Learning design in higher education – teachers’ processes and conceptions (HEDLearn)
(completed)
University teachers’ competencies are coming under scrutiny in Norway, as consequence of the increase interest for quality of higher education.
The HEDLearn project aims to explore the way university teachers in a teacher training program collaborate to generate learning designs intended to engage students. Photo: Pixabay
About the project
University teachers’ competencies are coming under scrutiny in Norway, as consequence of the increase interest for quality of higher education. Concurrently, university teachers are expected to provide student-centered learning environments, and the opportunity for students to deepen understanding, or facilitate development of problem solving or generic competencies, as required by a changing society and labor market landscapes. Very little is known about how teachers design such learning environments, how their courses are set up, in terms of goals, activities, resources, methods, tools, to both meet the standards of the academic discipline and support students to become independent and competent learners. Research on learning design in higher education, and especially on how teachers work together to create student-centered learning environments are an unexplored terrain.
Objectives
The HEDLearn project aims to explore the way university teachers in a teacher training program collaborate to generate learning designs intended to engage students. One goal is to understand how teacher organize their collaboration in a team, and how they proceed in their discussions and development of the course and learning material. A second aim is to identify teachers’ conceptions, experiences and challenges with a) creating learning environments that are student centered and b) work together on this complex task.
Background
The project employs a theoretical framework inspired by sociocultural and sociomaterial ideas. The discussions of the teacher teams and their collaborative work are analyzed and interpreted by using notions related to productive dialog, co-construction of new ideas, and development of shared knowledge artefacts for the learning design. The methods consist of recorded observations of work meetings, document collection and analysis, and individual interviews with the participating teachers.
The HEDLearn project is hosted at the Department of Education. A number of master students are engaged in the project, through examining the existing dataset and by collecting additional data.
Sub-projects
Master thesis projects by
- Iulia Barbu
- Ying Li
- Monika Elmhjellen
Selected publications
Selected
Esterhazy, R., Nerland, M. & Damşa, C. (2019). Designing for productive feedback: an analysis of two undergraduate courses in biology and engineering, Teaching in Higher Education, https://doi.org.10.1080/13562517.2019.1686699 (IF 2.15)
Damşa C., & Wittek A.L. (2020) Making Group Learning Work. Processes and Pedagogical Designs in Higher Education. In: Elken M., Maassen P., Nerland M., Prøitz T., Stensaker B., Vabø A. (eds) Quality Work in Higher Education. Higher Education Dynamics, vol 54, pp. 115-134, Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-41757-4_7 (Level 1)
Damşa, C. & de Lange, T. (2019). Student-centred learning environments in higher education - From conceptualization to design, In C. Damşa & T. de Lange (eds.), Studentsentrerte perspektiver og tiltak i høyere utdanning. Et forskningsbasert innspill til kvalitetsarbeid i praksis, UNIPED, 42(1), 9-26, doi: https://doi.org/10.18261/
Damşa, C. I. (2018). Research and development assignments as instruments for learning in teacher education. Research-based knowledge for the purpose of professional Education. In P. Maassen, M. Nerland & L. Yates, Reconfiguring knowledge and knowledge policies for the purpose of Higher Education, Springer Verlag.
Markauskaite, L., Muukkonen, H., Damsa, C., Reimann, P. & Thompson, K. (2020). Interdisciplinary learning in undergraduate and graduate education: Conceptualizations and empirical accounts, In: Gresalfi, M. and Horn, I. S. (Eds.). (2020). The Interdisciplinarity of the Learning Sciences, 14th International Conference of the Learning Sciences (ICLS) 2020, Volume 1, pp. 398-406. Nashville, Tennessee: International Society of the Learning Sciences.
Master theses
Daria Volosach (2022). PRINCIPLES FOR DESIGN AND TEACHING IN ONLINE AND BLENDED COURSE IN HIGHER EDUCATION
Carol Paul Rodriguez (2020). Knowledge creation in an interdisciplinary team.
Ying Li (2019). University Teachers' Pedagogical Work with Canvas.
Monika Elmhjellen (2019). Canvas som læringsplattform. En kvalitativ studie om vektlegging av Canvas i undervisningspraksisen.
Published Jan. 27, 2020 1:38 PM
- Last modified Mar. 12, 2024 1:20 PM