UBC Okanagan 11th Annual Learning Conference
Kelowna Campus, May 5-6, 2015
Welcome from Dr. Cynthia Mathieson, Provost
Keynote Address: Dr. Alec Couros
Teaches pre-service teachers at U of S in Regina in online and blended format.
The Blur – professional and personal life meets online.
Our professional identity includes what is online about us and by us. Couros uses facebook to connect with family and posts many family pictures, and also professionally blogs and tweets. On his Twitter network while on sabbatical he put out a tweet inquiring if anyone was interested in facilitating a MOOC with him. He had over 2000 responses from around the world.
Advocate of OPEN – gives himself away for free – showed the following video clip.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jXZR3pWKxQ
Change is attributed to
i) TOOLS
We shape our tools AND our tools shape us. Eg. Feel naked if we leave house without cell phone.
Pedagogy of abundant content – Henry Jenkins
Technological affordances/increased number of tools + abundant content = participatory culture
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYbSD_GdkjU
ii) CONTENT
Renting of videos is gone – eg Blockbuster Showed funny video clip about Blockbuster museum tour and how hard things were back then.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TrPwOrf4sM
Significant shifts in media – Napster changed everything
Atoms ß-> bits
Scarcity ß-> abundance
Consuming ß-> creating
Individuals ß-> ??
Standardization ß-> personalization
Creative Commons – BC is doing amazing things. MOOCs from Great Universities on Open Culture. http://YouTube.com/education is the greatest MOOC of all!
He loves ‘Smarter Everyday’ – Latest clip is Backwards Brain Bicycle
https://www.youtube.com/user/destinws2
Corporate Finance on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGlW5DwMXHU
Story of Corporate Finance by telling story of Caspian Sea Drinks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5heT0tmbjY
Statistics – Why Statistics?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxXsPc0bphQ
Hans Rosling
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=en2ix9f8ceM&list=PLBE30C2B39FE4BD1C
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo
Hypothesis Testing Intro
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UApFKiK4Hi8
Learning =Formal learning + augmented learning (possibly via apps) + informal learning
Eg. Of his daughter formal piano lesson + practice + training tutorial on how to play a certain song
iii. Participatory Culture
Howard Gardner and Katie Davis – The App Generation: talks about three areas identity + intimacy + imagination
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ap3EyeCgFbU
iTrevor– kid dancing in Apple Stores (Trevor Moran)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VARkJUB98PI&list=PLB8ADC0008B791481
Digital dualism vs augmented reality.
IRL = in real life
implies online is not real life. Today’s generation considers digital world as their reality and older generation may be more comfortable AFK = away from keyboard. Common now to move private moments into public. Showed video clip of marriage proposal with flash mob that was likely initiated through Twitter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLEDRjQD25k
New mode of TV
Imagination – showed video clip of Audri Clemens (7 year old boy) who made a Rube Goldberg machine. Balls and ramps and toaster and wine glass all to smash a monster.
The big shift is that the learning culture is participatory – see Audrey Watters
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rETy-zyqtU Data is the New oil: MOOCs, metaphors and money
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kDb_-eWTv0 ChangSchoolTalks
http://hackeducation.com/ her blog
We come from MYOB Learning – individual and it’s about that grade on that transcript. Today it looks a little like:
“And then the teach said – You may take notes’ image with students taking pic of board
Showed his 21st century learning networks model that included Blogs, Wikis, Chat, Video Conference ets. What he did not know at that time is how important the networks would be and it may be that they are the critical link to augment our own ideas.
https://twitterforeducation.wikispaces.com/21st+Century+Fluency
How do we capture the spirit of open, networked and participatory communities in our learning environments?
In practice
1) Designing for networked learning. “A New Culture of Learning” by Doug Thomas and J Seely Brown in which they believe centre of learning is comprised of two elements – massive ifo network + …?
Couros courses are mostly online or blended and open boundary, that is the classroom walls are thin. He has a cohort of students but also includes at points, others.
He buys a domain name for each course as his public facing version of course. He also has network mentors – put out call on blog – 200 people showed up for his 20 students!
He created class trailers for each course.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVbO2q0ZSok
He uses all public domain stuff; Archive.org has a great assortment of ’B’ movies that are open domain.
“Small tools loosely joined” –takes MacGyver approach to his classes.
Also uses Google Plus Community & Google hangouts in addition to LMS as he does not have to get approval to invite those outside university into GPC.
He has a twitter hashtag for every course so that students can learn how to use and interact on Twitter. He can spend hours providing feedback on student blog assignments but amazing how sometimes it is a single 140 characters from an expert that will make the class for some students.
CMS vs PLN - Consider whether student controlled or instructor controlled.
Personal Learning Network – build their own core of their learning – for example edublog.org
Twitteracy: Tweeting as a New Literary Practice - read this article.
Twitter requires you to spend time but there is great payoff in the amazing networks one can build.
Hoot sweet and tweet deck are vital to manage and analyze info.
This is a mindset shift. Web and internet are not just to look up stuff, but rather to connect and participate. Example: grade 8 kid’s youtube ‘help with bowdrill set’. He was doing it wrong and asked that people help him correct. He had over 15,000 hits on youtube, but had sent out twitter to advertise!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuFsDN8dsJU
Understanding digital identity – digital artifacts can be easily copied, shared. Now things are public by default and private with effort - the reverse of what it was like in the past.
We are in a world where everyone has a camera and video can be clipped and reversed and completely change what others perceptions are. We are always on Candid camera!
When you decine to create or to curate a culture in your spaces you’re responsible for what spawns in the vacuum (Alexander, 2014). Kids are online and if we ignore it we are not doing their l earning justice.
One university gives each student a domain name upon registration and helps them build their digital identity from the beginning of their studies.
“We systematically overestimate the value of access to info and underestimate the value of access to each other. Shirky, 2011
http://image.slidesharecdn.com/introductionandorientation-tpack-140601140045-phpapp01/95/tpack-workshop-introduction-and-orientation-36-638.jpg?cb=1423048132
Language learning practice - Connects young people through video conference with seniors in US.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82iob25i25A
“…more than better students. Better people.”
Humanizing nature of technology – how can we further connect and humanize our classroom?
______-
Session 1: Transforming Student Learning Through a Learning outcomes Approach to Curriculum Design.
Gary Hunt, Coordinator, Teaching and Learning Support, Thompson Rivers University
They have undertaken a university wide learning outcomes intiative. Graduate attributes (outcomes) for institution has been completed. Now they are at program learning outcomes level and once done will have this for each program.
Using learning outcomes provides constructive alignment between institutional, program and course goals. Should be understandable to broad audiences and integrate with program review – 7 year cycle at TRU.
They have 60+ programs at TRU and their goal over the next couple years to get program LO’s for all as currently not many have this.
Did small group activity to write a program learning outcome.
Curriculum Map Example
Session 2: Impact of Experiential Learning during an Undergraduate Degree
Go Global
University of Delaware – started Study Abroad movement in 1923.
In Canada 3% average of students engage in an Overseas Opportunity such as Study Abroad whereas at UBC Okanagan there is 22% involvement.
Outcomes of the learning process are varied and often unpredictable – educational, personal, physical,
Heard stories from 2 different students.
How do we create these experiential learning experiences?
Faculty do UBC courses with UBC faculty with UBC students for 5 weeks – Brazil, UK, New Zealand, Ital. Engineering has put proposal for International Seminar in Netherlands too – their programming is too intense for them to do a full year Study Abroad program so this is a great compromise as they get university credit for the course
Session 3: SOTL – Active Student Involvement in SoTL at TRU
a) Ginny Ratsoy, Provost’s Fellow, Teaching and Learning Support, Associate Professor of English
Literature on Students and SoTL; Debby Andrews, 4th year BA student (mature).
Hutchings (2010) One of most powerful lessons has been value of involving students by inviting them into this work not (or not only) as objects of study
Also Werder & Otis (2010) who suggeste we avoid a monologue about teaching and learning (p.29)
McKinney et al has a continuum of the range of student voices in SoTL (fig 6.1).
Low autonomy High autonomy
Low complexity High complesity
Passive role active role
Weak connection to instructor strong connection to instructor
They have a weekly ‘Experiential Learning Series’ and once students were included in presentations by accident (started in Fall 2014), they realized the interest and richness was truly increased. They did not just model learning faculty.
Example 1 – Co-Op Student
Student had a Study Abroad, Research Assistantship and additional involvement. She attended all 14 of the initial year’s service. She was very valuable to faculty who presented. She received hands-on communication training and gradually developed into a valuable contributor.
Example 2 - Service Learning Student – novice to experiential learning and unaware of related opportunities. She worked as a scribe on a community play as a scribe. By Fall 2014 she co-designed a second community service rol that was about experiential learning.
Debra Andrews – Undergrad Conference Research Group Tasks
She mentioned a study from Alberta regarding lower GPA students invited into research service opportunities – and that they more significantly improved their grades than those with higher GpA going in.
70% of universities in Canada offered research opportunities to their students. She created an online survey to find out more about universities that offer opportunities for research. Low response rates but has learned more about who to send to so in future she can increase response rates. In her student street survey – most students said they did not have time for extra curricular work so she suggested including in course curriculum would be terrific.
b) Is there a Librarian Involved in your SoTL activity?
Session Leaders: Elizabeth Rennie, Kathy Gaynor, Penny Haggarty from Library at TRU
More challenging to find sources for teaching and learning literature. Teaching and learning centre wanted to start their own SoTL library, but decided in discussion with library, better to house all there as they have better hours, and can control and acquire more easily. Big role that has been taken on by library has been to be a leader in organizing the undergrad conference, and it will become official part of library responsibilities going forward – they publish the conference proceedings for dissemination.
They recognize that institution needs to support and provide framework to disseminate faculty and student research and have an institutional repository has finally been approved after 10 years of working for this.
Annotated Inventory of Faculty involved in SoTL and will have it in a lib guide shortly so that can be updated more frequently. They have a lib guide for SoTL: http://libguides.tru.ca/c.php?g=194070&p=1276693
Researching our Own Classroom Practice – tougher to do as librarian for example between 2002-2012, 1.38% of articles in SoTL journals were published by librarians (41 of 2979 articles examined and 28 of these were about information literacy).
Possible opportunities for partnering with faculty, student and librarian. For example in Business and marketing plans (McGeachin & Ramirex, 2001). Libraries can be used a place to learn not a place of learning, as it is really a learning lab. Libraries often don’t use how their space is being used, rather only that it is being used. Library could partner up with faculty to GIS where and how students are using their space. Senior or grad course in which student groups had a Librarian and faculty member on their team where they put together a literature review and put it on a library guide then used by undergrad students of that discipline. This gave librarian opportunity for student relationship that would not otherwise be had, and feedback from students confirmed they learned a great deal from librarian.
At TRU – they had a co-op student created a lib guide about academic integrity (peer to peer resource). They believe that librarians have a professional responsibility to connect info literacy with student success initiatives. They can be active, engaged participants in the SoTL research. Association of College and Research Libraries. Framework for Info Literacy for Higher ed.
http://www.ala.org/acrl/standards/ilframework
http://libguides.tru.ca/ubc-o_learning_conference
Librarian from Red Deer College is doing research around info literacy sessions – goal setting and satisfaction after session. Control group set a goal and other group did not. She would like to continue.
Another librarian from Capilano goes to faculty learning community and has developed a relationship with a faculty member and now next year will co-lead with another faculty member, a faculty learning community focused on SoTL. Librarians responded by saying that they understand faculty are busy, and it is hard to find faculty that are interested in doing this. They discussed the large proportion of sessional faculty as problematic in developing these relationships. TRU has seen transition and more common now to see 2 to 3 tenured faculty with 8 to 10 sessional. Faculty likely don’t know how much librarians know and can help with.
Session 4: Engaging and Supporting Student Entrepreneurship Across Disciplines
Vancouver Island University
Ken Hammer, Ph. D. Teach and practice entrepreneurship, Co-founder of Startup Nanaimo.
John Predyk, Special Advisor to president VIU – Teach Entrepreneurship, Board member of Community Futures Development Corp
Goals:
Case Study of a business plan competition at VIU
Supports needed to foster entrepreneurship at our institutions
Literature Review – global push to more entrepreneurial universities, making ent more of a priority academically. The Innovative and Entrepreneurial University – report in US. Says to 1) encourage faculty innovation and entrepreneurship; 2) actively supporting the university tech transfer function; 3) facilitating university-industry collaboration 4) engaging with reginal and local economic development efforts; 5) promoting student innovation and entrepreneurship