Pedagogy - Presentation Slides

Here are the slides of my recent presentation on Pedagogy: Approaches for Facilitation of Learning.

Event: Dialogue Session on Competency Development - Sharing of International Best Practices
Organized by Faith InfoTech Academy for Professional Advancement
6th March, 2009
Technopark, Trivandrum, Kerala.

Thank you.

E-learning Presentation Slides

Here are the slides from my recent presentation on E-learning

Event: Dialogue Session on Competency Development - Sharing of International Best Practices
Organized by Faith InfoTech Academy for Professional Advancement
6th March, 2009
Technopark, Trivandrum, Kerala.













Thank you.

Note on Pedagogy

Last week, I gave a presentation on pedagogy to a group of teachers from engineering colleges. I already wrote about my presentation on e-learning in the previous post. Here I am beginning to write about the highlights of my presentation on pedagogy.

I started with the problem. The issues are of student performance, teacher performance and job satisfaction. It is clearly stated by Richard M. Felder and Linda K. Silverman, in their classic paper titled "Learning and Teaching Styles in Engineering Education", published in the Journal of Engineering Education in 1988. The scenario is not very different even today. To quote Felder and Silverman:

"Mismatches exist between common learning styles of engineering students and traditional teaching styles of engineering professors. In consequence, students become bored and inattentive in class, do poorly on tests, get discouraged about the courses, the curriculum, and themselves, and in some cases change to other curricula or drop out of school. Professors, confronted by low test grades, unresponsive or hostile classes, poor attendance and dropouts, know something is not working; they may become overly critical of their students (making things even worse) or begin to wonder if they are in the right profession. Most seriously, society loses potentially excellent engineers."

<< http://www4.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/Papers/LS-1988.pdf >>

To address the issues, we need better pedagogy. I think of pedagogy as the algorithm of education. Though there are many algorithms that work, we can increase effectiveness significantly with a better algorithm.

<< class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Andragogy' popularized by Malcolm Knowles is often used to refer specifically to adult learning. >>

The starting point for effective pedagogy is knowing the learner. Knowing the learner is different from merely knowing about the learner. The framework for knowing the learner would involve a few dimensions, such as the following:

1. Intelligence: Not only logical-mathematical intelligence, but also the other types of intelligences as described by Howard Gardner.
2. Learning Style: Use any model, such as Index of Learning Styles (Richard Felder and Linda Silverman) or Learning Style Inventory (David Kolb). If required, expand the profile by including profiles such as Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) or Hermann Brain Dominance Instrument (HBDI). << http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html >>
3. Motivation: Again use any model of motivation. I prefer the model based on David C. McClelland's theories, and look specifically for achievement motivation.
4. Goals: Try to get an understanding of the learner's overall life goals and specific career goals for the medium term. I get the participants in my sessions to recollect their experiences of peak performance, and commit themselves to valued career goals for a two year period.

I shall write about other aspects of pedagogy, such as Problem Based (Inductive) Learning, Iteration, Collaboration and Constructivism in other posts in the future.

Signing off for now. -- JJ

Notes on E-learning

Last week, I had the opportunity to interact with a group of around 40 teachers from several engineering colleges. This was during a Dialogue on Competency Building - Sharing of International Best Practices, organized by Faith InfoTech Academy for Professional Advancement at Technopark, Thiruvananthapuram.

I gave two presentations - one on pedagogy and another on e-learning. I shall summarize the main points of my presentation on e-learning here.

I started the presentation, recalling the equation, L = f(P,E). Learning is a function of characteristics of the Person and of the Environment.

Related to the Person, I touched upon concept of Multiple Intelligences (Howard Gardner) and Learning Styles (Richard Felder and David Kolb). Related to the Environment, I listed four factors: Software Systems, Physical Infrastructure, People and Processes.

The subject of my talk was about how software systems, especially e-learning tools, can be used to improve the effectiveness of learning. E-learning is technology to implement pedagogy.

I mentioned a few features of e-learning, without making it an exhaustive list of features and benefits. Some of the features highlighted were:

• Flexible content development and presentation
  - Learning Objects
  - Personalization
  - Multimedia
• Enables iterative approach with increasing complexity levels
• Timely feedback at individual level
• Not distance learning; but enhanced collaboration across geography
  

I shared my observations on how e-learning has evolved during this decade. My observations are based on my personal experience with e-learning. I became a founding team member of an e-learning company in 2001, and was Product Manager for e-learning products. Looking back at the end of the decade, I see how many of my ideas about e-learning has changed over the last few years:

• From control to collaboration
• From top-down to peer-to-peer
• From technology to pedagogy
• From expensive to inexpensive
• From authoring by experts to authoring by everyone.

When talking about e-learning today, I would give more emphasis to Search, Wikis, Blogs, RSS feeds and Social Networks, than to what is traditionally considered as e-learning tools - i.e., LMS, CMS etc. It is not because it is the in-thing to talk about social media, but because we are at a juncture where a paradigm shift is taking place in the field of education. The shift is from control to collaboration. The impact of social media is only an indication of this shift in zeitgeist.

That's all for now... More in the next posting.