Introducing this exercise
Towards the end of 2010, I volunteered to join a working group at Edinburgh University that has the task of exploring the distance learner experience at this institution. The simplest way of describing the focus of the group is to say that there's a desire to get an appreciation of what it means to be an online distant learner and how well the university meets our needs. There's also an acknowledgement that what already works for us (or might do so in the future) could be of benefit to the wider student population.
Clearly, this task cannot be achieved without hearing the experiences and ideas of current online distant learners. With the encouragement of Hamish McLeod, I therefore suggested to the working group that approaching my fellow students on the MSc in E-Learning might be a good way of capturing the experiences and expectations of online distance learners.
To this end, I created a discussion board to capture a sense of what it means to be a distance learning student (rather than what it means to be an MSc E-Learning student specifically). Discussion took place under 9 themes, categorised under pre- and post-entry. At the beginning of March 2011 I offered an overview the group's thoughts to staff involved in distance education at Edinburgh University. My input was part of a wider seminar that also considered distance education from the perspectives of teaching and support staff.
As this exercise is now complete I have added a password to preserve the discussion (which is hosted on the Experiences page of this site). Please get in touch if you'd like to visit the discussion board.
Clearly, this task cannot be achieved without hearing the experiences and ideas of current online distant learners. With the encouragement of Hamish McLeod, I therefore suggested to the working group that approaching my fellow students on the MSc in E-Learning might be a good way of capturing the experiences and expectations of online distance learners.
To this end, I created a discussion board to capture a sense of what it means to be a distance learning student (rather than what it means to be an MSc E-Learning student specifically). Discussion took place under 9 themes, categorised under pre- and post-entry. At the beginning of March 2011 I offered an overview the group's thoughts to staff involved in distance education at Edinburgh University. My input was part of a wider seminar that also considered distance education from the perspectives of teaching and support staff.
As this exercise is now complete I have added a password to preserve the discussion (which is hosted on the Experiences page of this site). Please get in touch if you'd like to visit the discussion board.