Modes of learning - Mark Nichols

 An early morning webinar with Dr. Mark Nichols hosted by the Commonwealth of Learning.  on the topic of 'modes of learning'.  

Began with what is 'teaching'? Pedagogy is the dance between pedagogy and the dynamic operating decisions of the university' - teaching is the activity that gives a subject its voice, that brings the subject alive for the learner to form a relationship with. Not all teaching has to have an identifiable teacher. 

How about learning 'learning is 'a smudge between a self that knows to be self that knows more' to learn, then is to be personally smudged from one state of knowing into another ... as knowers we are forever incomplete: there is always more to know.

Introduced the project. Work with Dr. Seelig to try to look at what constituted learning, especially what is open, flexible and distance learning. For Te Pūkenga there are three modes, on-the-job, f2f, and distance delivery. What do these mean, how can they be combined, are these actually singular in themselves?

There is no such thing as an on-the-job delivery mode, turns out to be fluid. Similar to distance delivery, there are many modes as well. There is great potential in missing the modes. 

Important to consider how to meet learner needs, increase accessibility.

Q & A followed

Defining modes helps to enable common dialogue and scalable innovation. Asserts for example that peer relationships across learners are not necessarily a requirement for effective learning. Being able to define the modes help with decision-making, shared practice and strategic planning. A shared programme may not all be offered in a fixed mode but be flexible to allow for learner needs, circumstances and objectives. Defining modes enables education by design. 

Overviewed the asynchronous (most to least) OFDL distance, work-based, study centre, negotiate) and synchronous (most to least) live classroom, virtual class, flexible, local group, road show, supervised self-paced. Details in https://tinyurl.com/teachingmodes

Provided two examples, one in business to show the ways the modes can be mixed to provide flexibility for learners. Learning activity - what learners do, teaching activity - what do teachers do, resources - what academic support, subject representation, courseware, timetable - asynchrous/synchronous and assessment - enduring assessments tasks and also pre-determined, must be decided on to design the learning. 

The work on modes of learning was undertaken to inform Te Pūkenga as it brought together diverse delivery modes. However, with the disestablishment of Te Pūkenga, this work has not been taken further. 

The work is helpful though to try to place some rigor into how delivery modes are difined. Encouraged the use of these modes of learning and to help with further investigation to refined the modes, identify exemplars and explore the planning dynamics (costs, operating considerations). Challenged us to reflect on - education is always designed 'how deliberate is it?