'n Program vir die professionele ontwikkeling van akademiese personeel aan Technikon SA

D.Ed. (Adult Education)A Programme for the professional development of Academic staff at Technikon SA. This research has been undertaken against the background of the contribution that the academic staff at Technikon SA can make in lowering the high drop-out rate of students, delivering high level manpower to the community and the effectiveness of this tertiary distance education institution. After an in-depth study of literature study it became evident that: It students dropping out in distance education is a complex matter and a great number of reasons exist why students do not successfully complete their studies: the responsibilities of lecturers have drastically in distance education; the professional role of distance education lecturers is undefined; professional development of Technikon SA academic staff is neglected; and lecturers have certain needs for professional development which must be identified and addressed. The problem addressed in this study has been to probe into the desirability and the nature of a programme for the professional development of Technikon SA lecturers. The objectives of this study are: It the literature exploration of the nature of and reasons for student drop-out and the professional role of distance education lecturers; the empirical identification and analysis of the developmental areas of Technikon SA lecturers; and to design a programme for the professional development of Technikon SA academic staff. The most important findings of this study are the following: Student drop-out rates can probably be reduced if the necessary student supporting structures are created and established within a distance education institution. Technikon SA as a tertiary distance education institution has developed rapidly over the past 14 years with the emphasis on scientific practice, co-operative education and training, technological practice and rendering of service to the community by delivering high level manpower. The professional role of Technikon SA lecturers comprises: teaching, research. community service and managerial tasks, For effective and efficient execution of these tasks, lecturers should have the necessary skills. There is a definite need for professional development amongst academic staff of distance education institutions which should be addressed by the institution. Empirical research. by means of a questionnaire. as to the importance and frequency of appearance of the tasks was launched amongst the full-time lecturers at Technikon SA and revealed that: lecturers regard teaching and managerial tasks as very important. while research and community service were regarded as not important: and more than 96% of programme for the staff in the form programmes. the group favours the design of a professional development of academic of shorter workshops and self study Findings of the empirical research together with the findings of the sources studied. result in the design of a programme for the professional development of academic staff. After taking various developmental conditions and possible restraining factors into consideration, the programme. based on the QDen systems approach, was developed in five phases. The most important conclusions drawn at the completion of this study are as follows: a definite need for the professional development of academic staff in distance education has been detected: job description of Technikon SA lecturers must be defined and outlined: Technikon SA must deliberately strive to create and establish a research cuIture: and a diplomatic approach towards professional development must be adopted in order to overcome resistance to chang

Building employability into a traditional curriculum: partnerships and frameworks to help transform distance education curricula in Myanmar

Higher participation rates in higher education support the social and economic development of countries. Distance education is an effective way of increasing the participation rate quickly rather than building more universities. But at the same time the curricula and qualifications being offered need to be aligned with the social and economic needs of the country so that graduates can be productive workers and responsible citizens. This paper reports on part of a large scale international development project (Transformation through Innovation in Distance Education or TIDE ) working with over 30 Myanmar universities involved in the country’s unique distance education provision. This distance education provision account for 60% of all higher education students in Myanmar but is based on traditional knowledge focused curricula that is not being taught using modern pedagogies and educational technologies. Working in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals this project is focused not only on enhancing online and distance education practices per se but also on enhancing the teaching of Environment and Sustainable Development in the curriculum. In trying to support the transformation of curriculum and teaching models the project is both providing a professional development programme for university staff on both areas but is also engaging with employers and other organizations with interests in the capabilities of graduates. Through this latter engagement we are trying to help develop both a generic graduate skills framework and also the expected graduate competencies needed by someone wishing to undertake Environmental Impact Assessments in Myanmar. These frameworks will hopefully help guide universities as they reform their curricula and introduce more teaching of practical and professional skills and behaviours for students taking these new qualifications

Devising Strategies for Enhancing Quality Staff Development in Embedding ICT in Teaching and Learning

Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) have huge potential and can add value to the quality of university teaching and learning. However, to fully exploit the potential of these innovative technologies, it is imperative that teaching staff are well informed about how to embed ICT in the curriculum in a way that is underpinned by sound pedagogy. Professional development programmes can enable staff to acquire appropriate skills to effectively facilitate technology-supported learning.The teaching staff from The Robert Gordon University and Edith Cowan University, are facing similar staff development challenges. Both universities provide online and distance education courses to their local and remotely located students. Staff involved in designing and teaching these courses require knowledge about and skills related to the appropriate use of ICT within teaching and learning contexts. Both universities face dual challenges: how to construct staff development programmes which develop their teachers’ ICT knowledge and skills; and how to include full time, part time and remotely located staff in such programmes. The authors of this paper are involved in assisting staff within their universities to develop ICT skills and have adopted a collaborative approach to designing a staff development programme in this area. This strategic alliancing between two institutions with similar profiles, staff needs and ICT experiences is proposed as a viable technique for implementing effective staff development in ICT.This paper reports on the initial stage of an ongoing collaborative project which aims to devise strategies to enable staff to use and embed ICT in their teaching

Training teachers committed to climate change mitigation

The environmental crisis, caused by unsustainable development and an unjust model, requires a global change in a political, social and environmental context. To promote this change we need to redirect Higher Education to train citizens to be able to make responsible decisions and act in a sustainable way. This requires educational initiatives promoted by universities to redirect teacher training towards sustainability. With this objective we present and focus a teacher training proposal based on treating the problems of Climate Change, the climate education and the development of teaching skills. Its purpose is to enable students of the Faculty of Education Sciences, future teaching staff, to participate, individually and collectively, in improving this socio-environmental problem of a local and global nature, which also has a multiplier effect for society in their later professional development. The proposal is based on a holistic and participatory methodology, promoting the development of sustainable skills, participation, information processing, critical thinking and autonomous and informed decision-making using ICTs and a platform providing distance learning. The experience can be the foundation for future proposals in different contexts and for different professional profiles

Threshold Concepts about Online Teaching: Progress Report on a Five Year Project

The burgeoning expansion of online education has presented the challenges of articulating an appropriate pedagogy for online education (Stevens, 2003; Runnels et al., 2006; Gosselin, 2009) while also contending with perceived and real deficits in lecturer competence (Shephard, 2007). Conceptually, the identified areas of concern are viewed as troublesome knowledge (Perkins, 1999), or knowledge that is counter intuitive to traditional teaching face to face teaching. To meet the emerging difficulties of new modes of distance teaching, researchers have focused on transformative learning using threshold concepts, or new portals, that allow understanding of concepts through new modes of thinking (Meyer & Land, 2003). Northcote and her colleagues used findings from their research into threshold concepts of online teaching to develop a tailored staff development training program (Northcote et al., 2011; Northcote et al., 2013). By identifying troublesome knowledge and threshold concepts, several unique benefits have been realised that include: 1) a focus for professional development programs; 2) a clearer understanding of the processes and resources needed to facilitate development; 3) support from institutional leadership; and 4) increased competence and confidence for online course developers

Evaluating the impact of the Learning Design and Course Creation (LDCC) workshop on the participants of the enhancement of Lifelong Learning in Belarus (BELL) project

Recently, national governments have introduced limitations on traditional approaches to curriculum delivery to cope with the impact of COVID-19. Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) have had to scramble to adjust their teaching and learning models in order to ‘pivot online’. As such, there is a pressing need for professional development of staff to deliver learning at a distance, based on robust distance and online education design frameworks. One such professional development offering is the LDCC Workshop from the Open University UK (UKOU) which, in September 2018, was attended by staff from six Belarusian HEIs involved in the ERASMUS+ funded Enhancement of Lifelong Learning in Belarus (BELL) Project. The Belarusian project partners were tasked with developing and delivering five distance and online courses for the first time in Belarus. The 18-month longitudinal study presented here evaluated the impact of the LDCC Workshop on the working practices of the participants and the design and realisation of their courses

A Central American Success Story: Innovation in International Distance Education

Based on actual workshop experiences, faculty at the Honduran Zamorano University in Central America created an effective, size-neutral, world-class distance education (e-learning) program for serving learners throughout Latin America through online and distance learning technology. The program is known as PAC @ D (Programa de Aprendizaje Continuo a Distancia or Life Long Learning Program at a Distance). It is administered by Zamorano’s global center for distance learning. The establishment of PAC @ D in 2010 was preceded by workshop efforts begun in 2004 by the authors. The workshop efforts focused on bridging the cultural uniqueness of educational programs in Latin America and the United States. The goal was to assist local faculty and staff at Zamorano University to build their own digital platform effectively and extend academic and outreach programs through that digital platform. The use of online and distance learning technologies can help extend intellectual capital beyond the limits of the physical campus in fulfilling the teaching, outreach/extension, and, to a limited extent, research missions. However, as we shall see in this professional paper, distance learning is more than turning on the technology with a click and a keystroke. At Zamorano, the development of PAC @ D required many hours of a full range of pedagogical and technological training, spread over 18 months. This professional development paper provides the rationale for PAC @ D, outlines its development, and provides suggestions for enhancing the educational experiences of distance learners

Different Approaches to the Development of Online Learning in Higher Education

The relevance of the study is substantiated by the intensive transition of the educational process to the digital environment. In this context, methods and principles of teaching, which are necessary to meet the society needs in modern education, are changing and developing. The authors reveal the issue of the global economy transformation, focusing on digital environments (digitalization). It is highlighted that digitalization contributes to the increasing demand for personnel and the necessity to improve the education system. The analysis of the theoretical features of online education is conducted, methods of its organization are identified, and modern requirements for teaching in higher education are determined. The key concepts that are the basis for the study are clarified. Approaches to the classification of online course formats and their other essential features are generalized. The authors introduce the classification of online learning in terms of time (synchronous, asynchronous) and the classification according to the degree of the educational process integration with online technologies. Additionally, the character of participants’ interaction (web support, blended learning, and fully online learning) is generalized. A review of online courses models by the format of participants’ interaction is carried out (model of online repository courses, xMOOC, cMOOC, hMOOC, ahMOOC, SPOC). The processes of online learning implementation, including e-learning and distance learning technologies in higher education have been revealed. The experience of the development of the first online courses at M. K. Ammosov North-Eastern Federal University is described. As a part of the study, the main approaches to the development of online learning in higher education are identified. The authors of the study focus on the work of the advanced training courses for the academic staff as the opportunity for professional competencies development in the context of online education

Different Approaches to the Development of Online Learning in Higher Education

The relevance of the study is substantiated by the intensive transition of the educational process to the digital environment. In this context, methods and principles of teaching, which are necessary to meet the society needs in modern education, are changing and developing. The authors reveal the issue of the global economy transformation, focusing on digital environments (digitalization). It is highlighted that digitalization contributes to the increasing demand for personnel and the necessity to improve the education system. The analysis of the theoretical features of online education is conducted, methods of its organization are identified, and modern requirements for teaching in higher education are determined. The key concepts that are the basis for the study are clarified. Approaches to the classification of online course formats and their other essential features are generalized. The authors introduce the classification of online learning in terms of time (synchronous, asynchronous) and the classification according to the degree of the educational process integration with online technologies. Additionally, the character of participants’ interaction (web support, blended learning, and fully online learning) is generalized. A review of online courses models by the format of participants’ interaction is carried out (model of online repository courses, xMOOC, cMOOC, hMOOC, ahMOOC, SPOC). The processes of online learning implementation, including e-learning and distance learning technologies in higher education have been revealed. The experience of the development of the first online courses at M. K. Ammosov North-Eastern Federal University is described. As a part of the study, the main approaches to the development of online learning in higher education are identified. The authors of the study focus on the work of the advanced training courses for the academic staff as the opportunity for professional competencies development in the context of online education

Different Approaches to the Development of Online Learning in Higher Education

The relevance of the study is substantiated by the intensive transition of the educational process to the digital environment. In this context, methods and principles of teaching, which are necessary to meet the society needs in modern education, are changing and developing. The authors reveal the issue of the global economy transformation, focusing on digital environments (digitalization). It is highlighted that digitalization contributes to the increasing demand for personnel and the necessity to improve the education system. The analysis of the theoretical features of online education is conducted, methods of its organization are identified, and modern requirements for teaching in higher education are determined. The key concepts that are the basis for the study are clarified. Approaches to the classification of online course formats and their other essential features are generalized. The authors introduce the classification of online learning in terms of time (synchronous, asynchronous) and the classification according to the degree of the educational process integration with online technologies. Additionally, the character of participants’ interaction (web support, blended learning, and fully online learning) is generalized. A review of online courses models by the format of participants’ interaction is carried out (model of online repository courses, xMOOC, cMOOC, hMOOC, ahMOOC, SPOC). The processes of online learning implementation, including e-learning and distance learning technologies in higher education have been revealed. The experience of the development of the first online courses at M. K. Ammosov North-Eastern Federal University is described. As a part of the study, the main approaches to the development of online learning in higher education are identified. The authors of the study focus on the work of the advanced training courses for the academic staff as the opportunity for professional competencies development in the context of online education