Learning Design in Higher Education: A Comparative Reflection

1. Do accountants tell it how it is? Do marketers like to solve open ended problems? A comparative reflection on learning design. Matt Bamber, University of Bristol Kath Mutter, University of Wales

2. Introduction • Thank you for allowing us to present to you today… • Our presentation will follow this order: • Introduce the theme of the project • Establish the contribution • Review the research methods • Examine the findings • Summary and conclusions • Finally, what we need is your feedback

3. The importance of learning design • Learning design is a niche area… • And is often overlooked by mainstream education researchers… • Why? • This is a difficult question but we think: • Debate is dominated by software design issues and this acts as a significant barrier to entry; • Learning design is seen as a tutor specific issue and therefore it can be viewed as meaningless to draw general conclusions; and • Students’ approaches to learning design have not been correlated to student attitudes to learning.

4. The importance of learning design • However, learning design is an essential consideration particularly in the context of our current higher education system where the following factors are important: • Pressure on staffing / teaching hours • Popularity of e-learning • Changing student wants, needs and abilities

5. Aims • Firstly, every classroom educator is affected by the LD debate • In addition, we acknowledge that every classroom educator is different • And we respect the fact that all students are different • Therefore the aim of the project was to address the core issue of flexibility of LD from a tutor/learner position • We hope that this will assist the LD software specialists during their design processes by encouraging debate from the front end of the issue

6. Design for Learning: The beginning? • Britain (2004) argues there are three general ideas behind the development of appropriate learning design: • Students learn better when they are “engaged in a learning activity” • Sound structuring of T&L activities is central to facilitate learning • Sharing and re-use of learning designs will complete the T&L cycle • Is there a best possible approach? • Is this a ‘one size fits all’ set of principles?

7. Original position • Biggs (1999) mapped engagement to activity and hypothesised that this, in turn, linked to student enjoyment and performance.

8. Engagement and the changed classroom dynamic • If Biggs is right, then tutors should aim towards the most ‘active’ teaching styles to which both academic and non-academic students will react positively • The more we ask our students to ‘engage’ in an activity the higher their level of engagement. • This in turn facilitates deep learning and all the benefits that arise from that. • This conclusion appears important for the LD debate and… • Appears to substantiate Britain’s (2004) general principles regarding learning design (given earlier)

9. Active approaches • What do we know about ‘active’ student learning or the facilitation of an ‘active’ approach? • Biggs (1999) specifically names two “very successful” approaches (p. 70): • Problem-based learning; and • Learning portfolio • Jones (2007) echoes this conclusion. • To provide a mix of enterprising skills and behaviours to manage a business an action-oriented teaching style is important. • Other studies reiterate these conclusions (including Trigwell and Prosser, 1991; Ramsden, 1997; Prosser and Trigwell, 1998)

10. Underlying presumptions • Therefore, we now have a series of underlying presumptions: • It has been argued that active learning facilitates a higher level of engagement (Biggs, 1999) • The more active approach the better for academic and non-academic students (Biggs, 199; Jones, 2007) • Higher level of engagement facilitates student deep learning approaches which underpin the fulfilment of the educational intention (Marton and Säljö, 1976; Entwistle & Ramsden, 1983; Biggs, 1979, 1987; Marton, 1981; Ramsden, 1992; Marton and Booth, 1997) • Certain teaching and learning structures facilitate this (Britain, 2004; Biggs, 1999) • Learning design specialists are looking to facilitate this engagement (Britain, 2004) • The best learning designs should be shared and re-used (Britain, 2004)

11. Subject specific • Therefore now we have some fundamentally important questions to ask ourselves as educators: • Do we use these approaches in our accounting tuition? • Do we use these approaches in our marketing tuition? • Are these approaches generic? • Are these approaches re-usable?

12. Methodology & Methods • Quantitative and qualitative • Questionnaire • A modification of the Approaches to Teaching Inventory (ATI). • Reflected so students respond to tutor’s teaching rather than tutor’s rating themselves • Plus, a self-designed questionnaire based on prior literature findings testing suppositions about academic ability and active approaches to teaching and learning • Scalable result: academic through non-academic; active through passive learning styles. • Focus groups • Random selection of students

13. Method: Phase 1 – Plot responses into matrix Non-academic student with a preference for active learning approaches Academic student with a preference for active learning approaches Student perception of preferred learning approach from Passive through active Non-academic student with a preference for passive learning approaches Academic student with a preference for passive learning approaches Student perception of non-academic ability through to academic ability

14. Findings: Accounting students • Total picture for accounting students • Fits neatly into our accepted understandings from prior literature • The more academic students are then the more they prefer a tutor to adopt an active teaching method

15. Findings: Accounting students: Non-academic preferences • Non-academic students preference for teaching and learning methods: • Again, fits neatly into our understanding from prior literature • The more academic the students who classified themselves as ‘non-academic’ become the greater their preference for active learning approaches

16. Findings: Accounting students: Academic preferences • Academic students preference for teaching and learning methods: • Direct conflict with the extant theory • The more academic the students who classified themselves as ‘academic’ become the greater their preference for passive learning approaches

17. Why? • Is there an issue with lack of clarity in the questionnaire? • You judge… the question read: Please indicate on the following scale where your preferences lie…

18. Findings: Marketing students: Non-academic preferences • Non-academic students preference for teaching and learning methods: • Again, fits neatly into our understanding from prior literature • The more academic the students who classified themselves as ‘non-academic’ become the greater their preference for active learning approaches

19. Findings: Marketing students: Academic preferences • Academic students preference for teaching and learning methods: • Not negatively correlated with the extant theory but does not conform • The more academic the students who classified themselves as ‘academic’ become the greater their preference for passive learning approaches

20. Findings: Focus group data • Definitions of ‘active’ teaching and learning approaches were significantly different dependent upon discipline • Marketing students viewed active teaching as group work, problem-solving and case studies • Often these methods are not available for accounting tutors • Accounting students commented that creating a set of financial statements out of the original transactional summary was active learning • And they are right… • But I wonder how many of us have ever thought this?

21. Findings: Focus group data • The importance of engagement: • “My favourite subject was design and technology at school. That’s because we were always 50% taught and then 50% do. You could sit in the classroom and learn about something and then next day you go and make it. So you can actually see what you’re doing. To actually operate a process is a million times better than just looking at it on a page.” • “Putting something into practice is always more enjoyable” • “You never really know the main pitfalls until you do it. It’s like a third dimension of learning…” • “I like the fact that you give us all sorts of scenarios with all different contexts to allow us to apply and see things from different perspectives.”

22. Findings: Focus group data • The importance of the structure / learning design: • “There are courses taught by endless Powerpoint slides… and you are expected to read them before the class… then they’re read out to you again in the class… and then you’re told to do questions in your own time. Well - you just don’t do them… you never get a sense of understanding. You don’t get the chance to build on and put it into practice. This is not good.”

23. Findings: Focus group data • Problem-based learning: • “There’s a course which is designed to be problem based learning. The idea is that you have a large class and put them into groups of about 8. You are then given a problem and you come back in three weeks with the answer. But there are big problems with this. The lectures aren’t tied to the solving of the problem, they are aimed at the exam in a few months time. You ask questions and the lecturers don’t want to offer help so they say they can’t. So you go to another group and they are stuck on a different problem. What you end up with is everyone with virtually the same wrong answer. You don’t learn anything!” • “It is an excuse for lecturers not to teach”

24. Findings: Focus group data • Reusability: • Unthinking re-use irritates and frustrates students from all disciplines • “I hate it when tutors use Harvard Business School cases from 1970’s – you are teaching us that marketing doesn’t play to those rules anymore “ • Teaching styles vary and one tutor’s notes are not re-usable in another tutor’s hands.

25. General conclusions • Engagement with learning materials is fundamental to achieving the educational intention for the vast majority of students • The structure of the learning materials and the linked ideas of building blocks and progression are important • However, this study asks more questions than it answers. • Do academic students prefer passive learning approaches? • Do we need to re-asses the definitions of active learning approaches? • If we do, then how does this inform the learning design debate? • Particularly, is re-usability a fundamental goal?

26. Thanks again! We welcome all comments and any questions…