September: sliding towards the mushy middle
I’m excited the FCP has at last begun. I’ve had a number of scholarship ideas bouncing around in my head over the last couple of years and will be seizing the opportunity this program presents. More about that shortly.
I was impressed with many of my colleagues during session one. Lots of sharp, eloquent, passionate people. Early career folks; others looking to leave something of a legacy as they move towards the end of their careet at UBC. There were a lot of folks I wanted to chat with more individually. Plenty of time for that I hope; ’tis early days.
In terms of my SoTL project, I’ve let go of the idea of doing an autoethnography of my ukulele lessons, which just started last week. Instead my project will (ostensibly) fill a gap in the literature that I’ve been whinging about for years: just how effective is online learning? More specifically I want to give former students in my “applications course” a chance to reflect on their course experience and its impact on their educational and professional lives subsequently (also known as “transfer of learning”). I’m confident the pedagogical approaches and tools we use in the course are effective somewhere. But to what extent and in what ways are they effective in this course–or not?
This would be an online survey and perhaps some follow-up interviews. In terms of methodology I’m rather confident of my skills to complete this project: I’ve conducted mixed methods (survey and interview) studies previously, and can rightly call myself an ethnographer (sociological rather than anthropological). I’m also well versed in adult learning theory and have a solid knowledge of more general learning theories. I have read Piaget (awesome) and Vygotsky (great conclusions; huge gap between findings and data described). And Houle and Freire and Knowles. And Pratt. 🙂
I hope to get the proposal in good shape by the end of October, get things moving with BREB in November and start recruiting for the study in January. And I’m really looking forward to getting to know others’ research ideas too!
References
Houle, C. O. (1996). The Design of Education (second edition). San Francisco: Jossey Bass Inc.
Freire, P. (1973). Education for critical consciousness. (1st American ed.). New York: Seabury Press.
Freire, P. (1997). Pedagogy of the heart. New York: Continuum Press.
Knowles, M.S. (1980). The modern practice of adult education. New York: Cambridge, The Adult Education Company.
Piaget, J. (2011). The Language and Thought of the Child. Seattle: Goldberg Digital Press (Amazon).
Vygotsky, L. (1986). Thought and Language. Boston: MIT Press.