researching learning platforms

Cameo 1

This student teacher carried out open-ended interviews with colleagues and focus group of six Year 7 students (two taught by each of the colleagues) about their experiences of using VLEs. Colleagues were asked to respond about their own use, the values of the VLE to their work life and learning experience of the students. They were asked to consider what they would like from the VLE and in the context of the Year 7 ICT group, whether it should be more than a storage area. From the colleague interviews, the trainee found out:

 Teaching staff have mixed views regarding VLE's and many are negative particularly about the amount of time required for initial set up, this was highlighted in published literature and my personal experiences at interview.

 The school also has a vital role to play in the uptake of VLE's, a school should allocate proper training and time for the development of such key resources as well as encouraging there use throughout the school as a whole in order to promote consistent practice.

The students’ responses showed that they had had differing experiences beyond simply logging on and saving work.

....it was clear from the tone of voice and generally attitude most were not keen on the VLE, even those who had been introduced to it in a fuller manner did not seem to demonstrate an enthusiasm towards the features.

Their responses to possible uses of a VLE were more positive when the student explained the idea of a virtual classroom.

Students seemed keen on the idea of being able to discuss work, gain teacher feedback both in contact the teacher and through electronic submission of work as well as to have access to directed study during revision time in the run up to exams.

 

Cameo 2

This student teacher chose the question, “How Can I Use Virtual Learning Environments (VLE) to Support My Year 10’s learning” to research based on personal experience of schools only using them in a very limited way.

This was particularly apparent on my pre course placement; teachers only used the VLE as a storage area for lesson plans, timetable information and resources.

The student teacher informally interviewed and gave questionnaires to four teachers (two ICT, one PE and one mathematics) and a Year 10 group.

Two teachers stated they did not use the VLE. ... The remaining two teachers one had stated they would upload and share resources with students as well as staff. Another teacher claimed that whilst they did not use the school supplied VLE, they did use an alternative piece of software. All teachers highlighted that they would enjoy using the VLE more if it was not slow, more user friendly, if they had more time to create resources to be placed on the VLE and the ability to track, monitor and assess student progression.

The student teacher found that it was not the idea of a VLE but the system that school had that was a limiting factor.

Interestingly, the teachers recognised the importance and the benefits of the VLE in supporting Year 10 students, in assessing student’s, providing additional resource and encouraging independent learning. They felt that this could be applied across all school years. Their main issues for not using it centred on them feeling that the current system either could not support them or they did not know how it could. They believe that once they have this knowledge for this learning platform, it will enable teachers to monitor, assess and track student’s progress. The general consensus was, provided the VLE worked properly, it should be introduced in all school years.

Of the group of 14 students: ... just under half stated they only use it for transferring files between school and home. The remaining students stated that they have never used it, explaining the reason as many of their class teachers never bothered with it.... Despite this lack of use, Year 10 students still stated that they would be interested in using resources placed on the VLE that would support their learning.

 

Cameo 3

This student teacher decided to investigate ‘How can I use VLEs to support my teaching of OCR Nationals to Year 10 and 11’. As part of this two ICT teachers were interviewed, one had responsibility for ICT and was heavily involved in the school’s VLE whilst the second was a relatively new member of staff. The teacher who was more familiar with the school’s VLE used it in a variety of ways including uploading teaching content (thus helping absentees catch up with their studies), as encouragement of independent learning skills through extension work, as curriculum guide for pupils and teachers. The teacher also made use of different media on the VLE including video to explain Flash animation and was using Podcasts.

The second teacher also felt that the VLE made a positive contribution to their work and was using some of the VLE’s capabilities, but was not sure how to contribute more resources due to lack of training in how to do this. As a relatively new member of staff the schemes of work and grading outlines had been very useful.

The forum capabilities had been disabled through concern over moderation and administration but both teachers could see that this provided the potential for pupils to share information through blogs, forums and wikis.

The VLE was also used for administration tasks although marking and annotating coursework had been abandoned because of costs outside the school budget. The school did, however use the system for reporting to parents on pupil’s behaviour, progress, homework and attendance so providing a home/school link.

Pupils were also interviewed and they commented that they found online content most useful Some had experiences of quizzes in Science and Mathematics which were useful in that they obtained instant feed-back and could use them to highlight their particular weaknesses. The pupils felt that on-line annotation of their work would be beneficial while some added that discussion groups would also be useful, particularly if a teacher was involved.

 

Cameo 4

The unintuitive interface of the Kaleidos system was cited by teachers at this student teacher’s school as one of the reasons that the VLE was largely unused. Although students use the system for emailing both staff and students have their own areas for storage although there was the ‘student shared drive’ and a ‘staff shared drive’. The student teacher observed that that the members of staff in the ICT department were happy with this arrangement but this gave the impression that teachers used their own resources, even if they were teaching the same units of study. The impression was also given that file duplication and versioning were an issue.

The student teacher formed a focus group with some members of staff to discuss and advantages and disadvantages of having a VLE. The staff gave the impression that students do enjoy online learning and the use of technology is a strong stimulus for learning and could also see the opportunities that use of a VLE would present. The staff acknowledged that effort was required and some identified a training need.

Now explore links to literature about VLEs and learning platforms