T OWARDS E-L EARNING A step by step guide
Raymond Elferink, Jenny Hughes, Sara Zondergeld RayCom BV
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License
This E-booklet was created by the Partnership for valorisation of the best e-learning practices among teachers and trainers in Europe. 2|E-Booklet Title .
Contents 1.
Introduction ...................................................................................7
2.
What is e-learning? ........................................................................9 Learning objectives ............................................................................9 When did it all start? .........................................................................9 Different sorts of e-learning ............................................................10 Synchronous learning...................................................................10 Asynchronous learning.................................................................10
3.
Why e-learning? ...........................................................................12 Learning Objectives .........................................................................12 Some reasons why you should be using e-learning.........................12 …and some of the myths about e-learning......................................13
4.
E-learning in organisations ..........................................................15 Learning objectives ..........................................................................15 Choosing a learning environment....................................................15 Five things not to do while selecting an LMS ..................................16 Personal Learning Environments .....................................................17 What does e-learning cost? .............................................................18 Hardware .....................................................................................18 Cameras, vidcams, microphones etc............................................18 Cabling .........................................................................................19 Software .......................................................................................19 Connectivity .................................................................................20 Technical support, maintenance and replacement......................20 E-Booklet Title |3
Staff training / continuing professional development ................ 20 Student training and support ...................................................... 21 E-learning materials .................................................................... 21 Consultancy ................................................................................. 21 5.
Introducing e-learning - getting started ...................................... 23 Learning objectives ......................................................................... 23 Senior manager ............................................................................... 23 Middle managers ............................................................................ 26 Teachers / trainers .......................................................................... 29
6. What sort of tools and applications do you need for communicating and creating e-learning content? .............................. 32 Learning objectives ......................................................................... 32 A basic toolkit for e-learning ........................................................... 32 Authoring systems........................................................................... 33 Image manipulation software ......................................................... 34 Web 2.0 and social software ........................................................... 36 Online communities..................................................................... 37 Basic Tools ................................................................................... 37 7.
E-learning in the classroom ......................................................... 42 Learning objectives ......................................................................... 42 Blogging ........................................................................................... 43 Microblogging ................................................................................. 44 Wikis ................................................................................................ 44 Podcasting ....................................................................................... 45 Screen capture / screen casting ...................................................... 45 4|Towards E-Learning
Video hosting and sharing ...............................................................46 Presentation sharing ........................................................................47 Social bookmarking ..........................................................................47 Collaborative slide shows / digital dialogue / Voicethread .............48 Image (photo) hosting and sharing..................................................49 RSS /feed readers ............................................................................49 Creating surveys ..............................................................................50 Instant messenger and voice call.....................................................51 8.
Using e-learning in the workplace ...............................................52 Learning objectives ..........................................................................52 Getting started: microblogging ........................................................52 Skill-Pills ...........................................................................................55
9.
Where next? ................................................................................57
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1. Introduction This is an introductory handbook written for practitioners in vocational education and training who want to know more about elearning and who would like to introduce e-learning in their own classrooms or workplace. This book is for you if: •
You are interested in e-learning (or think you should be!);
•
You are increasingly feeling that much of the stuff you are reading and hearing about e-learning is way beyond ‘ordinary’ trainers and managers like you;
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You are computer literate but not a computer expert. (That is, you can happily use word processing software, email or the occasional spreadsheet but not a lot more);
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You would like to be a bit more creative than producing the occasional ‘PowerPoint’ presentation;
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You are wondering how to go about introducing e-learning in your lessons or institutions and how to take others with you.
You do NOT need to be an IT specialist! Having said that, we are very conscious that levels of knowledge will vary enormously, as will exposure to the technology and we can only apologise if some bits are too hard or too basic for individual readers. The purpose of this handbook is to get you going – whether you are a teacher or a trainer or a manager in industry or the principal of a VET school. It can only point you in the right direction and raise some of the issues you will need to address. E-Booklet Title |7
Some people have made the obvious point that a book about elearning is rather a contradiction in terms and felt that it would have been more appropriate to have produced an online version with all of the obvious advantages of easy updating. However, we felt that the very people for whom this book is written are probably the group least likely to use or feel confident about using web-based materials. A book is comfortable and familiar and that is exactly how we would like VET teachers to feel about e-learning. One of the problems with any handbook is the sequencing because they are intended for readers to dip into rather than be read from cover to cover. Ideally, this means that key ideas should be explained as many times as necessary so that chapters stand alone. Don’t worry if you encounter words or terminology that you are unfamiliar with, you may find a fuller explanation elsewhere in this book, or you can simply google for more information. Finally, we are more conscious than most of the rapid changes in elearning. Changes are happening not only in the technologies but also in the pedagogy underpinning it and in the social environment in which vocational education and training, including e-learning, takes place. The two-year lead in time between writing a book and its subsequent publication means, therefore, that there is a built-in obsolescence, which is impossible to avoid. In recognition of this, we have tried wherever possible to indicate general trends and directions as well as current practice. However, these tend to be our personal opinions and a paradigm shift in technology could prove us to be quite wrong!
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2. What is e-learning? Learning objectives By the end of this chapter you should be able to: •
Say what e-learning is;
•
Distinguish between what is commonly meant by e-learning and related terms;
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Consider the major differences between synchronous and asynchronous e-learning.
When did it all start? E-learning or ‘electronic’ learning is simply the delivery of education or the acquisition of knowledge using computers or computer based materials as a medium. This is hardly a precise definition but the term is so widely used that it has been refined and re-defined by different groups of users in different contexts to suit their own purpose. It is a much broader concept than the Computer Based Training or Computer Aided Instruction which first appeared in the 1980s and more all embracing than ‘Online Learning’, which appeared a decade later (with the growth of the World Wide Web) and refers only to web-based learning. The last ten years has spawned a huge range of related terms – ‘online learning’, ‘open learning’, ‘distance learning’, ‘programmed learning’, ‘technology based training’, ‘technology enhanced learning’, – the list is endless. The purists insist there are important distinctions between them and this may be the case. In practice, a lot of people use the terms interchangeably and still manage to communicate with each other perfectly well so don’t worry about it. E-Booklet Title |9
More recently, with the explosion of mobile technologies and the exponential growth in mobile phones, PDA and other hand-held devices, the idea of Mobile- or m-learning has emerged. Although much e-learning is completely stand alone and goes on in the absence of a teacher, this book focuses on how e-learning can be used to supplement or complement face-to-face teaching rather than replace it. Although some VET schools or training centres do have students following online programmes, we are assuming that most VET teachers will want to mix traditional teaching methods with some e-learning methods. We call this Blended Learning.
Different sorts of e-learning There are many ways of classifying e-learning – depending on who is doing the classifying and for what purpose. We think the following distinction is helpful.
Synchronous learning Synchronous learning is when student(s) and teachers participate simultaneously in the learning process. They communicate live, in real time, using technology to do so. It is a two-way process. They may use telephones, Skype, an interactive whiteboard, a chat room or interactive web conferencing and they sign on to meet at designated times. They are almost always geographically distanced from each other. Otherwise the logic is that they could meet face-to-face.
Asynchronous learning Asynchronous learning is when learners access learning materials which have already been developed and produced by someone else at 10 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
a different time. This might include broadcast television, CD-Roms, DVD’s and textbooks as well as online resources. It is essentially a one-way process even if the programme has built in some interactivity. The important thing about asynchronous e-learning is that the learners work at their own convenience. They can typically choose the time, the duration, the frequency and the pace at which they learn. Some sorts of e-learning fall down the middle – for example blogs, comments on blogs, contributions to online forums or the text of a Skype chat. These may be synchronous or asynchronous, one-way or two-way depending on how they are used.
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3. Why e-learning? Learning Objectives By the end of this chapter you should be able to: •
List some of the reasons why e-learning is useful in VET;
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Outline some of the major pitfalls and problems.
Some reasons why you should be using e-learning In no particular order… •
E-learning – in particular the use of social software – exposes your trainees to a community of practice far larger than they would otherwise have. This means a wider range of experts from whom to learn, a professional support network and easy access to new ideas and changing industry practices and trends.
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E-learning increases the potential for transnational learning (using collaborative working tools), partnerships and worker mobility.
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E-learning helps overcome the problems of teaching trainees based on different sites or from a range of work places without having to bring them physically to one location.
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E-learning offers new and additional pedagogic opportunities and methods which have no equivalent in traditional teaching. That is, e-learning does not just replicate or mimic traditional teaching but supports new learning paradigms.
•
E-learning, particularly the use of web 2.0 applications, uses technologies with which your trainees are familiar, which reflects their lifestyle and which helps integrate their home – school – work lives. A generation of teenagers – Generation Z - is growing up in a social environment where the internet, computers and mobile technologies are part of the fabric of 12 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
their life. It is inconceivable that learning should be set apart from this. •
Introducing e-learning in initial VET is a good preparation for lifelong learning, much of which will depend on individually directed web based learning.
•
Developing e-learning skills is part of your continuing professional development!
…and some of the myths about e-learning •
E-learning is a cheap solution. This is not necessarily the case. It can be cheaper than face-to-face learning but not always. For example, setting up a wiki for dispersed groups of apprentices costs absolutely nothing. Producing a professional quality 10 minute interactive training video on DVD can easily cost 50,000 Euro. They are both e-learning!
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The cost benefits of e-learning are notoriously difficult to quantify.
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E-learning means you can ‘standardise’ training and ensure that everyone gets a consistent message. This may be true if you are using older, asynchronous e-learning methods which are based on a CD Rom or on the web and allow for little interactivity. However, this is not the case if you are using elearning methods that are synchronous and based on social software and have high interactivity.
•
Some of the technology is not robust enough, it keeps crashing and this demotivates students. This can be horribly true but it is getting better!
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As a teacher you need high level ICT skills to use e-learning methods. Absolutely not true! E-learning based on web 2.0 tools, such as YouTube or Twitter, needs only the same skills E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 13
as people who use these sites socially. What you DO need are high level pedagogic skills and creativity!
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4. E-learning in organisations Learning objectives By the end of this chapter you should be able to: •
Explain what a Learning Management System is;
•
Explain what a Personal Learning Environment is;
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Calculate the major direct and indirect costs associated with e-learning;
•
List the savings that can be made through the adoption of elearning.
Choosing a learning environment A learning environment is simply the place where learning takes place. In e-learning it is typically used to refer to particular software systems that institutions such as schools, colleges and universities use to create a shared virtual space for learning. A Learning Management System (LMS) is a software tool, typically web based, which helps to plan and deliver learning events and to ‘manage’ learners by keeping track of their progress and their performance across a range of learning activities. It also facilitates interaction between teachers and students and among students themselves. A Learning Content Management System (LCMS) focuses on the development, management and publishing of the content that will typically be delivered through the LMS. It provides authors and designers with the means to create e-learning content efficiently. Both of these are often combined in a single package. E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 15
Some LMSs such as Moodle or Illias are free; others, such as Blackboard Academic Suite, are not. The Upside Learning Solutions Blog has this to say about choosing a system – which we think is sound advice (with adaptions) 1:
Five things not to do while selecting an LMS 1. It is not an IT system purchase. Do not make the LMS an IT department purchase only. You do not need to be any more IT-savvy than you probably already are to go about selecting the right LMS system for your organization. It is a piece of software and the IT part stops there. From the very first day when you start talking about the need for an LMS with management and internal staff do not involve IT, (unless you need some input from them). Make sure you focus on the core objectives, perceived benefits, and desired outcomes from the system. 2. Do not buy after just a sales demonstration. If required, get one or two more demonstrations done; involve more people to ask more questions: administrators-to-be, user groups, the IT team (yes, they can give input and ask technical questions but only to an extent). 3. Do not delegate the research to one person who may only look at it from a narrow perspective or present an opinion that may not be fully informed or accurate unless that person is qualified to map requirements to system functionality. Otherwise, set up a team. 4. Do not sign the order before a full trial access. Just as you wouldn’t buy a car without a test drive, you wouldn’t purchase an LMS without trial use either. Involve 1
Full text at: http://www.upsidelearning.com/blog/index.php/2009/08/27/five-thingsnot-to-do-while-selecting-an-lms/
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administrators and some users and do a full trial. This may take a few weeks depending on your team’s availability and planning. 5. Do not leave the ‘thinking’ part to the LMS vendor. Go through the process of scoping and describing your requirements elaborately, the expectations you have, the initial data set to be loaded, etc. This exercise takes time and effort but eventually saves time and hassles. Ensure the vendor documents the requirements before any sort of implementation starts.
Personal Learning Environments You may not want a LMS at all. An alternative is the Personal Learning Environment (PLE) approach. Unlike the LMS model, which is institutionally focussed and course driven, a PLE is based on a learnercentred view of learning. The PLE is a concept not a new computer based learning system and reflects fundamental changes in the way we are using technology for learning. A PLE is simply a collection of tools that help learners structure, organise, represent and reflect on their learning. Different people will use different tools so there are as many different PLEs as there are learners. It is certainly a much cheaper solution than the LMS approach as each learner will build their own PLE from a range of applications most of which are freely downloadable. The idea of a PLE is a natural response to the growth of social software and its use in e-learning – a PLE is, in a sense, a customised collection of web 2.0 applications whereas LMS systems were designed, albeit unintentionally, in a way which isolates learners within institutional, class and subject bound groups and actually prevents the open social networking that characterises the ways in which we are using computers to communicate today. E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 17
What does e-learning cost? The question we are asked most often is probably “How much does elearning cost?” Our usual reply is “How much does learning cost?” – which is a directly analogous question but rarely asked because of the complexity of calculating the answer. Working out the return on investment for e-learning is very difficult because there are so many variables to consider and so many activities that can be loosely classed as e-learning. However, if you are considering a major investment in e-learning facilities, here are some of the things you will need to include in the costs.
Hardware If you are intending to use an LMS (such as Moodle), you will need a server and desktop terminals or computers for students, together with the necessary peripherals. However, you can manage without any of this if you stick to using commonly available social software and if your trainees have a PDA or mobile phone connected to the web or a personal laptop.
Cameras, vidcams, microphones etc A ready supply of all of these is essential if trainees are going to be involved in creating their own e-learning content. Both the video and still cameras can be quite cheap as publishing images to the web requires a far lower quality than printing them. So lots of cheap cameras are a much better buy than a few expensive ones. The reverse is true of microphones! If students are going to be making their own podcasts then the quality of the sound is really important and skimping on microphones is false economy. A picture which is a 18 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
bit fuzzy you can live with. Sound which is muffled or distorted, you cannot!
Cabling Cabling is often overlooked as a major cost. Classrooms and training rooms are usually in buildings designed by architects rather than teachers and wired by electricians who are only interested in ease and efficiency of installation rather than the pedagogic impact. Typically this means designated ‘computer rooms’ will either have benches running around the perimeter walls providing easy access to wall mounted sockets or there will be long parallel rows of benches with built-in wiring. From a teacher’s perspective, both of these configurations are a pedagogic nightmare. In the first case you are talking to people’s backs; in the second you have no way of organising informal group work, collaborative working or assignments. So, if your institution is considering a brand new installation, think about under-floor cabling with sockets sunk in the floor all over the room so that tables can be arranged café style, in a horseshoe or whatever arrangement is most suitable for your lessons.
Software If you are buying commercial software, remember to cost in the appropriate number of user licences. Many software packages come in ‘student/educational’ or ‘standard’ or ‘professional’ versions with price and functionality increasing as you go up the scale. Although the savings offered by the ‘education’ versions can be attractive – especially for general education – it may be false economy in VET schools. We know of an entire Graphic Design degree course taught using the student versions of well known graphics packages despite the fact that these trainees were leaving VET school to work in an E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 19
environment where the ‘professional’ package was the industry standard. As far as possible, we recommend using open source software and most social software is free anyway.
Connectivity You will need to add in the recurring costs of your broadband connection with sufficient bandwidth to support all your users potentially being online at the same time and to allow for use of highbandwidth services like video streaming and video conferencing.
Technical support, maintenance and replacement We have lumped these together because it is likely that your institution will already have a model for this i.e whether maintenance and support of ICT equipment is provided in-house or outsourced or a mixture of both. They may also have a policy covering the period over which certain items of equipment may be written off and replaced. However, the introduction of e-learning across the institution will put an additional load – and, therefore, cost – on these services.
Staff training / continuing professional development Assuming that e-learning is being introduced as part of institutional policy (rather than through the initiative of a few individual teachers), you will need to cost in training for staff. This will include not only course fees (for face-to-face training) and cost to supply cover, but it should also include downtime when staff are using web based learning.
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Student training and support We often assume that students and trainees, particularly younger ones, will be sufficiently familiar with web 2.0 applications or confident enough to find their way around other software without much help. This may be true for the majority but there will always be some students who will have had less access to computers at school or in the home who will need additional support. The most efficient way of providing this is through a drop-in facility – and this will need to be costed in.
E-learning materials Depending on the sort of e-learning you are thinking of, there may be costs associated with buying ready-made courses or packages. However, as there is such a wealth of open content material that is freely available, this can be minimised. More importantly, you need to allow sufficient time for teachers and trainers to prepare high quality e-learning materials themselves. This can be considerable. A simple, text-only, slide presentation for use with one group of trainees with a face-to-face trainer may only take half an hour to prepare. The same slide show with interesting graphics and a recorded voice over, which is a stand-alone learning resource that is uploaded to a slide share website for use by others, can easily take two days!
Consultancy You may need someone to hold your hand throughout the whole process or you may just need to buy in someone for a few days to configure a system or provide some staff training. If you are intending to produce your own materials for a mass audience you may need the E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 21
services of a programmer or graphic designer. Consultants can be expensive but nevertheless more economical than recruiting new staff or releasing existing staff.
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5. Introducing e-learning - getting started Learning objectives By the end of this chapter you should be able to: •
Identify your own role and the personal contribution you can make to introducing e-learning in your institution or workplace;
•
Construct a route map for the introduction of e-learning in your organisation or for yourself within that institution;
•
Discuss some of the change management issues you will need to address.
If you want to introduce e-learning methods into your organisation, the way you go about it will be largely determined by the position you hold. We have considered how you may approach it firstly as a senior manager (e.g Head of Human Resource Department or a VET school principal) then as a middle manager (e.g a training officer or section leader) and finally as a classroom teacher or trainer.
Senior manager Before you even consider introducing e-learning, ask yourself why you are doing it. What problem are you trying to solve with it and what do you want to achieve? Just as important: how will you know that it has been achieved? What are your targets? And over what time period? Change needs to be measurable. ‘Introducing e-learning’ is just not specific enough! Do you want to install a complete learning management system including computerized student / trainee tracking, a repository of materials and course content or would you be happy if a handful of creative teachers or trainers got together and started experimenting with social software tools? E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 23
•
Consult early and consult often. If you force change on people, problems normally arise. You need to ask yourself which groups of people will be affected by your planned changes and involve them as early as possible. Check that these people agree with it, or at least understand the need for change and have a chance to decide how the change will be managed and to be involved in the planning and implementation. Use face-to-face communications wherever possible.
•
Try to see the picture from the perspective of each group and ask yourself how they are likely to react. For example, older staff may feel threatened and have no interest in adopting new technologies. The staff who teach IT often consider that e-learning is really under their remit and resent the involvement of other staff in their ‘territory’. Another very sensitive group will be your IT technicians. They can make or break your plans by claiming they ‘cannot support’ this or that and raising all sorts of security issues and other obstacles.
•
Although you may be enthusiastic about e-learning try not to be too zealous. This is not sustainable in the long term. The idea is to convey your enthusiasm and stimulate theirs rather than hard selling e-learning. If you do, people will nod their acceptance then completely disregard it thinking this is yet another of those initiatives that will go away in time. Change is usually unsettling, so the manager, logically, needs to be a settling influence not someone who wants to fire people up with his own passion thinking this will motivate them.
•
Think carefully about the time frame. If you think that you need to introduce e-learning quickly, probe the reasons - is the urgency real? Will the effects of agreeing a more sensible time-frame really be more disastrous than presiding over a disastrous change? Quick change prevents proper consultation and involvement, which leads to difficulties that take time to resolve.
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•
Think about the scale. Are you going for a top down approach which may be standard across the institution and include a Learning Management System and a Learning Content Management System? Or are you going to stimulate small scale explorations in the classroom with a few interested teachers and try to grow e-learning organically?
•
Avoid expressions like 'mindset change', and 'changing people's mindsets' or 'changing attitudes', because this language often indicates a tendency towards imposed or enforced change and it implies strongly that the organization believes that its people currently have the 'wrong' mindset.
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Workshops, rather than mass presentations, are very useful processes to develop collective understanding, approaches, policies, methods, systems, ideas etc.
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Staff surveys are a helpful way to repair damage and mistrust among staff - provided you allow people to complete them anonymously, and provided you publish and act on the findings.
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You cannot easily impose change. People and teams need to be empowered to find their own solutions and responses, with facilitation and support from managers. Management and leadership style and behaviour are more important than policy and sophisticated implementation processes. Employees need to be able to trust the organization.
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Lead by example. Set up a Facebook group as part of the consultation process, use a page on the organization website to keep people up to date with planned changes, use different media to communicate with staff, make a podcast of your key messages and publish it on YouTube.
John Kotter, a professor at Harvard Business School has designed the following eight step model for introducing e-learning, which we think is really useful so we have included it in full:
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•
Increase urgency - inspire people to move, make objectives real and relevant.
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Build the guiding team - get the right people in place with the right emotional commitment, and the right mix of skills and levels.
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Get the vision right - get the team to establish a simple vision and strategy. Focus on emotional and creative aspects necessary to drive service and efficiency.
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Communicate for buy-in - involve as many people as possible, communicate the essentials, keep it simple and appeal and respond to people's needs. De-clutter communications - make technology work for you rather than against.
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Empower action - remove obstacles, enable constructive feedback and lots of support from leaders - reward and recognise progress and achievements.
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Create short-term wins - Set aims that are easy to achieve - in bite-size chunks. Manageable numbers of initiatives. Finish current stages before starting new ones.
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Don't let up - Foster and encourage determination and persistence - ongoing change - encourage ongoing progress reporting - highlight achieved and future milestones.
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Make change stick - Reinforce the value of successful change via recruitment, promotion, new change leaders. Weave change into culture.
Middle managers As a middle manager, in some ways you are in the most difficult position if you want to introduce e-learning methods in your classrooms or workplace as you have to convince both those above you and below you. Convincing senior managers is usually fairly easy to start with if you present them with some concrete benefits of using 26 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
e-learning in a specific context and tell them that in the first instance it will not cost anything. For example, telling management that you are going to get your first year building apprentices to set up a wiki around new materials or record their work experience on a blog and that there are no cost implications is very unthreatening whereas announcing that you are going to introduce e-learning across your department is going to raise all sorts of concerns. The important thing is that once you have done something, share the success stories with your senior managers – get them to listen to the podcast your apprentices made or invite then to join your engineering students’ Facebook group. This reassures them they made the right decision in allowing you to get on with it and actively engages them in the process. It is then much easier asking for extra money for a video camera to improve on the audio podcasting than it would have been without any concrete outcomes. A lot depends on how familiar your senior managers are with elearning technologies and pedagogies and whether they are promoting it, indifferent or actively against the ideas. If they are lacking in knowledge, one of your jobs is to educate them and the best way of doing this is to do some small scale stuff (such as the things suggested above) and show them the results. Make a clear, simple but well produced slide presentation explaining what you want to do and the benefits it will bring. Don’t send it to them as an email attachment – upload it to Slideshare and send them the link. In this way you are ‘training’ your managers in the use of e-learning - don’t miss an opportunity! If you do need extra resources, set out a clear proposal showing what is capital cost (such as hardware) and what is recurring revenue cost (such as broadband connection). Make sure you cost in EVERYTHING (see list above) – there is nothing designed to infuriate senior E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 27
management as much as a proposal that is deliberately under-costed to increase its chances of approval then to find out after implementation has started there are extra costs which, if not met, waste the rest of the investment. Of course, this is true of any proposal but investment in e-learning seems particularly prone to escalating and ‘hidden’ costs. When it comes to dealing with the people below you, the same rules apply as those set out for senior managers. To these we would add one or two specific ideas. •
Begin with a grass roots approach.
•
Start where you have most chance of success. Find out who in your section or department is interested in e-learning or is confident about using ICT. Encourage and ‘grow’ these people and make sure you reward them in some way. (This could be a few hours non-contact time to develop some e-learning materials or chance to go to a training course, conference or visit).
•
Talk about the successes at staff meetings. Most people will see e-learning as yet more work for which there is no payback – you have to motivate them in some way.
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Find a vocal group of beta testers.
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Don’t set strict rules – encourage exploration and experiment.
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Create opportunities for staff to look at e-learning being used effectively. This could be visits to other VET schools or training centres, (real or online), YouTube videos or practical training sessions – the best are those where they leave with e-learning ideas or materials or other products that they can use immediately in their classroom or work place.
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Encourage staff to join in online forums or open meetings about e-learning. If they are not confident to start with, it is perfectly OK to ‘lurk’ in the background occasionally. 28 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
•
Hold informal training sessions and encourage the use of microblogging as a back channel during training.
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Constantly monitor feedback and make changes as needed.
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Communicate the stories behind e-learning. E.g. how did social software start? What made Twitter happen? Will Facebook survive?
Teachers / trainers If you are an individual teacher or trainer it can be very daunting trying to introduce e-learning into your teaching if you are working in an organisation where there is no experience or culture of e-learning. You cannot change this easily from your position. The best way of influencing things is to just try something out in your own classroom. You are definitely better starting off with some simple web 2.0 based activities as these have no cost implications. Choose this activity carefully – think of any objections that could be raised, however ridiculous. For example: •
“A Facebook group? – Facebook is banned or even firewalled because staff and trainees waste too much time on it.”
•
“A Skype video interview between a group of apprentices and a skilled craftsman? – IT support section will not let you access Skype, (which uses a different port, which they will have closed and will not open for ‘security reasons’)”
•
Sharing bookmarks using del.icio.us ? – the students will use it to share porn sites.
An audio podcast may be a good start if you have enough computers with built-in microphones and speakers or access to a microphone and a recording device like an ipod. Setting up a group wiki around a E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 29
particular theme is also difficult to object to. Another possibility is to get trainees blogging. If you are lucky, you may find that your managers are just glad that someone is interested and give you the freedom to operate. There are very few who will actively prevent you as long as it does not cost them time or money, although you may find that some other staff have a negative attitude. From this base you can gradually build up a small informal group of like-minded teachers to share ideas or swap materials. A group of teachers will also have more influence. Make sure any positive outcomes are disseminated, preferably show casing trainees’ work. One good way of doing this is to print out a list of guest log-ins and passwords to anything you are working on (e.g a wiki) or the url to web pages where your trainees are publishing work (e.g. Flickr, YouTube, personal Blogs). Add a brief explanation and stick it on the wall as well as routinely sending it by email to other staff in your section ‘for information’. This has the double benefit of keeping what you are doing transparent and also makes some people curious enough to click on the hyperlink. Invite other teachers along to your classroom when you know you will be using e-learning or invite them to drop in to your group meetings. You will also need to introduce the idea of e-learning to your trainees. Although many of the younger students will need no convincing, it can be difficult with older workers who may have a very fixed idea of what constitutes ‘training’ or ‘learning’. Make sure that the first time you introduce a new application to a group that you allow enough time to explain how the technology works and time for them to familiarize themselves with it using a ‘test’ example before you start. For example…”let’s all try setting up a wiki about things to do with 30 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
Christmas / the World Cup / the best pubs in …” before you get onto the serious stuff.
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6. What sort of tools and applications do you need for communicating and creating elearning content? Learning objectives By the end of this chapter you should be able to: •
Explain what authoring software is and give some examples;
•
Explain what image manipulation software does and give some examples;
•
List a range of web 2.0 applications that are useful for creating e-learning content and explain what they do;
•
Explain the terms ‘web 2.0’, ‘social software’, and ‘online communities’;
•
Discuss how the concept of web 2.0 has impacted on practice in e-learning and how pedagogical approaches to e-learning are changing.
A basic toolkit for e-learning If you are thinking about using e-learning methods with your students or want to develop some e-learning materials, you will need a basic toolkit of applications to help you do it. These fall into three groups: •
Authoring systems
•
Image manipulation software
•
Web 2.0 and Social software
For developing high quality learning materials you will need some authoring software and also a graphics / image manipulation programme. Both of these can range from very expensive (up to 2000 32 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
Euro) to free, if you use open source software. In this booklet we will mainly deal with the free ones. You will also need some web 2.0 applications, which may be held on your own computer or accessed online.
Authoring systems An authoring programme is a software application that allows you to create multimedia digital products that are heavily customized without having to know anything about programming - a bit like a programme for writing programmes. Some are very general, some are created specifically for e-learning. They enable you to add features and functionality to your basic material, such as graphics, interactivity, animation, feedback loops and so on. Then there are programmes for creating tests that allow you to choose the question type, calculate the individual scores and aggregate class data. The following tools are the ones we have tried and tested and are our own personal favourites – mainly because they are free or cheap! eXe (free) A must-have in your tool box if you are planning on developing web content is eXe. eXe is an e-learning HTML editor – means you can create web pages without having to understand anything very much about html. You can download the latest version of the eXe software from the front page of the eXe project website: http://exelearning.org There is a great online tutorial on getting started with exe at the website of the eLat project, University of Bath: http://blogs.bath.ac.uk/elat/exe/getting-started-with-exe E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 33
xerte (free) Xerte is another authoring tool that is freely available and free to use. It produces Flash-based output that can stand alone or be embedded within Moodle. For more information see: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/xerte/ CourseLab (free) CourseLab is an e-learning authoring tool, which is very powerful and reasonably easy-to-use. It gives you a full WYSIWYG 2 environment and can create high-quality interactive e-learning content that can be published on the Internet, LMSs, CD-ROMs and other devices. It requires absolutely no programming skills although it is a bit fiddly and counter-intuitive to start– it is easy when you have worked it all out! Also, there is no Mac version. Download it from http://www.courselab.com
Image manipulation software If you are using a fairly up to date version of Windows or a Mac, you will find that you have a basic image editing facility on your machine. If you have a PC, look for Paint, on a Mac use I-Photo. Both these programmes allow you to import images in JPEG, GIF or PNG and swap formats before you export them. You simply select a picture, click on edit and use the buttons to crop photos, blur defects, apply a number of special effects, adjust colour intensity, tone, temperature, brightness, sharpness or softness, exposure and so on. Having selected the file format you want to export your images in, 2
What You See Is What You Get - describes a system in which content displayed during editing appears very similar to the final output (Wikipedia)
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you can then adjust the resolution. You have a menu option which allow you to export directly to the web and a further range of options which allows you to set parameters for the web image. Many people start off with these applications before progressing to more sophisticated software with additional functionality. Other trainers (including the authors) find them perfectly adequate for most of their needs and don’t bother. If you want to progress beyond the basics we suggest trying: GIMP This is an abbreviation for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is free and a good choice for quick image editing. It has a lot of professional features and can handle all common formats (GIF, JPEG, PNG). There is also a version available that is very similar to the Adobe Photoshop interface. Download from http://www.gimp.org Picasa Picasa is also free software for image editing and administration that was taken over by Google Inc. in 2004. It was designed for beginners. It is particularly good for creating photo-albums for the web. It does not technically meet the criteria for an image editor, since it does not allow for pixel-level editing. For more information see: http://picasa.google.com Comic Life To this list we would definitely add Comic Life (find them at http://plasq.com/comiclife) which is not free but very cheap – about $25 for the standard version. It not only enables you to make E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 35
cartoons and comics (which make e-learning fun) but gives you an extremely fast and easy way of creating quality slides by allowing you to layout and overlap multiple images, put text and graphics on top of images, add backgrounds etc. The slides can then be saved at an appropriate resolution, exported and dragged into PowerPoint or used as the basis for your Prezi-presentation (see: http://prezi.com).
Web 2.0 and social software We have mentioned web 2.0 and social software several times. Perhaps this is the time to explain what we mean. Web 2.0 is a term used to describe both trends in the way that people are using the World Wide Web and also changes in the technologies that both drive and reflect the changes. 3 The predominant way that people used to use the web was to access information or media products as they would visit a library or watch television or go to see a film. A key concept of web 2.0 is the idea of web users actively participating and creating the web content, rather than being passive consumers. At the same time, web designers have been creating tools that help people do this – particularly tools to enhance creativity, to work collaboratively and to share information. Social software is simply web based programmes that allow users to interact and share data with other users. Some allow you to create 3
The term ‘2.0’ mimics the way developers label new versions of software. However, web 2.0 does not refer to an upgrade in the technical specification of the web, it is a metaphor used to describe how web designers and web users are moving in a new direction.
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networks of friends, personal profiles and blogs, start or join interest groups or post photos, music and videos for others to see. Some are sites for storing and sharing particular sorts of information. For example: •
Flickr for sharing photographs;
•
YouTube for sharing video;
•
Del.icio.us for sharing bookmarked web sites;
•
Slideshare for sharing presentations;
Most all of these sites share characteristics like the ability to upload data and media together with tools for adding tags or keywords, tools for searching and downloading. Collaborative software is a special category of social software. Like all social software it is used to describe co-operative information sharing systems but is usually narrowly applied to the software that enables collaborative work functions. Examples would be online calendars that can be shared with other users, e-mail, text chat and wiki’s.
Online communities All the sites mentioned above are fed with data by users and the software facilitates interaction between them. This leads to the creation of online communities which are an integral part of the web 2.0 concept.
Basic Tools The table below outlines some of the basic sorts of tools, summarises what they do and gives some examples. E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 37
What it is for Blogging
What it does A personal publishing tool with which any individual or group can publish on the web and receive feedback from others. Plug-ins enable you to embed resources such as images from Flickr, YouTube videos and Slideshare presentations. Microblogging Enables you to stay in touch and update your contacts on where you are and what you are doing. Usually formatted to respond to the question “Where are you now…” or “what are you thinking…” with a strict limit (about 140 – 150 characters) on the length of the response. Wikis A collaborative tool for setting up easily edited websites which have content added and amended by readers. Podcasting Making and broadcasting your own audio and video material on the web so that others can listen or download your work. Screen capture Instantly captures and shares and screen images on your computer screen casting and enables you to add audio. Video hosting You can upload and store videos using webcams, camcorders and and sharing mobile phones and allow others to share them. You can also search or browse videos made by others and comment on them.
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Example Wordpress Blogger
PBWiki
Audacity Garage Band
Jing
YouTube
Presentation sharing
If you create presentations using Keynote or PowerPoint you can store them, tag them and share them online. You can make them availably publicly, privately, downloadable or not and can synchronise them with an audio file. Social You do not need to store your bookmarking bookmarks in your browser any longer. You can tag them, store them online and share them with others. Collaborative Using PowerPoint presentations slideshows and pictures, you can create an audio slideshow and audio comments can be left by others. Image hosting Your personal or professional and sharing picture collection can be tagged and stored online and shared with others. Access and the facility to download can be controlled. RSS reader Keeping up to date with your favourite websites can mean scanning many websites and blogs every day. With an RSS reader you simply subscribe to the site’s newsfeed and news of updates is delivered to you automatically. Creating Set up a poll and embed the poll surveys widget in your blog or website and then track the responses on a website.
Slideshare Prezi
Del.icio.us
Voicethread
Flickr Picasa dropbox
Google Reader
Polldaddy Surveymonkey
E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 39
Private social Lets you create and customise a networking private network for a group of people (like a private FaceBook.) Live New technology that enables live interactive video broadcasting to broadcasting a global audience using just a camera and internet connection. Online meeting You can connect people at a distance to an audio or video meeting from your computer. You can also use Skype or telephone to connect them. Enables people to talk, see, use a whiteboard and annotate or share files. Instant Provides a way of text messaging messenger and online contacts using your voice call computer. It also also allows you to send files and set up group chats and calls and gives you free computer-to-computer audio and video calls. There are low charges to make calls to landlines. Table: Basic Tools
Ning
Ustream.tv
Yugma
Skype
All of the applications above can be used to support learning. They are all free and accessible on the web. Just search Google for any of them. All are relatively easy to use and many come with their own online tutorials. Together they provide an entry route into e-learning at little or no cost. Institutions do not have to invest in expensive and complicated IT infrastructures, teachers and trainers do not need to be trained in special technical skills. What teachers do need is creativity and imagination in how they use them. It is a quite different approach from the way that many VET organisations conceive of e-learning as the production and use of 40 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
online courses or digital learning objects or stand alone ‘programmed’ learning packages. This is not only a far more expensive option (unless you really are training mass audiences) but it still replicates, to a large extent, a very traditional pedagogy. An online, preprogrammed course which provides information and takes the learner through a sequence of tasks and activities is still very much teacher driven although the ‘teacher’ may not be physically present. Multimedia digital learning objects may be a more interesting way of illustrating a lecture than a quick diagram on a blackboard but they serve essentially the same purpose – to allow the teacher or trainer to share his ideas. Programmed learning which allows trainees to input data and provides standard feedback is not truly interactive and does not allow the learner to decide what information he wants to share and with whom. Moreover, the earlier generation of e-learning was based on a model of separate learners with their individual learning programmes and online courses, learning in their own time and at their own pace and in relative isolation. This was heavily promoted as an aid to developing ‘autonomous learners’. However, in practice – particularly in industry, learning rarely takes place in this way. The workplace is a collaborative environment in which information is exchanged and knowledge shared. The great advantage of the ‘web 2.0 approach’ is precisely that it reflects this reality through the use of social software that shifts the focus from individual to collaborative learning and through the development of communities of practice.
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7. E-learning in the classroom Learning objectives By the end of this chapter you should be able to: •
Use a range of social software applications to enhance learning;
•
Discuss the sorts of learning problems that different software can solve and suggest situations when they could be used;
•
Think of some specific e-learning activities in your own subject area using social software.
Once you have familiarised yourself with some of the tools we have suggested and are confident that you can use them, you then need to think about how you could use them to enhance the learning experience for your students or trainees. We thought it might be useful to list some ideas to start you thinking. Given the wide range of vocational areas and the wide range of tools, it would be a mammoth task to suggest activities for each application for each subject area so we have just provided some general guidelines with a variety of examples drawn from across the vocational field. First a word of warning: in a real training situation you would not select the e-learning method first and then work out how you could use it. We are doing it this way in the context of the handbook just to stimulate your ideas. In practice, always think of the learning problem you are trying to solve first THEN look at what e-learning (and traditional learning) options exist.
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Blogging A weblog is usually a personal website where individuals can publish whatever they want to share with others. Weblogs are commonly known as blogs. •
Get trainees to set up individual blog pages recording what they are doing in VET school and in the workplace – it makes it much easier to keep on- and off- the job training integrated and coherent. E.g. assignments can be related to immediate practice.
•
If trainees are based in a range of industries or locations then give them the same assignment – e.g. find out what quality assurance systems are in place in your company – then tell them to write a blog post on the results. Compare the answers. Tell each trainee that they have to post a question which they are still curious about e.g. “Do small companies really use all these quality assurance systems or do they just jump through the hoops to satisfy customers and awarding bodies?” Everyone has to respond to everyone else’s question.
•
Encourage trainees to use their blog for reflection and evaluation.
•
Set up a multi-user blog to record impressions of a particular industrial visit or other activity. Sometimes maintaining a blog can seem very daunting – multi-user or group blogs can be less threatening.
•
Make a photoblog over a one month period posting one picture each day representing what each trainee did in work that day.
E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 43
Microblogging A microblog is similar to a blog but on a much smaller scale. Posts are typically restricted to about 140 characters so could consist of nothing but a short sentence fragment, an image or embedded video. •
Use Twitter as a way of collecting answers to questions posed in the classroom e.g. a hairdressing trainee wants to know what hairstyles are likely to be fashionable next season – Twitter it, right there in the middle of the lesson.
•
Use Twitter for role play – e.g. tell management trainees that they are all people or groups connected with the same company in which there are rumours of impending redundancies as a result of a drop in profits. Let each person choose their persona – the Managing Director, trade union negotiator, shop floor worker, husband or wife of worker, customer, shareholder etc. (doesn’t matter if there are duplicates). They all sign up to follow each other then twitter their ideas and feelings in 140 characters. Keep it going for a few days!!
•
Twitter short and quick ‘homework’ questions and ask for tweets from everyone in response e.g “Jen Hughes wants to know one new thing you learned in work today” or (e.g with construction trainees) “Jen Hughes wants to know what are the main causes of damp in old buildings.”
Wikis A wiki is a page or collection of Web pages built in a way that enables anyone who accesses them to contribute new information of their own and amend content already there. It is also the name of the software that enables us to create, edit and link the pages. •
Set group projects and encourage trainees to set up wikis. Award marks for evidence of effective use of collaborative tools. 44 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
•
Set up a class wiki around common themes or interests. Negotiate the folder structure and editorial rights – use it as a core communication vehicle rather than just circulating your lecture notes or uploading them to a website. Use multimedia and encourage trainees to contribute material and to take responsibility for certain themes E.g social pedagogy trainees could have areas dealing with young children, older people, special needs etc and could have folders for activity ideas, materials, reports, news articles, images etc.
Podcasting A podcast is like a radio or TV show. However, instead of being broadcast live, a podcast is recorded and then distributed (syndicated) over the internet, so that you can listen to it whenever you want. •
Get trainees to do some interviews and record them as audio podcasts. For example, ‘Interview the oldest person in your company or the person who has worked there the longest and ask them how the technology in that industry has changed, how practices have changed, what have been changes for the better, what do they regret etc’.
•
If trainees are working on a group project, ask them to submit a podcast of the process they went through then award marks for content, marks for process.
•
Record practical work or laboratory experiments using a mobile phone. Submit them with written reports or embed them in personal blogs.
Screen capture / screen casting In the same way that a screenshot is a static representation of a computer screen at a point in time, a screen cast captures what E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 45
happens on a monitor over a period of time, typically with accompanying audio, from an application being demonstrated or a narrative from the presenter. •
If you are teaching any sort of CAD or graphics programme it is really useful to give trainees a screen cast showing you undertaking specific actions on your computer.
•
Screen cast a short audio video message from you to your trainees using your computer camera (e.g. reminding them of an important event), and send it out on Twitter.
•
Get trainees to make a slide presentation around a particular topic, add a voice over and screen cast it.
Video hosting and sharing Video sharing websites are social networking sites that allow you to upload and store video clips and share them with others and, in some cases, download them. YouTube is far and away the most used of these sites and the first commercial one. •
Searching for video clips can also be an integral part of a student’s background research for a project or assignment. Following links is a good first step in learning research techniques. If it is a written report then the web address of the clips can be included in the bibliography. However, if students are publishing their reports on the web then they should be encouraged to embed the actual clip.
•
Take a polemic topic and have debate using video clips. Asking different groups to find clips that support different points of view - not only adds to the subject content of the lesson but helps trainees become intelligent users of the web.
•
Encourage trainees to film their learning using a video camera or mobile phones – for example field trips, site visits, practical work - and publish the results. 46 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
•
Get trainees to look for video clips that explain certain theoretical principles in practice e.g science or engineering students could be asked to find video clips of the effects of metals expanding when heated or construction trainees could be asked to find videos illustrating the effect of capillary action.
Presentation sharing There are over 300 million PowerPoint users in the world who do 30 million presentations every day. Many of them are happy to share their presentations with others. Applications such as Slideshare store, manage, organise and share presentations. •
Encourage trainees to use SlideShare as a research tool for assignments or to provide supplementary information around the topic they are studying.
•
Get trainees to make a slide presentation (in PowerPoint or Prezi) instead of a formal written report and publish it.
•
Give trainees a short time (say 30 minutes) to prepare a presentation and deliver it to the class. Encourage them to reuse or repurpose an open content presentation on Slideshare and dispel the idea that this is ‘cheating’. Discuss copyright, acknowledgement of sources and plagiarism.
Social bookmarking Social bookmarking tools enable users to store, manage, search, share and organise bookmarks of web pages and hold them online. •
Set up a group for your trainees around a particular subject or theme and add your bookmarks for essential reading together with your comments. Ask all trainees to comment on your contribution or other people’s. Good for ensuring they do the reading. E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 47
•
Set up a group, set an assignment and get trainees to add bookmarks for sites they have found useful in their research together with a rating and a description. It provides good ‘evidence’ of their research. Looking at bookmarks that are publicly available is also a way of fast tracking research into a topic.
Collaborative slide shows / digital dialogue / Voicethread A voicethread is an online media album that can hold essentially any type of media (images, documents and videos) and allows people to make comments in five different ways - using voice (with a microphone or telephone), text, audio file or video (with a webcam) and share them with anyone they wish. A voicethread allows group conversations to be collected and shared in one place, from anywhere in the world. •
Set up a cross discipline voicethread with students from other vocational courses around a common theme e.g. health and safety in the workplace. Collect a series of images, add short opening comments for each and ask a question for trainees to respond to.
•
Get trainees to take turns to provide interesting images each week that will provoke debate around the topic the group is working on or something in the broader subject area that interests them.
•
Invite employers to join in a voicethread.
•
Get trainees to produce a multimedia voicethread reporting on a piece of research or practical assignment. Get them to invite feedback from 5 other people e.g their boss, their friend, their workmate, another student etc. Ask these people to allocate a grade.
•
Set up a voicethread with trainees in another country. 48 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
Image (photo) hosting and sharing Image sharing site is a generic term for websites that provide storage and publishing facilities for your photographs, presentations and videos. •
Set assignments that involve using a picture-sharing repository. For example, ask them to find pictures in advance of a lecture around the topics you intend to cover. Print them off and make a wall display or put them all into a PowerPoint presentation and work your lesson around it.
•
Alternatively, ask students to find pictures to illustrate what you have told them in a lesson as a homework project. Let them search for pictures of others with a Creative Commons license using Google or more specifically, with Flickr.
•
If they are submitting essentially text-based homework, encourage them to include pictures as well.
•
Keep a digital camera /mobile phone in the class all the time and encourage the pupils to use it for recording activities, work in progress, finished work, wall displays and so on. Publish these using Flickr.
RSS /feed readers News feeds allow you to see when websites have added new content. You can get the latest updates in one place, as soon as they are published, without having to visit the websites you have taken the feed from. Feeds are also known as RSS (Really Simple Syndication' or ‘Rich Site Summary’). •
Get trainees to compile a list of useful websites related to their industry sector – preferably ones that change regularly E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 49
such as news sites, blogs, online trade journals or research and development sites. Ask each trainee to monitor each site and find a way of sharing with the rest of the group any items that are of particular interest. (Swap around regularly as some sites are more boring or interesting than others.) •
Do this as a group activity at a regular time each week. Using a projector, flick through the updates for that week and stop and talk about the ones that are interesting.
•
Take a general scientific site that has lots of feeds to choose from - for example, the New Scientist site is excellent. Get trainees to check which feeds may contribute to your vocational area (construction, hairdressing, engineering, health etc.
•
Set homework assignments such as ‘What is the latest research /news on…?’
•
If you have set up interesting wikis, voicethreads etc. get trainees to decide whether it should be syndicated and add an RSS feed.
Creating surveys There are many applications which allow you to create questionnaires and surveys using a variety of question types, email the survey to a contact list and analyse the responses. Most of these are free for small numbers of respondents. •
Self evaluation of learning is increasingly important. Get your trainees to design their own marking scheme for an assignment and set their own criteria. Then turn this into a questionnaire and send it to the other trainees in the group plus the trainer. Trainees then produce a self-assessment based on responses.
•
Take a simple research issue e.g. ‘What level of customer service do clients in a particular industry want?’ or ‘What 50 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
makes a good engineer / chef / carpenter etc.?’ You may also want to give them some sub headings. Ask each trainee to design a short survey and get (say) 10 people to compete it. Compare results. Find out if the way in which the questions are asked makes a difference. •
Use online surveys as part of your course planning (issue a list of topics and ask trainees what they most want to learn) and course evaluation.
Instant messenger and voice call •
Arrange an interview with an industry ‘expert’ or an experienced craftsman and make a video call. Beam it onto a large screen and let the group ask questions. A surprising number of people are prepared to do this. For example, your sports science students could do a live interview with a famous athlete.
•
‘Visit’ your trainees in their workplace using Skype.
•
Start a Skype chat around a particular topic and add all your trainees into the chat. Encourage them to join in but also form breakaway chats.
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8. Using e-learning in the workplace Learning objectives By the end of this chapter you should be able to: •
Recognise situations in the workplace where e-learning could be helpful;
•
Explore the use of mobile technologies for work place learning.
Vocational education and training takes place in many locations – in classrooms in VET schools, in training centres, at staff meetings, on the shop floor, informally over coffee in the factory canteen and at a host of other locations. Although learning in the workplace has been mentioned, most of this book has focussed on formal learning in an institutional setting, whether that is a classroom in a company training centre or a classroom in a college. However, research has shown that the number and the importance of ‘work based trainers’ is increasing. This last section is written with them in mind.
Getting started: microblogging If you are a trainer in the work place the chances are you will have limited or no access to conventional training resources. Computers, if available, are likely to be being used for other purposes directly related to production. There will be no dedicated accommodation for training. Time will be at a premium and people will constantly be on the move. The one thing that you do have is a mobile phone – as will almost everyone else. Most of the training you can do online with a 52 | T o w a r d s E - L e a r n i n g
computer you can also do with a phone. And, you can do it wherever you go. The past decade has witnessed two revolutions in e-learning. The first — the Internet revolution — changed everything in vocational education and training. The second — the mobile phone revolution — seems to have changed nothing, at least in formal education institutions. VET teachers are vaguely aware that their students have mobile phones (and annoyed when they forget to turn them off in class), but it hasn't occurred to many that the fact they have these devices might have anything to do with providing them with educational experiences and services. The workplace is one learning domain where mobile devices come into their own and also a cultural environment where the technology is accepted. If you are a work based trainer trying to get e-learning introduced in a company, we’d suggest starting with microblogging and building it up until it becomes the central learning and communication platform in the organization. Microblogging can be used for: 1. Broadcasting information - information sharing can happen in real time and anyone can make contributions unlike discussion boards or emails. 2. Performance support – you can use microblogging to provide realtime performance support with quick tips and links to resources (like pdf files, quizzes, YouTube videos, Flickr/Picasa photos etc.) Microblogging is great for just-in-time support. 3. Expert Guidance – employees can follow trainers or tutors to explore a particular topic or they can provide follow up after a formal E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 53
training session or chance to find out more. Lists of experts can be created and integrated within the learning portal. Learners can follow lists or individuals. 4. Live Discussion Forums – microblogging can be used for live discussions. You can schedule it at a particular time and decide on a unique hashtag 4 for the session. People can share their ideas/thoughts and hear different points of views. It usually generates a large repository of ideas, opinions and links. One can take time to reflect on them later. Try this out by following the learning community on #lrnchat as an example of a Twitter discussion forum. 5. Knowledge Repository – the search feature of microblogging tools can be used to extract information anytime. You can refer back to your own updates/messages, search on a topic and get pointed information. If you know of an expert on that subject/topic, you can use that in your search as well. 6. Back Channel - the workplace can also use microblogging as a back channel for live training courses or training webcasts to track the user’s responses, ask questions or to share any related information. These tools can also be integrated within live webcasts too. There is an excellent case study by B J Schone John Polaschek of how microblogging is being used as a major learning platform at Qualcomm. It can be found in the DevLearn09 Conference Tweetbook accessible at http://www.elearningguild.com/showFile.cfm?id=3753 They list the following uses for microblogging: •
Connecting – “Does anyone know…?”
4
Hashtags are subject keywords used in microblogging. They start with a hash-sign (e.g. #e-learning or #food).
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•
Community building
•
Building bridges
•
Continuous status updates
•
Real time chat
•
Industry research and news
•
Internal marketing
•
Increase sphere of influence
•
Motivational aids - Contests, quizzes, giveaways, sneak peeks
•
Partner with internal departments
For more detail access their slideshow at: http://elearningweekly.wordpress.com/2009/11/19/a-case-study-ofmicro-blogging-for-learning-at-qualcomm/
Skill-Pills Mobile devices can also be used for ‘formal’ training, for example using Skill-Pills. Skill-pills are two minute learning videos which can be delivered straight to your mobile device. You can view them whenever you have time or wherever you are. These skill-pills (over 100 in number and growing) are categorized into domains like Leadership, Management, Personal Skills, & Sales. A whole range of skill-pills is available off-the-shelf but you can also customize them. Custom pills can provide pre- and post-workshop information, reminders etc. Some companies have found customised Skill-Pills are a great way to deliver employee communication by
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creating animated avatars of their CEOs or other senior staff. It is very focused and personal communication for busy employees. Have a look at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuUwJAy0IUQ
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9. Where next? By now you will realize that e-learning need not be about students logging in to an online course or working through a CD Rom based training programme (although it can be) – it is also about trainees and teachers working together to explore how they can use technology to help them learn. E-learning is about doing and not just about accessing information. It is about learners creating content not just about consuming it. It needs to be hands-on for you and for your trainees. For those who are interested in finding out more about actually producing learning materials or who want step-by-step instructions on how to use the software we mention or who want to know a bit more about some of the technical and theoretical aspects of elearning, we happily refer you to the E-learning Handbook for Classroom Teachers produced by the Comenius project TACCLE (Teachers’ Aids on Creating Content for Learning Environments) which can be found on: http://www.taccle.eu. Both handbooks are distributed under the Creative Commons ShareAlike licence and we have included some of the material from the TACCLE handbook in our handbook, adapted for VET. Now you have read this book, the best way you can carry on learning about e-learning is, firstly, to just have a go! Secondly, follow some blogs by people – preferably practitioners – who are enthusiastic about e-learning. Thirdly, become involved in the many communities of practice around e-learning – through open online conferences and training, through microblogging, through bulletin boards and online forums. And finally, let people know what you are doing, share the content you have created and encourage your trainees to do the same. Good Luck! E - B o o k l e t T i t l e | 57
Wyşsza Szkoła Biznesu - National Louis University has been well known among the best Polish universities for years. Practical approach to education combined with a solid educational backround and modern technological facilities makes WSB-NLU one of the pioneers in many fields of science and business. WSB-NLU - a place for people with passion. Vilnius Business College is a non-profit private training organization providing higher education as well as formal and informal education in the fields of business administration, finances, languages and ICT. The Belgian Network for Open and Digital Learning is a non-profit making organization. It aims at establishing cooperation between statutory organizations and private companies with a view to a growing implementation of elearning in training programmes for employees in Belgium. Stockholm School of Economics in Riga (SSE Riga) is one of the leading business schools in Baltic countries, which offers quality education in economics and business administration. SSE Riga has been involved in a number of research projects related to business development in Baltic Rim. RayCom BV in Utrecht, The Netherlands is a software development company that specializes in web-based solutions for knowledge development, knowledge exchange and business.