6
November
2006
What do you already know about your preferred learning styles?
I have had several analyses done over the years. My Myers-Briggs Type Indicator results are: ENTP or ENTJ – extroverted, intuitive, thinking and either perceptive or judging, – mainly perceptive but apparently I can switch into judging easily if required. It is interesting that in one of the readings in Activity 2, this was not a profile that most teachers had; that is, people who graduated and became teachers as a profession. However, it was a common profile for TAFE instructors who come from a workplace background of some sort, and then teach about practical things that they know and do. Perhaps more a profile of a demonstrator, facilitator, coach, mentor than a teacher as such.
I already suspected that kinesthesis would be my main learning and teaching comfort zone. I routinely take in information from whatever source, and then DO something with it to imbed it. If I see a good teaching tool, I will immediately apply it as soon as possible in my class situation. If I can’t see how I would use information, I get agitated about receiving it. Jangly. Hard to sit still.
What influence will our preferred learning styles have on our e-learning experiences?
Well I would have thought a lot, hence in another subject I chose as my topic “An Exploration of Learning Styles as they relate to Adult Education”. All six critical annotated bibliographies are posted on my blog in Activity 2 for the benefit of anyone who would like to share my journey. I was particularly interested in learning styles and e-learning, so my first bibliography was:
Greenagle, F. (2003) “Lead balloons, stone canoes, and learning styles.” American Society for Training and Development. (I will record the link but wreck it and others so that the blog doesn’t reject it when I attempt to load it.) hjjp://www.learning circuits.org/2003/sep2003/greenagle.htm
I think a para from my peer reviewer of this paper,
Ian Perkins, sums things up well: “I found interesting the information relating to the origins of learning styles (more classroom based) and the emerging dilemma for educators trying to determine if these styles (or guides for information delivery) can be adapted (or are even important to) elearning. It is a dilemma that I had not even considered prior to reading your review.”
Other bibliographies were useful, especially the Coffield et al paper: “Should we be using learning styles? What research has to say to practice.”
From the student perspective, I explored that in Activity 2 in studying “Learner/Student Readiness” for e-learning. In the S.O.R.T. on-line questionnaire, each category of questioning had Strategies and Suggestions to help students to better learn on-line. However, when it came to assessing Learning Styles/Preferences the results were generic in that it didn’t matter what your learning style or learning preference result you got – the strategies and suggestions were identical. I.e. it didn’t matter.
Intuitively, I would have thought that it does impact. From the teaching perspective, the way I teach a module of Captive Animals is markedly different to the way one of my colleagues does. Hers is distance learning, people have to do a lot of reading and then answer questions and assignments. I present readings, (in something similar with an online course for Sydney TAFE), but the students have to do what I call ‘Evidence Exercises’, and even then I am challenged by assessing competency remotely.
Complete the Learning Styles questionnaire from the following URL and note your preferred learning styles and suggestions for studying.
Coffield et al (mentioned above) reported that ‘conclusions about VAK model were unequivocal: ‘despite a large and evolving program, forceful claims made for impact are questionable because of limitations in many of the supporting studies and lack of independent research on the model.’ Nevertheless, I think VARK has intuitive sense and I am loath to dismiss it.
My VARK questionnaire results are: Visual: 4; Aural: 5; Read/Write: 2, and Kinesthetic: 11. The study strategies suggested for kinesthetic preference learners (and I suppose, facilitators of learning) are in accord with what I do and how I approach learning. I shouldn’t be surprised that I am working on the concept of creating a functional BioPark at Richmond TAFE to assist in the delivery of my course, because I think learning is best achieved operationally. It’s just what a kinesthetic would think. Currently I teach in a laboratory, we go on many field trips and field tours where students physically do procedures. We discuss examples of principles, applications of information, have as much hands-on as I can arrange, do simulations and practice runs, bring in collections of plants, use recipes to make up foods for animals etc.
How might my preferred learning style be reflected in the layout of my weblog?
I don’t think it is. My weblog is fairly basic, because it reflects the current level of my computing skills. As my skills develop. The blog it will change as I would like to offer some bells and whistles on it – podcast opportunities if you feel like listening, some videos to demonstrate techniques, self tests, – also it should look good. Something for all of the senses.
The image of the lyrebird I loaded at the beginning of the subject onto my blog encapsulates where I want my blog to go- the bird is beautiful to look at, its song is fantastic and it dances wonderfully. So I could be seduced to replace it with a short video clip. But, the question is, would all of my students have the level of equipment to watch this and listen to it? I wouldn’t want any left out, or even feeling that they were left out.
What influence will my learning preference have on the short course I selected?
I needed one that had self tests in it, learning exercises if you like, rather than simply the information provided online instead of in a book
My desire was to progress the Learner/Student Readiness topic of Activity 2, and to consider expanding that to consider Teacher/Instructor Readiness. I particularly wanted practical online short courses.
Posted under Uncategorized
6
November
2006
What do you already know about your preferred learning styles?
I have had several analyses done over the years. My Myers-Briggs Type Indicator results are: ENTP or ENTJ – extroverted, intuitive, thinking and either perceptive or judging, – mainly perceptive but apparently I can switch into judging easily if required. It is interesting that in one of the readings in Activity 2, this was not a profile that most teachers had; that is, people who graduated and became teachers as a profession. However, it was a common profile for TAFE instructors who come from a workplace background of some sort, and then teach about practical things that they know and do. Perhaps more a profile of a demonstrator, facilitator, coach, mentor than a teacher as such.
I already suspected that kinesthesis would be my main learning and teaching comfort zone. I routinely take in information from whatever source, and then DO something with it to imbed it. If I see a good teaching tool, I will immediately apply it as soon as possible in my class situation. If I can’t see how I would use information, I get agitated about receiving it. Jangly. Hard to sit still.
What influence will our preferred learning styles have on our e-learning experiences?
Well I would have thought a lot, hence in another subject I chose as my topic “An Exploration of Learning Styles as they relate to Adult Education”. All six critical annotated bibliographies are posted on my blog in Activity 2 for the benefit of anyone who would like to share my journey. I was particularly interested in learning styles and e-learning, so my first bibliography was:
Greenagle, F. (2003) “Lead balloons, stone canoes, and learning styles.” American Society for Training and Development. (I will record the link but wreck it and others so that the blog doesn’t reject it when I attempt to load it.) hjjp://www.learning circuits.org/2003/sep2003/greenagle.htm
I think a para from my peer reviewer of this paper,
Ian Perkins, sums things up well: “I found interesting the information relating to the origins of learning styles (more classroom based) and the emerging dilemma for educators trying to determine if these styles (or guides for information delivery) can be adapted (or are even important to) elearning. It is a dilemma that I had not even considered prior to reading your review.”
Other bibliographies were useful, especially the Coffield et al paper: “Should we be using learning styles? What research has to say to practice.”
From the student perspective, I explored that in Activity 2 in studying “Learner/Student Readiness” for e-learning. In the S.O.R.T. on-line questionnaire, each category of questioning had Strategies and Suggestions to help students to better learn on-line. However, when it came to assessing Learning Styles/Preferences the results were generic in that it didn’t matter what your learning style or learning preference result you got – the strategies and suggestions were identical. I.e. it didn’t matter.
Intuitively, I would have thought that it does impact. From the teaching perspective, the way I teach a module of Captive Animals is markedly different to the way one of my colleagues does. Hers is distance learning, people have to do a lot of reading and then answer questions and assignments. I present readings, (in something similar with an online course for Sydney TAFE), but the students have to do what I call ‘Evidence Exercises’, and even then I am challenged by assessing competency remotely.
Complete the Learning Styles questionnaire from the following URL and note your preferred learning styles and suggestions for studying.
Coffield et al (mentioned above) reported that ‘conclusions about VAK model were unequivocal: ‘despite a large and evolving program, forceful claims made for impact are questionable because of limitations in many of the supporting studies and lack of independent research on the model.’ Nevertheless, I think VARK has intuitive sense and I am loath to dismiss it.
My VARK questionnaire results are: Visual: 4; Aural: 5; Read/Write: 2, and Kinesthetic: 11. The study strategies suggested for kinesthetic preference learners (and I suppose, facilitators of learning) are in accord with what I do and how I approach learning. I shouldn’t be surprised that I am working on the concept of creating a functional BioPark at Richmond TAFE to assist in the delivery of my course, because I think learning is best achieved operationally. It’s just what a kinesthetic would think. Currently I teach in a laboratory, we go on many field trips and field tours where students physically do procedures. We discuss examples of principles, applications of information, have as much hands-on as I can arrange, do simulations and practice runs, bring in collections of plants, use recipes to make up foods for animals etc.
How might my preferred learning style be reflected in the layout of my weblog?
I don’t think it is. My weblog is fairly basic, because it reflects the current level of my computing skills. As my skills develop. The blog it will change as I would like to offer some bells and whistles on it – podcast opportunities if you feel like listening, some videos to demonstrate techniques, self tests, – also it should look good. Something for all of the senses.
The image of the lyrebird I loaded at the beginning of the subject onto my blog encapsulates where I want my blog to go- the bird is beautiful to look at, its song is fantastic and it dances wonderfully. So I could be seduced to replace it with a short video clip. But, the question is, would all of my students have the level of equipment to watch this and listen to it? I wouldn’t want any left out, or even feeling that they were left out.
What influence will my learning preference have on the short course I selected?
I needed one that had self tests in it, learning exercises if you like, rather than simply the information provided online instead of in a book
My desire was to progress the Learner/Student Readiness topic of Activity 2, and to consider expanding that to consider Teacher/Instructor Readiness. I particularly wanted practical online short courses.
Posted under Uncategorized
15
October
2006
After extensive searches for articles on this topic, I realized I was not interested in any compare and contrast type polemics at all. I needed something of value to my students, so needed something emanating from experiential data. The USG Student Online Readiness Tool was a welcome find, and with some slight adaptation it will work well.
Despite my sometimes irritation with Internet searches etc., the fact is that what I wanted was out there; and I had to keep at it until I found something of value. The AFLF model is useful in covering all of the bases in an online course overall – Deciding, Designing, Funding, Delivering, Preparing, Producing, Managing, Testing and Evaluating. But the USG Student Online Readiness Tool was more focused on what I needed. It highlights the sensitivity of search engines and the link to the key words. On reflection, you learn from everything. Attitude is important.
Posted under learner readiness
15
October
2006
The Australian Flexible Learning Network checklist focused on several quite limited skills, and gave no indication of what actually was meant by ‘ability to use a computer comfortably”. The University of Georgia SORT equivalent to this was “Technology Experience” and their questions were quite pointed and allowed the student to self test, then look at the answer and note some Suggestions and Strategies about what to do. Technological Experience covered 5 of the seven skills in the AFLN list. The seventh, ‘ability to work independently’ would equivalence to USG “Study Habits’.
The USG Student Online Readiness Tool also explored key issue areas not even raised by the AFLN – My Lifestyle, Goals and Purposes, Learning Preferences and Resources. Much more comprehensive.
However, not so much because the USG test is American, I may need to carefully dig a bit deeper and read all of the Suggestions and Strategies for all possible combinations that get over the line (in terms of am I ready for online learning).
Posted under learner readiness
15
October
2006
Although Case Study 1 is a useful ticklist, I need something that has more detail and depth and checks out the competency of the prospective student to successfully perform online, preferably with self tests. As with a quote from Matthew: “Many are called but few are chosen”, some sites were drivellous.
The link below to SORT – Student Online Readiness Tool will work.
It explores the following topics as questionnaires where answer scores are recorded depending on whether you answered ‘Usually sometimes or rarely’ to most questions and “yes/No” to some. I physically filled in the questionnaire for myself and it gave not only clear scores, but also offered suggestions for what to do to improve readiness. Excellent.
The topic areas explored were:
· Technology experience
· Access to tools
· Study habits
· My lifestyle
· Goals and purposes
· Learning Preference, and
· Resources.
All but one of the topic areas were well done in my view. Learning Preferences was not. It didn’t matter what learning preference resulted (I filled in for myself and submitted results; then clicked all of the right hand column and submitted; then all of the left hand column and submitted), the answer was the same. It did give some brief Suggestions and Strategies, and directed the student to different learning style inventories to investigate further, but, really- what a lot of mumbo jumbo this is turning out to be. Intuitively, learning styles is attractive, but seems to have insignificant androgogical application.
THEN ADD URLhttpd://www.alt.usg.edu/sort/html/1fbk1.htmlENDURL
Posted under learner readiness
15
October
2006
I need structures to support my e-Learning course, in particular those which will help prospective students to be clear about whether they are suited to online learning as a mode of education. As a trainer, I don’t want to be lumbered with solving a range of computer problems, but need these to be worked out ahead of a student joining the program.
The Australian Flexible Learning Framework (‘supporting e-learning opportunities’) provides an excellent model for establishing and delivering e-learning. Within this is a section 3.8.1 Skills needed by learners.
Based on experience, ‘the following skills are required of learners in an e-learning environment. Problems in these areas can impede learning process.” And then go on to list 7 dot points:
- 1. Ability to use a computer comfortably
- 2. Knowledge of basic mouse skills such as clicking, double clicking and drag and drop
- 3. Familiarity with the layout of keys on a keyboard
- 4. Ability to communicate electronically (if emails, chat rooms, or discussion lists etc are part of the e-learning course)
- 5. Ability to use the Internet (if this is part of the e-learning course)
- 6. Awareness of occupational health and safety issues when using as computer, including posture, arrangement of desk, chair, keyboard and monitor
7. Ability to work independently, this requires self-discipline by the learner.
(THEN ADD IN URL -WHICH WON’T LOAD FROM MY COMPUTERhttd://industry.flexiblelearning.net.au/Guide/3-8-1_Skills_needed_by_learners.htmENDURL)
Posted under learner readiness
15
October
2006
Focus of inquiry or interest- Student/Learner Readiness. The reasons for this have been discussed. I need students to be clear about what to expect from the course, and what they have to do in order to ‘do well’. I want to be teaching Captive Animals, not how to learn using computers.
Searching for Case Studies.
How do you select appropriate information sources- where do you start?
Google, Dogpile, learning circuits, About… as a start. I begin with those suggested by Alison, and those referenced in any papers I have read that were valuable. The google and dogpile search engines are a more scattered approach.
What key words may help narrow your search?
e-learning is too big. E-learning AND ‘student readiness’ OR ‘learner readiness’. I use And and OR and also the inverted commas to bracket information.
Which UTS Library databases or journals may be useful?
Will look at an online catalogue. It would be worth spending a day physically looking at journals.
How do you evaluate and filter information?
Usually I open up the link and have a quick look, or in the case of journal articles, read the abstract to see if it is what I was seeking.
How do you distinguish points of view from fact?
Sometimes with difficulty. Usually, the extension is a good first approximation. One should have greater confidence in .edu, .gov, .org extension in that order and maybe be circumsprct with respect to .net or .com.
Then, I would look at the statistical treatments, sample sizes etc to see if what is presented is rigorous or not. Many papers in the first 3 extensions dress up the data and conclude far more than their samples would support. Also, the language can be a dead giveaway, eg. ‘I think’, ‘I feel’ , ‘I believe’ flag points of view.
I would not dismiss points of view, but they need to be clearly so. There is a tendency in researchers to mask this. One recent paper dressed up as significant was actually a pilot project (NCVER paper) . The authors were clear about the limitation of their study, but it still didn’t stop them making out that their study was more than it was. In fact, it was worth a couple of paras in an industry magazine rather than full publication. I was once on the council of the Linnean Society of NSW and on the council of the Royal Zoological Society of NSW where one of our major outcomes was to publish Proceedings of the first and Transactions of the second. That paper would not have made it past peer review.
Are your resources: reliable? Credible? Authentic?
Not sure how to answer this more than in question above. Beware of dot net and dot com, and for that matter know that dot gov will have political bias, and dot org will have organizational bias and dot edu might report things without enough rigor being applied to be sure that the information is ok.
Are your resources biased in any way? What do you do about this?
Well everything is biased, and researchers try to reduce the level of it. If we are looking at peer reviewed papers in the literature – either paper or electronic, I would have more confidence. You could look at Current Contents or other citation indexes to see what people thought of certain papers, and whether they used them productively. It depends on the amount of investment you are making in a decision depending on information that may be biased.
Also, a lot of information I read is biased towards the classroom and university level, which is a subset of the adult students I am interested in. I don’t think you can extrapolate beyond that sample to the broader adult community.
Dot coms are clearly biased. Even in the extent of what they DON’T show – clearly if there is something out there that doesn’t support their commercial point of view they will not report it.
Posted under learner readiness
15
October
2006
What decisions do you expect organizations to address before they implement an e-Learning program?
The table is a valuable checklist and I could tick off most.
However at TAFE although there is a general pressure towards offering flexible on-line e-subjects etc etc, there is really very little support to this. The two Paychex papers are interesting in that the first one is virtually a Luddite refrain from “laggards” - people who represent the last 16% of the population in that curve which describes take-up of new technology (Rogers 1995:314- Fig 2.2)
The second Paychex paper couldn’t be more different (Guerra & Heffernan) and I read it with some jealousy because Paychex is clearly in support of the whole e-learning adventure. TAFE makes out it is, but is not.
My experience with my on-line captive animals Cert 3 course gave clear warning. I was it. I was the author, the implementer and everything else in between with very little support – well infinitesimal support. What is worse is the attitude. At one stage it was seriously suggested that my paid teaching could be reduced to 3 hours per week to service nearly 30 students. This scaling issue may be TAFE’s undoing, because this mean spirited and money grubbing attitude will eventually lead to a demise of good-will towards TAFE. They open themselves up to private RTOs which can and maybe will deliver the product better. If using the Guerra Index, I would put my current TAFE offering down at the 1, 2 maybe at best 3 score; whereas Paychex was at level 8 out of a possible 10 – so that says it all.
I am particularly interested in Student Readiness/ Learner Readiness including everyone being clear about the expectations and what is needed for success. Likewise in Trainer Readiness.
The paper of Palloff, R.M & Pratt, K. (2001) ‘Lessons from the Cyberspace Classroom: The Realities of Online Teaching’ Jossey-Bass San Francisco was useful, although as with most of the literature of this entire subject, it is pitched at university level students. The problem is that university is generally about cognition, whereas my teaching is currently about development of competency.
It highlighted issues I did experience – the need to build a learning community, students expect 24/7 immediate resolution of any questions, need to limit collaborative events. Good stuff.
I did all of the lessons in the 3 ½ hour course offered by Pennsylvannia State University World Campus,(THEN PUT IN URLhttps://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/facdev101/.shtml ENDURL) ,mentioned in the above paper, and found that useful, but it was mainly from the perspective of authoring and implementing a course rather than being a student.
I found the Research Dog exercise very valuable as a template, and intend to do it for my up-coming Certificate 4 in Captive Animals from Richmond so as to highlight the issues and as a useful guide to their resolution before I go into the project.
Posted under learner readiness
14
October
2006
It is interesting to do this subject from a student perspective and to find out how very irritating e-Learning can be, and hence think about ways of making it easier/better.
Firstly, I had narrow times for access, and when I did there was no connectivity to the server. Eventually this meant to having to pay someone to come in and ‘clean up’ my computer.
Then, there were still connectivity issues, resulting in having to uninstall modem software and then reinstall it, being guided by the suppliers. But they were not able to explain why it happened at all, and tried the usual trick of blaming some other aspect of the computer system – Microsoft, the hard drive, the router… So if you do not have a reasonable amount of confidence in the computer, I can see that these things alone could wreck your schedule.
Then when I directly entered some posts to my weblog, they disappeared without trace. Being reminded of what happened to Beth Evans in losing all of her assignment in class, I now write everything out in a word document, and then cut and paste to the weblog, so that I at least have a record of work.
Then there is the issue of reading electronic papers. I find weblogs easy to read, but normal script tedious after a while. If you then need to download and printoff the paper, it is a waste of the planet’s resources and a further example of over-promised but under-delivered aspects of e-Learning. Perhaps there is a formatting consideration so that papers meant to be read electronically can appear a screen at a time. Some formatting is downright annoying. I found the double columns in one of the papers irritating as you had to scroll down and then back all the time, and when the script wrapped around Figures and Tables it was doubly annoying.
Also, studying pdfs can be a problem in that while reading something it is good to be able to highlight key phrases in yellow – but of course you can’t do that in a pdf, unless I suppose if you had pdf writer – which might be a good investment. If there is a choice pdf or Word, I gratefully accept Word because I can highlight and cut and paste if needed.
Lastly, I have found that if I try to open some pdfs available on the uts website, my computer apologises, but closes out of the internet citing an incompatible issue leading to Dr Watson something or other. MS asks to advise them, I do, but nothing happens. I need to save these pdfs to my hard disk first, then open them up. But if I forget and just hit the link- holey moley.
So it is an interesting, if irritating experience. I’m sure there will be many more entries to this list.
Posted under e-learning
13
October
2006
Bibliography 6. Learning styles- the key to personalised e-learning?
I accessed this document published by Peter Honey in February 2001 posted on his own website, which in fact contributed very little about what the title suggests, but its short summary is:
‘Peter Honey discusses the results of a survey he has conducted about e-learning, in particular the things that people like and dislike about e-learning.
“Peter Honey devised an online questionnaire to investigate the existence or otherwise of e-learning styles, with the aim of correlating learning preferences with likes and dislikes and to see what significant differences emerged.
His chatty report admitted that too late he realised that he should have devised the survey differently or asked some additional questions which now, in retrospect, seem blindingly obvious.
This is truly illuminating. Here is one of the leading proponents of learning styles modelling having trouble with constructing a survey which was done in collaboration “with my friends at the Campaign for Learning and KPMG.” One of the questions I had concerned a control group. Everyone filled out the questionnaire ONLINE, so if you had a learning style that didn’t accord with e-learning, then possibly you wouldn’t be using your computer in this way. And nothing of any detail about the survey was published other than:
“Well, you must have guessed by now that the survey didn’t reveal the fascinating differences I was hoping for- the likes and dislikes were remarkably similar regardless of learning style preferences”. So no correlation was demonstrated. He then went on to list the top 6 likes and dislikes.
He also believes that these results ‘have some important implications’ but he didn’t discuss what these might have been.
I think the same results could have been achieved simply by asking people to indicate what they like and dislike about e-learning, so if you delete this result then there is nothing much in the report.
He thought that he would have to drill down deeper to discover if people with different learning style preferences had the same thing in mind when they signed up for these likes and dislikes. But since 2001 there does not appear to have been any follow up work ‘drilling deeper’.
And he then concluded with the consideration that “my initial survey may have failed to reveal e-learning styles as such, but I am confident that it shows up some important differences about how people approach online learning.” Hmmm. My search continues.
http://www.peterhoney.com/article/66
Posted under Learning Styles
