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Distributed ‘places’ and ���‘spaces’ for learning in ���

Higher Education

Professor Mike Keppell Director, The Flexible Learning Institute &

Professor of Higher Education Charles Sturt University

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Overview

!   Distributed spaces

!   Assumptions

!   Ecological university

!   Principles

!   Diversity of spaces

!   Aligning with curriculum

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Distributed Spaces

!   Growing acceptance that learning occurs in different ‘places’

!   Proliferation of approaches emerging including ‘flexible’, ‘open’, ‘distance’ and ‘off-campus’ that assist the ubiquity of learning in a wide range of contexts (Lea & Nicholl, 2002).

!   Growing acceptance of life-long and life-wide learning also have a major influence on distributed learning spaces.

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Assumptions

!  Universities value and seek to enhance the skills essential for lifelong and life wide learning, developing graduates who will continue to develop intellectually, professionally and socially beyond the bounds of formal education.

!   Universities believe that programs, services and teaching methods should be responsive to the diverse cultural, social and academic needs of students, enabling them to adapt to the demands of university education and providing them with the cultural capital for life success.

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Barnett, R. (2011). Being a university. New York: Routledge.

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Ecological University

!   Global connectedness and dependence on world around them

!   Instead of ‘having an impact’ on the world which can be both positive and negative ecological universities seek sustainability

!   They are self-sustainable in their multiple levels of interactions.

!   They adopt a ‘care for the world’ as opposed to an ‘impact on the world’ approach (Barnett, 2011).

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Higher Education Principles

Access and Equity & Equivalence of Learning Outcomes

ethical obligations

Student Learning Experience traverses physical, blended and

virtual learning spaces. ‘place’ of learning is diverse

Constructive Alignment learning outcomes, subject,

degree program, generic attributes

Discipline Pedagogies specific needs of disciplines

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Key principle throughout the presentation is

‘design’

Question 1 Is there discussion that the student learning

experience encompasses physical, blended and virtual learning spaces?

Yes or No?

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Learning spaces

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Learning Spaces

!   Physical, blended or virtual ‘areas’ that:

!   enhance learning

!   that motivate learners

!   promote authentic learning interactions

!   Spaces where both teachers and students optimize the perceived and actual affordances of the space (Keppell & Riddle, 2012).

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Physical Virtual

Formal Informal Informal Formal

Blended

Mobile Personal

Outdoor Professional

Practice

Distributed Learning Spaces

Academic

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Physical Learning Spaces

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Seven principles of ���learning space design

!   The SKG project has established seven principles of learning space which support a collaborative and student-centred  approach to learning:

! Comfort: a space which creates a physical and mental sense of ease and well-being

! Aesthetics: pleasure which includes the recognition of symmetry, harmony, simplicity and fitness for purpose

! Flow: the state of mind felt by the learner when totally involved in the learning experience

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Seven Principles of Learning Space Design

• Equity: consideration of the needs of cultural and physical differences

• Blending: a mixture of technological and face-to-face pedagogical resources

• Affordances: the “action possibilities” the learning environment provides the users, including such things as kitchens, natural light, wifi, private spaces, writing surfaces, sofas, and so on.

• Repurposing: the potential for multiple usage of a space (Souter, Riddle, Keppell, 2010) (http://www.skgproject.com)

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Albury-Wodonga Learning Commons

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Comfort Aesthetics

Flow Equity

Blending Affordances Repurposing

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Apple – Cupertino Training Room

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Wallenberg Hall - Stanford University

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Affordances? - Blending

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Comfort Aesthetics

Flow Equity

Blending Affordances

Repurposing

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MIT – STATA Center - EDDY Spaces

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Technology-enhanced Active Learning (TEAL) Centre

Affordances - Blending

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Harvard University

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Discipline Pedagogies

‘Plasma to Chalkboard’ for Physics Professors

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Affordances

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Seven Principles - Questions

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Question 2 What learning space design principles are most

important to you? A. Comfort & Aesthetics

B.  Flow and Equity C. Blending and Affordances

D. Re-purposing

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Virtual Learning Spaces

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Virtual Learning Spaces

!   Virtual learning spaces provide unique opportunities that are unavailable in physical learning spaces

!   These affordances or ‘action possibilities’ allow a richer range of learning interactions

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Informal Virtual Learning Spaces

Informal

Formal Virtual Learning Spaces

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Facebook

!   Online and offline worlds are clearly coexisting

!   Face-to-face friendships from home have been developed and sustained through continued online interactions

!   Newer online relationships have flourished at university and developed into face-to-face indepth relationships” (Madge, Meek, Wellens and Hooley 2010, p. 145).

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Blended Learning Spaces

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Flexible learning

!   “Flexible learning” provides opportunities to improve the student learning experience through flexibility in time, pace, place (physical, virtual, on-campus, off-campus), mode of study (print-based, face-to-face, blended, online), teaching approach (collaborative, independent), forms of assessment and staffing. It may utilise a wide range of media, environments, learning spaces and technologies for learning and teaching.

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Blended & Flexible Learning

!   “Blended and flexible learning” is a design approach that examines the relationships between flexible learning opportunities, in order to optimise student engagement and equivalence in learning outcomes regardless of mode of study (Keppell, 2010, p. 3).

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Mobile Learning Spaces

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Mobile Learning Spaces

!   “Learning when mobile means that context becomes all-important since even a simple change of location is an invitation to revisit learning” (ALT-J Vol 17, No.3 p.159)

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Mobile Learning Spaces

!   With its strong emphasis on learning rather than teaching, mobile learning challenges educators to try to understand learners’ needs.

!   Understanding how learning takes place beyond the classroom, and

!   Intersection of education, life, work and leisure” (Kukulska-Hulme, 2010, p.181).

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Academic Learning Spaces

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Academic Learning Spaces

!   Physical, blended or virtual ‘areas’ that:

!   enhance academic ‘work’

!   that motivate academic ‘work’

!   enable networking

!   Spaces where academics optimize the perceived and actual affordances of the space.

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Academic Spaces

!   Barnett (2011) suggests that “today’s university lives amid multiple time-spans, and time-speeds” (p. 74).

!   Constant email...

!   Committee meetings......

!   Historians who focus on the past

!   Researchers who may focus on the future

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Academic Spaces

!   Universities may need to be conscious of the 24/7 existence of their students across the globe, each in their own unique time-span.

!   Virtual spaces

!   Residential students

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Academic Spaces

!   Barnett (2011) suggests that academics may be active in university spaces that may include:

!   Intellectual and discursive space which focus on the contribution to the wider public sphere.

!   Epistemological space which focuses on the “space available for academics to pursue their own research interests” (p. 76).

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Academic Spaces

!   Pedagogical and curricular space focuses on the spaces available to trial new pedagogical approaches and new curricular initiatives.

!   Ontological space which focuses on ‘academic being’ which is becoming increasingly multi-faceted beyond the research, teaching and community commitments. In fact “the widening of universities’ ontological spaces may bring both peril and liberation” (p. 77).

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Question 3 Do you regularly contribute to a professional blog?

Yes or No?

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Personal Learning Spaces

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Personal Learning Spaces

!   Personal learning environments (PLE) integrate formal and informal learning spaces

!   Customised by the individual to suit their needs and allow them to create their own identities.

!   A PLE recognises ongoing learning and the need for tools to support life-long and life-wide learning.

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Connectivism

!   PLE may also require new ways of learning as knowledge has changed to networks and ecologies (Siemens, 2006).

!   The implications of this change is that improved lines of communication need to occur.

!   “Connectivism is the assertion that learning is primarily a network-forming process” (p. 15).

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Outdoor Learning Spaces

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Outdoor Learning Spaces

•  These pathways, thoroughfares and occasional rest areas are generally given a functional value in traffic management and are more often than not developed as an after thought in campus design. As such the thoroughfares and rest areas are under valued (or not recognized) as important spaces for teaching and learning (Rafferty, 2012).

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Putting it all

together

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Conclusion !   A global revolution is taking place in tertiary education.

The traditional concept of the lecture room is being redefined as digital and distance education becomes the "new normal" (Mark Brown, Dominion Post).

!   It is time that we begin changing our thinking about the ‘place’ of learning for both learners and staff.

!   We need to let go of the tradition of universities as being a ‘singular place’ where learning and teaching occurs.

!   Distributed learning spaces are the future.

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Further Information

!   SKG Report: http://documents.skgproject.com/skg-final-report.pdf

!   Book Chapter: http://www.slideshare.net/mkeppell/distributed-spaces-for-learning

!   Mike’s Blog: http://mike-keppell.blogspot.com.au/

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