Designing Online Resources to Enhance In-Class Interactions

David Wright, Writing Specialist & Mike Winiski, Associate Director, Center for Teaching and

Learning, Furman University Jeremy Donald, Faculty Technology Liaison, Trinity

University

NITLE Seminar

September 20, 2012

Upcoming NITLE Seminars

• FemTechNet: The First DOCC,* A Feminist MOOC, October 4, 4-5 pm EDT

• Stories of the Susquehanna: Digital Humanities, Spatial Thinking, and Telling the historia of the Environment, October 9, 2-3 pm EDT

• Evaluating Digital Scholarship, October 10, 4-5 pm EDT

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Goals1) Examine Kolb’s Learning Cycle as model for

designing learning environments (whether physical or digital) that set the stage for dynamic, rigorous, and robust in-class interactions

2) Share examples of how we applied this model to develop flexible online modules to help optimize face-to-face time

3) Promote dialog about the applicability of this model at participant institutions

Desired Learners

I want my students to show up to class . . .

“Reversing the Flow”

“That is, we start in practice, and practice drives us to content. Or, more likely, the optimal way to learn is reciprocally or spirally between practice and content.”

—Randall Bass, “Disrupting Ourselves: The Problem of Learning in Higher Education”

Key: Developing pedagogies that blend practice and content, both in and out of the classroom.

Traditional Writing Instruction Model

• Give assignment.

• Students write and submit essays.

• Instructors grade essays and give feedback, which sometimes includes specific writing instruction.

• Handbooks mostly function as remedial or supplementary resource.

Workshop Writing Model

• Give assignment.

• Students write and submit drafts for workshop.

• Class workshops essays together, which sometimes includes specific writing instruction.

• Students revise and resubmit essays for final evaluation.

• Handbooks still mostly function as remedial or supplementary resource.

“Reversing the Flow” with Digital Tutorials

• Provides instructors with high-quality, targeted instructional materials.

• Blends writing “content” lessons (e.g. “Writing Effective Thesis Statements) with the actual practice of drafting.

• Allows instructors to decide how and when to incorporate the tutorials into their classes.

Tutorials in Richmond’s “Writer’s Web”

Thesis Statement Video Page: http://writing2.richmond.edu/writing/wweb/thesis2.html

Thesis Statement Exercises: http://writing2.richmond.edu/writing/wweb/thesisexercise.html

• We drink / sip the experiential learning Kool-Aid;

• We didn’t invent this;• It’s just a model, but the simplification can

be useful.

Assumptions and Notes

Kolb’s Learning Cycle

Experiencing

Examining

Explaining

Applying

*denotes student experience

The Learner’s View

• Examine the role of social media in our professional and personal lives and its impact on how we communicate with one another

• Identify traps as well as potential upsides of social media in our professional lives and develop strategies for optimizing its use

Social Media in the Workplace (Business Writing Class)

Experiencing

Examining

Explaining

Applying

The Learner’s View

Experiencing

Examining

Explaining

Applying

Experiencing

Examining

Explaining

Applying

You’ve been working for a company for several years. During a strategy planning session, the topic of Facebook comes up. The technology doesn’t seem to be a fit for any of the company initiatives, so the group moves on to other topics of discussion. You’re an avid user of Facebook and connect with family, friends, and several co-workers with whom you feel close. You get home that evening, log into email, and find a friend request from the Director of Marketing, an attendee at the meeting earlier in the day. He’s a very well-respected member of the organization, but he’s always made you feel uncomfortable for some reason. You aren’t sure what to do, so you ignore the request. A few days later, you bump into this co-worker in the hallway. He asks if you’ve gotten the request. What should you do?

Experiencing

Examining

Explaining

Applying

Lead With Experience

As Instructors, We Are All Self-Taught

“That is, we start in practice, and practice drives us to content. Or, more likely, the optimal way to learn is reciprocally or spirally between practice and content.”—Randall Bass, “Disrupting Ourselves: The Problem of Learning in Higher Education”

(From Svinicki and Dixon, 1987)

(From Svinicki and Dixon, 1987)

(From Svinicki and Dixon, 1987)

What do you do with class time?

Class time for…

• Targeting the understandings, content, or skills that students find most difficult

• Providing low-stakes practice and feedback opportunities (emphasis on peer feedback w/ expert oversight; also an informal assessment opportunity)

• Letting students build something from their meaning-making/explaining/mistake-fixing that can in turn support them in the active experimentation phase

Examples

• Students create a set of criteria or guidelines to apply during their upcoming active experimentation

• Students create a set of criteria for self-evaluation

• Students create something typical to authentic practice (e.g., a research proposal, an executive summary, a spec sheet)

ACS Blended Learning Grant Project:Analyzing and Creating Maps

http://bit.ly/NtBkup

Website serves as resource for instructors, providing online materials intended for out-of-class use (tutorials, including a substantial case study, and ideas for writing prompts) as well as suggested in-class strategies. A complete sample curriculum for a two-day module on spatial thinking is also provided.

Screencast Tutorials:Map LiteracyHistograms, etc. Case StudyCreating Your Own Map

Teacher’s Notes:Writing, activity, and assignment ideas for adapting into your course

Sample Curriculum:More-developed example of an adaptation/implementation within a political science course.

Map Literacy Example

Answer questions, reply to prompts

Working in groups, create a set of guidelines for map-making that reflect the criteria you’ve worked together to refine.

Apply your guidelines in the written evaluation of a new set of maps, and see if the guidelines are aligned with your own critical response to the maps. Note revisions you would make to the guidelines.

(Individually) write list of pros and cons for a chosen map, using criteria you’ve developed.

Discuss homework as a class.

Map Literacy Example

Answer questions, reply to prompts

Working in groups, create a set of guidelines for map-making that reflect the criteria you’ve worked together to refine.

Apply your guidelines in the written evaluation of a new set of maps, and see if the guidelines are aligned with your own critical response to the maps. Note revisions you would make to the guidelines.

(Out of class)

(Individually) write list of pros and cons for a chosen map, using criteria you’ve developed.

Discuss homework as a class.

Map Literacy Example

Answer questions, reply to prompts

Apply your guidelines in the written evaluation of a new set of maps, and see if the guidelines are aligned with your own critical response to the maps. Note revisions you would make to the guidelines.

(Out of class)

Working in groups, create a set of guidelines for map-making that reflect the criteria you’ve worked together to refine.

(In class)

(Individually) write list of pros and cons for a chosen map, using criteria you’ve developed.

Discuss homework as a class.

Map Literacy Example

Answer questions, reply to prompts

Apply your guidelines in the written evaluation of a new set of maps, and see if the guidelines are aligned with your own critical response to the maps. Note revisions you would make to the guidelines.

(Out of class)

Working in groups, create a set of guidelines for map-making that reflect the criteria you’ve worked together to refine.

(In class)

(Individually) write list of pros and cons for a chosen map, using criteria you’ve developed.

Discuss homework as a class.

Real-time assessment/feedback opportunities

Map Literacy Example

Answer questions, reply to prompts

Apply your guidelines in the written evaluation of a new set of maps, and see if the guidelines are aligned with your own critical response to the maps. Note revisions you would make to the guidelines.

(Out of class)

(Homework)

Working in groups, create a set of guidelines for map-making that reflect the criteria you’ve worked together to refine.

(In class)

(Individually) write list of pros and cons for a chosen map, using criteria you’ve developed.

Discuss homework as a class.

writing-to-learn assignments

problem-based assignment design

conceptualworkshops

contextual learning experience design

Image Credits

• online communities map - http://xkcd.com/802/

• think - http://www.flickr.com/photos/jakecaptive/3205277810/

• chalkboard - http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeffreywarren/297096827/

• city - http://www.flickr.com/photos/holly_northrop/4278173735/

• bewildered - http://www.flickr.com/photos/viydook/6094186264/

ReferencesBass, R. (2012). Disrupting ourselves: The problem of learning in higher education.

Educause Review. Retrieved from http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/disrupting-ourselves-problem-learning-higher-education

Kolb, D. A. (1983). Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development (1st ed.). Prentice Hall.

Svinicki, M. D., & Dixon, N. M. (1987). The Kolb model modified for classroom activities. College Teaching, 35(4), 141–146.