New curricular approaches to teaching and learning in environmental education through ICTs. Study of an interuniversity master's degree in Spain

Author(s):

Ligia Isabel Estrada-Vidal(presenting / submitting)Esther Mena Rodríguez(presenting)Juan-Carlos Tójar

Conference:

ECER 2014

Network:

16. ICT in Education and Training

Format:

Paper

Session Information

16 SES 04, ICT in Higher Education

Paper Session

Time:

2014-09-03

09:00-10:30

Room:

B011 Anfiteatro

Chair:

Duygu Albayrak

Contribution

Nowadays, it is common to use free distribution platforms to develop virtual university campus that support the classroom teaching. Specifically, the Moodle platform promotes the teaching and learning that the knowledge society and the European Higher Education Area demand. Its interactivity allows developing a collaborative and constructivist perspective of education (Matua, Kanaabi & Cayaban, 2013; McLuckie, Naulty, Luchoomun & Wahl, 2009). This perspective has produced changes that have led to new approaches in curriculum materials applied

Moodle is used as the main tool or like other space that links to external resources. Its development promotes better design and resource use of the tool by the teachers and students involved. Both of them interact in the same learning environment (Chen, Wang & Hung, 2009).

Within the learning design process, several aspects are taken into account to define the activities that take place throughout the course. Thus, the activities must be easily understood by students and faculty in order to achieve the learning objectives proposed, they must be a sequencing and coordination of activities, and they should use the resources and services necessary to support the activities learning (Katsamani, Retalis and Boloudakis, 2012). Its interactive feature makes teachers (learning designers) change, update or improve their designs to make learning to be effective (Katsamani, Retalis and Boloudakis, 2012).

There are several evaluation experiences using Moodle (Costaa, Alvelosa & Teixeiraa, 2012; Damnjanovic, Jednak, & Mijatovic, 2013, Escobar-Rodriguez-Lozano & Monge, 2012; Horvat, Dobrota, Krsmanovic & Cudanov, 2013; Matua, Kanaabi & Cayaban, 2013; Mijatovic, Cudanov, Jednak & Kadijevich, 2013; Katsamani, Retalis & Boloudakis, 2012) or one of its tools for teaching in Higher Education (Wai Ying Lu & Law, 2012). However, there are still no widely accepted models of evaluation.

In this paper a study evaluating the design and use of Moodle as a tool that facilitates the development of theoretical and practical activities in a Masters in Environmental Education adapted to the EHEA is exposed. This postgraduate education has blended-learning character and it is taught in six Spanish universities. Use of three websites that correspond to the three modules of the Master degree (general subjects, researcher and professional itineraries) is made.

The coordination between the participating universities let share the resources found in the virtual campus (synchronous and asynchronous learning) and simultaneously it let emit classes with a web conferencing platform by Adobe Connect (synchronous learning).

In the academic context, the use of a platform like Moodle is considered a key resource to the development of a new curriculum approach in higher education. The participating teachers shared similar concepts and procedures in Environmental Education, but they have training and experiences very heterogeneous in virtual education. Therefore, Moodle courses designed show how each participating teacher interprets the virtual model of teaching, depending on how you use the several tasks and resources. Thus, the analysis of the resources used in each of the materials and designed pages is a source of wealth for the assessment of b-learning experience.

The aim of this study is to identify the resources and their use in the three websites by Moodle in the Master’s degree in Environmental Education in the last four academic years (from 2009-10 to 2012-13).

Method

A descriptive study of the resources included in the Moodle platform during the four academic years, from 2009/2010 to 2012/2013, and the participation of teachers and students of the Master in these resources are presented. Information of twelve websites in total were consulted (three per academic year), corresponding to the general module four websites, other four at the research itinerary and other four added at the professional itinerary. The collection of data was analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. The instruments used to obtain information from the platforms were two check-lists, which were completed by two internal reviewers: a coordinator and a teacher of the Master. The responses of both judges were compared to identify issues and disagreements, as well as present and absent elements in the program elements. To do this, at the beginning of the school year 2013/2014, all material and content of the three websites Moodle platforms in each of the academic course 2009/2010, 2010/2011, 2011/2012 and 2012/2013 were reviewed. The first instrument contains two dimensions corresponding with the tools offered by the Moodle platform (activities and contents). The data were recorded using 25 indicators, 18 corresponding to category "activities" (e.g., forum, glossary, workshop, task, wiki) and 7 in relation to the category "contents" (for example, file, folder, URL, label). The second checklist consists of 92 indicators organized into two broad categories (process and results). The set of indicators about the process includes questions on knowledge management in the training program. For example, indicators of the existence of written guidelines, organization of activities depending on the difficulty or the system of communication between students and professors were included. The set of indicators about the process included indicators on student assessment, teacher evaluation and monitoring the impact of training. In the descriptive analysis frequencies and percentages, contingency tables and correlations were calculated. Qualitative analyzes were performed from reduction procedures, available data, and drawing conclusions. All of this according to an increasing scale of abstraction from speculative analysis, classification and construction of categories, concept formation and typologies (Tójar, 2006). Qualitative analysis was performed based on the opinions of professors and students mainly expressed in forums and diaries available on the different platforms.

Expected Outcomes

The information provided by quantitative descriptive analysis and qualitative-interpretative analysis, allowed deciding which elements of instructional design should be modified in the blended-learning education model own of the Master’s degree. Thus, it is recommended maintaining open and heterogeneous design which is in all Master's degree subjects. Failure to follow a fixed scheme of activities and contents, a constructivist learning environment is created in which necessary conditions exist for students and teachers engaged cooperatively. However, based on cooperative learning as a means of building knowledge in a group, the number of participatory and interactive activities (for example, forums, chats, diary, workshops, glossaries and wikis) should be more proportionate. Most of the resources used during four academic years are “contents” (1390 versus 549 activities), with 787 files followed by 207 folders, 199 URL and 196 pages. The most commonly used “activities” are “task” (172 times), followed by post (118) and wiki (80). Therefore, the experiences of a constructivist model that followed some subjects should be extended to other subjects which prevailed in the least interactive resources, such as for example files or tasks. In another sense, the lack of interactive resources was offset by the massive use of forums. Among them, stands out the wide creation and innovation of topics and discussions that provided collaboratively between students and, between these and professors. These uses make emerge creative and innovative elements, thus promoting new curricular approaches. The information provided of proposals outlined in the diaries, extended and deepened in the forums, indicate that the activities are designed to promote teamwork and to reinforce learning. By contrast, among the missing elements, you can find that contents were not always designed on the perspective of increasing difficulty, and programs do not always disposed of an explanatory introduction or suggestions for follow-up.

References

Chen, D. T., Wang, Y. M., & Hung, D. (2009). A journey on refining rules for online discussion: implications for the design of learning management systems. Journal of Interactive Learning Research, 20 (2), 157‐173. Costaa, C., Alvelosa, H. & Teixeiraa, L. (2012). The use of Moodle e-learning platform: a study in a Portuguese University. Procedia Technology, 5, 334 – 343. Damnjanovic, V., Jednak, S., & Mijatovic, I. (2013). Interactive Learning Environments (2013): Factors affecting the effectiveness and use of Moodle: students' perception. Interactive Learning Environments. [On line] http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10494820.2013.789062#tabModule. DOI: 10.1080/10494820.2013.789062. Education (2014): Adapting physics courses in an engineering school to the b-learning philosophy. European Journal of Engineering Education, DOI: 10.1080/03043797.2013.874980. Escobar-Rodriguez, T. & Monge-Lozano, P. (2012). The acceptance of Moodle technology by business administration students. Computers & Education, 58, 1085–1093. Horvat, A., Dobrota, M., Krsmanovic, M., & Cudanov, M. (2013). Student perception of Moodle learning management system: a satisfaction and significance analysis. Interactive Learning Environments. DOI: 10.1080/10494820.2013.788033. Katsamani, M., Retalis, S., & Boloudakis, M. (2012). Designing a Moodle course with the CADMOS learning design tool. Educational Media International, 49 (4), 317-331. DOI: 10.1080/09523987.2012.745771. Lu, J., & Wai Ying Law, N. (2012). Understanding collaborative learning behavior from Moodle log data. Interactive Learning Environments, 20 (5), 451-466. DOI: 10.1080/10494820.2010.529817. Matua, D., Kanaabi, J. & Cayaban, D. (2013). Using moodle e-learning platform to foster student self-directed learning: Experiences with utilization of the software in undergraduate nursing courses in a Middle Eastern university. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 93, 677 – 683. McLuckie, J. A., Naulty, M., Luchoomun, D., & Wahl, H. (2009). Scottish and Austrian perspectives on delivering a Master’s: From paper to virtual and from individual to collaborative. Industry and Higher Education, 23 (4), 311-318. Mijatovic, I., Cudanov, M., Jednak, S. & Kadijevich, D. M. (2013) How the usage of learning management systems influences student achievement. Teaching in Higher Education, 18 (5), 506-517. DOI: 10.1080/13562517.2012.753049. Tójar, J. C. (2006). Investigación cualitativa. Comprender y actuar. Madrid: La Muralla.

Author Information

Ligia Isabel Estrada-Vidal (presenting / submitting)

Universidad of Málaga

Research Methods and Educational Innovation

Málaga

Esther Mena Rodríguez (presenting)

University of Málaga

Methods of Educational Research and Innovation

Málaga

Juan-Carlos Tójar

University of Málaga, Spain

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