Design Issues
What difference can VLEs make in supporting student learning?
Most tutors currently use VLEs to allow students to access course materials and learning resources (such as articles, case studies, guidelines and simulations) in a wide variety of formats (for example text, video, interactive Flash animations and so on). In many classes in both FE and HE, students already have the opportunity to download lecture notes and PowerPoint slides from a VLE. The problem with this way of working is that it does not take account of how students will use these resources to help them learn. More importantly, tutors have no way of knowing whether students have truly learned a concept.
Some tutors are using VLEs to allow students to submit coursework electronically, and to support online student discussions (see Gilly Salmon's text on 'E-moderating', 2002). For example, your students may download a course reading (from a VLE) and discuss their views on a topic articulated by the teacher using an online bulletin board. The main problem is that interactions will only take place online, even though it may be more effective for your students if they were to discuss ideas face-to-face, particularly if they are campus-based learners.
The true potential of VLEs extends well beyond these scenarios, as they offer a chance to move from a 'directive' approach to teaching towards an 'active' approach to learning. For example, your students might download a course reading from a VLE and discuss their ideas face-to-face in small groups of three or four. These discussions could take place in any 'real space' of their choice: the classroom or lecture theatre, 'breakout' rooms or a coffee house. When the students have reached a consensus, and within an agreed timeframe, the views of the group can be drawn together and posted to a bulletin board within the VLE, where students are invited to review and reflect upon the postings of other groups and to respond online.
Many tutors in FE have changed short teaching sessions to loosely structured, two-hour gatherings in a classroom. Some HE tutors are reviewing their teaching methods in a similar way. Students may be divided into small groups and given a series of learning tasks. The students are free to walk around the classroom and discuss ideas with their peers or with tutors. Within the classroom students can use computers to access the VLE where they can search for and retrieve information, upload information resources to a shared group workspace, access and evaluate resources sourced by others and integrate the ideas gleaned from these materials into 'work in progress' documents. The materials are stored and shared in the VLE, but the interactions (discussions/brainstorming and writing reports) will be mainly in 'real space'.
These scenarios illustrate an approach that combines the use of a VLE with real-life interactions. This is currently referred to as 'blended' or 'flexible' learning. Unfortunately, most courses within VLEs do not fully integrate the interactions of students with tutors and peers across real and virtual spaces. A recent review of the use of VLEs in UK Higher Education by Britain and Liber (2004) confirmed that most tutors are using VLEs simply to distribute class information (e-administration) or course materials (e-content management), rather than to enhance face-to-face classroom interactions (e-learning). This is not quite the case in FE, though there is still considerable scope for supporting the 'blending of online and classroom activities'.
