As presented in Chapter 1, the course Blended learning: E-learning applications in training is offered to first-year master students, during the second semester. The goal of the course is to enable students to design learning solutions incorporating educational technologies.
The students’ main task is to act as e-learning providers for real clients and, in teams, to create online learning modules for the particular needs and circumstances of the clients. The projects last the entire semester, with students working in teams of 3 – 4 persons. Four organizations participated in the research, and eleven teams were formed, of which one was involved with a fifth organization that did not consent to participate (as detailed in Chapter 4).
During the previous semester, students attend courses in Design and assessment of training programmes, Human resources training and development, and Training methods and techniques. In the programme design, these are meant to support the courses taught in the second semester. However, I found students struggling with many of the pre-requisite concepts. They also take a concurrent course in Adult learning, but since some concepts are needed earlier than they are taught in that course, we often had to cover them separately.
Identifying client organizations and gaining entry started several months before. The client organizations were chosen based on having: a clear learning- related agenda, the organizational capacity to participate in the project, and previous experience with learning technologies. These criteria ensured that the organizations are credible clients, knowledgeable enough to offer valuable
learning opportunities to the students. I discussed with the clients the overall scope of the projects and our own constraints. The students could choose the client and module topic within client constraints. Each organization assigned people to work with the student teams in two roles: content experts, responsible for content-related materials and clarifications, and supervisors, responsible for facilitating alignment between projects and organizational needs. Students met with the clients, at their premises, twice: at the beginning, to establish requirements and constraints, and at the end to present the results. All other communication with the client was mediated by me.
Table 5.1 presents the client organizations and their profiles; the topics selected for the projects and their audiences; the materials provided; and the number of teams involved with each client.
The course meetings are scheduled once a week, for three hours, in the afternoon, to accommodate people coming from work, although the format is of full-time studies. I share the course with a colleague who teaches for two weeks (sessions 8 and 9). For the class activities, I requested a seminar room, with movable furniture, whiteboard, projector and screen and instructed the students to bring their own laptops so they could continue working between classes. However, we were allocated a big lecture hall for the first two hours and a very small computer lab for the next hour. Since this was not suitable, every week we looked for a room to meet or we relocated to a teahouse nearby. We also used various locations in the city for additional meetings, some requested by the students, some in connection with client meetings.
Attendance was a sensitive issue, as students planned to come at only half the meetings – a typical requirement for passing – but realized this was not effective in the PjBL approach. So, they strived to attend as much as they could, but this meant students coming and going continuously during the meetings, making organization difficult and some activities impossible, as more than once, at the end of the class I had a completely different group than at the beginning.
Organization Organization context Topic of projects Initial materials provided by organization Teams PD – Public organization
Provides diverse training on public administration, in face-to-face, blended and online formats.
Has VLE installed and managed internally.
Micro-learning modules to be published on the website, aimed at educating the general public about aspects of the public function. Course manual on Introduction to public administration 2 PS – Public organization
Prepares future magistrates by one year of face-to-face courses and one year of supervised practice.
Is in the process of implementing a VLE and creating content with internal
resources.
Online modules for an existing Personal development course: body language and non-verbal communication, assertiveness, elements of child psychology, stress management.
Information about the organization
Profile of the magistrate Competencies addressed by the Personal development course 4 CB – Commercial bank
Is a commercial bank with national coverage.
Training department organizes courses for employees on: processes, products, regulations, software applications, and skills, in face-to-face and online formats. Has VLE installed and managed
internally, the online courses are created by external contractors and own staff.
Online modules for the
Customer Service course to be used as pre-work for new employees, follow-up content after the course, or refresher for more experienced employees.
Materials presenting the organization
Manual of the Customer Service course
Organization Organization context Topic of projects Initial materials provided by organization
Teams
CH – Charity Is a national charity promoting
librarianship and information science. Organizes qualification courses in librarianship, only face-to-face. Is involved in a variety of educational projects for librarians and the general public.
Online modules related to a campaign for digital skills for better employment
opportunities: using job search engines, creating an online resume, handling an interview using technology.
Information about the campaign
3
Un-named organization
Did not consent to participate in the study.
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As described in Chapter 4, I administered a questionnaire at the beginning of the course to investigate students’ experience with technology and PjBL. The results indicate minimal previous exposure to educational technology. Although all 32 respondents reported they frequently use the internet to search for learning materials, only 16 had taken online learning tests, and only 12 had used e-learning platforms. Out of the 12, only two had previously submitted assignments and received feedback online, and only one had previously worked collaboratively online for an assignment. Out of the 32, 26 had not previously used forums to discuss learning-related topics. Given this minimal exposure, I planned to incorporate in the course a lot of support regarding technology use.
One of the goals of the course is to enable students to incorporate technology in their learning interventions, so I judged important to facilitate familiarity with a VLE, by using one in connection with this course. As presented in Chapter 1, I obtained permission to use a VLE reserved for teaching staff. I created a dedicated course space, illustrated in Figure 5.1, with features for sharing resources, submitting assignments, uploading e-learning modules, discussion forums, publishing news, and a shared calendar.
In order to work as instructional designers, students should be familiar with a range of e-learning authoring tools, which are software applications that enable the creation of learning modules incorporating text, images, videos, animations, sound, and interactions (Gaeta et al, 2014), without the need to have programming expertise. Using my practitioner experience, I selected CourseLab1, an authoring tool with a visual editor, simple to use, free (we had no budget), and with a sufficient range of features, illustrated in Figure 5.2.
Figure 5.2 - CourseLab screenshot
In addition, I introduced two other authoring tools: Articulate Storyline2, and BranchTrack3. These are professional tools offering either wide or very specialized capabilities. Using trial versions, two teams used them in addition, and instead of CourseLab. Other specialized tools were found by teams to process sound and create infographics and animations.
I communicated with students via an email discussion group and a Facebook group, which each cohort was already using. Direct email communication with each team was also very frequent, making version tracking of the projects very difficult. The forum in the VLE was not used because students preferred the channels they already used.
1www.courselab.com, last accessed March 1, 2016 2https://articulate.com/, last accessed June 15, 2018 3
In order to help students to organize their work and sustain their motivation, I created a series of weekly mini-assignments. Since requests for extensions abounded, I extended the deadlines repeatedly. The assignments contributed to students’ final grades and, after the first feedback and grading, they could redo them (with exceptions) until the end of the semester, when I graded them again.
In guiding the students to work on their projects, I followed the general principles of design and PjBL (see Chapter 2), and I offered contextual support in the form of mini-lectures, explanations, modelling, feedback, questions, and hints. Class meetings were generally dedicated to project work. I gave feedback both on the spot, and by email between sessions. We discussed the feedback, and students asked clarifying questions. I hoped we could set an intermediate feedback session with the clients, but the students’ projects came together very late in the course.
Four of the online assignments were set up for reflection purposes, in connection with key events in the course. These written reflections were graded only on formal requirements, such as length, topic, and submission on time, not on content. Another reflection was administered on paper, during the class, and it did not contribute to the final grade.
The assessment strategy allowed students to accumulate points for each mini-assignment, the final product and its presentation. The final product was collectively graded.
Figure 5.3 shows the timeline of activities. Each week (referred as W1 to W14) we held a course session, referred to as S1 to S14 later in this chapter. The diagram also reprises the data collection strategy presented in Chapter 4, to provide a reminder useful for the following data analysis.