Awards for Excellence in Research Supervision

Having completed courses in Assessment and Online Pedagogy, the next topic in my "Postgraduate Certificate in Tertiary Teaching" is graduate "research supervision". The question I am exploring is if the tools and techniques which have been developed for on-line coursework can be applied to research supervision. The trend I noticed in my studies of coursework pedagogy is to have students take more responsibility for their own learning. This is emphasized through the use of terms such as andragogy (adult learning) and heutagogy (self directed learning). One of the hot topics in research supervision seems to be how to provide students with more guidance and support. This suggests that the two approaches could meet somewhere in the middle, with coursework students having more autonomy than they do now and research students having more oversight. We could then use the same approach and tools for coursework and research students and allow a mix of coursework and research for each student. The hidden agenda in this would be also using the same system for monitoring the performance of the supervisors.

However, I suspect that research supervisors will oppose any overt requirement for more structure in how they teach than coursework university teachers. Many will even oppose the idea that they are "teachers" at all, or that "pedagogy" applies to them. Universities provide a high level of autonomy to their researchers, so you can't simply tell them something will be done a certain way, they must be persuaded. One way used appears to be through awards for excellence in research supervision.

Awards for Excellence in Research Supervision

A search for "research supervision" awards returned 65,600 results on the web. Limiting the search to Australian educational institutions (edu.au) returned 13,800 web pages. The same search on US institutions (EDU) returned only 7,810 results, but 22,900 for the UK (AC.UK). This may be the result of the different use of the term "award" in the US, rather than a difference in emphasis on awards.

Academics Need Teacher Training

In Lost professors: we won’t need academics in 60 years, Professor Chris Lloyd, University of Melbourne, predicts the number of "genuine" academic positions in Australia will return to 1952 levels. Here are some comments on the article:

Researching and teaching

"... Academics create knowledge through largely unfunded research ..."

Professor George Walker, has been discussing the relationship between teaching and research in Canberra this week.

"... generate curriculum; they deliver lectures; they accredit ... "

Academics have been largely untrained in how to design and deliver education. There are now teacher training programs in place at many Australian universities and these will make a big difference to the quality of education.

Knowledge middle men

"When I started lecturing in 1978, I would take one or two textbooks and write out my own lecture notes. ... "

Yes, there are many disciplines which started out in such an ad-hoc way. But it is time we did things more professionally in tertiary education.

"These days, I design new courses by trawling the web ... "

It is one of the dirty little secrets of education that teachers use the Wikipedia but then penalize their students for doing the same. In some courses I have got students to critique and edit a Wikipedia entry to give them an appreciation of its good and bad points.

"I deliver the course to the students in a big hall. ... "

In 2008 I decided that lectures were not a good way to do education, so stopped giving lectures.

"Surely, 60 years from now, the very best curriculum and audio visual presentations will be collected, digitised and organised ..."

Videos of lectures are not that much more useful than live lectures. There are better ways to do education. Techniques for new teaching styles are explained in tertiary teaching courses run by many universities.

"I am not sure that there is much interaction in most lectures anyway. ..."

"Lecture 2.0" is the general term for more interactive lecture
techniques (my "last lecture" gets a mention).

Could it really happen?

"Electronic interactions through small groups ... "

Small groups work well, face-to-face, or online. But we can't handle an increased volume of students this way, without improved tools and techniques. Routine tasks of helping students with academic writing, for example, can be automated with an artificial intelligence tutor.

What about accreditation?

"Accreditation is another core function of universities which they currently monopolise. ..."

Professional bodies also run courses, certify professional training and accredit university courses. I was commissioned in 2008 to write an online ICT Sustainability course for the Australian Computer Society. This is designed to meet a global skills standard and delivered as part of a globally certified professional program, accredited through national professional bodies. It was later adapted for use at university in Australia and North America.

"A degree is a quality guarantee ... I cannot see the private sector usurping this role. "

There is little distinction drawn between public and private sector tertiary institutions when it comes to quality, they have to meet the same standards.

The major issue is local versus global: if a student is studying
on-line, will their teaching be outsourced to a low cost country?

Brave new world

"Many may argue that it is daft to predict what will happen in 60 years. ... "

We do not have to wait 60 years: changes to education are happening now and will become very apparent in the next five to ten years. Australia is well placed to benefit from this change, as for example, one of the leading Learning Management System products (Moodle) was developed here and there are many deep thinkers on how to do education better.

The current situation reminds me of the Internet in the mid 1990s, when technology was available and worked. But most IT professionals were in a state of denial, saying the Internet was just an academic experiment and not suitable for serious use. Within a few years the Internet came to dominate IT. The hard part was integrating the Internet way of working into traditional corporate culture.

Some academics are now saying that the more systematic approaches to education are threatening their academic freedom and that online learning is untested. But I expect that within a few years these will become the normal and obvious ways to do university education. Hopefully Australian universities will be part of that change, or they will become just satellite campuses for overseas institutions.

My suggestion to my colleagues on how to get to the new world of university education is "Integrating Online Learning into Campus Life".

University Teaching: strategies and techniques

Australian educational designer Deborah Veness has started a new blog: "University Teaching: strategies and techniques". While aimed at higher education, many of the tips are applicable to school and vocational teachers as well. For the heavier theoretical aspects of education, see Deborah's other blog: Educational Reflections.

E-Learning Maturity Model

In 2005 Dr Stephen Marshall, Senior Lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington created an E-Learning Maturity Model (eMM). This is inspired by the software engineering Capability Maturity Model from Carnegie Mellon University. It is intended to assess how mature an institution is with its use of electronic learning. The eMM documentation is available under an open access license:

• Key Concepts
• Processes
• Process Dimensions
• Capability Assessments
• Interpretation of Results

There have been many attempts at applying the "Maturity model" idea to other disciplines, but with little success. Software engineering has a very rigorous processes and training for staff. This then lends itself to the assessment of the processes against standards. Education is not quite like that, at least not in most institutions.

Teachers are not all trained in the same methods (some staff at universities are not trained in education at all). Different approach abound and teachers work alone, or in very small, loose knit teams. There is considerable use of casual and part time workers in education. Essentially teaching is mostly a craft, not an organizational activity. As a result it would be difficult to apply the maturity model to the organization as it does not have a common set of processes to test against. A tiny fraction of educational institutions would even be at the lowest point on a maturity scale, not because they do not do education well, but because they do not do it as an engineering production line-like activity.

What might prompt educational institutions to adopt more systematic processes is e-learning. When education was done by a lone teacher in front of a class, it was diffiult to moninitor and measue what they do and little scope for production line efficiencies. E-learning uses computer mediated communication with a learning management system which can monitor and record all interactions between staff and students. This information can be mined to see what is done. Also materials such as course content and tests can be reused much more easily.

The eMM processes make a useful checklist to see where educational institutions are up to:

L1.	Learning objectives are apparent in the design and implementation of courses
L2.	Students are provided with mechanisms for interaction with teaching staff and other students
L3.	Student skill development for e-learning is provided
L4.	Information provided on the type and timeliness of staff responses to communications students can expect
L5.	Students receive feedback on their performance within courses
L6.	Research and information literacy skills development by students is explicitly supported
L7.	Learning designs and activities result in active engagement by students
L8.	Assessment of students is designed to progressively build their competence
L9.	Student work is subject to specified timetables and deadlines
L10.	Courses are designed to support diverse learning styles and learner capabilities
D1.	Teaching staff are provided with design and development support when engaging in e-learning
D2.	Course development, design and delivery are are guided and informed by formally developed e-learning procedures and standards
D3.	Explict linkages are made in the design rationale regarding the pedagogies, content and technologies chosen
D4.	Courses are designed to support disabled students
D5.	All elements of the physical e-learning infrastructure are reliable, robust and sufficient
D6.	All elements of the physical e-learning infrastructure are integrated using defined standards
D7.	Resources created are designed and managed to maximise reuse
S1.	Students are provided with technical assistance when engaging in e-learning
S2.	Students have access to a range of library resources and services when engaging in e-learning
S3.	Student enquiries, questions and complaints are collected formally and managed
S4.	Students have access to support services for personal and learning issues when engaging in e-learning
S5.	Teaching staff are provided with pedagogical support and professional development in using e-learning
S6.	Teaching staff are provided with technical support in the handling of electronic materials created by students
E1.	Students are able to provide regular formal and informal feedback on the quality and effectiveness of their e-learning experience
E2.	Teaching staff are able to provide regular formal and informal feedback on quality and effectiveness of their e-learning experience
E3.	Regular formal independent reviews of e-learning aspects of courses are conducted
O1.	Formal criteria used to allocate resources for e-learning design, development and delivery
O2.	Institutional learning and teaching policy and strategy explicitly address e-learning
O3.	A documented specification and plan guides technology decisions when designing and developing courses
O4.	A documented specification and plan ensures the reliability, integrity and validity of information collection, storage and retrieval
O5.	The rationale for e-learning is placed within an explicit plan
O6.	E-learning procedures and which technologies are used are communicated to students prior to starting courses
O7.	Pedagogical rationale for e-learning approaches and technologies communicated to students prior to starting courses
O8.	Course administration information communicated to students prior to starting courses
O9.	The provision of e-learning is guided by formal business management and strategy

Table 2: eMM Version Two Processes

Open Access for On-Line Education

Last week I commenced the course Assessment, Evaluation and Learning EDU5713, at University of Southern Queensland, via e-learning. One technique I have found useful to supplement the materials provided for the course, is to first look up terms in the Wikipedia and the search for materials in Google Scholar. Wikipedia generally provides a brief, easy to understand overview of the topic and Google Scholar provides authoritative papers (it is not a good idea to cite Wikipedia in your assignment).

As an example the Wikipedia entry for Assessment_for_Learning is very readable and the Google Scholar Entries are useful.

One way Google Scholar could be improved would be with an "Article Available" option. It is frustrating to have numerous articles listed, but then find most are behind pay-walls, so that it is not possible to read more than the abstract, without paying a fee or signing up to a service. I Suggest adding an extra option "Article Available" to allow only those articles where the text is available on-line without the need for payment or signing in.

It would also be useful to have the same open access options (for looking for articles with Creative Commons and similar licenses), as in the non-scholar advanced search, would also be useful.

While institutions, such as USQ, provide access to on-line papers via their library, it is much easier for the staff and the students, if freely available articles are selected for readings. This way the student does not need to login to the university library system to get to the article.

ps: Surprisingly on the topic of e-learning, many of the papers found are from Australian authors. This may be because the Google search engine, seeing I am in Australia is giving me local results, or that doing an Australian course I am searching on topics of particular interest to Australians. But it may be just that Australia is a leader in e-learning.

Benchmarking Education Quality

The Benchmarking of Education Quality came up on day two of the ANU Educational Research Conference at the Australian National University is concentrating on research and postgraduate education. The Australian National University has a "Benchmarking of Educational Quality and Standards" policy. ANU will be using the International Foundations of Medicine (IFOM) for testing medical students in the ANU Medical School.

Expanding Doctoral Education

An interesting theme from day two of the ANU Educational Research Conference at the Australian National University is the rapid expansion of postgraduate studies at university. One comment which got my attention was that the Australasian Digital Theses Program had "fallen over". From reading the web site, I had the impression that it had now been subsumed in various university based repositiories, which then had their metadata harvested by the National Library of Australia.

Also of interest is the question of what demand there is for postgraduate education, what it costs and what pool of people suitable for it is available. One issue is if there is too much concentration on the prestige of PHDs, when other more flexible forms of ongoing education would be more useful.

One example of a more flexible approach is the ANU Graduate Studies Select. The Postgraduate Certificate in Tertiary Teaching I am currently studying allows for going to to a Masters.

Knowing When You are doing Innovative Education

Dr Stephen Dann from the ANU College of Business and Economics at ANU Australian National University is speaking at the ANU Educational Research Conference on how to innovate productively in education. He suggested that just trying things was not innovation, as you need to check who might have done it before so you can learn from their experience and document what it is you are doing so others can learn from that. He also pointed out how techniques from the teachers discipline can be sued in teaching (in his case marketing).

Mining Learning Management System Data to Improve Education

Paul Francis from Astronomy at the Australasian National University is speaking at the ANU Educational Research Conference about data mining he did on data in the Learning Management System of his course. He found a smooth progression for his students. Students who did well in one form of assessment, tended to do well in others. He quipped that the assessment could have been reduced to one multiple choice test, noting more seriously that assessment has multiple purposes, not just giving one number at the end. These are similar results, using similar techniques to the work by Colin Beer at Central Queensland University, reported at Moodle Moot Au 2010.

Kotter Process Applied to Learning

Dr Kim Blackmore is talking on "Findings from the Engineering Hubs and Spokes Project" at the ANU Educational Research Conference. Most interesting was the application of business change theory to education. Kim described adapting Kotter's eight steps to organizational change to the process of introducing blended learning:

1. Create a sense of urgency
2. Develop a guiding coalition
3. Develop a vision for change
4. Communicate the vision
5. Empower broad-based action
6. Generate short-term wins
7. Don't let up
8. Make it stick in the organizational culture

From: John Kotter, Wikipdia, 2011

Encouraging Critical Thinking Thought by University Students

Dr Fiona Mueller, is presenting on "Content and Process in University Teaching" at the ANU Educational Research Conference. She explained how the ANU's international students (mostly from China) are provided with support by ANU College to adapt to university life. This includes encouraging critical thinking by the students, who may be used to just selecting and repeating materials from authoritative sources.

Dr. Mueller gave the example of showing the film "Animal Farm" to the students to provoke discussion, with one of the students seeing this as a attack on their government. This causes me some concern, as while students need to be helped to understand the ways of a western university, the ANU also needs to understand and respect the cultural context of their students. To simply brainwash the students to think the ANU's western view of thinking is correct and that all others are wrong is not teaching critical thinking.

The ANU and the students need to come to terms with a world where western dominance has reduced and other ways of thinking need to be understood. I suggest the ANU staff need to work to understand other points of view, so they can better teach the students how to express views in different contexts. This will benefit all ANU students, not just international ones. As an example, a government or corporate culture has aspects which can be as difficult to deal with for a graduate as that of a foreign country.

Research for Excellence in Tertiary Teaching

Greetings from the Australian National University where Professor Lawrence Cram, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) is giving the Opening Address for the ANU Educational Research Conference. His theme was "lists". Professor Cram started with "How to Become an Excellent Tertiary-level Teacher. Seven golden rules for university and college lecturers" by HENRY ELLINGTON. He pointed to further education and conferences for lecturers, but suggested Ellington missed out on the point of lectures conducting research.

Professor Cram then looked at "What does Good Education Research Look Like?" by Lyn Yates (Open University Press, 2004). The question here was: who is our research for?

Lastly Professor Cramlooked at "What Makes a Concept Good? A Criterial Framework for Understanding Concept Formation in the Social Sciences" by John Gerring:

Nowhere in the broad and heterogeneous work on concept formation has the question of conceptual utility been satisfactorily addressed. Goodness in concept formation, I argue, cannot be reduced to 'clarity,' to empirical or theoretical relevance, to a set of rules, or to the methodology particular to a given study. Rather, I argue that conceptual adequacy should be perceived as an attempt to respond to a standard set of criteria, whose demands are felt in the formation and use of all social science concepts: (1) familiarity, (2) resonance, (3) parsimony, (4) coherence, (5) differentiation, (6) depth, (7) theoretical utility, and (8) field utility. The significance of this study is to be found not simply in answering this important question, but also in providing a complete and reasonably concise framework for explaining the process of concept formation within the social sciences. Rather than conceiving of concept formation as a method (with a fixed set of rules and a definite outcome), I view it as a highly variable process involving trade-offs among these eight demands.

From: What Makes a Concept Good? A Criterial Framework for Understanding Concept Formation in the Social Sciences, John Gerring, Polity , Vol. 31, No. 3 (Spring, 1999), pp. 357-393 Published by Palgrave Macmillan Journals

Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3235246

Why students learn a language at university

In the first session at the Australian National University Educational Research Conference on 'Language learning: motivation and student retention', Dr Gabriele Schmidt reported research which showed that students were selecting German language studies out of general interest for travel, not for vocational reasons. The details are published in her book "Motives for Studying German in Australia: Re-examining the Profile and Motivation of German Studies Students in Australian Universities" (Peter Lang Publishing Group, 2011).

In response to this the courses were changed by removing traditional classroom instruction and replaced with more interactive activities. The conclusion was that there was no need to separate students into culture and services courses. However, this seems to me to have implications for government support for language studies. The assumption has been that language studies are of value for furthering international trade. If students are not enrolling for vocational purposes, it would be tempting to cancel funding to schools and universities for language studies. However, a follow-up study might find that graduates do find their language studies of use later, even if it is not why they selected them.

Re-examining the Profile and Motivation of German Studies Students in Australian Universities

Schmidt, Gabriele

Series: Duisburger Arbeiten zur Sprach- und Kulturwissenschaft - Volume 84

Year of Publication: 2011

Frankfurt am Main, Berlin, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Wien, 2011. 190 pp., num. tables, 5 graphs
ISBN 978-3-631-60791-6 hb.
ISBN 978-3-653-01092-3 (eBook)

Discipline

» Linguistics
» Germanic Languages and Literatures

Book synopsis

The last comprehensive study of the motives for studying German in Australia was conducted in the late 1980s. The main objective of this thesis is not only to fill the gap of recent data but at the same time to analyse the new data in the context of relevant theories of language learning motivation. The data analysis focuses on students' demographic backgrounds, their motivation to learn German, and on their expectations towards course content. Where possible, the new data is compared with former studies in order to investigate what changes have occurred over the last two decades. It will be shown that these changes are primarily a reflection of changes to higher education policies. Overall, the thesis establishes a theoretically informed and data-based platform for curriculum development which will assist German Studies programs in designing their courses for the future.

Contents

Contents: Analysis of the profile and motivation of German Studies students in Australian universities - Data to relevant theories of language learning motivation - Changes in Australian higher education - Data-based platform for course design.

About the author(s)/editor(s)

Gabriele Schmidt has been a lecturer in the German Studies Program at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra since 1996. She received her Masters degree from the University of Bielefeld, specialising in German as a Foreign Language. Before she joined the ANU she worked for six years at the Institute for International Communication (IIK) at the University of Düsseldorf (Germany).

Series

Duisburg Papers on Research in Language and Culture. Vol. 84
Edited by Ulrich Ammon, René Dirven and Martin Pütz

ANU Educational Research Conference

Greetings from the Australian National University where the "ANU Educational Research Conference" has just started. I started as a student of tertiary teaching yesterday, so I thought I would come to the conference to help my studies:

ANU Educational Research Conference
November 15 - 16, 2011

Sessions
Tuesday November 15

Session 1: 8.45 - 10.30

8.45: Registration

9.00: Welcome, Dr Margaret Kiley, Convener - Graduate Research Field of Education ...

9.05 - 10.30: Panel 1, 'Language learning: motivation and student retention'
Chair: Prof Jane Simpson
Presenters: Prof Gerlese Akerlind, Dr Louise Jansen, Dr Roald Maliangkay, Dr Daniel Martin and Dr Gabriele Schmidt

10.30am - 10.45am: Opening Address, Prof Lawrence Cram, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research)

Morning tea: 10.45 - 11.15

Session 2: 11.15 - 12.45

11.15 - 12.45: Panel 2, 'Content and Process in University Teaching'
Chair: Dr Linda Hort
Presenters: Dr Fiona Mueller, Dr Paul Waring, Dr Tony Connolly

Lunch: 12.45 - 1.15

Session 3: 1.15 - 2.45

1.15 - 2.45: Panel 3, 'Findings from the Engineering Hubs and Spokes Project'
Chair: Assoc Prof Chris Johnson
Presenters: Dr Malcolm Pettigrove, Dr Kim Blackmore, Ms Lynette Johns-Boast, Ms Lauren Thompson

Afternoon tea: 2.45 - 3.00

Session 4: 3.00 - 5.00

3.00 - 4.00: Panel 4, 'Using a range of pedagogical resources to design inquiry-based teaching with undergraduates'
Chair: Prof Larry Saha
Presenters: Dr Alastair Greig, Dr Brenton Prosser, Dr Shanti Sumartojo, Ms Frances Wild and Ms Cherie Prosser

4.00 - 5.00: Panel 5, 'What did you do in the teaching war, parent?' Stories from the innovation front
Chair: Prof. Richard Baker
Presenters: Dr Beth Beckmann, Dr Paul Francis, Dr Stephen Dann

Drinks ... 5.00 - 6.30


Wednesday November 16

Session 5: 9.00 - 10.30

9.00 - 10.30: Panel 6, 'Doctoral Education'
Chair: Prof. Diana Davis
Presenters: Mr Rod Pitcher, Ms Georgia Pike, Ms Margot Pearson

Morning tea: 10.30 - 11.00

Session 6: 11.00 - 12.30

11.00 - 12.30: Panel 7, 'Conceptualising research-led education at the ANU'
Chair: Ms Denise Higgins
Presenters: Assoc Prof Susan Howitt, Ms Pam Roberts, Dr Anna Wilson

Lunch: 12.30 - 1.00

Session 7: 1.00 - 2.30

1.00 - 2.30: Panel 8, 'Assessment, benchmarking, faculty development and research opportunities'
Chair: Assoc Prof Gerry Corrigan
Presenters: Prof Amanda Barnard, Ms Nyree Mason, Dr Sarah Martin, Prof Cathy Owen, Dr Alexandra Tyson

Afternoon tea: 2.30 - 3.00

Session 8: 3.00 - 5.00

3.00 - 4.30: Panel 9, 'Towards a Re-imagining of Indigenous Education Policy'
Chair: Prof. John Taylor
Presenters: Dr Bill Fogarty, Dr Inge Kral, and Dr Jerry Schwab

4.30 - 4.45: Future Collaboration, Dr Margaret Kiley

4.45 - 5.00: Closing, Prof Aiden Byrne, Dean of Science, Director of the College of Physical & Mathematical Sciences

Modular Portable Classroom Design

The University of Melbourne's Design School is running a federal government sponsored competition for a relocatable classroom design, called "Future Proofing Schools". I started preparing a submission, but realized that while I had a concept, I could not prepare the architectural renderings required. So I decided to release what I had done, the "Future Proof Classroom" (FPC). There is the statement and two for the competition, along with two renderings:

Future Proofing Schools Submission: Statement

Future Proof Classroom (FPC)

Tom Worthington, 28 October 2011

Schools are not just buildings

Schools are a resource for the whole community. Design needs to start with community consultation and to consider use of the school by the whole community. School buildings are valuable and need to be able to be reconfigured for different uses at different times of the day, night and weekends, by students, adult learners and the whole community. Schools are at the centre of the community in bad times as well as good. So schools need to be designed to not only survive a natural disaster, but be ready to function an an emergency relief centre for the community, with their own water and power supplies.

Building the community in the School

1. Online consultation system: Consultation needs to happen from the start, so the first component of the FPC is a web site for consulting the community. The system provides for all phases of school development, from pre-planning, design, building, operation, maintenance, modification and relocation. The system allows the community to be consulted directly online and the text and video minutes of face to face town hall style meetings to be kept. The system will also hold all planning documents, in a legally certified e-records, to allow for audit of the process.

2. Planner: Planner is an online application which allows anyone to design a school, using pre-prepared modules and test how it will look and work.

3. Educator: Educator is an online extension of the school building, which provides an interface from computer screens in the building. But even before the building has been designed, educator takes care of the pedagogy (teaching to children), androgyny (teaching to adults), and heutagogy (self directed learning). The system provides a web site for e new facility and links this to other facilities on the campus, surrounding schools, community facilities and resources nationally and globally.

4. Tech Modules: The physical school is built from one or more tech modules. These are 20 foot ISO shipping container sized units holding the pre-installed mechanical, electrical, water, waste and ICT systems. The tech modules also provide the basic structure the building is assembled around. The modules are filled with equipment, such as computers, solar panels, and water treatment systems, which is progressively unpacked as the building unfolds around the modules. Before lock-up stage, the models provide secure storage for the equipment and can be linked to a wireless security system.

5. Flex Panels: The tech modules are only large enough to hold the mechanical systems for the school, there is no room in them for classrooms (and no one likes sitting in a shipping container anyway). The floor, wall and roof panels of the building are delivered folded in 40 foot ISO container sized cradles. The floor panels are unfolded onto the foundations and then the wall, ceiling and roof panels added. The cradles the panels were delivered on also form part of the structure of the building. The "twist-lock" connectors built into the standard shipping containers are used to secure the to the structure of the building to meet the highest Australian cyclone and earthquake codes. All windows are fitted with steel mesh for security and bushfire protection.

The school provides flexibility by using compact movable furniture (delivered packed in the in the containers). Areas of the building can also be changed subtly by adjusting the colour and intensity of the low energy LED lighting and by the use of sound reinforcement. This allows the open space to be reconfigured for small groups, classes, learning commons, community library or public meeting. The building can be relocated by folding the panels back into the shipping cradles they arrived in. The components can be reassembled into two smaller buildings or several kits used to make one larger building.

Design Process

The brief called for up to 60 students to be accommodated, with per student 3.5 m² for teaching (total 210 m2) and 9.75 m2 per student overall (585 m² total). An initial design is for a building with a footprint the size of 40 ISO shipping containers, arranged in a grid of 4 x 10, to make a 24.232m by 24.3m building.

The building is delivered as eight ISO containers: two 20 foot containers (ICT/Power Module and the Toilet/kitchen/water module) and three 40 foot panel cradles. The building can be transported as four trailer truck loads or four loads of the RAAF's C-17 cargo aircraft.

The building has no internal walls, apart from those of the tech modules and so the layout can be arranged as required. There is a screened veranda around all sides, to provide covered outdoor space. The roof can be changed from a low pitch for a contemporary look in inner city areas, to a suburban pitch, as required. The cladding is painted steel for durability and low cost and can have a full colour digital image applied with an industrial ink jet printer at the factory, to simulate any building material, architectural style or decorative effect required.

Portable Classroom Design Competition

The University of Melbourne's Design School is running a federal government sponsored competition for a relocatable classroom design, called "Future Proofing Schools". The competition is open to anyone, but primarily aimed at professionals and tertiary students including Architects, Landscape Architects, Urban Designers, Planners and Industrial Designers. There is also a special web site for Year 10 to 12 school students.

Available are:

1. Brief and Guidelines
2. Frequently Asked Questions
   
3. 21st Century Learning
4. Sustainable School Environments
5. Landscape Integration and Connections
6. Prefabrication
   

Three-step challenge

The competition has three steps:

1. Propose design ideas for next-generation
   relocatable classroom space [s] that:
   
   • suit a core cluster of up to 50 - 60 students*
     * based on teaching space of 3,5sqm per student + amenity spaces such as teacher preparation areas, wet areas and lockers + core spaces such as toilets
     Note: Australia’s Federal Guidelines suggest 9.75sqm per student for an entire school.
     
   • can be scaled to suit larger or smaller student populations
   • can adapt sustainably and economically to a range of physical and cultural contexts [climates, topographies, amounts of land available]
   • provide delightful spaces within, between and adjacent in which to teach, learn and play can be installed rapidly
2. Show us how your design idea from step 1 works
   by applying it to a school site, either real
   or hypothetical:
   How will your design idea:
   
   • address variations in climate, topography and amounts of land available at different schools?
   • address connections to the outside, and existing buildings?
   • allow for clustering to create connected learning communities?
   • convey a sense of permanence, even though it is relocatable?
   You are free to tailor your design ideas to physical contexts of your own choice. ...
   
   
3. Show us how your tailored design idea from
   step 2 can be re-located and re-adapted to
   a new school site with different physical
   parameters, either real or hypothetical:
   
   • How will your design idea adapt to this new set of parameters?
   • What building elements might change?
   • What building elements might stay the same?
   Consider that your tailored design idea may be relocated after one year, three years or even more at its first school site.
   

An ABC Radio "By Design" Podcast about the design of demountable school buildings with James Timberlake (Kieran Timberlak) and Arie van der Neut (HVDN) is available: "Reimagining 'relocatables' as 21st century learning spaces".

The competition is funded as Australian Research Council Linkage Grant project "Future Proofing Schools: using smart green integrated design approaches to prefabricated learning environments" (LP0991146, by CL Newton; T Kvan; D Hes; K Fisher; MJ Grose; S Wilks).

Schools in the Community Context

While the competition guidelines do a good job of setting the learning and environmental context, they do not appear to take into account the school in its social environment. Treating a school is a resource for the community and should be planned to be available for use by the community. A school building can be used by students of other schools in the area and as a community facility when not needed by students. At the same time the cost of the school building and its facilities can be reduced by drawing on community resources.

As discussed in my submission to the parliamentary inquiry into the NBN, governments are paying for unnecessary duplication across education sectors in both online learning and physical infrastructure. Substantial savings could be obtained through the creation of an ‘Australian Learning Commons’ consisting of multi-use school buildings and free sharing of teaching materials throughout Australia.

Rather than have a single purpose relocatable school building which, has to be dismantled and moved on a truck every few years to re-purpose it, this can be done by changing the use of the classrooms from daytime school student use to nighttime adult education class, to weekend community class. Instead of having to move walls to reconfigure the classroom, which could take minutes or hours, the software running on the computers in the classroom could be changed in seconds.

How to Create an International Graduate Level Course Using Moodle

I will be speaking on How to Create an International Graduate Level Course Using Moodle at the MoodleMoot Virtual Conference (MMVC11), 10am 18 August 2011 Canberra time (18 August 2011 at 00:00:00 UTC).

This presentation discusses how Moodle was used to deliver an online postgraduate course around the world, on the topic of sustainable information technology. This includes the use of less than broadband Internet links, tablet computers, smart phones and e-book devices.

Enhancing University Teaching

Greetings from the Australian National University where details of the Vice-Chancellor's Teaching Enhancement Grants are being presented. Of the $100,000 available, half is reserved for technology enhancement of education. Grants are normally for a maximum of $10,000 so these are relatively small investments, which can be for innovative (and risky) ideas. The Case Studies of Educational Excellence provides examples of previous successful projects, including Judy-anne Osborn's "Student-run Mathematics Film Showings". Another interesting previous project was "Law Student Well-being and the Law Curriculum: Exploring the Links". Also the Teaching Ideas 7 Principles of Good Practice from University of Tennessee were recommended.

My interest was in applying for a grant for my courses in Green ICT and e-documents to add video and some software. However, the emphasis for the grants is on how to use the technology for better learning for students. In particular we were discouraged from just applying for a grant to buy some Apple iPads (there are many Apple iPad University Trials). Also it was pointed out that the university already provides a range of software applications and Training & skills development.

It was suggested projects should be innovative and, for example, just taking a face to face course and putting it on-line is not. Also the initiative should be broadly applicable and be able to be communicated. One aspect of communication was that proposals should avoid educational jargon and use clear language. One aspect of interest is that the applications are made with electronic documents, with PDF discouraged.

iPads at Moodle e-Learning Event

Greetings from the wrap-up session of the MoodlePosium at Australian National University in Canberra. Of the twelve people I can see around me in the audience, six have devices in front of them. Three have iPads, one an iPhone, one laptop and I have a netbook. Looking at how these devices fit on the small flip-up desk provided in the lecture theatre, the iPads are the least conspicuous. It would be difficult for the presenter to tell if the audience was using an iPad or a paper notebook, when the iPad is flat on the desk.

However, I found using the the iPad virtual keyboard clumsy and the screen reflections from overhead lights painful. One delegate had a very elegant blue-tooth keyboard and their iPad propped up as a portrait format screen. This was very elegant but very conspicuous.

The iPhone user is hand holding the device. The laptop user has the unit covering the full surface of the small desk with the screen hanging out into space.

A 10 inch netbook seems to fit very well in this environment, not covering the whole desk. An alternative would be the Kensington KeyFolio Case for iPad, which has a built in rubber Bluetooth keyboard. This turns the iPad into a netbook format device.

Copyright in your Moodle Course

Greetings from the last day of the MoodlePosium at Australian National University in Canberra. Vanessa Tuckfield from CIT is speaking on managing copyright in Moodle courses. She pointed out that copyright law applies to much of what educators use, even if they have Creative Commons as an ideal. Copyright generally applies for 70 years after the death of the creator, thanks to the Disney Corporation. There are some statutory licences which educational institutions can purchase (such as Screen-rights).

CIT is working on having electronic surveys of copyright use to avoid teachers having to fill in paper forms. CIT has a repository of materials. Teachers put material in there and this can then be used for multiple courses. This sounds to me like it could be a good idea, even without copyright considerations. The items are tagged with the type of licence.

One point to remember is that in the VET sector, material created by staff is owned by the institution. So organisations need to make sure they do not end up paying for using something they already own.

Vanessa pointed out that educators tend to forget to reference images they use. It may be difficult to include traditional academic references in interactive material. She also poitned out that for material which is not clearly labelled, the Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) will collect fees and hold them for collection by the author.

CIT have a "sticky" Moodle block which outlines Copyright of the course materials.