and to different career stages of those engaged in teaching and supporting learning. The standard descriptors are underpinned by areas of professional activity, core knowledge and professional values. The framework provides a reference point for institutions and individuals as well as supporting ongoing development within any one standard descriptor. The framework was developed by the Academy on behalf of Universities UK (UUK), GuildHE and the four UK higher education funding councils after extensive consultation with the higher education sector. They recognise the diversity of institutions and enable a sector-owned approach to learning and teaching standards.

Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) - What is it?\n\nIntroduction\n\nIn this section, we offer both a brief definition of SoTL (SoTL in brief), as well as a much more detailed and scholarly discussion of the history and different conceptions of SoTL (starting with Conceptions of Scholarship and SoTL, and progressing through the subsequent sections).\n\nThe aims of this section are:\n\n * to inform the reader of the different conceptions of scholarship in general and the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) in particular, and to highlight any interesting points and controversies;\n * to encourage the readers' own consideration of what scholarship, and in particular SoTL, might be; and,\n * to provide a working definition for the purposes of this web resource. \n\nThus, this section includes a brief review of the work of leading academics regarding scholarship and SoTL, as well as links to relevant articles etc., to allow readers to become familiar with several different currently-merited conceptions, and so provoke thought on the matter. The sections titled In Depth are optional extras for those who are interested in more of the intricacies in the debate about SoTL.\n\nNote - although SoTL is our preferred term here, some authors have referred to is simply as the scholarship of teaching (hence, SoT), thus when considering a particular author's work, we shall refer to the concept with the same terminology as used by each author.

What is Constructive Alignment? Constructive Alignment, a term coined by John Biggs (Biggs, 1999) is one of the most influential ideas in higher education. It is the underpinning concept behind the current requirements for programme specification, declarations of Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs) and assessment criteria, and the use of criterion based assessment. There are two parts to constructive alignment: * Students construct meaning from what they do to learn. * The teacher aligns the planned learning activities with the learning outcomes. The basic premise of the whole system is that the curriculum is designed so that the learning activities and assessment tasks are aligned with the learning outcomes that are intended in the course. This means that the system is consistent.

The Meyer and Land Threshold Concept "The idea of threshold concepts emerged from a UK national research project into the possible characteristics of strong teaching and learning environments in the disciplines for undergraduate education (Enhancing Teaching−Learning Environments in Undergraduate Courses). In pursuing this research in the field of economics, it became clear to Erik Meyer and Ray Land [1−6, 7−12], that certain concepts were held by economists to be central to the mastery of their subject. These concepts, Meyer and Land argued, could be described as 'threshold' ones because they have certain features in common." Glynis Cousin, An introduction to threshold concepts Over the past five years this concept has been embraced by many disciplines outside economics; indeed the above quote is from Glynis Cousin's excellent short introduction to the concept written for earth scientists. The threshold concept has been seen as a valuable tool, not only in facilitating students' understanding of their subject, but in aiding the rational development of curricula in rapidly expanding arenas where there is a strong tendency to overload the curriculum (Cousin, [1, 13]). This web page will describe, briefly, the characteristics of a threshold concept and list selecteted references to the work of those examining its value in the engineering and computer sciences, the physical and biological sciences, economics, accountancy, mathematics and statistics.

ASKe is the Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning based at Oxford Brookes University Business School. It was set up in summer 2005 with a £4.5 million award (spread over five years) from HEFCE in recognition of good practice based on pedagogic research into aspects of assessment carried out by staff in the Business School and the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development. ASKe's work focuses on ways of helping staff and students develop a common understanding of academic standards, and it builds on and promulgates established good practice.

Assessment Standards Knowledge exchange ASKe is the Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning based at Oxford Brookes University Business School. It was set up in summer 2005 with a £4.5 million award (spread over five years) from HEFCE in recognition of good practice based on pedagogic research into aspects of assessment carried out by staff in the Business School and the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development. ASKe's work focuses on ways of helping staff and students develop a common understanding of academic standards, and it builds on and promulgates established good practice.

There are growing expectations among college students to be able to access and manage their course materials over the World Wide Web. In its early days, faculty would create web pages by hand for posting this information. As Internet technologies and access have matured over the past decade, course and learning management systems such as Blackboard and Web CT have become the norm for distributing such materials. In today's Web 2.0 world, wikis have emerged as a tool that may complement or replace the use of traditional course management systems as a tool for disseminating course information. Because of a wiki's collaborative nature, its use also allows students to participate in the process of course management, information sharing, and content creation. Using examples from an information technology classroom, this paper describes several ways to structure and use a wiki as a course management tool, and shares results of a student survey on the effectiveness of such an approach on student learning.\n\nKeywords: Wiki, Course Management, Collaboration, Web 2.0, Content Creation, Student Learning.

The entire ontology (manifested beliefs about teaching and learning) of higher education is misconceived: It does not fit with the proven realities of learning, and does not fit at all with the new nature of knowledge construction in a Web 2.0 world. The education establishment needs to say goodbye to pedagogy and hello to andragogy to create a better fit. Here's the difference:\n\nIn pedagogy, the concern is with transmitting the content, while in andragogy, the concern is with facilitating the acquisition of the content.\n\nThere is little doubt that the most dominant form of instruction in Europe and America is pedagogy, or what some people refer to as didactic, traditional, or teacher-directed approaches. A competing idea in terms of instructing adult learners [including first-year college students], and one that gathered momentum within the past three decades, has been dubbed andragogy. [http://www-distance.syr.edu/andraggy.html]\n

The Carnegie Foundation Founded by Andrew Carnegie in 1905 and chartered in 1906 by an act of Congress, The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching is an independent policy and research center with a primary mission "to do and perform all things necessary to encourage, uphold, and dignify the profession of the teacher and the cause of higher education."

A short summary of Carl Rogers' work and perspectives on teaching as 'facilitating learning'; core conditions for learning, etc - an interesting perspective from a psycho-therapist turned educational researcher. Worth a read :-)

Unlocking Knowledge, Empowering Minds. "My life is in teaching. To have a chance to do that with a world audience is just wonderful." * Gilbert Strang MIT Mathematics professor United States Read more Free lecture notes, exams, and videos from MIT. No registration required.

Unlocking Knowledge, Empowering Minds. "My life is in teaching. To have a chance to do that with a world audience is just wonderful." * Gilbert Strang MIT Mathematics professor United States Read more Free lecture notes, exams, and videos from MIT. No registration required.