at 27 March 1995
at 27 March 1995
How can computers help teaching &
learning?
Aims of the curriculum
Perspectives of the teaching & learning process in
UK HE
Fitting IT into learning
Staff needs for innovation
What kinds of evidence can be used?
Can investment in IT suit conflicting
perceptions?
Ways in which Universities are perceived to
operate
Conclusions emerging from TILT
Recommendations for change in UK HE
institutions
There are many links to other pages.
return to TILT home page
Teachers in the TILT Project investigated many different ways of using IT for their students' learning. All listed below (except those italicised) were evaluated.
The ways in which a teacher or institution uses IT depends to some extent on the aims of their curriculum. Some of the main categories of curricular aims are given here.
How can IT can be tailored to suit the many different perceptions of what University teaching must provide? Different kinds of IT, or ways of using it will suit different needs. The IT advocate must accommodate the many views that HE teachers hold on what is important in the teaching and learning process in UK HE.
Many teachers, knowing the whole process to be so complex, decline to adopt an academic approach to pedagogy. They see IT offering to help with a specific learning problem, probably doing something better than with any other media: dynamic graph drawing in mathematics, simulation for student control, simulations to save equipment and ethics, drill and practice to replace what often goes on poorly in crowded tutorials, an illustrated lecture to improve visual communication. They also hope for more time: to devote more effort to some other aspect of the teaching and learning process, or to make space for research or administration.
Nevertheless, some teachers hold strong positions on pedagogy.
These have been informed by
Various views become fashionable at times (e.g. behaviourism, constructivism). The ways in which a teacher may see IT fitting into their teaching depends on these views. A few examples are given here of how a point of view on teaching and learning leads to a particular kind of CAL.
Those who emphasise expert knowledge structures see learning as acquiring the knowledge of an expert in the subject - a professional or a researcher. The teacher provides a representation of the subject's knowledge structure (as trees of prerequisites in a logical development) and makes it accessible to the students. Such teachers may prefer a learning package to emphasise this structure.In Discovery Learning students learn through projects, investigations, problem solving with teacher providing motivation, advice and pointing to resources. Such teachers may prefer a package to be a resource collection, such as perhaps the TILT Library package.
Entwistle emphasises surface - deep - strategic approaches, and in the MacFarlane Working Party report identifies a series of functions of teaching which are necessary to fully support student learning. They would recommend that a package prevents surface learning, but may feel that it should be designed to permit the strategic approach.
Perry distinguishes nine stages of learning maturity and the need to support the student to transform from the receiver of facts from an authoritative teacher, through accepting that knowledge is incomplete, to taking responsibility for learning, seeking experts and comparing alternatives. It is very difficult to construct a learning packages to work equally well at all these stages. The teacher must consider intervening often in its use, or adapting it to make several versions.
Diana Laurillard, in Rethinking University Teaching discusses the basic Higher Education processes, and shows how IT fits into teaching & learning. Her main elements are: discursive, adaptive, interactive, reflective. She shows how different kinds of educational technology can fit different parts of these processes, but not all of them.
Behaviourism emphasises stimulus - reward, and implies that teachers should focus on assessment. CAL designed with a behaviourist bias emphasises formative assessment feedback.
To the Constructivist, meaning depends on experience - the teacher and students negotiate authentic, complex, real-world tasks of great variety. This leads to the use of complex, large CAL packages of information and simulation, or real IT-based information, such as rich database-style resources, or the World Wide Web itself.
The IT advocate must accommodate the many views that HE teachers hold on what is important in the teaching & learning process in UK HE.
Some TILT staff tried to find an eclectic compilation of models that could be used to evaluate how IT fits in to the teaching & learning process. Here is an example of what kinds of factors appeared important:
Teaching staff have various reactions to pressure from an IT proponent:
"no time to listen to you""over my dead body"
"it will never work"
"yes ......but"
"what's in it for me?"
"they will never let me"
"need more computers"
"help me to do it NOW"
An institution that is convinced that IT has a larger role needs to ensure that
University teachers and administrators require convincing that it
is worthwhile to invest in IT for their teaching. The kinds of
evidence demanded varies considerably, but the TILT staff have found
that among the most compelling are results from a properly conducted
analysed and reported evaluation process, favourable case studies
showing the successful integration of IT into the curriculum, and an
enthusiastic response from students. A fuller list of the evidence
which was found helpful for TILT staff in convincing colleagues
follows:
There are many roles in a university, with diverse perceptions, attitudes and objectives that will influence their reaction to proposed changes. Institutions may be organised in a highly managerial way, or or more collegiate. Curricula stress becoming a subject expert, or gaining generally transferable skills. Staff have various models of what is important in their teaching. Individuals perceive how new learning technologies present opportunities and threats to their ability to balance their many objectives and priorities. How can these be satisfied, and lead to investment in changes in a university's organisation, resources and teaching methods?
We were concerned with the effect, on the adoption of IT into teaching, of the ways in which Universities are perceived to operate. Even within a single institution, such as the University of Glasgow, there are many different perceptions of the ways in which such a large complex organisation behaves.
To a large extent, we could draw conclusions about other institutions from observing, and participating in, large subdivisions of a single one. Amongst the literature that were helpful for interpreting our own observations, the publication of Dixon 1992 and Middlehurst 1993 are worth mentioning.
Universities were undergoing rapid change. Currently in the UK there were annual decrease in real funding per student, and increased competition for students between a larger number of universities. Cost-effectiveness became of greater importance. IT and CAL were moving from the "start-up" phase to the "productive" phase [Leiblum 1992], and there were great hopes of them providing gains in cost-effectiveness [TLTP, MacFarlane].
In general , we felt that it was useful to consider that the emphasis on which kinds of IT are adopted, and the processes by which this can occur depend on the ways in which those in power perceive their institution.
In a Collegial institutions, in which
the advocates of IT for learning will expect to be listened to, but will not be able to exert any power other than of their personal demonstration and reasoning. We doubted if any institution is now, if ever, purely Collegial.
In a Professional institutions, in which there is
the advocates of IT for learning must work hard to become regarded as experts, and become, or enlist the help of, senior members.
In a Bureaucratic and formal institutions, dominated by administration, the leader has power and control, sets the tone, and decisions flow down. Our IT proponents must lobby, and seek his eye.
The Entrepreneurial organisation, market led, with managerial responsibility, will seize on IT for learning if it is believed to help increase its share of students.
An institution with a cybernetic image regards itself as a system that monitors its environment and its subsytems, relates this to objectives, detects significant deviations, and takes corrective action. It uses Quality Assurance and Audit techniques extensively. The advocates of IT for learning must relate this use of IT to the system. They tend to find reference to external QA very powerful.
University as an organic adaptive system must maintain a state of creative equilibrium with its environment to survive & prosper.
In most real institutions there is political power and conflict between
The IT proponents must recognise subjective and ambiguous perspectives of meaning and goals of different groups within the institution, and participate in the political processes.
Another page lists and discusses the Conclusions from TILT.
Another page lists and discusses our Recommendations for change in UK HE institutions.
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