Pontydysgu – Bridge to Learning

I’ve been thinking about educational transitions today. this is part of the European funded G8WAY project which aims to use social software to support learners in transitions. In particular the project aims to focus on three transitions – from school to work, from school to higher education and from higher education to work. and being a well designed project, the first phase involves the elaboration of a pedagogic framework for the project.

This – I think – needs to link a number of things. Firstly we have to look at what are the issues in transitions, secondly look at different pedagogic approaches to supporting learners n those transitions and thirdly find a way of linking social software tools or rather the affordable of different social software tools to different activities which could be included in a pedagogical approach. Not so easy. I have just finished reading a two papers by Grainne Conole which have an interesting take on developing models for this kind of work although I am not sure how they can be used in practice, Mapping pedagogy and tools for effective learning design - cowritten with M. Dyke, Martin Oliver and J. Seale puts forward a model “that supports the development of pedagogically driven approaches to learning. Grainne follows this up in a more recent paper called ‘New Schemas for Mapping Pedagogies and technologies. In this paper she looks at Web 2.0 and argues that “the current complexity of the digital environment requires us to develop ’schema’ or approaches to thinking about how we can best harness the benefits these new technologies confer.”

I will return to these models and schema in a post later this week.

in this post I want to briefly brainstorm the issues in transitions for learners – both as notes for myself and also in the hope that readers may be able to point be in the right direction or suggest things I have missed.

School to Work Transition

• change from school based subjects to work based applied competence
• change from school based class organisation to team or hierarchical work based organisation
• increased responsibility for own work
• increased responsibility for own learning
• different forms of work based learning
• may have to deal with customers or members of other work organisations
• may have to follow quality processes and procedures
• different forms of assessment of learning and /or performance
• different ways of reporting on work and achievements
• changes in identity (school student to worker)
• different social groups 0 integration in work community and / or communities of practice
• increased informal elarning

School to university transition

• Different forms of subject organisation
• different forms of time organisation – with increased responsibility for own time management
• different forms of assessment
• greatly increased responsibility for own work
• frequently accompanied by leaving home – having to organise own life (financial management)
• different forms of study
• need to manage own time
• need to select course modules (learning pathway) and consider post university career
• new learning tools (increased use of technology)
• new identity as student
• different social groups integration in student community

University to work transition (largely same as school to work transition)

• change from university based subjects to work based applied competence
• change from university based faculty organisation to team or hierarchical work based organisation
• increased responsibility for own work
• increased responsibility for own learning
• different forms of work based learning
• may have to deal with customers or members of other work organisations
• may have to follow quality processes and procedures
• different forms of assessment of learning and /or performance
• different ways of reporting on work and achievements
• changes in identity (student to worker)
• different social groups 0 integration in work community and / or communities of practice
• responsibility for planning own professional development and career progression
• increased informal learning

Can anyone add to these lists?

A quick post about mobile devices and work based learning – which I know I have been going on about a lot lately.

So far most of the work on mobile learning at a practical level seems to me to fit into four categories:

• applications designed to provide information for students – about their courses, lecture times, venues, transport information, buildings etc.
• what might be called learning objects – small apps designed to support learning about a particular topic or issue – often using multi media
• apps or projects aiming to improve communication between learners or between learners and teachers
• information – revision guides etc. designing to promote mobile access to resources

There is nothing wrong about any of these and they all may be useful in pushing mobile learning forward. But I think they may fail to really extend forward ideas about tecahing and learning 0 they are all essentially repackaging existing elearning applications for mobile devices.

The big potential I see for mobile devices is in their affordances of being always on – or almost always on, in the fact that we already accept the idea of the frequent but sporadic use of the devices for all kinds of activities such as taking photos and messaging – as well as making telephone calls – and that they are portable.

in other words – taking learning support to areas it has not been taken to before. And prime amongst these is teh workplace. It is little coincidence that many of the main take-up areas for elearning are for those occupations which involve regular use of computers e.g in ICT occupations, in marketing and management etc. Ans one of the main issues in developing elearning for vocational or occupational learning is the contextual nature of such learning and the high cost of producing specific learnng materials for relatively low numbers of learners. Vocational students often wish for learning materials to be in their own language, thus exacerbating the problem of small numbers of users for specific occupations.

It is also interesting to note that despite many researchers pointing to the importance of reflection as a key pedagogic tool, there has been limited pedagogic and technical development to facilitate such an approach.

The use of mobile devices can overcome this. They can be used in specific contexts of location, tasks, experince, colleagues and allow ready means of reflection through the use of photographs, video, text and audio.

If linked up to a server based ‘portfolio’ this could form an essential part of a Personal Learning Environment. Furthermore the learning materials become the entire work environment, rather than custom built applications. And tools such as Google Goggles could easily be incorporated (although I have to say it seems more alphe than beta ot me – I havent managed to get it to recognise a single object so far!).

I am mush taken with a free Android Ap called Ontheroad. It doesn’t do much. It is designed its ays for you to share your adventures on the road You have to set up a free account on a web site. You can publish active trips (I am going to try to make one this week). You can add articles including your position by GPS, you can add text, multimedia, dates and choose which trip to publish it to though the telephone network or by SMS. You can browse existing articles and look at comments. You can add media including photos already on your gallery. Or you can record a video (audio support seems limited).

And it is all synced through a server. It would not take much to refocus this app to a Learning Journey, rather than a road trip. And it could be incredibly powerful in terms of work based learning.

So I do not see a great technical challenge. the bigger challenge is in developing a pedagogic approach which incorporates informal learning in the workplace and such a portfolio based on practice within formal approaches ot education and training.

If you are interested in working with me to develop these technologies and ideas please get in touch.

Before I take any steps to comment current European developments in Vocational Education and Training (VET) it is worthwhile to look at theparallel developments in Higher Education (HE). During the recent weeks the German student protests on the implementation of HE reforms have made headlines. The protests have swept all over Germany:  students are occupying the main auditories and the university rectors tend to express their understanding. Also polititicians tend to sympathise with the students’ concerns.

So what is going on:

• What is the reason for these protests?
• Why do all show so much understanding?
• What kind of changes are being sought?

Obviously, the HE reform that has caused so much dissatisfaction is linked to the implementation of the Bologna Process. Paradoxically, so far the Bologna Process has made positive publicity: the idea of common degree structures and access to mobility across European Higher Education Area have been widely greeted. Yet, the implementation of Bologna Process has brought into daylight less inspiring features of students’ everyday life.

Looking at the implementation of the Bologna Process in Germany it is worthwhile to note the following changes:

• The hitherto successful single-cycle study programmes (Dipl.-Ing., Dipl.-Päd. etc.) have been chopped into Bachelor-Master structures. Often the old contents have been packed into new degree structures.
• Not all Bachelor graduates have access to Masters programmes. Therefore, the increased number of examinations serves as a selection mechnism that narrows down students’ options.
• For the traditional civil servants’ careers the Bachelor degree is not accepted as an entrance qualification. Therefore, the alleged polyvalency of Bachelor degree is not a reality.
• During the lats years the universities have complained that they are underfunded. The students experience this as tight and inflexible schedules that narrow down the freedom of choice (that is officially given in the curricula).
• The students’ possibilities to follow the pre-given schedules are narrowed down by other practical difficulties (the overcrowded lectures, queueing to seminars,  distribution of learning events to different locations, need to work during the studies, need to commute from other places to the university town).

All these issues have been taken up now. The students have made their point: something has to be done!

As I have mentioned, the public debate has shown mainly understanding and sympatthy to the students’ concerns. However, the statements that have been made by politicians, leading government officials and university rectors are not necessarily outlining a clear change agenda. In fact the discussion is moving in some kind of Bermuda triangle: No one seems to be responsible for the problems and no one seems to be in a position to introduce necessary changes. The Federal givernment (Bund) refers to the legislative power of the Federal states (Länder). The officials of the Länder refer to the realtive autonomy of the universities. the university representatives refer to the lack of resources.

It is also more striking that alongside students the discussion on the Bologna Process and of the current developments in germany has been taken up by journalists. Not many researchers have been that visible in the debate. This can be a matter of time: it is the task of the journalists to respond quickly to hot issues. For researchers it is more challenging to analyse the conflicts in which they are themselves involved as university staff members.

I myself do not wish to get deeper involved in the debate on Bologna Process (or on the German HE reform) on a general level. Surely, I have to come back to the issue with some of my project themes (European cooperation on VET teachers and trainers; The role of practice-based learning in some areas of HE). But the current protests (and the issues that have been raised) are also symptomatic for other areas of European educational policies:

• What are the side-effects of seemingly successful European policies?
• What kind of context-specific issues are linked to national (or regional) implementation of European reforms?
• What kind of creative spaces and new learning opportunities can be promoted (or narrowed down)  in the context of European reforms?

I think this is enough for the moment. I will get back to these questions with my next posts.

I started my blogging with the heading “I-Europe”. I wanted to cover discussions on European innovations in Vocational Education and Training (VET). However, I soon realised that I was trying to make an analysis on a creative period in European VET research (1995-2000) and confronting it with a less creative period after 2000.

My questions in my early blogs were of the type:

“What has happened to the European dimension/ interdisciplinarity/ innovations?” or

“What has happened to trans-national cooperation/ networks/ knowledge sharing?”

Now, looking back, I see that those were questions that are put forward by an observer or a historian. They do not bring you forward with the questions:

“How can we influence the European cooperation climate in the field of VET and of VET research?” or

“How can we make better use of knowledge sharing and knowledge development in European networks?”

These are questions that do not necessarily lead to a big picture or to an overarching change agenda. Yet, they are questions that give a role for the working and learning processes that we are going through in European cooperation. With the new heading of my blog I want to discuss this type of questions.

The new heading has also another meaning: This kind of questions have to reach the ground – the reality of vocational teaching/learning processes and the reality of working and learning contexts.

In this spirit I will try to discuss the projects with which I have been working and what challenges they raise for the new year 2010. I will also try to make some remarks on issues that are hot in the educational debate (such as the implementation of the Bologna process in German universities and Higher Education policies. And – alongside these contributions I will try to make some remarks on the European cooperation climate and how we (different actors in the field can respond to the ongoing climate change (I do believe that something like this is going on).

OK, This was my opening statement. I will come back soon with one of the above mentioned issues.