Unit 1 – Introduction to Learning by Design

Introduction to Learning by Design

Objectives

By the end of the unit, students would be able to;

• discuss learning by design
• explain what is meant by teacher design teams
• state at least five principles in designing activities
• define interactive lectures
• state three ways used in evaluating the quality of design

Approach: Teachers Learning Technology by Design

• Learning by design: it seeks to put teachers in similar roles as they work collaboratively in small groups to develop technological solutions to authentic pedagogical problems.

-They focus on a problem of practice

-Seek ways to use technology (and thereby learn about technology) to address the problem

-Their exploration about technology are tied to their attempts to solve educational problems

-Being designers to technology not passive users.

• The aim is for students to learn content deeply and at the same time develop the skills and understanding needed to undertake solution of complex, ill-structured problems.
• This is accomplished by having students learn in the context of trying to achieve design challenges. Rather than memorizing facts to be reproduced on tests, students become involved in the concepts being covered and learn them in services of completing the design challenge before them.
• As they work towards successfully achieving design challenges, they get practice designing, analyzing data and drawing conclusions, making informed decisions and justifying them with evidence, collaborating, and communicating. They not only learn facts; they also learn practices and reasoning and how to apply the facts and skills they are learning.

Teacher Design Teams (TDT)

• Definition: design teams can be defined as a group of individuals working collaboratively to design and develop ICT- based solutions to authentic pedagogical problem faced by teachers. Teacher design team promotes:

–Active Learning (learn by doing, learn through problem solving processes)

–Local Ownership (not just a consumer of technology)

–Collaboration (learn/teach each other, focus on practical problem from different perspectives)

–Sensitive to their subject matter and instructional goal

Usefulness

• Specific form of teacher collaboration in curriculum design

–  Collaboration of several teachers concerned with consciously redesigning   their curriculum

• Improve the teaching process

–  Professional development of teachers

• Fruitful means for educational reform
• Building of cohesion in the staff
• Realizing a better curricular product
• Teachers developing their own practice and enacting/using it within the school curriculum
• Teachers having a sense of ownership of product

Design of Learning Activities

• According to Thiagi, effective instruction has three components:

1. Content related to the instructional objectives
2. Activities that require learners to process the content and to provide a response
3. Feedback to learners to provide reinforcement for desirable responses and remediation for undesirable responses
4. It is important to rethink the use of lecture-presentations.
5. While a lecture is a valid form of instruction, it does not necessarily lead to deep learning because it positions the participants as passive recipients of information.
6. For a lecture to be effective, it must first of all be the most appropriate means for achieving the learning outcomes.
7. In addition, the lecturer has to be not only knowledgeable about the subject matter but also engaging and motivating.
8. And the lecture must be done in an interactive way, or in combination with short participatory activities.

Principles of Designing Learning Activities

• 1) Integrate content and activity to focus on key content and foster active learning.
• 2) Design and implement activities that help learners to master the content and strengthen their critical thinking, creativity, problem-solving and decision-making skills.
• 3) Be guided by your target learning outcome/s. Choose content and learning activities according to the target learning outcomes.
• 4) Engage in authentic learning: Use real-life examples and simulations of real-life activities, such as making an assessment, analyzing a problem, identifying solutions, and making a proposal.
• 5) Help participants build on prior knowledge and professional experience and make connections between these and the training content. Design activities to get participants with varied levels of experience and expertise on the topic.

The Process

-For the development of curriculum materials, teacher education programmes, interventions

-Cycle approach to design  and formative evaluation

-Combination of preliminary study, expert review (validity), try-out and appraisal by users (practicality), and field-test (achievement)

Ways Forward

Teacher support materials,

• Showing ‘how to do it’
• By way of procedural specifications
• Focus on:

-Lesson preparation (computer-based program)

-Subject content

-Lesson execution

-Assessment of learning

Professional development

• Preferably in combination with exemplary curriculum materials
• Should model the classroom situation, or
• Should be in the classroom

Criteria for Evaluating the Quality of the Design Product/Process

Validity/legitimacy (ideal/formal)

• Is the design based on state-of the-art knowledge?

Practicality (consistency intended perceived/operational)

• Can the design be implemented?

Effectivity (consistency intended-experiential/attained)

• Does the design achieve what it aimed for: learning effects
• Cost – benefits