Preparing Ed.D. Students to Conduct Group Dissertations

In this article we present an overview of a recently launched cohort-based Ed.D. program that prepares participants to conduct group dissertations. The program, a hybrid model of online learning activities and monthly face-to-face class sessions, is delivered through a partnership between a university’s college of education and the administrative office of a statewide system of community and technical colleges. Discussion begins with a review of the pedagogical rationale that informed program design and instructional practices, followed by a presentation of key program elements tracing the development of the cohort through an innovative, collaborative dissertation process still in progress.     

Upper secondary and vocational level teachers at social software

This study focuses on upper secondary and vocational level teachers as users of social software i.e. what software they use during their leisure and work and for what purposes they use software in teaching. The study is theorised within a technological pedagogical content knowledge framework, the emphasis is especially on technological knowledge and technological pedagogical knowledge. Four hundred thirty seven teachers were surveyed using an online questionnaire with Likert scaled statements and open-ended questions. Results suggest that the number of different types of social software actively used for teaching is small and that the potential of social software as a tool for supporting collaborative learning has not yet been realised. Discussion of the results is framed in the context of teachers’ developing technological pedagogical content knowledge.     

Supporting students to develop collaborative learning skills in technology-based environments

The paper focuses on the question of how to advance collaboration through the Web and support lifelong learning. First, the theoretical framework and architecture of a new web‐based tool, the ‘IQ Team’, is introduced. IQ Team is an interactive online assessment and support system to learn social skills needed in cooperative work, and belongs in an interactive online assessing and tutoring system, ‘IQ Form’, developed for the Finnish Virtual University. IQ Team has three main elements: (1) interactive self‐evaluation test banks, (2) online tutoring sets and (3) learning diaries. In the creation of IQ Team, the validation process was conducted with two samples (n = 259 and n = 275). The online students’ social skills in different groups were explored, and the feedback data from different user groups were analysed. The online students scored high values for social skills, and no differences were discerned between university, Open University and technical students. The qualitative data (n = 35) were collected in order to get users’ feedback of the tool. The qualitative data consisted of interviews, open‐ended questions and online discussions. The users of IQ Team reflected that the tool benefited them to become aware of their group work skills and developed their collaborative learning skills. IQ Team provides a powerful tool for online instruction and communication in higher education and in the Open University to promote joint‐regulated learning.     

Using TPCK as a scaffold to self-assess the novice online teaching experience

How does one evaluate one’s own online teaching? Do novice online instructors depend on end-of-semester course evaluations or a Quality Matters rubric? Perhaps their professional development is driven by a personal belief that seeking multiple perspectives from different lenses is core to reflective practice. This work explores one way to interrogate one’s own online teaching practices through a systematic reflection on technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPCK). It involved identifying and reflecting upon instances in which TPCK was evident in the design and facilitation of the online learning environment in an undergraduate online course. Ways to improve online teaching based on increased meta-cognitive awareness of TPCK are considered. Implications of this self-study for distance learning professional development are discussed.     

The ARIADNE Project (Part 2): Knowledge Pools for Computer-based and Telematics-supported Classical,Open and Distance Education

This paper presents the tools and methodologies underlying the ARIADNE framework for enabling open and distance education and for enhancing more conventional training schemes. The ARIADNE concept relies on a distributed knowledge pool system that stores pedagogically indexed educational resources, as well as on a set of tools and methodologies for authoring curricula. The basic approach is one of share and reuse. Specialized authoring tools are under development for the production of simulations, multiple-choice questionnaires and auto-evaluation exercises. Segmentation tools for video and text-based material, with integrated facilities for hypertext generation, are also under development. The distributed knowledge pool system consists of one central knowledge pool, and a number of local knowledge pools. Corporate training systems can also be built around private knowledge pools. Before pedagogical documents can be inserted into the knowledge pool system, their pedagogical and other characteristics must be described. A pedagogical header generator tool assists in this task. Pedagogical engineers can define the spatio-temporal, socio-pedagogic process that we call a curriculum, and choose the active and expositive documents that embody it, by using a curriculum editor. Finally, students consult or work with the documents of the curriculum they subscribed to, through a personalized view provided by the ARIADNE learner interface.     

Ratings for the mercantile marine: the roles of charity,the state and industry in the pre-service education and training of ratings for the British Merchant Navy, 1879–1939

Pedagogically aimed craft education was established around the same time as the school-based system of formative education, under the term Sloyd. This refers to a pedagogical system of manual training that promotes general child development, through the acquisition of the technical skills employed in woodwork, metalwork, sewing, knitting and the making of useful objects by hand. The purpose of Sloyd was to employ craft as a tool in general education, in order to build the character of a child, encouraging moral behaviour, greater intelligence and industriousness. The Sloyd pedagogy reached Iceland towards the end of the nineteenth century: during the years 1889–1938, 38 Icelanders had attended Otto Salomon’s teacher-training school in Nääs in Sweden, in order to learn Sloyd. These students became pioneers of the pedagogical craft in Iceland and their influence was significant in the development of the still-existing school subject.     

A Technical/Strategic Paradigm for Online Executive Education

This article discusses the development and delivery of online courses for the executive education audience. The goal is to introduce a new framework, the technical/strategic paradigm, that will help educators to identify the pedagogical needs of disparate executive groups and adjust their online course development plans accordingly. We describe how four key elements of online courses (course structure, content‐based learning materials, assignments, and learning assessment) should be fashioned in a way that honors the technical or strategic focus of the learning environment. How the technical/strategic paradigm molds well with many different types of executive educational audiences and settings is illustrated. Course developers seeking advice on how to put these ideas into practice will find lists of resources and implementable recommendations. Ultimately, we argue that some of the pitfalls that faculty experience when transitioning from a traditional business school environment to an online executive education environment can be attributed to a misunderstanding of the degree to which students expect technical versus strategic content.     

Online Design Education: Meta‐Connective Pedagogy

Rapid technological advancement has changed the landscape of design education to be integrated with educational technology, and the worldwide COVID‐19 pandemic has further accelerated its transition to online education. Pedagogical engagement with online education is unavoidable to ensure that the transition is successful when the situation ends. Yet, many prior studies on online design education remain focused on technical and administrative uses of digital technologies. In this article, meta‐connective pedagogy is introduced to enable educators and researchers critically to engage with pedagogical concerns emerging from the connective nature of the digitally networked world. Meta‐connective pedagogy is to focus on we are always‐being‐connected and argue that authentic learning and teaching are determined by diverse forms of pre‐existing connectivity. This article consists of four parts. First, it is argued that studio‐based learning has developed a ‘resistant’ stance towards online education, which justifies the omission of understanding connective features from its discourses. Second, four up‐to‐date studies on online design education are critically reviewed in a comparative manner, as their views are split into technical and pedagogical aspects. Third, meta‐connective pedagogy is introduced to address why and how connectivity becomes an emerging pedagogical concern for online education. Fourth and last, a schematic form of meta‐connective design education is articulated, and new roles and responsibilities of educators are addressed. Overall, it is argued that the whole concept of design education is subverted towards connectivity that is inclusive of social components of traditional design studios in a more efficient way.     

Supporting Technical Professionals’ Metacognitive Development in Technical Communication through Contrasting Rhetorical Problem Solving

This article presents an experimental pedagogical framework for providing technical professionals with practice on writing skills focusing on the development of their metacognitive rhetorical awareness. The article outlines the theoretical foundation that led to the development of the framework, followed by a report of a pilot study involving information technology professionals in a global setting using an online learning environment that was designed based on the framework.     

Team-based curriculum design as an agent of change

Curriculum design in higher education environments, namely the consideration of aims, learning outcomes, syllabus, pedagogy and assessment, can often be ad hoc and driven by informal cultural habits. Academics with disciplinary expertise may be resistant to (or ignorant of) pedagogical approaches beyond existing practice. In an environment where there is a need to develop online activities for students, one way to counter this friction is through a team-based approach underpinned by design-thinking. A design-thinking team brings together content, pedagogical and technical expertise to examine and resolve curriculum design issues. This paper explores a number of case studies in which such teams developed units of study and programmes for online delivery. The paper looks at the possibilities that the team approach can be a vehicle to instigate cultural change within and beyond the team; that is, from an individualist to a collective approach and ownership of the curriculum and its design, maintenance and continuous improvement.     

Academically Supporting STEM Students From a Distance Through Videoconferencing: Lessons Learned

Student demand for distance learning, changing student demographics, and low retention compel institutions of higher education to develop alternative forms of academic support that can effectively serve the increasingly diverse needs of students. Videoconferencing provides institutions with the capacity to provide interactive real - time academic support that can successfully accommodate these needs. This article discusses the technical, pedagogical, staffing, training, and marketing factors that were important in the development and management of an online academic support program delivered synchronously through videoconferencing to students in high-risk Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) courses. The factors emerged from a mixed-method study that showed the efficacy of the online academic support program and identified influences that affected student adoption of academic support through videoconferencing.     

Designing and building an on-line community: The struggle to support sociability in the inquiry learning forum

In this paper we describe the sociotechnical structures of the Inquiry Learning Forum (ILF), a Web-based professional development tool designed to support a community of inservice and preservice mathematics and science teachers creating, sharing, and improving inquiry-based pedagogical practices. Founded in our previous research and consistent with our pedagogical commitment, the technical structures of the ILF have been designed around a “visiting-the-classroom” metaphor. This decision was based on our belief that teachers need to be full participants in, and owners of, their virtual space for meaningful interaction to occur. The hallmark of this environment is that teachers with a broad range of experience and expertise can come together in an on-line environment to observe, discuss, and reflect on pedagogical theory and practice anchored to actual teaching vignettes. The goal of this paper is to share how we instantiated our pedagogical commitments and to describe the challenges we faced during the design, development, implementation, and analysis of the ILF. Toward this end, we walk the reader through our design and implementation process, highlighting our change in focus from usability to sociability issues, and movement from conceiving the ILF as an electronic structure to a sociotechnical interaction network. The ILF Design Team consists of Brian Beatty, Tom Duffy, Geraldine Haas, Chris Keslin, Sun-Myung Lee, Justin Marquis, and Kirk Sluder     

Children learning to use technologies through play: A Digital Play Framework

Digital technologies are increasingly acknowledged as an important aspect of early childhood education. A significant problem for early childhood education has been how to understand the pedagogical use of technologies in a sector that values play‐based learning. This paper presents a new framework to understand how children learn to use technologies through play. The Digital Play Framework is based on the sociocultural concept of tool mediation and Corrine Hutt's work regarding epistemic and ludic activity as basis for understanding play. The Digital Play Framework presents a series of indicators for how children learn to use technologies as cultural tools, first by exploring the functionality of technologies through epistemic activity, and second by generating new content through ludic activity.     

Design Education Online: Learning Delivery and Evaluation

Online learning has been recognised as an effective pedagogical method and tool, and is broadly integrated into various types of teaching and learning strategies in higher education. In practice, the use of Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) in higher education has become an integral strategy for quality education. The field of design education, however, has not been researched extensively in regard to online learning, delivery and evaluation. This article discusses design education from an online learning perspective. It proposes an integrated framework with three key components for online learning via VLE including an interactive delivery structure, communication channels and learning evaluation. Additionally, the article describes and evaluates how VLE sites for two design units were built based on an integrated framework and student learning experiences. The results indicate that online design education should be integrated with various educational values and functional features in a systematic manner, and requires designing learning evaluation protocols as part of learning activities and communicative forms within online‐based learning sites.     

Teachers’ emotional responses to new pedagogical tools in high challenge settings: illustrations from the Northern Territory

This paper explores the role of teachers?? emotions in adopting new pedagogical tools in urban and remote schools in the Northern Territory. The discussion is illustrated through case study material of Northern Territory teachers who had taken up using a web-based early childhood literacy resource called ABRACADABRA. A sociocultural perspective is used to examine the relationships among the teachers, the new resource, and teachers?? emotional responses to using the resource. The ABRACADABRA case study material suggests that the teachers did not embrace using the new tool purely on the basis of their ability and willingness to use it. Rather, the whole school context played an important role in both technical and emotional support for teachers. Teachers?? negative feelings of frustration and reluctance to use the new tool, as well as their positive feelings of confidence and fun, were triggered in part by their own interaction with the tool, but also by other factors within the school environment, such as collegial support. Hence, the emotional filters through which teachers thought about ABRACADABRA themselves became a mediating factor in their use of the tool. This study has implications for how we conceptualise teachers?? adoption of new resources in challenging settings such as Indigenous education, and highlights the relationship between teacher effectiveness and their feelings about their work.     

The European Education Quality Benchmark System: helping teachers to work with information to sustain change

Applying the concept of 'quality' to education has been controversial, making it difficult for educators to develop systems for sustainable quality development in schools that meet the needs of governmental accountability and pedagogical practice. The varying perspectives reflect conflicting views about what is quality and, morevoer, how quality can and should be measured. Over the last several decades, numerous programmes and strategies have been developed at the European level to assist schools in developing quality in education, as well as giving perspective to the underlying questions. In 2003, the European Education Quality Benchmark System (2EQBS) was designed with the intent to bridge the paradigmatic camps regarding quality in education, providing educators with a holistic framework to examine their practices in relation to the needs of their community, national curricula, pedagogical principles, and European partners. A formal content validation and usability study were conducted of the quality development tool to examine the degree to which the 2EQBS provides educators with a framework to facilitate school development through cross-cultural partnerships in an age of accountability. Findings from this study are presented in this article and contribute insight into the possibilities for creating a framework that facilitates school development through cross-cultural partnerships and provides teachers with a system for helping to sustain change.     

Exploring affecting factors of and developing a framework for teachers’ online instruction

Online teaching has been capitalized to maintain normal educational activities since the outset of the pandemic. However, the wide adoption of emergency remote teaching may present challenges to teachers in terms of performing their instructional work. Hence, this study aimed to deeply explore the affecting factors of teachers' adoption of online instruction during emergencies through a qualitative research design. Semi-structured interviews and document analysis were utilized to collect data with nine higher education teachers at nine Chinese universities. Eight categories of factors emerged from this study that influenced the participants' adoption of online instruction, namely, facilitating conditions, technology self-efficacy, characteristics of learners, teaching administration, pedagogical factors, resistance to change, time issues, and security issues. A framework for developing teachers’ competencies for online instruction is proposed based on the results.     

Validation of the diagnostic tool for assessing Tertiary students’ readiness for online learning

Increasing numbers of educational institutions are adopting an online approach to teaching and learning; however, little regard has been given to the prerequisite personal and technical qualities required for academic achievement and satisfaction within this environment. In recognition of this, researchers have been exploring the design, development and testing of diagnostic tools to assess student readiness for online learning. This study builds on previous work by the authors to further validate their diagnostic tool for assessing Tertiary students’ readiness for online learning (TSROL) which has four subscales: ‘Technical skills’, ‘Computer self‐efficacy’, ‘Learner preferences’ and ‘Attitudes towards computers’. Factor and reliability analyses revealed that Technical skills and Computer self‐efficacy possessed good reliability and validity, and ‘Attitudes towards computers’ fair reliability and validity. However, ‘Learner preferences’ required revision as it possessed poor reliability and validity. Analysing the demographic data revealed that older students had lower Technical Skills and computer self‐efficacy than younger students. The TSROL can be improved by adopting a more multidimensional interpretation of the Learning preferences and Attitudes towards computers subscales.     

Making meaningful decisions about time,workload and pedagogy in the digital age: the Course Resource Appraisal Model

This article reports on a design-based research project to create a modelling tool to analyse the costs and learning benefits involved in different modes of study. The Course Resource Appraisal Model (CRAM) provides accurate cost-benefit information so that institutions are able to make more meaningful decisions about which kind of courses—online, blended or traditional face-to-face—make sense for them to provide. The tool calculates the difference between expenses and income over three iterations of the course and presents a pedagogical analysis of the learning experience provided. The article draws on a CRAM analysis of the costs and learning benefits of a massive open online course to show how the tool can illuminate the pedagogical and financial viability of a course of this kind.