Collaborative exercise

As per my last post (May 1), students this week commenced working in teams to collaboratively devise concepts for their branching e-learning scenarios. I suspected that team ideas would be more engaing than individual ones and I wanted the students to experience for themselves the effectiveness of collaboration within the creative process.

Here are some details/observations from the f2f class where this occcurred:

1. I suggested they form their own groups of 2 or 3.
2. Initially a little slow to form groups, but this resolved itself in under 3 minutes with one exception (see 3 below). There are 6 groups overall.
   
3. A very quiet individual in the class did not leave their seat for some time. I encouraged them individually, then mentioned to the whole class that they make sure noone is left out. A group of 2 then invited the remaining individual to join them. This group performed really well and came up with some strong concepts for the project.
4. One group retired to a break-out room where it was a little quieter to work -- this group completed their planning first.
5. After some initial hesitation with the theme of "safety" --- following brief brainstorming, all groups devised interesting and different approaches. I selected a deliberately 'dry' topic in order to stretch their creative problem-solving muscles --- the groups rose to the challenge.
6. Most classes for these students are computer based -- this was a pleasant departure from that format.
   
7. The mood in the room was very upbeat as they worked with their concepts - I congratulated them on their efforts. It felt very gratifying to see my learning ideas work as planned.
   

The planning exercise involves making a decision tree ( a little like a 'choose your own adventure' story) and each branching decision needs to teach the audience a concept. I chose to do this in a f2f environment for the following reasons:

1. This activity needed some guidance. When there were questions about how to frame some concepts -- small suggestions from me got things moving again quickly. I needed to be there.
2. Previously I had investigated online mindmaps to see if this would work for this exercise and decided against it, based on the time it would take to brainstorm online or asynchronously.
3. Previous learning pref discussions in this class have revealed the kinesthetic learning prefs of these students. As I suggested using mindmaps and other tactile techniques (postits etc) for brainstorming ideas, this worked best f2f. And quicker too.
4. The collaboration of the groups seemed more effective in person, rather than online. It was more animated, funny at times, full of body language, very expressive etc.
5. Groups got most of the work done in the 2hr f2f class - some groups will meet later to finish.

So oddly enough, even though a flexible learning environment is designed to largely solve the time-poor problems of learners - there are times when a f2f approach seems the quickest to a solution.

Adobe Captivate 4

Over the last 3 weeks, I have introduced Adobe Captivate 4 in f2f classes as an e-learning authoring tool. The Adobe speel claims that no programming or multimedia skills are required, but I have found through teaching Captivate to non-multimedia teachers in the past that the tool is a little daunting to those without multimedia experience.

However, my multimedia students (with existing Flash skills etc) have found it very easy to pick up -- collectively we summed it up as "like Powerpoint with a timeline". In just 2 weeks f2f (total 4 hrs) we have looked at using the tool to develop content that incorporates screen demos, presentations, and quizzes. Soon we will look at how the tool can be used to develop interactive branching scenarios.

Following the screencasts developed by students using Screenr (see post on March 17), they appreciate the editing capabilities of Captivate which allows the author to edit mouse paths, insert new audio, etc. I wanted them to see the differences between the 2 approaches to screen recording and appreciate the immediacy of the free online tool (Screenr) before being exposed to the sophisticated commercial alternative (Captivate).

Students are now working in groups to design their own branching scenarios to teach some aspect of 'safety'. The next project will involve authoring these individually in Captivate.

The initial group-based design is intended to encourage collaboration amongst students -- students clearly are stretched further in a collaborative environment, enabling greater learning opportunities and a more interesting design. Building the products individually will allow personal approaches to their own folio pieces.

Some technical probs

A week or so ago, two different students explained that they have not been able to access the online resources from home. This caused me to consider a few points:

1. Why did they wait this long to mention this? Was it fear of appearing foolish, or was the problem intermittent?
2. Only 2 out of 17 class members seem to have the problem - but it is still a problem nonetheless
3. As far as we can tell, the problem relates to their individual setups on their home computers - still trying to determine exactly what the issue is, but it is clearly hard to cater for everyones unique setups (although we should)
   
4. In the meantime, the blended approach and the availability of computers outside of class has meant these students have not been disadvantaged (I fact these two students are more up to date than others)
5. I have used institute SMS and email communication to pass on possible solutions from our IT staff

Needless to say, this is still a WIP...

Focus areas for this research

Before I get into the post, I havent forgotten about this blog, just life gets in the way sometimes. Anyway, onward and upward...

I've been doing a lot of reading of academic papers related to this research and there are many themes that are suitable to pursue when discussing instructional design pedagogy and flexible learning. However this is a small project so I've limited the list to these main points:

• learner-centredness -- the notion of learner choice and making a distinction between 'learners get' and 'learners do'
  
• constructivist approach -- particularly using a learner-centred environment to engage learners in knowledge construction through collaboration, meaningful contexts and reflection
  
• blended learning -- explore as an effective model for online learning
  
• use of technology -- particularly warning against starting the learning design process with technology solutions in mind (ie: learning concepts first, tools second)
  
• teachers role - how does this transform in a flexible learning environment?

This next and last item is not really a main point, more something I'd like to develop as the research ensues...

• Some broad guidelines or tips for pedagogical approaches to flexible learning (maybe a mash-up of what's out there)