Week 29 - Consider your audiences (Take action)
To what extent does gamification impact on behavioural engagement for distance learners?
What?
The wider audience context for my inquiry is my community of learning (COL) which include my mentor teacher and other teachers in my office. I also think that my wider community involves other teachers that are a part of The MindLab community as I share these blog posts with them. The theme that I have chosen to look at in this reflection has been identified in Bolstad, Gilbert, McDowall, Bull, Boyd & Hipkin's (2012) reading of New views of equity, diversity, and inclusivity (pg.25).
So what?
I chose to look at this weeks reflection through the equity, diversity and inclusivity lense because raising engagement drives my inquiry which aligns perfectly with Bolstad et al's (2012) idea of 'producing educational engagement and success for all learners is an important priority.' (p.25). My mentor teacher's perspective towards my practice is very supportive and open-minded. They have been very intrigued and inspired to see the impact of gamification with my distance learners. They have definitely taken on board my perspective and are wanting to implement gamification elements into their own practice. This view is also expressed from other teachers within the MindLab context as they provide support in their feedback to my blog posts.
The other teachers within my office I believe are also open-minded, but I feel some may be apprehensive to include gamification into their practice, due to not knowing enough about the positive impact technology can have with learners, especially distance learners. As suggested by the OECD (2018) to head towards the future we need to equip teachers with sound pedagogical and technological knowledge, so sharing my findings with them may help them feel more confident or even more open to the idea of incorporating different practices.
I chose to look at this weeks reflection through the equity, diversity and inclusivity lense because raising engagement drives my inquiry which aligns perfectly with Bolstad et al's (2012) idea of 'producing educational engagement and success for all learners is an important priority.' (p.25). My mentor teacher's perspective towards my practice is very supportive and open-minded. They have been very intrigued and inspired to see the impact of gamification with my distance learners. They have definitely taken on board my perspective and are wanting to implement gamification elements into their own practice. This view is also expressed from other teachers within the MindLab context as they provide support in their feedback to my blog posts.
The other teachers within my office I believe are also open-minded, but I feel some may be apprehensive to include gamification into their practice, due to not knowing enough about the positive impact technology can have with learners, especially distance learners. As suggested by the OECD (2018) to head towards the future we need to equip teachers with sound pedagogical and technological knowledge, so sharing my findings with them may help them feel more confident or even more open to the idea of incorporating different practices.
Now what?
I am in the fifth week of my inquiry now and I have nearly seen 9 out of 11 students engaging in their learning, which is 81% I am absolutely thrilled with my results so far. I have allocated close to 500 Dojo points now which is really exciting! The weekly Google Classroom activities that I am setting hook them in to continue on and engage. This week I scaffolded them to write or create their pepehas, and to make a positive comment on someone else's to help create connections between those on my class list. As mentioned by Bolstad et al (2012) one way to build "capacity for diversity" is to explore connections and the key idea in 21st-century learning is to know "who learners are, where they are and to what and whom they are connected to," (p. 26). Our learning experiences should provide the opportunity to explore those things which I feel I am starting to address by getting the students to reflect back on who they are. I feel that I am starting to address the issue of genuine engagement identified in Bolstad et al reading and involve my students to shape their learning. One student has gone even further and now wants to investigate their family tree, so I am supporting their journey with that.
At the moment, even though I am excited about my results, I am also conscious of what and how much I share so not to overwhelm those that are new to the gamification aspect. I am saving up for my end of inquiry findings which I will start to investigate in my sixth week and will share this with both of my mentor teachers and also anyone in my office who is interested and of course the teachers in my MindLab community!
At the moment, even though I am excited about my results, I am also conscious of what and how much I share so not to overwhelm those that are new to the gamification aspect. I am saving up for my end of inquiry findings which I will start to investigate in my sixth week and will share this with both of my mentor teachers and also anyone in my office who is interested and of course the teachers in my MindLab community!
References:
Bolstad, R., Gilbert, J., McDowall, S., Bull, A., Boyd, S., & Hipkins, R. (2012). Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching — a New Zealand perspective. Report prepared for the Ministry of Education. Retrieved from https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling/109306
OECD. (2018).Trends shaping education 2018 spotlight. Retrieved from http://www.oecd.org/education/ceri/Spotlight-15-A-Brave-New-World-Technology-and-Education.pdf
Bolstad, R., Gilbert, J., McDowall, S., Bull, A., Boyd, S., & Hipkins, R. (2012). Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching — a New Zealand perspective. Report prepared for the Ministry of Education. Retrieved from https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling/109306
OECD. (2018).Trends shaping education 2018 spotlight. Retrieved from http://www.oecd.org/education/ceri/Spotlight-15-A-Brave-New-World-Technology-and-Education.pdf
Hi Jayde
ReplyDeleteI am so excited for you that your experience has been so positive and your students are really engaged. That is a significant change!
I thought your comment that some of your colleagues "may be apprehensive to include gamification into their practice, due to not knowing enough about the positive impact technology can have with learners, especially distance learners" was interesting.
Do you have an opportunity at your work to teach the teachers how to use Dojo, for example, so that they feel less intimidated about new technology perhaps?
Do you have any research in mind that you could share with other teachers, to justify your use of gamification, engagement, and improved learning outcomes? Maybe you could share with them the NZ Curriculum pages on engagement - cognitive, behavioural and emotional. (http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Teaching-as-inquiry/Student-engagement)
Their list of factors influencing student engagement (e.g. nature and extent of teacher feedback on students’ progress) and assessing student engagement (e.g. are students persistent in their work, despite challenges and obstacles?) are really interesting.
All the best for the rest of the year!
Kia ora Jayde,
ReplyDeleteYou have trialled something new and innovative in your workspace and it is paying off for your students as well as whānau with their engagement. I believe that as you continue on this journey you will be a great influence to other educators in your distance learning workspace and you could quite capably lead the digital and collaborative context and support your fellow educators to build their own capacity with the technology to impact the same engagement and communications as you have.
I feel the apprehensive colleagues you have, may be so, due to the level of their own technological knowledge and perhaps you could support them with some new learning around some digital technology tools and using these to engage students where possible?
With this in mind, I think it is also critical that your colleagues do understand that there are some key elements as to how to implement gamification as a successful engagement tool in your programme, for example you have been very mindful of how frequent and how much you share with your students so not to overwhelm them. On the other hand I assume you have had to work out a good balance so that it is still frequent enough to keep them engaged, a fine balance that could quite easily tip the scales.
It is great reading the amazing response you are receiving from your distance learners and I look forward to reading your findings in your future blogs.