Skúsenosti s dištančným vzdelávaním na KGP

1. Skúsenosti s dištančným vzdelávaním na KGP G.M. Timčák, FBERG TU Košice

2. Úvodné poznámky • Elektronické platformy pre dištančné vzdelávanie sa začali ujímať v rámci prechodu na „mass education“. V dnešnej dobe sa nutne zvyšuje počet vysokoškolsky vzdelaných ľudí. Strategickým cieľom napr. v Británii je mať 50% populácie s VŠ vzdelaním. To konvenčné školstvo nezvládne.

3. Úvodné poznámky • Neprítomnosť fyzickej osoby pedagóga/ andragóga vo výučbovom procese vedie k odstráneniu možnosti adaptovania si vzorov (nezabúdajme, pedagóg by mal byť aj vzorom). • Toto spôsobuje aj nedostatok kultúrnej a sociálnej kontextualizácie a tým je potom o mnoho ľahšie vedomosti užívať neeticky či nevhodne. • Vzdelávanie nie je len transfer poznatkov.

4. Úvodné poznámky Riziká sú však dosť veľké. • V prvom rade nastáva depersonifikácia vzdelávania. Pedagóg, ktorý bol v dennom kontakte so študentmi je nahradený e-platformou a e-mailom, kde na oboch koncoch sú si navzájeom neznámi ľudia. Ak máme 30 študentov, a ak každý týždeň na web dáme (sprístupníme) 1 prednášku, a ak na prednášku nadväzujú cvičenia(„e-cvičenia“ - zadania), potom môžeme očakávať aspoň 30 e-mailov, ktoré treba zodpovedať. FAQ súbor tomu nepomôže.

5. Why distance education • There is a need for having higher educated workforce • There is a need and market for DE • It enables • Better time management • Better study management • Better information maganement • Gives more freedom to student and tutor alike • Enables the use of up-to-date e-learning platforms

7. Strong points • Study when convenient • Study where convenient • Study self-management • More tutoring and couching possible • More learning channels available • Modern learning technology available • The society is interested in getting this package and service from HEIs

8. Weak points • Neded for self-study management • Need to have financial resources • Need to have family and workplace support • Weak legislative support for the process of provision • HEIs have less experience with this form • Less homes have access to Internet than desirable for DE • Network service slower than desirable at homes

9. What is needed for a DE BSc. Course?

10. Experience with DE course preparation, delivery and management Students The majority of the students do not have the necessary skills for e-learning. Thus a start-up course would be necessary for them to get the skills. Adult learners usually have access to Internet only at their workplace. The usuall home access is at present too slow for a system like eLern. Adult learners lack the necessary learning skills. A „Learning to learn“ would be another start-up course needed.

11. Students Undergraduate DE students have problems in addressing the issue of learning self-management and time management. To make their DE success rate better and their feeling of satisfaction greater, far more on-line tutor support would be necessary. For that a greater availability of home internet access would be needed. That should be a State defined policy.

12. Projekt IDEP • Ako sme začali a k čomu sme dospeli: Keď sme získali projekt IDEP na vypracovanie učeb. materiálov 1. ročníka geopropagácie, boli sme radi, lebo domovská inštitúcia sa o RĽZ alebo o financovanie vývoja nových učebných technológií stará väčšinou len podnecovaním k získavaniu grantov.

13. Project goals overview The aim of the project was to develop and provide the course through the uLern platform in School Year 2002/2003 to a group of 20 students. Then to compare the educational results with the results of a second 21 DE student group. This was achieved at the BERG Faculty, TU Košice.

14. Target group The target group was the general public desiring to work for a degree course in tourism. Fourty-one freshers registered for the DE course. Their age ranged from 19 to 50 years. The majority had secondary education, some had already a HEI degree. From this group More than 95% of them successfully completed the 1st year, and 76% of the original number is now in their 3rd year.

15. Projekt IDEP • Potrebovali sme • Osnovu • Autorov • Počítače pre autorov a SW a prístup k Internetu • Školenie autorov a tútorov (málo ich chodilo na školenie) • Platformu pre e-learning (uLern) • Redaktorov e-learningového materiálu (1 pre pôvodný text, 1 pre e-text) • Administrátora platformy • Tútorov

16. Projekt IDEP • Ďalej sme potrebovali: • Know-how pre odbornú a andragogickú časť • Motiváciu • Čas • Manažéra DV • Informácie pre študentov (obsahový, časový a formátový harmonogram) a jednoznačne definované pravidlá hry (pre tútorov aj študentov)

17. Projekt IDEP • Už po nejakom mesiaci behu semestra nastali zaujímavé procesy – e-learningoví študenti boli radi svojej voľnosti, ale konzultoval s konvenčnými DV študentmi, Títo teda hrali akúsi rolu mentorov. Náš andragogický experiment trval rok, pretože tam projekt končil a financovanie ďalšej časti sa neuskutočnilo. Jeden rok ešte mali Internetovú podporu a tento šk. rok končia obidve skupiny bežnou DV formou.

18. Skúsenosti • Autori: nie je jednoduché napísať dobrý e-learningový text. Nestačí previesť konvenčný text. Ešte stále sa to učíme. • Tútori: Nie je jednoduché osvojiť si andragogické princípy. • Mentori – chýbajú • Manažment DV – po projekte chýba • Platforma: starý uLern, ako aj podobné platformy nie sú príliš user friendly. • Pri našej pedagogickej (resp. výskumnej) záťaži je ťažko kvalitne zvládavať klasický aj e-learning.

19. Skúsenosti • Pre e-learning by mali byť e-pedagógovia alebo e-andragógovia. • Pre prípravu textov na e-learning by mali byť špeciálni poradcovia. • RĽZ je kľúčový faktor pri skvalitňovaní pedagogických a andragogických ako aj e-learningových schopností učiteľov/tútorov. • Zvládavanie nového SW je časovo náročné. Pri vysokých úväzkoch a žiadnych úľavách to ťažko zvládavať.

20. Skúsenosti • Študentov tiež treba tejto forme učiť. • Ideálne by bolo aspoň mesačné vzdelávanie: • Počítačová gramotnosť (HW, SW) • Sprístupniť notebooky pre študentov • Jazyková gramotnosť • Dištančne študijné zručnosti • Manažment času • Manažment úloh

21. Inštitucionálne skúsenosti • K úspechu v e-learning treba ucelenú stratégiu, ktorá by vytvárala: • Jasné definovanie cieľov a cesty vedúcej k ich dosiahnutiu • HW, SW a procesný rámec • Znalostný rámec • Harmonogram zmien • Podporu procesu špecialistami.

22. Other IDEP projects Within the IDEP project initiative of the OSF we are working and has been working on a number of distance education projects. Some of the projects are presented elsewhere, so we will deal only with the following ones: • KGP – DV: BSc course at the BERG Faculty, TU Košice (completed) • EVAPRO: Evaluation of educational programmes and courses (in progress) • I2DV: Internet based innovation of distance education(completed)

23. The project consortia The projects were managed and worked out by project consortia. They included ILLE TU as a key member. In case of the KGP DV project, the Dept. of Geotourism is the key partner. In the other two, ILLE TU is the leading partner.

28. The EVAPRO project This 1,5 year long project aims at the creation of a course for teaching educational programme evaluation.The course will give to programme designers, secondary school- and HEI managers information and knowledge on: ·What evaluation is and how to use it for the improvement/upgrade of teaching and management of courses. ·How to design evaluation plans, how to select the appropriate evaluation type ·How to implement the evaluation procedure ·How to process and present the evaluation results ·How to work with people and information in the framework of evaluation.

29. Project goals The EVAPRO course is designed as a 3rd generation DE course. It combines on-line and off-line study with asynchronous ans synchronous on-line communication. Apart from the 3 module of the course the participants will receive the following tools: a glossary of basic terms in educational course evaluation ans a set of tools for the implementation of the evaluation procedure. The EVAPRO course ends with a Final Project that has to be defended. The study is composed of the following parts: ·Introduction – 8 hours ·3 modules of study, assessments and a case study – 72 hours ·FTF meeting – 8 hours ·Preparation of the Final Project - 28 hours ·Sum total – 116 hours Thus the course is one semester equivalent.

30. Experience with DE course preparation, delivery and management Students The majority of the students do not have the necessary skills for e-learning. Thus a start-up course would be necessary for them to get the skills. Adult learners usually have access to Internet only at their workplace. The usuall home access is at present too slow for a system like eLern. Adult learners lack the necessary learning skills. A „Learning to learn“ would be another start-up course needed.

31. Students Undergraduate DE students have great problems in addressing the issue of learning self-management and time management. To make their DE success rate better and their feeling of satisfaction greater, far more on-line tutor support would be necessary. For that a greater availability of home internet access would be needed. That should be a State defined policy.

32. Student support The personal interaction of the tutor with the learner or a group of learners can be managed in a FTF manner or virually through virtual classrooms. The lower interpersonal contact level is a disadvantage of the DE system. The danger of providing knowledge without positive personal examples of application (ethics) is getting greater. Knowledge gets dissociated from its social and ethical context (responsibility for ethical use of knowledge).

33. Teachers HEI teachers usually do not have the necessary skills in andragogy. They sometimes fail to be able to develop successful learning cooperation with adult learners. HEI teachers often do not have the skills to work with more complex learning SW environment and lack the skills to utilise the possibilities that such SW offers.

34. Teachers HEI teachers, HEI managers and decisionmakers often do not have sufficient knowledge about the strategies needed for making eLearning programmes successful. One of the other IDEP projects (VAT –Virtual DE authoring team) contributes to the solution of that point. HEI teachers lack knowledge about the work of a VLE tutor. They apparently do not see what is their new role in such a position. This tends to decrease the success of the courses.

35. Institutional level At HEIs, the approach to DE and VLE often lack wider coherence and a unified strategy. The HRD of HEI teachers is heavily neglected. The preparation for their role in e-Learning /VLE (as authors, tutors, learning process managers, counsellors, etc.) is greatly inadequate.

36. Institutional level HEIs do not seem to care for benchamrking or testing their learning products. The products are usually not modified for the needs of the various target groups. This can cause lesser customer satisfaction. In case od undergraduate or graduate study, the course designer and tutor is not infrequently less skilled in work with the Web environment or eLeraning than the student. That gives a strong psychological disadvantage.

37. When looking at The EU learning Opportunuty Market, we can see, That time is running short for us. Much strategic and Executive effort Has to be invested Into e-learning. When looking to SK Learning opportunity Market, we see a need to prepare the society for A change in the Way how HEIs will Provide learning Services.

38. Conclusions 1 • The KGP project for DE is up to now a success • The row between the Ministry and the HEIs caused unforeseen problems. It is difficult to predict all the effects of this process. • The KGP will continue in its effort to provide quality undergraduate DE courses in geo-tourism.