Fostering Collaboration is the focus of this year’s Dublin Region Higher Education Alliance (DRHEA)elearning summer school. The DRHEA consists of the four universities and four institutes of technology in the Dublin region, which have a total of almost 11,000 staff and about 75,000 students. An elearning newtork of excellence is being established, starting with a preliminary audit on elearning among its members. The audit focuses on the use of VLEs and among other things urges the expansion from course management to greater use of learning activities and the upgrading of skills to support this.
The role of educational technologists in the transforming of education was discussed in a lively presentation by Larry McNutt. He illustrated the growing role of collaboration and the declining importance of content by comparing the rise of Wikipedia with the decline of Microsoft’s Encarta encyclopedia. While noting that the Irish Learning Alliance is an umbrella group for Irish eLearning companies, he advised learning technologists to ‘reclaim the field’. Technology needs to be ‘put in its place’ with learning technologists and academics using technology to help broaden access to education.
Librarians from DIT and DCU introduced the role of Web 2.0 in higher education. This was followed by hands-on workshops in collaborative technologies, including my own on blogs and wikis. I found that there were 2 bloggers among a class of 15 – including Michael Seery. By the end of the class all participants had written blog posts and contributed to a group wiki. We used Campus Pack from Learning Objects which are available for both Blackboard & Moodle so that access can be restricted to class members.
I am looking for a tool that will enable a group (some with little technical experience) to create and maintain a website on a voluntary basis. The desired features include: open source, standards compliant, easy-to-use, secure with threaded discussion forums, news, RSS, calendars and media handling. It must be suitable for showcasing papers, presentations and video clips from an annual conference.
The Old: Our group wanted to move away from a ‘traditional’ website created in Dreamweaver as it depended on one or two people to maintain it.
The New: We looked at and rejected:
Drupal and eZ Publish – difficult, steep learning curve, probably more than required.
Moodle and WordPress – stretching them too far beyond their original purpose.
Ning – we wanted a conference site as well as networking (also it’s not open source).
Now we are looking atJoomla- which seems at about the right level of functionality and ease of use. I was going to add their logo but it is not allowed!
The UCD School of Geography, Planning and Environmental Policy ran a pilot, large class teaching project with their first-year students in the second semester. The students used Moodle, a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE), similar to Blackboard, to investigate major themes in Human Geography. Dr Niamh Moore and Dr Mary Gilmartin of UCD Geography took a blended approach, mixing lectures and online activities. Their aim was to foster active learning and the development of generic skills in communication, teamwork and IT among the students. They also hoped to increase participation and reduce isolation among the class of approximately 400 first-year students.
The themes selected were Global Commodities, Heritage and Development, Environment and Development and Landscapes and Migration.
A topical case was used to explore each theme, namely, the Coffee Trade, Tara and the M3 Motorway, the Corrib Gas Pipeline Development and Emigration and Immigration in Ireland.
The students were divided into groups of eight for online activities. Each group studied all four cases. Groups had their own chat rooms and discussion boards for communication. Tasks included creating a class glossary, worth 20% of the module marks, and producing a range of individual and group assignments. For each case study, two assignments were required. These included creating a class glossary, worth 20% of the module marks, and producing a range of individual and group assignments. For each case study, two assignments were required. These were worth 5% and 10% of the module marks respectively. The lecturers were supported by twelve tutors (postgraduate students) who helped manage communication within the groups and conducted tutorials.
The content was developed by four undergraduate students over a six-week period. The students compiled and created content including web links and audio and video material, such as music and an interview with one of the Rossport Five.
The project was seen as a general success with a marked improvement at both tutorials and lectures. The end of year results suggest that students who engaged fully with the module and submitted their assessments had a greater opportunity to score more highly than in the traditional exam system. However, the corollary was also true. A small number of students who did not engage with the assignments and material scored very low grades, as they did not have the terminal exam as a safety net. Evaluations are currently being analysed but would suggest that students had a generally positive learning experience, developed social networks and bonds and achieved deeper learning.
This project will be continued next year and will be fine-tuned based on the results of the evaluations from students. A second year module in Cultural Geography will adopt a similar approach in 2007/08 and will act as a follow-on for the students who successfully completed Introduction to Human Geography I (People and Places).
The Large Class Teaching Project on Human Geography can be found at http://moodle.ucd.ie/.
My thanks to Dr. Niamh Moore for her assistance with this article.
Editor:Niall Watts, Educational Technology Officer, AVC. IT Services. Ext 7035
The views expressed in this article are the personal views of the author and do not represent the opinion of University College Dublin.
