Romanian Internet Learning Workshop (RILW)

- The Internet as a Vehicle for Teaching

This second gathering at Illieni brought back many who had attended last year as well as some newcomers. We were treated to a diverse range of papers and were able to have extended sessions of lively discussion. The POLYGON society, organised by Mihai Jalobeanu and others, ensured that this conference also featured artistic and cultural experiences which enhanced the whole event.

Papers included several offering broad views of Distance Education (DE) and the use of the Internet in the U.K, Germany, Moldova and Romania as well as detailed and specific presentations of particular software, projects and case studies. Though our cultures and contexts are different, many of the difficulties and problems that arise with regard to DE and change in teaching methodologies, are familiar.

There is one particularly important aspect of DE which has special significance in Romania and that is the nature of the communications network. Aurel Vlaicu of the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca explained the current situation in a paper entitled 'Internet Learning using Existing Communications Infrastructure in Romania'. Since 1990 there has been much development and re-structuring of telecommunications in all the Central and Eastern European countries, but the level of this development varies between them. There is still a huge gap between the average monthly incomes of these countries and those in Western Europe which limits the use of any new (and relatively expensive) services that are being introduced. With this factor in mind, a realistic design was proposed that consisted of establishing a heterogeneous network of local study centres using the internet as a link to a main study centre and a broad bandwidth for speed. It is hoped that costs should be decreasing in the near future due to rapid development of technology in this area, with this in mind a multi-media application has been designed and tested for use with such a network. The main idea was to ensure a high degree of interactivity between students and teachers and to ensure the use of different kinds of information presentation. Using an ORACLE server-client software environment (consisting of the Web, database and videoserver) monitoring the student's activities and opportunities for evaluation are included. Stability and ease of use have been established, though the physical restrictions of bandwidths and servers could cause delays when the opportunity of testing the system with a greater number of users demanding access arises.

During a round table discussion we considered areas of priority and potential problems involved in the design and delivery of new courses offered on such a system in Romania. The following initial difficulties were discussed:

1. Initiatives are local or individual without always achieving support from the authorities.
2. Legislation for this type of education has only recently been established.
3. Accreditation of DE activities is currently being developed, so where some regulations are being sought and defined.
4. Quality assurance of DE courses needs some attention - in the past this has been lacking and part-time courses have had a bad reputation. Methods need to be defined.
5. It is hoped to include an element of co-operation between study centres - strategies are needed to be able to achieve this and overcome previous habits of mistrust.
6. Choice of initial student target groups needs to be considered as well as choice of media in the delivery of the courses.

Our responses were as follows:

1. There are two possible approaches - to respond to market need or to offer courses that respond to government policy (assuming policy and market demands differ). Most comments supported the former argument on the basis that courses are more likely to succeed if there is a perceived need by the student and if the students are extremely well-motivated. In fact, it was also suggested that the issue of motivation should be the primary criteria of approach to ensure that the first target group are highly committed.
2. Access is very important and technical compatibility in facilities and competence levels are needed. Perhaps a preparatory IT skills course for all students needs to be offered. Tutors may also need this training.
3. With regard to choice of appropriate communication media - this should depend on the didactic needs of the course design.
4. One particular target group was suggested - those who need professional training or re-training (education, health and local government). It was agreed that evidence so far shows that post-graduate courses had the highest demand and greatest success rate in DE courses offered for the first time, and that this particular target group would support local communities. In Romania, teachers need to re-qualify every 5 years and DE could assist with this requirement.
5. It was suggested that support and action was needed from 'the top', but this has been notoriously difficult in the past and access to information should be given a priority in any case.

The third comment above, regarding appropriate communication media linked with course design was at the core of Michael Ribold's paper - "First Steps towards Structures in the use of Internet Tools in Distance Learning Environments". The Distance Education Centre at Lüneburg University, Germany has had many years of experience in supporting students’ learning during collaborative world-wide projects for students based at the campus as well as Internet tutorial support for those students studying at a distance. On the evidence so far, internet tools are utilised more often in action based rather than knowledge based settings. It was felt that other important factors needing consideration in the design of a distance teaching environment are ‘openness or construction, guidance or experience and learner centred or teacher centred’ approaches. He stressed the interdependency of technical facilities and pedagogical theories. Interestingly, experience showed that home-based students would rather work off-line than on-line - this makes issues of access and ease of use of primary importance.

It was of personal interest that a DE Centre at a university in Germany was spending much of its time supporting students who were sometimes involved in non face-to-face learning situations, though based on the campus. This was a trend discovered in many UK universities during an ESRC project called - ‘Innovations in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education’. The DE aspect of T&L, as presented at this conference, described how many of the changes and ‘exciting’ developments involving learning at a distance were occurring in collaborative projects designed for students studying at University campuses. It was suggested that a convergence may be happening between Distance Learning methodologies and Mainstream education, especially as new information and communication technologies open up possibilities. Other reasons include pressures of increased student numbers, recent government papers and problems of distance with multi-site universities.

Eugen Caisin described recent developments at the State University of Moldova which is the oldest and largest (12,000 students) in the republic. The paper he presented was entitled ‘Teaching Internet to the University Staff: Internet Support of Students’ Learning’ (written by Roza Dumbraveanu and his father, Simon Caisin), but added to this was an interesting overview of the background and introduction of computer technology in education in Moldova. The problem presented to the Computing Centre at the university was that students were arriving who were fairly competent - having had computer experience at school, however, the teaching staff at the University needed training. At the beginning of the paper a simple but profound remark is made - ‘There is a difference between providing access to information and learning something from that information.’Thus the case is made for staff training and re-inforced by an acknowledgement that new ‘technology in the learning environment requires changes in pedagogy and teaching/learning styles’. Equipment and network connection was made possible with sponsorship from Soros, the next major obstacle was to overcome a lack of staff motivation by creating opportunities for experience and familiarity with computers and the internet. Simply having the computers was not enough. A one-week intensive course was provided for around 240 staff, who in turn, it was hoped, would teach two other members of staff what they had learnt. The objectives for this course included the development of a student-centred approach - flexible learning, students’ management and responsibility as well as the monitoring of students’ progress and testing students’ abilities to integrate information gained from the internet into their theses. The paper concluded by recommending a combined approach of constructivism and instructivism when the use of the Web is made with T&L and stressed opportunities gained that are based around access to information, courses and experts.

The nature of a didactic approach was at the heart of a paper describing the first stages of a collaborative "Virtual European Pilot School" , presented by Rolf Zajonc from Humbold University of Berlin. The system proposed is an internet based Distance Learning Platform which aims to provide 100 hours of instruction towards the Private Pilot License. The media will be a mixture of text, graphics, CBT and communication facilities of an asynchronous or synhchronous nature. This paper described the ‘harmonisation process’ that was the main task of this university, with the aim of organising all the Pilot Schools and Instructors to come to an agreed approach and definition of learning objectives that will form the basis of all the instruction material. Despite difficulties of a short timescale, unclear roles, instructor motivation and the asynchronous nature of most communication, a large table was produced with the function of a ‘Sense Giving Structure’ - linking modules with specific learning objectives (defined collaboratively) and the possibility of a narrative element in the tutoring system which would act as a guide through the course.

Nic Nistor of Ludwig Maximilan University, Münich has been leading and researching Virtual Seminars since 1995. This year he presented the results of a particular aspect - that of managing information, from a comparison between two approaches used within a virtual seminar, the traditional classroom and problem-based learning (PBL) designs. His data consisted of the use of information resources and the exchange of information (which was based in an asynchronous environment). His conclusion was that the problem-based approach stimulated a better selection of information and use of it, but because more discussion was needed for strategy and coordination of the task, students could benefit from some initial training in PBL.

The Problem -Based Learning environment featured in a presentation by Bill Lindsay from the University of Strathclyde, Scotland. A historical perspective of evolution and revolution in technological education was explained - the curriculum evolved from craft-based to design-based in the 1970’s and it was only at this time that girls were given the opportunity to study the subject. Gradually, in the 80’s with influence from Industry and the government, new pupil-centred methods of teaching were introduced - this meant more emphasis given to process (projects and problem-solving tasks), needs and social context as well as changing the teacher’s role towards ‘facilitating’ the action and learning of the pupil. This is the way in which students learn to be Technology teachers at Strathclyde - so they have the example and the experience. The introduction of internet use in this course was the subject of a separate case-study presentation. Outcomes of this survey show familiar issues arising - entertainment rather than education, information ‘overload’, frustration due to the amount of time it can consume, difficulty in the detection of plagiarism and lack of attention given to other research sources. It is recommended that students would benefit from a study skills course which includes use and information management of the internet.

Use of Computer software systems designed to enhance the teaching and learning process were also demonstrated. First, Doru Ursutiu from Brasov University, Romania, showed us how he had been using a product of National Instruments called LabVIEW (Laboratory Virtual Instrument Engineering Workbench) of which the latest version allows parallel execution of tasks such as web browsing, signal and frequency analysis and control via the Graphics programming language ‘G’. The student is given a task which can be viewed on the web, the task is then carried out using LabVIEW and followed up with a complete report and analysis of the experiment delivered to the tutor via the internet (email or web page). The Virtual Physics Laboratory integrates computers and industrial hardware which expands the range of instrumentation accessible and the possibilities of control education - the LabVIEW tool reduces the time needed for teaching basic material allowing further areas to be covered by the professor.

Bernhard Ertl of Ludwig Maximilan University, Munich demonstrated his programme which allows students to create a concept map on the Web. He described that there are many different kinds of maps that can be applied to this technique which depend on the objectives and control of the administrator. Basically, his idea is that maps can be created cooperatively on the internet which will represent concepts and their relationship with each other through a coded linking system. The creation of these maps and their use is particularly effective with problem-solving tasks such as diagnosis and treatment solutions for student doctors. The mapping tool consists of nodes and connections with actions behind each node (such as linking to another web page) with the possibility of pre-defined actions set by the moderator that may assist students in their own tasks. I had seen a course designed in the form of a concept map on the internet before, but this application allows greater responsibility on behalf of the student and is a way of representing their own understanding of knowledge that has been gained.

Unfortunately some 'intended presenters' did not manage to attend, but this was more than compensated for by the opportunity for further discussion and visits to developing networked and distance education centres in the vicinity. Two papers were presented during a visit to the Miercurea Ciuc Educational Centre and there were several others over the whole event, so this review has reported on most, but not all of the presentations. Overall the conference offered so much more than its title and was enriched by the paintings and presence of an accomplished artist from Cluj - Andra Felicia Pop (a member of the Romanian Visual Arts Artists Union - U.A.P). The RILW proceedings were published and presented in an impressive hard back folder with a new RILW logo designed by Andra. Mihai Jalobeanu junior who also exposed his design expertise on the cover of the proceedings. The social arrangements including a string quartet, "Gaudeamus", consisting of soloists from the Brasov Philarmonic Orchestra playing Mozart and Beethoven in the local church on Sunday evening were superb. It was an event and place where friendship, culture and intellectual pursuit were of equal importance. It is also an event which will happen again next year with a different format and for additional reasons - Erasmus funding has just been realised to include students in an intensive programme about distance learning on the internet.

Please note the RILW Home page with its mirror:

• http://www.itim-cj.ro/rilw/
• http://www.syslab.ceu.hu/~michail/rilw/
• http://infix.emp.paed.uni-muenchen.de/nic/cmc/rilw/RILW98.html

This document will be published in the next volume of 'Interactive Learning Environments' (published by Swets & Zeitlinger) which will be available in the Spring of 1999.

More information regarding the journal can be found at the following publisher's web-site: http://www.swets.nl/sps/journals/ile1.html

Susan English