Learning in vivo

Drafting experiential education procedures for a university

Those who have been involved in a policy and/or procedure creation process at a university will know it is not an easy task. Substantial literature reviews (which I blogged about during the recent past) that informed a first draft had been undertaken. This draft (Download Procedural Manual on Experiential Learning) has been distributed by e-mail to key role players within the university for critique and comment. The commentary received has been incorporated and a second draft made institutionally available on Intranet and called for commentary through the university's daily e-news mail (Download 2nd Draft of Procedural Manual on Experiential Learning).

At this point a meeting with a senior educational-support line manager resulted in further review and supplementation. A third draft -- Download 3rd Draft of Procedural Manual on Experiential Learning has been produced, which served as discussion document with several key stakeholders. Following thorough consultation and incorporation of input, contributions, commentary, critique and recommended structural changes the process has since arrived at a sixth draft -- Download 6th draft towards a Procedural Manual on Experiential Learning. The sixth draft got formally tabled at a committee within the structure and accepted in principle - subject to a few changes. This new version (Download Procedural Manual on Experiential Learning DRAFT 2-1 - apologies for the hyperlinks to Intranet pages that readers would not have access to) is now the official 2nd draft, for which a powerpoint presentation (Download Procedural Manual on Experiential Learning) had been prepared in order to present it at a next level internal committee.

Ultimately a Procedural Manual for Experiential Learning had been presented to Senate 13 June 2012 and approved, whereafter it was placed on Intranet with the University Council approved Policy for Experiential Learning.

Nine events of instruction — Gagné

Gagné’s “Nine Events of Instruction”, referenced in Becker (2007: 27 – 29) support the instructional design of five areas of learning capabilities:

• Verbal, both oral and written, information
• Intellectual skills, including manipulation of symbolic information as well as problem solving
• Creative cognitive strategies and control over own learning
• Physical motor skills
• Personal attitudes influencing choice

Gagné’s Nine Events provide for conditions of learning, as well as guidelines for selection of appropriate media:

1. Reception, attracting and gaining attention
2. Creating expectancy by making the objectives known
3. Retrieval of prior knowledge by stimulating recall of former learning
4. Presentation of the stimulus, encouragement and challenge (selective perception)
5. Offer self-contained learning—learning guidance provided within (semantic encoding)
6. Elicit interactive performance or responding
7. Reinforcement by providing feedback
8. Assessment of performance (retrieval)
9. Generalise by enhancing retention and transfer of learning

Becker, K. 2007. Pedagogy in commercial video games. In D Gibson; C Aldrich & M Prensky. 2007. Games and simulations in online learning: research and development frameworks (pp 21 – 47). Hershey: Information Science Publishing.

Journal of Cooperative Education and Internships now open access

JCEI access for individuals is now open to the public at no charge! Vol 45 Issue 01 has just been published:

Topic	Page
International centre of social science education and research in The Hague, The Netherlands.	5
Development of Learning Outcomes Assessment Methods for Co-operative Education Programs	11
Where’s WIL? Including work-integrated learning in descriptions of what it is that academics do	34
Comparative Curriculum Analysis of Mechanical Engineering Technology Programs at Purdue University and the National Taipei University of Technology	45
Mentoring Latinos in STEM: Transforming Struggling Co-op Students into Savvy Professionals	53
Developing an Online Learning Community for Engineering, Cooperative-Education Students: A Design-Based Research Study	67
Professionalising Accounting Education – The WIL Experience	80
Responding to Rapid Change in Higher Education: Enabling University Departments Responsible for Work Related Programs Through Boundary Spanning	94

JCEI is offered through EBSCO's library subscription for institutions. Request your university library to purchase subscription.

Definition of work-integrated learning and related terms

[Updated 27 April 2010, based on commentary received]

Work-integrated learning (WiL) is one of the tuition and learning components of Unisa students, registered for vocational and professional programmes offered by Unisa. Work-integrated learning:

· focuses on theory and practice in relevant authentic, work-based contexts

· helps the student socialise into the workplace environment

· is differentiated from laboratory and field practicals

· is aimed at developing specific competence that forms part of the overall curriculum

· relates to the development of knowledge, skills and attitudes -- in an integrated way; learning work practices; whole person and interpersonal relations development

· is achieved through the placement at and hosting of students by employer organisations

· is enabled by workplace mentoring, aimed at helping the student recognise her/his strengths and development needs

· is monitored by academic staff and assessed by both workplace practitioners and academic staff

· is ultimately an institutional responsibility, accountable to statutory, professional and/or vocational bodies

· is dependent upon a structured training relationship between Unisa, host employer organisation and the student, as illustrated below:

 

 

Download Wil definition - 1st notes by Prof Geertsema + Prof Hendrick + Dr Groenewald

Terminology in use and/or well known among stalwarts in the vocational and/or professional fields:

· Cooperative education	1. A form of education in which the educational institution and the occupational field co-operate in order to provide a joint educational programme, which includes workplace experience 2. A strategy where students undergo in-service training and gain work experience as integral part of their curriculum. The experience complements and supplements the academic learning to produce employment ready graduates. The experience must be well planned and supervised.
· Employer organisation	A host organisation that receives students and provides services, resources, etc. in aid of a student’s learning: welcome, orientate, dwell and sent forth.
· Experiential/in-service training or learning	The in‐occupational field experiences described as a process of placing students in the workplace for hands‐on experience. A workplace activity linked to the formal academic programme for purposes of experiential performance and to allow the student first‐hand experience. The process must allow for abstract conceptualization, experimentation, real and concrete experience and reflective observation. Is typically done in terms of a log book with supervision by a workplace mentor. Students apply their knowledge gained and by doing and experiencing the daily routines.
· Experiential learning grant (ELG)	A Sectoral Education & Training Authority (SETA) grant that caters for studnets who need in-service training as a requirement for the successful completion of a registered qualification.
· Laboratory or field practical/practicum	It is a form of tuition where activities and/or experiments are done with required apparatus in order to illustrate theory and give students an opportunity to gain supervised experiences. It is differentiated from work-integrated learning in that it forms part of the theory tuition, but undertaken in a suitably equipped laboratory, which could be in nature.
· Field based training	A model of distance education for teaching the conceptual material and enabling students located throughout the country to be trained largely in their home-based contexts, with the focus on professional development work. This comprises fieldwork practice and supervision in home locations.
· Mentoring	A competent and suitably qualified practitioner (the mentor), fostering, helps and guides the student’s (the mentee) growth and development—normally not done for personal gain.
· Monitoring	On-site monitoring by academic staff is done with the following specific objectives in mind: ·    To gather evidence regarding the learning of the student ·    To detect the student’s progress towards attaining the learning outcomes ·    To obtain the workplace supervisor’s (mentor) evaluation about the performance and conduct of the student ·    To mediate discretely regarding problems identified ·    To aid the student to reflect on experiences, in order to optimise learning
· Placement	1. The site where a student undergoes experience 2. The process of facilitating the student’s application and interview process as may be required by host organisations after short-listing
· Workplace learning	Many higher education programmes consider workplace learning to be a valid learning experience for students. Most professional training programmes include a ‘practicum’, which can vary from a few weeks to a few years of practical experience at a site of professional practice. This model can be strongly or weekly integrated into the formal learning programme, depending on how it is supported, supervised, and assessed. In such programmes, the workplace is present, both as a learning resource and as a benchmark of practice

Download Glossary of Terms related to work-integrated learning (WiL)

A High School Musical learning by earning exemplar

In the local paper (Roodepoort Record) of 30 October 2009 appeared the article below. The local high school (Hoërskool Florida) has two cafeterias, one a High School Musical look alike.

The restaurant manager not only provide good quality food and a good return for the school, but give interested scholars the opportunity to learn and earn. In exchange for their energy the manager teaches scholars profesionalism, working with money and management of a hospitality concern.

Development of university staff

Seventeen years ago, Duke (1992: 96) observed that academic staff at universities regarded themselves "less as employees than as a kind of college or fraternity of individual scholars and professionals freely associating for the advancement of knowledge and the expression of academic autonomy". He proceeds to indicate that identity and first loyalty of faculty is with their discipline and the international community thereof. Given this collegiate context, staff development had been perceived as almost intrusive; close to offensive and even insulting. However, study leave or sabbatical is still held in high regard as an acceptable form of academic staff development.

However, circumstances changed. State funded higher education institutions can no longer do as they please—now there is accountability to government and the taxpayer. State funding is conditional to the performance of institutions in terms of, for example, throughput. Research funding is coupled to research output, in order to encourage more research. Academic staff is becoming more amenable to acquiring new abilities and enlarging their repertoire of skills.

Duke, C. 1992. The learning university—towards a new paradigm? Buckingham: SRHE & Open University Press

Hierarchy of Learning Objectives

I mention in my blog Learner-managed Learning through Work (http://psychsoma.co.za/learning_in_vivo/2009/06/learnermanaged-learning-through-work-lmltw.html) the Hierarchy of Learning Outcomes (HLO) model.

I have not yet had access to Delahaye, B.L. 2005. Human Resource Development: Adult Learning and Knowledge Management, 2nd ed. Brisbane: John Wiley & Sons. but found valuable information via Google.

 

References:

http://www.auscampus.net/current-students/coursenotes/hrsubjects/mgt2_hrd/Lecture%208%20HRD%20design.ppt

http://uob-community.ballarat.edu.au/~coconnor/chapter9a.ppt