The Twilight of the Cyborgs

Reflection on Topic 4: Design for online and blended learning

Joanne Kuai

joanne.kuai@kau.se

One of the biggest takeaways from the COVID-19 pandemic in higher education is that flexibility needs to be built into our pedagogical approaches. Blended learning as an educational approach that integrates traditional face-to-face classroom instruction with online learning activities (Boelens, De Wever, and Voet 2017) offers some toolbox. It seeks to combine the strengths of both traditional and digital learning methods, offering students a more flexible and personalised learning experience. In a blended learning environment, students often engage in online modules, discussions, or assessments, complemented by in-person interactions with instructors. There are some key challenges associated with blended learning, including ensuring equitable access to technology, addressing the digital divide, and maintaining a cohesive learning experience across online and offline components.

To address these challenges, innovative approaches are called for, such as building community of inquiry (CoI) (Fiock 2020). The CoI framework identifies three essential elements for a meaningful educational experience: cognitive presence, social presence, and teaching presence. Cognitive presence involves the construction of knowledge through critical thinking and discourse. Social presence emphasises the importance of building a sense of community and interpersonal relationships among learners, fostering a supportive learning environment. Teaching presence refers to the role of the instructor in designing and facilitating effective learning experiences.

The CoI approach recognises that meaningful learning occurs when these three elements interact dynamically. By promoting active engagement, open discourse, and a sense of community, the CoI approach aims to enhance the quality of online and blended learning experiences in higher education, fostering a collaborative and intellectually stimulating educational environment. Leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to build a Community of Inquiry (CoI) in higher education involves strategic integration of AI technologies and realising AI-empowered learning that encourages learners to have their agency in the process (Ouyang and Jiao 2021).

AI can be utilised to analyse students’ learning patterns and preferences, providing personalised content recommendations for a better cognitive presence. AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants can create interactive and responsive online environments and increase social presence. AI-driven analytics can assist instructors in assessing student engagement, performance, and participation. By automating routine administrative tasks, AI allows educators to focus more on designing and facilitating meaningful learning experiences, thereby enhancing their teaching presence. By strategically incorporating AI into the educational landscape, we can harness the potential of these technologies to foster a robust CoI and a blended learning experience.

References

Boelens, Ruth, Bram De Wever, and Michiel Voet. 2017. “Four Key Challenges to the Design of Blended Learning : A Systematic Literature Review.” EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH REVIEW 22: 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2017.06.001.

Fiock, Holly. 2020. “Designing a Community of Inquiry in Online Courses.” The International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning 21 (1): 135–53. https://doi.org/10.19173/irrodl.v20i5.3985.

Ouyang, Fan, and Pengcheng Jiao. 2021. “Artificial Intelligence in Education: The Three Paradigms.” Computers and Education: Artificial Intelligence 2 (January): 100020. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.caeai.2021.100020.

Reflection on Topic 3: Learning in Communities

Joanne Kuai

joanne.kuai@kau.se

The benefits of engaged pedagogy and learning in communities have been widely acknowledged, as human beings is a social person in a social world, and in relation to participation, the social and the individual constitutes each other (hooks, 2010; Wenger, 2010). In building a learning community, many aspects need to be taken into consideration, such as inclusivity, classroom ethics, and group dynamics in different stages of group development (Tuckman, 1965).

When I first started my postgraduate program as a master’s student in Denmark, the sheer amount of group work was overwhelming. In discussing this with locals, I was informed that group work is part of the culture in education. While it took me some time to get used to it, I came to appreciate group work for the opportunities to collaborate with people with different cultural backgrounds, expertise, and working habits. Learning, hence, does not solely come from books and lectures, but also from the process of collaborating, learning from fellow participants, and navigating through group dynamics, which is what we need to deal with in real-world scenarios. Drawing from my own experience as a student, my experiences as a teacher, and discussions with fellow educators, I find the 2*2 group formation a great technique and would like to implement it in my future teaching. A student can first pair up with someone they are familiar with and more comfortable working with and be mixed with another pair to add to challenges and also the novelty aspect of group work. Such as measure has been found to lead to more positive attitudes from the students and encourage learning (Mahenthiran & Rouse, 2000).

In addition, I find special attention to inclusivity to be crucial to setting the tone for the learning community to be built. Norm-critical pedagogy offers an important toolbox for addressing different forms of oppression and articulating ways to work against it, be it racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, or other forms of oppression (Bromseth & Sörensdotter, 2014; Kumashiro, 2000). Adopting the practices of pronoun rounds, revising the syllabus to include accessibility and accommodation needs, and following the checklist for decolonizing the syllabus can be some of the first steps to establishing shared values and practices among participants and creating an inclusive atmosphere where everyone can feel welcomed and comfortable with sharing. This requires the teacher to constantly reflect on one’s positionality, actively change the curriculum, and rethink the foundations of our society, including the educational structures, as learning is the prosecution of social structure and of identity (Wenger, 2010; Wysong, 2020). Only when we’re attentive to such processes can we build learning communities that sustain pedagogical change.

References

Bromseth, J., & Sörensdotter, R. (2014). Norm-critical pedagogy. Gender Studies Education and Pedagogy, 24, 24–32.

hooks,  bell. (2010). Teaching critical thinking: Practical wisdom. Routledge.

Kumashiro, K. K. (2000). Toward a Theory of Anti-Oppressive Education. Review of Educational Research, 70(1), 25–53. https://doi.org/10.2307/1170593

Mahenthiran, S., & Rouse, P. J. (2000). The impact of group selection on student performance and satisfaction. International Journal of Educational Management, 14(6), 255–265. https://doi.org/10.1108/09513540010348043

Tuckman, B. W. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological Bulletin, 63(6), 384.

Wenger, E. (2010). Communities of practice and social learning systems: The career of a concept. Social Learning Systems and Communities of Practice, 3, 179–198.

Wysong, L. (2020, December 6). WHAT WOULD IT MEAN TO “DECOLONIZE” THE CURRICULUM? Hindsights. https://medium.com/hindsights/what-would-it-mean-to-decolonize-the-curriculum-4fcedbe781d1

Reflection on Topic 2: Open Learning – Sharing and Openness

Joanne Kuai

joanne.kuai@kau.se

This work is licensed via CC BY 4.0

Open education practices (OEP) involve open education resources, open teaching and learning processes and open research and scholarly practices that incorporate some key principles such as accessibility, flexibility, shareability, affordability, innovation and academic freedom (Shareefa et al., 2023). With technological development, there are increasing opportunities to support open educational practices, such as online video conferencing supported online teaching, web repositories supporting resource sharing, and not to mention the latest generative AI tools, such as ChatGPT, being used as virtual educational assistants and with 24/7 availability and has the flexibility to be used in various fields and customising for individual needs (Baidoo-Anu & Ansah, 2023).

Like it or not, students are embracing ChatGPT and the like and using AI tools for various purposes (Malmström et al., 2023). How to prepare the students and prepare ourselves as educators in the face of AI has generated much debate. An impressive open crowdsourced collection (Nerantzi et al., 2023) on ideas of how to use AI in education is a great example of open educational practices in the age of AI. Inspired by the Open Educational Resources movement, it has been pointed out that increasingly, community building to facilitate more lively academic exchange, collaborating with students to have a flipped classroom to enhance the learning experience, and relying on social media, listsesrvs, groups and public annotations can help educators to respond to the challenges brought by AI (Mills et al., 2023).

OEP and OER support the idea of sharing an alternative educational paradigm that affirms everybody’s right to education, participate in cultural life and benefit from scientific knowledge and development. The benefits of OEP powered by AI lie in its speed, accessibility, potential for scalability, time-saving, and cost-effectiveness, among other things. However, it is also important to note some limitations. To begin with, one should be cautious about the quality of the information. Some materials could be altered and become inaccurate. With AI-powered information retrieval, one can also experience biases in input data, biased questions, and outdated information, among other issues. Secondly, equity is also an issue not only due to different accessibility and technology and information but also because relevant literacy may vary across geographical locations, democratic backgrounds, and disciplinary differences. Third, maintenance and updates may take a lot of effort and time. To address these issues, better institutional support is needed, and so is more transparency to establish a chain of accountability. Only by evaluating these issues carefully and putting in place functioning mechanisms are we able to fulfil OEP and OER’s potential and align AI’s goal with our goal of benefiting humanity.

References

Baidoo-Anu, D., & Ansah, L. O. (2023). Education in the era of generative artificial intelligence (AI): Understanding the potential benefits of ChatGPT in promoting teaching and learning. Journal of AI, 7(1), 52–62.

Malmström, H., Stöhr, C., & Ou, A. W. (2023). Chatbots and other AI for learning: A survey of use and views among university students in Sweden. Chalmers Stud. Commun. Learn. High. Educ, 1.

Mills, A., Bali, M., & Eaton, L. (2023). How do we respond to generative AI in education? Open educational practices give us a framework for an ongoing process. Journal of Applied Learning and Teaching, 6(1), Article 1. https://doi.org/10.37074/jalt.2023.6.1.34

Nerantzi, C., Abegglen, S., Karatsiori, M., & Antonio Martínez-Arboleda (Eds. ). (2023). 101 creative ideas to use AI in education, A crowdsourced collection. https://doi.org/10.5281/ZENODO.8072949

Shareefa, M., Moosa, V., Hammad, A., Zuhudha, A., & Wider, W. (2023). Open education practices: A meta-synthesis of literature. Frontiers in Education, 8. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feduc.2023.1121739

Reflection on Topic 1: Online Participation & Digital Literacies

Joanne Kuai

joanne.kaui@kau.se

When I first started teaching as a first-year doctoral student, covid struck. I had envisioned myself as a teacher greeting those young and radiant faces of the Swedish and international youth in the classroom, walking around the lab, answering students’ questions on the spot, and drawing on the whiteboard enthusiastically to illustrate a concept. All these went to the drain. Instead, I had Zoom rooms as my classroom and floating big heads and even “blackholes” as my audiences. Adaption must be made, and quickly. Luckily, the hardware and software infrastructure were mostly in place. Colleagues were also eager to share experiences and tips and tricks for all of us to learn and improve and adapt to the online teaching/learning environment. How I wished I had taken a pedagogical course like Open Network Learning (ONL) beforehand to better prepare myself for that. But it’s never too late. As Rugube et al., (2020) pointed out, online learning has its unique value of flexibility, and with proper methods adopted, the rich learning experience is not necessarily diminished.

There are many learnings from the sessions and literature from the first few weeks of the ONL experience. I’ll highlight the following three:

1. Digital literacy as a development process: there are many facets of digital literacy that not only include media literacy, ICT literacy but also career & identity management, etc. (Developing Digital Literacies – Jisc infoNet, 2014). Each of the elements deserves attention to comprehensively develop our capabilities for an online teaching/learning environment. Literacy is also about development and needs to be contextualized and even applied to individuals differently. Raised awareness will be the first step for such development to be purposed and evaluated and improved;
2. Be patient and practice empathy: each participant in the online learning environment, be it a teacher, student, or facilitator, comes with their own values. Some may be more advanced in some aspects, and some may need a bit more help to begin with, but each one can make a contribution. Respect the differences and be agile to facilitate. The generosity should also extend to oneself. Allow oneself time to adapt and learn. As our Karlstad University’s local facilitator, Ann Vestfält mentioned: “Trust the process”. We are on this journey together and we carry each other;
3. Constant reflexivity and share good energy: as a member of academia, reflexivity almost comes as a default setting for anyone who wants to learn and improve in a meaningful way. Applied in an online learning environment, such a practice is beneficial not only for oneself but also for other participants and helps to equip with the knowledge and skills necessary at a good pace and evolve together as a community. The good energy aspect also lies in the importance of great emotional support’s tremendous value in creating learning experiences that are meaningful and rewarding.

As bell hooks (2010, p. 20) discussed convincingly the importance of engaged pedagogy, and she does not “begin to teach in any setting without first laying the foundation for building community in the classroom”. This educational philosophy aims to create an optimal learning environment that emphasizes mutual participation for the movement of ideas exchanged by everyone may forge a meaningful working relationship between teachers and students, and between students and students in the classroom. Although the online teaching environment may add to the complexity of the matter, with continued critical reflective academic practice, we can still strive for the best learning outcomes for all the students and build a community in the online environment (Gillett-Swan, 2017).

References

Developing digital literacies—Jisc infoNet. (2014, October 11). http://web.archive.org/web/20141011143516/http://www.jiscinfonet.ac.uk/infokits/digital-literacies/

Gillett-Swan, J. (2017). The challenges of online learning: Supporting and engaging the isolated learner. Journal of Learning Design, 10(1), 20–30.

hooks,  bell. (2010). Teaching critical thinking: Practical wisdom. Routledge.

Rugube, T., Mthethwa-Kunene, K. E., & Maphosa, C. (2020). PROMOTING INTERACTIVITY IN ONLINE LEARNING – TOWARDS THE ACHIEVEMENT OF HIGH-QUALITY ONLINE LEARNING OUTCOMES. European Journal of Open Education and E-Learning Studies, 5(2), Article 2. https://doi.org/10.46827/ejoe.v5i2.3381