An introduction to digital environments for learning (P01038)

? Credit Points : 20 ? SCQF Level : 11 ? Acronym : EDU-P-P01038

This course is aimed at teachers, developers and other practitioners within post-compulsory education who wish to develop both their understanding of the effects of the online mode on educational theory and practice, and their skills in creating and supporting high quality online learning opportunities for their students.

It will give participants the opportunity to engage hands-on with digital learning environments, provide them with structured access to a community of peers and expert tutors, offer practical guidance on the effective use of new technologies for learning, and also explore some of the cultural and contextual issues which define 'elearning' as a vibrant field of study. On completion of the course, participants will have gained a broad overview of how online learning has become a key issue in higher education, what digital environments can offer in terms of the delivery and support of learning programmes, and how the educational project is affected by our engagement in this mode of teaching. Participants will gain first-hand experience of working individually and collaboratively in a formal online-learning programme, will have the opportunity to design their own learning resources, and will have the chance to engage with and debate some of the key ideas about elearning emerging from current research.

Entry Requirements

none

Subject Areas

Home subject area

Education, (The Moray House School of Education, Schedule C)

Delivery Information

? Normal year taken : Postgraduate

? Delivery Period : To be arranged/Unknown

? Additional Class Information : The course starts on 13 June 2005, with a 1-week summer school during the week of the 20 June 2005. This is followed by 9 weeks of online, distance study.

Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes

On completion of the course students will be able to:

1. critically evaluate a range of technologies in terms of their impact on teaching and learning
2. design their own online learning resources
3. contextualise their own practice in terms of the key issues emerging from current research in elearning

Assessment Information

Equivalent to 5,000 words and comprising:

Part 1 (50%): Creation and maintenance throughout the course of a reflective diary in the form of a weblog. Participants will be required to provide evidence in the weblog that they have been engaging fully with the technologies introduced during the course, and that they have to a reasonable extent been able to synthesise their knowledge of these into a vision of how they might be used within teaching programmes.

Part 2 (50%): Collaborative production of an assignment relating to an area covered by the course. Participants define their own specific topic. The assignment will be produced in pairs, and participants will be encouraged to explore alternative forms of literacy in its presentation (for example hypertext, online chat, email exchange).