Interact stories 3
Interactions between students and teacher/s
Active Demonstrations for Distance Education Students
Assisting students to document their disease collections using the Blog tool
Chatting with lecturer about the Bible
Enlightening complexity in a masters subject using a wiki and forum
Interact: a case study COM119
Making static resources dynamic
Using the one Interact site for a cross-campus merged subject
Using the Polls tool and the Chat tool to provide assessment assistance and increase interaction for distance students
Using the Polls tool to increase interaction for internal students
Using the Resources tool to provide contextualisation for portions of the Study Guide and to increase interaction for Distance students
Return to Interact examples index
Active Demonstrations for Distance Education Students
Rationale: (1) Introduce students to the Interact resources area (2) Provide distance education students with the opportunity to see psychological principles explained in person and in some cases, demonstrated.
Description: One of the primary complaints from distance education students concerns their lack of opportunity to put a ‘human face' on the material, developing a sense of rapport with the lecturer that may facilitate learning. Moreover, demonstration of the principles of psychology taught in the class may be a valuable complement to the text materials not easily afforded to distance students. In order to address this issue I created weekly video clips (between 3 and 10 minutes duration) introducing the week's topic, reading and main issues. Occasionally these included active demonstrations. In the topic on behavioural learning, I posted two videos of me attempting to train my dog! One demo concerned Associative Conditioning (yes- Pavlov's Dog rings a bell) and another focusing on Operant Conditioning. These were very well received and were easy to do. What is more, this proved an easy way to get students to investigate the Interact area, request more information on topics, or exchange ideas via the Chat Room function. All in all we had a very busy interact site this semester!
Justin Harrison, School of Humanities and Social Sciences (back to top)
Assisting students to document their disease collections using the Blog tool
Rationale: to assist students to use the Blog tool to document their disease collections.
Description Gavin Ash used Camtasia to produce voice-over instructions showing students how to use the blog. The instructions are captured together with visual step by step instructions on screen. He produced a sample blog for the students to use as a template to document their disease collections. This is a new subject in which Gavin provides instruction and content week by week. Gavin has also made mp3 recordings as a new approach to capture students' attention. Gavin introduces the week's lecture notes and also talks about some of the issues that they might find difficult or points out details that they need to be aware of. This personalised approach has been well received.
Gavin Ash - School of Agricultural & Wine Sciences (back to top)
Chatting with lecturer about the Bible
Rationale: To develop students' interpretation skills by working on a Biblical text together.
Description: I announce in the Forum and Announcements of an online chat with myself, about 5 days in advance (having taken a poll in Week 1 over suitable chatting times). I announce also the text we will be studying, so students can prepare if they want. During the chat, I post a few sentences at a time from the text and ask various questions and give various comments. The students enjoy the interaction and it is a great way to teach interpretative skills.
Matthew Anstey - School of Theology (back to top)
Enlightening complexity in a masters subject using a wiki and forum
Rationale: To assist students in understanding the complexity of educational research
Description: Educational research is complex. To assist students in understanding and critiquing educational research the subject has two voluntary activities that utilise the wiki and forum to bring the students and their ideas together and, with the support of the lecturer, draw out the complexity of research and related issues.
The task is divided into 5 parts and students are allocated to each part by the first letter of their surname. Each student responds to a set of questions drawing on the materials of the subject and posts a 200 word response to the wiki page for their part of the task. All students have access to all wiki pages to read the responses. This gives the students the time to focus on one aspect but at the same time see everyone's contributions to each part.
The lecturer then responds to the cohort and the task as a whole focusing not on specifics but highlighting the complexity. This is a valuable learning process that opens up the issues. The learning from this task feeds into the first assignment as the second similar task with a different focus feeds into the second assignment. The students are asked to critique a piece of educational research in their assignments.
A sub forum is set up for the students to discuss each assignment, post task and prior to the due date. The lecturer watches the debates and how student learning unfolds and comes in only toward the end of a debate to confirm and support the learning. There has been a 92% response rate to task 1 in 200870.
Dr. Beverley Moriarty - School of Teacher Education (back to top)
Interact: a case study COM119
Jerry Boland - School of Communications (back to top)
Making static resources dynamic
Rationale: Giving students some flexibility in the pace of their learning while still making the subject have some dynamism.
Description: My basic practice in Interact is to place heaps of information into the Resources section. I add README files to explain the contents of each folder, giving context when they might be useful. Also I add a web page as a front end to the section (using the Web Content tool), which automatically includes the README files. I number files to give a suggested order and make key sections more prominent (eg by naming them creatively to get lower in the alphabet!).
I try to put effort into my resources - for example for STA382 part of the subject is trying to teach statistics using Excel (which is regrettably not the best tool for the job - but Excel skills are important and it is widely accessible). So I have produced interactive Excel files which give thorough examples and then questions to allow for practice. I try to increase Excel skills as well as trying to create understanding of Statistics (statistics can easily become plugging into a formula - so it is important to try to get meaning across - thus I emphasise randomness early on. Excel's RAND() function and the F9 key help produce graphs that can rapidly change). Students in general really appreciate these Excel files, especially how they increase their generic skills.
Putting all the resources up initially is good, since it allows students to proceed through the material somewhat at their own pace. The downside though, is that the resources feel static and students may lose interest in checking regularly.
To keep up the dynamic side of things I make regular announcements revealing the next set of resources to look at (marking them as urgent or useful or if needed etc). I prefer to use the Announcements tool for messages that I do not want replies to, but want all students to get (make them high priority). I use the Forum if I want responses. Generally for maths subjects I use the Forum more as a help desk with some responses to anticipate problems.
For STA382, the resources were very well used (I used the Site Stats tool to gauge). The Forum was quiet for this subject (compared to my others at least). The individual nature of some of the assessment meant I received more phone calls.
Michael Kemp - School of Accounting and Computer Science (back to top)
Using the one Interact site for a cross-campus merged subject
Rationale: To use the one Interact site for a cross-campus merged subject to provide consistency of advice relating to assessment whilst allowing academic autonomy within the separate face-to-face campus cohorts.
Description: The three separate cohorts make use of campus-based Resource Folders within the Resource Tool and Subfora within the Forum tool.
This allows students access to all the resources (should they wish) but keeps the campus-specific comments within the context of the campus-based subfora.
Reading Process and Pedagogy
Jen Thompson describes it on her worksite information as follows:
EML210 is the second in a series of literacy subjects for the Bachelor of Education (Primary) designed to ensure students will meet the core discipline, pedagogical and syllabus knowledge requirements of the accredited pre-service teacher education course. With a focus on reading, viewing and listening, it also prepares students for the integration of literacy across the Key Learning Areas of the curriculum. We have a cohort of over two hundred students across two campuses this semester with lecturers situated in Bathurst (Judith Taylor) and Wagga Wagga (Jen Thompson and Nick Clarke). The subject forum is a valuable learning tool for small group discussion and answering queries regarding assessments. The forum has been organised for your convenience in the following ways: The main Subject Forum, accessible to all enrolled students, will have threads for questions about each assessment item and any ICT or Technical queries. The Subject Convenor, Jen Thompson, will be monitoring these discussion threads on a weekly basis. Please place your posts in response to the topic threads established. Three campus subfora will be available for Bathurst, Wagga Wagga First Year and Wagga Wagga Second Year students. You will have access to the subfora for your location and the posts will be monitored by your workshop lecturer in each location. These discussion campus subfora will have threads established for the weekly topics. If you want your lecturer to respond to a discussion point remember to Flag their attention in the subject line of your post by writing: Attention Jen or Query for Judith or Question for Nick etc.
Jen Thompson, Jude Taylor, Nick Clarke - School of Education (back to top)
Using the Polls tool and the Chat tool to provide assessment assistance and increase interaction for distance students
Rationale: To provide assessment assistance and encourage students to use the forum more for discussion.
Description: In response to requests for assistance in preparing for the EED517 Child Development assessment item Bev Lambert prepared a poll question asking students when they would be available to chat. This simple tool stopped the myriad of emails/forum postings which would otherwise have eventuated. Bev found the chat successful and that as a result students began to use the forum more for discussion.
Bev Lambert - School of Education
Using the Polls tool to increase interaction for internal students
Rationale: To encourage students to consider an issue and register an opinion before class so that they are can be more actively engaged in the class discussion around the issue
Description: I prepare a poll question around a relevant problem, then let the students know via the Announcements tool that the question is available. The students are informed that I will only discuss the particular problem if at least 50% of the class answer the poll question. I prefer this to be formative assessment as I am trying to promote life-long learning where the students are motivated to attempt the question without fear of losing marks and without feeling that they need to Google to find the correct answer. The results of the poll are displayed in the lecture and are used as a stimulus for further discussion.
Jens Loberg - School of Dentistry & Health Sciences (back to top)
Using the Resources tool to provide contextualisation for portions of the Study Guide and to increase interaction for Distance students
Rationale: To use the Resources tool to provide contextualisation for portions of the Study Guide and to increase interaction for distance students.
Description: Barney Dalgarno drafted brief notes on each topic and then recorded short “almost off the cuff” audio files and used the Resources tool in Interact to provide contextualisation for portions of the Study Guide and to increase interaction for distance students in EMT502.
Barney Dalgarno - School of Education (back to top)