Maree Gosper

Web-based lecture technologies and learning and teaching: a study of change in four Australian universities

The uptake of web-based lecture technologies for recording and delivering live lectures has increased markedly in recent years. Students have responded positively, and for many their use has transformed learning – freeing them up from rigid timetables by providing choice in lecture attendance and supporting learning by extending the lecture experience and enabling them to revisit key concepts and ideas in their own time. Less transformational has been the impact on teaching. Although changing attendance patterns and disquiet about the quality of learning are of concern to many, lecturers have largely responded by simply modifying lectures. For most, the challenges of catering for the learning needs of a cohort with variable lecture attendance have not been addressed at a whole of the curriculum level. The technologies have been added on, rather than integrated into the curriculum. This paper will review the changes taking place in learning and teaching, explore the reluctance to embrace more wholesale change to the curriculum, and discuss the implications for institutions in the face of ongoing change.

Framing and Enhancing Distributed Leadership in the Quality Management of Online Learning Environments in Higher Education.

This article reports on the findings of senior leadership interviews in a nationally funded project on distributed leadership in the quality management of online learning environments (OLEs) in higher education. Questions were framed around the development of an OLE quality management framework and the situation of the characteristics of distributed leadership at the core of the framework. The project’s premise is that distributed leadership is a descriptive reality of managing OLEs given the various leadership parties involved and the complexities of the contemporary technological landscape. Leaders’ understandings of distributed leadership were examined—its nature, value and potential for advancing the quality management of OLEs. There was confirmatory evidence of its reality, but its meaning and value were not uncritically accepted. It can be concluded that building distributed leadership must start through deliberative formal leadership commitment and action starting at the highest levels of the institution.

Implementing Game-Based Learning: The MAPLET Framework as a Guide to Learner-Centred Design and Assessment

Game-based learning can provide immersive experiences simulating authentic environments to enable students to develop and demonstrate the mastery of foundational knowledge through to complex concepts and higher order metacognitive and creative skills. While research provides evidence of the benefits of game-based learning, assessing the effectiveness of the learning that takes place is not without its challenges; realizing assessment in game-based learning cannot be achieved in isolation of the broader curriculum. From a whole of curriculum perspective, the alignment of targeted outcomes with gaming activities and assessment strategies for both summative and formative purposes is pivotal to the creation of effective learning experiences. Matching the intellectual maturity of learners with the demands of the gaming environment is also essential in order to facilitate engagement. Both require a strong understanding of the learner and process of learning, particularly the cognitive processes that underpin the development and assessment of different types of knowledge and skills. This chapter introduces a new approach to curriculum design which addresses both these elements within a single framework. The MAPLET framework combines the fundamental principles of curriculum alignment with a model for intellectual skill development based on the development of expertise. Use of the framework to guide decisions about which gaming applications to use, when and for whom, and how they can be assessed is discussed.

Technologies and the Assessment of Higher Order Outcomes

Alignment between the intended learning outcomes, the teaching and learning activities and the assessment tasks is one of the keys to student engagement, to involve students in a ‘web of consistency’ (Biggs, Teaching for quality learning at university.p 26 2007). While higher order learning such as evaluation, problem solving and creative thinking; espoused as fundamentals of university learning, appear in many graduate attribute statements, previous studies suggest that designing the curriculum to elicit and assess these higher order learning outcomes poses a challenge for academics (McNeill, Gosper and Hedberg, 2010. Emerging Web 2.0 technologies have been heralded as having potential to support this type of assessment, yet in order to take advantage of these affordances, academics need the skills to integrate them into the curriculum to support learning and assessment. This paper reports the results of a survey conducted in an Australian University to explore the types of learning outcomes academics target in their curricula and how technologies are used to assess these outcomes. The results suggest that while many academics intend higher order outcomes, they are less likely to design their teaching activities or assessment tasks accordingly. Amongst the implications of the study is the need to support unit convenors in designing their curriculum to take advantage of the potential for emerging tools to support assessment of higher order outcomes.