Learning Market goes remote: Reflections on distance education

In keeping with the times, May 6th, 2021 witnessed the very first fully remote Learning Market event organized in the University of Oulu. The theme of the event, “Future of Distance Education” seems more topical than ever both for teachers and students. While the ‘digital leap’ is by no means a novel concept, the past year, so markedly characterized by the Covid-19 pandemic, certainly accelerated the process. Both teachers and students were forced to quickly adapt to new methods of teaching and learning. Now, with the end of the pandemic becoming a more tangible prospect (with some faculties in the University of Oulu hopefully returning to face-to-face teaching in the fall semester), the big questions many university teachers find themselves asking are: What have we learned from the past year and is there something about distance education worth preserving going forwards? 

One clear advantage of distance education, brought up several times in the event as well, is the increased accessibility to teaching. This was reflected in the participants of the Learning Market event as well. For the first time, the event was open to all teachers of the PedaPohjoinen network of institutions of higher education. Accordingly, the event drew over 130 participants from different northern universities. The event itself was a multimodal production: some of the specialist interviews and discussions, hosted by Juho Karjalainen, being broadcasted from the University of Oulu’s Vimma-studios, with the majority of the presenters’ connecting remotely via Zoom.

Despite the new modality, the actual core content of the event remained unchanged. At its heart, the Learning Market continues to serve as a venue for students of university pedagogics to present functional didactic practices and central findings derived from applying their studies to university teaching. This year, the three central themes around which the student’s presentations were organized were: good practices in distance education, assessment in distance education, and active distance education. Central to all themes was the desire to counter the disadvantages of remote teaching, whether they be the creeping Zoom fatigue (e.g. Bailenson 2021) so familiar to many, or the difficulty to assess the learning of several hundred black screens. Despite the theme of distance education, many of the practices introduced by the students in the event are applicable in traditional face-to-face teaching. One pedagogical framework many students found particularly useful was that of continuous assessment (e.g. Tynjälä, 2002) combined with the concept of the flipped classroom (DeLozier & Rhodes, 2017). Those wishing to learn more about the topics discussed are urged to keep an eye on the blog https://yliopistopedagogistapostia.blogspot.com/ where the students of university pedagogics will summarize their experiences and findings.

1.Students of university pedagogics were asked pick a single word or concept to summarize the Learning Market 2021 event

The event was kicked off with an interview of Tapio Koivu, vice rector in charge of education at the University of Oulu. Having recently accepted the position in Oulu, Koivu reflected on the effect of the pandemic on university teaching. Koivu likened the effect of Covid-19 on universities to a  “tsunami, whose damage is difficult to assess before the water has receded”. At the same time, Koivu notes that it is not all doom and gloom: the number of completed degrees at the University of Oulu has not fallen during the pandemic, with some faculties even seeing an increase. Koivu sees the future of university teaching being marked by search for balance between more traditional, pre-Covid  teaching methods and novel distance education methods. This search, according to Koivu, will be largely the responsibility of individual faculties and degree programs. On a grander scale, with the collaboration between universities becoming more prevalent (as exemplified by the Digivisio 2030 -project), Koivu foresees individual universities potentially becoming clearly specialized. Koivu also stressed the importance of rewarding excellent teaching: great practices within degree programs need to be identified and strategic funding distributed to scale them. Individual teachers could also be rewarded via novel means, one such means being an award for best innovation in remote teaching, as suggested by Koivu. On a final note, to ensure the wellbeing of teachers, Koivu addressed the prevailing academic culture of glorifying needlessly hard work and the seemingly bloated number of various IT-services and complex bureaucratic procedures. One way to reward excellent teachers is certainly to allow them  to focus on the teaching.

Following the presentations and specialist sessions, a formal debate was organized between students of university pedagogics on whether teaching and assessment in distance education settings differ fundamentally from more traditional settings. Following an engaging and vivid discussion, the audience voted on the winner of the debate, deeming that, indeed, these pedagogical activities are essentially different in remote education. Building on the debate, the event was closed by a final discussion featuring university teachers Niina Impiö (University of Oulu) and Markus Aalto (Oulu University of Applied Sciences),  student representative Emma Hulkkonen, and the rector of the liberal education institution Oulu-opisto Outi Lohi. The discussion first centered on how to prepare for the impending corona-exit in the context of university education. The importance of openly disseminating information regarding future policies to both teachers and students was stressed. Obviously, as the pandemic progresses and goes through various stages, rapid responses from the powers that be are often required. Nonetheless, transparency in policy making plays and important role in ensuring that both students and the teachers are not overwhelmed by the demand for constantly adapting to new restrictions and rules. In keeping with the theme of change, the discussants also expressed their desire for stability where possible: having used the past year to learn different tools and technologies, often through trial and error, many teachers and students are understandably reluctant to adopt yet another set of technologies. Hopefully, the experience gathered during the past year regarding what works and what doesn’t will be put to good use.

This brings us back to the big question:  What have we learned from the past year and is there something about distance education worth preserving going forwards? Judging from the discussions and presentations in this year’s Learning Market, the biggest positive effect in the future will stem from the multimodal nature of university teaching. Various hybrid models of teaching, increased accessibility, and subsequent potential for collaboration between universities are certainly positive things. At the same time, the question of the future well-being of university teachers was raised several times by multiple participants. Rewarding excellent teaching, ensuring that teacher can focus on the actual teaching, and quite simply, listening to the them in matters related to teaching, both remote and face-to-face, is more important than ever. 

Lähteet

Bailenson, J. N. (2021). Nonverbal Overload: A Theoretical Argument for the Causes of Zoom Fatigue. Technology, Mind, and Behavior, 2(1). https://doi.org/10.1037/tmb0000030

DeLozier, S. & M. G. Rhodes (2017). “Flipped Classrooms: a Review of Key Ideas and Recommendations for Practise.” Educational Psychological Review 29: 141–151.

Tynjälä, P. 2002. Oppiminen tiedon rakentamisena. Konstruktivistisen oppimiskäsityksen perusteita. Helsinki, Tammi.

Kirjoittaja: Joonas Råman