Implementing #virtual #education activities through good #educational #practices – #elearning #Panama

Paper aparecido en:

Durán Rodrigo; Estay-Niculcar, Christian; Alvarez, Humberto; y, Contron, Aaron. (2015). Implementing Virtual Education Activities through Good Educational Practices. En Journal of Virtual Studies, vol. 6. No. 1. Pp. 9-28. [Enlace: http://ejournal.urockcliffe.com/index.php/jovs/issue/view/7 ]
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IMPLEMENTING VIRTUAL EDUCATION ACTIVITIES THROUGH GOOD EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES

ABSTRACT

The purposes of this research are: first, to validate the potential of virtual education activities as an alternative in the teaching-learning process; second, to use the Chickering and Gamson (1987) model of good educational practices for writing and evaluating virtual education activities in a Master program; and third, to determine the impact of these practices in the teaching and learning process.  The research was conducted with the teacher and his ten students enrolled in the Master Program of Sciences of Information and Communication Technologies at Universidad Tecnológica de Panama. This research provides four important elements: first, general knowledge for enrich the planning and designing of college syllabus that requires virtual components; second, specific knowledge addressed to college teachers for writing virtual education activities using the seven good educational practices from Chickering and Gamson (1987);  third, self-assessment formats for writing virtual education activities,  by the teacher, at the beginning of the academic year and for the evaluation of these activities, by the students, at the end of the course and fourth, measurement of the impact in teaching and learning through the use of these educational practices. The investigation is descriptive and results show that all interviewees, the teacher and his ten students evaluated the virtual education activities favorably through the use of good educational practices.  However, the sample for the study is small, so it is required expanding  the sample and collect more data in future researchings.

KEY WORDS

Virtual Education, good practices in formative assessment, university assessment, composition of activities, learning process.

1. INTRODUCTION

Ebbers and Oscar (2014) identify two important dimensions of learning communities: (1) primary membership, which differentiates on the characteristics that group members hold in common; these include learning organizations, faculty learning communities, and student learning communities; and (2) primary form of interaction, which differentiates based on group members methods of interaction, such as in-person physical interaction, virtual interaction, or no direct interaction through correspondence.

Virtual education is a type of education that relies on learning communities composed by faculty and student through virtual interaction using the information and communication technologies (ICTs). Therefore, ICTs is not only an instrument or a new means of information and communication. ICTs generate a new social space, and therefore a new educational space where students, faculty and administrative staff interact to meet requirements (Nikolov, 2009).

Virtual education is suited to the situation of many students, because, for example, the need to reconcile work and family activity with their training, the presence of a disability, and the possibility to develop the learning process to their own pace, situations that can be presented often, that cause students to be distanced from the study centers (Huddleston and Unwin, 2013).

It should be noted that the virtual education has characteristics that differentiates it greatly from the classroom education, among which are: (1) greater autonomy and independence of the students to develop their learning at their own pace; (2) many of the students are granted practical objectives, because these students are developing an occupation related to their studies, which greatly enhances their intrinsic motivation (Wighting, Liu and Rovai, 2008).

Cornelius-White and Harbaugh (2009) quoted that the aforementioned characteristics also demand greater self-regulated activity, responsibility, and commitment from the student; virtual education also limits students to build relationships and situations shared or collaborative learning through traditional ways. However, at present this constraint quoted by Cornelius-White and Harbaugh (2009) is being largely offset through the use of ICTs and, more specifically, the use of forums, email, web pages, video conferences, and other new mediums; which are the core components of virtual spaces or platforms (Gouseti, 2014)

The virtual education activities are all actions performed by the student, as a part of instructional process through a virtual space or platform that belongs to the university; in the virtual space, students can interact with resources in order to understand, develop and complete their virtual education activities posted in the university platform (Tibaut, Rebolj, Menzel and Jardim-Goncalves, 2014).  The virtual education activities are the basis for teaching and learning in virtual education.  However, these kinds of activities can also be used in blended or hybrid education to complement classroom education activities (López-Pérez, Pérez-López, Rodríguez-Ariza, 2011).

The virtual education has been a subject of interest in many latitudes, including it in strategies and initiatives, such as:

The e-Europe Plan, approved by the Prime Ministers of the European Union, submitted in Lisbon on May 23 and 24, year 2000 (Europe – Summaries of EU Legislation, 2014).

The project on Higher Education using virtual modality, developed by the UNESCO International Institute for Higher Education in Latin America and the Caribbean, in year 2002 (ANUIES-UNESCO, 2004).

The law number 30 from July 20, 2006; to establish the National Assessment and Accreditation System for Improving the Quality of Higher Education in the Republic of Panama, which emphasizes the importance of virtual education as a part of the teaching-learning process in Higher Education (National Assessment and Accreditation of Panama, 2014).
In Panama, the reality of virtual education is highly describable. The latest report issued by the Technical Oversight Committee of Panama (TOC) in February 2014, states that: from a total of 745 careers belonging to 32 approved private universities; 9 careers are offered through the virtual modality exclusively (1% of total); 42 careers have been approved in different modalities including virtuality (6% of total) and 703 careers have been approved in different modalities, not including the virtual modality (94% of total) (TOC, 2014).

After submitting the initial references, we formally present the three purposes of this research:

To validate the potential of virtual education activities as an alternative in the teaching-learning process, through a case study conducted at Universidad Tecnologica de Panama, in the Republic of Panama.

To use the Chickering and Gamson (1987) model of good educational practices for writing and evaluating virtual education activities in a Master program.

To determine the impact of these practices in the teaching and learning process.

2. GOOD EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES

The concept of good practice or best practice appears frequently in the literature of business and public management; and is defined as an effective action that has facilitated a process or has been an alternative to a problem (Rodriguez, 2008).

Zabalza (2012) suggests that three conditions must exist to work with good practices: (1) the good practices must exist; (2) there must be a need to make good practices, visible and (3) good practices must necessarily refer to the fluidity and the unavoidable contextualization of the concept.

The term or concept of good practice was manufactured by Hammer (1990); and is defined as a way to do a job that produces a good result. A successful practice is recognized for being “innovative, replicable, evaluable and transformative” from the responsible exercise of autonomy. Davies and Kocchar (2012) also define good practices, as those that provide some degree of improvement, in the overall performance of a system in a specific context. At government level, the State of Virginia (USA) (2014) defines good practice as a superior method or innovative practice that contributes to improve performance of the process. Additionally, good practice presupposes an explicit act of decision that involves institutional resources (Global University Network for Innovation, 2012).

Good practice in college is defined as an experience (program, project) that contributes significantly to the social relevance of higher education institutions, promoting an active role in building a more just and sustainable society, in social, political, cultural, friendship and the economy means  (Observatory Network for Best Practices, 2011).  Bain (2005) defines it as, the successful in helping the students to learn; getting a positive, substantial and sustained influence; in their ways of thinking, acting and feeling.

The Group of Research & Multimedia from Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona (2014) defines good teaching practices, as educational interventions that facilitate the development of learning activities which efficiently achieve the intended learning objectives and other kind of learnings, with high educational value; including the following indicators: significance for students, student involvement, treatment of diversity, level of cognitive operations, social participation and collaborative work.

International institutions such as the UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), the BID (Bureau International d’Education), the OSCE (Organisation pour la Sécurité et la Coopération en Europe), the BIDDH (Bureau des Institutions et des droits démocratiques) and the Council of Europe, have addressed the importance of collecting good practices in education to become a reference, in the development for the educational policies (Zabala, 2012).  In the Latin American Region, the Program for Educational Reform in Latin America and the Caribbean (PERLAC, 2014) has published a compilation of existing good practice, from 18 different countries in the region; these practices belong to the database: Best Practices in Educational Policy and Educational Reform. This publication is considered, as a part of the attempts of improving the quality of and the results of education. These good practices are grouped into the following categories: teacher training, management, curriculum materials, maintenance and improvement of school infrastructure, incorporation of new technologies, and evaluation systems.

2.1 MODEL OF GOOD EDUCATIONAL PRACTICES

The three models that have been studied for evaluation are listed in Table 1.  This table compares good educational practices models such as Chickering and Gamson (1987), Alexander (1997) and Coffield and Edward (2009).

Table 1: Models of Good Educational Practices

Criteria Authors Chickering & Gamson (1987) Alexander (1997) Coffield & Edward (2009)
Background Not applicable Not applicable Deepens the work of Alexander
Foundation of the model Seven principles of good educational practices Pedagogical approaches used reflexively, compiled by other teachers from interacting with them Context, knowledge, curriculum, pedagogy, evaluation, management and society based
What does the model describe? Specific list of seven principles of good Educational practices List of questions List of dimensions
Detail of the model Practice 1 – Encourages contacts between students and faculty.Practice 2- Develops reciprocity and cooperation among students.Practice 3 – Uses active learning techniques.Practice 4 –Gives prompt feedback.Practice 5 – Emphasizes time on taskPractice 6 – Communicates high expectationsPractice 7 – Respects diverse talents and ways of learning. Who, the administration or other power groups, propose a good practice, what is the purpose of this and what are the consequences?How a good practice is consistent, how the practice can be evaluated and the values that sustain the practice?What supports and evidences based on relevant educational research endorse them?What degree of utility does a presented practice has as a good one for both faculty and work context?What conceptions of good teaching and learning are the ones to inspire the practice of a teacher? Organizational features.Students.Previous history.Syllabus.Type of budgets.Values.Organizational knowledge and professional skills of the practice.

Content selection and learning.

Planning, sequencing and evaluation of the practice.

Skills, beliefs and values ??of teachers.

Influences, relationships and adaptation of a good practice with the labor market.
Source: Prepared by authors

The selection of the model requires two steps.  The first step is evaluating the three models and then choosing one; each model will be evaluated from the parameters listed on row labeled as Detail of the model, from Table 1.  Based on the principle of simplicity, authors are going to choose one of the three models that better optimizes the writing of virtual education activities, by using the details of the model.

If the generic virtual education activity to be written, by implementing good educational practices is, for example: Comparative study of documents and analysis of an experience, problem or opportunity in the professional life of the student, which model would be the most optimal and  the simplest to understand from a teacher when planning and designing syllabus? Chickering and Gamson (1987) handle a timely list of seven principles of good practice; Alexander (1997) includes a list of questions and Coffield and Edward (2009) propose management dimensions.  Based on the previous parameters, handling a list of seven good practices are more optimal and it is easier to understand and apply for a teacher, than handling a set of questions or a set of dimensions; during planning and designing of the course.  The aforementioned analysis justifies the selection of Chickering and Gamson (1987) with respect to the other two models and meets criteria number 1.

The second step is validating the decision of the authors, by identifying similar studies as the one proposed in the current manuscript; where  Chickering and Gamson (1987) has been quoted, as core model.  Important studies for virtual education, have used the principles of Chickering and Gamson (1987), such as the researching developed by Graham, Cagiltay, Lin and Craner (2001); Hutchins (2003); Bangert (2004); Tobin (2004); Dixon (2012);  Babb, Stewart and Johnson (2013) and Cakiroglu (2014 ).

Authors of the present manuscript, value the work developed by Graham et. al (2001) that relates the 7 principles from Chickering and Gamson (1987) with a proposed set of on line instructions.  The relationship is presented as follows:

Principle 1, known as, good practice encourages student – faculty contact, has its corresponding lesson for on line instruction, which is: instructors should provide clear guidelines for interaction with students.

Principle 2, known as, good practice encourages cooperation among students, has its corresponding lesson for on line instruction, which is: well-designed discussion assignments facilitate meaningful cooperation among students.

Principle 3, known as, good practice encourages active learning, has its corresponding lesson for on line instruction, which is: students should present course projects.

Principle 4, known as, good practice gives prompt feedback, has its corresponding lesson for on line instruction, which is: instructors need to provide two types of feedback: information feedback and acknowledgement feedback.

Principle 5, known as, good practice emphasizes time on task, has its corresponding lesson for on line instruction, which is: online courses need deadlines.

Principle 6, known as, good practice communicates high expectations, has its corresponding lesson for on line instruction, which is: challenging tasks, sample cases, and praise for quality work communicate high expectations.

Principle 7, known as, good practice respects diverse talents and ways of learning has its corresponding lesson for on line instruction, which is: allowing students to choose projects topics incorporates diverse views into online courses.

3. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This research is intended to get the following objectives:

General knowledge addressed to universities, especially in Panama, about the potential of virtual education activities as a part of planning, designing, and implementation of curriculum.

Results that allow, both government and private universities, in Panama, the justification about the potential of virtual education, as an alternative to classroom education, in order to increase the number of virtual careers.

Specific knowledge for university instruction, of how to write virtual education activities, by using the seven good educational practices from Chickering and Gamson (1987).

Replicable formats for self-assessment of virtual education activities by the teacher; at the beginning of the academic period and for the evaluation of these activities, by the students; at the end of the academic period.

3.1. Participants

The unit of analysis is the teacher and the student; from their contributions to the research, the authors will test, the effectiveness, of writing virtual education activities by using Chickering and Gamson (1987).  The methodology was developed from a case study, in which the teacher and his ten students participated actively.  The name of the course is Simulation Modeling Dynamic Systems of the Master Program of Sciences of Information Technology and Communication offered by Universidad Tecnologica de Panama.

In terms of case study participants, this group of ten students has the following characteristics: the average age of participants is 26.2 years; 50% are males and 50% females. 80% of participants have at least a bachelor’s degree, prior enrolling the Master Program and only 20% have postgraduate studies, prior enrolling the Master Program. Regarding years of experience, 1 student had no previous working experience, before enrolling in the Master Program; 2 students had less than one year of working experience, before enrolling in the Master Program; 3 students had one year of experience, before enrolling in the Master Program; 3 students had 4 years of working experience, before enrolling in the Master Program and one student had 8 years of experience, before enrolling in the Master Program. The average of years of working experience, of the sample, is 2.4 years. Finally, 100% of students that had had working experience, before enrolling in the Master program, belong to the Technology sector.

3.2. Instruments

This research requires the use of three instruments, which are described below:

Instrument 1.  Faculty self – assessment matrix.

Purpose of the instrument: This instrument allows calculating the average that comes from the self-assessment performed by the teacher, when matching the activities of virtual education with the seven principles of good educational practice of Chickering and Gamson (1987). The average is obtained in the intersection, row = n + 1 and column = m + 1.

Deadline to fill out the instrument: At the beginning of the academic year by the teacher, the results should be reported the to the research team, a week after receipt of the instrument.

Structure of the instrument: An array of n + 1 rows (where n is the set of virtual education activities reinforced by the teacher) and m = 7 columns, where m represents the seven educational practices from Chickering and Gamson practices (1987) (practices are listed in detailed in the Table 1). The row (n + 1) and the column (m + 1) are used to calculate the averages obtained from virtual education activities or good educational practices.

Format: Refer to Table 2, with the key indicator at cell A_{n+1, m+1}

Instructions for filling out the instrument: The number of cells are obtained, from the multiplication of n number of rows (virtual education activities) and m = 7 columns (good educational practices).  For each cell, the teacher must choose one specific value of the domain from 1 to 5. If the activity n, after using the good educational practices from Chickering and Gamson (1987) did not meet the practice m criteria, at all, the value to be chosen by the teacher is 1; whether the activity n met the practice m criteria, in a poorly manner, the value to be chosen by the teacher is 2; if the activity n met practice m criteria, in a partially manner, the value to be chosen by the teacher is 3; if the activity n met practice m criteria, in a good manner, the value to be chosen by teacher is 4; and if the activity n met practice m criteria, in a largely manner, the value to be chosen by the teacher is 5.

Research question: Did the wording from activity n fulfill criteria of education good practice m?  Where m = 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7.

Table 2: Self-assessment matrix for virtual education activities in relation to good educational practices.

# Virtual education activity Practice 1 – Encourage contacts between students and faculty Practice 2- Develops reciprocity and cooperation among students. Practice 3 – Uses active learning techniques Practice 4 – Gives prompt feedback Practice 5 – Emphasizes on time task Practice 6 – Communicates high expectations Practice 7 – Respects diverse talents and ways of learning AVERAGE OF THE ACTIVITY
1 Activity 1 E₁₁ E₁₂ E₁₃ E₁₄ E₁₅ E₁₆ E₁₇ A_{1, m+1}
2 Activity 2 E₂₁ E₂₂ E₂₃ E₂₄ E₂₅ E₂₆ E₂₇ A_{2, m+1}
3 Activity 3 E₃₁ E₃₂ E₃₃ E₃₄ E₃₅ E₃₆ E₃₇ A_{3, m+1}
4 Activity 4 E₄₁ E₄₂ E₄₃ E₄₄ E₄₅ E₄₆ E₄₇ A_{4, m+1}
…
n Activity n E_n1 E_n2 E_n3 E_n4 E_n5 E_n6 E_n7 A_{n, m+1}
AVERAGE OF GOOD PRACTICE A_{n+1, 1} A_{n+1, 2} A_n+1,3 A_{n+1, 4} A_{n+1, 5} A_{n+1, 6} A_{n+1, m} A_{n+1, m+1}
Source: Prepared by authors

From Table 2: On one hand, cells E₁₁ … E_n7 represent integer numbers in the set = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5}; each cell can contain a single value of that set (this value represents the evaluation from faculty).  On the one hand, the average per activity or A_{1, m+1} = (E₁₁ + E₁₂ + E₁₃ + E₁₄ + E₁₅ + E₁₆ + E₁₇) / m; for A_{2, m+1}, A_{3, m+1}, A_{4, m+1}, A_{n, m+1} applies the same formula, only the row displayed in the pair is varied (n, m) where n is the row and m is the column. The average for good practice or P_{n+1, 1} = (E₁₁ + E₂₁ + E₃₁ + E₄₁ + E₅₁) / n; for A_{n+1, 2}, A_{n+1, 3}, A_{n+1, 4}, A_{n+1, 5}, A_{n+1, 6}, A_{n+1, 7} applies the same formula used for P_{n+1, 1}, except that the column represented in the pair is varied (n, m) where n is the row and m is the column. Finally, the average of activity is equal to (A_1,m+1 + A_2,m+1 + A_{3, m+1} + A_{4, m+1} + A_{n,, m+1}) / n and the average of good practice is equal to  (A_{n+1, 1} + A_{n+1, 2} + A_{n+1, 3} + A_{n+1, 4} + A_{n+1, 5} + A_{n+1, 6} + A_n1+1,m) / m.  A_{n+1, m+1}. Both averages have the same value.

Instrument 2.  Student evaluation matrix.

Purpose of the instrument: This instrument allows the students, evaluate virtual education activities in order to determine, if these activities favored or not their learning process.

Deadline to fill out the instrument: At the end of the academic year, the students had up to 3 calendar days, to complete the instrument, after received it.

Structure of the instrument: There are two sections. The section  1 of the instrument is a form, with a set of questions related to the background of the section and section 2 of the instrument is a set of two matrixes of n rows (where n is the set of virtual education activities defined by the teacher) and 1 column; the first matrix allows the student evaluating the degree of understanding of the activities, in terms of the way they have been written by the teacher and the second matrix allows the student evaluating the level of impact of the virtual education activity, in his learning process.

Format:  Refer to Table 3

Instructions for filling out the instrument:

Section 1, background of the student, includes the following types of questions: two discrete questions (age and years of working experience); one question with mask (sex) and two multiple choice questions (highest degree achieved by the student and specialty based on UNESCO classification of Science and Technology areas in which the student has developed his career). For section 2 and depending of the number of activities, for each activity, the student should choose one value of the domain from 1 to 5.

Section 2 is associated to three research questions.  The first question of section 2 is about the degree of understanding of the activity by the student.  The participant can perform his evaluation from the following criteria: if the student evaluates the question 1 with a value of one (1), means that the student did not understand the description of activity n, at all; if student evaluates the question 1 with a value of two (2),  means that the student had a low level of understanding from the description of activity n; if the student evaluates the question 1 with a value of three (3), means that the student had an average level of understanding from the description of activity n;  if the student evaluates the question 1 with a value  of four (4), means that the student had an acceptable level of understanding from the description of activity n and finally, if the student evaluates the question 1 with a value of five (5), means that the student had a satisfactory level of understanding from the description of activity n. The student is allowed to choose one numeric value per activity.

The second question of section 2 is about how the activity n has impacted, the student learning process. The participant can perform his evaluation from the following criteria:  if the student evaluates the question 2 with a value of one (1), means that activity n did not support his overall learning process; if the student evaluates the question 2 with a value of two (2), means that activity n provided a good support to his overall learning process;  if the student evaluates the question 2 with a value of three (3), means that activity n provided an average level of support to his overall learning process; if the student evaluates question 2 with a value of four (4), means that activity n provided a good support to his overall learning process and finally  if the student evaluates question 2 with a value of five (5), means that activity n provided a largely support to his overall learning process.

The third question of section 2 is about which kind of activity does the student think supported his learning process largely for this particular course?  The student choose only one alternative: (a) classroom education activities; (b) virtual education activities; (c) distance education activities (non-virtual activities)

 

Research questions:

How much did you understand the wording of activity n when you developed it?

How much did activity n fulfill your overall learning process in the course?

Which kind of activity do you think supported your learning process largely for this particular course?

Table 3: Questionnaire to be answered by the student

Please fill out the following questions:Section 1 – Background1)       Age:__________2)       Years of working experience: ________3)       Choose the highest level of education achieved so far:a.       Bachelor Programb.       Graduate Program

c.        Master Program

d.       Doctorate Program

e.        Post-Doctorate Program

4)       Select one specialty you have developed your career (Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain, 2014):

a.       Logic

b.       Mathematics

c.        Astronomy and Astrophysics

d.       Physics

e.        Chemistry

f.        Life Sciences

g.       Earth and Space Sciences

h.       Agricultural Sciences

i.         Medical Sciences

j.         Technology

k.      Philosophy

Section 2 – Specific questions. For questions 1 and 2, please evaluate from 1 to 5 (1 is the lowest and 5 is the highest) for each activity. For questions 3 please choose only one option from the three alternatives:

1)       How much did you understand the wording of activity n when you developed it?

 

ID Activity Description Score
1 Activity description for ID 1 E₁₁
2 Activity description for ID 2 E₁₂
3 Activity description for ID 3 E₁₃
…
n Activity description for ID n E_1n
2)       How much did activity n fulfill your overall learning process in the course?

ID Activity Description Score
1 Activity description for ID 1 E₂₁
2 Activity description for ID 2 E₂₂
3 Activity description for ID 3 E₂₃
…
n Activity description for ID n E_2n
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