MOTIVATE

MASTERS LEVEL OPPORTUNITIES

AND

TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION

IN VOCATIONAL TEACHER EDUCATION

Leonardo ProgrammeLLP-LdV-TOI-2007-HU-008

CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS OCTOBER 2009

Technological Educational Institute of CreteChania Branch

MOTIVATE

MASTERS LEVEL OPPORTUNITIES

AND

TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION

IN VOCATIONAL TEACHER EDUCATION

Leonardo ProgrammeLLP-LdV-TOI-2007-HU-008

CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGSOCTOBER 2009

Technological Educational Institute of CreteChania Branch

Edited byLászló Kadocsa

Gyula Gubán

Technical edited byTibor Fauszt

This publication was supportedby the Life Long Learning Program

European Funding Leonardo Scheme

Védjegygrafika: Koffán Károly grafikus művész, főiskolai docens

ISBN 978-963-9915-24-4

Felelős kiadó: Dr. Bognár László rektorKiadja a Dunaújvárosi Főiskola Kiadói HivatalaKészült: 6,2 ív terjedelemben, B/5-ös méretben

Munkaszám: 4845/2009Műszaki felelős: Aszalós Lászlóné

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Table of contents

Pál Pentelényi - Ágnes Tóth HOW TO MOTIVATE VET TEACHERS FOR LIFE LONG LEARNING ................... 5

David LordTECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION IN MOTIVATE: LESSONS IN SECOND LIFE ........................................................................................................... 11

Principal Lecturer , Pekka Kalli EXPLORATIVE LEARNING AND SOCIODYNAMIC WORKINGSTYLE .............. 19

Loureiro, Mª João, Pombo, L. - Santos, C. (presenter) ASSESSMENT AS A STRATEGY TO PROMOTE ONLINE INTERACTION .......... 25

Haris PapoutsakisINTER-UNIVERSITY COLLABORATIVE CURRICULA DEVELOPMENT ........... 39

Péter TóthUTILIZATION OF WEB-MINING ALGORITHMS IN EVALUATION OF VIRTUAL COURSES ............................................................................................... 49

István SimonicsDISSEMINATION AND EXPLOITATION IN MOTIVATE PROJECT ..................... 61

Sándor SupliczPSYCHOLOGY IN TEACHER EDUCATION ............................................................. 73

László Kadocsa – Gyula GubánNETWORK TEACHING AND LEARNING IN PRACTICE ....................................... 83

Lourenço Frazão - Carolina Santos - Teresa OliveiraTEACHING ENTREPRENEURSHIP AS PREDICTOR TO PURSUIT MASTER COURSES ....................................................................................................................... 89

Hassan ElsayedAPPLICATION OF VIRTUAL REALITY TECHNOLOGIES ..................................... 99

Ádám Balázs Tóth – Anna BéresREVIEW OF MOTIVATE QMS ELEMENTS ............................................................ 103

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HOW TO MOTIVATE VET TEACHERS FOR LIFE LONG LEARNING

Pál Pentelényi -vice director genera; Ágnes Tóth - professorBudapest Polytechnic

pentelenyi.pal@tmpk.bmf.hu, toth.belane@tmpk.bmf.hu

Abstract: The paper provides an overview of the Masters level Opportunities and Technological Innovation in VocAtional Teacher Education (MOTIVATE) project aims and procedures. The main focus of the paper is to show what impact can be reached by the project results end products to the motivation of VET (Vocational Educational Training) teachers.Key words: motivation, life long learning, ICT development, vocational teacher education

1. IntroductionThe new type of training leading to the master level qualification for teacher of engineering was successfully accredited in Hungary at the end of 2006. The first students were enrolled in 2007 and the primary experiences gained accordingly.

The development of Master level in-service training is being supported by a Leonardo project consisting of eight partner institutions of six EU countries (Finland, Greece, Holland, Hungary, Portugal, United Kingdom).

There has been a long-term co-operation between the School of Education and Professional Development (University of Huddersfield) and the Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering Education (Budapest Tech Polytechnical Institution) regarding the use of new technologies in engineering education.

The MOTIVATE project sets out to utilise a range of new technologies, including WIKIs, blogs, virtual learning environments and ‘virtual worlds’. In particular, for module delivery, use is made of the Moodle virtual learning environments, both providing WIKIs and blogging facilities, along with other networking systems, discussion forums and communication tools.

2. Master level training in HungaryThe two year long Master level training – as a complementary training – is built on BSc qualification of engineering or BSc qualification of technical trainer. Both BSc qualifications require 210 credit studies including a 30 credit value practical term.

During the BSc level engineering training there is an opportunity for the students to get acquainted with educational studies by choosing from optional courses offered of this path. Basics of pedagogy, psychology, and communication are provided altogether for 10 credits with an emphasis of developing practical skills needed in the teaching profession. This preparatory phase serves three goals: provide a kind of career guidance by showing a sample of teacher education; motivate potential students for pursuing educational studies; assist the higher educational teaching staff in the selection process

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to find the best students for master level engineering educational studies taking into consideration not only the achievements in engineering studies but also the affinity for the teaching profession.

The master level phase of studies leading to the qualification for teacher of engineering consists of three elements: engineering (widening and deepening the students’ technical knowledge), pedagogical-psychological (focusing on teaching profession) and practical (teaching engineering during 14 weeks).

3. Project aimsThe new type of technical teacher training has been introduced in engineering areas of mechanical, electrical and IT engineering in the form of in-service training and correspondence courses. These forms of training provide opportunities for using virtual learning environments. Moreover the in-service students who are teachers can actively participate as subject specialists in virtual discussions about their methodological experiences. These on-line forums were introduced as innovations by the University of Huddersfield first. In the framework of a Leonardo project the University of Huddersfield is the innovation provider and two Hungarian higher educational institutions utilise the good practice with the contribution of other EU institutions.

The innovation is twofold: the introduction of Masters level modules into the technical teacher education programmes, and the use of new and emerging technologies in the implementation of the developed curriculum. All partners have a wide experience of curriculum development and technological innovation in its delivery.

This project also contributes to the development of the European Credit Transfer System to facilitate transparency and comparability of qualifications, transferability, validation and recognition of learning outcomes achieved by individuals in different learning contexts using different methods in different countries and at different levels.

Innovative solutions for sharing aims, objective and criteria includes the use of social software and collaborative Web 2.0 technologies which facilitates the creation of a new online community of European partners. Platforms have the potential to encompass new partners or involve trainee teachers across different institutions and countries in similar collaborative efforts. One particular advantage is the development of Subject Specialist communities for technical teachers that, because of the reach of internet based technologies, can facilitate much larger groups of subject specialists than are possible in face to face contexts.

4. Project processesThe first Work Package included establishing the project processes and facilities, revised and refined schedule and work plan, revised budget details, quality assurance policy and reference documents. Continuous discussions between project partners (initial face to face contact in the first project meeting and subsequent consultations facilitated by email) helped efficiently solving the tasks.

In the second Work Package the preparation for course design and delivery at the Masters level was accomplished: curriculum for Master level in-service (lifelong

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learning) vocational teacher training in mechanical, electrical, and IT engineering were finalised.

Masters level criteria were identified after examples of “good practice” within the partner institutions having experience in curriculum development were contributed. Aspects included quality issues as well.

In the third Work Package curriculum development for Master level vocational teacher education Module specifications for Master level in-service training including innovation elements transferred and adapted, Materials for “Innovative Didactic Solutions”, Guideline for the “Multimedia and e-learning” common module have been created.

After examining the commonality in the vocational teacher education curricula of the participating countries, those modules of the existing curriculum were identified that proved to be considerable as objects of innovation transfer and suitable for adaptation. Opportunities for creating a new module to teach the use of multimedia were preliminarily determined.

Work Package 4 is related to Technological innovation. Although the content of this package was performed basically in the second half of the project, several activities concerned have been done earlier. Courses on developing ICT competencies of staff members were organised in all institutions of the consortium.

Although several activities related to this package have been done in the first year of the project (e.g. courses on developing ICT competencies of staff members were organised in all institutions of the consortium), the content of this package (analysing research data gathered on the use of different technologies, investigating the possibilities of using up-to date technology across different platforms, making recommendations for future utilisations) were performed basically in the second half of the project. Creation of on-line communities for staff and students of in-service teacher training and utilisation of virtual learning environments formed the most significant project product. Moodle provided the platform for sharing training modules and utilising the advantages of synchronous discussions. The technical forum was organised in by Fontys PTH in the Netherlands and data gathering was organised using electronic means. Fontys PTH also provided experience of the didactical use of ICT in teacher training institutes. The recommendations were distributed in electronic format to all participants.

Within Work Package 5 course implementation was carried out. Three modules (Pedagogy, Multimedia and e-learning, and Teaching a specialist subject) were selected for common delivery. The Finnish partner provided the Moodle virtual platform for the first common module delivery. The second one was organised by the Portuguese partner. Both modules were delivered in English and the language of the forums and on-line discussions was also English.

Course implementation facilitated communication and collaboration between students of the partner institutions, generated comparative data on the usability of new technologies, and it provided opportunities for experience of various CMC and online learning systems when introducing the modules of new curriculum. Electronic based teaching materials were prepared and innovative learning strategies were observed by vocational teacher education institution staff. Struktura Ltd monitored the processes and provided feedback. Internal evaluation of the impact and external monitoring ensured

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the results to be adequate for larger scale transfer and dissemination, valorisation, and further publication as appropriate.

For the “Teaching a specialist subject” common module it was decided that the language to be used should be the native language of the participating institutions so that to reach higher participation. The decision was well established and around 80 students participated in the discussion forums where individual practices were shared.

As regards Work Package 6, in the evaluation of project processes the project results achieved during the project were summarised and evaluated by the papers and presentations of the MOTIVATE conferences in 2008 and 2009.

External monitoring remarks are being matched to the overall evaluation aspects. Dissemination is supported by the conference proceedings being prepared in co-operation with partners and subcontractors. Feedback has been received from continuous monitoring by Struktura Ltd (P5), from evaluation by local experts and project management and also via staff meetings and reflections. And finally, “Book of case studies” including assessment materials is published for the vocational training area and also to supply information for the management and decision makers.

5. Project resultsFor the students and lecturers of master level in-service training and teachers of vocational schools the emphasis is laid on the up-to-date methods of trainers, tutors and mentors including on-line discussions and advisory activities in virtual platforms.

These methods are being disseminated throughout the countries of the project partners including the vocational teacher training institutions of these countries. Local and international seminars, conferences supported the dissemination of project results.

The main results of the project were as follows:

Curriculum for Master level in-service vocational teacher training in engineering

The open and flexible nature of the curriculum supports the local adaptability. Flexibility can be served by optional modules both in the pedagogical and professional areas keeping in mind the coherence with the bachelor level curriculum. It is also necessary to build elements into the curriculum for orientation leading to PhD level training.

Module development for Master level vocational teacher training

The module development is based on the required competences and is in accordance with the European Credit Transfer System. The common module development can be the first step for encouraging student exchange in the area of vocational teacher training. The project provides a unique solution for virtual exchanges in the way of common module delivery, when selected modules are available on virtual platforms and additional methods i.e. participation in on-line communities support learning in the virtual environments.

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Module guidelines

The guidelines of the modules include not only the short descriptions of the modules but also the expected outcomes, requirements organisations and methods applied during the learning process. The partner countries are free to adjust the core elements of the guidelines to their own system taking into consideration the varying infrastructural background and the local regulations. Timing, availability and prerequisites may also differ in the partner institutions. In spite of the differences the common elements and the on-line discussions of experiences result in better understanding and an opportunity for further harmonisation.

New training method: Creation of on-line communities, utilisation of virtual learning environments

When developing the common modules the realisation and the development of abilities for individual and group work are in the focus. Students of in-service courses are provided with guidelines of the modules including the suggested learning methods and the reading texts (bibliography). They attend learning sessions where they work in laboratories with tutorial assistance. They are taught how to use virtual learning environments (Moodle) and are encouraged and required to join in the on-line communities. It is envisaged that the skills developed during these courses may be spread over the vocational schools where the in-service students teach.

Handbook for studying and applying multimedia methods in vocational training

The University of Huddersfield gained experience in their Master level course of Multimedia and e-learning. These modules are part of the curriculum in the partner countries. The textbook of Educational technology and Multimedia will be a widely used textbook in the Hungarian vocational teacher training institutions and the paper based learning material is excessively combined with individual practical work.

Book of case studies on Master level in-service training

The case studies have a didactical approach with special attentions to the characteristic features of adult learning. Technological innovations are presented and good practices described. Experiences of common module deliveries via virtual learning environments are described.

6. Motivation for teachersThe pedagogical programme of the Master level vocational teacher training introduces practitioner led innovation using ICT in teaching and learning. Emphasis is placed on the selection of approaches appropriate to the learners’ needs and the evaluation of ICT intervention. The aim of ICT related modules is to introduce the course participants to different methods and tools used for eLearning. It is examined what can be done with different tools, how they have developed and what the future trends in eLearning tools might include. The approach is not merely tool-centred, but also the changes in the conception of knowledge and learning that are currently taking place in the modern information society are discussed. The relation between the changing conceptions, changing tools and the need for change in pedagogical thinking is considered.

It is envisaged that the participants of the course will be able to apply multimedia and interactive content for use within teaching and learning with originality; to select

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suitable technologies for application in a specific teaching and learning context appropriately from a range of ICT based approaches with reference to current developments; to research innovations in teaching and learning using appropriate methodologies and to critically evaluate a range of technology based approaches to teaching and learning.

To keep pace with the rapid developments is a challenge for practicing teachers but with proper technological support it can provide motivation for this type of life long learning.

The up-to-date course contents are complemented with the possibility to share individual experiences with peers on-line. Since the students of vocational teacher training courses are teachers themselves they have opportunities to create new methodological solutions and also to implement them.

Raising methodological questions and presenting solutions motivate all participants of on-line communities. Students of in-service training are encouraged to participate in these activities. Tutors only act as moderators during these discussions.

A strong evidence of the motivating effect of the on-line methodological communities was that after completing their master level studies and receiving the required qualification the former students did not cease to be active members of the communities. They provided suggestions, expressed their opinion or simply commented ideas whenever they found a new topic interesting and valuable from the aspect of their teaching profile.

One of the most important effects of the MOTIVATE project is the impact of the on-line communities on the trainee teachers. The on-line communities can continuously motivate the VET teachers to enrich their methodological culture by improving new IT and communication technologies.

Resources[1] Bates, T. (2005) Technology: e-learning and distance education. Second edition

London: Routledge

[2] Collis, B and Moonen. J. (2001) Flexible Learning in a Digital World: Experiences and Expectations. London: Kogan Page

[3] Lockwood, F. & Gooley, A. (2001). Innovation in Open and Distance Learning. London: Kogan Page

[4] Somekh, B. (2006) Action Research a methodology for change and development Maidenhead: Open University Press

[5] Toth, A. and Pentelenyi, P.: Virtual Electronic Learning in Continuing Technical Teacher Training, In: Conference Proceedings of the 9th World Conference on Continuing Engineering Education, IACEE, May 2004, Tokyo, Japan, 525-528. p.

[6] Tóth, P.: Experience with common VLE usage. p113-131 In: Pentelényi, P. (ed.): Virtual Learning Environments. LIGATURA Kiadó, Budapest, 2006, 131 p

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TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION IN MOTIVATE: LESSONS IN SECOND LIFE

David LordSchool of Education and Professional Development

University of Huddersfield, UK d.lord@hud.ac.uk

AbstractPart of the remit for the Motivate project is to report on the possibilities for “technological innovation in vocational teacher education”. The UK partner, the leading provider in the overall project, and the Dutch partner, responsible for overseeing technical input to the project, have experience in the application of e-learning initiatives to the teacher education field. This paper relates the experiences of the University of Huddersfield and Fontys University PTH, the Motivate partner institutions in the UK and the Netherlands respectively, in using the ‘virtual world’ environment, Second Life, to support delivery of teacher professional development courses.The paper begins by examining some of the potential facilities and opportunities available in Second Life, and continues by describing the nature of the experimental work carried out in the two institutions. An appropriate model of e-learning is discussed, and this is used as a basis for evaluation of the experiences of Second Life in the two universities. The paper provides a number of observations regarding the successful implementation of Second Life in teacher education. Concluding remarks address issues of access and motivation, and the comment is made that it is not possible to solely rely on the novelty value of the environment; there must also be investment in the platform, in terms of development time and funding, to provide realistic situations and contexts for learning. Finally, in the paper, some recommendations for future developments in this field are made.

1. IntroductionThe MOTIVATE project title is an acronym: Masters level Opportunities and Technological Innovation in VocAtional Teacher Education. The title reflects the dual aims of the project, to incorporate Masters level modules into the vocational teacher education curriculum, and to introduce the use of new and emerging technologies in its implementation. The curriculum under development is that of the two Hungarian project partners, whilst the partners from Finland, Greece, Holland, Portugal and the UK are responsible for the provision of the expertise. Two of the ‘providing’ project partners, in terms of their contribution to the “technological innovation” aspects of the development, have significant experience of the use of the virtual world environment, Second Life.

Fontys PTH, the teacher education institute of Fontys University in the Netherlands, gained funding in 2007 for a pilot project in Second Life, choosing this platform in preference to alternative virtual world software of which they had previous experience. In a cross-university initiative, Fontys PTH were instrumental in the design and creation of the Fontys Virtual Campus, which they subsequently managed on behalf of the other institutes of the university.

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The University of Huddersfield, the UK partner of the Motivate project, also began their Second Life experience in 2007, when a small team of developers in the School of Education and Professional Development began a pilot project using the environment to support the delivery of a Masters level course for in-service teachers’ professional development.

By conducting interviews with the main developers of the Second Life ‘presence’ in the two institutions, the author gathered data on the experiences throughout the developments. Issues relating to the general provision are reported in sections 3 and 4 of the paper. The information collected which relates to the evaluation of the Second Life experiences is presented in section 5, and comments regarding the success of the respective ventures are made with reference to models of e-learning considered at the start of that section. Firstly, in the next section of the paper, the features and facilities of Second Life are introduced, along with a consideration of the applications of the environment in an educational context.

2. Second Life Features and Uses in EducationSecond Life is an internet-based 3-dimensional virtual world environment populated by virtual people called avatars. In order to enter Second Life a person needs to ‘register’ (at no cost) and obtain an avatar. The environment consists of land, sea and sky, and land can be bought, either as part of ‘the continent’ or as a separate island. An avatar registered as the owner of land must pay a monthly fee for a premium account. There is also a monthly ‘rent’ for land, in addition to the initial one-off payment. Property and services can be created and traded. There is a Second Life economy, and all transactions take place using the unit of currency, the Linden dollar.

Users of Second Life can meet other people, socialise, take part in group activities, participate in events, listen to broadcasts, view simulations, investigate 3-D models, etc. Some activities are freely available to all users, others are available by invitation. If an educational establishment buys an island, for example, and sets up some features and activities on a virtual campus, students can register, and then be invited to become ‘residents’ of the island, in order to make use of the facilities available there.

Kirriemuir (2007) investigates how the virtual environment is being used in Higher and Further Education in the UK, and remarks that most of the institutions surveyed used Second Life to support the delivery of courses. There were also instances of Second Life being used for creating a ‘presence’ for publicity purposes, staging exhibitions of work, conducting research into the environment itself, developing tools and simulations, trying out programming skills (using LSL, Linden Script Language).

From Kirriemuir’s review it is possible to identify the following main categories of usage of Second Life in an educational setting:

Social forum – the opportunity to meet others, enter into debate/discussionsStaging events – multimedia events/facilities – video, audioSimulations - modellingRole play / Gaming

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3. The Dutch Experience Fontys PTH had experience of virtual worlds with the intranet based 3-D Active Worlds prior to the purchase of an island in Second Life in 2007. The decision to change the environment was based on the fact that Second Life provides free avatars, uses a higher quality graphical interface, works on different hardware platforms, and has world-wide availability.

The original purchase was financed from the Fontys ‘technology fund’, a source of funding for the development of new technology with educational applications. The bidding process was informal, requiring a statement of aims and goals of the project, the number of students affected and details of their involvement, details of staff involved, and expected outcomes.

Before building on the island a meeting took place between all 35 Fontys institutes, to gain agreement on the overall design of the virtual campus. Discussions were also held with architects in order to negotiate an ‘open-plan’ design which would facilitate avatar flying into different building complexes! (Lessons had been learnt from the earlier experiences of other institutions. For example, Amsterdam University had re-created their real-life campus in the virtual world, and found that access by flying into enclosed buildings was very problematic!) Fontys PTH now manages and owns the island and campus, renting land for building to the other institutes in order to raise the monthly fee to Linden Labs.

The Fontys virtual campus has been used to host a variety of events, including the staging of exhibitions, museum displays, concerts, meetings, debates, live broadcasts, demonstrations of 3-D tools and simulations.

Fontys use their Second Life provision on a number of courses, mainly in optional modules of their study programmes. In face-to-face sessions, based in classrooms and using demonstrations, students learn about the general features of the environment. Then a student makes an account in Second Life (creates an avatar), learns the basic principles of navigation, and is provided with a piece of land for building (according to an assignment specification). The results of these activities are recorded in a video, which forms part of the assessment requirement of the module.

Students also engage in activities related to their teaching subject. A team of developers has worked with subject specialists to create subject-related features in the Second Life environment. For example, language teachers can now engage in role play in a restaurant setting; engineering students can investigate the workings of a 3-D model of a turbine.

In a current project, the Fontys team has used ‘wrap around face’ software which enables the real-life facial features of a person, obtained from a series of photographs, to be applied to an avatar. The team were commissioned to make a video of the Dutch Education minister making a speech, transfer it to Second Life (having created a life-like avatar to deliver it), and show the performance at a conference he was unable to attend.

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4. The UK Experience In 2007, a small team of teacher educators interested in new and emerging technologies, from the School of Education and Professional Development at the University of Huddersfield, were successful in bidding for funding to conduct an experiment in Second Life. The team proposed to investigate the effects on student motivation and learning, by introducing Second Life on a variety of teacher education programmes. The environment was mainly used on a Masters level teacher professional development programme, the MSc Multimedia and E-learning course.

As in the Fontys experiment, an island was bought, and a virtual campus constructed. The intention was that in-service student teachers would have the experience of using a new kind of online interaction, and an opportunity to try out a tool that they might use with their own students in the future. Although the main developer in the team provided some features for exploration by the students, the main focus of the development was the provision of a meeting forum for the geographically dispersed students.

Also, in a similar development to that involving the Dutch Education Minister, the Huddersfield team gained the support of senior management at the University, by making an video of the Vice-Chancellor appearing virtually in Second Life, and thus promoting the project.

5. Evaluation Much has been written about the potential benefits of e-learning in general and the so-called Web2 technologies in particular. Advantages of e-learning generally include the availability of resources whenever and wherever electronic access is possible, and the possibility of repeated access and exposure to learning experiences without the stigma of repeatedly asking a ‘real person’ for explanation. Web2 technologies, such as wikis, blogs and podcasts, provide the added benefit of “situated learning” and the opportunity for the learner to contribute to the knowledge base. In conjunction with social networking software, these new technologies enable the establishment of “communities of practice” (Wenger, 1998) in the learning process.

Of interest here is the fact that in a virtual world such as Second Life learning can take place and be constructed in the same way, with the added features of anonymity of the participant, and the total involvement and ‘immersion’ of the participant in the simulated environment.

Any evaluation of learning in such an environment should be conducted with reference to an appropriate e-learning model. This section of the paper, therefore, begins with a discussion of two e-learning models, establishing an appropriate context and issues for evaluation, before applying the criteria to the experiences in Second Life of the two Motivate partner institutions under consideration.

5.1 Models of E-learningSalmon (2000) based her analysis of the e-moderating process on a social constructivist model (Vygotsky, 1978). She developed a commonly accepted e-learning model in which learners progress through five stages of increased complexity and involvement: access and motivation; on-line socialisation; information exchange; knowledge

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construction; development. These stages refer to levels of on-line interaction, beginning with the ability to access the system and communicate with others, and culminating with expert skills of conferencing and generation of new forms of knowledge. Salmon’s model also indicates the need for technical skills and support throughout all stages. This social constructivist model is applicable to situations in Second Life where networking and group work is taking place, but does not provide a framework for evaluation of other modes of learning.

The limitation of Salmon’s model regarding the types of learning to which it is applicable, is highlighted by Moule (2007), who argues that a different model is required to encompass e-learning of an individual and instructivist nature, and blended learning situations. She provides a refinement of Salmon’s model, the “e-learning ladder”. (See figure 1 – reproduced from Moule (2007))

Whereas the ‘rungs’ of the ladder cover the whole gamut of e-learning experiences from the “instructivist” to the “constructivist” (individual data gathering to interactive communities of practice), it is in the ladder ‘supports’ where issues most useful to the Second Life evaluations are addressed. Moule acknowledges the technical requirements for successful engagement with the environment (access to ICT facilities, the IT skills of the participant, and the support available), but also considers other issues affecting the quality of learning:

group working – the dynamics and composition of the group, and the willingness of members of the group to collaborate and engage with each other (where interactive methods are used);

facilitation – availability of a tutor or moderator to initiate and organise activities, answer questions (facilitation can often be successfully achieved in face-to-face interactions if a blended learning model is adopted);

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longevity of engagement – the length of time spent in the e-learning environment (sufficient exposure to the facilities provided, or to other participants, for meaningful interaction).

The ‘Moule e-learning ladder’ provides a useful structure when considering participant engagement with an e-learning environment such as that provided in Second Life, and aspects of the model will be referenced in the following evaluations of the Dutch and UK Second Life experiences:

5.2 Dutch Experience EvaluationThe Second Life presence at Fontys serves to enhance the learning process by providing facilities and features for engaging the student teachers while they are on the real-life campus. Since the virtual environment is used to enrich the face-to-face learning, they can become fully involved in, and indeed contribute to, the contextual situations provided. They use their real-life encounters with peers and tutors in order to engage in discussion, and develop their ‘communities of practice’.

When students are on the ‘actual’ campus, technical support, facilitation by tutors, access to appropriately high specification computers, help with IT skills, are all available in the immediate ‘face-to-face’ environment, without the necessity of recourse to on-line support.

The overall development is sustainable with continued funding from the rental of ground on the island to the other Fontys institutes. The team gain additional funding from small-scale projects, such as the delivery of the minister’s speech described earlier. Other ongoing development projects include a virtual world viewer which runs on a mobile device, and a facility enabling communication between real and virtual worlds whereby a mobile phone text message can be sent to an avatar in Second Life.

The Dutch project in Second Life is therefore thriving and continually expanding in scope.

5.3 UK Experience EvaluationThe meeting forums held in Second Life on the masters level programme promoted useful discussion, and a number of participants gained insight from the process, were able to form useful working groups and generally benefited from the experience. The environment was seen as a potentially useful tool for incorporation into their own teaching.

However, from the outset the UK experiment was beset with problems, many of which arose from the remoteness of the access point. An insufficiently powerful computer system at home (which is where many students were attempting to gain access) prevented many students from achieving even the first stages of registering and obtaining avatars. Again, issues regarding computer processing power and memory availability made navigation and the associated manipulation of graphics impossibly slow. Inevitably, motivation for participation was affected by these problems with access.

The overall conclusion to which many UK students came was that the disadvantages outweighed the advantages to be gained from the environment. The effort required to

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access the system, to learn how to navigate the system was not sufficiently rewarded in terms of the benefits and facilities to enhance learning provided.

The project was considerably under-funded in terms of development time, and time available for background research and the gaining of expertise; the enthusiasm, motivation and expertise of one particular developer is no substitute for the systematic long-term planning required for sustainable development.

The combination of these factors in the evaluation of the UK experience, unfortunately led to this particular development in Second Life being discontinued.

5.4 Common Student AttitudesWhen referring to student attitudes to the Second Life environment, carried out following both Dutch and UK experiments, the lead developers made very similar observations. In both institutions, student opinion was sharply polarised, with approximately half liking the experience. Furthermore, very few were ambivalent. This phenomenon was referred to by the UK developer as the “Marmite effect”! (For the benefit of those unfamiliar with the product, Marmite is a yeast extract “spread” which people tend to really love or absolutely hate!)

It is interesting to speculate what other factors correspond to the like or dislike of Second Life. The Dutch developer detected a correlation between enthusiasts and ICT students. There may be links with personality traits or learning styles…..

6. ConclusionsBoth the Dutch and UK experiments described in the paper have provided valuable experience for the two institutions in the use of a virtual world environment in higher education, and have raised awareness of its potential for learning. Second Life provides a sophisticated social networking environment where students can meet and interact, with the potential of developing, through a social constructivist approach, strong communities of practice (Wenger, 1998). Furthermore the environment supports facilities which can engage participants in exciting and engaging activities, and the student can benefit from many other learning experiences of an instructivist nature, covering the whole range of learning experiences in the model described earlier, the “e-learning ladder” (Moule, 2007).

The relative success of the UK and Dutch experiences hinges on the issues of access, motivation and technical support. The computer used to access Second Life needs to have sufficient memory and processing power to manipulate the graphical interface. The UK students were geographically dispersed and many had problems with access via their home and work computers. Additionally, both the development of the Second Life presence in the UK and the facilitation/support provided to students were under-funded (relying on the efforts of just one person).

There was novelty value in the projects involving the Education Minister and the Vice Chancellor, and these ventures were successful in securing funding and gaining approval for the development generally. When it comes to the use of the environment by the teacher education students, the “showpiece” developments are less important than the provision of contextual and relevant situations and activities.

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The following recommendations can be made:

Strategic planning needs to take place, with management backing and support.A dedicated team, fully supportive of the development, must be put in place.Technical and facilitation support is required, with staff development available.Sustainable funding sources need to be developed and maintained.Students require contextual learning and opportunities for collaboration and contribution.

Finally, there are certain developments taking place which are worthy of mention, and may affect future provision in the field. In 2007 Linden Labs published the source code for Second Life, and this has led to the possibility of “open source” virtual worlds. A group of developers (including IBM) produced “Open Sim”. This has similar properties to Second Life, and a virtual world can be created which supports the same features. At the moment Open Sim lacks ‘universality’ (links between virtual worlds created in the new platform), but the further development of a standard “mark-up” language for virtual worlds (similar to html on the Web) would solve that problem.

References[1] MOTIVATE (2007)., Masters level Opportunities and Technological Innovation in

Vocational Teacher Education, On-line http://motivate.tmpk.bmf.hu/, Accessed: 20/10/09

[2] Moule, P (2007), Challenging the five-stage model for e-learning: a new approach, ALT-J, Research in Learning Technology, Vol. 15, No. 1, March 2007, pp. 37–50, Routledge

[3] Kirriemuir, J (2007)., The Second Life of UK Academics, Ariadne issue 53, On-line http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue53/kirriemuir/, Accessed: 20/10/09

[4] Salmon, G. (2000) E-moderating: the key to teaching and learning online (London, Kogan Page)

[5] Vygotsky, L. (1978) Mind in society (Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press)

[6] Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of practice (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press)

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EXPLORATIVE LEARNING AND SOCIODYNAMIC WORKINGSTYLE

Principal Lecturer, dr. Pekka Kalli( Co-operation with dr. Kaarina Ranne)

TAMK University of Applied Sciences, Teacher Education Centre

Abstract: TAMK University of Applied Sciences, Teacher Education Centre has created a model of operation in which experts can enhance their own learning in group work. This model based on the notion of explorative learning is useful in the further development of expertise in any kind of expert organization if only the person in charge can use it. TAOKK has decided to adopt the method as the basis of its own teaching. This method has connection to another important model called DDE –discussion based on disparate expertise. Keywords: Explorative learning, collaborative work, sociodynamics, expertise.

1. Main problem and how we have tried to solve it?One of the main questions in current pedagogy is how to combine cognitive and emotive processes fruitfully in learning activities. In our project, “Topakka” in Finnish, we have tried to combine progressive inquiry learning, or explorative learning as we also call it, and sociodynamic leadership in teachers’ working model.

Explorative learning is a way of thinking where you compare learning to inquiry or to innovative and creative work. The main theoretical basis is in cognitive psychology and in social constructive pedagogy. The main ideas came to Finnish discussion from Canada. The most significant works are from writers such as C. Bereiter and M. Scardamalia. [1] In Finland researchers who have specialized in this field are professors Kai Hakkarainen and Kirsti Lonka. [2]

From autumn 2006 until spring 2008, in vocational teacher education in the Tampere University of Applied Sciences, we have systematically used a collaborative learning approach as a teaching method; in this context we call it explorative learning. The empirical material for this project was gathered from nine groups consisting of vocational teacher trainees (N= 198).

The aims of the TOPAKKA project were to

1. Gain new knowledge of how teacher trainees experience the process of collaborative learning / explorative learning;

2. Develop a new approach to the education processes of vocational teacher training;

3. Create a model of collaborative learning to the curriculum of the vocational teacher training programme.

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Theoretical framework and research designAs the settings and the contexts of learning are in a constant change, there is a need for further investigation about the nature of learning processes. It is also necessary to share best practices among established teachers and researchers.

The main idea of explorative learning can be opened by three metaphors of learning, which describe the three dimensions of learning (see Figure 1).

Gaining knowledge

Participating Creating knowledgeFigure 1: Dimensions of learning

If you ask “what is learning” the traditional way of answering begins: First you have to gain knowledge, and then you have to practice. The “new way” starts from the basement of the triangle – participating in practices and creating knowledge.

This is also what we have been trying to do in the actual learning processes. The question is how to do this in a creative and innovative way?

Prof. Kai Hakkarainen and his colleagues have described the process of explorative learning in Figure 2.

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Figure 2: Explorative learning process

This was the theoretical starting point of our research and development project “Topakka” in 2006. But, how to create a learning environment, which is structured enough for safe learning and also free and open for new ideas, and for new practices?

We found that we have to combine the knowledge and skills of sociodynamic leadership with the idea of explorative learning, if we want to get results both in the processes and outcomes of learning.

2. Sociodynamic leadership and learning processThe theoretical outcomes of the TOPAKKA- project can be summarized as follows:

– In a collaborative learning process, the teacher or the group leader has a challenging task in creating a learning environment that is well-structured and sufficiently planned.

– The group dynamics and the leadership of small study groups (4-6 persons) play an important role as regards the theoretical framework of this project.

– The curriculum of teacher education and the problems in authentic learning settings form the context for realistic studying tasks. The tasks are created by the small groups themselves.

– The ways of evaluating the learning process and the results of learning are various; individual assessment, self assessment of a small study group, assessment of peer groups, assessment by the teacher.

The empirical material that was gathered during two years from nine different student groups (20-24 persons per group) was analyzed in several ways. With the following questions we gathered feedback from the teacher trainees about their experiences:

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1. You can compare a collaborative learning process with innovative researchprocesses. Describe and evaluate how innovative your small studygroup process (4-6 persons) has been in your opinion?

2. When you use collaborative learning methods, you also create new methods andpractices. What kind of new practices and ideas has your small study group created?

3. How does the teacher education programme and its new structure support yourown knowledge creation?

3. DDE – discussion based on disparate expertise In his dissertation Mentoring discussion as Spielraum: disparate expertise in mentoring the prospective teacher in vocational teacher education Dr. Harri Kukkonen created a new perspective on mentoring discussion. The purpose of his study is to investigate mentoring discussion in a new way: Mentoring discussion based on disparate expertise (MDDE). In MDDE the prospective teacher and the mentoring teacher have different professional and educational backgrounds and fields of teaching. The mentoring discussion can be understood as a situational and collaborative Spielraum where a narrative on being teacher is produced.

This situation is quite similar in peer-discussion: students are studying or exploring some subject from different points of view. So we are trying to unite our knowledge from these three views: explorative learning, sociodynamics and discussion based on disparate expertise.

4. Further discussionWe published a book in February 2009 on the collaborative learning project in vocational teacher training [3]. We also aim to contribute in various articles and to share experiences with other teacher education experts and teacher trainees in order to further analyze the findings of this project. The OKKA-foundation and University of Applied Sciences in Tampere supported the publication of the book (www.okka-saatio.com, www.tamk.fi)

One big question which still needs more research is assessment. We have tried to use as a strating point a model where assessment is seen as a very wide, context-based process. Learner is seen not only as the owner of the learning prosess, but also as an owner of the assessment process. [4, 232] Assessment must be seen as individual assessment, self assessment of a small study group, assessment of peer groups, assessment by the teacher and the organisation. We must also concentrate more on a question between the process and the outcomes.

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Bibliography [1] Bereiter, C. and Scardamalia, M. 1993: Surpassing ourselves: An inquiry into the

nature and implications of expertise. Chicago, IL: Open Court.

[2] Hakkarainen, K., Lonka, K. and Lipponen, L. 2004: Tutkiva oppinen. WSOY. Helsinki.

[3] Heinilä, H., Kalli, P. and Ranne, K. (eds.) 2009: Tutkiva oppiminen ja pedagoginen asiantuntijuus. OKKA-säätiö and TAMK. Helsinki-Tampere.

[4] Poikela, E. & Poikela, S. 2006, Devoloping Context-based Assessment within The Framework of Problem-Based Learning. In: Poikeala, E. & Nummenmaa, A-R. (eds.), Understanding Problem-Based Learning. Tampere University Press, Tampere 2006.

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ASSESSMENT AS A STRATEGY TO PROMOTE ONLINE INTERACTION

Loureiro, Mª João, Pombo, L.Research Centre for Didactics and Technology in Teacher Education

University of Aveiro (Portugal)Santos, C. (presenter)

Escola Superior de Tecnologia e Gestão do Instituto Politécnico de Portalegre;

Abstract: Elearning, unlike paper-based distance education, allows the interaction of learners with peers, teachers and content through the use of computer mediated communication, that entails the learner interaction with the technology in use. Several authors claim that interaction among people is critical to the learning process and put forward benefits to interactive learning. However, from our experience and from the literature, we noticed that, when using elearning environments, some students often lurk rather than contribute. Moreover the interaction is sometimes superficial not involving critical and creative thinking. In this contribution we share our experience in blearning modules, in particular the assessment strategies we have been using to promote interaction in online contexts. We briefly describe different elearning contexts, from professional education at secondary education level to master course modules, where assessment (peer and teacher assessment) was designed to promote deep thinking and interaction. From those cases, some recommendations are presented.Keywords: assessment, elearning, blearning.online interaction,high order competences

1. IntroductionThe literature indicates that online discussion and interaction is a key issue in online collaborative teaching and learning processes, i.e, in elearning initiatives. As pointed out by Muirhead (2002) elearning, unlike paper-based distance education, allows the interaction of learners with peers, teachers and content through the use of computer mediated communication tools, that entails the learner interaction with the technology in use. The engagement of students in online collaborative activities gives them the opportunity to share and discuss issues aligned with their needs, to take responsibility for their own learning and to develop a variety of competences (Fleming, 2008), such as interaction and sharing, active discussion, retrieving information and problem-solving. Active learning strategies promote enhanced understanding, retention and critical thinking (Mandernach et al., 2009).

Although the identification of the benefits of online interaction and the availability of guidelines (Muirhead, 2002, Woods and Baker, 2004, Hammond, M., 2005, Fleming, 2008) and models (Salmon, 2000; Seddon and Postlethwaite, 2007) to promote interaction in online contexts, several studies report that students often lurk rather than contribute to the discussions and interaction is sometimes superficial not involving critical and creative thinking strategies (Rourke & Kanuka, 2009). Given that, as Palmer et al., (2008) results suggest, passive lurking in online discussion may have no implications in student learning outcomes, one can ask - what can be done to facilitate more efficient interaction?

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To answer the previous question, one possibility is the use of teachers and peers formative assessment strategies. While a great deal has been written on the advantage and benefits of online teaching, little is known on how assessment is implemented in online classroom to monitor and inform performance and progress. Xin & Creasy (2004) indicated that, performance-based assessment, writing skills, interactive assessment and learner autonomy were major assessment aspects to inform teaching and enhance learning. If one of the major roles of online instruction is to increase self-directed learning, as part of the pedagogical mechanism, web-based classroom assessment should be designed and practiced to impact learner autonomy. Portfolio assessment, self assessment and peer-review are some forms of assessment which encourage students to engage continuously and foster a deep approach to learning. Key elements of these approaches are reflection, feedback, and integration of learning and assessment (Dochy & McDowell, 1997).

Teachers and peer assessment is considered to support collaboration between the learners and to encourage them to work as a team (McFadzean & McKenzie, 2001). The review of the literature presented by Topping (1998) reveals that peer assessment is of adequate reliability and validity in a wide variety of applications. Although peer feedback has been demonstrated to support students' learning in traditional classrooms, little is known about its efficacy in online discussions (Ertmer et al., 2007).

The above mentioned means that the potentialities of teachers and peer assessment in online contexts seems to not yet been fully tapped. This paper focuses on the authors’ experiences and is a contribution to the problem - how to promote quality interaction, that involves high order competencies, in online contexts exploring assessment strategies? Five b-learning modules in which assessment strategies were explored are presented. For each module, we describe their contexts, the ICT tools in use, how assessment strategies were used and present random thought/reflections related to the results of the used assessment strategies. In the final session, we present the assessment principles underlying the experiences and put forward recommendations emerging from the authors’ experience.

2. The case studies

2.1. Case 1The Educational Technology module was offered at the University of Aveiro as a compulsory module in initial teachers’ education courses . While some decades ago Educational Technology modules were technology centred, current research in the area postulates that to overcome the weak level of ICT integration in schools, several variables should be considered, as teachers’ gender, pedagogical beliefs, teaching and computer self-efficacy, computer skills and attitudes towards ICT (Sang et al, 2009). Teachers’ education is another variable reported in the literature (Loureiro et al., 2009). Moreover, teachers’ education programs should focus aspects related to how to integrate ICT in the curriculum and the underlying rational and give to the future teachers the opportunity to plan ICT integration (Karsenti et al, 2002, Glaser et al., 2005). Taking that into account, the Educational Technology module aims the development of skills related to the integration of ICT in educational contexts, including it use for educational purposes, and technical ICT skills (the use of ICT tools, for instance to communicate, to search and organise information, …). The module was

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delivered in a b-learning regime. Students were required to critically develop, present and discuss lessons plans integrating ICT, which encompass the search and analysis of ICT resources and literature in the domain of ICT in Education.

To help students to go throughout the literature and to clarify and analyse arguments to base their decision-making process, several thread discussions are organized exploring the LMS in use at the university. The topics of the thread discussions are various, like: advantages of ICT use in education; obstacles to ICT integration; Internet security; and opened sequentially. Students are supposed to discuss answers to each thread based on the proposed literature (available in the content areas of the LMS and also searched by their own).

The students’ posts were assessed and graded by the teachers based on quantity (level of participation) and quality criteria. Quality criteria included: relevance to the topic, correctness (linguistic, scientific, use of references), deepness (posts include different arguments and their rationality), reflexive thinking (questioning, integration and discussion of arguments), and interaction with peers and content (relevant references to peers posts and to the literature in the domain). From the beginning students were aware that the assessment of their contributions is twofold: formative and summative, except for the first thread discussion that is assessed and graded only for formative assessment purposes. Teachers’ acted mainly facilitator, recognizing and valuing students’ best contributions. Teachers’ role is clarified since the beginning of the module. The following transcription illustrates it:

“Being the post a comment to XXX message, you should clarify the relations between them. Moreover, some of the aspects are not contextualised, for instance, those of the last paragraph. We acknowledge the good reflection that you present concerning the advantages of using ICT in education for teachers’ practices. Some others are pointed out in the literature, what are they?” (teacher’s post).

From teachers’ reflection but also from the evaluation of teaching done by the students, we conclude that the explored assessment strategies increased participation and the quality of the interaction. Several students posted messages revealing critical thinking and integration of arguments, levels of interaction difficult to achieve.

“Like A and B, I agree that the integration of ICT in the classroom is related to teachers education in the field. (…) I think that teachers have a lot of opportunities for professional development, since there is a large offer of modules (in-service teachers training). Nevertheless the organisation of those modules, how they are delivered (…) are not relevant. Taking into account the studies of XXX, ICT should also be integrated in initial teachers’ education courses (…). Several constrains to that integration are referred in the literature (…).” (extract of a student’ post).

Moreover, the students stressed that having access to the assessment and grading of their contributions to the first thread discussion helped them to auto-assess their contributions and thus take responsibility for their own learning.

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2.2. Case 2Recently, in the context of an in-service professional teacher’s development module on Computer Science Education, one of our students complained that she had problems to supervise their students when they were placed in enterprises. She was a teacher in a professional education course at the secondary level that includes the placement of students in enterprises for a period of one month. She could only visit their students once during the professional stage given that she has several students, which she recognised as largely inefficient. We decided to implement a small project to evaluate the use ICT to improve the interaction and collaboration between the students - students and the teacher, during that period (Gonçalves, 2009). A social network was used for that purpose. Thread discussion were organised around students problems, engaging them in questioning and collaborative problem solving. While questioning and discussion is considered as main aspects of online learning, the literature indicates that their potential is far from being explored (Fleming, 2008), since teachers do not use questions effectively and students questioning is not promoted (Neri de Souza and Moreira, 2008). As in the previous experience, the teacher acted as a facilitator. Students should share their problems/questions and help each other to find possible solutions.

Assessment strategies were similar to the ones exposed for case 1, i.e., teacher assessment had formative and grading purposes and students were aware of the assessment criteria in use and involved in the process. Teacher’ assessment and grading was delivered in this case periodically (every week). The assessed dimensions were the level of participation and the type of interaction (social, information sharing, questioning). To assess students’ question we adapted Cachapuz et al. (2002) categories to the contexts of professional education. Students questions were thus classified in four categories as illustrated in figure 1.

Figure 1 – Categories of students’ questions and examples

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The evaluation of the experience (students were asked to fill an evaluation questionnaire), showed that students valued the experience and stated that the explored strategies should be used more often. Nevertheless some students felt uncomfortable to assess their peers. This can be related either with the students’ learning styles and the novelty of the experience. Teacher’ assessment improved participation and the significance of the students’ questions. The majority of the students’ questions were related with professional relevant problems. From those, the number of closed questions was greater than the open ones (table 1), which we think is normal taking into account the contexts and level of education.

Table 1Categorization of students’ questions.

Questions Open Closed

Professional relevant 9 16

Academic 1 5

Peers’ feedback contributed to the specification of the students’ problems as illustrated in the following transcriptions and the development of evaluation competences and critical thinking.

“I had problems to install software XXX, could you help me?” (student 1)“(…) you have to explain the situation. What was the message error?” (student 2)

2.3. Case 3Educational Software Evaluation (ESE) was offered in a b-Learning mode and was part of the Master’s Course on Multimedia in Education at the University of Aveiro, created in 2002/03, which was primarily delivered online. The ESE’s main goal was the development of evaluation competences by students, in particular of educational software evaluation. Considering the learning outcomes defined for the module, the purpose was to lead students to develop an educational software evaluation project, in which they had to define and describe: (i) the evaluation object and the purpose of the study, (ii) the nature of the study, (iii) the evaluation goals, (iv) the participants, (v) criteria and indicators, (vi) the data gathering strategies and tools, (vii) the data collection itself, (viii) the analysis of the data, and (ix) the conclusions reached.

Bearing in mind that we live in an Information Society, apart from the competences needed to face the challenges this raises, the ESE module also aims at promoting the development of general competences, such as (i) critical use of ICT in educational context (blogs, concept maps…), (ii) collaboration, (iii) research, (iv) information search, organization and treatment, (v) development and evaluation of work/education plans, among others.

The ESE module covered the time span of five weeks – January and February 2007 –, and had two face-to-face sessions (twelve hours each). The remainder of the activities took place online. The proposed activities and tasks are fully described in Loureiro et al. (2007). Prior to the start of the module, the teacher and the tutor prepared the documents and the activities related to the module itself and made them available in a LMS. This e-Learning platform was also used to deliver information on bibliography, to discuss the

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tasks, clarify doubts and evaluate the module (a specific forum was created for that purpose). Besides the LMS, a blog was created for this particular subject and it aimed at supervising the students’ work, sharing information, discussing topics related with the tasks and the tasks themselves (http://ase07.blogspot.com).

The explored assessment strategies comprise: i) self assessment, since students had to write individual reflections along the teaching and learning process; ii) peer assessment, for instance, of the proposed projects as well as of the final reports and of the developed collaborative competencies; iii) teachers’ assessment of the ongoing work and of the products. The evaluation of the teaching was made through the triangulation data gathered in an online questionnaire (http://wsl2.cemed.ua.pt/ase) and the initial and final students’ written reflections (http://ase07.blogspot.com).

Although the majority of students considered that the activities were relevant and well structured, from figure 2 one can conclude that the less important tasks were the activities related to students’ assessment – individual reflections (self-assessment), survey of perceptions and self and peer assessment of the development of the group works and of the collaborative competences. Students felt uneasy and confused because they are not used to assess other colleagues and they may have some prejudices about face-to-face evaluation. Some of them sent their peer assessment sheet to the teachers’ email and kept their colleagues out of the process. This aspect is important considering that most of the students who attended the module were teachers. Taking that fact into account, these results can be explained by a deficient evaluation culture in teachers’ practices (as reported by Loureiro et al., 2007), which in our view should be natural and frequently practiced.

The relevance and dificulties of the tasks

0 4 8 12 16

Survey of perceptions

Reading of bibliography

Discution and synthesis of reading

Auto-assessment

Group work

Presentation and discussion of group work

Auto- and hetero-assessment

Concept maps

Hetero-assessment of colaboration competencies

Prop

osal

task

s

Number of studentsdificultyrelevance

Figure 2– Students’ perception about the relevance and difficulty of the purposed tasks, including assessment tasks (adapted from Pombo et al., 2009b)

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The assessment framework used in the ESE module revealed some positive and negative aspects. Specially because ESE was a b-Learning module, it was very important that the assessment tasks were online and timetabled within the module, as this (i) allowed the assessment to focus not only on the learning product, but most of all on the learning process and (ii) enabled students to develop their knowledge individually and collaboratively by re-thinking and re-discussing the module contents over and over again (Pombo et al., 2009b).

The module contemplated group as well as individual assessment because, in this way, it was easier to assess students according to their personal involvement in the proposed tasks. However, and particularly in group work, it was difficult to assess the students’ real individual contributions because, most of the times, the groups resorted to communication tools outside the LMS and module blogs, for instance, Skype and MSN messenger, etc. This is why self and peer evaluations were so relevant in terms of the final summative assessment (20%). One of the main problems of the assessment framework used resulted from the fact that the module duration was only one month and the assessment tasks are very time consuming, not only for the student but also for the teacher and the tutor.

Regarding the online interaction with the teachers, some students felt the need for being guided. Students stated that the teacher should have given them feedback more frequently and should also have been more directive. Nonetheless, most of these students admitted they had developed a systemic competence that was not in the module’s guidelines (but the teacher thought it was very important), i.e. to be able to do research and develop a project work autonomously.

2.4. Case 4The post-graduation module described as case 4 is the Distance Education (DE) module, which is part of the Doctoral Course on Multimedia in Education. This module was also offered in a blended learning mode with two face-to-face sessions (like in the previous case). The duration of this module was a five-week period with intensive online elements.

Following the results of the previous study, case 3 (Loureiro et al., 2007; Pombo et al., 2008) some changes in the design of the module were undertaken. Regarding collaboration, in the previous module (case 3), apart from face-to-face sessions where the tasks were discussed, it happened essentially inside the groups. Inter-group collaboration was scarce partially due to the fact that each group developed their project in a different blog. In the DE module, instead of using one blog per group, we decided to use only one site (http://ead0809.wetpaint.com) for the whole class in order to increase the collaboration among groups. Another strategy implemented in the DE module to increase the collaboration between groups was to demand to the students to assess the work done by at least two other groups, using open asynchronous tools for that purpose. This way, students would gain a deeper knowledge of each other’s work and could be more collaborative online.

Among the skills that students are supposed to develop in a third cycle that underlie the creation of the Doctoral Course on Multimedia in Education, firstly implemented in 2008/09, it is possible to mention the following: research, selection, systematization and information synthesis, communication, collaborative work and assessment skills (self

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and peer assessment). The learning outcomes of the module were defined taking that into account and the methodology based on problem solving and project work. The proposed activities and schedule are described in Pombo et al. (2009a).

The assessment modalities comprised several aspects, namely the assessment of the learning process and the learning products, as well as self and peer assessment of the collaborative competences and of the project (literature revision paper) developed by the students. The assessment included a formative component to which special emphasis was ascribed. The final marks and the respective weights were negotiated within the class in the first face-to-face session. Formative feedback was delivered along the process, trying to answer students’ questions as well as giving constructive suggestions about what to change, how and why. In order to contribute towards the reflection about the learning outcomes, some reflective activities were proposed, such as: sharing the work being developed, peer assessment of the group work and reflection about the skills developed, either in the face-to-face sessions or at a distance (weekly individual reflections).

The evaluation of teaching was made by the students in an online questionnaire. The results show that peer assessment, using open asynchronous communication tools for that purpose (the wiki of the module), improved students’ comments on the work of other groups during the module. The intention was to increase collaborative work among groups, during the process, which was verified, namely by the interactions in the wiki and through the final comments to the module. Like in the previous case, some students felt uncomfortable in assessing their peers and assessments tasks were the less valued (Pombo et al., 2009a).

On the other hand, some new less positive aspects came out from the evaluation of the module. Students regretted the fact that the individual reflections, made using a GoogleDocs form, could not be shared with their colleagues, only the teachers had access to them. Nevertheless, some students felt more comfortable with the situation. Another advantage was that students’ reflections were not influenced by those of their colleagues, who posted their opinions earlier.

As positive aspects that were maintained from the previous experience (case 3- ESE module) we can mention the flexibility that was implemented since the very beginning of the module. Students felt comfortable to be part of the whole process, including choosing activities instead of having them imposed by the teachers, which might hinder students’ motivation.

2.5. Case 5Case 5 relates with a post-graduation module concerning Evaluation and Quality in Education (EQE). As in the previous case, most students are teachers (although teaching at different level of education) and are enrolled in a PhD course. All those students intend to develop their research projects in the area of educational evaluation. Unlike the students of the ESE and the EAD modules, the students of the EQE module have little practice concerning the use of ICT for online learning, i.e, they had no previous experience in distance education.

A LMS was used with the objective of information delivery but also to facilitate the communication between the students and the teachers and among the students, thus promoting collaborative work. The main objectives of the module were the expansion of

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students collaborative, meta-cognitive and evaluation competencies. Taking those objectives into account auto and peer assessment was performed for all the proposed activities.

One of the activities, the last one, developed within the EQE module aimed the auto and peer assessment of the learning strategies explored by the students during the module. Students, in group, should describe and analyze the working strategies explored by the group and the mobilized individual, cooperative and collaborative learning strategies. That analysis should be based on different papers that discuss this various types of learning strategies and presents analysis frameworks (Gunawardena et al., 1997, Dillenbourg, 1999, Bradley, S and McConnell, D., 2008, and Qiu, M., 2008). Students’ involvement and satisfaction with the task was very high, which we think is related both to the motivation and the value that those students grant to evaluation and to self reflection.

3. Final thought and recommendationsThe above described experiences are based on an “authentic assessment”, which implies that the assessment process was thought as an inmost part of the teaching and learning process (Wiggins, 1998) and students were assessed “within a relevant context and are required to collaborate extensively to produce a product that demonstrates the knowledge, understanding and skills they have learned (…) and the ability to manage (…) activities” (BackBoard Connections Pty Ltd, 2002, p. 6).

Bearing in mind current thinking regarding assessment and HE, in particular the orientations inherent to the Bologna Declaration, the inclusion of self and peer formative assessment was also valued. Draper (2007) points out three different, but mutually reinforcing, reasons to include self and peer assessment when designing a course. Students are required to have a greater degree of autonomy and, consequently, to be less dependent on their teachers to develop lifelong learning (1). In the near future, given that efforts are being done to expand HE, the students/teachers rates will be bigger, this implies that other sources of feedback, like peers’, must be used (2). These sources are sometimes better because students work things out for themselves and peer explanations can be better understood than those from the teaching staff (3). Considering the characteristics of elearning (e.g. Gomes, 2004), the mentioned reasons are even more important in this context than in face-to-face courses.

As far as the feedback loop is concerned, besides the above mentioned principles, we also took into account that it is not useful to give students feedback if they can not understand the reference being used, i.e., what they are supposed to do and the assessment criteria. As reported above, those aspects were presented and discussed with the students either in the face-to-face sessions or in the LMS forum. Formative feedback was also delivered, trying to answer students’ questions as well as giving constructive suggestions about what to change, how and why.

From the reported cases, it can be concluded that the quality of online interaction varies with contexts and from students to students, i.e., students with different characteristics (motivations, needs, learning styles, ICT skills, …) and expectations will interact differently. Our results suggest that if assessment is considered for grading purposes and students have access to teachers’ assessment, i.e., assessment is embebbed in the teaching and learning process, students participation and the quality of interaction will

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increase. This means that, from one hand, teachers should expect different types of interaction behaviours and, from the other hand, encourage high level of interaction by periodically grading students’ contribution in online discussions (recommendation 1).

From his literature review Hammond (2005, p.18) put forward that “learners should have knowledge, experience, and understanding of the benefits of group work; be confident in and have some level of proficiency in ICT”. Concerning the use of assessment to promote online interaction, the above described experiences do not confirm this statement. As described above, while in cases 1, 2 and 5 (were online interaction was a novelty to the students) teachers and peer assessment was essential to promote quality online interactions, from cases 3 and 4 (students enrolled in post-graduation degrees related with Multimedia in Education), it emerge that students’ perceptions about evaluation and assessment can hinder the process. Moreover, as reported in case 5, students’ positives perceptions toward assessment seem to be related with their level of satisfaction with assessment tasks. It is thus important, prior to the use of similar strategies, to discuss with the students their benefits in order to help them to develop positive perceptions concerning assessment (recommendation 2). We believe that this can be achieved by the implementation of the activity described in case 5.

Deep assessment of online interaction is time consuming and may not be compatible with the diversity of task both students and HE teachers have to cope with. Our experience suggests that quantitative aspects of assessment should use efficient tools in order to turn them automatic. Existing LMS and Web 2.0 tools gives access to the statistics of the use of the system in demand. From our results, in particular the increased interaction following the periodic grading of students’ contributions reported in case 2, we propose that those statistics should be sent to the students and teachers by the system every week (recommendation 3).

Ebersole (2009) reports that faculty teachers with more assessment experience have higher levels of participation in and unique attitudes toward assessment. Having that in mind and our experience, in order to develop the expected attitudes towards assessment, we recommend that the aassessment strategies, like the ones referred in this paper, shouldn’t be explored in a single module/discipline (recommendation 4).

Taking into account that the potentialities of teachers and peer assessment in online contexts seems to not yet been fully tapped, in this paper, the authors share and reflect about their experience in the domain. We expect to have offered a valuable contribution to the use of assessment as a strategy to promote quality online interaction.

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[3] Cachapuz, A., Praia, J., e Jorge, M. (2002). Ciência, Educação em Ciência e Ensino das Ciências. Lisboa: Ministério da Educação.

[4] Dillenbourg, P. (1999). What do you mean by collaborative learning? In P. Dillenbourg (Ed) Collaboraive-learning: cognitive and computational approaches. Oxford: Elsevier, 1-19.

[5] Dochy, F.J.R.C.; McDowell, L. (1997). Assessment As A Tool For Learning. Studies in Educational Evaluation, 23 (4), 279-298.

[6] Draper, S.W. (2007). A momentary review of assessment principles. REAP Conference – Assessment design for learner responsibility, 9-31 May. URL: http://reap.ac.uk (accessed on 28 August 2007).

[7] Ebersole, T. (2009). Postsecondary Assessment: Faculty Attitudes and Levels of Engagement. Assessment Update, 21(2), 1-2.

[8] Ertmer, P. A, Richardson, J. C., Belland, B., Camin, D., Connolly, P., Coulthard, G., et al. (2007). Using peer feedback to enhance the quality of student online postings: An exploratory study. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 12(2), article 4. URL: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue2/ertmer.html. (accessed on 28 August 2008).

[9] Fleming, D. (2008), Using best practices in online discussion and assessment to enhance collaborative learning. College Teaching Methods & Styles Journal, 4(10), 21-36.

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[11] Gomes, M. J. (2004). Educação a distância: Um Estudo de Caso sobre Formação Contínua de Professores via Internet. Braga: Centro de Investigação em Educação da Universidade do Minho.

[12] Gonçalves, R. (2009). Utilização de uma rede social na orientação de estágio no Ensino Secundário. Relatório da disciplina de Didáctica da Informática. Aveiro: DDTE, Universidade de Aveiro.

[13] Gunawardena, C. N., Lowe, C. A. & Anderson, T. (1997). Analysis of a global online debate and the development of an interaction analysis model for examining social construction of knowledge in computer conferencing. Journal of Educational Computing Research 17(4), 397-431.

[14] Hammond, M. (2005). A Review of recent paper on online discussion in teaching and learning in higher education. Journal of Asynchronous Learning Networks, 9(3), 9-23.

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[16] Lloyd, M. (2005) Towards a definition of the integration of ICT in the classroom. In AARE 2005, AARE, Eds. Proceedings AARE '05 Education Research - Creative Dissent: Constructive Solutions, Parramatta, New South Wales.

[17] Loureiro, M. J., Pombo, L., Balula, A & Moreira, A (2007). Integrating Eassessment as an Inmost Part of the Teaching and Learning Process. In Proceedings of the. World Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, and Higher Education. Chesapeake: VA: AACE, 360-365.

[18] Loureiro, MJ.; Pombo, L.; Barbosa, I.; Brito, A.L. (2009). A utilização das TIC pelos alunos dentro e fora da escola revisitada: um estudo em Escolas do concelho de Aveiro. EUKids Online – Portugal. Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 3 July.

[19] Mandernach, B.; Forrest, K.; Babutzke, J.; Manker, L. (2009). The Role of Instructor Interactivity in Promoting Critical Thinking in Online and Face-to-Face Classrooms. MERLOT Journal of Online Learning and Teaching, 5(1), 49-62.

[20] McFadzean, E. & McKenzie, J. (2001). Facilitating virtual learning groups – a practical approach. Journal of Management Development, 20(6), 470-494.

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[22] Neri de Sousa, F.; Moreira, A. (2008). Perfis de questionamento CTS na formação de professores em TIC. In I. Martins & R. Vieira (Eds), V Seminário Ibérico, I Seminário Ibero-americano Ciência, Tecnologia e Sociedade no Ensino das Ciências. Aveiro: Universidade de Aveiro, Portugal.

[23] Palmer, S.; Holt, D.; Bray, S (2009). Does the discussion help? The impact of a formally assessed online discussion on final student results. British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(5), 847 – 858.

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[25] Pombo, L., Loureiro, M.J., Balula, A. & Moreira, A. (2008). Teaching and evaluation strategies in online contexts – the case study of Educational Software Evaluation. In Proceedings of the IASK (International Association for the Scientific Knowledge) - International Conference Teaching and Learning 2008. Aveiro: IASK, 148-155.

[26] Pombo, L.; Loureiro, M.J.; Balula, A.; Moreira, A. (2009b). Diversity of strategies to promote effective b-Learning: a case study in Higher Education. In Ulrich Bernath, András Szücs, Alan Tait and Martine Vidal (Eds), Distance and E-learning in Transition – Learning Innovation, Technology and Social Challenges, ISTE & John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

[27] Qiu, M. (2008). Sense of Collaboration in Different Group Configurations in Online Graduate Course Discussions. In K. McFerrin et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of

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Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education International Conference 2008 (pp. 3126-3132). Chesapeake, VA: AACE. URL:

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[28] Raby, C. (2004). Analyse du cheminement qui a mené des enseignants du primaire à développer une utilisation exemplaire des TIC en classe.Thèse de doctorat présentée à l’Université du Québec à Montréal. URL:

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[29] Rourke, L. & Kanuka, H. (2009). Learning in communities of inquiry: a review of the literature. Journal of Distance Education, 23(1), 19-48.

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[32] Seddon, K.; Postlethwaite, K. (2007). Creating and testing a model for tutors and participants to support the collaborative construction of knowledge online. Technology, Pedagogy and Education, 16 (2), 177-198.

[33] Topping, K. (1998). Peer Assessment between Students in Colleges and Universities. Review of Educational Research, 68(3), 249-276.

[34] Wiggins, G. P. (1998). Educative assessment. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

[35] Woods, R.; Baker, J. (2004). Interaction and Immediacy in Online Learning. The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 5(2). URL: http://www.irrodl.org/index.php/irrodl/article/viewArticle/186/268 (assessed on 25 September 2009).

[36] Xin, L.; Creasy, K. (2004). Classroom assessment in web-based instructional environment: instructors’ experience. Practical assessment research & Evaluation, 9(7). URL: http://PAREonline.net/getvn.asp?v=9&n=7 (assessed on 20 September 2009)

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38

INTER-UNIVERSITY COLLABORATIVE CURRICULA DEVELOPMENT

Haris PapoutsakisElectrical Engineering Department

Technological Education Institute (TEI) of Crete harispap@career.teicrete.gr

Abstract:Research on collaboration issues started in the early 1990s and it was soon realized that the tools people need to work with others are different to the ones needed to work alone. Groupware differs from past software. Taking full advantage of existing information systems, groupware represents a fundamental change in the way knowledge-based organizations use information technology. Our experience with MOTIVATE, an international project where six European Universities develop common Master level courses, lead us to investigate into the ways Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) could be used to ameliorate inter-university, collaborative curricula development.The paper first explores the two different approaches to knowledge transactions; internal knowledge markets and the internal communities’ approaches that dominate knowledge sharing within an organization, be it a firm or a university. It then examines where collaboration is required, under same or different time and place environments, and the peculiarities of the information systems involved in every occasion. Triggered by the findings of two empirical studies, it extrapolates on how collaborating universities can make groupware the backbone of their knowledge sharing infrastructure. The paper concludes that proper use of ICTs may revolutionize the inter-university, collaborative curricula development process.Keywords: Inter-university Collaboration, Curricula Development, Knowledge Sharing, Information and Communication Technologies, Groupware.

1. IntroductionInter-firm collaboration has been addressed, from a general perspective, by numerous researchers (Davenport and Prusak 2000; Grand and Baden-Fuller 1995; Sveiby 2001; von Krogh et al, 2000), among others. The majority of the above cited literature focuses on inter-firm collaboration and refers to commercial organizations. In a prophetic article Drucker (1988) had long ago foreseen that we are at the beginning of the third evolution in the structure of organizations that are becoming information based and that in the future will be organized not like manufacturing organizations, but more like a symphonic orchestra, a hospital or a university. Each organization will be composed mainly of specialists who direct their own performance through feedback from others: colleagues, customers and students.

In reverse of what Drucker prophesied, modern universities, especially after the Bologna Accord (1999), are organized in a way similar to that of a commercial organization. They have objectives to meet, budgets to comply with and managers to make sure that they will perform according to their plan. In this paper, we focus on the

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ways that ICT-based tools, traditionally used by collaborating organizations, could also be effectively used by collaborating universities.

In MOTIVATE (2007-2009), an international project funded by the European Union (EU), universities from six EU countries (Finland, Greece, Hungary, Portugal, The Netherlands and United Kingdom) have joined efforts in developing common Master level courses, using Technological Innovation, for Vocational Teacher Training. For this reason, our investigation originates from a practical point of view and emphasizes on the ICT-based tools and techniques that facilitate inter-university collaboration on curricula development and particularly among academics and staff members from different universities or departments. This means not only encouraging academics to share knowledge on a person to person basis, but also to put their knowledge in a form that others can easily access it. Under this perspective we believe that the challenge is to recognize where ICTs fit in the overall knowledge sharing arena of the universities.

It is important to examine the channels that permit and facilitate information to flow inside and within the collaborating groups of academics. According to Martin and Marion (2005), universities serve as the platform to enable academics to express their ideas and add substantial value to the information-processing environment. Two are the main types of information handling activities: the procedure-based ones (related to the procedures that each one of these groups is involved in) and the knowledge-based information handling activities. We shall focus our interest on the information systems designed to support knowledge-based activities. Systems that support academics of the various groups in performing information handling activities in order to work together, share expertise and knowledge, and develop new curricula. As of their nature, these systems must support activities that do not always follow the same or similar process and that deal with information and knowledge that cannot be easily captured.

The rest of the paper is organized as follows. In the next session, we take a brief look at the two different approaches that dominate knowledge sharing within an organization. Namely, the one of internal knowledge markets, based mainly on reciprocity, and the one of internal communities, based primarily on commitment. We then examine the situations where collaboration is required, under same or different time and/or place conditions, and the peculiarities of the information systems involved in every occasion. In section three, we extrapolate from the findings of a previous empirical study, in a way that enables us to give, in the conclusions section, certain guidelines that may encourage collaborating universities to make groupware systems the backbone of their knowledge sharing infrastructure.

2. Supporting CollaborationThere are more than one patterns that allow the flow of information and knowledge in organizations, including universities. Cohen (1998) distinguishes two different approaches to knowledge transactions in organizations: Internal knowledge markets and internal knowledge communities. The choice of one of the two approaches is of significant importance, as it affects knowledge sharing. According to Cohen, the proponents of knowledge markets are mainly talking about knowledge interactions between individuals and emphasize on incentives as they tend to consider that knowledge is a ‘thing’ that can be transferred. Prusak (1997) stated that there are knowledge buyers, sellers and brokers in the organizations, each of whom expects to

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gain something in a knowledge transaction. The main price mechanism governing the knowledge market is reciprocity, the expectation that one will get valuable knowledge in return for giving it. Or, to put it in another way, one needs to contribute knowledge to become part of the knowledge networks on which his success depends.

Supporters of the knowledge community approach focus on the group and give more attention to encouraging connections among people, which may lead to deeper exploration of the process of knowing. They suggest more emphasis on personal connection and commitment to shared success –but also risks and benefits– and less on knowledge transactions, which von Krogh (1998) associates with ‘low care’ social situations. Collaborators worry about themselves and their partners; buyers and sellers don’t. Trust and good will influence act much more powerfully in a community or collaboration world than they do in the relatively impersonal market environment.

Our experience within the academia lies in between. Most academics and staff care about their colleagues and knowledge markets within universities depend on trust and reciprocity while the value of exchanged knowledge cannot be precisely defined and ‘payment’ for it is usually intangible. Academics, as knowledge community members, are individuals who are better prepared to contribute to the group effort when they expect a share of the benefits of the group success. In their academic market place, they also make a ‘market’ calculation of what they will get in exchange for the knowledge they offer (Basu and Sengupta, 2007).

For the past 25 years, Decision Support Systems (DSS) have been used in order to help more than one person work together to reach a decision. McNurlin and Sprague (2004) note that DSS traditionally support ‘pooled-interdependent’ decision making (several people to reach a decision jointly by working together simultaneously and interacting) or ‘sequential interdependent’ decision making (one person makes a decision –or part of a decision– and passes it on to another person). It is not always easy to tell when the decision making starts as certain supplementary activities (such as data gathering, communicating and interacting) are also part of the process.

The activities of groups of academics and staff involved into inter-university collaboration on curricula development can be divided into two generic categories:

a. Communication and interaction, where communication is conceived as transmitting information from one person to another or to several others and interaction means back-and-forth communication over time. Example: Office systems and in particular e-mail used for everyday exchange of views on the development of new curricula.

b. Decision making and problem solving, where members of the groups reach a decision or form a consensus. Example, not very commonly met: The use of ICT-based Decision Support Systems to make a difficult decision related to the new curricula implementation.

Both types of group activities are needed in collaboration and, historically, systems supporting group work have originated from one or the other of these two major functions.

Johansen (1991) and his colleagues of the Institute for the Future are categorizing the work of groups using a variation of the DeSantis and Gallupe (1985) matrix, by having time on one dimension (same time/different time) and place on the other (same place/different place). The time/place framework they propose in their search for ways

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in which technology can be utilized to support ‘anytime, anyplace’ collaboration is shown in Figure 1. The two options (same or different) of the parameters time and place designate the way the group members are communicating and interacting over time and/or distance. The ‘same time/same place’ cell, for example, includes electronic meeting support systems. The ‘different time/different place’ cell incorporates such communication-oriented systems as voice and e-mail, group editing, work flow, etc.

Face-to-Face Meetings

� Electronic copyboards� Electronic decision support� Team-building tools

Teams in Place

� Team room tools

Cross-Distance Meetings

� Audioconferencing� Videoconferencing� Screen sharing

Ongoing Coordination� Voice mail� E-mail� Facsimile� Group editing� Project managers/schedulers� Work flow

Platforms� Local area networks� Advanced workstations� Operating environments� Integrated office suits

Same Time Different Times

SamePlace

DifferentPlaces

Figure 1 Groupware OptionsSource: R. Johansen of the Institute for the Future, Menlo Park, CA.

In the two subsections following we shall further comment on some particular situations where the use of information systems to support inter-university collaboration is of importance. Until recently there has been little integration among the systems in the four cells, even though it is clear to investigators and system developers that supporting collaboration must aim to permit anytime, anyplace group working.

2.1 Same Time / Same Place CollaborationSupporting same time/same place collaboration has generally meant supporting meetings. Traditionally, academics and staff members from the collaborating universities involved meet face-to-face in order to align their objectives, develop the new curricula framework and finally reach a first decision. Meetings are part of the daily schedule of any staff member and McNurlin and Sprague (2004) mention the results of a US study that have found that the average executive in a US company spends more than 800 hours a year in meetings. The number alone represents an approximate 30 percent of total work hours, and what is more, the executives reported that they considered about 240 of those hours to have been wasted in useless meetings. In the relevant literature, there are no similar figures for academics, but we believe that they would not vary dramatically.

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Another ‘same time/same place’ situation that can benefit from the use of group support systems is the traditional presentation and discussion sessions usually applied in academic conferences and in meetings of a certain importance.

2.2 Different Place CollaborationCollaboration among groups of academics and staff that work in different places and probably at different times is another promising use of ICTs, and particularly groupware. In the emerging global academic collaboration, academics and staff, exactly in the same way that staff of multinational companies do, can use the three main regions of the globe (Asia, Europe and the Americas) to extend their workday to round-the-clock by passing work from groups in one region to the next at the end of each one’s workday. At the end of the 24 hours day, they will have accomplished three days worth of work, without any of them having to work long hours. The University of Hong Kong, in China, with its collaborating universities in Finland and USA, is a good example of the situation described above.

One of the results of using ICT to support collaboration is the formation of the so called virtual teams; they exist in a space but not in one place. Some of them never meet face-to-face. They are formed to handle a new curricula development project and then disband after the project is completed. Virtual teams tend to operate in three cells of the Johansen matrix.

• Same time/same place: The team meets face-to-face probably once, at the beginning, to develop the objectives and the basic framework of the new curricula.

• Different time/different place: Team members work separately and then communicate by e-mail to exchange ideas on specific content or even the composition of certain chapters.

• Same time/different place: If the collaborating universities possess strong enough technology, team members may have audio or video conferences to discuss developments and progress towards common goals.

The current MOTIVATE project exploits the use of ICTs for common, Master level curricula development and continues work started in the VELVITT (2003-2005) project, by the same EU partners. The earlier project, as reported by Papoutsakis (2007), developed common modules using Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs), an ICT application designed for education and providing facilities for learning management tools, online learning frameworks, collaborative learning environments, web course design tools, etc. Both the software and the courses developed reside on a server and are designed to manage or administer various aspects of learning, delivery of materials, student tracking, assessment etc. Training material was developed for three common modules: Basic Teaching Skills, Computer Mediated Skills and European Collaboration. The content of each was chosen to compliment the existing curricula of each of the participating institutions and ensure that it could be integrated into existing teaching and learning timetables.

From the above review it becomes obvious that there is a spectrum of group working situations and many types of ICT-based systems that support inter-university collaboration on curricula development. These systems have been around for at least 20 years, and have become increasingly sophisticated over that time. They permit more

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discussion, more evenly spread participation, more high-level discussion, and involvement by more people than a traditional planning meeting would allow. Other tools allow real-time collaboration among distributed academic team members who not only need to hear each other’s voices, but sometimes need to simultaneously see their rough drawings to an academic project in real time. Still other collaboration tools help team members located around the globe ‘converse’, not in real-time but at different times of the day.

3. Results of Previous Studies Two previous studies have triggered us to make inter-university collaboration the subject of this paper. The first one is an empirical research on the relationships of three collaborating industrial groups: manufacturing, quality control, and research and development. What is common between academics and the members of the above three industrial groups is that they are both scientists and share scientific knowledge in their everyday practice. In this first study (Papoutsakis, 2006), the last question in the two symmetrical relationship questionnaires examine the use of certain ICT infrastructure as tools and enablers for inter-organization collaboration, among manufacturing, quality and R&D groups. We are listing here below certain findings, regarding the use of ICT infrastructure, which have triggered us to expose them for the case of collaborating universities:E-mail has been reported as used by 86,6 percent of the participating companies.

• 71 percent of the participating companies use Intranets.

• Internet has been reported as used by 42,85 percent of the participating companies.

• Extranets have been reported as used by 23,65 percent of the participating companies.

• 20,95 percent of the participating companies use Groupware software.

• Workflow software has been reported as used by 11,6 percent of the participating companies.

In a similar way, the last question in the manufacturing performance questionnaire is investigating the use of certain ICT functions on four collaborating issues, closely related to the group performance. As modern universities, especially after the Bologna Accord (1999), are organized in a way similar to that of an organization and their performance is assessed continuously, we are listing here below the findings:

• Facilitating access of information in Data Bases has been reported as an ICT function used by 84,4 percent of the participating companies.

• 82,6 percent of the participating companies use ICTs to coordinate business tasks.

• Facilitating team members to work together has been reported as an ICT function used by 76,4 percent of the participating companies.

• 69,2 percent of the participating companies use ICTs to support decisions making.

The above cited percentages refer to the average of ‘strong’ answers (Likert ratings 5, 6 or 7) between the key-informants of the relevant questionnaires and the complete questions are exhibited in the Appendix. Under the above described

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university/organization analogy we consider the four previously listed ICT functions critical for the performance of universities involved in collaborative curricula development.

The second study (Cheng et al, 2009) is a research among academics of a private Malaysian university. It has to be noticed, though, that it is a Multimedia University and almost 64 percent of the responders were young lecturers between 26 and 35 years of age. The authors investigate the knowledge sharing behaviour among academics of this university, although they comment that there is no direct way to measure the outcome of knowledge sharing in a knowledge-based institution, such as a university. To our understanding, the concept of knowledge sharing within a university is very close to inter-university collaboration, as it is perceived in this paper. For this reason, we are summarizing here below the most interesting of their findings:

• Academics are motivated to share knowledge, if the incentives and reward mechanisms encourage them to create a conducive knowledge sharing environment. Monetary and non-monetary incentives are crucial in generating the passion toward knowledge sharing.

• Personal aspiration and the desire to build a reputation as an expert in their academic environment provides strong inspiration for academics to upload their valuable knowledge work on the university’s knowledge sharing network.

• Academics are encouraged to contribute to the university’s knowledge sharing network if they expect to receive useful knowledge in return.

• Another factor, related to the personal expectation, is the desire of academics to be portrayed as altruistic in helping others with what they know.

The authors also estimate that in a university, the impact of knowledge sharing could be greater than that in a commercial organization.

4. ConclusionsBuilding upon our experience with the MOTIVATE project and considering the findings of the above two previous studies, despite their limitations, we may state that collaborating university work is performed mainly in task-focused teams, where trust and influence are both important for knowledge sharing and collaborative curricula development. Academics from various universities work together as a team for the duration of a project (i.e. the development of new courses or curricula) depending on a variety of ICTs tools for their collaboration. Under this new shift, academics ‘managing’ universities should make sure that their colleagues and staff:

• include in their academic objectives the task of local or international collaboration, which means to share knowledge and available information with colleagues in collaborating departments or universities;

• make best use of the ICT resources (special groupware software and equipment) available within the university.

In doing so universities will take maximum advantage of the positive role that ICT-based collaboration may play in collaborative curricula development and on their overall performance. Our experience with the MOTIVATE project demonstrates that

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the use of ICT-based collaboration tools changes the inter-university collaboration process, maximizes the number of those who can participate in collaborative curricula development, the way they cooperate and even the kind of work they do. Within the partners of the MOTIVATE project, supporting collaboration has been acknowledged as a mainstay and it is commonly accepted that it is conductive to both knowledge generation and sharing. Making available the wealth of knowledge that exists throughout all partner universities is of real benefit to the process of collaborative curricula development and, thus, inter-university collaboration may become the heart of the academia, as inter-firm collaboration has already been for the business world for many years now.

Appendix1. In the two symmetrical Relationship questionnaires, the use of certain ICT infrastructure by the collaborating groups has been evaluated through the responses to the following multiple question (Nr. 12):

Specifically, the use of the following ICT infrastructure is:

Intranet Extranet Groupware , Workflow

Internet , e-mail , ……… … , ….…………

Data warehouse ,

Other ………… , ………..….. ………..…….

For simplicity purposes we have grouped ratings of the 7-points Likert scale into three categories:

• Extremely Strong, Strong or Moderately Strong: Strong

• About Average: Average

• Extremely Weak, Weak or Moderately Weak: Weak

We are assuming that infrastructures not rated at all in the questionnaires are not used by the company for purposes of sharing knowledge, although we understand that there might be some few cases where this was unintentionally disregarded.

2. In the Performance questionnaire, the use of certain ICT functions has been evaluated by the responses to the following multiple question (Nr. 9):

Specifically, the use of the following ICT function is:

- Coordinating business tasks:      

(collecting, facilitating, sharing, etc. information)

- Supporting decision making:      

(reaching the right information at the right time)

- Facilitating member’ team to work together:      

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(no matter where they are)

- Facilitating access of information in Data Bases:      

(no mater where they are)

- Other ………………………………………….:     

- Other ………………………………………….:     

For simplicity purposes we have grouped ratings of the 7-points Likert scale into three categories:

• Extremely Strong, Very Strong or Strong: Strong

• About Average: Average

• Non-Existent, Very Weak or Weak: Weak

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Management Initiatives of Academic Institutions – a Case of an Indian Business School. The Electronic Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 5, Issue 3, pp. 273-282.

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[10] Drucker, P.F., (1988). The Coming of the New Organization, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 66, Issue 1, pp. 45-53 and re-published in The Harvard Business Review on Knowledge Management, 1998, Harvard Business Review Series, Harvard University Press, Boston, MA.

[11] Grant, R.M. and Baden-Fuller, C., (1995). A Knowledge-based Theory of Inter-firm Collaboration, Academy of Management Best Papers Proceedings

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[12] Johansen, R., 1991, Leading Business Teams: How Teams Can Use Technology and Group Process Tools to Enhance Performance, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA. More on his work on the site of the Institute for the Future www.iftf.org

[13] Martin, J. S., and Marion, R. (2005). Higher Education Leadership Roles in Knowledge Processing. The Learning Organization, Vol. 12, Issue 2, pp. 140-151.

[14] McNurlin, B.C. and Sprague, R.H.Jr., (2004). Information Systems Management in Practice, Pearson Educational Inc., New Jersey, Sixth Edition.

[15] MOTIVATE (2007-2009). Leonardo da Vinci project LLP-LdV-TOI-2007-HU-008 co-financed from the European Union. The acronym stands for Masters level Opportunities and Technological Innovation in Vocational Teacher Education. Details can be found at the web-site of the project http://motivate.wetpaint.com/ or http://motivate.tmpk.bmf.hu/

[16] Papoutsakis, H. (2006). How Far Can Information Systems Support Inter-firm Collaboration? Journal of Knowledge Management Practice, Vol. 7, Nr. 3, September.

[17] Papoutsakis, H. (2007). Virtual Electronic Learning in Vocational and Initial Teacher Training: An International Report, Proceedings of the CBLIS 2007 Conference (Computer Based Learning in Science). Heraklion, June-July 2007, Constantinou, C.P., Zacharia, Z.C and Papaevripidou, M. (Eds.), pp. 215-224.

[18] Prusak, L., (1997). Knowledge in Organizations, Butterworth-Heinemann, USA.

[19] Sveiby, K.E., 2001, A Knowledge-based Theory of the Firm To Guide Strategy Formulation, Journal of Intellectual Capital, Vol. 2, Issue 4, pp. 344-358.

[20] VELVITT (2003-2005). Leonardo da Vinci project LLP-LdV-HU/02/ BF/PP-136003 co-financed from the European Union. The acronym stands for Virtual Learning in Vocational and Initial Teacher Training. Details can be found at the web-site of the project www.velvitt.banki.hu or at www.bgk.bmf.hu/velvitt/ourproject.html

[21] von Krogh, G., (1998). Care in Knowledge Creation, California Management Review, Vol. 40, Nr. 3, spring, pp. 133-153.

[22] von Krogh, G., Ichigo, K. and Nonaka, I., (2000). Enabling Knowledge Creation. How to Unlock the Mystery of Tacit Knowledge and Release the Power of Innovation, Oxford University Press, New York, NY.

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UTILIZATION OF WEB-MINING ALGORITHMS IN EVALUATION OF VIRTUAL COURSES

Péter Tóthdirector

Budapest Polytechnic, Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering Educationtoth.peter@tmpk.bmf.hu

Abstract: Lots of electronic-based syllabuses and virtual courses were developed during the last 10-15 years in over the world. However, not much has been heard of their success or efficiency, as would be supported by scientific testing. The present study is to give an overall picture of the structure of virtual courses and the basic knowledge of data mining, mainly in the area of web-mining. The analysis of student behavior in the learning environment is based on a log file created on the server.We have been composed aiming at revealing advantageous practical application possibilities of web-mining for the usage of educational materials based on SPSS Clementine and Google Analytics tools. The “user-centered” philosophy of these tools is in perfect harmony with the concepts of modern marketing, ergonomics and pedagogy. This new approach, as opposed to the traditional “page-centered” philosophy, puts the students’ goals and intentions to the center, and designs the services of the system accordingly, as a matter of fact, as we experienced, quite successfully.Our approach is radically different from the traditional ones, as it is not based upon some “representative sampling” concerning the interaction of the learners and the material, but of the contrary, all interactions of all students can be analyzed at the fine resolution of single keystrokes and mouse clicks.Keywords: web-mining analysis, learner-centered approach, virtual learning environment (VLE)

1. Philosophy of web-miningWeb-mining, was first mentioned by Etzioni [1], who suggested that traditional data-mining techniques for finding hidden patterns in huge databases, can be used to web-based information. Web-mining is an emerging method in education research, assisting instructors and developers in improving learning environments and supporting decision-making of policymakers. [2]

Models for applying usage mining as a research method in education were suggested by Pahl [3] and Zaïane [4], although earlier research already discussed the potential of analyzing on-line courses using this method [5]. According to Pahl, usage mining of e-learning is totally different from usage mining of e-commerce, since the learning process is far more complicated than the shopping process, and its cognitive aspects are much more difficult to track by means of log files. [3]

According to Liu data mining is also called knowledge discovery in databases. It is commonly defined as the process of discovering useful patterns or knowledge from data sources, e.g. databases, texts, the web, etc. The patterns must be valid, potentially useful and understandable. “Data mining is a multi-disciplinary field involving machine

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learning, statistics, databases, artificial intelligence, information retrieval, and visualization. Web mining aims to discover useful information or knowledge from the web hyperlink structure, page content and usage log. Based on the primary kind of data used in the mining process, web-mining tasks are categorized into three main types: Web structure mining (WSM), Web content mining (WCM) and Web usage mining (WUM).” WSM deals with the analysis of visit structures, click series, and with the planning strategy of web sites. WCM is an intelligent search agent, information filtering and categorization, and web query systems can be rated to the range of web content mining. The object of WUM is the analysis of flow, the examination of customers’ habits, and the increasing of interactivity. [10]

Web-mining is a very effective data mining approach developed in the internet-based segments of the business world. In fact, it is applying data mining for sophisticated traffic analysis of websites based on the so-called “log files” continuously being created on the server machine of the content provider. [6] Its aim is to increase the efficiency of the given websites.

These log files of different formats are in principle very rich sources of information about the activities of visitors. The problem here is just the contrary of the usual: we have not too little, but too much information. The size of the log files in the business sphere – depending, of course, on the number of actual visitors and the length of the time period studied – is quite often in the range of several hundreds of MBs or even GBs. This huge body of mainly technical information has to be filtered, transformed, and processed so that valuable pieces of information characterizing the visitors’ behavior and motivation should be gained from it. [7]

For practical web-mining purposes, based on our earlier experiences, we propose the Clementine Web-Mining tools [8]. The “user-centered” philosophy of these tools is in perfect harmony with the concepts of modern marketing, ergonomics and pedagogy.

This new approach, as opposed to the traditional “page-centered” philosophy, puts the users’ goals and intentions to the centre, and designs the services of the system accordingly. As a matter of fact, as we experienced, quite successfully.

Several examples of analysis approaches that proved to be successful and which are supported by very sophisticated software modules – called here “streams” - often containing intelligent learning algorithms:

– Visit and User Segmentation (E-Channel User RFM Classifications, User Mode Determination, Visit Branding)

– Web Site Activity and User Behavior (Visit Activity Variances, Identifying Undesirable Behavior, Lifetime Conversion Tracking, Points of Abandonment, User Activity Focus, Visit Activity Funnels, Navigational Usage)

– Activity Sequence Analysis (Most Common Activity Sequences, Eventstream Visualisation)

– Propensity Analysis

– Advanced User Segmentation

A part of these streams can immediately be adapted to important problems in the world of Internet-based teaching materials.

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2. Basic concepts of web-miningThe log files from our server provide the data that we need for web-mining. A web-mining program reads and processes the web server log files, collecting information that we can then use for web analytics in general. These are among the data points extracted: hostname of the user; path to and name of the resource requested from the server, such as an HTML file; date and time that the request was made; authenticated user name for the user; referral page (the page that the user visited immediately before the current page); user identifier, also known as a user cookie. [8]

The Internet works via a request-response protocol. Each time a user looks at a web page with his web browser, the browser is making a request or a set of requests to a server. The web server sends back a response consisting of data, which the browser then interprets and displays. With each request it receives, the server writes an entry to its log file. Each request corresponds to a resource (a file) on the web site, such as a home page. If the requested page contains additional resources, such as a narrative sound file, a video, an animation, an image, each additional item generates a separate request and, thus, a separate entry in the log file. [8]

Web servers use a variety of log file formats. A basic log file entry might look something like this:

90.111.28.145 -- [15/Apr/2009:14:38:25 +0200] "GET /moodle/mod/resource/icon.gif HTTP/1.1" 304 - "http://mpi.banki.hu/moodle/course/view.php?id=37" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; .NET CLR 1.1.4322)”

IP address -- [date : time] "GET resource, protocol" file size - „URL address of linked web page" „browser type (and other data)"

Users, in this case students are the people who visit (request content from) our virtual course. A set of rules to our web log data is applied to determine whether a user who made a particular request is the same user who made other requests. The user-cookie method is the preferred method for identifying users at most web sites. It is transparent to most users, does not require them to log in, and produces the most accurate data for web analytics.

A visit is a series of requests to a web site made by the same user. More precisely, within the series, each request must occur no more than 30 minutes after the previous one. [8]

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Table 1Event definition file

Event category Event name Event Definition Event

Attributes

Forum Forum /moodle/mod/forum/index.php?id=37 Forum_ID [Forum]

Interactive learning material

Digital vector graphics editing 1

/moodle/file.php/37/Idofuggetlen/Dk1/*

Interactive learning material

Digital vector graphics editing 2

/moodle/file.php/37/Idofuggetlen/Dk2/*

Events are the key interactions that a user makes with our web site, in this case in our virtual course. Defining and tracking events helps us to understand how well our web site is fulfilling its intended purpose. We are able to focus less on the individual pages that users view and more on the actions that users perform. To define events, we must identify a set of pages (URLs) that interest us most for analysis purposes. These pages correspond to our events. [8] A typical set of events in VLEs might include forum, submission, test, interactive learning material, etc. These can be given in event definition file (Table 1).

3. Process of web-mining analysisThe application of web-mining in VLE is an iterative cycle in which the excavated knowledge should “enter the loop of the system and guide, facilitate and enhance learning as a whole, not only turning data into knowledge, but also filtering mined knowledge for decision making”. The web-mining process consists of the same four steps in the general web-mining process as follows: [9]

a) Collecting Moodle usage data. The Learning Management System, in this case Moodle is used by students and the usage and interaction information is stored in the log files.

b) Preprocessing the data. The data is cleaned and transformed into an appropriate format for web analytics.

c) Applying web-mining algorithms. The web-mining algorithms are applied to build and execute the model that discovers and summarizes the knowledge of interest for the teacher or developer.

d) Evaluating the results. The results or model obtained are interpreted and used by the tutor for understanding students’ behavior and by the course developer during improvement process.

4. Case study – Educational Technology and MultimediaThe most technology-demanding subject in technical teacher training is Educational Technology and Multimedia. In the framework of this subject, students on full-time and correspondent courses learn how to use education technological devices in their pedagogical work (overhead projector, video, video projector, documentary camera, etc)

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as well as the means and equipment of preparing and developing information media (transparency, video film, photograph, figure, digital presentation, etc).

The increase in dynamically changing syllabus content and the decrease in the number of contact classes made it necessary to develop, then use electronic syllabuses in this subject first. As a result of the first development we composed a multimedia base syllabus of three modules (basic skills, digital image editing, digital vector graphics editing), which we made available to our students on an optical disc. The electronic syllabus does not only show the structure of education technological devices, their installation and the possibilities of their application in education, but it also surveys and drills the development process of information media. In other words, a lot of emphasis is laid, besides communicating information, on the skilled acquisition of editing programmes.

Meeting this dual requirement was reflected in setting the electronic syllabus contents. In the course of communicating information, images, illustrations, texts (written and narrative), animations and videos, while in the course of presenting structural algorithms, animations supported by narrative explanation were applied.

In the meantime, emphasis shifted increasingly from a multimedia base individual learning environment to collaborative and cooperative learning environments. Therefore we also revised our electronic syllabuses to meet the requirements of the virtual learning environment. Since these syllabuses were available in a html format, it seemed practical to insert them in the same format in Moodle (Figure 1). To the electronic syllabus organized into modules several Moodle objects were added (forum, submission, test, wiki).

Figure 1 Structure of the course

Processing the syllabus was conceived in a blended form. Students took part in 3-hour practices per week, where they learnt how to handle education technological devices and how to use, at a basic level, all those programmes which make the preparation of the most frequently used visual aids, teaching aids and electronic syllabuses in technical and adult training possible.

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Between guided practices students individually had to process electronic syllabuses, prepare their homework, and take part in forums. Through the opportunities offered by wiki, joint syllabus development in a selected topic also took place. Student skills were tested by using the Moodle test module.

As investigation was partly targeted at the processing specialities of the syllabus inserted in html format, let us first see the structure of that. The electronic syllabus, as mentioned earlier, was divided into three modules and then 2 to 3 further sub-modules were separated within each module. One sub-module covered 2 or 3 units, 12 to 22 mixed-structure (hierarchical-linear) display pages on average (Table 2).

The structure of the units and the navigational directions are given in Figure 2. The first pages of the subsections are directly accessible from the main page, and so are the subsequent pages sequentially. The main page can be reached from any page. It is not necessary to use main page subsection links, as pages can be displayed subsequently by clicking on the arrows in the bottom right corner. ”Glossary” and ”Help” are accessible from any display page. It is a problematic part of navigation that the back arrow does not point towards the previous display page but sometimes towards the main page (reference error), thus breaking the continuous processing of the syllabus. Another navigational problem is that sometimes pages which cannot be reached from the menu in the main page, only by sequential navigation, are wedged between the main page and the first page of the first subsection. For this reason these pages were often left out of syllabus processing.

Table 2Structure of the electronic syllabus of the examined course

Modules Sub-modules Marked as Number of Units

Number of Display Page

Basic Skills Basic Skills 1 E1 3 13

Basic Skills 2 E2 2 18

Digital vector graphics editing

Digital vector graphics editing 1 Dk1 3 22

Digital vector graphics editing 2 Dk2 2 18

Digital vector graphics editing 3 Dk3 3 12

Digital image editing Digital image editing 1 Da1 3 18

Digital image editing 2 Da2 3 16

Digital image editing 3 Da3 2 12

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Figure 2 Structure of the Sub-modules

5. Web-mining algorithmsThe main objective of the investigation was to explore by web-mining methods the most important characteristics of student behavior or, in other words, the learning activity during the accomplishment of the Moodle courses. The results presented in the previous chapter do not describe classic e-Learning-base distant learning but blended-form full time training where traditional classroom education is specially integrated with online and offline learning methods.

Students took part in 3-hour practices per week, where they learnt how to handle education technological devices and how to use, at a basic level, all those programmes which play an important role in the preparation of visual aids, teaching aids and electronic syllabuses.

Between two practices students individually had to process electronic syllabuses, prepare then upload in the system their homework, and take part in forums. To assist preparation, self check tests were inserted in the course. Student skills were tested by using the Moodle test module.

In introducing learning activity two approaches were followed. On the one hand, the role in the students’ learning process of the objects which produce learning activity on the virtual course was explored (macroanalysis), and on the other hand the microstructure of processing electronic syllabuses was investigated.

There are two types of web-mining tools in the practice, online and offline methods.

Online web-mining methods such as Google Analytics offer fast, easy-to-survey and clear answers to some of the above questions, thus satisfying the needs of everyday syllabus developers. The precondition of the application of these programmes is that the so-called ”Follow” code (Javascript code) must be placed on the web-site to be analysed. This method does not offer the possibility to analyze data created before the installation of the code.

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Figure 3 Structure of a SPSS Clementine stream

Offline web-mining methods such as SPSS Clementine and its web-mining node are able to provide opportunity for a lot more profound, more comprehensive and more scientific analyses, far beyond descriptive statistics (Figure 3). It is an aggravating circumstance for the application of online tools that within the virtual learning environment several simultaneous courses are running. The isolation of related results as well as their survey are often too complicated. It is also difficult to perform analyses concerning the levels of the objects comprising the module and the pages comprising SCORM module and the html base syllabus. Clementine is also capable of extracting related data from the log file.

5.1. Macroanalysis of virtual course by Eventstream VisualizationThe SPSS Clementine contains two types of streams for macroanalysis. One of them analyzes a specific aspect of virtual course usage and another provides a general understanding of user, in this case learner behavior and course activity. Virtual courses commonly have one or more multi-step processes that learners are required to follow in order to achieve a specific goal. To learn the content of a sub-module online, learners are typically required to progress through a series of steps from sub-module 1 to self-evaluation test. [11]

By macroanalysis we wanted to see what role Moodle objects inserted in the course, html base electronic syllabus units, static glossaries, submission, forum and self check tests played in online and offline learning. To answer this set of questions the visit level analyzing streams of the program were used. First, the electronic syllabus was examined, which is divided into above mentioned three modules. The modules consist of sub-modules (separate objects), and those in turn consist of units accessible from the menu. The pages of the units are on the one hand linearly connected and, on the other hand, their first page is accessible from the menu. In the case of macroanalysis the succession of modules and sub-modules, while in the case of microanalysis that of units and pages during visits were examined.

The Eventstream Visualizaton stream looks at the traffic that is performing a specific sequence of activity in a known order. This type of analysis is particularly useful for

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virtual course that have well-defined, multi-step paths that the learner must follow to complete a specific action. The classic example of this is the path in a given sub-module: sub-module 1 – sub-module 2 – sub-module 3 – self-evaluation test. [11]

Figure 4 The succession of sub-modules comprising visits – Digital image editing

Figure 5 The succession of sub-modules comprising visits – Digital vector graphics editing

This report in Figure 4 is designed to show the number of visits in which students follow the defined activity path. It is important to note that activities are noncontiguous. In other words, the student does not have to initiate the activities consecutively. As long as they occur in sequence and in the same visit, the visit qualifies as a valid occurrence.

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In the example above, 159 visits include a visit the Digital image editing 1 sub-module. About 35% of these visits witness the student continuing to the Digital image editing 2, and 18% to the Digital image editing 3 sub-module. Of those, only 13 visits see the student proceed to the download demo activity. The learner completes the sequence in more than 8% of visits.

Although all modules and syllabus units were visible simultaneously on the course students followed the order set by the teacher and the way syllabus processing took place during practices. Midterm tasks and module-end tests also prevented ”campaign-like” learning at the end of the term. In processing syllabus units (usually 2 or 3) comprising the modules, two types of learning strategies could be distinguished. The most dominant form of learning strategy was the one when a student visit aimed at processing more than one (usually two) syllabus units, but aiming to acquire only a single unit was also typical. There were few visits seen which aimed at processing all the syllabus units of a module besides doing the self check test (Figure 4 and 5). Thus the developer’s intention that students should learn not only before the check test appears to be realized. Although there is no real continuous student activity on the course, significant steps could be taken in the direction of collaborative learning by a well-structured course and well directed student activities.

5.2. Microanalysis of virtual course by Visit Page FunnelsThe microanalysis focuses on analysis at the page level rather than at the events level. The streams present some general summary statistics about our virtual course, e.g. which learners are using to access the course, which pages are getting the most hits, and what are the most commonly viewed sequences of pages (clickstreams). [11]

The analysis by Visit Page Funnels stream looks at the traffic that is performing a specific sequence of activities in a known order (Figure 6). This type of analysis is particularly useful for virtual courses that have well-defined multistep paths down which the students must follow in order to complete a specific action. A classic example is the path a user must run in order to achieve a given sub-module this is referred to as the learning process from 1sr page to the last one, page by page. [11]

Figure 6 Sample values for the parameters in the stream

Although to a different extent, syllabus processing within a syllabus unit is constantly characterized by student ”dropout”. With regard to syllabus units it was mainly typical of the ones processed first, whereas with regard to pages it was typical of the first 1 to 3 pages. Obviously, both are seen to originate in online learning and familiarity with the electronic syllabus. ”Dropout” may also be interpreted in the dimension of the theoretical and the practical syllabus. Although it is more significant in the case of the former than the latter, it is constantly present in both. Students thus interrupting syllabus processing certainly return later and continue learning.

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Figure 7 Processing Sub-module Digital Image Editing 2

The student who easily ”gives up” will not fully cover all the pages of the particular syllabus unit (Figure 7 and 8) and he will escape when he becomes bored with the task which needs persistence. He is not certain to re-enter later and continue learning where he has left off. The ”tasting” type will ”leaf through” the material, get oriented and then interrupt the visit, but later he will return and fully deal with it.

Figure 8 Processing Sub-module Digital Vector Graphics Editing 3

To finish, we mention the last question of microanalysis, which aimed at the role of time-dependent media in syllabus processing. Average time allotted to process pages containing only texts or graphics was acceptable, but leafing through was frequent, too. It was mostly typical of ”tasting” (”trying”) students. It is considered as leafing through when the student spends considerably less time over a given page than would be necessary to fully understand it, usually a few seconds only. Digital videos were usually played, especially when playing started automatically on opening the page, but this way it precedes reading the introductory text. It was not typical to interrupt playing automatic videos.

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Bibliography[1] Oren Etzioni: The World Wide Web: quagmire or gold mine? Communications of

ACM, vol. 39, 1996, p65-68, http://www.cs.washington.edu/homes/etzioni/bib.html

[2] Anat Cohen and Rafi Nachmias: A quantitative cost effectiveness model for Web-supported academic instruction. The Internet and Higher Education vol. 9, 2006, p81-90

[3] Claus Pahl: Data mining technology for the evaluation of learning content interaction. International journal of E-Learning, Vol. 3, 2004, p47-55

[4] Osmar R. Zaïane: Web usage mining for a better Web-based learning environment. In: Proceedings of 4th IASTED International Conference on Advanced Technology for Education, Banff, Canada, 2001

[5] Rafi Nachimas - Arnon Hershkovitz: A Case Study of Using Visualization for Understanding the Behavior of the Online Learner. In: Cristóbal Romero - Mykola Pechenizkiy - Toon Calders - Silvia R. Viola: International Workshop on Applying Data Mining in e-Learning (ADML’07) Crete, Greece, 2007, p43-53

[6] János Abonyi (ed.): Adatbányászat a hatékonyság eszköze. (Data-mining as Device of the Efficiency). ComputerBooks, Budapest, 2006, p400

[7] Lajos Izsó: Applying Web-mining Methods for Quality Assurance of Internet-based Educational Materials. (A revised and extended version of the plenary presentation given at the “13th Multimedia in Education Conference”) Journal of Applied Multimedia, 2/II/2007, p15-20

[8] SPSS Inc.: Web Mining for Clementine 1.5. User's Guide. NetGenesis, Chicago, 2005, p89

[9] Cristóbal Romero - Sebastián Ventura - Enrique García: Data mining in course management systems: Moodle case study and tutorial. Computers & Education, Vol. 51, No. 1. 2008, p368-384.

[10]Bing Liu: Web Data Mining. Exploring Hyperlinks, Contents and Usage Data. Springer, Berlin, 2006, p532

[11]SPSS Inc.: Web Mining for Clementine 1.5. Application template. NetGenesis, Chicago, 2005, p177

60

DISSEMINATION AND EXPLOITATION IN MOTIVATE PROJECT

István SimonicsAssociate professor

Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering Education, Budapest Tech Polytechnical Institution

simonics.istvan@tmpk.bmf.hu

Abstract: When the strategy for dissemination was planned, our intention was to take into account all our opportunities to spread the results of our MOTIVATE project in the possible most efficient manner so that they reach as many professionals as possible. It was quite obvious that electronic dissemination should play the most dominant role in our strategy. The following main channels of dissemination were planned accordingly:Project website: to show the events, studies and products. The website of the project gives a sort of electronic dissemination of projects findings not only throughout the project lifetime, but it will ensure their sustainability for a further three year long period as well. We use Wiki and web2 technologies as well: http://motivate.tmpk.bmf.hu/. Current news: given electronically, for the inter-institutional network of Vocational Teacher Education, in the participating countries. Project conferences: for disseminating the project aims in Hungary and partner countries. Disseminating the project results for the network of vocational schools linked with vocational teacher training institutions for providing practical placements. Disseminating the project results for further vocational institutions and training organisations via students of in-service distance learning courses.Conference attendance and presentations: to propagate the project worldwide. Dissemination of the project results in local, national and international periodicals.The paper focuses and presents the results of new internet based technology supports all types of technical teacher training and provides exceptional opportunities for in-service and distance learning where on-line communication can be regarded as a new tool for disseminating and multiplying individual experiences.Keywords: initial teacher training, in-service and distance learning, sustainable innovations, dissemination, exploitation

1. IntroductionWhen we plan and implement Community supported Leonardo da Vinci – LdV –, projects it is important to think about effective dissemination and giving access to the project products in a wide range. Using the support we have to apply the innovation, but have to provide an added value as well and disseminate the results beyond the project partners. Analysing the valorisation process we have to take into account that the project results have to be sustainable after finishing the implementation period and the financial support.

In the end of 2007 Masters level Opportunities and Technological Innovation in VocAtional Teacher Education – MOTIVATE –, project was supported by Leonardo da Vinci – LdV – EU programme. The Coordinator of the project is Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering Education at Budapest Tech Polytechnic Institution –

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CTTEE. It was easy to select and invite the project partners because we had worked together with them in two previous successful LdV projects: Life Long Learning in Teacher Training Technology – 3L in 3T –, and Virtual Electronic Learning in Vocational Initial Teacher Training – VELVITT. The competence of partners ensures the effective implementation. The professional background for VET Teacher training is provided by University of Huddersfield (UK). Tampere Polytechnic (FI) and Fontys University of Applied Science (NL) have had great experience on development of curricula. The developed training materials are piloted by the two Hungarian Higher Education Institutes – HEI – the Coordinator CTTEE and College of Dunaújváros. The assessment and monitoring are provided by the Faculty of Science – University of Lisbon (PT) and Technological Educational Institute of Crete (EL). The adaptation of Quality insurance is managed by STRUKTÚRA Quality Development Ltd. (HU). The synergy of competence of partners is used as Work package or Task Leaders.

2. Valorisation strategy in the implementation processIn the Needs analysis we had stated in the changed Hungarian higher education according to the Bologna process and the newly introduced Higher Education Act, the VET teacher training can be organised only on Master level. Because of the early recognition of these needs the Coordinator CTTEE and College of Dunaújváros had received accreditation starting permission for MA VET teacher training in 2006. The Objective of this project is to adopt the best practice on European level of VET teacher training and Quality insurance system with support of innovation transfer. The innovation is twofold: the introduction of Masters Level modules into the vocational and technical teacher education programmes, and the use of new and emerging technologies in the implementation of the developed curriculum. Currently, VET teacher training in the UK is designated as ‘postgraduate’ but has not previously been delivered at Masters level, being postgraduate only in time and in the sense that it is seen as progression into teaching for those with existing graduate status. This anomaly is being addressed by a current initiative to develop the Post Graduate Certificate in Education to be delivered at Masters Level. The development of Master Level modules in the UK has been identified as an opportunity to facilitate concurrent development in partner institutions across Europe.

Definition of Target groups was based on users of project products. On Micro level the Primary Target group is the students of MA education. The Secondary Target groups are the Vocational Education and Training – VET – pupils in secondary schools and the management of these schools. On Meso level the Target groups are the students and teachers of partner HEIs. The stakeholders are the policy makers in Ministry of Education and Culture and other professional bodies. On Macro level the Target groups are the European HEIs and stakeholders related the project partners and professional bodies e.g. CEDEFOP and European Training Foundation – ETF.

The project products are curricula for MA VET teacher training, training modules, handbooks and case studies will be printed in Hungarian and English and delivered to the relevant Target groups. This project will also contribute to the development of the European credit transfer system for VET to facilitate transparency and comparability of qualifications, transferability, validation and recognition of learning outcomes achieved by individuals in different learning contexts in different countries and at different levels.

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The project aims at contributing sustainable innovations in the vocational education and teacher training practices of the six EU nations participating in MOTIVATE and possibly other countries as well. The Valorisation plan of MOTIVATE consists of two elements: a Dissemination plan and an Exploitation plan.

2.1. Dissemination planWhen planning the strategy for dissemination, our intention was to take into account all our opportunities to spread the results of our MOTIVATE project in the possible most efficient manner so that they reach as many professionals as possible. Besides the common agreement for this strategy, each member of the consortium has also its own possibilities to contribute in making the project findings more widely disseminated. It is quite obvious that electronic dissemination should play the most dominant role in our strategy. The following main channels of dissemination are planned accordingly:

–Project website to show the events, studies and products. The website of the project gives a sort of electronic dissemination of projects findings not only throughout the project lifetime, but it will ensure their sustainability for a further three year long period as well. We use Wiki and web2 technologies as well. In the preparation process we have used an open community web site: http://motivate.wetpaint.com/

Figure 1 MOTIVATE Project Website in starting period

Nowadays the website is hosted and managed by the Coordinator CTTEE. All the necessary information can be found for the public and we use intraweb also for supporting the project management and partners with the official documents: http://motivate.tmpk.bmf.hu/

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Figure 2 MOTIVATE Project Website hosted by Coordinator

− Current news, given electronically, for the inter-institutional network of Vocational Teacher Education, in the participating countries.

− Project conferences for disseminating the project aims in Hungary and partner countries.

− Sending the project results for vocational teacher training institutions.

− Disseminating the project results for the network of vocational schools linked with vocational teacher training institutions for providing practical placements.

− Disseminating the project results for further vocational institutions and training organisations via students of in-service distance learning courses.

− Conference attendance and presentations to propagate the project worldwide.

− Dissemination of the project results in local, national and international periodicals.

2.2. Exploitation planWe have mainly concentrated on providing an answer to the question of how the MOTIVATE could better attain significant, and therefore, surplus value by transferring the maximum number of the project results into the educational practices, systems and policies of both the participating countries and possible other countries as well. The following issues have been addressed by the partners, in order to complete our valorisation plan.

A needs analysis of the characteristics of the partnership has been carried out during the preparation of the project proposal. Partner institutions of the project have expressed

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their interest to use MOTIVATE project products on a trial basis. Other institutes also have shown interest for free utilisation and it is not possible to count on revenues from this cooperation. Special attention has been paid on the conditions and obstacles for achieving surplus value. The partners are well aware of the fact that, despite all their good intentions and efforts, it is hard to guarantee a priori that all the foreseen innovative educational MOTIVATE project results will meet with approval and have high success inside or beyond the boundaries of the partnership. We believe that the use of the specific tools described and especially MOTIVATE’s strong dissemination plan described earlier, shall help to create the conditions required in order to promote the surplus value of the MOTIVATE project products. The results and products will spread to vocational schools via the teacher training students of in-service teacher training => the sustained usability will strengthen.

3. Course ImplementationWe have planned the course implementation in Work Package 5 in the first six months of 2009 as follows:

− Facilitate communication and collaboration between students of the partner institutions,

− provide opportunities for experience online learning systems when introducing the modules of new curriculum.

One of the commonly developed module was Advanced Pedagogy.Table 1

Institutional Specific Module Data

1 Name of institution: Budapest PolytechnicName of Department: Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering Education

Course Title: MA teacher of engineeringCredit rating: 2 Credits at M level

2 Name of institution: Dunaújváros CollegeName of Department: Teacher Training and Engineering Education

Course Title: MA teacher of engineeringCredit rating: 2 Credits at M level

3 Name of institution: University of HuddersfieldName of School: Education and Professional Development

Name of Department: Post Compulsory Education and TrainingCourse Title: Postgraduate Certificate in Education

Credit rating: 10 Credits at M level3 Name of institution: Lisbon University

Name of Department: Education Course Title: Postgraduate Certificate in Education

Credit rating: 4 Credits at M level4 Name of institution: Tampere University of Applied Sciences (TAMK)

Name of Department: TAOKKCourse Title: Qualifying studies for vocational teachers

Credit rating: 4 Credits at M level

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The goals for this course are indicators for the training practice innovation and are based on the European guidelines for education and training. We intend to increase the quality of the education and training of the educators/trainers developing their necessary competences having as referential the challenge of the knowledge society. We use the ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) in an open training environment. Using ICT as tools for learning we intend to integrate the approaches centred in the students according the different learning situations and the pedagogical requirements of the target population. We hope that learning will be more attractive and at the end it can have a positive impact in the teaching and learning. Training teachers and trainers in scientific and technological disciplines, developing competences both for entrepreneurship and for learning throughout their lives we believe we are contributing for a more developed and competitive Europe. However, we intend that the goals for education and training will be more than tools for employment or for the professional life. We expect to contribute to the European shared fundamental values dissemination, namely to the personal and social development, to a better life allowing the democratic participation crucial for an active citizenship in a society which must respect the cultural diversity. In broad terms this course articulates with the others courses planned in the Motivate project: eLearning methods and tools and teaching a specific subject. The European cooperation will be a constant allowing a framework based on the compatibility of systems in the space of education and training as a key domain according to the Lisbon strategy. The implementation of the detailed course programme based on a flexible learning organization is supported by a strict cooperation – sharing experiences, discussing, creating training networks - among the partners that in their institutions implement master courses.

The module is presented in four sections to enable successful completion of the various components of the Problem Solving and Action Planning Project:

SECTION 1 Analysis of pedagogical practiceReview of teaching experience to date. Feedback from observations. Advanced teaching techniques (what makes a good teacher, questioning techniques, behaviour management, etc). Observation of other teachers (ethical issues, good practice) – video case studies. Review of how people learn – learning/teaching theories and practice. Review of lesson planning, teaching/learning methods, resource design.

SECTION 2 Creativity and innovatory practiceWhat is creativity? Innovation and creativity in the practice of teaching. Modelling creativity. Problem solving – innovative solutions. Technological Innovation – E-pedagogy. Methods of initiating change – overcoming resistance to change.

SECTION 3 Problem Solving and Action PlanningOverview of research methods in education. The nature and methodology of an action planning process. Addressing issues of ethics, validity and reliability in problem solving processes. The implementation and reporting of problem solving and action planning processes

SECTION 4 Models of Reflection and EvaluationReflective practice – critical approaches. Processes of reflection and evaluation. Selection and implementation of models of reflective practice.

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In the Learning Strategy we have planned:

− Lectures and seminars on the underpinning theoretical concepts

− experiential learning based normally on practice teaching, supported by reflection and self-evaluation

− group and/or individual work relating to the theory and practice of Problem Solving and Action Planning; reflective practice

− reflection and dialogue on constructive feedback on teaching observations from peers and experienced practitioners

− individual project work.

The teaching and learning process is supported by Moodle Learning Management System (LMS). Moodle is designed to help educators create online courses with opportunities for rich interaction. The Virtual Learning Environment is hosted and coordinated by Lisbon University Education Department: http://meduc.fc.ul.pt/

Figure 3 MOTIVATE Moodle VLE

In this Virtual Classroom students can find several background materials for supporting their learning process e.g. “Module Synopsis Resource” Word, “Basic Teaching Goals” and “Culturally Responsive Pedagogy” PDF or “An Introduction to Creativity” PowerPoint presentation documents.

They can contact their tutor or other student colleagues as well there are open Forums for the participants.

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Figure 4 Learning Forums

The Forums can be moderated by the tutors or students as well. This tool was the most successful element in the collaborative learning community. Students and tutors enjoyed the live and fruitful conversation without constrains and border. There was no any problem with a language they had a free feeling being in the same Virtual Classroom from six countries. Everybody was partner there was no difference between tutors and students, they could share their opinion and it was part of the learning process. In the beginning tutors invited their students from each participating country, but later it became a self-accelerated process. In Section 1 there are two Learning Forums:

–Elements of Good Teaching

–To respect other cultures is an ethical demand

The “Elements of Good Teaching” moderated by Agnes Tóth from Hungary CTTE. Discussion was started with a request: ”Could you recall an example when your teacher (or you as a trainee teacher) proved to be intellectually active? What is the secret of being energetic and enthusiastic?”

There are 11 topics of discussion in this Forum:

–Importance of other factors

–Elements of Good Teaching

–E-learning as useful educational tool

–Hungarian mathematics teaching

–Cheating

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–How do the evaluation methods support learning?

–Good communication

–Learning by way of research and development projects for companies

–How to approach the dilemma of teachers’ own inadequacy?

–Maximum amount of students in classroom?

–Technical gadgets

Figure 5 Topics of Discussion

As we can see on Figure 5 most of the moderators included their photo into the system which gives a more personal circumstance for the discussion. The most popular topic of discussion was “Elements of Good Teaching” it had 37 replies, the next topic ”Cheating” had 10 replies.

It is really important the content of messages, what kind of information can and should share among the group. In the beginning there was a really sceptic opinion from a Hungarian student: “I had this feeling as a student but I miss this feeling as a teacher. Unfortunately I don't remember anyone who motivated me, and I think I can motivate somebody only if I'm obsessed, and I love the topic. The last term I had to teach Physics, what I don't really like, and my training was an anguish. I thought myself a fake. The next term I will teach math. I'm looking forward to it. I hope this time I will feel myself better, and they will enjoy my lessons.” Immediately it was followed with another bad experience by another student. Some day later professor David Lord from UK gave a positive pattern and feeling: “I think that what you consider to be an element of good teaching, depends on your perspectives as a teacher (or on teaching) - what type of teacher do you like? – someone, who is very knowledgeable in their subject and

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provides you with the information you require? – someone, who provides you with the necessary study skills to discover yourself what you need to know? - etc. There is an interesting web site: "teachingperspectives.com", which allows you to take a short inventory to find out what sort of teacher you are or would be. Give it a try!” It wasn’t a simple opinion! He gave a right guideline how to change and through back the discussion to the positive side.

Figure 6 Live Discussion

Finally it helped immediately after came the next positive opinion from UK again: “A teacher who inspired me was a great teacher because she always made lessons fun and interactive, and she commanded the respect of the class without shouting or being too friendly with the students. A number of teachers that I have had during my degree were very knowledgeable, but unable to convey this information in the right way, and couldn't teach in a language that was appropriate for people on our level. I think good teachers can look at the group and judge what level of language to use. The teacher needs to engage the learners, and get learners interacting and have a variety of teaching techniques to cater for different learning styles.”

These two examples demonstrated the responsibility of tutors how to keep in hand the discussion forums, to change the bad and sceptic feeling, to give right guideline and professional content and to open new field of discussion, in the second one the “variety of teaching techniques”. The discussion was followed on the right way: “I believe a good teacher is one that:

− has good rapport with the students. Listens carefully to students’ comments, questions and answers and responds constructively. Treats all students in a courteous and equitable manner.

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− is enthusiastic and able to stimulate interest in the subject.

− communicates high expectations of students and a belief that they can meet those expectations.

− uses a variety of methods to address the needs of students with different learning styles.

− interacts extensively with the students inside and outside of class, provides prompt feedback on their performance, conveys a strong desire for them to learn, and motivates them to do so.”

The Forums gave us a good picture how ICT and Virtual Learning Environments can change our teaching methodologies and learning strategies. In this distance learning the changing roles supported the reception of knowledge.

4. ConclusionAn overall impact of the new type of training is to enhance the professional status of teachers in technical fields by the provision of a coherent programme of initial teacher training and continuing professional development.

The new internet based technology supports all types of technical teacher training and provides exceptional opportunities for in-service and distance learning where on-line communication can be regarded as a new tool for disseminating and multiplying individual experiences.

Over the last few years we have played a leading role in Hungary regarding the application of Moodle VLE in inter-institutional and international cooperation. We wish to further enrich our methodological culture by testing and improving new IT and communication technologies.

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References[1] Tóth, A, and Pentelenyi, P, MASTER LEVEL TECHNICAL TEACHER

TRAINING SUPPORTED BY THE MOTIVATE PROJECT, Budapest MOTIVATE Conference, ISBN 978-963-7154-83-6, 2008, 8 pp.

[2] Tóth, A, and Pentelenyi, P, New Perspectives for Technical Teacher Training in Hungary According to the Bologna System, Engineering Competences – Traditions and Innovations, Moscow, 37th International IGIP Symposium, 2008, 129-137. pp.

[3] Tóth, P, ANALYSIS OF STUDENT BEHAVIOUR IN COMMON MODULE DELIVERY Budapest, MOTIVATE Conference, ISBN 978-963-7154-83-6, 2008, 17 pp.

[4] Pentelényi, P. and Tóth, Á. Development of e-learning and Virtual Learning Environments. In: Pentelenyi, P. (ed.): Virtual Learning Environments – Training Material. Ligatura Ltd., Budapest, 2006, 9-20 pp

[5] Lord, D. Learning to Teach a Specialist Subject: Using New Technologies and Achieving Masters Level Criteria MOTIVATE Conference, ISBN 978-963-7154-83-6, 2008, 6 pp.

[6] Jarvis P, Holford J and Griffin C The Theory and Practice of Learning. London, 1998 Kogan Page.

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PSYCHOLOGY IN TEACHER EDUCATION

Sándor SupliczCentre for Teacher Training and Engineering Education

Budapest Tech Polytechnical Institutionsuplicz.sandor@tmpk.bmf.hu

Abstract:The findings of research into the person and role of the teacher motivated us to take the tools and methods of psychology into consideration to a greater extent when formulating the new curriculum of our teacher of engineering MA programme. The research projects shed light to many elements as conditions of becoming a good teacher that would suggest career socialisation, value system, relationship samples and personality being more important than the easy-to-learn professional or lexical knowledge. For this reason, we have identified those areas of teacher training where we saw possibilities for development.Key words: master level teacher training, carrier socialisation, reflectivity, teacher-pupil relationship, weak ties, value system, Bálint group.

1. Introduction The developments summarised in the abstract are a description of our work already realized and still in progress in the framework of BMF TMPK (Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering Education of Budapest Polytechnic). In my presentation, I would like to focus on some important elements of the implementation of the objectives set forth in the documentation of our teacher of engineering programme, which were developed using the tools of psychology.

2. The theoretical background of the curriculum development activityIn this paper, we describe the developments carried out in two courses, Pedagogy and Teaching a specialist subject as an integrated practice. The theoretical background of the developments consists of research findings in the fields of humanistic psychology, the technique of case discussion groups, the analysis of strong and weak social ties, conflict management and other research results. It is hoped that the attitude changes necessary for career socialisation are achieved by way of decreasing the intensity of the ego-defence mechanisms, using the energy of conflicts and acquiring the capacity for self-reflection. For the development of the value system and cultural elements, we offer a new course reader. Some of the texts in this reader are discussed at the practical sessions of the Personality development course. We intend to provide assistance in dealing with the tensions inherent in the teacher’s role, as well as in the formation of the role model in the course of improved microteaching exercises. The adoption of a good teacher-pupil relationship interface is facilitated by way of the application of the theory of “weak ties”. The adaptation of the best practices is expected from the work carried out in Bálint groups.

The teacher’s personality serves as the basis of the work of the teacher. The development of the personality is a slow, time-consuming process. Psychotherapeutic

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procedures, therapeutic and development trainings often last for years, and success is not even guaranteed then. In teacher training we do not have such methods and this much time at our disposal. Teacher training, like other fields of education, concentrates on the course material. It conveys a rational body of knowledge. Our research [14] indicates, however, that – on the basis of the expectations of pupils – the merits of good teachers and the faults of bad ones can be traced back not so much to the rational areas, their specialised expertise, but rather to their personalities, as well as their role and relationship models. It is the development of the personality, role and relationship models from which we can expect success. Not easy, but long-lasting success. This does not mean that we regard the cognitive methodological and specialised, subject-based elements unimportant; however, any deficiencies in these areas can be made up for more easily later. The role model and the relationship model are much more difficult to change and develop, since they are related to the entirety of the personality, and not only to knowledge. The intensification of the personality development, career socialisation and career identification effects in the initial period of the teacher training are fundamentally important. In the opinion of Bagdy, career socialisation must be placed in the focus of teacher training. The elaboration of the relational field of impact is an important task of teacher training. The credibility and congruency of the teacher are necessary for the act of reception. [1]

On the basis of both their subject matter and perspective, the most important guardian and developer of these areas is the psychologist. The perspective, the attitudes, the role model continue to develop, but always affected by the randomly good or bad influences of one’s first workplace. From the results of Carl Rogers, Thomas Gordon, Bálint Mihály, we have incorporated into the development of our teacher training programme some already well-known methods, mainly used by psychologists, which had not previously been applied in the practice of Budapest Polytechnic. On the basis of international and Hungarian research findings, including our own results, we have set as our objective the practical implementation of the elements pertaining to the person and role of the teacher. We have incorporated into the teacher training subjects several such elements that, through the interpretation of value systems and the teacher’s role, as well as the relationship model, have the effect of role and personality development.

The rational elements, the knowledge and the behavioural expectations have always provided plenty of support in the formation of the teacher's role. Practicing teachers participate in continued, in-service training, as well as obtain new diplomas and degrees. To the great disappointment of both the training institutions and entities supervising their work, dozens of research findings seem to indicate that the effects of the measurable characteristics of teachers (experience, documented qualifications) cannot be identified in the results of the pupils, or only to a very limited extent. Providing a summary of research project conducted in the field of teaching efficiency, Goldhaber was able to identify only a 3% positive effect of more practice and higher qualifications of teachers in the performance of their pupils. The non-identifiable positive effects of good teachers had an 8.5% impact on their pupils’ performance. [6] These results also reflect some effect of preconceptions. Some analysts complain that they are not entirely correct methodologically. Sometimes the positive impact of a good teacher only manifest later, in areas that cannot be measured by performance tests. It appears that the higher qualifications, the development of rational elements, the growth of knowledge do not yield the expected results. Family background and the individual

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capabilities of pupils, on the other hand, had a 60% impact on success. It is worth rethinking, therefore, how teacher training could be enriched with such elements that are capable of increasing the efficiency of the teacher.

For students the information is available in the course materials. The expectations pertaining to the role are also known. Yet this is not manifested in the efficiency of teachers with more training, or only to a very small extent. We assume that higher teacher efficiency can be achieved not primarily by adding to the body of information and the course material, but by enhancing the depth with which the material is dealt with.

The main areas of development:

• The enrichment and experiencing of the teacher’s role model.

• Conflict management, reflectivity, empathy development.

• The reinforcement and development of self-knowledge and the elements of the value system.

• The reinterpretation of the teacher-pupil relationship interface.

• The adoption of the best practical solutions.

Any parts of course materials that are emotionally not processed are only present as quickly forgettable, external information. Such knowledge that was learnt but was never integrated into the emotional and conceptual system is quickly relegated by the pupil’s memory, as unnecessary or disturbing elements, among the forgotten/unconscious elements. This way, the conflict between learned expectations and the role assumed in practice is eliminated.

In our earlier research [13], we examined the possibilities for the development of the personality-dependent – and thus difficult to change – competences that primarily determine the quality of the teacher. That research indicated that the values of the personality and emotional acceptance are particularly important factors in the evaluation of the teacher’s quality. These were important and difficult to develop. Real values cannot be “obtained cheaply.” The place of these two factors can be well located in a competence structure used in the course of our work. Also in teacher training, a significant part of the course material is embodied in the cognitive elements, the easy-to-learn knowledge, the acquisition of which would not be a challenge to a student with good memory and some sense of conformity. We can usually evaluate abilities and skills on the level of behavioural expectations. The constructive competences, which are related to the personality, to emotional acceptance, the value system, the morals, the ability to cultivate weak social ties, do not become emotionally accepted in case of some of the students, and they do not match with certain determining elements of the person’s value system. This means that these elements are not incorporated into the personality of the teacher candidate. Nobody examines these today, and they are difficult to measure. It is only in case of gross, manifested behavioural faults that they can have a considerable influence on the evaluation of the students. The personality-dependent constructive competences are difficult to control. Their development requires emotional identification. In a class that is built up specifically for this purpose and using these methods, we can touch upon and open up this field, as well as work on it with more efficiency. If teacher candidates do not get to the point that they have their own,

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internalised role model, a largely coherent personality, and the ability to manage weak ties, then their behaviour will be dissonant and incredible. Psychological principles and pedagogical rules learnt for the purpose of reciting them at the exam can only be recalled by the end of one’s studies in a largely fragmented way. Amid the feelings of excitement and the anxiety caused by the teaching practice, the candidate is hardly capable of using any of these elements.

The following table, read from top to bottom, shows the competences, in the order of difficulty to develop them.

Table 1The structure of competences [10]

Characteristics of the competence

The structure of the competence

Difficulty of developing

the competenc

e

Visible, conscious

Cognitive elements, knowledge

Proficiencies

SkillsEasy to develop

Capabilities (intellectual, communicative,

operative, social)

HIDDEN, LESS CONSCIOUS OR UNCONSCIOUS

Constructive competences (ethical,

aesthetic, attitude, empathy, values)

DIFFICULT TO

DEVELOP

We have selected and worked out new methods for the development of the areas deemed as important on the basis of the theoretical results and the demands perceived. We have started their introduction in the practice of teacher training

3. Realisation

3.1. The enrichment and the experiencing of the teacher’s role modelWe developed the well-known method of microteaching into a role experience of psychological depth in small groups. At the practices conducted in the humanistic spirit of Rogers, we provide assistance in the emotional processing of the situation and contribute to career socialisation with the help of discussing and resolving the positive experiences as well as fears caused by the public performance. At the first meeting we lay down the rules of group-work, and the instructor very consistently ensures that these rules are observed. Peers do not criticise or provide advice to the fellow student on the spot, but rather share their own experiences. The result is that there is no significant resistance in the practicing student. Members of the group take turns in telling their feelings and impressions. Then they identify the successful and unsuccessful elements

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in the role, as well as the possible reasons for these. The students communicate their thoughts in the form of “I-statements”: “I felt that…”

The main questions to ask ourselves: What did I understand from this and what did I not understand? What helped and what hindered the efficient processing of the body of knowledge conveyed? What were the feelings that arose in me? Was I able to actively pay attention or was I bored? In what was I able to think together with the presenter and where did I lose it?

3.2. Conflict management, reflectivity, empathy developmentAt the personality-development group sessions, the power of cognitive dissonance, as described by Leon Festinger, is also used for the purpose of overwriting wrong elements of the role model. The change is possible if the student experiences the conflict [12] with the mistakenly constructed elements of the teacher’s role on both an intellectual and emotional level. It is important that the student should live the conflict within his or her own person, and not in opposition with the instructor or the peers in the group. If the conflict that arises becomes one between persons in the interest of the defence of one’s ego, then the session will not reach its objective. Wrong patterns of behaviour considered by the student presenting as his or her own are difficult to change without damage to one’s self-esteem [5]. Like dragons, the ego-defence mechanisms guard the already accepted and practiced elements of the role. This is why the student should never interpret the notions communicated as an attack against him or her. For this purpose, a sincere, accepting atmosphere [9] has to be formed. The feeling of security arising from the approving-supporting atmosphere will not trigger the defensive mechanisms. The energies of the student thus liberated and the resulting opening up provide an opportunity for admitting mistakes. As a result of the low activity of the ego-defence mechanisms [11], the intellectual paths necessary for change become passable. The practice provides students with an opportunity to experience the feelings of congruency, empathy and unconditional acceptance. The extent of identification with the teacher’s role and with the material can be judged on the basis of the feedback provided by the peers. This is based on the establishment of patterns for the formulation and use of reflective thoughts. In the course of the practices, we try to find the links between things read in the literature, our own experiences and the teacher’s role model. Serving as the basis of the role model are actual persons. The characteristics of good and bad teachers are defined by the group on the basis of their own experiences. They are derived from the main characteristic features of the teachers in secondary school they considered the best and the worst. These results are supplemented with the findings of research projects. This way we can define the positive role model, on the basis of which each member of the group can, in accordance with his or her own personality, formulate development objectives. This way, the wrong elements of the interpretation of the teacher’s behaviour and role become more clearly visible.

Later, in the course of the teaching practice, we also use the experiences gained here. If the students cannot identify with, apply and reinforce the new behavioural and social tie element harmonised with the role and their personality, then they will return to the role model and methods that are already well established and they are used to.

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3.3. The reinforcement and development of self-knowledge and the elements of the value systemWe are compiling a course reader representing a new perspective and consisting of excerpts from works of literature and moral philosophy. Its aim is familiarising students with the artistic and scholarly formulations of fundamental human values, as well as helping them rethink and discuss these in the personality development classes. The collection provides samples for the most important, determining elements of the personality – the value system and morals. The reader contains short texts, as well as excerpted passages from works written in different periods, in different styles and cultures. Students can choose the works they like the most as the starting point for their work. This contributes to the emotional acceptance of group-work and reduces resistance. “On the basis of findings in research into attitudes and values, a lasting change can only occur in an individual’s system of opinions and notions, and then consequently in his or her behaviour, if the change extends to include the attitudes, the values, as well as the notions of that individual on himself or herself. A quickly occurring change in the attitudes usually does not affect the values occupying a more central position, and the dissonance between the two systems will sooner or later lead to a restoration of the earlier attitudes.” [2, p.26.] This enticing colourful cultural and philosophical offering provides students with an opportunity to start in the most favourite paths chosen by them in the direction of the reinterpretation and reinforcement of the values and moral rules, where ultimately all of the paths lead them. It is hoped that on the basis of the excerpts students would become curious to read the entire work. The reader is expected to be published in the spring of 2010 and introduced for use in the 2010-2011 academic year.

3.4. The reinterpretation of the teacher-pupil relationship interfaceA new element of the interpretation of roles must also be raised in the course of the development of the teacher’s efficiency. Research into network theory [3, 4, 7, 8] called attention to the role and importance of “weak ties” the stability of larger social systems.

In the social-psychological sense of the word, a teacher-pupil relationship can be seen as a weak tie. The participants are members of different social groups. Their respective norms of behaviour, level of cultural education, maturity, asymmetric positions, and the loyalty toward one’s own groups would all suggest that such relationships fall into the category of weak ties. Strong ties would be an equal or perhaps even friendly relationship between people who have the same value system, areas of interest, working in a similar status. We can assume such strong ties between members of the teaching staff of a school. Smaller groups of pupils, perhaps an entire class, can also form such “strong tie networks.” In the course of social psychological experiments conducted in schools, the relationships between groups of pupils have been frequently examined. However, a teacher or teachers are very rarely included in such examined groups. Teachers also very rarely consider a pupil as a friend on equal basis, because they are, in fact, not equal. A teacher cannot establish a close, friendly relationship with hundreds of new pupils each year. This cannot be the aim either. Too many ties cannot be deeply lived through and experienced; with time they would become untenable and lead to the burning out of the teacher. In the network of communities we pay little attention to weak ties that transcend group boundaries. They are difficult to identify statistically, but their role is nevertheless important. They stabilise the school as a system. The

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exploration of the characteristic features of the weak ties between teachers and pupils, as well as their development is an important area of our work. We often experience that the behaviour of the members of a group is ethical within the group, but it is unethical and hostile toward outsiders, and especially toward a member of group considered as hostile. If we succeed in achieving, by way of cultivating the weak ties, that the members of these two groups should not regard each other as inaccessible and hostile, then we can have a basis for more successful work together. The teacher candidate must be able to cultivate weak and positive ties with pupils that transcend the group boundaries, but in the awareness that these cannot be elevated to the level of strong ties, or only in very rare cases. Teacher candidates must understand differently socialised youngsters, but they should not necessarily also agree with them. The condition for the existence of this relationship sample is that teachers should be able to remain emotionally open toward a group having a different value system and customs, such as the group of pupils. They should be able to experience and interpret, as well as – in the interest of more efficient cooperation – to shape their ties in the entire social network surrounding it.

3.5. The adoption of the best practical solutionsThe processing of experiences in Bálint groups. The aim of these sessions is the processing of the conflicts of ourselves and others, as lived through in the teacher’s role. The interpretation, transfer and acceptance of solution and relationship samples. Empathy development. The manifestations of the personality vary on the level of behaviour. They consist of the assumed expectations of the individual toward the role, as well as his or her natural reactions. Bálint groups provide an opportunity in the framework of the MA programme to analyse and reinterpret school conflicts that one experienced in his or her teaching practice or perhaps earlier as pupils. This exercise should take place in around the 7th or 8th week of the semester after the first teaching practices are started. In case of teacher candidates in the full-time programme, there are only still unsettled pre-figurations of the teacher’s role. They do not yet have good or bad habits or “innervations”, and so it can be freely formed within the boundaries provided by the role, the personality, the social space and the task at hand. This is an intellectual, behavioural and emotional element that is not yet stable, not part of the teacher’s role, and can be formed more easily.

For students getting a second, postgraduate degree and already having experience as a teacher have a wealth of experiences to rely on. The reinforcement of the positive elements that were well established in the course of their earlier training and work and that have become a firm part of their role can be valuable for the group as a whole. Thanks to the rules of operation in the group, the changing of the wrongly formed elements is not experienced as forced upon the individual, but rather happens by way of new interpretations acquired in the roles and by incorporating new elements of reality. The badly formed emotional reactions, attributions, habits and roles that are based on mistaken interpretations are difficult to develop. Students must first experience and admit that in the given situation their behaviour is not efficient, but inadequate, and immediately one or several other solutions and role models must be offered that are more efficient.

In order for a change to take place, the fields of force must be changed. We could often observe that the driving force of changes that have only just started disappeared as soon

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as the mentor teacher was not longer there, and students returned to their old practices because they did not experience that they were untenable. Change involves uncertainty. This often led to the starting up of counter-forces, in order to maintain the balance and ensure the defence of the ego. Since the forces of change appear in the framework of the teacher training, with the change in the social field they also lose their energy. One must be able to also recognise the successful elements in one’s own social/workplace environment, and then formulate and apply the new ones instead. The success of this will serve to reinforce the process. In case of unsuccessful attempts, however, the change will not take place. Unfortunately, the retarding forces are more difficult to influence, because these are often part of the ego-defence mechanism of the individual or have become an integral part of the communal culture. The indirect methods of the Bálint group do not force the group members to become defensive. The emotional security of the group reinforces the congruency of its members, it offers positive examples tested in practice, and contributes to the development of empathy. The cognitive dissonance against one’s existing but less successful own model can be a driving force of change here as well.

We consider the integration of valid psychological and pedagogical theories and the latest research results into practice, as well as the updating of the theoretical foundations an important task.

“THERE IS NOTHING SO PRACTICAL AS A GOOD THEORY” – K. Lewin

Bibliography[1] A pedagógus hivatásszemélyisége (1996). Ed.: Bagdy Emőke, KLTE Pszichológiai

Intézet Debrecen

[2] Barcy Magdolna (1997): A csoportok hatékonysága és a személyes változás. Animula, Budapest.

[3] Barabási Albert-László (2003): Behálózva – a hálózatok új tudománya Magyar Könyvklub

[4] Csermely Péter (2005): A rejtett hálózatok ereje: hogyan stabilizálják a világot a gyenge kapcsolatok? Vince Kiadó

[5] Gordon Thomas (1990): T.E.T. A tanári hatékonyság fejlesztése. Gondolat, Budapest

[6] Goldhaber Dan (2002): The Mystery of Good Teaching Sunday, March 10, 2002 Education - Spring (2002) – Education http://www.educationnext.org/20021/

[7] Granovetter, M. (1983): The strength of weak ties: A network theory revisited. Sociological Theory 1, 202-233.

[8] Granovetter S. Mark (1976): The Strength of Weak Ties. American Journal of Sociology, 78, Issue 6( may 1973), 1360-1380.

[9] Rogers Carl R (2006): Valakivé válni. A személyiség születése. SHL könyvek, EDGE 2000 KFT

[10] Henczi Lajos (2006): Vállalati elvárások a szakképzésben. Szakképzési Szemle 2006/2. 125-157

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[11] Pfister Éva (2001): Pedagógus szerepértelmezések és ellenállás. In: Buda András (ed.): Pedagógia és hermeneutika. Kossuth Egyetemi Kiadó, Debrecen, pp. 73–78.

[12] Schein H. Edgar (1995): Kurt Lewin’s Change Theory in the Field and in the Classroom: Notes Toward a Model of Managed Learning’ Working Paper 3821 Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology http://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/2576/SWP-3821-32871445.pdf?sequence=1 (2009 09 18)

[13] Suplicz Sándor (2007): A pedagógusok sikeressége szempontjából fontos jellemzők diákvélemények tükrében. Alkalmazott pszichológia, No.1. pp. 116-129

[14] Suplicz S. – Fűzi B. (2007): A pedagógusok sikeressége szempontjából fontos kompetenciák. Alkalmazott pszichológia, No. 3-4 pp. 24-45

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NETWORK TEACHING AND LEARNING IN PRACTICE

Dr. László Kadocsa – Dr. Gyula GubánCollege professor College professor

College of dunaujvárosKadocsa.Laszlo@mail.duf.hu

Guban.gyula@mail.duf.hu

AbstractThe pedagogic and methodology studies play an important role in the MA teacher training in Dunaújváros. Within the frames of these studies – considering that most of the students are either practicing teachers or are involved in pedagogical type of professional practice – there are several opportunities to have an insight in others’ experiences and to acquaint these. Network experience and knowledge-share – which has been implemented within the frames of MOTIVATE project and is ongoing in the next semester - is a significant part of the handover.This presentation will on one hand introduce those professional areas and issue in which there are some new possibilities to use network learning and will also introduce the new teacher role model.Key words: master training, characteristic of training, change of teacher roles.

1. Master training in DunaujvárosTechnical teacher training (both regular and correspondence courses) at Dunaújváros Polytechnic/College is ongoing since 1970. Due to the economic changes and the Bologna system the structure and the content of the training has been modified, it developed first into engineer-teacher course, lather become dual level course: professional trainer (BA level) plus MA course.

The cycle of MA course is a 2 years (4 semester, 120 credits) course based on the basic training. The main aim of the MA cycle training is to develop the skills and knowledge obtained during the first cycle, to adopt competencies and to provide professional training within this cycle based on the requirements of the labour market.

Considering the experiences of recent education practice and training requirements we can conclude those main characteristics that distinguish this structure from former professional teacher training systems. We can also describe the planned structure of the outcomes qualifying exam that guarantee the quality of the master course:

1. The MA course’s aims and requirements show a characteristic difference with former professional teacher trainings regarding technical module based scientific aspects.

2. There is also a significant difference in pedagogic module at fields of subject methodology, teaching technology and the practice of school system education and education for adults outside the school system.

3. The precondition of the teacher qualification exam is the successful completion of the required subjects, and the submission of the portfolio/final essay suggested by the jury.

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The main concept behind this training has been the implementation of a more practical technical teacher training which connected closely to the practical orientation of vocational schools and industrial/trade schools and the application of new learning theory.

The MA training the aim of the professional experience is to ensure that students acquire profession related knowledge and skills, pedagogic related competencies. We can find aims among these such:

how to prepare for classes, how to plan and run classes, how to behave as teacher, analyses and experiments, getting to know the institute itself and the way things work within this education environment (school life, school programmes, teacher-parent relationship, school leadership, etc.), how to organize teaching-learning procedures and to acquire developing and analysing skills )

The professional experience can be divided into three main cycles. All items concerned with the three cycles’ activity, tasks and resolutions, analyses have to be included in the portfolio prepared by the student. The IMS eportfolio standard differentiates three types of portfolio: evaluating, learning and group portfolio and our students have applied these. The portfolio is part of the teacher qualification exam. The first 2 cycles are related to special subjects methods, and the 3rd cycle is to comprehensive pedagogic experience.

During the first phase student should get to know the teacher profession, and the methods of developing pedagogic skills. These competencies will implement in the professional modules of didactic, psychology and methodology. This practice involves the work out and practical application of the thematic plan of a chosen topic. The analyses, tasks, solutions and evaluation obtained during the training will be part of the portfolio. The trainers of these professional subjects and also the teachers of the practicing schools will provide methodological assistance.

Students have the opportunity to discuss these issues within the forums of the Moodle system. During this preparation phase they also have the chance to discuss issues regarding educational theory - beside methodology queries and to gain new information and to write professional blogs.

One of the most typical students’ tasks is micro-teaching and how to get prepared for that. The preparation to develop certain teachers’ competencies gives a good opportunity for the students to change ideas about the solution of their chosen methodology problems.

As all students need to prepare a micro-teaching draft, they can this way learn from each others’ solutions e.g. teachers competencies such as the structure of lessons, students tasks, evaluation of students’ achievements.

The goal of the second cycle practice is to provide an opportunity for the students to develop their competencies needed for the practicing of their profession and described in the professional requirements.

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Related tasks

1. Planning and carrying out of training process

2. Working out learning task related documents (class tasks, homeworks, competence based guidelines to enforce learning)

3. Evaluation of delivered lessons with special regard to the teacher’s competences developed

4. Preparing essay on a chosen topic.

During this second phase students’ forum operates between the framework of methodology subject. In relation to the teaching of certain thematic units such as teaching algorithm, databases, welding skills, mechanical basic skills or modelling simple procedures, again there are several possibilities to elaborate detailed solutions and to justify them from a pedagogic point of view and to exchange experiences/ideas.

The ‘correspondence and calendar client’ professional blogs, RSS reader(aggregator) may get a central role among the students’ tools.

The mentor has a leading role in this professional school practice.

In the third cycle the goal of the practice is to provide an opportunity for the students to develop their competencies needed for the practicing of their profession, and described in the professional requirements. These key competencies can be developed during the training in different ways. According to the experienced main teachers’ opinion they can be grouped in three classes:

− To the first group belong those, which already in the two years of training were to be developed, and in which the attendees could reach a higher development level. These are mostly certain parts of educational activity, the methods of planning and learning guidance, and the establishment of self-analysing and self-evaluating skills.

− To the second group belong those areas, with which the attendee already met during his professional life, but most likely his/her experiences are not efficient for the high quality fulfilment of assignments. To this belongs for example the acquaintance of students, student groups, the planning, organization and guidance of extracurricular and free time activities, and the cooperation with the colleagues and parents, etc.

− Finally those, which usually develop and reach the efficient development level only after a couple years of practice. Such are for example the: individual threatening, the differential education, the multicultural approach, etc.

The training period (last semester of the course) is a coordinated professional experience led by a lead trainer and a dedicated department expert in a suitable educational institute (adult training school).

The half-year long practice provides an opportunity for the development of all these competencies described in the educational requirements, but by the selection of assignments its needed to be considered, that the activities of the competencies belonging to the second group should be emphasized.

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Related tasks

1. Self evaluation and quality management.

2. Elaborating learning tasks, helping tools, guidelines (class works, homeworks, taking minutes, learning guidelines) plus elaborating 10 tasks in details.

3. Assessment and documentation of the classes held, focusing on the developing methods of certain teacher competencies (planning and implementing student’s work instructions, evaluating students’ performance, cooperation, team work, etc.)

4. Participating at school events (parents’ meetings, cultural programmes, school excursions,) at least 3 times, plus providing a written summary of these events.

5. Teaching-educating work related experiment and analyses

6. summary and analyses of pedagogical-methodological experiences

7. Exam teaching, analyses, documentation including oral evaluation of the college lead trainer.

2. Network learning and the roles of teacherThe Motivate program gives an opportunity to try/experience the elements of network learning (forum, moodle) concerning learners’ tasks.

The main possibility for the actual application of the forum occurs during the framework of educational theory and the discussion of pedagogical issues regarding methodology tasks.

Subject pedagogy - introduced in the second phase - also offered a good opportunity, concerning education drills mainly. It provided the possibility to compare certain teaching methods, contents and to provide feedback.

The final portfolios gave a good overview of students’ experience about the basic forms of network learning.

In the current semester we started to introduce the e-portfolio by using web 2.0 facilities. The e-portfolio has been planned and developed based on the experiences of the Motivate project.

During this phase of our educational procedure we plan to introduce the accumulatory and integrational applications, in which components such as google documents, pictures, videos (teacher Tube, You Tube), Wiki and other blogs play a very important role.

During the planning of learners’ tasks new teachers’ tasks appeared. These procedures will be reconsidered and introduced in a more detailed way in the forthcoming semester.

One of these teachers’ tasks is the development of learning environment and organizing learning procedures. The creation and re-forming of new learning environment is a very time-consuming task, especially in the first phase of this alteration. Our main tasks here are content providing and content organization. First we need to integrate the new

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technical and content possibilities into the current learning environment. It also contains the acquainting, valuation or preparation of multimedia programs – acquaint of Internet databases, creation of source databases, catalogues, websites, download and refresh of data, furthermore the acquaint and use – at certain stage also the creation – of teaching-evaluating programs.

The share of the information system of education database, providing accesses and user rights for them and to follow up on the learning processes will also mean a significant job to do.

The other important task is to provider students with the necessary help, motivation and encouragement. We have to prepare students for individual learning, to make them understand they are responsible for their own successes, and need to help them in recognizing their own knowledge level and personal abilities/skills. We have to motivate them, give them guidance and advice if needed, help them to select the appropriate learning material, where and how they can find the necessary information and knowledge-content needed for their personal development. The teacher has to learn continuously in this new, open learning environment. This way the teacher will become a learning mate, also an expert and advisor based on these experiences. We have to learn to handle that new situation, that due to the attributes of the current information technologies, it may happen that students experience or learn something quicker than we do. We can define the new roles of the teacher in many ways. The teacher is a facilitator who gives a helping hand with learning and leads learning support procedure, helps to

The tasks of network teacher(Alec Couros, http://www.flickr.com/photos/courosa)

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understand the information provided by the learning materials. The teacher is a developer, supporter whose taks is to choose the appropriate teaching tools, provide students with guidance about the use of the system, and also to valuate the tasks and projects. The teacher is an advisor who is involved in course selection and helps students to overcome any difficulties.

The teacher is a mentor who provides information about consultations and also about where to find learning tools and other sourse data.

These networks have very significant role in the learning of digital era and also in the development of vocational training (master training). They influence and form the structure of quality learning and also change the role of the teacher. It is very important to create an atmosphere that reinforces this innovation. We need to provide a supportive inner sub-culture to fit the importance of these new communication possibilities. In this environment knowledge-share is an important value and we have to consider the enhancement of external connections also like workshopes, joint projects, etc..

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TEACHING ENTREPRENEURSHIP AS PREDICTOR TO PURSUIT MASTER COURSES

Lourenço Frazão - Universidade de Évora; Carolina Santos - Escola Superior de Tecnologia e Gestão do Instituto Politécnico de Portalegre; Carolina Santos, - Faculdade de Ciências da

Universidade de Lisboa (Colaborator);Teresa Oliveira - Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa

Lourenço Frazão: lourenco-frazao@sapo.pt

AbstractA study carried out with students attending the 1st cycle of higher education showed that their entrepreneurial intentions, entrepreneurial attributes, behaviours and the entrepreneurship teaching at University are predictors for the students to go on with their studies and register in master courses. From the results we can infer that those predictors identified are important elements for the definition of the 2nd cycle of higher education - master programmes and curricular plans - in specific areas related to entrepreneurship as a career option. Literature argues that the intentions are the best predictors of the behaviours and exists a direct relationship between the increase of qualifications and the entrepreneurial activity.Keywords: Entrepreneurship, higher education, master courses, intentions.

IntroductionEntrepreneurship in educational research has had a slow progress (Gibb, 2002). Nevertheless, as it was observed over the past decade, it has been an increase in the offer of entrepreneurial education programmes. Also, recently entrepreneurship has been under the scope of researchers. At the same time, the interest by students in creating new partnerships, business and self-employment as a career option (Fayolle, 2005) has been increased. Despite this interest by the students, the Universities seem to have some difficulties in considering a priority the learning of how to create a business (Frank, 2006; Sarkar, 2007). This difficulty is translated by the difficulty of the Universities to set specific programs or assess its impact in terms of an entrepreneurial activity or behaviour.

The young people from 18-24 years are influenced by the entrepreneurial culture perceived by the academic community (Audet et al., 2005). This fact gives to the University the compulsory role of promoting a positive image of entrepreneurship as a career option and at the same time, to provide training and educational environments where the entrepreneurial intentions of students can be developed (Fayolle, 2002).

If we accept as valid the fact that the creation of a business or partnership results from a planned action, (Fayolle et al., 2006; Fayolle, 2005) and that the intentions determine the attitudes and those are translated into behaviours (Ajzen, 2002, 1991), then when students express the intention of creating employment or choose entrepreneurship as career we are facing an important indicator of future entrepreneurial behaviour. Studies, referred by Tamásy (2006), suggest that entrepreneurial intentions have a strong influence in the decision making process of creating new companies. The combination of intentions and decisions allows us to have the perception of the possibility of students become entrepreneurs or create their own jobs.

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Education by itself doesn’t transform intention into action but jointly with the contextual factors of the environment (culture, values, beliefs) can influence the entrepreneurial orientation of individuals. There is an effect in the students’ entrepreneurial intentions every time there is a change in the social norms and values (actions from the Government, political and economic policies) (Aldrich & Marinez, 2001). For students, time and context are, together with the individual costs (Lee & Venkataraman, 2006) essential for the decision-making process to pursue an entrepreneurial opportunity identified as one having a possible success. The importance of these factors places multiple challenges to the University in terms of implementing entrepreneurial education.

The lack of studies on the impact of entrepreneurial teaching raises questions about its repercussion on attitudes, behaviours, intentions and of the potential of the students for entrepreneurial activity. Despite these questions, it is acknowledged that the entrepreneurial education in the University may have positive effects in the training of students (Galloway et al., 2006), in choosing entrepreneurship as a career for professional life (DeGeorge & Fayolle, 2004), in recognising the importance of entrepreneurship training in the process of creating an enterprise (Klapper, 2005; Fayolle et al., 2004) and in the quality of new business.

The importance of students having attended entrepreneurship courses when creating entrepreneurial activities or choosing entrepreneurship as a career has been worth mention by several authors. Comparative studies among students in Canada, Australia, United Kingdom and France showed different results. In Canada a highly positive relationship for creating business among students of Engineering was reported (Menzies & Paradi, 2003; 2002) 1. . The study in Australia showed a high desire and feasibility for starting a business (Peterman & Kennedy (2003) 2 . However, studies developed by different authors3 in the United Kingdom and in France have reported the existence of opposite results.

The results of the research studies reinforce the importance of drawing the courses in accordance with the needs, characteristics, developmental stage and objectives of the students. At the same time, those studies reinforce the need to define several contents and teaching methods (Blenker et al. 2006) that would stimulate the development of ideas that would lead to the creation of new businesses and self-employment. In this line of ideas, the role of University seems to be creating contexts, teaching methodologies and learning dynamics that would value and stimulate the individual characteristics of the students. On one hand, it is important that the University understands the organizational and social needs, according to an entrepreneurial paradigm. On the other hand, the University has to create the conditions for the existence of an entrepreneurial culture that facilitates the translation of the intentions into the development of entrepreneurial behaviour.

One of main dilemmas that entrepreneurial education faces is the definition of a general theory for entrepreneurship. This definition is, to some authors4 , very important for

1 Quoted by Menzies (2005)2 Pittaway & Cope (2007)3 Charney (2006) quoted by Gibb & Hannon (2007); Fayolle et al. (2006, 2006a); Galloway et al. (2006); Fayolle (2005)4 Blenker et al. (2003); Gartner (2001); Fiet (2000)

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planning curricular contents aiming to the development and success of students as well as the development of teaching/learning methodologies. Indeed, there is a strong need for conceptual support that would provide the foundations for teaching and for the development of entrepreneurial behaviour, skills and attributes to all students. Entrepreneurship cannot be seen as content in a specific area or an optional content but a transversal content embembed in an entrepreneurial culture. Thus, the implementation of teaching entrepreneurship implies to define, what to teach, how to teach and in what context. Furthermore, it is necessary to provide the University with qualified human resources with an entrepreneurial perspective in different areas of knowledge.

There are different opinions about the necessary changes to implement and develop the teaching of entrepreneurship in higher education. Some authors doubt if entrepreneurship can be taught. However, the current issue is not whether entrepreneurship can be taught, but how to develop and promote the different aspects of the phenomenon (Heinonen et al., 2006). The obvious lack of consensus between the authors on what can be taught means that each one argues that entrepreneurship can be developed and enhanced through education and training, while others share the idea that not everything can be taught as it is the case of entrepreneurship.

Volkmann (2004) 5 argues that the content and methods will be the decisive factors to the success of entrepreneurial education, but other authors6 advocate the idea that it is more a matter of content than method. In our opinion what seems to be possible and desired is to promote the entrepreneurial culture and the teaching of entrepreneurship for a professional career option. For designing a programme, it is necessary a dialectic perspective between the contents and methodologies, taking in account the characteristics and culture of the intended audience, seeking to reconcile formal and no formal learning with the experience held by students.

It is a fact that there is an effort of the scientific community to diversify methods and approaches in the entrepreneurial education. Teacher training in entrepreneurship is rare, occasional or limited and so, according to Carrier (2007), there are still, many teachers that tend to replicate the traditional methods of their own teachers, using an excessive expository teaching strategy and hence not allowing students’ participation and decreasing the motivation of student regarding innovative ideas. These facts may come from institutional ethos or from the insufficient training received by the teachers, from teachers not knowing what and how to teach, lack of global knowledge in the area, unknown specific language (Frank, 2006), or due to some fundamentalism regarding educational traditions which affects the motivation and commitment of the teachers.

Existing different ways and contexts of entrepreneurship, one of the challenges that is placed to education, among others, is to develop in the students the necessary skills to be able to act creatively, detect, assess and explore the entrepreneurial opportunities when they appear (Kirö, 2005). Another challenge that teaching entrepreneurship faces is related to the teachers’ difficulty to take risks, to assume new practices, to adapt different methodologies according to new audiences and contexts. Gibb (2002a) suggests an approach based on the creation of environments leading to the learning of entrepreneurs behaviours so that entrepreneurship is understood not only as an

5 Quoted by Fayolle et al. (2006)6 Carrier (2007); Kirö & Carrier (2005); Carrier (2005); Fiet (2000a)

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imperative necessity for economic development, social and aesthetic society, but also as a professional career, giving personal satisfaction of the individuals.

In addition to the definition of content and learning methods, it is urgent to define policies and strategies that would promote entrepreneurship at a social level and at all the different levels of education (Kirö, 2006; Blenker et al., 2002) in order to provoke social change that would promote new attitudes towards entrepreneurship.

In short, we can state that the knowledge resulting from cooperation between research and teaching for entrepreneurship can clarify the present difficulties about what to teach, how and in which context. Furthermore, this cooperation can help to identify the determinant factors of the choice of entrepreneurship by students as a career and understand the relationships between these factors. The achievement of these aspects is relevant to the formulation of general theory of education for entrepreneurship as well as to contribute for the definition of the educational policies, in a prospective way, given the evolution of entrepreneurship phenomenon in the context of globalisation.

Objectives and Methodology

In order to formulate best practice recommendations capable of promoting academic success and the pursuit for the 2nd cycle of higher education (master courses) in specific areas oriented to entrepreneurship we had developed an empirical study with students from the 1st cycle of higher education. In this study we wanted to know the perceptions of students about the incentives promoted by the University that would support sufficient knowledge, the intentions to choose a entrepreneurial career and their motivation for continuing the studies at a 2nd cycle of higher education.

A questionnaire, built by the researcher and pre validated, was administered to 254 higher education students attending the courses of tourism, civil engineering, informatics and computers engineering from two different Portuguese universities located in different geographic areas and economic contexts. For this presentation, from the broader questionnaire, three groups of questions were selected: i) the students’ entrepreneurial intentions; ii) the entrepreneurial attributes and behaviours; iii) the role of University in the teaching of entrepreneurship. The data was gathered through the analyses of the students’ answers to the questionnaire administered at the end of 2nd semester. In order to organize the data and to produce results the SPSS program (version 15.0) was applied and content analysis of the open questions was performed.

Discussion and ConclusionsIn order to know the importance of the knowledge promoted by the University in the pursuit of higher studies to the 2nd Cycle of higher education (master courses) associated with the entrepreneurial intentions in students, we have developed a set of statistical tests and the content analyses of the answers given by the students who constituted the target group.

The results enabled us to verify that the entrepreneurial intentions were included in the linear regression model due to their regression coefficient being highly significant (β =, 275; t (178) = 5,953; p =, 000). This result is revealing of the importance assigned by the students to entrepreneurial intentions. This predictor includes the establishment of the own business or establishment of small business, and should be understood as a precipitating factor for the continuation of studies. This result supports other studies

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conducted by Shane (2008) that showed the existence of a direct relationship between the increase of qualifications and the entrepreneurial activity. It is understandable that the students intend to enhance knowledge because their intentions involve financial investment, calculated risks in addition to personal attributes.

The analysis of the linear regression allowed also us to identify entrepreneurial attributes (β =, 416; t (185) = 7,986; p =, 000) as another significant predictor of entrepreneurial intentions. That is, the entrepreneurial attributes are also determined by the entrepreneurial intentions and are a precipitating factor for the continuation of studies.

In a deeper analysis and as a way to understand what were the attributes that influenced the entrepreneurial behaviours we did a linear regression regarding the attributes and behaviours. This procedure has enabled us to identify the variables, “ I like to challenge the predetermined ” (β =, 168; t (11) = 2,960; p =, 003), “ to be ambitious is a form of my personal fulfilment (β =, 185; t (11) = 2,878; p =, 004) and “ I prefer to work hard to create my own job than to be a rich employee ” (β =, 163; t (11) = 2,396; p =, 017), as being significant predictors of entrepreneurial behaviour.

The results comply with some of the characteristics that define the entrepreneurs. They are unconventional individuals, with great creativity and aware of their beliefs, which fulfilment is guided by ambition and that they need to dedicate many hours of work to their activities. The results seem to confirm the existence of a relationship between the personality trends and the intention to create a business (Lüthje & Franke, 2003), as they are willing to work hard to achieve it.

The analysis of linear regression also allowed us to identify the entrepreneurial education promoted by universities (β =, 248; t(185) = 4,513; p =, 000) as another significant predictor of entrepreneurial intentions. That is, entrepreneurial education is also a determinant to entrepreneurial intention and is a precipitating factor for the pursuit of studies.

The fact of the students giving an great importance to entrepreneurship promoted by the University, where the learning that emerges from it is intertwined, show that the University has a big significance in promoting creativity, innovation and the development of skills that help students to identify, evaluate and realize the entrepreneurial opportunities and encourage them to create self-employment and small entrepreneurial companies. The role of University in providing learning and training environments that would develop the entrepreneurial intentions of the students (Fayolle, 2002) seems to be decisive. In fact, the University can help students to view new career opportunities such as creating employment and small innovative companies, by choosing to continue their studies in order to acquire knowledge, which enables them to face the challenges, the competitors, the risks and the pressure as part of their activity and lifestyle.

To meet the expectations and needs of the students, the University must promote additional strategies for acquisition of practical knowledge in the field. These strategies can be, for example market studies. They are a way for potential entrepreneurs to get to know the competitors, the means and the processes in use, the suppliers, the distribution channels and the marketing options. Our study, also, showed the adverse impacts on motivation that bureaucracy causes on student entrepreneurs, both in the creation of a business, as well as in accessing funds. Such evidence, meets our concerns about the

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role of University, not only in the teaching of entrepreneurship, but also related to the importance of complementing the knowledge of students with practical aspects related to legislation, taxes, administration and management, as well as funding and the housing market as Onstenk (2003) refers.

Enhancement of entrepreneurial education agrees with the results of a study developed by Albuquerque (2008) with higher education students that also showed a positive impact on higher education resulting from the development of performance-related practices classes according to a professional activity. These results seem to mean, by one hand, the importance of teaching methodologies in the satisfaction and motivation of students and, one the other hand, the importance combining contents with their applicability in a professional activity, contributing to the acquisition of specific knowledge and to meet personal and professional expectations.

The fact of the attributes, the intentions and the teaching of entrepreneurship produce positive effects on carrying on their higher education studies is revealing of the University’s importance. So, the University should implement a rapid increase of practices and methodologies in order to capitalise attributes, develop skills and promote behaviours related to the development of knowledge that would help to sustain and to complement the entrepreneurial intentions of students. This result is particularly important today because entrepreneurship is not only a lifestyle capable of responding to personal needs and motivations, but also a career opportunity capable of generating economic, social and aesthetic value. It is also a reason for personal and professional achievement, as well as a mitigating factor of social conflict that would emerge by an increase in unemployment, whose global economic crisis came, only to boost.

RecommendationsRegardless of understanding entrepreneurship as a competence, a process or an activity it is important that the University promotes the full development of teaching through new practices that will motivate and teach students how to create in an innovative way, enhance the attributes of personality, as well as, develop skills and promote entrepreneurial behaviour aiming to recognize and evaluate entrepreneurial opportunities.

The University should promote the entrepreneurial education in all courses in order to create not only an entrepreneurial culture that helps the students to understand the potential of entrepreneurship in creating economic, social and aesthetic value, but also to promote a positive image of entrepreneurship as a professional career.

This change can stimulate the desire to deepen the academic knowledge as a tool that would enable the students to create employment and, in particular, for students who recognise the importance of having a University qualification at master level as an added value to the consolidation of their entrepreneurial intentions.

The generalization of an entrepreneurial culture at the University is an option capable of ensuring the students with entrepreneurial intentions of pursuing for the 2nd cycle of higher education wishing to continue to deepening their knowledge and aiming to obtain an entrepreneurial expertise.

It is necessary to make policy-makers aware of the need of the Government to allocate funding for the universities be able to encourage and to support the creation of students

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innovative small businesses. It would be also necessary to implement tax benefits to young people that would create new businesses supported by innovative projects. Such option would be an incentive for creating employment for young people with innovative ideas, while easing bureaucratic aspects. Easy access to grant credit lines for new business, that does not suffocate it in financial terms, is a desirable political measure.

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superior. Sísifo. Revista de Ciências da Educação, 7, 19-28. Consultado em Fevereiro 14, 2009, from http://sisifo.fpce.ul.pt

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[3] Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned behaviour. Organizational Behaviour and Human Decision Processes, 50, 179-211.

[4] Ajzen, I. (2002). Perceived behavioural control, self-efficacy, locus of control and the theory of planned behaviour. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 32, 1-20.

[5] Aldrich, H., Martinez, M. (2001). Many are called, but few are chosen: An evolutionary perspective for the study of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 25(4), 41-56.

[6] Blenker, P., Dreisler, P., Kjeldsen, J. (2006). Entrepreneurship education – the new challenge facing the Universities. A framework or understanding and development of entrepreneurial university communities. Working paper 2006-02. To access, January 12, 2007 from http://www.hha.dk/man/cmsdocs/WP/2006/2006-02_ENG.pdf

[7] Carrier, C. (2007). Strategies for teaching entrepreneurship: what else beyond lectures, case studies and business plan? In Alain Fayolle, Handbook Entrepreneurship Education (pp. 143-159). Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing.

[8] Degeorge, J-M., Fayolle, A. (2004). Etudians et entrepreneuriat: Porquoi se former? Humanisme et Entreprise, 267, 33-44.

[9] Fayolle, A. (2002). Les déterminants de l’acte entrepreneurial chez les étudiants et les jeunes diplômés de l’enseignement supérieur français Gestion 2000. 61-77.

[10] Fayolle, A. (2005). Evaluation of entrepreneurship education: behaviour performing or intention increasing? International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, 2 (1), 89-98.

[11] Fayolle, A., Gaillay, B., Lassa-Clerc, N. (2006). Assessing the impact of entrepreneurship education programmes: a new methodology. Journal of European Industrial Training, 30 (9), 701-720.

[12] Fayolle, A., Gaillay, B., Lassa-Clerc, N. (2006). Assessing the impact of entrepreneurship education programmes: a new methodology. Journal of European Industrial Training, 30 (9), 701-720.

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[13] Fayolle, A., Vernier, A., Djiane, B. (2004). Les Jeunes diplômés de l’enseignement supérieur sont-ils des créateurs d’entreprise comme les outres? Gestion 2000, 39-55.

[14] Fishbein, M., Ajzen, I. (1975). Belief, attitude, intention and behaviour: An introduction to the theory and research. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.

[15] Frank, A. (2006). Developing entrepreneurship skills and knowledge at the discipline level: The case of the Built Environment. To access, October 26, 2006, from http://testing-ncge.com/files/biblio652.pdf

[16] Galloawy, L., Brown, W., Anderson, M., Wilson, L. (2006). Investigating the potentials of entrepreneurship education. International Journal of Management Education, 5(2), 57-65.

[17] Gibb, A. (2002). In pursuit of a new “enterprise” and “entrepreneurship” paradigm for learning: Creative deconstruction, new values, new ways of doing things and new combinations of knowledge. International Journal of Management Reviews, 4 (3), 213-231.

[18] Gibb, A. (2002a). Creating conducive environments for learning and entrepreneurship: leaving with, dealing with, creating and enjoying uncertainty and complexity. Industry and Higher Education, 16 (3), 135-148.´

[19] Heinonen, J., Vento-Vierikko, I., Hautala, V., Hytti, U., Lamminpää, K., Malinen, P., Poikkijoki, S. (2006). Breeding Entrepreneurship in Life Sciences - Study on a Training Programme for the Graduate Schools of the Academy of Finland. Turku School of Economics and Business Administration. Report http://www.tukkk.fi/ytkk

[20] Kirö, P. (2005). Entrepreneurship learning in a cross-cultural context challenges previous learning paradigms?, in P. Kirö & C. Carrier, The dynamics of learning entrepreneurship in a cross-cultural university context. Entrepreneurship Education Series 2/2005, Hämeenlinna: University of Tampere, Research Centre and Professional Education, pp. 68-102.

[21] Kirö, P. (2006). Entrepreneurship education and Finnish society. Work paper nº152. To access, May 17, 2007, from http://ideias.repec.org/p/ttu/wpaper/152.html

[22] Klapper, R. The Project Entreprendre – an evaluation of an entrepreneurial Project at a Grande Ecole in France, in P. Kirö & C. Carrier, The dynamics of learning entrepreneurship in a cross-cultural university context. Entrepreneurship Education Series 2/2005, Hämeenlinna: University of Tampere, Research Centre and Professional Education, pp. 188-212.

[23] Lee, J., Venkataraman, S. (2006). Aspirations, market offering, and the pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunities. Journal of Business Venturing, 21, 107-123.

[24] Menzies, T. (2005). Entrepreneurship education at universities across Canada, in P. Kirö & C. Carrier, The dynamics of learning entrepreneurship in a cross-cultural university context. Entrepreneurship Education Series 2/2005, Hämeenlinna: University of Tampere, Research Centre and Professional Education, pp. 286-309.

[25] Pittaway, L., Cope, J. (2007). Entrepreneurship education: a systematic review of the evidence. International Small Business, Vol 25 (5), pp. 479-510.

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[26] Sarkar, S. (2007). Empreendedorismo e inovação. Lisboa: Escolar Editora.

[27] Shane, S. (2008). The illusion of entrepreneurship. New Haven: Yale University Press.

[28] Tamásy, C. (2006). Determinants of regional entrepreneurship dynamics in contemporary Germany: A conceptual and empirical analysis. Regional Studies, Vol. 40, Nº 4, pp. 365-384

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APPLICATION OF VIRTUAL REALITY TECHNOLOGIES

Dr. Hassan Elsayedprofessor, deputy director-general

Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering EducationBudapest Polytechnic

hassan.elsayed@tmpk.bmf.hu

AbstractThe purpose of this article is to show the meaning and implications of Virtual Reality in e-learning at the Centre for Teacher Training and Engineering Education and to support individuals and organizations, whether they be schools or workplaces, with implementing Virtual Reality Specially simulation materials which is developed by VRLM.

Key words: virtual reality, e-learning, 3D environment

1. IntroductionNowadays we have entered the e-decade. The worldwide Web has given us e-learning. This brings about a new way to sell education services. The Web and the Net have also increased opportunities to communicate with a large number of people, quickly and cheaply. There are plenty of e-learning materials – all using new technology to grasp a larger market share. May be even to produce and distribute materials and services more effectively and efficiently.

Virtual Reality is often used to describe a wide variety of applications, commonly associated with its immersive, highly visual, 3D environments. The development of CAD software, graphics hardware acceleration, head mounted displays, database gloves and miniaturization have helped popularize the notion. In the book The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality, identifies seven different concepts of Virtual Reality: simulation, interaction, artificiality, immersion, tele-presence, full-body immersion, and network communication. The definition still has a certain futuristic romanticism attached. People often identify VR with Head Mounted Displays and Data Suits.

E-business, e-learning and now Virtual Reality (VR). What’s it all about? Are these just trendy words or do they point to new life styles and a new economy? Is e-learning with the use of Virtual Reality just another new training technology?

In the new millennium, VR looms large. VR pops up in training and education services, conference presentations, and it seems to be quite popular markets of technology-assisted learning products. Is VR just a marketing device? Or is this a new word to describe a new reality?

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2. Application of VRMLIt is normal with new technologies, the realization of the idea of VR was not so easy because the technologies ( hardware &software) was limited, for example; low-resolution head-mounted displays, limited tracker range and accuracy, and high costs for hardware and software. Today the technologies have made great progress. The technical development has been accompanied by dropping costs, so both technically and economically suitable to do prominent application. Sincere, nobody can say that all Virtual Reality technological problems and limitations have been solved.

But we can say that the Virtual Reality is now in daily application use. Some of application fields are: General and vocational Education, Pilot training, medical , games and entertainment, cinema, army, environment, heritage and archaeology, tourism and museums, architecture, Sport, commerce( marketing), mechanical and electrical design, fine arts, health care education, therapeutic uses( phopia treatments), manufacturing, urban design, space research and challenges.

We use applications of WRML since long time. VRML – Virtual Reality Modeling Language – object oriented programming language. Give chance to the user to move freely in virtual world, touching objects, to build up an 3D world.

The resources section on the Web site explains that simulation with VRML is dynamic, happens in real time, collaborative, individual, and it enables the enterprise. Somebody tells is that VR(VRML) is Internet-enabled learning. Click to learn come takes a wide view suggesting that VR(VRLM) refers to the creation, delivery, and interactive of training.

I view the expression VR(VRML) broadly. It represents convergence in the education, training and information fields. As I see it, the term VR in e-learning groups together education, training and structured information delivered by computers, through the Internet, or the Web, or from the hard drive of the computer – or an organization’s network. This definition of VR in e-learning includes CBT, WBT electronic performance support systems and other interactive on the Internet. Education, training and structured information overlap one another.

Some thought-leaders and marketers are positioning VR as a panacea. This is misleading. VR in html is not a universal solution. It is complex. It demands new understanding, new leadership. To give us some of the knowledge we require to became leaders in VR, first we will try to understand the strengths of VR in html( perhaps you know the weaknesses), and we will polish this off with several tips on how to implement VR successfully.

More than seven years ago, we are interested to develop simulation materials for technical subjects in Virtual Realty. There for we buy developing software like: Virtual Basic, VREAM, V.REALM BUILDER( 3D WEB solutions).

Also we have Head Mounted Display, and we ensured high quality personal computers in our laboratory . During the last seven years we developed many simulation materials such as:

PC Motherboard, chemical molecule, the function of TV tube, accumulator( battery), and with VRML we developed simulation materials for physics, geometry and

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astronomy. Beside that we developed many multimedia and html materials for western countries and Brussels.

3. Pros and cons of VRVR is duality. Whether we are talking about advantages and disadvantages, pros and cons, difficult versus easy – we are talking about one entity: VR like a coin, the moon, a relationship, VR has two sides. The whole is composed of the two dichotomies – the pros and cons.

There are many advantages of VR(VRLM) as seen from the perspective of learners, instructors, developers. We will list some advantages below.

4. Some advantages of VRML for learnersLearners appreciate the following qualities of VRLM :

• VR fosters interaction among students and instructors. Interaction stimulates understanding and the recall of information.

• Accommodates different learning styles and fosters learning through a variety of activities that apply to different learning styles.

• Fosters self-paced learning whereby students can learn at the rate they prefer.

• Convenient for students’ access at any time and place.

• Reduces travel time and travel costs for students.

• Allows students to select learning materials, or to be directed to content that meets their level of knowledge, interest and what they need to know to perform more ef-fectively in their particular activity.

• Provides context sensitive help (Electronic performance support systems) to com-puter users and helps them complete tasks on-the-fly.

• Develops knowledge of the Internet that will help learners throughout their careers.

• Encouraging students to take responsibility for their learning and succeeding builds self-knowledge and self-confidence.

• VRML permits instructors to develop materials using the world-wide resources of the Web.

• Allows instructors to communicate information in a more engaging fashion than in text-based distance education programs. VR offers a wide-range of images( 3D) with video and sound, virtual reality technology in the future will improve the ef-fectiveness of the approach even further.

• Generates more personal gratification for instructors through quality student parti-cipation.

• Reduces travel and accommodation costs associated with training programs.

• Developers can develop training, demonstrating, in very specific details, how to per-form a task such as repairing equipment.

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• Facilitates modifying training and education materials, by using html.

• Allows developers to design once and use the same module in several programs.

References:

[1] [1] Hillis, Ken (1999): Digital Sensations: Space, Identity and Embodiment in Virtual Reality. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN.

[2] [2] Stanney, K. M. ed. (2002). Handbook of Virtual Invironments: Design, Implementation, and Applications. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., Mahwah, New Jersey

[3] [3] Warwick, K, Gray, J. and Roberts, D. eds. (1993). Virtual Reality in Engineering, Peter Peregrinus.

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REVIEW OF MOTIVATE QMS ELEMENTS

Ádám Balázs Tóth – Anna BéresStrukrura Ltd.

toth@strukturakft.hu

AbstractThe purpose of this paper is to give direct feedback about some underlined QMS elements used in MOTIVATE. Other purpose is to support the design of QMS of future projects by analysing the QMS elements of current project in practice.

Keywords: QMS, internal and external monitoring

1. IntroductionDuring the MOTIVATE project, the following QMS elements (Sources of information) were used:

• Controls of QAPs

• Internal forums

• Phase questionnaires and interviews

• Internal audit results

• External monitoring

Evaluation method selected to the practice of MOTIVATE: SWTD

This review concentrates on phase questionnaires and monitoring questions.

2. Phase questionnaires and interviewsAccording to the evaluation the aims of the common module deliveries have been fully achieved. Students felt that the collaboration with students and tutors was good. They evaluated the competence of the tutors as very high level.

Students evaluated the use of foreign language in the communication. Generally with very few exceptions, they expressed, that it was easy to communicate with each other. Mostly they were also very positive about the VLE usage. They listed the flexibility as a positive feature, and also the freedom of their timetable and the possibility of international teamwork.

Among the values of learning together with foreign students, they underlined the importance of getting information about foreign culture, fresh, unusual ideas, possibility to improve language skills, making new friendships.

Using questionnaires and interviews it strengthened the QM control possibilities in the project. It gave a positive direct feedback in the middle of the project both about the module development and about the course of the project.

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3. Feedback of internal auditInternal audit concentrated on web based content on three main areas: planning, quality assurance and product delivery. The purpose of the web based internal audit was to ensure at different stages of MOTIVATE, that the project meets the requirements and are documented. Some of audit topics were also covered, assured partially by other quality assurance procedures.

According to the audit results, all project plans issued internally and externally were checked to the application and contract and Leonardo project regulations. As part of planning QMS policy was agreed between the partner members of the consortium. The purpose of these policy agreements was to define how QM will support the project and its products. As a result of the agreements, processes were documented where each institutions could use their own QMS and process were documented as reference documents such as “Document and data control” and “Procedure of design process”.

Relating the Products of the project a product life cycle was designed and product control methods were introduced to the project members so that all members could count with the internal aims of the quality control. Project aims were achieved in the updated deadline, responsibilities of project tasks covered their role entirely, presentations were effective, pre set up timetables were kept correctly, communication platforms ran properly, and the project management was well organised.

4. Feedback of external monitoringThe project kept its internal and external plan to the stated deadlines during the project.

MOTIVATE project procedures were able to react on difficulties at the start of the project.

Changes in using different VLE (Associate Online-Moodle) did not have influence on the progress of the project.

Successful online forums were used in carrying out the common module delivery.

The analyses of the feedback information related to project management, project administration, project achievements, responsibilities etc. in the main phases of the project showed that the project is keeping its deadlines.

There were no serious failures, which needed action to assure the achievement of the set up project aims.

Project aims were achieved in the given deadline, responsibilities of project tasks covered their role entirely, presentations were effective, pre set up timetables were kept correctly, communication platforms ran properly, project management was well organised.

MOTIVATE project could be well followed on its official website.

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5. Feedback of MOTIVATE QMS

Strength Weakness Threats Demand

Controls of QAPs

Designed, already in practice, standardised

No new control element, rigid requirements does not match to the need actual situations in practice

Processes could change more rapidly than controls of QAPs

Big input time designing suitable QAPs

Internal forums Direct, honest,

dynamic, interactive,

flexible in time and distance

hard to analyse,

answers have influence on each other,

uncontrolled answers

Uncontrolled answers can mislead those who have less knowledge in the actual topic

Web site

Phase questionnaires and interviews

Designed

Structured

easy to analyse, independent answers,

Questions are limited to designer’s ideas

Questions could be misunderstood,

Needs a lot of time, Big input time designing suitable and analysable questionnaires

Internal audit results

Structured, well documented,

Limited to given information, rigid in time and distance

Depends on the knowledge of the auditor

Expert auditor of the field

External monitoring

Independent, Rigid in time and distance, limited to time and specialists

No balance of importance

Continuous involvement

In QMSs most QA procedures are based on cycles. These cycles have resources from human creativity, from feed back information of previous cycles or from the changing environment. Varying the cycles, the procedures should change continuously to be able to meet the requirements of the changing needs.

To be able to perform quality work in different environments, those who manage their own systems should not wait till a new model or standard is issued. The current demand from management systems is that they should develop themselves taking into account the specific quality requirement of the specific sector.

The quality of VLE products in Vocational Teacher Training very much depends on how the possibilities and the limitations of the environment is understood by the system

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managers including the QS managers. Also it depends on how sufficient quality aims are set up and how effective quality procedures, cycles can be developed for the users: Students, Teachers, Developers, Operators, Administrators.

In the future, learning from this project, quality procedure of module development can be refined and adjusted, specific quality measures can be set up for the evaluation of training materials and results. For defining the right quality measures, results of the different forums could be used as they seem to be the most direct and honest sources of information.

One future plan could be to work out measures of elements of good teaching in Virtual Learning Environments and investigate how those measures can support the training needs of different vocational institutions.

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