“I wanted to connect” lessons learnt from an open online PBL trial within Academic Development 2010/11 Chrissi Nerantzi Academic Developer University of Salford

Something to think about What would I need the most during online learning? What would I miss the most during online learning?

‘Relatively little research has explored students’ experience of facilitation’ (Savin-Baden 2003, 56)

locations

• complete PBL task

• Create online space

• Find participants (AD, PgCert participants) – SEDA

• Find critical friend

• (AD) familiarise with technology and PBL

• (AD) work on PBL scenario, assessment criteria, peer feedback template

timeline

team member

teacher

chair scribe

thinker

learner

stage 1: explore the problem stage 1: explore the problem

stage 2: discover known and unknown, plan

stage 2: discover known and unknown, plan

stage 3 : research and share stage 3 : research and share

stage 4: apply stage 4: apply

stage 5: present stage 5: present

5-stage model (Mills, 2006)

Web2.0 toolkit

blog

Project 2010-2011

method and data collection and analysis

… there are limited ways in which individuals experience the same phenomenon

(Marton, 1981)

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Capturing participants’ variation of experience

Data collection • individual remote interviews

• surveys (initial and final)

• reflective accounts

Remember? You were asked at the beginning

What would I need the most during online learning?

What would I miss the most during online learning?

I never, ever, ever have been involved in anything fully online either as a learner or as a tutor or any other thing.

I wanted to connect

I would have liked to come away feeling it was

more of a community being created.

In my group, there was really lack of communication and I am as guilty of it as anybody else.

I was quite excited about this and very keen to be a part of it. The possibility of how online collaboration might work.

I didn’t feel the facilitators particularly engaged with

the participants which was a big drawback to this

process.

I felt like virtually walking in the darkness,

going to a wrong direction, hitting a wall that suddenly coming up and when I need

help, no one responded right away.

There was a lack of real human contact eye-to-eye, smile, feeling the

other’s real presence.

findings

Time

Busy Study Timing

Technology Choice

Number Use

Communication

Asynchronous Synchronous

No communication

People

Working with colleagues from other institutions

Multi-disciplinary groups

Socialising and community

Group size

Rules

PBL task

Scenario

Assessment and feedback

Online PBL

Yes, to online PBL Yes, to blended

PBL No to PBL

PBL in PgCerts

Facilitators say definitely yes

Some participants are

sceptic

Reflecting

Purpose and structure

Engagement Time

Privacy

Facilitation

Clarity of role

Engagement and support

Structure and scaffolding

Preparation

we synchronous communication

• learning in multi-disciplinary teams

• learning with colleagues from different HE institutions

• the opportunity to participate and learnt a lot from the trial and the issues experienced

we also

• Time available and extent of task

• Technology was frustrating for some

• Working 100% online problematic

• Asynchronous communication slowed things down

• The social element was missing, no community feel

• Facilitation! This was the biggest issue of all and recognised by participants and the facilitators themselves

main issues

The role of the facilitator

“Facilitators new to problem-based learning often feel that it is better to say less – or even nothing – so that the students feel that they are taking the lead in the learning.”

(Savin-Baden 2003, 50)

“[...] students new to problem-based learning, [...] (feel) that the lack of direction is duplicitous because they feel it is the facilitator’s way of avoiding a declaration of their own agenda and concerns.

(Savin-Baden, 2003, p. 50)

Could we remove/r

eplace PBL here?

coaching: push>pull

less experienced PBL students

need push

(directive)

facilitation approach

experienced PBL students

need pull

(non-directive)

facilitation approach

(Neville, 1999; Savin-Baden 2006)

Clarity of role “I personally think I would have found at least clarification what the facilitator would do, and again, I might have missed it and it may be my lack of experience, but then again any student who is coming for the first time to do PBL, will have that lack of experience. If I had been told, that the facilitator is there basically to mop up any really serious issues, somebody who is really ill, completely unable to participate before the facilitator steps in, fair enough, I am not going to have kind of support and then I would have to step up to the plate and be a leader.”

“. .. not being sure myself where things were, what we were doing...”

Lack of support “I felt a bit like, I was not knowing which direction I was taking and a bit sort of in a doubtful sort of perspective, whether I’m actually reading the right material, whether I’m going to the right things, whether I’m following all the right stuff that I’m needing. yeah a little bit in the dark. [...] I feel there was a bit of, not too much facilitation going on. [...] I would have encouraged people to, to read the scenario together. Because I think that the initial, do the scenario, read the scenario together and then once you read it, maybe for a very brief time, read it together and, so say “ok, go and think about this, and maybe pay attention to these points a little bit more and maybe come back and we’ll discuss a bit more and then”. Something along those lines”

“I was probably not confident as I would normally do in the sense of directing people and helping people, facilitating as I would normally be.”

More structure

“Potentially creating more of a structure, where it would be expected to interact on a more regular basis”

“I really should have had perhaps more structure in arranging meetings with the group…”

Better preparation

“PBL depends on very thorough planning”

“I think because it is an online trial, I didn’t realise how I wasn’t prepared, if you see what I mean. Had I known, perhaps I would have had more preparation [...] had I done sort of more research myself it would have helped.”

I participated in a couple of online programmes. Speaking personally, I hated it! There is no scope for discussion. I spent my days sitting in front of the computer. Communicating via email, offering feedback to students, writing things. ... learning needs to be quicker being able to communicate directly with students, it is part of a social process, it shouldn’t be sitting in front of a computer again... I can learn from it, do I enjoy it? No!

• Communication, communication, communication!

• More hands-on approach required initially!

• Task setting and timelines

• Use the structured PBL model and PBL tutorial process

• Use available technologies for (a)synchronous collaboration

• Lay the foundations of a learning community

PBL facilitators engagement

Facilitation modes (Heron,1989, 1993) Student perspective TESEP 3E (Smyth,2007)

Hierarchical (directive) Enhance

Co-operative (partnership) Extend

Letting go (autonomous) Empower

Progressive online PBL framework

a suggestion: facilitation for 3c

Suggestions made by participants and facilitators:

• Facilitators to receive training in advance

• More structured and supportive approach to facilitation

• Arranging regular synchronous meetings

• Participants and facilitators to get to know each other and create the foundations of a learning community from the very beginning.

Main recommendations

online training for PBL facilitators

Ongoing support

Orientation tour

Facilitation for 3c

Use PBL structure and process

The role of the facilitator... “... seems to be extremely important in an online learning activity.” (Chernobilsky et. al p. 61)

“The general goal of the facilitator is to help students construct causal explanations that connect theories, data and proposed solutions.” (Hmelo-Silver, 2002, p.10)

“is guiding students on the learning process, pushing them to think deeply and modelling the kinds of questions that students need to be asking themselves.” (Hmelo-Silver, 2002, p. 1)

“It might be that PBLonline requires more of a silent presence by the facilitator, along with appropriate hinting and prompting, rather than some of the direction and intervention that seems to be evident in much e-moderating” (Savin-Baden, 2006, p. 11)

“Students doing PBLonline seem to need less facilitator support and guidance as they become more familiar and skilled with managing the learning approach.” (Savin-Baden, 2006, p. 11)

The role of the facilitator... “Facilitators new to problem-based learning often feel that it is better to say less – or even nothing – so that the students feel that they are taking the lead in the learning. (Savin-Baden 2003, 50)

[...] particularly with students new to problem-based learning, results in students feeling that the lack of direction is duplicitous because they feel it is the facilitator’s way of avoiding a declaration of their own agenda and concerns. (Savin-Baden 2003, 50)

Neville (1999): novice students with little experience of such learning (PBL) would probably benefit from directive tutors who where knowledge experts.

Neville (1999): More experienced PBL students require less direction and become increasingly self-sufficient.

Also applicable

more generally?

existing research limited “Relatively little research has explored students’ experience of facilitation” (Savin-Baden, 2003, p. 56)

references Bowcott, O (2011) Open University may be in its 40s – but students are getting younger, Guardian online, 3 January, available at http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/jan/03/open-university-students-younger [accessed 4 January 2011]

Chernobilsky, E, Nagarajan, A & Hmelo-Silver, C E (2005) Problem-Based Learning Online: Multiple Perspectives on Collaborative Knowledge Construction, in CSCL '05: Proceedings of the 2005 conference on Computer support for collaborative learning (2005), pp. 53-62.

Downes, S (2010) New Technology Supporting Informal Learning, Journal of Emerging Technologies in Web Intelligence, 2(1), pp. 27–33.

Hmelo-Silver, C E (2002) Collaborative Ways of Knowing: Issues in Facilitation, in: · Proceeding CSCL '02 Proceedings of the Conference on Computer Support for Collaborative Learning: Foundations for a CSCL Community, available at http://elc.fhda.edu/faculty/faculty_docs/facilitation.pdf [accessed 12 January 2011].

Marton, F (1981) Phenomenography – describing conceptions of the world around us, Instructional Science, 10, pp. 177-200.

Meiszner, A (2010) The Open Education Movement, 24 April, available at http://www.openedworld.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=21&Itemid=25 [accessed 6 January 2011]

Mills, D (2006) Problem-based learning: An overview, available at http://www.csap.bham.ac.uk/resources/project_reports/ShowOverview.asp?id=4 [accessed 5 March 2010]

Neville, J A (1999) The problem-based learning tutor: teacher? facilitator? evaluator?, Medical Teacher, 21(4), pp. 393-401.

Savin-Baden, M (2003) Facilitating Problem-Based Learning, Illuminating Perspective, Maidenhead: SRHE and Open University Press.

Savin-Baden, M (2006) The challenge of using problem-based learning online, in: Problem-based Learning Online (2006), pp. 3-13, available at http://mcgraw-hill.co.uk/openup/chapters/0335220061.pdf [accessed 12 January 2011].