Active Learning in a Hybrid Environment:

Using Moodle in the Elementary Years

by

Erin Gibbs

A Project Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

MASTERS OF EDUCATION

In

The Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy (Technology Studies)

(Digital Learning & Curriculum Cohort)

THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver)

May 2012

© Erin Gibbs, 2012

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Table of Contents

I. Background ……………………………………………………………………4

II. Epistemological and Ontological Framework………………………………..4

III. Project Introduction and Rationale…………………………………………...5 Screenshot 1……………………………………………………..7

IV. Relevance and the Research…………………………………………………...8

V. Key Concepts and Literature Review.………………………………………...9

i. 21st Century Skills……………………………………………………..10 Screenshot 2…………………………………………………….13 Screenshot 3…………………………………………………….13 Screenshot 4…………………………………………………….14 Screenshot 5…………………………………………………….14

ii. Active Learning ……………………………………………………….16 Screenshot 6…………………………………………………….17

iii. Literacy in Relation to Technology…………………………………..19

iv. Hybrid Learning Environments……………………………………...23 Screenshot 7.……………………………………………….…...24

VI. Ethical and Practical Concerns and Implications…………………………. 25 Screenshot 8……………………………………………………26 Screenshot 9……………………………………………………27

i. Ethical Strategy……………………………………………………….28

VII. Analysis and Interpretation………………………………………………….30 Screenshot 10…………………………………………………..31

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Screenshot 11…………………………………………………..34 Screenshot 12…………………………………………………..34

VIII. Conclusion…………………………………………………………………….37

References……………………………………………………………………………..39

Appendix A:…………………………………………………………………………...42 Table 1: B.C. Social Studies IRP 2006…………………………………42

Appendix B:……………………………………………..............................................43 Start-up Letter to Classroom Teachers Gr.4-7………………………….43 Appendix C:.………………………………………………………………………….44 Table 2: Key Concepts with References………………………………..44 Appendix D:…………………………………………………………………………...45 Moodle Questionnaire for students……………………………………..45 Appendix E:…………………………………………………………………………...52 Moodle Questionnaire for parents……………………………………..52 Appendix F:…………………………………………………………………………...55 Self and Group Reflection Posts………………..………………………55

Appendix G:…………………………………………………………………………..59

Appendix H:…………………………………………………………………………..60 Appendix I:………………………………………………………………………..…..61 Appendix J:……………………………………….…………………………………...62 Table 3: Timeline of the duration of this Master of Education……........62 Appendix K:…………………………………………………………………….……..64 Table 4: Website for MsGibbs@Brock…………..……………….….....64          

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I. Background

I started this M.Ed. because I wanted to develop my technological competency, to learn

how to weave technology into my practice and to gain expertise in leading professional

development amongst my colleagues. While I have always been interested in staying current

both professionally and technologically, without the structure of the M.Ed. I may not have had

access to the kinds of resources and knowledge sharing to allow me to achieve this level of

learning. I had used a Smart Board with Notebook software for a number of years and I wanted

wider exposure to technology that could be incorporated into my teaching. I have become

interested in combining synchronous and asynchronous learning with face-to-face (F2F) time

and am presently learning everything I can about using Learning Management Systems (LMS),

specifically Moodle. Moodle is the acronym for Modular Object Oriented Dynamic Learning

Environment.

II. Epistemological/Ontological Framework

Defining my epistemological and ontological position and how it relates to my practice,

and specifically to my project, is the subject of the following paragraphs. Epistemologically I

believe we learn in various ways. I believe that learning is a life-long process and is dependent

upon interaction, which is essentially how Bandura describes reciprocal determinism: the

continuous reciprocity between cognitive behaviour and the environment. Because I believe

this, I find Vygotsky’s Social Constructivism Theory particularly relevant. Children learn best

in the company of others, actively engaged and with appropriate cognitive scaffolding by

knowledgeable others. In my teaching practice I consciously try to avoid bombarding students

with too much talk or instruction. Small but specific chunks of information and then time to

digest and explore is how I learn best and how I see my students learning. A child’s

developmental level, that is, what they are cognitively capable of, in the Piagetian sense, must

be considered when planning learning activities for optimal growth. I believe active learning

and social interaction should mesh with the child’s genetic potential to provide optimum

conditions for their learning.

Personally, I have learned much through reading and I place great value on the power of

the written word. Great orators also resound with me; I have been entranced, educated and

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influenced by some outstanding teachers. I know that I learn through experience, from being out

there and living it. Phenomenologically, I can say that experience has involved all my senses,

each contributing to the general experience. Because children learn in different and unique

ways, I have been interested to see if using a Learning Management System like Moodle with

elementary-aged children would be more suited to one learning style than another, or if it would

accommodate all of the varied strengths children exhibit in their learning.

Use of the written word is obviously of key significance, as is visual media in using

Moodle. Ontologically I am happy with the hands-on experience this LMS affords the students,

as well as the potential development of more critical ways of viewing the media. Having

students blog their perspectives and comment on their peers’ posts may help to make their

understanding of the topic more concrete while exposing them to differing opinions and

knowledge. This would perhaps fall under the interpretivist paradigm in that the students’ world

is being constructed through their social interaction (discussion forums, blogging and

responding to other’s views). Activities throughout this project have been structured and the

dialogue modeled enough that children haven’t floundered for lack of direction, yet their

creativity and expression have had opportunities to show. The virtual side to this classroom has

given every student equal opportunity to be heard (read?) and responded to. I have also been

pleased with the F2F discussions we have been able to have on topical content and global issues

accessed through various RSS feeds blocked into my Moodle courses. RSS feeds are

continuously updated feeds resulting in immediate “real time” news.

III. Project Introduction and Rationale

I have been investigating the educational benefits and the practicality of using a

Learning Management System such as Moodle, with elementary-aged students in a school that

has not traditionally used much technology. I work at a small Canadian school in the Vancouver

School District. While it is in East Vancouver and still considered inner city, the demographics

have changed considerably in the past six years. Traditionally the school’s population had been

made up of lower socio-economic status (SES) and new Canadians. Now it is a neighbourhood

of higher SES, new homeowners and considerably less English Language Learner (ELL)

families. Parents are more visible and likely to be more involved in the school community than

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they have been in the past. About 20% of our 215 students are from the Philippines or are 1st

generation Filipino Canadian. Additionally, 20+ languages are spoken as either first or second

languages. We also have two district classes; one is a Low Incidence Resource Program (LIRP)

for students with developmental delays, while the other is an Extended Learning Assistance

Class (ELAC) for students with severe learning difficulties.

The purpose of this project has been to integrate the use of technology with the

intermediate Social Studies and Language Arts curriculum. Key concepts of the project I have

undertaken are: 21st Century Skills; Active Learning principles; hybrid learning environments;

and literacy in relation to technology. The context is my school community consisting of four

classes of intermediate students in grades 4 through 7 whom I see twice weekly in the computer

lab, their classroom teachers and the parents, as well as the larger school district community. Of

the 90+ students I work with, 25 have assigned Ministry-based designations: fourteen for

learning disabilities; six are medically based disabilities and two for autism. Designations are

pending for an additional four students. I have a School Support worker for limited class time

(37%) to assist with the Ministry designated students in my classes.

In terms of curriculum, the Moodle courses I designed complement British Columbia’s

Social Studies curriculum for grade 4 and 5, as well as the overriding curricular goals of

Language Arts for grades 4, 5, 6 and 7. The former course focuses on the skills and processes of

Social Studies in the study and comparison of various First Nations in Canada [Appendix A,

Table 1]. For example, grade 4 and 5 students used critical thinking to respond to text and

media; they looked at maps and used them to identify native territories; they gathered

information from various sites with alternate perspectives; and finally, they worked on

presentation skills. The other three divisions I teach range in grades from 5 to 7 (ages 10-13).

Their Moodle courses focus more on the overall curricular goals of Language Arts. Writing and

representing using various media, reading and viewing, as well as the development of oral

language skills in a technologically enhanced hybrid environment have been part of this year’s

experience for the upper intermediate grades.

Below is a screenshot that provides a very general overview of Information Technology

for grades 4-7.

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Screenshot 1: Ministry Overview of Information Technology K-12

Central to my curriculum has been the concept of participatory culture (Gibbs, 2011). In

the 21st century, the term participatory culture is used to describe the world of today’s global

citizens, information technology users who are not merely passive consumers, but contributors

and producers, or prosumers (Wikipedia). In a participatory culture such as we live in today,

education must prepare youth for affiliations, collaboration, knowledge sharing, problem

solving and creative thinking (Gibbs, 2011).

The rationale for this project is that, while the increased use of and need for technology

is widely recognized, school districts face budgetary restraints that limit access by teachers and

students. Specifically, the resources allocated for technology within the Vancouver School

District are minimal at best, despite growing public interest in and pressure to promote 21st

Century learning and practice. The skills needed by students in order to navigate their way

through our increasingly complex and connected world are discussed in greater detail later.

Moodle is an Open Source LMS, that is free and accessible to all. In the Vancouver School

District, and throughout British Columbia, teachers have supported each other in learning and

implementing Moodle, despite the lack of funds directed to professional development

opportunities in this area. Over the last year and a half I have met a growing number of teachers

who are interested in using Moodle in their classrooms. We have met after school to share and

develop our skills. Increasing the visibility of Moodle by showing its interactive functionality

with elementary students in grades 4 through 7 may help to prompt school districts to spend the

necessary funds to support professional development for teachers in this area. Currently within

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the Vancouver School District, there are 500 active Moodle courses, active being defined as “at

least one person logged in to that course at least once since Sept.1, 2011” (K. Amos, VSB,

personal communication, January 24, 2012). These numbers include teachers who have started

to develop a course in Moodle but who may not have had the necessary follow-up professional

development to continue.

In addition to promoting the benefits of using an Open Source LMS, I wished to use my

time and that of my students to best advantage. Being the computer prep teacher for grades 4-7,

I see these classes twice weekly to cover the 2 x 45 minutes allotted to classroom teachers for

their own weekly prep. I perceived a need for computer lab time to be integrated into core

courses instead of being something separate done during classroom teacher’s (CT’s) prep time.

Because I know it is difficult to adequately cover the curriculum without using all possible time

and resources, in September I proposed to incorporate Social Studies and/or Language Arts into

lab time and to work collaboratively with CTs (See Appendix B Start-up letter to classroom

teachers). Instead of teaching such technological skills as keyboarding, using search engines

and citing sources in isolation, these periods could be time for grades 4-7 to be taught these

skills in context: to work interactively, and to present their knowledge through NoteBook

software and other applications, as well as to learn to communicate ideas and information using

a LMS.

IV. Relevance and the Research

Using Palys and Atchison’s (2003) framework for how to place this project within the

academic literature, my overarching question has been: Where does my project fit in the

“existing domain of inquiry” around using technology with students (p. 138)? What has been

written about this topic? Who are the interested parties involved? What if any are the specific

problems associated with this topic? What educational philosophies or theories are associated

with using a Learning Management System? To answer these questions, I am looking at each of

the four key concepts of the project. These are: 21st Century skills, Active Learning principles,

literacy in relation to technology, and hybrid learning environments.

In terms of relevance for education, social constructivist theory strongly supports

interactivity amongst students (Vygotsky,1978). Interactivity, the use of solving real world

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problems and the use of Active Learning principles is also recommended (Merrill, 2002;

Marchese, 1998). Moodle is an ideal LMS for promoting interactivity amongst students and

teachers through its various features such as discussion forums, student-led glossaries, blogging,

responses, asynchronous messaging, etc. Additionally, the integration of technology into

today’s pedagogy is no longer in question: 21st Century learning supports and advocates the use

of technology in face-to-face, synchronous and asynchronous learning environments (Carmean

& Haefner 2002; Gordon & Bull 2004; Kang, Heo, Jo, Shin & Seo 2010-11; Prensky 2001;

Shaw 2010; Wagner 2008; Woodard 2005).

Using Moodle in a hybrid-teaching environment connects well with my understanding

of Critical Theory. Under this paradigm, the world is not a “fixed reality” to which all members

subscribe, but a system of values that have been socially and historically constructed (Glesne,

2011, p. 9). Many aspects of Critical Theory research are relevant to my project, particularly the

idea of providing alternative ways of looking at what might be considered the status quo:

“Critical theory research critiques historical and structural conditions of oppression and seeks

transformation of those conditions” (Glesne, 2011, p. 9). The learning environment I have

constructed using Moodle has provided the appropriate space for critical reflection on issues

that move students beyond their immediate personal development and skills to issues of social

significance. Students of the 21st Century face numerous challenges that will require creative

and collaborative educational approaches. Facilitating the development of critical thinking and

perspective-taking skills will help students to gain empathy, ideally leading them to consider

paths of constructive intervention around major issues such as racism, sexism, homophobia,

global warming and poverty. Habermas’ (1984) theory of emancipatory knowledge speaks of

critical self-reflection as being a means to transform one’s perspective and to see how one’s

personal ontology is shaped by the world in which we live. I believe that ongoing critical self-

reflection is necessary in a teacher’s practice, in order to be perpetually aware of the hegemony

of the society in which we live and to best help students learn to think critically for themselves.

V. Key Concepts and Literature Review

Many of my references inform two or more of my four key concepts: 21st Century

Skills; Active Learning Principles; hybrid learning environments; and literacy in relation to

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technology. As an example, some of my references for hybrid learning environments such as

Carmean and Haefner (2002), and Woodard (2005), have also been mentioned in the context of

Active and 21st Century learning. Additionally, Woodard (2003) has authored an article

Technology and the constructivist learning environment: Implications for teaching information

literacy skills, which will inform both literacy in relation to technology and hybrid learning

environments, my third and fourth concepts. For convenience, I have added a Table matching

my four key concepts with my reference sources (See Appendix C, Table 2).

V. i. 21st Century Skills

Much of the research I’ve gathered about ideal 21st Century learning has national

economic prosperity foremost in mind with students being groomed to be competitive in the

knowledge economy of today. The skills of the 20th Century still being taught in the majority of

classrooms are leaving many young people at risk of not being relevant in today’s market.

Critical pedagogy would point out that relevancy is a subjective term; are we assuming that

fitting into the dominant hegemony of capitalism is a prerequisite of true global citizenship? Is

serving the market a citizen’s sole purpose and what makes them relevant? Critical pedagogy

would hope to ensure that effective teaching would help students understand the context of the

world they are going into but to also move them beyond the idea that their main function is to

serve the current market economy. Innovative solutions to enduring social problems will likely

require that we step beyond this rather limiting view of our purpose so students develop the

capacity to not only understand the world in which they live but also to be able to conceptualize

the world in which they would like to live.

So what specifically are 21st Century skills? In keeping with the national economic

prosperity theme mentioned above, Partnership for 21st Century Skills has emerged as the

leading (American) advocacy organization focused on infusing 21st Century skills into

education. This is a partnership made up of 40 major businesses and educational foundations.

The skills are related to learning and innovation and can be further broken down to include

creativity and innovation, critical thinking and problem solving, communication and

collaboration. The skills are incorporated into core subjects, which are combined with the

interdisciplinary themes of: Global Awareness, Economic and Entrepreneurial Literacy, Civic

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Literacy, Health Literacy and Environmental Literacy (The Intellectual and Policy Foundations

of the 21st Century Skills Framework, 2007).

Tony Wagner (2009), a professor at Harvard and author of The Global Achievement

Gap: Why Even Our Best Schools Don’t Teach the new Survival Skills Our Children Need –

and What We Can Do About It (2008), states the following as being the essential skills students

must be taught in order to navigate their careers successfully: critical thinking and problem

solving, collaboration across networks and leading by influence, agility and adaptability,

initiative and entrepreneurialism, effective oral and written communication, accessing and

analyzing information, curiosity and imagination (School Leadership Briefing Audio Journal

and Professional Development for Administrators). Wagner speaks of the dysfunction of the

educational system in which teacher education programs and administration promote content

over competency. He also discusses how outdated teaching methods fail to engage today’s

children. The online world experienced by children is much more in tune with the realities of

the 21st Century and children are aware that school is lacking relevancy.

While children are spending more time online, they may not always be learning

technical skills and ways of communicating in a way that contributes meaningfully to ongoing

discussions in an educational setting. Neither can we assume that technical skills will be picked

up through osmosis. Basic technological skills need to be learned in order for our students to not

only access information, but to communicate in effective and varied ways. While I have been

fascinated to observe how quickly young students can pick up the basics of using a LMS, I have

also been reminded of the necessity of teaching basic keyboarding skills such as spacing, using

caps, centering and editing, not to mention basic literacy skills such as writing grammatically

correct sentences. Learning to use the features of Moodle such as file transfer, messaging,

asynchronous messaging behaviour, drop-box features, RSS feeds, blogs and discussion forums

“all build a student’s sense of place in the world of technology” (Carmean & Haefner, 2002, p.

29). Of the 90 odd students using Moodle at My school, 65 were new users at the beginning of

the school year. Bearing in mind that these students have only two periods a week in the

computer lab with me, about half of the first term, September through mid-October, was spent

in familiarizing them with the basic features of Moodle. Students who had learned to navigate

through their Moodle course(s) became tutors to those still learning. By mid-October, the 65

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new users had become competent users and could login, navigate to their course, send

messages, post, comment, tag, and add to the glossary. Many quickly figured out how to insert

links into their posts.

I have also observed that students will spend time using Moodle outside of class time,

on weekends, evenings and even over the winter break. Comments written by students in the

Online Learning Questionnaire I administered in January show enthusiastic responses about

both content learned and fun aspects like messaging (Questions and responses can be seen in

Appendix D). These learned technological skills become part of the student’s repertoire and can

be transferred to other newer technologies as they appear, demonstrating an aspect of life-long

learning. In the context in which I am using Moodle, students have both F2F instruction and

online (both asynchronous and synchronous) instruction and work time.

A study out of South Korea also reveals that country’s focus on national economy and

the development of 21st century curriculum and skills to maximize future worker relevance

(Kang, Heo, Jo, Shin & Seo, 2010). This study culminated in the identification of thirty-three

21st Century skills in the cognitive, affective and sociocultural domains, suggesting that

students be inculcated with learning activities that nurture these skills. Adding to Wagner’s

(2009) list of relevant skills are such social skills as respecting diversity, valuing social

participation and confidence in one’s ability to work well in groups. South Korea is fast

becoming known as the “most wired place on earth” as seen in the PBS Frontline video: The

Most Wired Place on Earth: Digital Nation Life on the Virtual Frontier. While South Korea is

working to modernize itself by making high-speed access readily available to its citizens, this

video also shows the dangers of children not being able to disconnect. South Korea is the first

country to identify Internet addiction as a psychiatric disorder. In an editorial in the American

Journal of Psychiatry, Block (2008) argues for Internet addiction to be included as a mental

disorder in the upcoming publication of DSM-V (American Psychiatric Association’s

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) due for publication in May 2013.

Alarming numbers of Asian youth are meeting the diagnostic criteria for Internet addiction: in

2006, it was 2.1% of the population of South Korean children aged 6-19 (210,000). The same

report states that 10 million teens in China also meet the criteria. Numbers are unavailable for

the U.S.A because most teens access the Internet from home as opposed to Internet cafes that

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monitor usage, but experts believe a similar phenomenon exists here in North America (Block,

2008).

The chart below shows how ownership of mobile media has grown with American youth

under the age of 19 using their cell phones for up to 198 minutes (3:18 daily) for texting,

listening to music, talking, watching TV, playing other media or games (Kaiser Foundation,

2010).

Screenshot 2: Mobile Media Ownership Over Time. (Kaiser Foundation, 2010)

When online time is factored in (see below), total media usage reaches close to 12 hours daily.

Screenshot 3: Media Use, by Age. (Kaiser Foundation, 2010)

One of the online questions I asked my students was about the amount of time they

spent online each day. I wondered if it would be comparable to the Kaiser Foundation statistics

above. Although I wasn’t specific about hours beyond 4, it appears that 61% of my students

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(aged 9-13) spend anywhere from 1 to 4+ hours online daily. This does not include time spent

using other media such as TV, music and video games.

Screenshot 4: Computer Use by Students (Gibbs, 2012)

Interestingly, the parents’ response to the question of how much time their children spent online

weekly stated much less time (See Appendix E for parent survey).

Screenshot 5: Parents’report of computer use by students (Gibbs, 2012)

Out of the plethora of information on developing 21st Century skills, I found a

fascinating organization called 21st Century Schools whose function is to provide professional

development to educators that is 21st century, interdisciplinary and integrated (Shaw, 2010).

What makes this organization unique is that, instead of gearing education to produce citizens

who obligingly work to maintain the current dominant economic and political systems, the same

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21st Century skills mentioned above are used to help students question the status quo. Key

questions of critical pedagogy are: “What is the purpose of schooling? Is it to ensure democracy

or to maintain the status quo and support big business? How can teachers enable students to

become critical thinkers who will promote true democracy and freedom?” (Shaw, 2010, p. 5).

Throughout my project, my definition of democracy is rooted in the idea that each and every

person has a meaningful voice in the decisions that impact their lives.

In an earlier publication of 21st Century Schools, Shaw (2008) states that we should see

the learner in a new context:

First – we must maintain student interest by helping them see how what they are learning prepares them for life in the real world. Second – we must instill curiosity, which is fundamental to lifelong learning. Third – we must be flexible in how we teach. Fourth – we must excite learners to become even more resourceful so that they will continue to learn outside the formal school day.

This context mirrors that of all the aforementioned authors but perhaps focuses more on the

teacher’s role in nurturing the successful 21st Century learner.

In using Moodle with my students, engaging them in discussion and exposure to world

events, I hope to have reflected a critical pedagogy perspective. Grade 5, 6 and 7 students have

read, discussed as a group and then responded to articles with topics as varied as education in

countries less privileged than ours, e-waste and its effect on the environment, and Day of the

Dead ceremonies in Mexico. Conversations about limited resources (“one shelf of books for a

whole school?!”), little children digging minerals out of computer parts, and why both Mexicans

and Filipinos have links to Spain, have sprung up. The world is not a “fixed reality” (Glesne,

2011, p. 9), but one that is open to question. As I learn more about different philosophies, I see

how schools, unwittingly or otherwise, participate in the perpetuation of the status quo, the

hegemony that keeps the privileged privileged and the poor always socio-economically

disadvantaged. It is refreshing to view education under a critical theory umbrella, and to believe

that teachers can be influential in helping young citizens learn democratic perspectives. Teaching

media literacy with the added component of effective technology, in this case LMS, has provided

a new impetus. Moodle has worked as a technological environment in which conversations and

differing views can be explored. My goal continues to be that of helping students learn to

analyze media critically and meaningfully, as they become life-long learners.

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V. ii. Active Learning

Following this vein of critical thinking in an environment of Active Learning, I have

looked at research by Chickering and Ehrmann, Implementing the Seven Principles (2003). The

article addresses the issue of the value of new technologies, in terms of how information

technology can advance Bonwell’s Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate

Education, (Bonwell, 1991). These principles have served as a popular framework for

evaluating teaching in traditional, F2F courses in undergraduate education. I would argue that

these same principles apply to good practice in education at the elementary and secondary

levels as well. Each of the seven principles demonstrate active learning, for example, enhancing

reciprocity and cooperation among students, facilitating time on task, promoting prompt

feedback and respecting diverse talents and ways of learning. If technology is not serving these

principles, or is possibly even detracting from them, one could question the value in its use.

Bonwell’s seven principles have been successfully demonstrated within the context of my

students using Moodle. Students have been involved in more than passive listening; they are

engaged in activities, (viewing, reading, posting, discussing). There has been more of an

emphasis on developing skills than on information transmission. The exploration of attitudes

and values is part of the posting and commenting. While students have not been exposed to a

large platform of attitudes and values, i.e., the unrestricted open-ness of the worldwide web,

they have begun the process of exploration by being open to attitudes and values within our

school community. I believe their motivation has increased through knowing that their answers

will be shared and discussed. Students also receive immediate feedback from me and from each

other. Finally, students have been required to use higher order thinking skills such as analysis,

synthesis and evaluation in order to post and to comment on their classmates’ posts.

Merrill’s “First Principles of Instruction”, (2002), talks about learning principles

common to several representative learning environments, including collaborative problem

solving, constructivist environments and learning by doing. In all of these environments, active

learning occurs when we engage in real-world problems, activate background knowledge, have

new knowledge demonstrated, have opportunities to apply the new knowledge and finally, have

this knowledge integrated in our overall schema. The training and acquisition of skills

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necessary to navigate within Moodle meets these learning criteria, as do the ensuing educational

experiences we have been able to pursue. Students in grades 4 – 7 have integrated the skills

necessary to navigate within Moodle and can now move on to other learning objectives using

these foundational skills.

Woodard (2003) has found that, with technology, students are spending more time on

projects, both in and out of school hours. I can attest to that. There have been students

consistently online in the evenings, on weekends and over the breaks we have had this school

year. I have seen messages posted at all hours with requests for URLs, clarification, and one

post from a Gr. 4 student about something he thought to be amazing: a clip of a renowned

Parkour athlete cycling his way through Scotland! A second term project involved small groups

of Gr. 6 & 7 students working together on a mutually agreed upon passion. Their task was to

teach the rest of the class about the subject using the media of their choice. Students used

Animoto, Prezi or NoteBook as the platform for their demonstrations. I was amazed to see the

initiative taken by most of the students. They assigned duties, recognized when a new direction

was needed and utilized constructive criticism. Time spent on their projects was well over the

time I could allot them in our two weekly periods of 45 minutes. Throughout the weeks given

for the projects, at least one group member had to report weekly in the Creative Projects blog on

Moodle. Their blog posts showed that work was being done over weekends and in the evenings.

Students were chatting through their Gmail and Facebook accounts. Woodard (2003) points out,

that because the students are interested in technology, it is easier for them to sustain their

interest in such a project-based pursuit and to follow alternative leads as they arise (p.184).

Below are some of my students’ posts on their projects.

Screenshot 6: Student posts & reflections on projects

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I think having the freedom to do these projects allowed the students to get a very real sense

of the amount of time involved in doing something well and in which they could take pride. As

well as the weekly posts on each group’s progress, they were also required to write up a reflection

of how they felt their group functioned (these posts can be seen in Appendix F).

Marchese (1998) in “New Conversations about Learning”, (1998) speaks of the

prominent role apprenticeship held in centuries of learning prior to the beginning of universal

schooling in the 19th century. Apprenticeship demonstrates all of Merrill’s (2002) learning

principles mentioned above, and is still the main source of preparation for adulthood in some

rural third world countries such as the Yucatan or Zimbabwe. Today’s conversations about

education highlight the necessity of creating independent learners, yet often, as Marchese

(1998) notes, schools in America are missing the big picture: “Students are trained to produce

right answers with fixed meanings; experienced workers and experts produce negotiated

meaning and socially constructed understanding.” By applying active learning principles,

teachers can facilitate students’ acquisition of a much broader basis of knowledge and skills

through collaboration, real-world problem solving and practical application. These are indeed

the principles of apprenticeship.

V. iii. Literacy in Relation to Technology

One of the goals of my project has been to see how effectively Moodle can

accommodate different learning styles at the elementary level in the quest to develop critical

awareness of media and social netiquette skills. The research I have gathered around learning

styles speaks to the concept of literacy in relation to technology.

As I began to delve into the research on learning styles and the implementation of specific

educational applications geared to address the various preferences, it became apparent that there

is no solid base of experimental research upon which to draw. One study called upon the

authors to determine whether the thriving industry of teacher guidebooks and educational

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materials geared towards specific learning styles was merited by scientific evidence. While the

existence of individual learning preferences was not disputed, the authors concluded: “at

present, there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning-styles assessments

into general educational practice.” (Pashler, McDaniel, Rohrer & Bjork, 2008). Another project

team reviewed 13 influential learning styles models and concluded that there is a “widespread

disagreement” about recommendations for teachers and, as in the study above, noted there is “a

dearth of rigorously controlled experiments...to test the claims of the main advocates.”

(Coffield, Moseley, Hall & Ecclestone, 2004, p. 140). While both reports emphatically support

the existence of learning styles, they decry the absence of experiential research and a common

language amongst researchers and promoters in the textbook and educational materials industry.

Gordon and Bull (2004) hope that by addressing the commonalities of learning styles,

educational researchers will be able to reach a consensus and begin to publish experiential

research that will stand up to scrutiny. They point out that there are three standard criticisms of

learning styles theories: first, the tendency to pigeonhole the learner, second, the suggestion that

a person’s learning style remains static over time, and third, that the learning style remains static

over different learning tasks. Interestingly for my purposes, Gordon and Bull (2004) suggest

that the use of multimedia educational materials can counter these criticisms by addressing all

of the various learning styles and more specifically, by assessing the learning style of the user

on an ongoing basis as s/he uses the particular instructional technology. For example, if at a

given time a learner best showed his or her understanding through a graphic display following

an assignment, this type of response could become optional in upcoming assignments. At a later

date, this student may choose to demonstrate their knowledge in a different format that could

easily be assimilated through multimedia educational applications.

In my experience this is what I have discovered about learning styles/differences: just as

with any student group, some students produce more than others and some are content to

produce the minimum acceptable. All of my students quickly learned to navigate through their

Moodle course(s), with some needing more support than others. Because auditory learners are

good at absorbing information from spoken words, and visual learners benefit from seeing

information, both types of learners were well served during our classes together. The F2F

portion of lessons included oral instructions and visual demonstrations. The online portion of

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lessons included written instructions, followed often by video clips. It is less clear to me how

kinesthetic learners may have fared, considering that this type of learner prefers to be active

while studying and may have difficulty focusing while sitting still. The one small group of

students who I did feel have struggled somewhat, have been the ones who are more distractible

and who tend to tune out or appear to have selective hearing. This may be the group that

Gordon and Bull (2004) refer to as the “resistant learner”, avoidant because they are unfamiliar

with ICT, or they lack confidence in using ICT or they don’t want to participate for a number of

other reasons. The first instance (being unfamiliar with ICT) has been dealt with as all students

have learned how to navigate their way through the Moodle site. The confidence in using ICT

may well be a factor with the very few students who have not fully participated in blogging and

commenting. I don’t know if I can draw a parallel between distractibility and being a kinesthetic

learner in the context of Moodle. Was the distractibility and lack of focus amongst this group

indicative of their need to learn in a kinesthetic way? Perhaps these students struggled more

with English as a second language than their classmates? Were the Ministry designations held

by some of these students reason enough to explain their less than consistent time spent on task?

Some of the aforementioned students would tend to lose track of the steps involved in task

completion. For example, I advise students to keep a minimum of two tabs open within Moodle,

that way they can go back and forth between the directions page and the page they may be

posting a response on. My easily distracted students would waste a great deal of time navigating

back and forth between Moodle pages within one tab, each time having to wait for the page to

reload. By missing or forgetting a simple but important instruction, these students made more

work for themselves over a longer period of time. If this group fits into the third instance of

Gordon and Bull’s resistant learner, those who do not wish to participate for any number of

reasons such as apathy, frustration, inability, discouragement or disobedience, then clearly more

time is needed for this small group to help build their motivation and competence participating

in and completing assignments.

Students have opportunities that didn’t exist even a decade ago in terms of access to

current news and issues. I see my role as an educator as helping them learn to question media by

being exposed to other’s viewpoints as well as that of the mainstream media, to learn to not

readily accept things at face value. As noted earlier in the first section of Active Learning, it is

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presently a limited audience to whom students’ viewpoints have been exposed, namely each

other and me. However, they have been exposed through RSS feeds to the Canadian

Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), The New Internationalist, as well as a newspaper written for

children called Teaching Kids the News. I would consider CBC to be mainstream, the children’s

paper to also reflect mainstream news perhaps with less of an editorial viewpoint, and The New

Internationalist to be controversially illuminating. The immediacy of the media students

encounter through using Moodle constitutes an authentic environment; life is all around and

how children learn to understand it will help define who they ultimately become. If long-term

competencies are the ultimate goal of our educational systems, as some researchers suggest

(Kang, Heo, Jo, Shin, & Seo, 2010), the sooner we start to help promote critical thinking skills

combined with empathy, the better.

In terms of the specific advantages of using technology in general as a cognitive tool,

Woodard (2003) sees a constructivist-learning environment as being made for it. In other words,

discovery learning in this information age requires the advantages and opportunities that

technology can afford. We are not confined to one source of information and we have the ability

to view, hear, read, create and share many different forms of media. Krug, Arntzen, and Wen

(2010) on the other hand have argued that reducing cognitive processes and technologies to a

“tool”, basically deskills teachers by restricting them to view the mind and sophisticated

technologies as a simple device and not a complex organism, which it is. (Krug & Arntzen,

2012). People who immerse themselves in using technology in their day-to-day lives understand

technology as connected with their cultural experiences.

The terms “repeatability”, “transportability” and “increased equity of access,” are

associated with the benefits of using technology in one’s instructional approach (Reeves, 1998,

p. 4). While Woodard notes critics who dispute the impact of media and technology on learning,

she looks at the impact technology has had on learning environments. Foremost is the

illimitable access to information. Additionally, thinking can be shown in various formats, and

more importantly, stored in ways other than the traditional form of print. This vastly increases

the available range of resources.

Using Moodle, students are able to complete unfinished work before the next class,

with access to computers at either home or school. Another bonus is the increased interest

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parents have been taking in their student’s projects. I have had more email from parents this

year than ever before, asking for clarification of projects in order to help their child work at

home. Parental involvement has been especially helpful for lower achieving students and those

with learning disabilities in helping to sustain their motivation and interest. More young

students are coming to class with data sticks for this very purpose (transportability). Shared

responsibility for student learning is becoming a welcome feature of 21st Century education.

V. iv. Hybrid Learning Environments

Much of what is written above in Literacy in Relation to Technology could also warrant

being included in this section on hybrid learning environments. Technology in my project has in

large part referred to the use of the LMS Moodle in an F2F classroom using both synchronous

and asynchronous environments.

In the wake of unprecedented adoption of LMS by post-secondary institutions, Carmean

and Haefner (2002), conducted research to determine what makes using an LMS effective.

While they caution about the use of an LMS without an understanding of best pedagogical

practice, they point out the myriad of benefits that can accompany its use if learning principles

remain in the forefront. Carmean and Haefner (2002) looked at the theories of researchers such

as Marchese, Chickering and Ehrmann, and Merrill amongst others, to come up with a common

and fundamental group of learning principles. They state that deeper learning happens when the

learning is “social, active, contextual, engaging and student-owned” (Carmean & Haefner 2002,

p. 29). Naturally, this research crosses over with that mentioned in earlier sections of this paper,

as the hybrid learning environment is common to my other key concepts (21st C skills, Active

Learning, and literacy in relation to technology). The social side of deeper learning is easily

seen with the use of Moodle. While students have been busy posting about an article they’d read

or in response to a video clip we’d watched, many have also enjoyed the fact that they could

message their friends throughout the lab or in other classes altogether. In some activities I have

required students to share their learning. For example, as a pre-reading activity one day,

students were asked to define 15 words and use them in a sentence to add to the course glossary.

They were asked to share the workload with two or three of their classmates by messaging. This

is an example of both cooperation and reciprocity amongst students, a social principle of Active

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Learning and a 21st Century skill, outlined by Carmean & Haefner, (2002). My students were

both surprised and pleased to be given the go-ahead to share the work. In fact, I’d have to say

that Moodle’s most popular feature is the messaging, at least with my students! Below is a

screenshot of one of the 14 questions administered in one of two online questionnaires I made

for students and parents.

Screenshot 7: Online Questionnaire for Students Nov.2011 to Jan. 2012

I haven’t used the chat feature as yet; my Moodle mentors warned me that this requires a lot of

extra teacher time and vigilance in terms of making sure all participants are staying on task as

well as using appropriate language.

Examples of active, contextual, engaging and student-owned learning abound. Our

Moodle courses have engaged students in real-world problems (active learning) (Carmean &

Haefner, 2002). We have learned about e-waste and the path that discarded electronics take.

Embedded video clips within the courses allow students to watch a clip as many times as

necessary before posting a reasoned response (repeatability). The Gr. 4/5 students with whom I

concentrated mainly on Social Studies, appreciated being able to repeatedly view the short

video of how First Nations used every part of the buffalo while they worked to create a labeled

diagram in the accompanying NoteBook project. Practice and reinforcement equal active

learning.

Students who have mastered a new skill such as hyperlinking or inserting an image, are

frequently sought out by other students who want to learn, an instance in which all five of the

deeper learning principles are present. However as Carmean & Haefner (2002, p. 29) point out:

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“Although deeper learning occurs with these five principles [social, active, contextual,

engaging, student-owned] they need not be present either all the time or all at once.” I

frequently find myself calling upon students to help other students; this is an example of

students perceiving knowledge as something constructed, rather than being straight out of a

book or from the teacher (Woodard, 2003). Because I have created my Moodle courses, I can

easily build on previous material as a way of scaffolding children’s learning. In this way their

learning is always contextual and built on a foundation of background knowledge. I can also be

very flexible in the make-up of assignments, as Moodle course creation is ongoing and easily

changeable.

VI. Ethical and Practical Concerns and Implications Enrollment in Moodle, as well as in various other online applications, necessitates the

input of individual email addresses for registration. My ethical issue is this: considering the lack

of district and Ministry of Education policy, how can a teacher ethically address British

Columbia’s provincial legislation (FIPPA) around using non Canadian-based sites, particularly

with children under the age of 13?

When I first began using Moodle in April of 2011 with 27 students, I devised a form

letter requesting parental permission to either use an existing email account, or to be granted

permission to create one for the student with the assurance that the parent would be supplied

with the login and password information. Most parents opted for me to make the account whilst

others supplied their own or one their child already had. There was, of course, the option of

“opting out”, thereby preventing their child from doing the same activities as their classmates.

No one opted out. This solved my immediate problem of enrolling students in Moodle. As my

experience with Moodle grew however, so did my interest in incorporating other applications

students could access for learning opportunities and to demonstrate their learning. I soon

discovered that having one’s own email address was crucial in order to access many application

programs. For example, I wanted my students to be able to access and use such applications as

Prezi, Animoto, Khan Academy, Google Docs, various avatar making and comic-creating sites,

to name a few. The students for whom I had made accounts were able to sign up, as were the

students who had used their own previously held accounts to sign up with Moodle. But the

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students whose parents had offered their own email user ids to create the Moodle account were

hooped. Their parents would hardly want to share their passwords with their children. Now I

had to create an updated and more specific form letter, this one asking for parents’ permission

for their child to have their own email account. I chose Gmail for two reasons: I thought it

would be easier to use Google docs if the students had Google accounts; and Khan Academy

only accepts new users who have either a Gmail or Facebook account. [See KhanAcademy

screenshot below.]

Screenshot 8: KhanAcademy

Pursuing the Facebook angle seemed more contentious since there have been various

edicts from district management about the use of Facebook at school. Although I know most of

my students have Facebook accounts, I decided to avoid that issue and to concentrate instead on

Google (Gmail) accounts.

Ethics are murky when it comes to using foreign-based servers, particularly when it is

with children under the age of 13, because of several pieces of legislation. These are B.C.’s

1996 Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA), the U.S. Children's

Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA), and the U.S. Patriot Act of 2001.

COPPA is behind Google and Facebook’s decision to deny accounts to children under

the age of 13, not because it requires an age limit on such accounts but because this is the way

these companies have chosen to comply with COPPA. While COPPA does not actually say that

children under the age of 13 should not have online accounts, it does say that their parents must

give permission because commercial web sites may collect data. An email account is considered

personal information by B.C.’s FIPPA. As Google and Facebook are all about collecting user

data, it is easier for these companies to deny accounts to under 13s, or to suggest that parents

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create the account, than to change their modus operandi.

Screenshot 9: KhanAcademy

So children either make their accounts giving a false birth date without their parents’

knowledge, or the parents themselves create the account giving a false birth date in order to

acquire an online account for their child with these U.S.-based servers. This is a massive ethical

conundrum affecting not only parents and their children, but also educational facilities that use

technology in their delivery of education. Learning Management Systems require email

accounts for students to be registered. While the use of the LMS Moodle itself does not

contravene FIPPA (as it is based on a local server), the email accounts necessary for students

are most likely based on U.S. servers. Home schooled children cannot access vital educational

sites without first acquiring an email account. Additionally, most online applications, for

example Prezi and Animoto, require logging in with an email account. The bottom line is that

most email servers are U.S.-based.

In British Columbia, Section 30 of FIPPA requires that personal information of residents

must be protected against such risks as “unauthorized access, collection, use, disclosure or

disposal” (FIPPA, 1996). Essentially this means that public institutions are responsible for the

protection of personal information of any member and are required to ensure reasonable

security. The U.S. Patriot Act (2001), however, gives U.S. law enforcement agencies greater

powers to intercept communication and to do roving surveillance on any individual using a

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server based in the U.S. In fact, as stated in the recent Privacy and Cloud-Based Educational

Technology conference in Vancouver, “the Patriot Act allows the U.S. government to access the

social media content and the personally identifying information without the end users’

knowledge or consent.” (April 2011). How then do teachers in B.C. enable access to Web 2.0

applications and email servers, while respecting and ensuring that FIPPA legislation is being

observed?

I considered the possibility of using Google Apps for Education as an ethical solution

whereby the Google site would be hosted on a local district server, but the fact remains that

Google is U.S.-based and that no clear legal precedence yet exists for using such, given our

FIPPA legislation. Wikipedia on Google Apps states: “Data security issues and national

interests mean that online application platforms can be unsuitable for use by governments or

commercial organizations, especially so for non-US organizations sharing, editing and storing

sensitive or confidential data.” Without clear guidance from B.C.’s Ministry of Education, I do

not feel comfortable using this application platform.

VI. i. Ethical Strategy

While my current school does not yet have a technology plan in place, we do have an

Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) posted on our school website as of September 2010. To create

or acquire student email addresses, I created a parental consent form authorized by my

Administrative Officer and sent home with all students I would be teaching in the computer lab

(see Appendix G). Later I realized the form would need to be updated in order to include the

fact that students may be using their email to access other applications (see Appendix H). Later

still I saw the need to acknowledge and inform parents of legislation (see Appendix I). At this

point, any literature I have accessed in my search for guidance or legal precedence regarding

FIPPA and the use of U.S. servers has been focused on post-secondary institutions. There is a

dearth of policy although the BC Campus whitepaper (2011) hopes to maintain an ongoing

conversation that will ideally inform future actions by legislators.

As yet there is not a standard consent form to be used by teachers in this district for

making parents and students aware of the risks inherent in using social media. The Privacy

Guide for Faculty Using 3rd Party Web Technology (Social Media) in Public Post-Secondary

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Courses, (February 2011), states: “Although the caution required when using social media may

at times seem burdensome to instructors, it is nonetheless necessary to ensure compliance with

FIPPA’s privacy principles and to safeguard students.” I understand that it is my duty to comply

with legislation to the best of my ability. To that end I have updated the first two versions of my

parental consent form into a more comprehensive form in the hope of addressing the following:

• informing  parents  of  the  issue(s)    

• protecting  the  teacher/school/district  through  this  information  

• allowing  the  creation  and  use  of  email  addresses  for  the  purposes  of  enrolling  

students  under  the  age  of  13  in  Moodle  courses  and  in  other  such  useful  sites  as  

Khan  Academy,  Prezi,  etc.    

I have copies of all returned parental authorizations for the original email consent

letter(s) sent out between September and February (See Appendices G and H). As yet, the most

recent revision has not been authorized and sent home (Appendix I).

This ethical strategy is more to do with teachers and parents than students because the

quandary educators and parents find themselves in, with regards to using web-based applications

on foreign servers, is a legal matter. Additionally, I don’t think children should be asked to, or

allowed to, create online accounts for themselves using a false birth date. While it is still ethically

problematic for parents and teachers to create these accounts for children using falsified birth

dates, with proper awareness about the whys and wherefores, the responsibility can be shared

between parents and school districts as we await updated legislation.

At my current school there has not yet been much conversation between parents and

teachers about Internet issues, although one parent has raised concerns about her 11year old son

having a Gmail account. Google had closed his account either due to inactivity or due to the

fact that his mother had stated his age as 11 when she created the account. I explained the

COPPA legislation as best I could, and its interpretation by Google and Facebook. It was partly

due to her questions that I revised the parental consent form around the issue of creating email

accounts for students to access online applications hosted on foreign servers. As I learned

more about legislation and especially after reading the BC Campus Whitepaper (2011), I saw

that I really had no alternative. At this point, the revised parental consent form (Appendix I)

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will be sent out at the beginning of the next school year, pending administrative approval.

VII. Analysis and Interpretation

In this section I attempt to address some of the questions raised throughout the project.

Have I integrated the use of technology with the intermediate Social Studies and

Language Arts curriculum? With the grade 4/5 class, I have used Moodle as the vehicle upon

which projects have been started and tracked. Students in this class have viewed and posted

critical reflections on various videos about First Nations, blogged about their personal progress

on projects and commented on each other’s posts as they have studied characteristics of

Aboriginal cultures. Students have presented their work through posting reflections on Moodle,

and through illustrations and text using Notebook pages on Smart Board. Two split grade

divisions, 5/6 and 6/7, have looked at global and topical issues in three other of my Moodle

courses, one course made specifically for their division and one called Intermediate Reading

Blog. We have worked on various skills and processes associated with B.C.’s Social Studies and

Language Arts curriculum such as presentation skills, showing sources, making and using

timelines, as well as developing basic language skills such as sentence structure and adding

detail to paragraphs. These skills and processes were tied into the reading, viewing and

responding to topical and global issues.

Has the blogging of perspectives and commenting on peers made students’

understanding more concrete while exposing them to differing opinions and knowledge? This is

a difficult question to answer satisfactorily. I suspect that learning has been more concrete

because I have seen the enthusiasm with which they respond to each other’s posts and with

which they read the comments their classmates have made. Generating enthusiastic discussion

on topical and global issues surely makes the understanding more concrete than otherwise. At

this point however, the only differing opinions and knowledge the students have been exposed

to have been my comments on their posts. Eventually I would like to widen the circle of

enrolled users to include more knowledgeable others who could help to broaden the

perspectives of these young learners while maintaining the safety of interactivity within an

intranet setting. Expanding the circle of Moodle users within and between school districts

would be a great step in this direction. Below are some posts showing students’ understanding

of various current (global) articles as well as some comments on posts.

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Screenshot 10: Student Posts & Comments

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The following are posts from the G. 4/5 Social Studies class:

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I notice that the blog posts made after watching video clips are more authentic than posts about

an article. I think this is because the student has no choice but to search for and use their own

words and in doing so they are forced to think deeply about what they had viewed. In many

instances of posting on articles, I found that students were far too prone to cut and paste.

By the very act of blogging about a topic, new information becomes more concrete. In

one article I read, the author talks about the skill of reflection being one of the casualties of the

Information Age (Prensky, 2001). Children or “digital natives” become immersed in a world of

multi-tasking and immediate gratification and may become “bored” with traditional educational

approaches (Prensky, 2001). Yet it is reflection that helps us get at the germ of the knowledge

and apply it in new situations. When asked to reflect upon what she appreciated about Moodle,

this student summed it up with the words Seeing how people take things in their mind…:

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Screenshot 11: Student Post

Using technology to bring about reflection is surely a plus.

Is using Moodle with elementary aged students practical? What are the educational

benefits? I believe it is practical and educationally beneficial for several reasons. Children are

learning through doing. Not only are they are learning valuable technological skills that will

benefit them throughout their lives, these skills are not being taught in isolation, but learned in

the service of content. Moodle is Open source, (free), and easily accessible to students, both at

school and at home. Parents have become involved and curious as their children have been

accessing Moodle at home and asking for usb flash drives to move their ongoing work (e.g.,

Notebook pages, Word) between home and school (transportability). Students that need more

time or who simply work at a slower pace than others, have the freedom of working from home

and the benefit of having support from a parent or older sibling. See posted comment below.

Screenshot 12: Student Post

From a teacher’s perspective, I can prep lessons and create entire courses from home,

and know that students’ course work does not have to be interrupted if I have a sick day.

Students who travel with their families during a school term can access their work from any

global location that has Internet access. Additionally, the ethical issue of storing children’s

content on a foreign server is avoided as Moodle is hosted on our District’s server (See Section

VI).

As will often happen in teaching, a lesson will uncover other avenues to be explored.

Using Moodle to teach tech skills such as posting enabled me to see the need for direct

instruction in other areas. It has served as a brilliant vehicle for highlighting attention on what

students need to learn. For example, posting on articles showed me that my students hadn’t

learned how to paraphrase or summarize, let alone write complete sentences. Mini-lessons

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sprung up as the need arose to teach and reinforce these necessary skills. I was also shocked to

see how many students thought there was nothing wrong in cutting and pasting. Even though

we may think our students have internalized a concept such as copyright, seeing blatant

examples of un-cited copying and pasting quickly proves otherwise. A recent series of lessons

involved pairing students into teacher/student couplings. Each was to find an article, highlight a

chunk of it and send it to their student. The student’s job was to paraphrase the chunk and send

it back to the teacher to be checked for plagiarism and marked. This seemingly dull exercise

somehow kept all four classes engrossed for 4 or 5 consecutive lessons. Higher order thinking

skills such as analysis and evaluation were evident when evaluating their classmates’

paraphrasing posts.

An article written by Dougiamas and Taylor (2003) summarizes a PhD research project

that was involved in the early stages of Moodle’s creation. I was gratified to read that we had

had many of the same insights. For instance, I have appreciated how creative and flexible lesson

planning can be in Moodle; as I discover new applications or a way for something to be made

clearer, I can easily incorporate changes into the course make up. Dougiamas found the same to

be true: “I continually evaluate the learning environment and make changes as necessary,

evolving in a way that brings the user along on an adventure” (p. 7). I have also discovered that

I need to spend more time modeling rich discussion so that students’ comments begin to have

depth. Next year I would like to explore the discussion forums of Moodle in the hopes that

richer and more reflective conversations will ensue.

I will discuss the limitations of my project here before concluding. Beginning in

September and well into the first term of school, Internet connectivity was an issue. Oftentimes

in the middle of a Moodle lesson the entire lab of 30 computers would either lose connectivity,

or would be far too slow to sustain student interest and productivity. Eventually, the school

board technicians switched us to a new server that promised greater bandwidth and an end to

connectivity issues. The second greatest problem I had was around the lack of policy to guide in

privacy issues, specifically in procuring email addresses for 75+ students as well as legal

permission for student access to sites based on foreign servers. This ethical issue was discussed

earlier in Section VI (the age 13 limit, FIPPA, U.S. Patriot Act). Because of this lack of policy

and direction, I spent countless hours of not only sending out continually revised parent consent

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forms, but of creating dozens of user ids and passwords, storing this information and repeating

the process with every new incoming intermediate student. My valuable time could have been

better spent on other aspects of this project. To further complicate the administrative side of

things, our school board grants only limited technical access to teachers. Regardless of the fact

that I am the Technology teacher at my school, I am required to submit email requests to the

Technology Help Desk to ask for technological updates. A deep freeze is on all computers,

which means that any applications or software downloaded will only remain accessible for as

long as that user is logged in. Waiting for a technician to come to the school in response to a

request can often take weeks. A simple need such as updated browsers thus becomes an

administrative nightmare.

In addition to the technical limitations, there has been very little (if any) collaborative

time with classroom teachers. I think the year’s experience would have been that much richer

had there been opportunities to plan together. I hope to have collaborative time included in our

next year’s school growth plan as a strategy. I would also edit many of the questions I included

in the Online Learning Questionnaire; some were redundant or irrelevant in terms of my project,

and the format for some of the questions didn’t allow adequate space for answering.

Additionally, only 35 of 93 students, and 5 parents participated in the online questionnaire

making the results perhaps less representative than they would have been with full participation.

I had to change one aspect of my project. I had wanted to include another class first

from Bangkok, and then from Nunavut but neither option panned out. My plan was to invite

another teacher’s participation and enroll his or her students in my Intermediate Reading Blog

Moodle course. In this course, students blog about a current novel and about topical issues in

the Teaching Kids the News online paper. They are also required to read classmates posts and

make comments on them. I thought this would be a wonderful way to broaden the pool of

alternate perspectives and social interactivity. I will pursue this in the future.

Recently I discovered the new Ministry of Education Quick Scales for Gr. 5-10

Information Technology (Feb. 2012). While it wasn’t published in time to be of use for this

project, I will definitely make use of it next year. The categories for evaluation are broken down

into Collecting, Organizing, Interpreting and Analyzing, and Presenting. I had created an

assessment rubric for the Gr. 6/7 Creative Projects and it would have been helpful to have a

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document such as this to use as reference for province-wide grade level IT expectations.

VIII. Conclusion

To recap, my project has involved using the Learning Management System Moodle with

elementary aged students to increase their interactive technological and social skills as they

deepen their awareness of important curricular, topical, global and social issues. We have been

engaged in active learning of 21st Century skills in a hybrid learning environment. The goal has

been to see how effectively Moodle can accommodate different learning strengths at the

elementary level in the quest to develop critical awareness of media and social netiquette skills.

I have observed that Moodle is easy to use; students as young as 9 years old and with

varying learning needs were quickly able to navigate their way around. The collaborative nature

of Moodle has allowed the students to participate in socially constructed knowledge. While

using technology has increased student motivation, interaction and desire to learn, it is only

effective if it is based on sound educational principles. For me this entailed using a

constructivist approach wherein children learn through interaction between themselves and their

environment. Each ensuing activity builds upon the last in an ever-increasing foundation and

application of knowledge. At this age level (9-13), I believe Moodle, indeed any technology, is

most effective in a hybrid environment such as the one my project used. While children may

take to the technology quickly and intuitively, they require instruction, guidance and practice

around how to use technology effectively in the pursuit and presentation of knowledge. I have

also worked to guide and promote student-led technology development workshops in which

students showcase their skills to younger or more novice students. Teachers too, require

sustained collaborative learning time. I facilitated two professional development sessions for

teachers this year around using Moodle, one at my school and another at Renfrew Elementary,

also in Vancouver. I have been asked to put together some sessions for the 2012-2013 school

year, as well as to continue in the informal monthly Moodle sessions with Vancouver teachers.

In acknowledgment of the information asked of me by parents in the questionnaire (see

Appendix E), I initiated a monthly news update about technology in our school newsletter and

created a website which invites comments, gives reminders and showcases student assignments

and achievements. To help parents understand and observe their children’s online work, I

created a screencast video showing the basic steps for logging in to my Moodle site (see

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Appendix K). I hope to have the last revision of the parental awareness and consent letter

authorized and sent home in September of 2012.

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References

Arntzen, J. Krug, D. & Wen, Z. (2008). ICT literacies and the curricular conundrum of calling all complex digital technologies ‘Tools’. International Journal of Education and Development using Information and Communication Technology. 4(4). Retrieved from http://ijedict.dec.uwi.edu/viewarticle.php?id=571&layout=html).

BC Campus (2011 April 13). Privacy and cloud-based educational technology conference final report. Retrieved from http://www.bccampus.ca/assets/Content

/Reports/Privacy-Conference-Report-April11-fomatted.pdf Block, Jerald. (March 2008). Issues for DSM-V: Internet addiction. American Journal of Psychiatry, 165(3), 306-307 Bonwell, C. (1991) Active learning: Creating excitement in the classroom. Retrieved July 7, 2010 http://www.ydae.purdue.edu/lct/hbcu/documents/Active_Learning_

Creating_Excitement_in_the_Classroom.pdf British Columbia Ministry of Education. (2006). Social studies grade 4 integrated

resource package (GBG 031). Retrieved from http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/irp /pdfs/social_studies/2006ssk7_4.pdf

Carmean, C. and Haefner, J. (2002). Mind over matter transforming course management systems into effective learning environments (pp.27-34). Retrieved July 11, 2011 from http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERM0261.pdf Chickering, A. and Ehrmann, S. (Oct. 2003) Implementing the seven principles:

Technology as lever. Teaching, Learning, and Technology. Retrieved July 2011 from http://www.tltgroup.org/programs/seven.html

Coffield, F., Moseley, D., Hall, E. and Ecclestone, K. (2004) Learning styles and pedagogy in post-16 learning: A systematic and critical review. London: Learning and Skills Research Centre. http://www.lsneducation.org.uk/research/reports/

COPPA - Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. How to comply with Children's Online Privacy Protection Act. Retrieved from http://www.coppa.org/comply.htm

Dougiamas, M. & Taylor, P. (2003). Moodle: Using learning communities to create an open source course management system. Retrieved from http://dlc- ubc.ca/wordpress/fergusonmelanie/files/2011/08/moodle-using-learning-communities- to-create-an-open-source-course-management-system.pdf

Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, R.S., C-165 (1996). Retrieved from http://www.oipc.bc.ca/legislation/FIPPA/Freedom of_Information_ and_Protection_of_Privacy_Act(April 2010).htm

Gibbs, E. (2011). Participatory culture (Unpublished graduate keyword). University of British

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Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.

Glesne, C. (2011). Chapter 1: Meeting Qualitative Inquiry. Becoming Qualitative researchers: An Introduction. (4th edition) (pp.1-26). Boston: Pearson.

Google Apps. (n.d.) Retrieved April 2, 2012 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Apps

Gordon, D., Bull, G. (2004). The nexus explored: A generalized model of learning styles. In Proceedings of Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference 2004 (pp. 917-925).

Grant, J., Tilly, J. & Tilly, K. Teaching kids the news. Retrieved April 14, 2012, from http://teachingkidsnews.com/about/

Habermas, J. (1984). The theory of communicative action, Vol. 1: Reason and rationalization of society. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Partnership for 21st Century skills. (2007). The Intellectual and Policy Foundations of the21st Century Skills Framework (March 2007), Retrieved November 2010 from http://www.p21.org/route21/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=48&Ite mid=44

Kaiser Family Foundation Study. (January 20, 2010). Graph illustrations from Generation M2 Media in the Lives of 8- to 18- Year-Olds]. Retrieved from http://www.kff.org/entmedia/upload/8010.pdf

Krug, D. & Arntzen, J. (2011). Enactive Pedagogies and Teacher Education: Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Ecologies of Learning, Research on Technology and Preservice Teacher Education, Technology as an Agent of Change in Teaching and Learning. AERA, New Orleans.

Marchese, T. (January 1998). The new conversations about learning insights from neuroscience and anthropology, cognitive science and workplace studies. New Horizons for Learning Quarterly Journal. Retrieved July 2011 http://home.avvanta.com/~building/lifelong/higher_ed/marchese.htm

Merrill, D. (2002). First Principles of Instruction, Educational Technology Research & Development, 50(3), 43-59. Retrieved July 2011 from http://mdavidmerrill.com/Papers/firstprinciplesbymerrill.pdf

Myunghee Kang, Heeok Heo, Il-Hyun Jo, Jongho Shin, & Jeonghee Seo (2010). Developing an educational performance indicator for new millennium learners. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 43(2), 157-170.

Palys, T. & Atchison, C. (2003) Ch. 5: Constructing a Research proposal. In Research decisions: Quantitative and qualitative perspectives (4th ed). pp.136-152). Scarborough, ON: Nelson.

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Pashler, H., McDaniel, Mark., Rohrer, D., & Bjork, R. (December 2008). Learning styles concepts and evidence [Abstract]. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 9(3), 105-119.

Participatory Culture. In Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved October 26, 2011from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Participatory_culture&oldid= 457518909

PBS Frontline. The most wired place on Earth. Digital Nation Life on the Virtual Frontier. Retrieved July 2011 from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/digitalnation/living-faster/where-are-we- headed/the-most-wired-place-on-earth.html?play#ixzz1RT86FlXr

Portal, P. (2011, February). Privacy guide for faculty using 3rd party web technology (social media) in public post-secondary courses. Retrieved from BC Campus website: http://solr.bccampus.ca:8001/bcc/items/d7cb3b64-ec73-7cd1-3be7-aa8a6b289ca1/2/

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants, Part II: Do they really think differently? (pp. 1-8). Retrieved July 11, 2011 from http://www.marcprensky.com/ writing/prensky- digital natives, digital immigrants-part2.pdf

Reeves, T. (1998). The impact of media and technology in schools. Retrieved April 14, 2012 from http://it.coe.uga.edu/~treeves/edit6900/BertelsmannReeves98.pdf

Shaw, A. (2008, August). 21st century schools. What is 21st century education? Retrieved April 8, 2012 from http://www.21stcenturyschools.com/What_is_21st_Century_Education.htm

Shaw, A. (2010). 21st century schools. What is critical pedagogy? Retrieved July 11, 2011, from http://www.21stcenturyschools.com/What_is_Critical_Pedagogy.htm

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Wagner, T. (May 2009). 21st century skills and the global achievement gap. School Leadership Briefing Audio Journal and Professional Development for Administrators. Retrieved July 11, 2011 from http://www.schoolbriefing.com/975/21st-century-skills-and-the-global-achievement-gap/

Woodard, B. (2003). Technology and the constructivist learning environment:Implications for teaching information literacy skills. Research Strategies 19, 181-192. Retrieved July 11, 2011 from https://www.sciencedirect.com

81 Solutions. (n.d.). Server Location Lookup. Retrieved from http://www.81solutions.com/server-loc

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Appendix A

Table 1: B.C. Social Studies IRP 2006

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Appendix B  Start up letter to classroom teachers.    erin gibbs            E-­‐Mail:  egibbs@vsb.bc.ca    

Date:  September  6,  2011  

Intermediate  Teachers  Brock  Elementary    4860  Main  Street  Vancouver,  V5K-­‐3R8    

Dear Here we are – back at it! I’m sending this letter to you because I will be working with your students for 2 periods a week all school year during your prep, which I will cover in the computer lab. My hope is that, with a little bit of collaboration, these prep periods will complement your classroom programs by integrating the technological objectives. Ideally, prep time will be something both useful for classroom teachers and meaningful for students. Specifically, I would like to develop students’ technological and socially interactive skills in their shared discovery of this year’s Social Studies and/or Language Arts curriculum; their lab work becoming part of their Social Studies and/or Language Arts grade each term. This year completes my M.Ed. degree in Information Technology. My Master’s proposal involves students learning how to use the online course management system Moodle to develop technological skills, boost interactivity, increase self-efficacy and promote a myriad of “21st Century skills”. Just in case you really want to know what I’m working on, (ha! ha!), I’ve attached my M.Ed. proposal (please don’t feel you have to read it); page 4 outlines my project proposal, pp. 7-10 name the 21st C skills. Bottom line – I’m really looking forward to working with you this year!

Sincerely,

Erin  Gibbs  Computer  Prep/Resource    

 

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Appendix C

Table 2: Key Concepts with References 21st Century Skills Block, J. (2008); Carmean, C. and Haefner, J.

(2002); Glesne, C. (2011); The Intellectual and Policy Foundations of the 21st Century Skills Framework (2007); Kaiser Family Foundation (2010); Kang, Heo, Jo, Shin & Seo (2010); Shaw, A. (2010); Wagner, T. (2009); Woodard, B. (2005);

Active Learning Principles Bonwell, C. (1991); Carmean, C. and Haefner, J. (2002); Chickering, A. and Ehrmann, S. (2003); The Intellectual and Policy Foundations of the 21st Century Skills Framework (2007); Marchese, T. (1998); Merrill, D. (2002); Shaw, A. (2010); Wagner, T. (2009); Woodard, B. (2003)

Literacy in relation to Technology Carmean, C. and Haefner, J. (2002); Chickering, A. and Ehrmann, S. (2003); Coffield, F., Moseley, D., Hall, E. and Ecclestone, K. (2004); Glesne, C. (2011); Gordon, D. and Bull, G. (2004); Kang, Heo, Jo, Shin and Seo (2010-11); Pashler, H., McDaniel, M., Rohrer, D., and Bjork, R. (2008); Prensky (2001); Reeves, T. (1998); Shaw, A. (2010); Wagner (2008); Woodard, B. (2003)

Hybrid learning environments Carmean, C. and Haefner, J. (2002); Chickering, A. and Ehrmann, S. (2003); Dougiamas, M. & Taylor, P. (2003); Marchese, T. (1998); Merrill, D. (2002); Prensky (2001); Reeves, T. (1998); Wagner, T. (2009); Woodard, B (2003);

           

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Appendix D Moodle  Questionnaire  for  Students      

   

   

   

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Appendix E Moodle  Questionnaire  for  Parents    

 

 

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Appendix F

 

 

 

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Appendix  G  

Dear Parents/Guardians, We would like each student in Divisions 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 to register for a g-mail account. This e-mail will allow the student to participate in our class blog and will allow the teacher to respond to assignment by e-mail, too.

*We expect that the parent(s) have their child’s password to the account so that all communication can be reviewed.

If your child already has an e-mail account, we would still like to set up a g-mail account with a way to identify the child that will be recognizable to us. We will try to use the first initial of the last name followed by the entire first name. For example, my g-mail would become: gerin@gmail.com (‘g’ for gibbs, followed by my first name). If that’s not available, we will look at the next easiest address options available. We need your permission to set up this account, so please sign the form below if you’re willing. Please remember, students with no Internet access at home, can complete homework in the library before school or at lunchtime, if supervision has been arranged.

Thank you, Teachers: Ms. Gibbs Ms. ……Ms. ……. Mr. ….

Principal: Mr. ……..

Please register my child, ________________________, for a g-mail account.

Parent/Guardian Signature___________________________ Date________________

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

   

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Appendix  H  2011-2012 School Year

Dear Parents/Guardians,

We would like each student in Divisions 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 to register for a g-mail account. This e-mail will allow the student to participate in our online Moodle programs and participate in other online programs such as the Khan Academy. It will also allow the teacher to respond to assignment by e-mail.

*We expect that the parent(s) have their child’s password to the account so that all communication can be reviewed.

If your child already has an e-mail account, please help them remember their password. Hint: A good question for email account password re-settings is “What is my student number?” as all Brock students use theirs regularly for logging in and for library withdrawals. We need your permission to set up this account, so please sign the form below if you’re willing. Please remember, students with no Internet access at home, can complete Internet homework in the library before school or at lunchtime if supervision has been arranged.

Thank you, Teachers: Ms. Gibbs Ms. … Ms. … Mr. …

Principal: M………..

Please register my child, ________________________, for a g-mail account.

Parent/Guardian Signature___________________________ Date________________

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Child’s Name: ____________________________________________

G-Mail address: ____________________________________________

G-Mail password: ____________________________________________ (Teacher will fill this in and send home a copy after registration is complete)

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Appendix I Date: Dear Parents/Guardians,

Teachers at Brock are seeking innovative ways to incorporate technology into the B.C. curriculum. We would like our students to register for an email account. If your child already has an e-mail account that you have created, please provide us with the email address. This will be used to register the student in our lab’s unique online learning system (Moodle), and will allow the teacher to respond to assignments by e-mail as needed. *We expect that parent(s) have their child’s password to the email account so that all communication can be reviewed. Additionally, students may have opportunities to access websites such as KhanAcademy, Prezi or Google docs via their email addresses. These websites are hosted on servers in foreign countries, such as the U.S.A. that are not subject to B.C.’s Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. Although we strive to minimize exposure of personal information, U.S. law allows information on U.S. servers to be viewed without user consent. Please see your student’s teacher if you have any concerns. Thank you, Teachers: Ms …… Ms….. Mr. ……Mr. ……

Principal: M…………. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ PLEASE COMPLETE, SIGN AND RETURN BY _____________________________. THANK YOU!

Choose: □ Please register my child ________________________ for an email account. (Name of student) □ Please use my child’s ____________________current email address______________

(Student name) (Current email address)

Parent/Guardian Signature________________________________ Date________________

*If you have opted for us to create an email account for your student, you will receive a copy of this with the account and password noted once it has been created.

 

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Appendix J

Table 3: Timeline of the duration of this Master of Education    

 

 

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Appendix K Table 4. Website MsGibbs@Brock