ONLINE MENTORING TO ENRICH THE LEARNING PROCESS

Transkriptio

1 ONLINE MENTORING TO ENRICH THE LEARNING PROCESS Riina Helenius & Irja Leppisaari Central Ostrobothnia Polytechnic / AVERKO Open Polytechnic Learning Network E-LEARN 2004, Conference on E-Learning in Corporate, Government, Healthcare, & Higher Education. November 1-5, 2004, Washington, USA

2 BACKGROUND AND GOALS OF THE ONLINE MENTOR PROJECT - The growing demand for flexible, contextual, authentic ways to tutor, study and learn links and networks between higher education and working life qualified and shared expertise - The goals of the Online Mentor project to develop a leverage model with working life orientation, for online tutoring and learning purposes to strengthen the aspect of working life in higher education to improve and intensify online tutoring to enhance the level of collaborative learning

3 1. Mentor Recruitment (-1/2004) THE STAGES OF THE PROJECT 12 online mentors (working life experts) will be recruited to the 10 courses in AVERKO, the Open Polytechnic Learning Network 2. Mentor Training (1-3/2004) Online mentors are trained (1 credit) to share their working life expertise on a online course that corresponds to their expert knowledge 3. Implementation (4/2004-4/2005) Online mentor will function on 2 to 4 online courses during a year as a work partner with the tutor in a competence area which has been negotiated, for example, in online discussions and/or as giving feedback and working as a tutor in some of the learning tasks 4. Evaluation And Modelling (5/ /2005) Online pedagogical research will be conducted on the project 5. Distribution (8/2005-)

4 - Funding European Social Fund (ESF) ABOUT THE PROJECT The State Provincial Office of Southern Finland Central Ostrobothnia Polytechnic - Administration Central Ostrobothnia Polytechnic / AVERKO, Open Polytechnic Learning Network - Duration AVERKO offers open polytechnic online courses to everyone regardless of previous education AVERKO courses start four times a year and the course offerings include over 40 courses, ca.150 points (=100 credits) The project is to be conducted in

5 ONLINE MENTORS ON AVERKO S COURSES - Setting Up a New Business and Planning Business Activities (3 points) Minna Paananen & Sanna Skog/Pedrina s Restaurant, Entrepreuners - Professional Growth (1 points) Sirkka Liisa Lokasaari/City of Kokkola, Work Supervisor - Basics of Social Work for Intoxicant Abusers (5 points) Juha Pekola/ Ventuskartano ry - intoxicant rehalibitation unit, Project Manager - Multicultural Issues (3 points) Pirkko Kivistö/Immigrant Office/City of Kokkola, Refugee Counsellor - Multicultural Issues in the Field of Social and Health Care (3 + 1 credits) Pian Ahonen/Central Ostrobothnia Central Hospital, gynaecology ja maternity ward, Midwife - Logistics (5 points) FINLAND POST/Jouni Männistö, Area Manager - Marketing Services (3 points) Keijo Särkijärvi/Advertising and marketing Agency Heinäkuu, Entrepreneur - Electronic Commerce (8 points) Timo Ylikangas & Vesa Pöyhönen/ RegWeb/Zonarius Oy, Managing Director, System Designer - Quality Management (8 points) Jukka Pajula, Quality Manager - Health and Safety at Work (1 points) Eija Alatalo/Työplus/Joint Municipal Board of the Health Centre of Kokkola Region/Occupational Health Nurse

6 PEDAGOGICAL FRAMEWORK OF THE PROJECT - Shared expertise with the interaction of higher education and working life Using local experts and expert organisations as sources of information and as learning partners learning networks sharing of knowledge Collaborative effort of teachers, students and representatives of the working life the fundament for multidisciplinary and multi-domain study and for networking - New concept of learning and tutoring, the focus being on contextuality, problem orientation, authenticity and meaningfulness

7 AGENTS OF THE ONLINE COURSE IN THE FRAMEWORK OF THE PROJECT Working life Online mentor Student Tutor Higher Education Higher Education ONLINE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT

8 PROJECT RESEARCH - Research questions How do the online mentors experience their action? How do the tutors experience the online mentors as their new partners in the online course? How do the students experience online mentoring? How do the students experience the sharing of expertise and the collaborative learning process in the online mentoring model? - Research methodology Action research Method triangulation qualitative and quantitative data gathering methods and analysis

9 PROJECT RESEARCH - Research data web tracks from 30 online courses interviews of 12 online mentors survey data: 10 to 15 teachers survey data: 600 students taking part in the online courses where online mentoring model was applied online mentors journals observation during the process, discussion memos, and feedback data Resulting in several research reports, research articles and conference papers In the following, initial findings of online mentor activities in seven online courses.

10 INITIAL VIEWS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF ONLINE MENTORS - Mentoring as a valuable learning experience - The role of working life expert was considered as rewarding and mentoring was also seen to advance networking. - Mentoring as an investment in the professional development The interactions and discussions with students and tutors supported the online mentors in reflecting and updating their knowledge and in enhancing their professional competence and growth. - Mentoring as a target of development The online mentors were also active in developing the online education and online mentoring model further More attention must be placed on committing the online mentors on their task and on highlighting the significance of time management (skills). The need for lighter mentoring model, the online mentor available for one or two weeks in a special online mentor forum

11 INITIAL VIEWS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF TUTORS - Mentoring as an efficient way to complement the know-how of tutors The tutors perceived the online mentor as useful and valuable partners While the online mentors shared their experiential knowledge, they also brought new ideas to tutors on how to develop their teaching profession and tutoring practices. Because of the online mentors input, the tutors could focus more on giving a personal feedback and on managing the course overall while the online mentors took part in the discussions. - Mentoring as a development tool for course modification and content production The tutors got a relevant feedback of the course content from the perspective of working life and were thus able to develop it further. - Mentoring as a way to share the responsibility of guidance The online mentors complemented the support of tutors. The roles and duties of online mentors and tutors, however, must be clarified accurately.

12 INITIAL VIEWS FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF STUDENTS - Mentoring as a source of motivation A chance to study and work with the real working-life professionals increased the students interest in achieving the learning goals the motivating impact of online mentoring - Mentoring as an enriching element in the online course Through online mentoring, the students were able to get new contacts and networks with skilled professionals and working life experts Online mentoring activated and enriched the interactions in the course. - Mentoring as a confusing experience Using online mentors and tutors at the same time confused some of the students. Some of the students had difficulties to separate the roles of the online mentors and tutors and to utilize the potential of mentoring.

13 PRELIMINARY CONCLUSIONS - Preliminary researcher findings indicate that online mentoring is seen as interesting and necessary feature of today s culture of education; it attracts students, tutors and mentors offers a meaningful way to share the expertise; it facilitates meaningful learning and effective tutoring allows a higher number of real working life problems and experiences as well as new ways of thinking or doing to be built in online education requires a high level of commitment by all involved parties to make it work must be designed and organised in a pedagogically meaningful way must fit into the structure of online course in order to be meaningful the need for interactive and collaborative elements

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