Approaches for the exploitation of the e-class platform in tertiary education in Greece M. Kalogiannakis1, K. Vasillakis2, G. Liodakis3, M. Psarros2, 1
ASPETE (School of Pedagogical and Technological Education)
[email protected] 2
TEI of Crete, Computer Science Department
[email protected],
[email protected] 3
TEI of Crete, Department of Electronics
[email protected]
Abstract Most people recognize that changes in Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) are having profound effects on our society and our lives. Teachers especially seem to be very interested in the use of ICT and distant learning as a feasible solution for all educational levels. Distant education is understood as a type of education where ICT applications play a significant role in the learning process. The main object in this learning process is the learner and the main subject is the educational institution, not the teacher. During the last years there is a remarkable increase of research on online learning and the use of educational technology. In this article we study the exploitation of one of the most common asynchronous teleducation (namely the e-class platform) Learning Management Systems (LMS) in tertiary education in Greece.
Keywords ICT, Distant Learning, e-class, asynchronous education
1. Introduction In recent years, various technological innovations have brought a great deal of changes in our life styles. Development and applications of new technologies have put pressure in order to provide up-to-date education. Ultimately education is a lifelong process with a major influence on people’s life and as a dynamic entity is always prone to change. Because of these continuous changes education will never be the same. ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) have served to accelerate the trend towards individualized learning and render learner’s involvement to be more active and complex (Lemmer, 2001). According to Papachristou et al. (2005) this may be achieved by a fertile combination of pedagogic learning theories, the methodology of educational software planning and an instructive approach of informatics as an educational object. There are many terms for online education. Some of them are: virtual education, Internetbased education, web-based education and education via computer-mediated communication. The definition of online education is based on Desmond Keegan’s (1996) definition of distance education. In particular, online education is characterized by: (a) the separation of teachers and learners which distinguishes it from face-to-face education, (b) the influence of
an educational organization which distinguishes it from self-study and private tutoring, (c) the use of a computer network to present or distribute some educational content, (d) the provision of two-way communication via a computer network so that students may benefit from communication with each other, teachers and staff. Over the last few years, e-learning has been perceived to be the springboard for a lifelong learning in schools, where students learn how to seek out new information, think critically and show initiative to meet up with challenges of the fast-changing world (Hedberg & Ping, 2005). E-learning is defined as interactive learning in which the learning content is available online and provides automatic feedback to the student’s learning activities (Paulsen, 2003). Organizations often struggle to use e-learning effectively. With so many options available, it’s easy to over-analyze, become baffled, or make unsuccessful choices. E-learning is by no means a panacea and according to Horton (2003) e-learning can be defined broadly as any use of Web and Internet technologies in order to create learning experiences. Distant education is also often linked with adult education and life-long learning (Paulesen, 2003). Internet in general and World Wide Web in particular, allow learning to be structured and presented in new ways. Such changes have implications for the organization and the structure of existing and new educational institutions. The situation in the Greek educational system of tertiary education is not an exception and it will be very interesting to explore it.
2. Distant Education - Framework Historically, distant education has continuously evolved as technology has improved. In modern education, tradition and innovation compete. At the same time, education remains a communication process, aimed at the cognitive and personal development of the learner. The development of ICT make distance education possible and introduce new characteristics in the traditional tutor’s role as both tutor and students are in a new educational environment (Kalogiannakis et al., 2005(a)). Undoubtedly, technology can play a very prominent role in the educational process and can be utilized in many ways. This role starts from information or educational material delivery and ends with cognitive tools (Reeves & Laffey, 1999). In education, significant efforts have been directed towards the design and implementation of asynchronous learning network environments for distance and flexible Web-based learning. At a basic level, an online learning system can be seen as an information system (Salter et al., 2005) with particular specifications bound to satisfy specific educational demands. Online communication may or may not be included, but it seems that the focus of e-teaching is rather on the learning electronic content than on communication between learners and tutors (Bennett & Lockyer, 2004). Web-based educational tools provide many ways to increase communication between class members and faculty, through various interaction styles as discussion boards, e-content provision, e-mail support, chatting etc. Students could combine the provided information with their own knowledge and develop a solid foundation for learning (Paulsen, 2003). Another benefit is that most students have a reinforced sense of equality. Distant education also faces many challenges. Feeling of isolation, time management, and familiarity with ICT are some of the issues that should be taken under serious consideration. When participants have to express anything in written, instead of saying it in a face-to-face communication, usually they
spend more time to think before opining or answer. This fact gives them extra opportunities to correct themselves and to avoid being unaffected and spontaneous. The provision of distant learning material alone is not effective. Student-content interaction in distant education is the most fundamental interaction style. Materials, which can change students’ attitudes towards learning, are considered as the basis of the all-learning processes. One solution to the problem of managing responsibility in online environments is to ask all involved to take responsibility for what they do. However, what is frequently reported as the most common problem in the framework of distant learning is the students’ feeling of isolation (Hedberg & Ping, 2005). The creation of a learning environment that encourages active participation and promotes continuous feedback is essential. In order to make distance education process effective, efficient and qualified, a student-centred education is needed. In addition, student’s participation in discussions, asking questions, interaction and participation in feedback processes are necessary elements for distant learning (Phillips, 1997). Adapting student-centred approaches to the online environment has required the development of new skills and changes to teaching practices (Bennett & Lockyer, 2004). An online teacher must create a coherent learning experience for the student taking into account that the educator maybe never has the chance to meet the learner physically. Therefore, the teachers must develop new supporting strategies that maintain motivation and encourage interaction (Bennett & Lockyer, 2004). When choosing technologies in order to support distance education material delivery, many factors must be considered. Some of them are: the capability of technology to handle media-rich content and network technology, the availability of existing educational resources for this technology, the authoring tools for resource development and the ease of use by course developer, the administrator, the tutor and the student (Papadakis et al., 2005). The importance of learner’s responsibility in learning is starting to emerge rapidly (Clegg et al., 2005) as pointing the students to web-resources or online lecture notes is not enough (Salter et al., 2005). However, the transition to online teaching and learning presents new challenges as the roles and the expectations of both staff and students evolve (Bennett & Lockyer, 2004). One of the main communicative roles of the tutor in distant learning is to organize interactions and inter-influences with and among students and the educational material. It has been underlined that the tutor is the one who creates an atmosphere of cooperation between traditions and innovations in education. Success depends mostly on tutor (Kalogiannakis et al., 2005(a)). Today, web-based learning environments have been developed for educational purposes and different web-courses have been applied especially to tertiary education. E-class is a typical asynchronous tele-teaching platform and it is supported by the non-profit organization Greek Universities Network (GUnet). In this research we present some recent approaches through the relevant bibliography for the exploitation of the e-class platform in tertiary education in Greece. Our analysis was based on qualitative methods analyzing some recent articles, mainly cases studies about the use of e-class in establishments of tertiary education in Greece. Furthermore, we were guided to a reviewing of the e-class usage in TEI (Technological Educational Institute) of Crete (http://eclass.teiher.gr).
3. Exploitation and assessment of e-class usage in Greece The articles mentioned in this section are not the only existing on the subject for the use eclass in tertiary education in Greece. However, there exist enough representative studies that guide us to evaluate the current situation concerning the use of e-class in Greece. The following case studies constitute an important framework for further research about the exploitation of distance learning (synchronous or asynchronous) in establishments of tertiary education in Greece. Leventidis et al. (2005) in their study concerns the laboratory course «Databases and Data Management» offered in University of Athens. They argue that the incorporation of distance learning tools, such as the asynchronous e-learning platform «e-class» in the educational procedure, enriches the traditional teaching methods by encouraging the interaction among teachers, students and educational material. Analyzing the various tools existing in this platform they found out that “agenda”, “announcements”, “assignment” and “forum” are the most useful and easy to handle tools. In the same study the authors believe that the platform usage should be expanded in all laboratory courses in University of Athens. In order to improve the platform operation, in the future plans of the research group are the creation (a) of self–evaluation exercises and (b) the team work assignments. In the distant learning course “Network Management” students of TEI of Epirus, according to Giannelou et al. (2005), show positive attitudes. In the specific course, the educational material was supported interactively via e-class platform. Their study elaborates two levels. In the first one, they study operability issues of the platform and in the second level they evaluate the new educational process through e-class platform concerning the students. The results of this study substantiate student’s positive intention for the distant learning educational process. Besides, the results of the same research bring to surface that the students using distant learning facilities have similar grades compared the students of the traditional course. The Department of Informatics at TEI of Athens reports very encouraging results about the eclass usage. The platform is considered user-friendly and this adds up to better adoptability, increases student’s homework time and improves student’s scores (Georgouli et al., 2005(a)). In this research, the redesign of the educational process with the introduction of e-class has been well accepted both by instructors and students. Authors also remark a great improvement of the educational process, especially dealing with laboratories courses. The same research also argues that the satisfaction of the e-class use will be increased in the near future due to the fact that students and teachers will get familiar with this new LMS technology. According to another research of Georgouli et al. (2005(b)), the open source e-learning platform has paved a new road, changing the existing ways of teaching and learning. In this research, a number of educational scenarios have been designed for different purposes and the first results seem to be very encouraging. The same research also assumes that the teachers’ experience using e-class will be increased with the level of adoption. TEI of Athens intends to initiate a pilot program proposing innovative teaching procedures for all courses based on this
experience. Their imminent goal is to convince all the instructors who are still afraid of technology to get involved with the use of distant learning. Another research at TEI of Lamia (Tziallas et al., 2005) describes the functionality, the architecture and the implementation of the e-class platform. Authors also present a detailed description of e-class emphasizing on its simplicity, and point out the fact that the software is completely free of charge. The approach followed at TEI of Athens/Department of Energy Technology was to create a learning environment, named e-study, based on the e-class platform (Karolidis D., et. Al., 2005). E-study has inherited all the features of the e-class platform and allows the educational collaboration between students and instructor with dynamic content and asynchronous dialogue introduction. Furthermore, additional subsystems were built (comprised of special hardware and software for collecting and handling real-time data, critical operational “onfield” parameters of industrial installations, etc.), in order to assist certain laboratory exercises’ conduction in a modern and efficient way. Finally, we present some important outcomes about the use of e-class at TEI of Crete gathered from various recent studies of ours. At first, the students-users of the system appear to be more stimulated when they have to attend a course through the e-class platform (Vassilakis et al., 2005, Kalogiannakis et al., 2005(b)). The students reported platform’s services as a supportive and complementary tool of conventional course rather than as autonomous educational tool. In another research the main aim was to provide elements regarding lecture’s role when using the e-class platform (Kalogiannakis et al., 2005(a)). The study revealed the overturning of the teacher-student relation and the distinguished role of the pedagogical framework. The new role of the lecturers through distance teaching platforms seems to be more complicated and demanding. Furthermore, according to teachers, e-class is useful as a subsidiary tool. Platform’s lecturers also consider that they are more active, instructional and productive in such environments, although they do not fully exploit them. In Liodakis et al. (2005) a first coordinated effort is conducted for a critical approach and evaluation of asynchronous tele-teaching at TEI of Crete. Based on semi-directive interviews and questionnaires with the involved population we attempt to study (a) their new roles of both students and instructors and (b) the new practices that emerge in a virtual learning environment. Amongst the new outcomes that emerged from this research, is the efficiency of e-class for a wide exploitation of asynchronous distance education at an institution of tertiary education. Taking into account the aforementioned exploitation scenario’s we conclude to the following. Almost all the articles show intention to spread platform usage in the academic community. All the institutions have experience on developing electronic courses, using the platform mainly as supportive and complementary tool to the conventional teaching. It is obvious that e-class platform’s usage stimulates the students in a positive way. The importance of the various communication tools provided by the platform was evident. Furthermore, there exists the necessity for a new pedagogical framework in such a distance learning environment. The roles for both instructors and students should change considering the new communication environment. As it concerns the performance of students, first results indicate an improvement, although the specific issue should be more investigated. Generally speaking, the overall educational process with the use of such a platform is changing dramatically.
4. Conclusions It seems that the platform is widely accepted by the academic community of Greece. A lot of tertiary educational institutions have already adopted the e-class platform and already there preliminary studies concerning usage experience. Both teachers and students show positive attitudes when using the specific LMS. Generally speaking, the stimuli offered to users of such platforms are more comparing to the ones of conventional teaching. The convergence of ICT and pedagogy will be critical for the use of such systems in the near future. In conclusion, we can assume that the future of distant learning is not black but stands on a new world of the information society and the era of life long learning. It is expected that gradual and controlled use of ICT tools such as e-class will definitely strengthen distant learning in coming years.
5. Acknowledgements The present work was supported by the project “Infrastructure exploitation to operate advance tele-education services in TEI of Crete” (operational program: “Information Society”, EU).
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