First experience of a flipped learning approach

Bryan McCabe is a lecturer in Civil Engineering at NUI Galway, and a winner of a President's Award for Teaching Excellence in 2011/12. About a year ago, Bryan was considering how he might use a flipped approach in his teaching and began planning such an approach for his 3rd year undergraduate course in Soil Mechanics, to be delivered starting January 2013. Bryan had a number of conversations with us in CELT during the year and we were keen to find out how his initiative had worked out. So, we invited him to give a CELT lunchtime seminar on March 21st.

In advance of the seminar, Bryan was keen to point out that this was his first experience with flipped learning and he could only talk about initial findings. He didn't want to be perceived as an expert in the area, but was willing to share his experiences and thoughts. The seminar abstract is:

First experience of a flipped learning approach to a 3rd year Engineering module

Flipped learning is a form of blended learning in which technology is used to make course content available outside the classroom, freeing up valuable classroom time for active problem solving and learning. In his presentation, Bryan McCabe will talk about his first attempt this semester at flipping his 3rd year (3 ECTS) Soil Mechanics module in Civil Engineering. The presentation will cover the production of short videos covering the basic module content and the active workshop approach adopted in the classroom. The response of students to the new experience has been captured by survey both early in the semester and at the end and these are discussed. Bryan will reflect upon what aspects of the approach have worked well and what areas need be to improved, in addition to the pros and cons from the lecturer's perspective.

The following narrative is based on Bryan's fascinating talk.

Background

The flipped model of teaching turns the traditional model - content introduced in the classroom and students learn through assignments and self-study outside the classroom - on its head. Students review basic content in advance of the classroom session, often made available through technology (videos, podcasts etc), and the classroom time is used for learning through doing - interactive workshops.

For more information on flipped learning, Bryan references the excellent Flipped Classroom Infograph, although the concept of flipped learning has been around for much longer than this infograph suggests. He also made reference to Julie Schell's acronym as described in her blog post How to FLIP your class ... in 4 basic steps.

Julie's Peer Instruction blog, Turn to Your Neighbour, is an excellent source of resources on the flipped classroom and peer learning in general.

The Soil Mechanics Module

The course that Bryan decided to flip is a third year engineering module, comprising 24 lecture hours over 8 weeks. It is taken (in 2013) by 64 students, from 4 different programmes. It is assessed using quizzes on Blackboard (20%) and a final written exam (80%).

Back in January, Bryan prepared the students for flipped learning using the Educause 7 Things You Should Know About Flipped Classrooms (pdf document, February 2012). He also issued a number of strong statements to students:

This change has major implications for how you should approach this module and gives you more responsibility for your learning, with potential for greater rewards as a result.

It should be noted that looking at the video clips alone or attending the classroom sessions without having looked at the video clips are strategies that are unlikely to serve you well in this module.

Flipping the Module

Based largely on existing materials, Bryan produced 15 narrated Powerpoints using Camtasia, covering core concepts, and uploaded these to screencast.com and YouTube. The total duration over the 15 videos was just 2 hours (distilled down from 24 lectures). Here's a sample video on Groundwater, Permeability and Seepage, demonstrating Bryan's approach:



Students were invited to ask questions about video content by email, twitter (@geotechNUIG) or at the start of class. In fact, none of these communication channels worked particularly well, and questions were normally prompted by the classroom problems. In hindsight, Bryan suggests that he might make better use of the Blackboard threaded discussion boards, which are available to all and visible to the entire group.

In the classroom session, Bryan did not summarise the videos, in case students might rely on such a summary. Instead, the students worked through a set of 17 soil mechanics problems, available in advance in a workbook. The problems were complex, requiring application and synthesis of the content provided in the videos. The problems were solved by the students, with prompts from the lecturer as required. Discussion of challenging or difficult topics, as identified by the students, were encouraged. Bryan reports some evidence of peer learning during these discussions.

On average, engagement was good; although Bryan admits to some slow days.

Six of the 15 videos produced are openly available on YouTube, and are being accessed in several countries. A second year civil engineering student in the UK has recently contacted Bryan, saying that he found the videos useful and could he produce more.

What the Students Thought

Bryan surveyed the students at the end of week 3 and again at the end of week 8. The results from the first survey were very positive, while those from week 8 were yet to be fully analysed at the time of the seminar.


The week 3 survey had 38 respondents (from a total of 64 students). Of those 80% reported that they watched the videos on a personal laptop or home pc rather than a mobile device or campus pc. They had not experienced flipped learning before.

80% of respondents said that watching the videos in their own time was either convenient or very convenient. Only 14% claimed not to have watched the videos in advance of the classroom sessions. Almost 90% found the classroom sessions more valuable or much more valuable than traditional lectures (see diagram). Further, 90% of students were comfortable or very comfortable with the environment of the problem solving sessions.

When asked about the flipped learning approach, two thirds of respondents identified the combination of videos and classroom sessions as being important.

The initial results were very positive and encouraged Bryan to continue with the approach.



An initial analysis of the week 8 survey results showed that just 24 students had responded to the survey at the time of the seminar. Engagement with the videos was poorer than indicated in week 3, but the effectiveness of the classroom sessions and the likelihood of attending the classrooms sessions had increased.

Bryan also asked the students how they would like to be assessed using free text responses (he had deliberately not changed the assessment method of the module from previous years). Students asked for more continuous assessment: short quizzes on video content during class, in-class tests and in-class exams.

Some sample responses are:

I think having some tests in class throughout the semester would be good. The online quizzes are good but I think tests in class would be better because it gives incentive to learn and revise the material as a whole, instead of just answering specific questions

Probably earn continuous assessment points as you go through the year by doing more in class exams this would make the videos compulsory to have viewed before every class

This feedback from students will inform changes in assessment for next year.

Bryan has now started to analyse the exam results from this year's group of students. Not surprisingly, exam performance is better for those who attended more classroom sessions - but with a lot of scatter!


What the lecturer thought

Bryan enjoyed the fact that there was less "delivery" going on and he described getting a "buzz" from the classroom sessions - not knowing where it might go or what he might be asked. He also felt that he added more value to the classroom sessions by being able to provide specialist technical knowledge as well as being able to focus on those areas that were more challenging or where misunderstandings were evident.


The videos themselves were time-consuming to make, but he now has a reusable (and shareable) resource. Next year he can put his efforts into rethinking assessment. There were also challenges around the existing timetable, with the scheduled hours being bunched and not conducive to the problem solving activities he wanted to promote.

Bryan's final words were "There's no going back".

Finally

I'd like to thank Bryan for sharing his initial experiences during the lunchtime seminar and for giving me permission to write up this post, linking to his YouTube videos.

I'd also like to thank Julie Schell for her permission to use her diagram within the post.


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E-Learning and Digital Cultures: Week 4 Reflection #edcmooc

At this stage, #edcmooc is over, and I can say that I have finally completed a MOOC. Before I reflect on my own experience of being a student on #edmooc, I want to complete my musings on the resources provided.

Week 4 continued the theme of Being Human, with a collection of videos, some readings on Transhumanism and some less challenging perspectives on Education.

Of the four videos, the two that I connected with most are True Skin (see it on Vimeo) and Avatar Days (watch on YouTube). True Skin reminds me of some of the sci fi videos from week 1, and has a dystopian feel running through it. The idea of being able to upload your mind - memory backup - is fascinating and has clear beneficial aspects, for example, for early alzheimers sufferers. What does it mean for learning though? If you can upload a (brilliant) mind, can you download it, or part of it, multiple times to many people? Maybe we'll all become like our smartphones, downloading learning to our brains like apps.

Less fantastical is the other video, Avatar Days. Maybe it was the Dublin accents, but this really resonated with me. I showed it to my 13 years old son and he sat watching it, mesmerized. He doesn't play World of Warcraft, but he does play other online games where he has an avatar. He understood the video.

It made me think a little more about online identities and the link between a person's real life and how that person is portrayed online. I've blogged previously about my own online identity (Hiding behind my avatar). To quote myself:

In some sense, my twitter persona is an alter-ego of myself. She says things in public that I would never say in a room full of people.

And now, watching Avater Days, I'm beginning to wonder how much of my online persona filters back into Real Life. In the last year, I've been blogging more and using this blog to make sense of my own thoughts and experiences in various topics related to learning technologies. Through comments left on blog posts and via my twitter persona, I've been interacting and developing with an explanding Personal Learning Network (PLN). In turn, this has contributed to my own professional development In Real Life (IRL). For somebody who is naturally an introvert, the extension of myself in the digital world has caused me (the real life me) to grow and develop in ways that would otherwise not have been possible.

Perspectives on Education

So, what does all this mean for a learner online? In my last blog post I reflected on what it might mean to be human as a teacher in an online course. Now I'm wondering what it means to be human as a learner.

David Hopkins recently highlighted a video on his blog called Engaging and Motivating Students, from a series on learning to teach online from the University of New South Wales. Watching this video (embedded below), which is really very good, it made me think about the differences between being a student in a traditional online course, and being a student in a MOOC.


 
In a traditional online course, the role of the teacher is multifold and teacher presence is very important. The teachers in this video describe how the teacher acts as the guide, is responsible for creating a collaborative learning environment and facilitates "the socialisation of students into online learning". One teacher even says that she is responsible for the students' learning, which I don't agree with. Many online courses include an introductory module intended to help students learn how to learn online.

But, in a MOOC where the teacher can't be present to monitor, encourage, give feedback, facilitate the socialisation of students - how do students learn how to learn online?

In the video, one teacher says that online learning environments are really democratic, and this can be true of many traditional online courses. But I'm not sure that it's true for MOOCs.

The majority of MOOC students, I suspect, already have at least one digital identity - which might be personal, professional, related to specific interests, or some other combination. So, each MOOC student is already coming with some online "baggage", (history, network of contacts, statement of interests etc) which is easily discoverable by other members of the course. If the person has been involved in a MOOC previously, then she already has a digital learning identity.

In a MOOC, the student is wholly responsible for his own learning. The teacher is not present and cannot be there every day. So participation, motivation and engagement is really up to the individual, as part of the wider group (or groups). How do the students learn to learn in this situation? How do they figure out the ground rules for online socialisation, usually established by the teacher? How do they learn about academic norms, standards and integrity? Is it the case that the people who become "successful" online students self-perpetuate the conditions that made them successful, while those who fail are left behind, forgotten?

And, what does it mean to be "successful" in a MOOC? That you get a certificate of achievement? At the recent #unitemooc event in Newcastle, @sheilmcn reported:

@glittrgirl felt empowered by not submitting final assignment for #edcmooc#unitemooc
— Sheila MacNeill (@sheilmcn) March 15, 2013

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E-Learning and Digital Cultures: Week 3 Reflection #edcmooc

I think I made a mistake in week three of #edcmooc. I was doing some travelling by train and decided to review the resources while in transit. Unfortunately, the Iarnród Éireann WiFi wouldn't let me access any of the videos, so I couldn't watch the film festival or Steve Fuller's TedX Warwick talk Defining Humanity.

Instead, I jumped straight into the advanced reading: Neil Badmington's introduction on Posthumanism. I read it twice, in full, and have gone back to sections since. But, I really don't think I have the necessary background to be able to make any sense of it at all.

Being Human, Humanism, Posthumanism and Transhumanism

As I read Badmington's introduction, I had fleeting glimpses of meaning and at times thought I might be approaching some understanding. But eventually I gave up. Is it possible to understand what posthumanism is without understanding humanism? I don't know, but all the different arguments got my head in a spin.

I was ready to give up at this stage. A couple of days later I did watch Fuller's talk and, though I still didn't understand many of the subtleties, was hugely relieved to hear that there is no agreed consensus about humanism.

So, my conclusion is, does it really matter? If I have a sense of what being human means to me, then I'm happy to leave the experts to their arguments.

Perspectives on Education

In contrast, the two readings on education were much more accessible. The Kolowich article from Inside Higher Ed describes the common belief that adding video and audio to an online course will help to provide the human element, which is missing from text-based materials. On the other hand, Monke's article laments the loss of interaction with our surroundings and with nature, as a result of increased focus on technology in schools.

The Talking Head V Being Present

The Kolowich article, as well as the recorded google hangout with the #edcmooc tutors, made me think about what does it mean to be human as a teacher in an online course.

It is certainly true that video and audio technologies can help to support the human element, whatever that might mean. Academic staff at NUI Galway have described how preparing podcasts for their students has allowed them to engage more deeply with the material and with their students. Webcam recordings,made  available to students via the VLE, can provide a personal touch. In both cases, the recordings are quick, with minimal editing, and specific to a group of people. Moreover, the purpose of the recording is to reach out to students online. The experience of the student is that the teacher is speaking, if not directly to him/her, but at least to a generic member of the class.

Lecture capture is something different. The lecture is being given to a group of people in the room, normally, but being recorded so that it can be accessed later. While some students may decide to watch the recording instead of attending the lecture in person, on the whole lecture capture is used as a revision tool. I am reminded of Andrea Sella's image of lecture capture as a time machine (at the Echo360 Community Conference Europe in 2011) , offering the possibility for students to go back and revisit those parts of a lecture that were unclear.

The recorded lecture has its use, but I don't think it provides the human element, as described by Hersh in the Kolowich article. In fact, a live lecture very often doesn't provide the human element either.

Contrast, within the #edcmooc coursera course, the recording of Steve Fuller's TedX Warwick talk and the recording of the week 3 google hangout with "the teachers". For me, as a student, Fuller's talk is a recording from 3 years ago, which doesn't speak to me at all. I couldn't watch the hangout live, but I got a lot from the recording and picked up on many points which had been previously unclear or that I haven't considered. Which one has the human element?

I think the important thing about the human element in teaching an online course is being present. This can be achieved through video and audio, but presence via text has been working in online learning for years. Presence via activity, comments and feedback in asynchronous discussion boards were strong features of my first experience of online teaching, almost 10 years ago. Video and audio technologies, among others, allow us to be present in different ways, but they do not, in themselves, deliver the human element.

Interacting with our environment

Finally, some quick thoughts based on Monke's article. Monke is arguing that we are focusing too much on technology in schools when children are better off experiencing the environment around them. I have some sympathies with his argument, but I think we need a balance. In particular, when it comes to simulations - why would we simulate an environment that the children can experience in real life?

I was reminded of the Windows 8 advertisement that is constantly on my tv at the moment. In it, a mother places a tablet onto her child's easel, so that the little girl can "paint" and print out her pictures. I know kids get messy when they paint, but this is crazy. We need a balance.


Mobile technologies offer huge opportunities when it comes to exploring our environment. While their use means that location becomes unimportant, it can also mean that location is of utmost importance. Students can be out in the field, interacting with the (natural) environment, and still be connected to the virtual classroom.

In conclusion

I found the week 3 material very tough and it took me a while to get to the stage where I felt I had anything to say. Again, these are completely my own ramblings; apologies if they seem completely confused. I'm off to read up on week 4.

References

Badmington, Neil (2000) Introduction: approaching posthumanism. Posthumanism. Houndmills; New York: Palgrave.http://www.palgrave.com/PDFs/0333765389.Pdf

Kolowich, S (2010) The Human Element. Inside Higher Ed http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/03/29/lms

Monke, L (2004) The Human Touch, EducationNext http://educationnext.org/thehumantouch/

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Learning Technologies Symposium 2013

Back in September, I welcomed the #cel263 class of 2012 to the Learning Technologies module, as run by the Learning Technologies Team at CELT.

Over the next few months we examined a range of technologies in the context of teaching and learning, and each participant was encouraged to complete a project to incorporate a technology into his/her teaching.

Five months after our first meeting, we again came together, this time for the annual Learning Technologies Symposium, where each participant in the course gives a 10 minute project presentation.

From Storify, read about it as it happened:





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Being Human #edcmooc

In week 3 of #edcmooc, we were asked to "create an image that represents or illustrates any one of the themes you have encountered in the course so far". Well, I'm not particularly creative when it comes to images, so I decided quite quickly that this was one part of the course that I might not take part in.

On Wednesday I struggled with some of the readings around humanism and post-humanism. I will talk about this in my blog post reflecting on week 3, coming soon (I hope). Anyway, I couldn't get my head around the theories and by Thursday morning was really feeling deflated.

On Thursday lunchtime I had an opportunity to go to a free lunchtime concent on campus, arranged by the Arts In Action group. The recital was given by Luisa Sello, a flautist, who has travelled the world as a recitalist and chamber musician. I had a lot of work to do, and I really thought twice about walking the few hundred metres to the venue, thinking I might be better to just work through lunch. In the end, I decided to make the effort, and I'm glad I did.

As she started playing, and the room went silent apart from her beautiful music, I felt myself relax. Before long, I was caught up in the emotion of the music. For that hour, it became clear to me what being human is all about. Through her music, Luisa reached out to my inner being, call it a soul if you like.

Thinking of the image competition, I quickly snapped a photo on my phone.

cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by sharonlflynn: http://flickr.com/photos/sharonlflynn/8474882391/

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E-Learning and Digital Cultures: Week 2 Reflection #edcmooc

Interactive White Board of the future

We're already in week 3 of #edcmooc, and I'm behind. I have some train travel ahead of me tomorrow, so that should give me a chance to catch up on materials. But before that, I'd better write up some thoughts from week 2.

Week 2 continued on the theme of Utopias and Dystopias, this time looking to the future - of society and education. Looking at the materials, videos and readings, a lot of thoughts went through my head. I'm not really sure what this course is all about, and I don't have a lot of time to devote to it, so I find myself relating the materials to my own professional life working in academic staff development, as well as to my own experiences of education as a parent.

I did watch all five videos in the film festival. Two of these (A Day Made of Glass and Productivity Future Vision) are video advertisements, offering a very sanitised possible near future. I say sanitised because everything, every surface, looked so clean and shiny. I know what my iPad looks like if I've been using it all day, but evidentally this grubiness won't be a problem in the future.

The description for Productivity is particularly amusing:
Watch how future technology will help people make better use of their time, focus their attention, and strengthen relationships while getting things done at work, home, and on the go.
Technical determinism (see week 1) or what?

The next 3 videos offer more unsettling visions of a possible near future. In two of these (Charlie 13 and Plurality) surveillance of the general population has become the norm and there is evidence of some higher power that is dictating and controlling the use of technology. Sight, on the other hand, demonstrated a particularly nasty side of gamification.

Some thoughts on these and the readings:

Technology does not change education
The image of education in the future, and the classroom scenes in Day of Glass (pictured) in particular, still has the teacher at the top of the classroom, using a fancy Interactive White Board (IWB). So, even the advertisers at the fancy technology company don't have a vision for how their technology might transform teaching and learning.

In the last 5 years, a lot of money has been spent putting technology (such as IWBs and Classroom Response Systems) into classrooms. Parents (myself included) have put huge efforts into fundraising for the latest technologies, and governments have been berated for not providing resources. The truth is that we can make the classrooms as high tech as we want, but it won't make any difference until we can put the resources into changing the way we teach. Technology won't do that for us.

This is a very good example of a general belief in Technical Determinism.

Technology does not change society
From the two advertising videos, it would appear that better technology in the future will not only improve lifestyles, it will make us better people as well. We'll all be quite happy to entrust our personal data to anyone (via personal devices), and nobody will abuse that trust. Ahem?

Sight, in particular, shows us a more likely scenario. The young man in the story is nasty from the start, and he's still nasty at the end. Technology can't change human nature, and humans will use technology to amplify their behavioural traits.

Another thing that struck me from the videos was the clear digital divide. In the two advertisements, it's obvious that all the gadgets and technologies are expensive and it's reasonable to assume that only the affluent will benefit. In Charlie 13 and Plurality, the divide is not between rich and poor, but between the general population (the Proles) and those in control (the Inner Party).

The Technological Imperative
I was reminded, via the film festival and the Bleeker reading on the Internet of Things, of the notion of the technological imperative, which I enjoyed so much in week 1. To complement Bleeker's paper, this video from IBMSocialMedia explains the concept well.

In my mind, this demonstrates exactly the idea that the "ubiquitous technozealots" will continue to develop the technology, because they can, and because it's bright and shiny. Taking a dystopian view, this will inevitably lead to increased surveillance and embedded tracking devices. And society will always find a use for them.

Perspectives on Education
This leads us on nicely to education, which is always an easy application domain for the technozealots.

I had read the Shirky article (Napster, Udacity, and the Academy), and some of the responses, when they first appeared. I don't think the Napster metaphor is particularly helpful: it identifies education as a commodity, to be bought and sold or given freely via MOOCs. I think that Shirky has some good points, which are getting lost in his determination to stick with the metaphor. In particular, I agree that the future is inevitable, and MOOCs, for better or worse, are part of that future.

However, MOOCs will not revolutionise education, in the same way that technology cannot change education. I think that we (the universities, schools, colleges, places of education) need to take ownership of MOOCs and not leave them to the technozealots and the marketing guys. MOOCs could be a catalyst, forcing us to rethink teaching and learning and assessment, and even community engagement. But I'm not particularly hopeful. I'm thinking of a local school, with 16 new Interactive Whiteboards and a bank of 30 laptops, with which the children are learning how to use PowerPoint.

Disclaimer
The above ramblings are completely my own. I'm tired and have to get up early for a 6:30 am train. I'll start the week 3 readings then.


Bleecker, J. (2006). A manifesto for networked objects — Cohabiting with pigeons, arphids and Aibos in the Internet of Things. http://www.scribd.com/doc/14748019/Why-Things-Matter

Shirky, C. (2012). Napster, Udacity and the academy. http://www.shirky.com/weblog/2012/11/napster-udacity-and-the-academy/

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E-Learning and Digital Cultures: Week 1 Reflections #ecdmooc

Back in early January, I heard Jeremy Knox speak at the Durham Blackboard Users' Conference about his involvement in the Coursera MOOC, E-Learning and Digital Cultures. It sounded interesting and, despite a heavy workload, I decided to sign up. I don't know if I'll complete it, but week 1 has been interesting and I'm still there.

I'll blog about the whole MOOC experience separately. For now, I just want to record my thoughts about the week one content and reflect on what I  might have learned.

First of all, I am a scientist by background, namely computer science and mathematics. While I love reading and the cinema, and I know what I like and what I don't like, I'm not used to analysing and critiquing them. I don't ever use the words "utopia" or "dystopia" in everyday conversation and I'm not comfortable using them. So, this is definitely new to me. I think I have a better idea, after week 1, of their meaning. I can see, I think, how they might be useful as a lens, but I also think the binary nature of utopia versus dystopia won't get us very far.

I tried to use the theme of utopia-dystopia when watching the four short films. I also dipped into some of the discussion boards to see what others were getting from the films (is that cheating?). Here are some very brief thoughts that occurred to me.

Bendito Machine III (see it on YouTube) This is an interesting little film, and definitely dystopian in nature and certainly has an element of technological determinism in it. The new machine has a life of its own, you can even see the "face" of the machine appear, and the impression is that the machine has a malicious intent. But, I'm more interested in the little guy who climbs the mountain at the start, like Moses, and uses his own little machine to somehow call down the new one. Who is this guy, and what is his role in pushing the new technology to an apparently primitive society?

Inbox (see it on YouTube) is a fairly harmless little love story, which inspired much discussion within the coursera discussion boards. Two people find a way to communicate via red shopping bags. It has something to say about the nature of communication in the technological world. Certainly the short messages written on post-its are very like direct messages on twitter. I thought it interesting that the young man felt the need to dress and groom himself before he felt comfortable to engage, as if he had to put on an identity. It was also interesting how quickly the young woman got bored with each form of communication. I don't see the film as either upotian or dystopian: it's just about two people using an unlikely form of communication, and says nothing about society as a whole. Am I missing something?

Thursday (see it on YouTube) I liked this little animation about a day in the life of two normal people in the not-so-distant future. It has some amusing little scenes, like the power cut, the guy not getting the hand scanner to work, the tweeting alarm clock. It could have a dystopian reading - people caught up in a system, going through a routine life, not aware of nature. But, it's a Thursday - maybe they go hill-walking at the weekend! The people seem content and I didn't notice any crime or anti-social behaviour on the streets.

NewMedia (see it on Vimeo) I love this film. Everything about it, from the soundtrack to the grey, desolate colours to the images, shouts dystopia. We have destroyed the world by creating New Media, which have evolved and taken over. Fantastic! Every time I watch it I see something new.

We were asked to think about utopian or dystopian stories of technology in popular films. What I find interesting here is that the best stories of technology told in popular films actually come from science fiction books and are almost all dystopian in nature. I don't think utopian stories would be particularly interesting. I love reading science fiction, in particular Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Iain M. Banks and William Gibson, all of whom have written stories with a dystopian view of technology. A particularly relevant one to this discussion is Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson.

Readings: Technological or Media Determinism
After watching the four short films I did move on to the readings. Again, I'm not used to this type of language and discipline, so I didn't find the readings easy, but they were thought-provoking.

The Chandler essay (Technological or Media Determinism) made me question my own language when talking/writing about technology. From Chandler:

Technological determinists interpret technology .. as the basis of society in the past, present and even the future.

This view seems to suppose that technology is the sole driving force for changes in society - that the technology (in itself) drives change.While I suspect that my language sometimes promotes the idea of technological determinism, it is not what I believe. I believe that technology is just a tool and that we, the users, determine how it will be used.

I found the notion of the 'Technological Imperative' very interesting and, as a computer scientist, I believe that it is true. From Chandler:

The doctrine of the technological imperative is that because a particular technology means that we can do something (it is technically possible) then this action ought to (as a moral imperative), must (as an operational requirement) or inevitably will (in time) be taken.

If something is technically possible, then somebody will do it eventually. It will happen even quicker if some agency decides to fund it. And yes, it does imply a "suspension of ethical judgement or social control", but when has that ever stopped something in the past? We have to believe that common sense will (eventually) prevail. Again from Chandler, "the mere existence of a technology does not inevitably lead to its use". Moreover, we often use a technology in a different way from what was originally intended.

I have to admit that I did start the second reading (Dahlberg), but didn't get very far. It's not that I couldn't read it, but rather I ran out of time. Maybe I'll come back to it.

Perspectives on Education

I thoroughly enjoyed reading David Noble's essay on The Automation of Higher Education. In it, he describes the commodification of higher education, that academic staff are being forced to make resources available online and that this will ultimately put them out of a job. This argument is very current, which makes it all the more surprising to realise that the essay was written in 1998 - more than 14 years ago. The promise (or threat) of digital education did not come to pass, though it is still with us.

I particularly enjoyed his paragraph about "the ubiquitous technozealots who simply view computers as the panacea for everything, because they like to play with them". They are still around today and still have the encouragement of their patrons:

... they forge ahead, without support for their pedagogical claims about the alleged enhancement of education, without any real evidence of productivity improvement, and without any effective demand from either students or teachers.

See the doctrine of the "technological imperative" above.

Final Thoughts

To finish off this post, a few last thoughts:

What I find interesting in the dystopian view of the future is the sense that somebody or something is in control and is dictating how technology is being used. I think there's more to say here, but have to figure it out.

With my new vocabulary this week, I think I am learning to analyse media artifacts in a new way. But it's very early days and I need to open my mind a bit.

I got through week 1 of a MOOC! I'm still here, and looking forward to week 2.

Related:
E-Learning and Digital Cultures: Week 2 Reflection
Being Human
E-Learning and Digital Cultures: Week 3 Reflection 
E-Learning and Digital Cultures: Week 4 Reflection

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Blackboard vs Facebook at NUI Galway

  by  pasukaru76 

For almost a decade, there has been continued debate about the future of Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) such as Blackboard, Moodle, and Sakai. As technology evangelists and futurists have prophesied the death of email, telephone landlines, and other ageing technologies, so too has the VLE been heralded to become as extinct as the dinosaur. It has come under sustained critique for its clunky user-interface; the walled-garden of authentication access, shielding it from the wider internet; the lack student ownership and autonomy; and more recently the absence of social features (e.g. ‘Like’ and ’Share’buttons) common to newer social media platforms. Will the VLE survive in the face newer platforms such as the ubiquitous and mighty Facebook?

In the spirt of questioning older orthodoxy, we asked the NUI Galway Blackboard user community to voice their views on the utility of Blackboard versus Facebook. Specifically, we asked, “which is more useful for exchanging academic information relating to your NUI Galway studies- Facebook or Blackboard?’. The poll was displayed online over the duration of a week (from the 21st to the 28th of January, 2013), featuring prominently on our Blackboard login page.

Here's what we found:

Results:
The numbers:

The figures in percentages:

Discussion:
Both above diagrams illustrate that 688 respondents (55%) voted in favour or Blackboard as the preferred platform, with 272 (22%) voting in favour of Facebook. Interestingly, a close 230 (18%) of votes were expressed for both as equal in utility to exchange academic course related communications. So there is room for replication and linkages across tools, rather than a dichotomy view of either/or.

However, Blackboard is clearly the dominant platform at NUI Galway, according to these expressed opinions. The respondents (in an non-representative, non-randomised and biased sample) report a clear preference for using Blackboard to exchange academic information relating to their modules to Facebook. The masses have voted - the VLE is perceived to be a more useful medium. Or at least to those who vote on Blackboard polls ;)

Are reports of the impending demise of the VLE slightly exaggerated? Perhaps for the time being.

Additional Reading: 
Selwyn, Neil (2012)‘Screw Blackboard... do it on Facebook!’: an investigation of students’ educational use of Facebook. Paper presented to the ‘ Poke 1.0 - Facebook social research symposium’, University of London, 15th November 2007 [Online] http://www.scribd.com/doc/513958/Facebook-seminar-paper-Selwyn

The Journal.ie (2012) Smartphones the future of internet – and 10 other predictions The Journal.ie, October 17th 2012 [Online] http://businessetc.thejournal.ie/10-predictions-for-internet-david-shing-dublin-web-summit-639108-Oct2012/

Notes from the Blackboard Mobile Users' Group meeting

cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo shared by sharonlflynn

The Blackboard Mobile User Group met on Monday afternoon, 7th January, as part of the 13th Durham Blackboard Users' Conference. The meeting was organised by Peter Rayment, Learning Technology Manager at Cardiff University, and attended by about 20 people from higher education around the UK. I was the only person from an Irish institution.

The meeting took place in the impressive new Palatine Centre (see picture), which houses the Law School at Durham University.

We started by going round the room, each person giving a brief introduction and describing the current status of Blackboard Mobile (Learn and/or Central) at his/her institution.

We launched Mobile Learn at NUI Galway at the end of March 2012, at the end of teaching and just 4 weeks before the start of exams. With a promising initial take-up, we were interested to monitor its use during the teaching semester starting in September 2012. Three weeks into term, the number of logins were looking good and this continued to increase over the semester. On the first day of teaching in the current semester (Monday 7th January) there were more than 2.3K logins on Mobile Learn.

Going round the room at the user group meeting, different institutions were at different stages with Mobile Learn. Only a few had more experience than NUIG, with many having just launched or about to launch. The number who have implemented Mobile Central was much lower. I was interested to hear that a couple of institutions have their students paying for the Learn app through a personal licence, rather than having an institutional licence.

Julie Usher, Solutions Engineer with Blackboard Mobile, and formerly at the University of Northampton, gave an overview of recent developments and where the products are going.

• Blackboard Mobile is ceasing support on Blackberry devices for Mobile Central only. 
• 14 languages are now supported within both Mobile Learn and Mobile Central. This is particularly useful for international students.
• The Software Development Kit (SDK) for Mobile Central is now open for partner developments. More details about the SDK are available on the website.
• New documentation is available on the Blackboard Mobile website, including a new implementation guide for mobile central, best practices for mobile friendly courses, and client case studies.

With Mobile Learn 4.0, coming soon, we can look forward to a new user interface, to be built from scratch. This will include improved content handling, and a cleaner, clutter-free interface (no more corkboard on the iPad app). It will include a better display of grades and information for instructors about item availability. It will be possible to jump to a bookmarked part of a course and the course list management will be improved. All this will be ready by summer, ready for the 2013 student intake.

Blackboard Mobile will also revisit analytics. Currently, it's possible to monitor number of logins at different times of the day, and what devices are being used, but we can't see what activities are taking place. Are students just using the app as a notification device or are they actually engaging with content? More detailed information would be very useful.

The meeting then moved on to a discussion of issues and questions from the various institutions.

Mobile Tests:  there are now two separate test editors, one specifically for Mobile Learn. Existing Blackboard tests are not necessarily suitable for Mobile, but it should be easier to identify problem questions and have an easier way to convert for Mobile.

Support for Mobile Learn:  help enquiries from Mobile Learn go directly through to Blackboard. Some members of the group expressed the preference that these should be routed through the organisation first. From the NUIG perspective, we are quite happy that requests for help with the mobile applications are handled by Blackboard, but it would be interesting to have information about the number and type of requests. In fact, I suspect these are quite low.

Engaging Staff with Mobile: in response to a questions about how we cab encourage staff to engage with Mobile Learn, and to make content more suitable for mobile delivery, we were pointed to the best practices document on the website. We also heard from Alex Spiers about staff development sessions at Liverpool John Moores University, specifically on this topic, which have been successful. This prompted me to think that we haven't really been pushing mobile at NUIG, and maybe it's time to start thinking about this.

Asking Students about their use of the Apps:  Finally, coming back to the issue of analytics, there was an observation that we don't know enough about how students are using Mobile Learn. Maybe they just use it to notify them when new content is available. If we can collect more information on this it will be possible to advocate where it is appropriate for use, or to target particular groups of students!

The next meeting of the Blackboard Mobile Users' Group will be online, with a gathering organised as part of the Blackboard Europe Conference in Birmingham in April.

[Update on 22 January 2013] We ran a quick survey on our Blackboard login page, asking students about how they use the Mobile Learn app. The survey was available for a week and we got a great response. The results are available on our dedicated blackboardnuigalway blog.

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Twitter apps on an iPad: recommendations from the PLN

Today I asked my PLN to recommend a twitter app for the iPad, one that is good for multiple accounts. The results are collated in the storify embedded below.

If you have any recommendations, please tweet them to me (@sharonlflynn) or comment below.



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Kaltura Education Video Summit - My New York Adventure

View of Empire State Building

The last two weeks have been a bit surreal for me, and on Tuesday I spent a very pleasant day in Dakota Studio on 5th Avenue in New York City, recording a presentation for the Kaltura Education Video Summit. The summit will be a virtual event, taking place on 6th December, and you can register now for free. My presentation is on Supporting the use of video for teaching and learning (in the Blackboard LMS) and I am one of a long list of speakers, but the only one from outside the US, as far as I am aware.

So, how did this strange situation come about? Being in New York, pre-recording a presentation for a virtual conference to take place next month?

Well, just two weeks ago I got an email from Meytal Burstein, marketing manager with Kaltura, letting me know that my abstract had been accepted for the virtual Summit, and that I was invited to give a 30-35 minute presentation. I was very pleased, of course, and expected to deliver the presentation from my desktop, similar to the Blackboard/Kaltura webinar I was involved in a couple of weeks previously.

But, Meytal's email went on:
The entire content for the Summit will be pre-recorded in mid-November (most likely the 19^th and 20^th) in NYC. We will be happy to pay your travel expenses to NYC, of course. We will do the video shoot in a professional studio, and of course we will provide you with a copy of your professionally edited video, in case you would like to use it as a resource in the future. 

Believe me that I had to re-read the email a number of times, and make sure that it wasn't sent to the wrong person, before I could breathe again. I didn't even tell many people about the trip, I was so sure it would all fall through at the last minute.

From my Aer Lingus flight

However, Sunday found me heading off on a plane from Shannon airport, having already sent my deck of slides to Meytal, ready for the recording gig on Tuesday.

During the various social events organised for the speakers, I met some incredibly friendly and interesting Kaltura people, with a big shout out to Meytal, Zohar, Iddo and the other Zohar, who all made me feel very welcome. I also met the very impressive Michal Tsur, President and co-Founder of Kaltura. Forbes recently printed an interview with Michal on Female Leadership in the Tech Industry, which I know a lot of people will be interested in reading.

I also met a small number of the other speakers, and am looking forward to watching their presentations on the 6th December. I know that I was not alone in feeling completely nervous about the recording.

The Studio Recording

On Tuesday morning I arrived at the studio in time for my make-up! While my face was being transformed, I was able to watch another speaker being recorded (Nathan Sanders from the University of Utah).

Then it was my turn. I was given a clip-on mic and put standing on a small platform. In front of me was a mac with my presentation pre-loaded, and being recorded using camtasia. In front of me were two camera men. I was told to direct my presentation towards a target, which was just behind the head of one camera man. We did some audio tests and the lights were adjusted (Nathan is a good bit taller than me). Then Iddo used a clapperboard and Take One began!

Giving a presentation to two camera men, with an audio guy, a make-up artist and a couple of other technical people in a studio, is a completely different experience to standing in front of an audience. They have really no interest in what you might be saying. There is no feedback; nobody nodding their head letting you know they have understood; nobody laughs (politely) at your jokes; there is nobody to make eye-contact with. On the plus side, nobody falls asleep. When you mess up a line, or lose your train of though, you just stop, take a deep breath, have a gulp of water (trying not to mess up your lipstick) and start again. It is the most bizarre experience.

I really don't know how I did. I know I messed up a couple of times and I'm relying on some good editing. I'm sure I looked like a scared rabbit in the car headlights. I don't know how well I got my message across. All will be revealed on the 6th December.

Interview

After the recording in the main studio, each speaker was asked to participate in an interview conducted with Zohar Babin and also recorded on two cameras. This was a lot less formal and much easier to perform. Zohar asked a number of questions about video in education and about our experiences at the conference. It was very conversational in style and I actually relaxed and enjoyed the experience. At the same time, we could hear the sirens blaring from outside the studio on 5th avenue, which was quite amusing.

In the photo on the left, Catherine L Moran of the University of New Hampshire talks about using video with her students.

And now, I find myself back at my desk and wondering if I've just woken from a dream. I will be tuning in on the 6th, and making myself available to answer questions at the virtual summit. I don't know if I'll be able to watch myself though.

Abstract

In case you're wondering - here's the abstract for my talk. I'll post the slides after the conference.

Over the last few years, we’ve noticed a significant increase in the use of video in teaching and learning on campus. Using the right video can enhance a lecture and increase student engagement. But encouraging academic staff to create their own video, or to make use of shared video resources, means that we have to provide a clean, simple workflow with reliable supporting technology. This talk will describe how NUI Galway has been implementing a project to integrate Kaltura into the Blackboard VLE to provide this support for staff. I’ll demonstrate some use cases for the building block, including video lab demonstrations, student presentations, vodcasts and student assignments. I will give an overview of the issues that have been experienced during the project and the extent to which they have been addressed. A particular issue is staff development: now that we have the infrastructure in place, how can we encourage and support more people to use it?

Finally, I would like to very sincerely thank the lovely folks at Kaltura who gave me the opportunity to be part of this wonderful experience. If you ever decide to visit Galway, although I can't pay your expenses, you'll be assured of a warm welcome.

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Hiding behind my avatar - follow up

I've decided to stick with my avatar. Here's why... (from Storify)

 

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