About – heal-in-one

Background of the Project

Student engagement is not only a challenge in traditional face-to-face (F2F) classrooms but also, and debatably more so, in online courses. Online course delivery faces additional barriers to engaging students not typically present in F2F courses including the fact that course design and development must occur before the actual delivery of the teaching and learning materials.

While the importance of active learning methodologies to improve student engagement has been thoroughly examined, the additional challenges faced by online course delivery changes how active learning practices are put into practice. Thereby, because of the unique nature and challenges of online courses, an understanding of the distinctive approaches to active learning is needed. A few aspects that should be considered with regard to online courses is the integration of design elements, accessibility of materials, value of interdisciplinary collaboration, development of community among students and faculty, encouraging valuable discussions and use of effective assessment methods.

The integrated course design models consist of the basic components of identification of situation factors, learning goals, teaching and learning activities and feedback and assessment. The proper design of these components is crucial to engaging students in an online environment. Next to that, effective time and resources management is necessary on the part of both the students as well as faculty when online. Further, methods of encouraging student communication and interactions amongst themselves and faculty differ greatly from F2F delivery methods. Consequently, the efficient implementation of teaching tools used to deliver the online course is a challenge for many faculties especially who deal with applied sciences.

However, many of these concerns can be addressed through the implementation of active learning strategies that encourage students to actively participate in the online course content. On the basis of current research can be claimed that typically active learning is not associated with online or hybrid learning environment. However, there are several strategies for effectively incorporating and practicing active learning in non-F2F settings including the use of well-conceived discussions, group work and creating a collaborative environment that encourages and fosters a community of learning. It is critical to weave active learning through the major components of an online or hybrid course, including discussions, assignments and assessments to promote a high level of student engagement.

The quality of an online course in comparison to its traditional F2F counterpart is the most critical issue that impacts the design and development of an online course. Some of the key components in online courses are the design of instructional material for the content delivery, student assessment of material, discussion management, time management and frustration handling. In the project it will be applied the multidisciplinary approaches of design and development of the key components ALTONE, the best practices of ALT in online course design and delivery and various mechanisms of student engagement they employed in online and hybrid courses.

These student engagement mechanisms are founded in classic pedagogies but will be adapted to suit the online and hybrid course environment. In doing so, the idea of applying traditional active learning methodologies to the online and hybrid setting while retaining the function of actively engaging students in their learning will be central throughout the project realization.

Summary of the Project

The efficient implementation of teaching tools used to deliver online and face to face (F2F) courses is a challenge for much higher education institutions, especially those who deal with applied sciences. Many of these concerns can be addressed through the implementation of Active Learning and Teaching (ALT) strategies that encourage students to actively participate in the online, F2F and hybrid course contents. Based on current research can be claimed that typically the ALT is not associated with any online or hybrid learning environment. However, there are several strategies for effectively incorporating and practising ALT in non-F2F settings including the use of well-conceived discussions, group work and creating a collaborative environment that encourages and fosters a community of learning. It is critical to incorporate the ALT through the major components of an online or hybrid course, including discussions, assignments and any other methodologies to promote a high level of student engagement.

In the HEAL-in-ONE (Higher Education Active Learning in Online education) project, it will be applied the multidisciplinary approaches of design and development of the key components ALTONE (Active Learning and Teaching in ONline), the best practices of ALT in online course design and delivery and various mechanisms of student engagement they employed in online and hybrid courses.

These student engagement mechanisms are founded in classic pedagogies but will be adapted to suit the online and hybrid course environment. In doing so, the idea of applying traditional ALT methodologies to the online and hybrid setting while retaining the function of actively engaging students in their learning will be central throughout the project realization.

Objectives of the Project

Quality of learning in online circumstances requires students’ higher independence in learning and work, skill of self-regulated learning, and better developed metacognitive abilities. It helps learners choose the right cognitive tool for the task and plays a critical role in successful learning to manage one’s own learning process. In order to take all this into account when designing the teaching situation, knowledge and skills of creating a quality educational experience for students are needed. Applied disciplines in agricultural sciences have faced challenge in how to develop the necessary practical professional knowledge, skills and values in the online environment. Their curricular content is more practical and requires the acquisition of skills parallel with theoretical knowledge. Two main problems are the problem of creating adequate activities for students in relation to the goals set; and the problem of the poorer quality of teacher-student interaction. Having in mind the above, the goals of the project are:

The general goal is to provide students with quality education. It means using high academic standards based on modern scientific knowledge in order to build dynamic combination of knowledge, skills, and values, and the 21st century competences in study programs of applied agriculture disciplines in undergraduate studies in online and hybrid environment;
Development of the principles of ALTONE in HE so as to make the most of the advantages of ICT in teaching and learning;
Raising the competencies of academics for creating prototypes of teaching situations for effective learning of content of different epistemological nature that are found in applied disciplines;
Curriculum redesign and implementation of curricular alignment between goals, teaching/learning methods, student activities, assessment of students and learning outcomes in pilot courses;
Development of a bank of scenario for teaching in an online environment according to the types of knowledge those students should master (declarative, procedural, practical)

Creating continuous support for improvement of ALT in HE (formation of a center for learning/teaching at the faculty). The partner organizations in the project want to integrate active learning into online and hybrid teaching on professionally applied subjects of applied agricultural sciences. Exchanges of good practices and experiences in ALT in online and hybrid environment among partner institutions at every level (teachers, ICT staff, and students) will contribute to this. All experiences from solving problems caused by the transition to full online education in the pandemic will benefit the future organization of education in “normal” circumstances

Implementation of the Project

The following activities are planned to implement during the realization of the project:
1. The joint analysis of realization of teaching and learning in different HEI contexts and introducing ALTONE methodology;
2. Writing the training material: handbook on transforming ALT from a classroom to an online and hybrid education, guideline for teachers redesigning subject curricula, guideline for teachers related to creating scenarios for online and hybrid education and guidance for evaluation of the scenarios and analysis of the results of teacher satisfaction classes)
3. Training on ALT and ALTONE methodology: active Learning Teaching (ALT) joint staff training course (active learning in online and hybrid environment, exchanges of good practices and experiences in ALT in online and hybrid environment among partner institutions and development of the concept of active learning in the online and hybrid environment;
4. ALT joint staff training course with focus on building teacher competences on evaluation of quality of teaching/learning process (redesigning existing teaching curricula, creating and evaluation scenarios for online and hybrid active learning and teaching, formative assessment, assessment for learning and assessment as learning);
5. Reviewing the project’s intellectual outputs and designing framework for the project sustainability (development of the concept and formation of a centre for continuous improvement of the quality of teaching/learning in a higher education institution, dissemination of principles ALT in online and hybrid environment with other universities).

Planned results of the Project

During the implementation of the project, teachers of pilot subjects are expected to adopt principles of good practice of active learning/teaching (ALT), improve planning of subject objectives for online environment, acquire relevant competencies for applying ALT methodology in online environment, contribute to improving interactivity between them and students also students to each other, fostering creativity in students as well as in themselves, fostering critical thinking in students as well as in themselves, improving students’ self-reflection on learning, as well as self-reflection on teaching methods in themselves, improving shared inquiry between learners and teachers to answer questions and solve problems that will facilitate modelling, foster creativity, and enhance active and collaborative learning. In addition, because learners will continue to come from a variety of generations, it is important for teachers to facilitate their learning needs to plan and implement effective programs using ALT. Formative and summative assessment will conduct to measure student abilities and knowledge before, during, and after participation in courses. Finally, the implementation of ALT is expected, the improvement of feedback on student learning success (feedback to learners about the course content and outcomes from technology can be used in such things as interactive exercises with feedback loops in online tests), evaluation of ALT and assessment implications for future use of online and blended active learning strategies. During the implementation of the project, the following results are planned:

1. Report on the analysis of needs for improving the quality of ALTONE based on the findings of research in partner’s country and in the world;
2. Desk analysis about reduce quality (decline in the volume and quality of knowledge; learning loss);
3. Development of the concept of ALT in the online and hybrid environment;
4. Writing a handbook on transforming active learning from a classroom to an online environment;
5. Training of teachers for the application of active learning methodology in online environment;
6. Training for raising the competencies of teachers for adequate use of ICT for more effective engagement of students and better learning and monitoring of teaching specifically in applied disciplines in higher education;
7. Selection of pilot subjects from different agricultural applied disciplines;
8. Training report for revision and evaluation of the pilot subjects book in accordance with the analysis of necessary changes;
9. Redesigning pilot course books so as to achieve curricular coherence between objectives, active learning/teaching methods, student activities, evaluation of student achievement and learning outcomes;
10. Evaluation of revised pilot subject books;
11. Teacher-tailored training, personalized, with each teacher working ICT expert and teaching/learning quality expert on improving the competencies of pilot teachers in the preparation of scenarios, how to choose digital tools in relation to the objectives of the subject and solving specific pedagogical problems;
12.Creating scenarios for prototype classes in applied disciplines in the online environment;
13. Evaluation of completed scenarios for ALTONE;
14.Creating a scenario for prototype classes in applied disciplines for hybrid learning, with a clear explanation of the activities that are realized live and those that are realized in the online environment;
15. Evaluation of completed scenarios for hybrid active learning/teaching;
16. Peer reviews of teacher satisfaction classes;
17. Development of the concept and formation of centres for continuous improvement of the quality of teaching/learning in a higher education institution.