Discussed during and after the presentation of Dr. Andi Sudjana Putra, Mr. Elvyn Sim and Mr. Muhammad Haizuruldin. This blog post is prepared by members of DYOM LC (find more in About Us).
This blog post presents the Students-as-Partners framework used to study student engagement in DYOM as discussed by the Learning Community (LC).
Theoretical Underpinning
Students-as-Partners (SAP) is used as the framework in studying student engagement in DYOM. The resources that the LC uses are as follows:
- From Griffith University: access from here.
- From Elon University: access from here.
- From The Higher Education Academy (THEA): access from here.
Student engagement can be seen from the following aspects:
- Students are engaged when they invest time and energy in their own learning. The measure of student engagement can therefore be based on the time and energy they invest in learning.
- Students are engaged when they are involved and empowered by the institutions (e.g., their schools) to shape their learning experiences.
According to the THEA (refer to Figure 1.1 of the reference), the four stages of student engagement are as follows:
- Consultation
- Involvement
- Participation
- Partnership
Upon reviewing these theoretical concepts, the LC related to their own DYOM experiences. For example, some experiences point to consultation taking place in the form of informal conversations outside the classroom and participation in the form of designing assessment rubrics with students.
Observation and Operationalisation
Notable points were raised according to the experience of LC members as facilitators, administrators and students.
Firstly, there has been a desire to enhance an experiential component in DYOM, hence making DYOM distinct from other modules in NUS. Experiential components include students designing (or co-designing) a set of assessment rubrics and syllabus with their professors. This shows that there was indeed a higher level of student engagement in DYOM than in other modules as students have more say in their own learning. Having observed this, it was also shared that there have been instances where students accepted a proposed DYOM plan from their professors without much objection. This might be because students were passive, felt lacking in knowledge about the topic to make constructive contributions, agreed with the proposal or simply being grateful for the module.
Secondly, student engagement may not necessarily be at the Partnership level, or that it may not always be aimed at Partnership level. Contextualisation is required to determine the proper level of student engagement for various activities in a DYOM. For example, student engagement in deciding the mode of learning may not be the same as in deciding assessment modes, in turn may not be the same as when creating content and so on.
Thirdly, providing appropriate pedagogical consultancy to students is both an opportunity and a challenge.
Although every DYOM topic is unique and participants of each DYOM would have had different experiences, there were some similarities and useful observations for the LC.
DYOM via Group Work with Supervision can be viewed as ‘the marrying of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Course) with experiential learning’. It became evident that the element of experimenting or customisation strongly defined the DYOM experience.
In terms of the level of student engagement, the LC concluded that each DYOM has elements of all four levels, although to varying degrees. It is worthwhile to think about increasing the level of student engagement. Each DYOM may need to consider its own context. For example, a DYOM organised by Office of Student Affairs (OSA) that requires students to run a project in their halls of residence will need to engage all stakeholders: not only students and OSA staff as the organiser, but also hall staff.
Conclusion and Follow Up
There is no ‘one size fits all’ that would work for every DYOM or for all groups of students. Contextualisation is therefore important – to tweak and adjust the curriculum to meet the needs of the stakeholders for the best experience.
The LC also reflected on the underlying motivations of the students; i.e., on the importance of describing to the students that DYOM is to be seen as an avenue to pursue their academic interests, rather than only as a ‘chill’ module for them to fulfil Unrestricted Elective (UE) requirements. Students’ learning experience would be more pleasant once they start steering their module in this direction, seeing that the DYOM aims to do both – cater to their interests while being enjoyable.