A User-centred Approach To Redesigning Teaching and Learning with ICT in Samtse College of Education, Bhutan
4. Learning designs with technology
A pre-workshop study of the use of technology among the faculty participating in the workshop shows that technology is used both for personal and professional purposes (Kinley, 2015). Online technologies are primarily used for personal use, in part due to slow and unstable internet access on campus. Among technologies used for teaching, faculty name hardware rather than software (laptop; calculator; LCD screen), and technologies are mainly used for presentation purposes.
The data material from the workshop has allowed us to closely study the process of re-thinking pedagogy for 21st-century teaching at SCE as this unfolds during the workshop and in subsequent teaching activities 28 faculty members participated in the workshop voluntarily. Participation was supported by management, and the workshop took place on campus during regular working hours. The staff were all from the teacher training program, and they represented several different subjects (chemistry; history; biology; English; primary curriculum; and professional curriculum). Data were collected in three different ways: Video recordings of oral presentations of designs developed during the workshop; posters describing the design ideas and the actual teaching and learning activities in the design; and finally photographs documenting various processes and products from the workshop. Through analysis, the data gave insight into preferred pedagogical patterns and also the range and levels of ICT usage in teaching and learning. Most of the designs portrayed the role of teachers as facilitators and guides. However, in their oral presentation of a design developed at the workshop, one lecturer says:
We want to have a shift in teaching; earlier we believed that teaching is the transmission of knowledge; now we want to have a shift on teaching focusing on the student rather than the teacher.
Besides positioning the role of the teacher, the core values ‘learning by doing’ and ‘collaborative learning’ had prominence in almost all the lessons. For example, a lecturer in the primary program gave the following statement:
They [that is, the students/future primary school teachers] are engaged in setting up the environment for the children in the ECCD centre. Because the teacher is not setting up the environment here (on campus) we are just showing them principles of setting up a good learning environment.
Thus, they present the teaching and learning situation where the lecturer demonstrates or explains, and the student is expected to actively carry out activities based on this. Likewise, in all the lessons it was shown that students engage in working in groups (online and face to face) with an ultimate goal to produce some outcome meant to be shared with the class. The teacher here is not central to learning rather provides a brief instruction or overview of the lesson, shares and makes resources available for the students, guides students in their task, and provides feedback on the student activity.
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The learning situations from the lessons presented students as working in groups, mutually searching for information, and creating a product.
The range of ICT used for teaching was revealed from the lesson outline (poster and presentation), and in the analysis we applied Puentedura’s well-known SAMR model (Hilton, 2016) to map what was done with the designs. The SAMR-model describes four levels of use of ICT, with Substitution and Augmentation as the less transforming ones, and Modification and Redefinition as the levels of more substantial redesign of teaching and learning activities. At the substitution level, the Internet was used for downloading and reading materials (text) online, VLE was used as a medium to upload learning resources by the teachers replacing printed materials, and replacing blackboard and charts PowerPoint presentation was used to share information (tutor) and findings (students), CDs and Clips replaced examples and demonstration by the teacher. A participant described as follows:
Traditionally what we do is we use a chart paper and we transcribe these vowels there (example on the poster) and we tell them ok this is how it is transcribed and this transcription means this, and that, but with the CDs they see the native speaker pronouncing it, how she uses the various parts of the mouth. Students can practice with the native speaker together as the person demonstrates.
The next level from SAMR model - Augmentation –can be identified in the example of the VLE online discussion forum (post discussion, participate in discussion and tutor feedback) and online assessment using a quiz. As mentioned by one lecturer:
Normally this particular topic is being taught in the class at a stretch maybe taking one hour or two hours within the class itself. In our design, we are using VLE, which is a change we have brought in teaching this particular topic.
This conveys a message on the usage of VLE for teaching and learning purposes.
5. Conclusion
The findings of this study suggest that more investment is required for the innovative use of technology in the classroom.
We have mapped our data with the SAMR model and Hooper & Rieber’s(2011) five phases of technology application in education - familiarization, utilization, integration, reorientation and evolution. Our findings show that the perspective of educational technology used for teaching and learning so far is focused on eitherthe technology itself or the teacher’s instruction and is limited to the first three phases. Speaking along the lines of Hooper & Rieber (2011), the teaching faculty needs to venture beyond familiarization and utilization and into the phases of integration, reorientation, and evolution of technology use.
The combined findings from analysing both the posters and the oral presentations have shown that drawbacks in rethinking teaching and learning with ICT relate to resources and the level of competency amongst the teachers. We did see, however, tentative integration of the 21st-century skills incorporated into the lesson designs, based on a limited pre-understanding of the concept of 21st-century teaching. To some extent, the workshop provided awareness of the need for rethinking pedagogy for the digital age. Overall, the new lesson designs attempt to redefine the role of the teacher, by placing more emphasis on active learning and student-centred practice. Further analysis of the empirical data confirmed that to a certain degree an interventionist approach to professional development assists teachers in rethinking and redesigning their teaching using ICT. In general, the current practice on ICT is primarily restricted to the enhancement level.
Overall, this study has provided some insights into the impact of the intervention workshop, pedagogic practices, and the level of technology use. These findings provide a guide for the planning of future intervention workshops. Consequently, this study also to a certain extent allows reflecting on the stand of SCE in particular and RUB in general on pedagogy in the 21st-century digital world.
References
Abras, C., Maloney-Krichmar, D., & Preece, J. (2004). User-Centered Design. In Brainbridge, W.Encyclopedia of Human-Computer Interaction. Maryland, USA: Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.
Beetham, H., & Sharpe, R. (2007). An Introduction to rethinking pedagogy for a digital age. In H. Beetham, R. Sharpe, Beetham, H. & R. Sharpe (Eds.), Rethinking Pedagogy for a Digital Age(pp. 1-10). Abingdon: Routledge.
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The learning situations from the lessons presented students as working in groups, mutually searching for information, and creating a product.
The range of ICT used for teaching was revealed from the lesson outline (poster and presentation), and in the analysis we applied Puentedura’s well-known SAMR model (Hilton, 2016) to map what was done with the designs. The SAMR-model describes four levels of use of ICT, with Substitution and Augmentation as the less transforming ones, and Modification and Redefinition as the levels of more substantial redesign of teaching and learning activities. At the substitution level, the Internet was used for downloading and reading materials (text) online, VLE was used as a medium to upload learning resources by the teachers replacing printed materials, and replacing blackboard and charts PowerPoint presentation was used to share information (tutor) and findings (students), CDs and Clips replaced examples and demonstration by the teacher. A participant described as follows:
Traditionally what we do is we use a chart paper and we transcribe these vowels there (example on the poster) and we tell them ok this is how it is transcribed and this transcription means this, and that, but with the CDs they see the native speaker pronouncing it, how she uses the various parts of the mouth. Students can practice with the native speaker together as the person demonstrates.
The next level from SAMR model - Augmentation –can be identified in the example of the VLE online discussion forum (post discussion, participate in discussion and tutor feedback) and online assessment using a quiz. As mentioned by one lecturer:
Normally this particular topic is being taught in the class at a stretch maybe taking one hour or two hours within the class itself. In our design, we are using VLE, which is a change we have brought in teaching this particular topic.
This conveys a message on the usage of VLE for teaching and learning purposes.
5. Conclusion
The findings of this study suggest that more investment is required for the innovative use of technology in the classroom.
We have mapped our data with the SAMR model and Hooper & Rieber’s(2011) five phases of technology application in education - familiarization, utilization, integration, reorientation and evolution. Our findings show that the perspective of educational technology used for teaching and learning so far is focused on either the technology itself or the teacher’s instruction and is limited to the first three phases. Speaking along the lines of Hooper & Rieber (2011), the teaching faculty needs to venture beyond familiarization and utilization and into the phases of integration, reorientation, and evolution of technology use.
The combined findings from analysing both the posters and the oral presentations have shown that drawbacks in rethinking teaching and learning with ICT relate to resources and the level of competency amongst the teachers. We did see, however, tentative integration of the 21st-century skills incorporated into the lesson designs, based on a limited pre-understanding of the concept of 21st-century teaching. To some extent, the workshop provided awareness of the need for rethinking pedagogy for the digital age. Overall, the new lesson designs attempt to redefine the role of the teacher, by placing more emphasis on active learning and student-centred practice. Further analysis of the empirical data confirmed that to a certain degree an interventionist approach to professional development assists teachers in rethinking and redesigning their teaching using ICT. In general, the current practice on ICT is primarily restricted to the enhancement level.
Overall, this study has provided some insights into the impact of the intervention workshop, pedagogic practices, and the level of technology use. These findings provide a guide for the planning of future intervention workshops. Consequently, this study also to a certain extent allows reflecting on the stand of SCE in particular and RUB in general on pedagogy in the 21st-century digital world.
References
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Prasad, A. (2002). The Contest Over Meaning: Hermeneutics as an Interpretive Methodology for Understanding Texts.
Organizational Research Methods, 5(1), 12-33.
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http://www.scoop.it/t/samr-model
Schibeci, R., MacCallum, J., Cumming-Potvin, W., Durrant, C., Kissane, B., & Miller, E. (2008). Teachers' journeys towards critical use of ICT. Learning, Media and Technology, 33(4), 313-327.
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Challenges and Opportunities. 7th Networked Learning International Conference.Aalborg: Aalborg University.
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