Virtual Worlds: Learning and Teaching in a Digital Age

On Tuesday I went to a workshop at Glasgow Caledonia University, which was was run by ALT, the Association for Learning Technology. I was particularly interested in this workshop, because the four participants in the JISC funded LEX study presented their findings on “Views from the other side: listening to learner voices”.

While most of our on campus students are the traditional school leavers, the information that the LEX project gathered on mature students and widening access learners was certainly interesting. Admittedly, the slant of the project, especially its videos, which were beautifully professionally produced by the funding and for JISC, were all very positive, and thus a tad too promotional for my liking. We must not forget the nay-sayers amongst the learners, who, for whatever reason, are not regarding learning technologies as beneficial. However, those are in the minority and lets face it, the days of ivory towers (without broadband access) are over and Generation C is coming into our Universities.

I guess what I most got out of the workshop was an insight into the methodology the project used: an adapted interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) which meant that the project group conducted interviews and focus groups with learners and afterwards transcribedthe interviews in their entirety.

The three research questionswere as follows:

• What might characterise effective learners in an e-learning context?
• What beliefs and intentions do effective learners display?
• What strategies do effective learners display?

Some of the emerging themes were as expected, and have to do with the necessity to fit learning around life, control and choices, expectations of technology, personalisation of environment, strategies and ways of coping, influence of and on the family, motivation to use technology and time management issues.

Learner Experiences of e-Learning: LEC Final Reports and Guides

What I am now interested in is in fact something that does not seem to be done: research into the lecturers’ views and voices. How do academics cope with the necessity to change? Using the IPA method could yield useful results, but alas, it is time consuming and thus resource intensive. Still, if anyone is interested in working with me on this little research project, I’d be most happy to hear from you: n.kipar@hw.ac.uk