Week
2 - an introduction to the pedagogy of blended learning.
We started off by
looking at different theories and teaching approaches that might be applicable
to blended learning:
Teaching
Strategies
Constructivist Pedagogy
– learners construct their own knowledge & meaning through experience;
involves real world experience where teachers act as facilitators. A case study
was presented where students were using a recording tool to record their
activities which they could then review and discuss with their tutor.
Social Constructivism –
individuals learn as a result of social interaction and collaboration with
others. A case study was presented where students used flickr and facebook to
share images and videos of their work. This gave students an opportunity to
share and reflect on what they had done; they could take pride in what they had
achieved; the material produced could be used as a revision tool.
Problem-based Learning –
individuals learn as a result of active learning, using real-world scenarios;
also involves social learning. A case study was presented where students were
developing creative skills and were actively engaged in their activities,
professional skills applicable to the workplace were also being developed.
I don’t’ have any
teaching qualifications so having formal definitions of various pedagogies was
interesting. These can provide a framework to use when thinking about how
learning can be enhanced by the use of technologies.
Many of the strategies
and activities described here would be applicable to teaching and helping
learners develop their information skills. We ground our teaching very much in
the practical application of skills to solve likely problems encountered in the
workplace.
Tools
The week we also started
to look at some tools:
NearPod ( https://nearpod.com/ ) – this is a tool that
allows you to create teaching content (eg powerpoint presentations and quizzes),
which can then be accessed by learners via mobile devices
Interactive whiteboard –
within classrooms, this allows teachers to present interactive content that
learners can engage with
Video / Audio input
using multimedia tools
Google Classroom –
activities can be structure ready for learners to follow
These tools are
presented as “free” to use.
Matching
Pedagogy with Technology
The next section of this
week encouraged us to think about what technologies would enhance which
teaching strategies
Digital
Literacy Skills Audit
We were asked to
complete a digital skills audit – my score was 160 / 250. Looking at the
results some of my low scores relate to: using a VLE (which we don’t have
access to), use social chat / discussion tools and using a webcam.
The library doesn’t have
a presence on the VLE and we are not encouraged to participate which I think is
a real shame and a big missed opportunity. We do try to encourage academic staff to include our content in their
courses.
I am going to try to
promote the comments facilities of our blogs to see if learners are interested
in using that. We do use Twitter although there is little interaction
there.
Using a webcam is
something that I could consider when creating our demonstration videos.
Border
College & Blended Learning
A case study was
presented of Border College which was using blended learning extensively. Some
key aspects that were mentioned included:
CPD for teachers – who
developed new skills when creating content for blended learning
Learners – contributed
to content, were more involved in their own learning, took more responsibility
for their learning, had more interaction with each other
Consider:
Another attendee pointed
out that evidence of learning may need to be retained for a period of time (for
example for proof of qualifications) which may be difficult when using open
tools outside the normal assessment structures.
It should be noted that
although these tools are promoted as “free” to use, users have to create
accounts and provide personal information which no doubt is used by the
providers for other uses.
Tools
Introduced:
Google Classroom
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