Designing and Planning a Teaching Session

1. Designing and Planning a Teaching Session This document is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 UK: England & Wales license, available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/.

2. Today’s menu • Approaches to study – some theories • Constructivism – what is it? • Video 1: outcomes • Outcomes-based planning – a background • Describing 'thinking skills' • Activity 1: writing learning outcomes • Alternative views on outcomes • Lesson planning • Video 2: students today • Activity 2: how does this affect learning design? • Learning technology – what is available? • Activity 3: lesson planning • Video 3: design in a technology-rich context

3. Expected learning outcomes At the end of this session participants should be able to: • state the rationale for using an outcome-based approach to planning teaching sessions • write expected learning outcomes for a specific course/session • discuss the advantages and disadvantages of various learning technologies • select appropriate teaching and learning activities to support outcomes • designing a teaching session using a template

4. Approaches to study – what a student does • Deep and surface approaches (Marton etc,’70s) • Strategic approaches (Biggs, Ramsden, ‘80s) • Approaches can be modified by designing the learning context (Biggs, ‘90s) • ‘Constructive alignment’ – congruence between • What the teacher intends learners to be able to do, know or understand (can be described as outcomes) • How they teach i.e. the activities • How they assess

5. So what is constructivism? • Piaget (1950s), Brunner (1960s) . . . • New learning and knowledge builds on old understanding – rarely a ‘blank slate’ • Learning is not just adding knowledge but bringing change or transformation to pre-existing concepts to refine understanding and linkages – hence notion of ‘deep learning’ • ‘threshold concepts’(Meyer & Land 2005)

6. Video 1 • 4 mins

7. What the teacher intends students to learn: “outcomes” • Planning starts with clear learning outcomes and the aim of planning is to align our learning activities with these. • Rationale: the planning of learning experiences and assessment of studentlearning has a significant impact on students’ approaches to learning. • Part of a systematic or ‘rational planning’ model • Dominant in the UK since ’90s

8. Why is outcomes-based planning important? • Became dominant in UK Higher Education since the Dearing Report (1997) • Often used in proposals for new programmes or modules • Used in the QAA Subject Benchmark statements • set out general academic characteristics and standards of degrees in a range of subjects: http://www.qaa.ac.uk/AssuringStandardsAndQuality/subject-guidance/Pages/Subject-benchmark-statements.aspx

9. UCL Context Programme design includes • the educational aims of the programme, including its intended learning outcomes and how these will be communicated to students, staff and external audiences; Programme Institution Questionnaire (PIQ UG) “The programme provides opportunities for students to develop and demonstrate knowledge and understanding, qualities, skills and other attributes in the following areas: A: Knowledge and understanding B: Skills and other attributes - intellectual (thinking) skills C: Skills and other attributes - practical skills D: Skills and other attributes - transferable skills http://www.ucl.ac.uk/academic-manual/

10. Writing Learning Outcomes Outcomes should be • Written in a future tense (will, should be able to…) • Identify important learning requirements • Be achievable • Be assessable • Use language which students can understand • Relate to explicit statements of achievement ….but ‘thinking’ outcomes perhaps most difficult to define

11. Describing ‘thinking’ skills 1. Evaluation -------------- 2. Synthesis -------------- 3. Analysis -------------- 4. Application -------------- 5. Comprehension -------------- 6. Knowledge 1. Create -------------- 2. Evaluate -------------- 3. Analyze -------------- 4. Apply -------------- 5. Understand -------------- 6. Remember Bloom – 1956, revised, Anderson & Krathwohl 2001 verbs

12. Describing ‘thinking’skills Video extract - Solo Biggs SOLO Taxonomy – more verbs http://www.johnbiggs.com.au/solo_taxonomy.html

13. Biggs (1996) Structure of Observed learning Outcomes Pictures from ATHERTON J S (2009) Learning and Teaching; SOLO taxonomy [On-line] UK: Available: http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/solo.htm Accessed: 27 October 2009

14. Writing Learning Outcomes • Consider your general aim/s for a module you are teaching. Write specific learning outcomes for this course: what do you want the students to learn?

16. Alternative views Laurillard (1993) - learning/teaching is a rich dialogue Haggis (2003) - deep/surface models can be challenged Rowland (2006) – outcomes imply a passive learner - learners may take on increasing responsibility for ‘designing’ their personal learning (PLEs) Siemens (2005) – ‘connectivism’: know howwhere Sfard (2007) – communities of practice But also... learners develop in unpredictable ways depending on their own independent motivations

17. Lesson Planning • aim of planning is to align our learning processes and activities with the intended learning outcomes. • assessment is particularly important • technology becoming increasingly central . . .

18. Designing learning activities in a technology-rich context (JISC template)http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/elearningpedagogy/workshops/session3.aspx

19. Why‘a technology-rich context’? • Video A Vision of Students Today • (How) do these changes affect learning design?

20. Learning technology at UCL • (How) do these technologies affect learning design?