Wiki page for contextual inquiry meeting today

[Knoop, Peter]

Sure, department could be a good proxy.  With your low number of samples
though, you probably want to make sure you don't get that one oddball
the department has who is pushing teaching with technology, and so often
teaches a bit different than their colleagues J  

 

Since you are very limited in how many folks you'll be able to talk to -
I see a lot of 2's and 3's in your table - I might also suggest that if
your goal is "80%", then the difference between institution types is
might be less important than some of your other factors, at least in my
field (which is perhaps a proxy for science departments here).  I've
attended a number of Teaching Geosciences in the 21st Century workshops
over the last couple years.  The groups are deliberately selected to
represent the use of new and innovative pedagogies at a cross section of
educational institutions.  One of the main beliefs of these workshops is
that whether you're at a large R1 University or a small 2-year community
college, most good pedagogies are generally applicable across
institution types.  For lower-level courses in particular, the textbooks
used, the organization of courses, etc. is pretty much identical.  There
are differences, but they commonly only surface in terms of
money-related details, as you might expect.  An R1 university can
generally give students first-hand experience with expensive lab
equipment and facilities as part of their learning experience, whereas a
small, urban, community college, will typically rely more on simulations
and virtual experiences, but also might have to include some remedial
background material.  The students with hands-on experience may learn a
bit more about the practical aspects of the work, particularly if that
is one of the courses' educational goals; however, the main focus of the
learning is on analyzing and interpreting the data and responding to or
placing in context the results.  Good pedagogies that address the latter
part generally work well at any institution type.  

 

For instance, concepts maps are emerging as a great tool for teaching
geosciences, and while the approach is not yet that common, it is
evolving simultaneously across the institution types you've defined.
Its definitely not trickle-down from R1's or trickle-up from Teaching
Colleges.  So I think slicing this space up by institutional type may
not be as informative as the opportunity for increasing the N's for
other factors.

 

I'm not advocating you toss all your Institution Types though.  I think
you've identified an important factor in terms of "Distance Learning"
versus traditional courses.

 

Now, having said all that, it reminds me that another "proxy department"
you might want to consider, in addition to humanities and sciences, is
professional.  Their programs and courses often require real-world
experiences, such as internships, practicals, community-service,
community-engagement, etc. as part of their learning experience.

 

I'll also mention while I'm thinking of it that I see very little
difference regionally in the US in teaching geoscience courses, other
than the obvious impact of the geology you can visit in your backyard.  

 

-peter

 

From: Daphne Ogle [mailto:daphne at media.berkeley.edu] 
Sent: Thursday, December 20, 2007 7:13 PM
To: Knoop, Peter
Cc: fluid-work at fluidproject.org
Subject: Re: Wiki page for contextual inquiry meeting today

 

Great point Peter!  It may come out in some the of the factors but I
think it's worth pulling out on its own.  We've expressed this in
variance in departments before.  So as you say humanities and sciences
will have much different kinds of content.  Do you think that is at the
right level?  I'll also list the idea of subject matter in general.

 

Thanks for the feedback!

 

-Daphne

 

On Dec 20, 2007, at 1:30 PM, Knoop, Peter wrote:





Hi Daphne,

 

One thing that jumped out at me under your "factors to consider" was the
perhaps you might also want to consider the subject matter or content of
the course, if its not already part of one of the other factors you
list?  I'm thinking here about differences in needs between humanities
and science courses as an example.  For instance, a 300-person
introductory history course has much different needs from Sakai than a
300-person introductory oceanography course.  Even if the structure is
the same at a gross level (your class type/structure factor?) -- one
large section with all the students in it and dozens of smaller sections
to break the students up into manageable groups for activities -- what
goes on inside that structure is often very different, i.e., what you
would like to accomplish and facilitate in a discussion section is
generally not the same as in a laboratory section.  Such differences
will likely reach down to smaller class sizes as well.

 

-peter

 

From: fluid-work-bounces at fluidproject.org
[mailto:fluid-work-bounces at fluidproject.org] On Behalf Of Daphne Ogle
Sent: Thursday, December 20, 2007 3:05 PM
To: fluid-work at fluidproject.org
Subject: Wiki page for contextual inquiry meeting today

 

Hi there,

 

Here's the link I mentioned to those of you on the planning call,
http://wiki.fluidproject.org/x/0xQa.

 

Please note it is a work in progress.  As I mentioned some of it may not
even make sense on its own yet.  We'll talk through it on the call. 

 

The goal of the meeting is to come up with a strategy to move the
contextual inquiries / needs assessment forward as quickly as possible
while continuing to move some of our other very important design work
forward.

 

We'll give breeze a try as Toronto's network issues seem to be better.

Daphne Ogle

Senior Interaction Designer

University of California, Berkeley

Educational Technology Services

daphne at media.berkeley.edu

cell (510)847-0308

 






 

 

Daphne Ogle

Senior Interaction Designer

University of California, Berkeley

Educational Technology Services

daphne at media.berkeley.edu

cell (510)847-0308

 





 

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