It was a great experience to learn about Problem-Based Learning (PBL) during a-week long course at National Institute of Education (NIE) from 22nd to 26th September 2008, under the professional guidance of Associate Professor Jessie Ee.
As the name implies, PBL uses problems as stimulus for learning. Unlike the traditional model of instruction where teacher directs content learning and students function as knowledge recipients, PBL obliges students to take ownership of their learning by functioning as problem-solver, with teachers taking on a role as a coach/facilitator to guide students' learning processes. In PBL, learning takes place through self-directed discovery and questioning. Students learn content knowledge and other multidisciplinary learning in a social context through collaboration and integration with other group members. In the process, students also learn problem-solving skills (problem analysis, reasoning, conceptual thinking, decision-making, synthesis of information etc) and other life-wide skills (effective presentation, effective communications, group dynamic, reflection and evaluation etc).
During the course, we were taught the PBL Processes and the key features and practical tools in each stage, stretching from Group Dynamics and Meeting the Problem à Problem Analysis and Learning Issues à Discovery and Reporting à Solution Presentation and Reflection à Overview, Integration and Evaluation à Reflection and Feedback. In between each stage, students are expected to conduct self-directed learning to discover new knowledge and ways to overcome problems. We were guided through group discussions and classroom activities to internalize the PBL processes. I personally felt that it was effective to learn these new knowledge in a fun and non-threatening environment. The enthusiasm, words of encouragement (and at times, words of wisdom) and warmth laughter from Dr Jessie had made our learning journey so much more pleasurable!
One of a very important tool in PBL processes is the Know-Need-Do (KND) Model. The model allows students to first list down what they know (identify facts from the problem statement). Through group discussion, students will then be able to identify what they need to know or investigate, and hence learning issues are generated. The next step, students will decide what they need to do to acquire the necessary information and knowledge, which will help them generate possible solutions to solve the problem presented to them. Dr Jessie was kind enough to give us many examples, and we had so many interesting case studies and activities that in just a few days, we were able to confidently use the KND model without much difficulty.
Cognitive Coaching was another interesting and useful topic where we were taught how to make good decisions and sound judgments by identifying and analyzing the facts, and systematically examining the pros, cons and consequences of a set of criteria or possible choices. This is very useful as a matter of fact that we are so frequently made to make decision about choices in our daily life.
The final project presentation based on a ‘real world’ problem was a challenging task, where we were expected to put all that we have learnt into practice. It was tedious trying to develop and ‘clamp’ everything into the presentation slides, especially under the pressure of time. More so, we were still at the ‘novice’ level. Fortunately, we were able to overcome the obstacles through teamwork. We called for short discussions, agreed on what we have to do, and assigned tasks to each of the group members. Dr Jessie was there to help and prevent us from failure in our project presentation, because that could discourage us from using PBL as an instructional tool in our workplace.
PBL offers great learning opportunities to the learners and has proven to be an effective instructional tool in the recent years. It allows interdisciplinary learning, and provides students with a mindset and methods to look for their own solutions so that they become independent, resourceful and flexible learners. Sadly, the resistance against PBL is usually not due to the mindset of students, but the mindset of teachers. The fear of losing ‘control’ that the teachers had enjoyed in traditional mode of instructions, and the amount of time and energy needed to prepare a good PBL package could be some of the causes.
I guess the best way to overcome such a negative mindset in teachers is to train them to be effective facilitators (or tutors) and equip them with the essential skills in facilitating learning and handling group dynamics.
Friday, September 26, 2008
Flexible Learning
Reflection on Asynchronous Online Discussion (AOD)
Abstract
Asynchronous Online Discussion (AOD) has become one of the preferred teaching strategies by many educators worldwide in the last few years. The nature of AOD offers great learning opportunity, as it may help enhance the participation of students who might be less willing to participate in traditional face-to-face classroom settings due to shyness; and it has the potential to encourage more thoughtful responses since participants can take their own time in composing their thoughts (Cheung & Hew, 2006). While AOD allows students to exchange ideas at any place at any time, it also posts many challenges to educators, particularly on content analysis and students’ participation.
Methodology
I have the opportunity to be among 25 students from MINDEF to have engaged in AOD while we were attending the “Planning & Designing Flexible Learning” course at NIE from August 25 to August 29, 2008. Two discussion topics, “What place does foreign talents have in Singapore?” and “How would you view them in your pursuit of a second career?” were posted by our lecturer and we were encouraged to participate in open discussions. To facilitate active participation, all postings were kept anonymous.
Benefits
AOD allows students to stay in touch with their community, without being limited by geographical boundaries. It encourages students to exchange views on selected topics and in the process, learn from each other’s sharing. AOD also allows students to clarify doubts and answer immediate questions rather than waiting to meet face-to-face. In my opinion, the most significant benefit of AOD is that it promotes active interaction that is limited and constrained in face-to-face instruction, especially for students who are shy and don't normally speak up in class.
During AOD, everyone has an equal opportunity to express his/her views. Keeping postings anonymous is a practical approach to encourage students to actively participate in discussion and freely express their views.
One’s thinking and opinions are visible to the rest in the same community during AOD. Generally, most of the inputs are of better quality because contributors can take their time to think and draft their inputs. Some students even attach URL links to relevant articles to support their claims. Through these healthy exchanges, students can improve their writing and thinking skills, and there would be substantial learning by virtue of reading the quality work that others produced.
From these few days of participation in AOD, it is evident that AOD could also be a platform for brainstorming of ideas. It promotes thinking about ideas in a more connected and continuous fashion, and allows students to build on others’ ideas.
Challenges
The most challenging task in using AOD as an instructional tool is to ensure every student is comfortable and know how to participate in AOD. Ground rules must be clearly articulated and enforced so that students do not engage in “personal attacks” or discussing something which are drifted from the discussion topic. From the viewpoint of a lecturer, I think it would be a challenge to balance providing direction without stifling students’ creativity.
Next, substantive extends of preparation time is needed before fruitful AOD could take place. Besides teaching the students how to use the discussion board, the lecturer also requires to spend time creating individual accounts and to ensure that the identities of the students are kept anonymous. Time is also invested to guide the students through warm-up activities before they proceed to the actual AOD topics.
Crafting of an interesting thread/topic is crucial to stir students’ interest to participate in discussion. It would be good to have very clear and specific discussion topic, with the end state or desired outcomes in mind, so that students would stay focused during discussions.
As witnessed during the few days of AOD exercise, it would be difficult for the lecturer to ensure full active participation from all the students despite setting the ground rules. There were some students who were extremely active and dominating, while some were just inactive judging from the number of postings and replies. It is therefore essential in an instructional setting to impose grading for AOD to oblige active participation from all students.
After all, I think the most challenging task of the lecturer is how to assess the students’ participation and contributions. Should it be based on quantity or quality? Moreover, it is really time-consuming to read through all the students’ postings. In this aspect, the lecturer could impose strict rules that all postings should be kept simple and straightforward, and there should be only one salient point in each posting. These rules would also discourage long-winded postings, which other students would require longer time to read, digest and understand. In most cases, students would choose to ignore those long-winded postings.
Conclusion
While there are many challenges when employing AOD in instruction, this teaching strategy has proven its worth in getting students to engage in open discussion on selected topics, thus widen their knowledge base and enhance their ability in conceptual thinking, which covers critical thinking, creative thinking and ethical reasoning. More importantly, AOD provides the flexibility for students to learn from each other at any place at any time. In planning and designing flexible learning, educators should never forget to include AOD in their instruction package.
Abstract
Asynchronous Online Discussion (AOD) has become one of the preferred teaching strategies by many educators worldwide in the last few years. The nature of AOD offers great learning opportunity, as it may help enhance the participation of students who might be less willing to participate in traditional face-to-face classroom settings due to shyness; and it has the potential to encourage more thoughtful responses since participants can take their own time in composing their thoughts (Cheung & Hew, 2006). While AOD allows students to exchange ideas at any place at any time, it also posts many challenges to educators, particularly on content analysis and students’ participation.
Methodology
I have the opportunity to be among 25 students from MINDEF to have engaged in AOD while we were attending the “Planning & Designing Flexible Learning” course at NIE from August 25 to August 29, 2008. Two discussion topics, “What place does foreign talents have in Singapore?” and “How would you view them in your pursuit of a second career?” were posted by our lecturer and we were encouraged to participate in open discussions. To facilitate active participation, all postings were kept anonymous.
Benefits
AOD allows students to stay in touch with their community, without being limited by geographical boundaries. It encourages students to exchange views on selected topics and in the process, learn from each other’s sharing. AOD also allows students to clarify doubts and answer immediate questions rather than waiting to meet face-to-face. In my opinion, the most significant benefit of AOD is that it promotes active interaction that is limited and constrained in face-to-face instruction, especially for students who are shy and don't normally speak up in class.
During AOD, everyone has an equal opportunity to express his/her views. Keeping postings anonymous is a practical approach to encourage students to actively participate in discussion and freely express their views.
One’s thinking and opinions are visible to the rest in the same community during AOD. Generally, most of the inputs are of better quality because contributors can take their time to think and draft their inputs. Some students even attach URL links to relevant articles to support their claims. Through these healthy exchanges, students can improve their writing and thinking skills, and there would be substantial learning by virtue of reading the quality work that others produced.
From these few days of participation in AOD, it is evident that AOD could also be a platform for brainstorming of ideas. It promotes thinking about ideas in a more connected and continuous fashion, and allows students to build on others’ ideas.
Challenges
The most challenging task in using AOD as an instructional tool is to ensure every student is comfortable and know how to participate in AOD. Ground rules must be clearly articulated and enforced so that students do not engage in “personal attacks” or discussing something which are drifted from the discussion topic. From the viewpoint of a lecturer, I think it would be a challenge to balance providing direction without stifling students’ creativity.
Next, substantive extends of preparation time is needed before fruitful AOD could take place. Besides teaching the students how to use the discussion board, the lecturer also requires to spend time creating individual accounts and to ensure that the identities of the students are kept anonymous. Time is also invested to guide the students through warm-up activities before they proceed to the actual AOD topics.
Crafting of an interesting thread/topic is crucial to stir students’ interest to participate in discussion. It would be good to have very clear and specific discussion topic, with the end state or desired outcomes in mind, so that students would stay focused during discussions.
As witnessed during the few days of AOD exercise, it would be difficult for the lecturer to ensure full active participation from all the students despite setting the ground rules. There were some students who were extremely active and dominating, while some were just inactive judging from the number of postings and replies. It is therefore essential in an instructional setting to impose grading for AOD to oblige active participation from all students.
After all, I think the most challenging task of the lecturer is how to assess the students’ participation and contributions. Should it be based on quantity or quality? Moreover, it is really time-consuming to read through all the students’ postings. In this aspect, the lecturer could impose strict rules that all postings should be kept simple and straightforward, and there should be only one salient point in each posting. These rules would also discourage long-winded postings, which other students would require longer time to read, digest and understand. In most cases, students would choose to ignore those long-winded postings.
Conclusion
While there are many challenges when employing AOD in instruction, this teaching strategy has proven its worth in getting students to engage in open discussion on selected topics, thus widen their knowledge base and enhance their ability in conceptual thinking, which covers critical thinking, creative thinking and ethical reasoning. More importantly, AOD provides the flexibility for students to learn from each other at any place at any time. In planning and designing flexible learning, educators should never forget to include AOD in their instruction package.
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