Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
“DISTANCE EDUCATION IN THE CONTEXT OF MOBILITY, DIGITALIZATION AND TECHNOLOGY:”
Potential and Barriers to bridge the digital divide
Sabine Siemsen
INTRODUCTION
Academic Work/Research:
• B.A. Thesis Structural-genetic conditions for digital literacy
• M.A. Thesis Globally Networked Learning-Processes in Higher Education:
Rethinking and Fusing Terminology and Theories in the
Context of Digitalization and Technology
Articles/Papers:
• Mobile Knowledge-Management (2012)
• Connectivism and Interactionism Reloaded: Knowledge Networks in the Cloud (2014 Springer)
• Social Writing: Launch and Establishment of a Writing Lab at the Distance University in Hagen
Learning (2015)
• Knowledge and Competence in Global Online Universities: How Terminology shapes Thinking
(2015 Springer)
3
STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES IN GERMANY – SOME NUMBERS
THE DISTANCE UNIVERSITY IN GERMANY
MOBILITY, DIGITALIZATION AND TECHNOLOGY: MEANS TO ENLARGE OR TOBRIDGE DIGITAL DIVIDE?
“DISTANCE EDUCATION IN THE CONTEXT OF MOBILITY, DIGITALIZATION AND TECHNOLOGY:”
Potential and Barriers to bridge the digital divide
4
STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES IN GERMANY – SOME NUMBERS
“DISTANCE EDUCATION IN THE CONTEXT OF MOBILITY, DIGITALIZATION AND TECHNOLOGY:”
Potential and Barriers to bridge the digital divide
5
STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES IN GERMANY – SOME NUMBERS
Universitys in Germany:
7 % of students* state being impaired, 1.8 % heavily impaired
Distance University in Hagen:
13 % (M.A. 8,9) have a health impairment
9 % choose the distance university because of heaving a health impairment
48 % (36) chronical/somatical
31 % (26) mentally/psychical disabled
13 % (22) physically handicapped/movement disorders
3 % (1) speech-impaired
3 % (7/ visually impaired/blind
0 % (4) hearing impaired
40 % of the above feel impaired to successfully completing their studies, out of them 34 % heaviliy and 42 %
moderate
* From the respondents to a study on student-contentment in the 4th and 5th term
6
THE DISTANCE UNIVERSITY IN GERMANY – CHANCE OR ALTERED BARRIERS?Projects and Approaches on heterogeneous learners at the Distance University in Hagen
Offers for blind and visually handicapped Students
HBS: Hagener Braille Software
• Course materials in different forms:• Embossed-Printed Study Courses• Studycourses in .txt or .doc or .rtf• Audioversions• Contracted Braille
A software - basing on already existing solutionsand developped at the Distance University - thattransforms scientific texts in embossed printing. It isrunning for windows systems and enables also totransform Marginalia, Formula and charts.
7
HETEROGENEITY AT THE DISTANCE-UNIVERSITY IN HAGEN
8
HETEROGENEITY AT THE DISTANCE-UNIVERSITY IN HAGEN
82,3 % (90,6 MA) of the students work in a job with at least 50% of full-time
14,5 % (BA) got their qualification to study through vocational qualification
(no university entrance diploma from school)
29,6 % (BA) have already successfully completed another university degree before
8,4 % (2,7) 18-24
30,5% (42,2) 25-31
28,4 % (30,4) 32-38
15,7 % (12,7) 39-45
11 % (7,4) 46-52
4,3 % (3,1) 53-59
1,7 % (1,5) 60+
9
DISTANCE EDUCATION AND ONLINE UNIVERSITIESNEW CHANCES OR ALTERED BARRIERS?
Projects and Approaches on heterogeneous learners
The Project “Social Writing” at the Distance University in Hagen
A Global Online University: Research on changed learning processes in a new learning culture
10
THE DISTANCE UNIVERSITY IN GERMANY – CHANCE OR ALTERED BARRIERS?Projects and Approaches on heterogeneous learners at the Distance University in Hagen
THE PROJECT SOCIAL WRITING:
LAUNCH AND ESTABLISHMENT OF A WRITING LAB AT THE DISTANCE UNIVERSITY IN HAGEN LEARNING
11
EVALUATION OF THE ADDITIONAL BENEFIT THROUGH THE INTEGRATION OF THE VIRTUAL CLASSROOM IN MOODLE TUTORIALS
Which aspects of such a combinations are regarded as most
important additional benefits
(Efficiency? The »social factor«? Motivation and Satisfaction?)
which are regarded as barriers and inhibition thresholds
(Technology? Time-Consume? Fear of embarrassing oneself by
interaction synchronously and using Camera and Microphone?).
10 closed questions (offering the possibility to give additions) and one
open question.
12
EVALUATION OF THE TUTORIALS AND THE ADDITIONAL BENEFIT THROUGH THE INTEGRATION OF THE VIRTUAL
CLASSROOM
The closed questions were analyzed quantitatively using
Excel,
the open question and supplemental free answers
qualitatively using MAXqda, a Qualitative Data Analysis
Software.
13
RESULTS
14
RESULTS
15
CONCLUSION AND PROSPECTS
fostering media-competence is important but by far not sufficient to compensate a lack in social presence.
Social skills that enable to cooperative and collaborative learning, to give and accept peer account, are equally important.
learners have to be enabled to communicate and interact in a way that makes them become conscious of the potential
of using different and various tools and approaches to generate and manage learning.
16
CONCLUSION AND PROSPECTS
social aspects, and the question of needs like self-confidence and experiencing peers as »real persons« are important
Communication in such courses is of highest importance
Approaches like … the use of peer-tutoring or buddy-concepts
a scaffolding of interventions of course-instructors,
changed roles of learning and teaching
Metacommunication about different understandings and expectations
… will become more important than questions on how to design a didactically and technologically perfect course.
17
MOBILITY, DIGITALIZATION AND TECHNOLOGY: MEANS TOENLARGE OR TO BRIDGE DIGITAL DIVIDE?
A Global Online University: Research on changed learning processes in a new learning culture
A New Learning Culture for Academic Learning : Global, networked, heterogeneous
18
ONLINE LEARNING AND THE DIGITAL DIVIDE
FOUR ILLUSIONS IN FORMAL EDUCATION(George Siemens, 2009)
Learning Needs can be defined
Learning (success) can be controlled
Learning communities (students) are similar (age, grade, knowledge base …)
Learning processes are coherent and structured
19
„All perception […], all behaviour […] all classes of learning […] must be regarded as
communicational in nature“ (Gregory Bateson)
From „Learning how to learn“ (Gregory Batesons Learning II) to
Learning how to learn to learn“:
Including Contexts and Sets of Contexts into Learning Experiences:
„Throws unexamined premises open to question and change“ (Gregory Bateson)
From Communication to Meta-Communication
From Key-Competences to Enhancement-Competence
From MOOCs (as forerunners) to GOAL (Global Online Academic Learning)
„Learning is a network phenomenon […] enhanced by socialisation, technology, diversity,
strength of ties, and context of occurence“(Siemens)
ONLINE LEARNING AND THE DIGITAL DIVIDE
20
ONLINE LEARNING AND THE DIGITAL DIVIDE
21
LEARNING, KNOWLEDGE AND COMPETENCE – A SPIRAL PROCESS…
22
THE QUESTION OF COMPETENCE …
23
META-COMMUNICATION …
… a mighty tool to transform Heterogenity from Challenge to Chance
Metacommunication can serve as Framework/Scaffolding to each Learning Scenario:
Before dealing with any content, deal with premises
Before adopting knowledge, discuss different understandings
While discussing content, discuss experiences and foreknowledge
After casting doubt on fixed knowledge, create cooperative new knowledge
24
A NEW LEARNING CULTURE NEEDS CHANGED DEFINITIONS
“We cannot sustain ourselves as learning/knowing beings in the current
climate with our current approaches. Networked (social, technological)
approaches scale in line with changes, but require a redesign of how we
teach, learn (and see learning), and come to know.” (Siemens, 2007)
Looking at learning-processes and knowledge
requires views from different angles,
needs to include contexts (individual, cultural, linguistic, social)
and first and fore-most there has to be an awareness of these different
contexts and their influence on definitions and expectations.
25
A CHANGED LEARNING CULTURE
is influenced through and influences …
(Educational)Science(research and discourses),
Educational Praxis (didactics, settings, environments),
and (Educational)Politics (social and cultural aspects of societey)
and therefore will have to imply questions like
… do traditional methods of evaluation and research still fit?
… does one need new criteria to define objectives, goals, success?
… can one even „measure“ those changed and enhanced learning-processes?
26
FROM THEORY TO PRAXIS …
27
WHAT A MOOC COULD BE BUT NOT NECESSARILY IS:
A place to transform learning
A place where roles merge and interaction enables new ways of thinking
A place that “takes a live of its own” (G. Siemens)
A place to share your ongoing thoughts and efforts related to it (B. Bull)
28
Take Home Message
Prior to considerations about didactics, methods and contents
there have to be ideas and concepts
of how to enable and allow individuals and learning communities to reflect
their way of thinking; to recognize different premises about what learning and
knowledge is,
and to set new, commonly found and shared context markers
as a pre-condition to reach a level of what Bateson defines as Learning III
Such new context markers could become passable bridges over
– not only the digital – divide between heterogeneous learners
29
LITERATURE
From the slides
Bateson, G. (1972). Steps to an ecology of mind;: Collected essays in anthropology, psychiatry, evolution, and epistemology. San Francisco: Chandler Pub. Co.
de Witt, C./Psyk, P./Siemsen, S. (2012): Mobiles Wissensmanagement. In: Jahrbuch ELearning 2013
Siemsen, Sabine (2015, in Druck): Learning, Knowledge and Competence in Global Online-Universities: How Terminologyshapes Thinking. In: Communications in Computer and Information Science Vol. 533. pp 28-42. Springer International Publishing Switzerland.
Siemsen, Sabine (2015, in Druck): Knowledge-Management by Social Writing; The Launch and Establishment of an Online-Writing Lab Using the Example of Citavi-OnlineTutorials at the Faculty of Cultural and Social Sciences of the FernUniversität in Hagen. In: Communications in Computer and Information Science Vol. 533. pp 134-147. Springer International Publishing Switzerland.
Siemsen, Sabine / Jansen, Rainer (2014): Connectivism and Interactionism Reloaded: Knowledge Networks in the Cloud. In: Learning Technology for Education in the Cloud. MOOC and Big Data. Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014
Siemens, G. (2007). Connectivism: Learning conceptualized through the lens of today’s world. Retrieved from http://www.elearnspace.org/presentations/connectivism_online_OCC2007.ppt
Siemens, G. (2009). Technologically Externalized Knowledge and Learning. Retrieved from http://www.connectivism.ca/?p=181
Tschofen, C., & Mackness, J. (2013). Connectivism and Dimensions of Individual Experience. In R. Paolucci (Ed.), Learning With MOOCs: Massive Open Online Courses (pp. 101–120). East Norriton Pennsylvania: Interlearning Company LLC.
30
LITERATURE
Recommendation in the themes context:
Bateson, N. (2010). An Ecology of Mind: A Daughter's Portrait of Gregory Bateson. Remember the Future [DVD]: Carl-Auer Verlag, DGSF, mindjazz, Alive.
Bowers, C. A., Jucker, R., Ishizawa Oba, J., & Rengifo, G. (2011). Perspectives on the ideas of Gregory Bateson, ecological intelligence, and educational reforms. Eugene, OR: Eco-Justice Press.
Bull, B. Why do we have letter grades? Retrieved from http://etale.org/main/2012/12/02/why-do-we-have-letter-grades/
Bull, B. (2013). Is the Letter Grade System an Outdated Educational Technology? Retrieved from http://etale.org/main/2013/07/15/is-the-letter-grade-system-an-outdated-educational-technology/
Downes, S. (2012). Connectivism and Connective Knowledge. Retrieved from http://www.downes.ca/files/books/Connective_Knowledge-19May2012.pdf
Downes, S. (2013). Half an Hour: Connectivism and the Primal Scream. Retrieved from http://halfanhour.blogspot.de/2013/07/connectvism-and-primal-scream.html
Ehlers, U.-D. (2013). Open Learning Cultures. Berlin: Springer-Verlag Berlin and Heidelberg GmbH & Co. KG.
Marc, E., Picard, D., & Holl, H. G. (1991). Bateson, Watzlawick und die Schule von Palo Alto. Athenäums Programm. Frankfurt am Main: Hain.
Ministry of Education. The New Zealand Curriculum: Key competencies. Retrieved from http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/The-New-Zealand-Curriculum/Key-competencies
Morris, S. M. & Stommel, J. (2012). A MOOC is not a Thing: Emergence, Disruption, and Higher Education. Retrieved from http://www.hybridpedagogy.com/journal/a-mooc-is-not-a-thing-emergence-disruption-and-higher-education/
Peschl, M. F. (2010). Knowledge constructin and knowledge creation as key factors in educational an innovation processes. In H. Risku (Ed.), Kognition und Technologie im kooperativen Lernen. Vom Wissenstransfer zur Knowledge Creation (1st ed., pp. 16–31). Göttingen: V & R Unipress, Vienna Univ. Press.
31
