Activity Three

Investigating Flexible Learning

For this activity I talked to a lecturer, who is in a similar role to myself, working in the Outdoor Leadership field but for another Polytechnic.

The students: 2nd year Outdoor Recreation students, aged between 18-29, all New Zealand European/Pakeha (no Maori, foreigners), 80% from the North island.

Time

He identified that time can be a real challenge in terms of work/life balance for both the students and the staff. Staff can often feel overloaded, struggle to manage with the systems and find it hard to stay organised and keep students in touch with what is going on. One reason for this is that they spend a lot of the time in the field outdoors. This can vary a lot from week to week but they will often leave to go quite early (around 6am) and generally get back sometime between  5-11.30pm.

As students this field time can also be a challenge and they need to priortise to self-manage as well as staying focused on when things are due.

Entry Requirements

Students need to have successfully completed a first year program in Outdoor Recreation. Some students get direct entry straight into 2nd year but this is not easily done and is determined from a solid base of logged prior practical outdoor experience.

Delivery and Logistics

Around 50% of this course is out in the field, 50% class time.

Outdoors

-Travel is by van or bus

- Location: they go all over the South Island depending on where is most suitable for what they are learning

- Rain or shine

Classrooms

- in about 15 different rooms and outside

- they use a variety of different mediums and technology to put across information including overheads, powerpoints, discussion, interaction, videos, whiteboards

- Students will work in varying group sizes (solo, pairs, small groups, larger group discussions)

- Small class sizes - 14-28

- Normal sessions are 2 hours with a break sometime in the middle

Content and Instructional Approaches

Lecturers try to cater to visual/audible/kinasethic learners both in the classroom and in the field.

Combination of face-to-face, DOING, listening and sharing ideas, reviewing, lectures, utilising resources, and receiving/giving feedback.

The course can often be perceived as something you would do to have a good time, to have fun. For some students it can be challenging to get them to be committed to the theory or assignments that go along with the practical assessments.

A lot of the learning is done through hands on experience - See Experiential Learning Cycle

Experiential Learning Cycle 3-stage models (Kolb, 1984)

Resources

For each course the students get given a hardcopy book, which they can use as a resource to add notes to or take away in the field.

They are also given a calender with all assessment dates for the year - and lecturers will inform them if there are any changes to this.

The timetable and course outlines can not be accessed online - instead the students are given a hardcopy of the timetable. The lecturer felt this system could be improved be make it more flexible as sometimes the students would lose this.

Students also have access to a climbing wall facility and library where can access information.

Activity Two

What does flexible learning mean to me?

The term "flexible learning" could be interpreted in many different ways. I see there being two aspects to flexible learning - the educator and the student.
On discussion with a college in the outdoor sector we both came up with some points that we felt embraced flexible learning;

• catering to different learning stules
• being open to students ideas/concepts
• adaptability - with both content and timeframes
  Content - having a plan of what you were hoping to deliver but adjusting this in response to student interactions to maximise their learning
  Timeframes - if you feel the student energy levels are low you might adjust your timeframes, or if you are taking a class late friday afternoon you may make it more interactive to keep students engaged

Why is it necessary to use a more flexible approach in your work?

Being flexible allows you to both understand and be more effective in catering to all learners. This is not just their preferred learning style but also their cultural backgrounds, personalities, social factors and where they have come from to name a few. As students they may also be dealing with issues such as work/life balance, financial or flatting difficulties.
Having resources available to aid in learning in their own time, being available and approachable (rapport being an important factor here) and setting the students up well in understanding educational systems are all important aspects here.

What do you need to explore to help this happen?

I need to become more efficient in setting up resources electronically to aid student learning. I am currently teaching environmental science which is a field I am really interested in making into a really "great" course" with resources that the students can draw on. However having sufficient time to develop this is a challenge I am currently facing.
Taking the time to build rapport with students and gain a better understanding of who they are will help in both developing courses that match their needs while increasing my approachability.
Being reflective of my work and making changes to take into the future is also important. Receiving feedback from students is also a critical part that can aid in my self reflection of teaching.
Giving students direct verbal and written feedback throughout their learning and not just at the end can also be crucial in developing flexible learning - as they can adapt their style and practises as well.
As a new member of staff I also need to continue to become more familiar with polytech systems e.g. moodle, assignment policies etc so that I can also be clear with students around expectations and help them gain a good grasp of systems. Role modelling behaviour can also be important in students understanding expectations.

What goals to you have for using Flexible learning in your work?

1. Resources - By the end of the year I want to set up some more powerpoint lectures for Environmental Science with great content that is interactive, which could be used as a tool for students to refer back to. This would include further developing the current weather information,  and setting up flora, fauna, geology and environmental initiatives - that could be used for setting up the assessment tasks more effectively.
2. Reflection - I have started a page of tips to take into next years courses with aspects I would change or develop.
3. Use debriefing tools to ensure self/social development of students is occuring so that they understand and met expectations as well as meet their full potential. Taking the time to have one on one chats with students could help here.
4. Become more competent in using technology as an instructional approach.
5. Become more organised, priortise and look ahead to develop great courses.