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Cases: Problem Solving
Collaborative Learning Online - Elizabeth Stacey
Keywords
Navigation; learning management systems; role of online teacher; role of online
learner; postgraduate education
Redesigning an online course in teaching online to suit
a new courseware management system.
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[AUDIO
TRANSCRIPT] |
As a 2003 Online Teaching and Learning Fellow, Elizabeth
Stacey, Senior Lecturer in the School of Scientific and Developmental
Studies in Education in the Faculty of Education, focussed on moving
from the FirstClass online teaching environment to Deakin Studies Online
(DSO).  As a teacher of and researcher in online teaching and learning
Elizabeth came to the project with a wealth of experience and as such
provides an in-depth insight to the challenges of retaining and replicating
functionality she has been using for many years.
In the design of her course Elizabeth considered issues such as
levels of navigation , especially in terms of moving from a ‘flat’ level
of navigation (as implicit in FirstClass) to a much more structured design
to her course (as encouraged by WebCT the central tool in DSO) and as
many online teachers would no doubt confirm, the value of this experience
often lay in discovering the subtleties and nuances of the new learning
system:
“
You can be as experienced as anything but you must learn those elements
of the tool… you can really only learn by trying”
Reflecting on her learners and her experiences, Elizabeth
covers areas such as her involvement as a teacher, learners taking on
roles as ‘experts’ and ‘technical collaborators’
and the frustrations some learners experienced. Of particular interest
were comparisons with previous experiences in terms of contribution and
structure of communication in
terms the more structured environment of DSO as opposed to the more ‘real
classroom’ experience
of FirstClass.
From the experience Elizabeth emphasizes the value she’s found in
the planning of resources and the changes WebCT has introduced to her
planning process :
“[It] gets you thinking in much more of the distance education mode”
However, her experience has led her to hope for some changes in the philosophy
behind how WebCT is structured ,
especially in terms of linearity and the available tools.
“Students are the ones that need some of the tools that we as teachers
have”
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:: resources ::
Stacey, E. (1999) Collaborative learning in an online environment.
Journal of Distance Education 14 (2), pp. 14-33
Stacey, E. (2000) Quality online participation: establishing
social presence. In T. Evans (Ed), Research in Distance Education 5, Deakin
University, Geelong, pp138-253).
Stacey, E., Smith, P.J. & Barty, K. (2004) Adult learners
in the workplace: Online learning and communities of practice,
Distance Education, 25, (1), 107-123.
Wilson, G. & Stacey, E. (2004). Online interaction impacts
on learning: Teaching the teachers to teach online. Australasian
Journal of Educational Technology 20 (1) 33-48
Smith, P. & Stacey, E. (2003). Socialization through CMC in
differently structured environments. In S. Naidu (Ed.). Learning
and Teaching with Technology: Principles and Practices, 165-176,
Kogan Page: London and Sterling, VA, USA.
Stacey, E. (2002). Social presence online: networking learners
at a distance. Education and Information Technologies , 7 (4):
287-294.
Stacey, E. & Rice, M. (2002). Evaluating an online learning
environment. Australian Journal of Educational Technology, 18 (3),
323-340.
Stacey, E. & Wiesenberg, F. (2002) Educational partnerships
online: Global collaborative learning through an online student
exchange program. In D. Passey, & M. Kendall, (Eds) TelE-learning:
The challenge of the third millennium. Kluwer, Boston. 337-344.
MIT Academic Computing Online Collaboration Resources
CQU Online Collaborative Learning
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