RSA #5 Transformative Learning

Online Resource #1:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lATlzSQaNts&feature=related

Online Resource #2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoRiCllMrdU&feature=related

By: Bridget Heenan

February 21, 2011

            Past practices in education have involved informative learning which can be seen in a traditional school setting.  In the age of technology, transformative learning is becoming the norm.  When hearing the term informative learning one may think of information being passed on to one another.  When hearing the term transformative learning one may think of what the word transforms means and conclude that transformative learning may mean to change how learning takes place.  One meaning of transformative learning is as follows, “transformative learning to refer to learning that is based on reflection and on the interpretation of the experiences, ideas, and assumptions gained through prior learning.” (Palloff & Pratt, 2007, p.185).  What I believe is being said by this quote is that one must be active member of their learning process by asking questions to further explore the concept at hand so that it becomes relevant to oneself.  Something becomes relevant to a person they have prior knowledge and or experiences involving the concept at hand. 

            When something becomes relevant to the learning a deeper level of learning has taken place, than just telling someone the information that they need to learn.  According to Cdub4086 he explains that informative learning’s field of study is a topic or subject area and the outcome of this type of learning is knowledge and transformative learning’s field of study is about human beings more specifically, you, whose outcome is power and freedom. (Cdub4086, 2009)  I think the main thing that Cdub4086 was trying to get across about transformative learning was that it is about the individual learner making the learning relevant to them; therefore, they gain power and freedom involving the given concept at hand.

            A running theme involving transformative learning is that it is about you, the individual learner.  One more online source confirms that for me.  Transformative learning takes place when one makes the learning process all about them, meaning you the individual learner.  Transformative learning can take place when you challenge yourself to learn, question, and understand the concept at hand at a deeper level.  Transformative learning takes place when you think about what you are learning, when you actively engage yourself in the learning experience, when you question what you are learning, and when you reflect on what you have learned and why you learned it. (Mason, 2010)  I believe that Mason’s four main aspects of transformative learning is to think, engage, question, and reflect on what you are learning. 

            Overall, all three resources have one main common theme and that is that transformative learning is all about you, the learner.  In order for the learning to be all about you, one must become active within their learning process.  In a World where technology and learning online is starting to become a norm people must become more active with their learning by using the internet resources to help ensure that transformative learning takes place instead of informative learning. 

References

Cdub4086. (2009, July 12).  Informative learning vs transformative learning [Video].  Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lATlzSQaNts&feature=related.

Mason, Shane. (2010, April 29).  Transformational learning – My initial thoughts [Video].  Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoRiCllMrdU&feature=related.

Palloff, R. & Pratt, K. (2007).  Building online learning communities: Effective strategies for the virtual classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Boss.

RSA #4 Blended Learning on the Rise

Online Resource:

http://www.committedsardine.com/blogpost.cfm?blogID=1667

By: Bridget Heenan

February 7, 2011

Within the past decade K-12 online learning programs have evolved across the United States as well as in other countries.  “An extrapolation of these figures estimates that approximately 700,000 students for the entire population of 48,000,000 public school students were enrolled in online and blended learning courses.” (Picciano & Seaman, 2007, p.9)  The survey and research results conducted by Picciano and Seaman allowed for them to predict how many students were enrolled in online or distant learning programs based off of the percent of their sample population.  Therefore, this number is not one-hundred percent accurate but it does allow others to see a glimpse of roughly how many current public education students were enrolled in an online or distant learning course within the United States. 

As the number students enrolled in online and blended education it makes one wonder, “what is the educator’s role in this fairly new learning environment?”  Palloff and Pratt discuss the role of the instructor for online and blended learning environments.  The instructor becomes more of a facilitator that monitors the student’s progress as well as encourages the students through their discussion boards and emails.  Not only is the role of the instructor important once the class is in session but the instructors duties before the class starts is also crucial.  The instructor must create the syllabus with having the end in mind in order to create a good course.  The instructor should create the syllabus for the course by following four basic steps: “(1) defining outcomes and objectives, (2) choosing appropriate reading material, assignments, and tasks, (3) establishing a topic-driven course outline, and (4) developing and aligning assessment of activities with outcomes and objectives.” (Palloff&Pratt, 2007, p. 130)  Once the syllabus is developed the instructor should take that first week to describe the expectations of the course in detail so that there are no misunderstanding and most importantly remember that it is okay to include humor within the course.     

The number of teachers that have been trained to create a syllabus and set up an online or blended K-12 class as increased over the years.  In fact, online and blended education seems to be a growing trend within the last decade.  Picciano and Seaman mentioned in their article that Illinois is one of the few states that have a K-12 virtual education program.  Since Illinois has a virtual education program I decided to research the programs in Illinois.  I found this blog article that discusses Chicago Virtual Charter School (CVCS) and Youth Connection Charter School (YCCS) that discusses their approach as more of a student-centered approach where the teachers help monitor the student progress and help the students become aware of their learning styles.  (Palloff&Pratt, 2007)  Both of these schools use an online education program by K¹² Inc which involves a student-centered approach.  This company is one of the biggest curriculum providers for virtual education schools for grades K-12.  “CVCS is one of a growing number of schools that have adopted a blend of face-to-face and online instruction, an approach that appears to be paying off: Despite serving many poor and minority students, the school made Adequate Yearly Progress in 2008 and 2009 and has posted considerable gains in both reading and math, becoming one of the 147 public schools in Illinois to win an Academic Improvement Award.” (Ohler, 2011)  Those are tremendous accomplishments given the high demands of No Child Left Behind and schools having to make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) in which very few schools have made AYP within the last several years.  I believe for this particular blended online schooling program making AYP in 2009 says a lot for the rigor of the curriculum and the semi self-paced online learning environment.

Educators are not only concerned with AYP and finances but they are also concerned about their students’ progress.  Every educator essentially has the same goal and that is for their students to be successful academically and in their future.  However, sometimes in order for a student to be successful when it comes to academics they may need to take a less traditional route to be successful such as the K¹² online curriculum program.  Some students will never be successful in a traditional setting because they are too busy trying to keep their reputation.  This is where I see having the students work from home four days and meet their instructor face-to-face once a week on a college campus might be more beneficial.  As research has shown in both Picciano and Seaman’s survey results from across the United States as well as the reports from Ohler on CVCS and YCCS goes to show that online education programs are successful and increase throughout nation.         

            Overall, after reading, researching, and going through K¹²’s sample lesson plans I think that the blended online module could be the norm for K-12 education within ten years.

References

Ohler, J. (2011, January 21).  Blended learning on the rise. [Web log comment].  Retrieved from http://www.committedsardine.com/blogpost.cfm?blogID=1667

Palloff, R. & Pratt, K. (2007).  Building online learning communities: Effective strategies for the virtual classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Boss.

Picciano A. & Seaman J. (2007).  K-12 online learning: A survey of U.S. school district administrators.  Retrieved from http://sloanconsortium.org/publications/survey/pdf/K-12_Online_Learning.pdf         

RSA #3 Building Social Presence

Online Resource 1:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VGM-G_7mQ0&feature=related

Online Resource 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUebJhGXKmo&feature=related

By: Bridget Heenan

2/3/2011

            Creating a social presence in an online learning environment is crucial in order for one to have a successful learning experience.  Social presence is when a person makes themselves seem “real” to others in the online learning community.  When a person establishes social presences within an online learning community they are not just interacting with the group by posting comments but they actually feel as if they are part of a community where others gain insight on one’s character (Palloff & Pratt, 2007).  It is not solely up to the student in the online learning community to create social presence but it is up to the instructor of the course to allow for an opportunity for students to create their social presence within the online learning environment.  The instructor can do this by allowing for an opportunity for students to introduce themselves online before the class starts as well as creating threaded discussion boards for all members to participate in.  The instructors have slightly different roles and duties when it comes to online courses. 

Instructors and facilitators should act as “playground monitors” or gentle guides while participants “play in the sandbox,” developing the norms and rules as they go.  Facilitators and participants must become equal partners in the development of an online community, as it is the participants who are the experts when it comes to their own learning. (Palloff & Pratt, 2007, p. 22-23)       

            If the instructors and the participants in the online learning community take on equal roles than the students will feel more open to share their thoughts with everyone online.  Instead of feeling as if they were being judged every time they posted something within the online learning environment. 

            Palloff and Pratt are not the only ones that support the instructor and the students to take on an equal partnership within the online learning community.  I found two videos on You Tube by 2turtlerun that supports the idea of equal partnership as well as making sure the instructor allows time for the students to create a social presence. 

            The two You Tube videos explicitly states how the instructor should or could set up their online class, so that students can establish social presence.  One of the suggestions on how to create social presence is to have a designated spot for student bibliographies where they can post pictures and other personal information that the students would like to share with their online learning community in order to establish a social presence. (2turtlerun, 2009 November)  In part II of the You Tube videos it discusses that the instructor should also share some personal information with the students to establish a positive social presence for all.  In order to make sure that the instructor is encouraging a positive social presence the instructor should participate in the discussion boards in a limited positive manner which was also suggested by Palloff and Pratt.  Part II of the video emphasizes that the instructors should also respond immediately to students emails and projects.  An instructor may provide feedback with humor as well; however, to let the student know that one is using humor the instructor should use smiley faces or LOL. 

            An online instructor does not want to use too much humor that the students do not take them serious; therefore, when giving feedback the instructor could also use a strategy suggested within the video called love sandwiches.  Love sandwiches allow for the instructor to start their feedback with a positive comment, then critique the student’s work giving positive constructive criticism, and then ending with another positive comment this allows for a positive social presence to be established between the instructor and the student.

     Overall establishing a positive social presence is one of the most important aspects of having a positive online learning community experience.  Palloff, Pratt, and 2turtlerun give many similar suggestions for creating a social presence on the student’s part as well as the instructor helping to facilitate that students have the opportunity to create a positive social presence within the online learning community.

References

2turtlerun. (2009, November 27).  Social presence: how to facilitate it, part I [Video].  Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VGM-G_7mQ0&feature=related.

2turtlerun. (2009, December 03).  Social presence: how to facilitate it, part II [Video].  Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUebJhGXKmo&feature=related.

Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2007).  Building online learning communities: effective strategies for the virtual classroom. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass