A Very Big Adventure

1
A Very Big Adventure

• Using the Moodle to enable multi-institutional
  collaboration in teaching computer ethics
• Joe Griffin, Dept of CSIS, University of
  Limerick, Ireland

2
Overview

• Fundamental questions
• Subject domain
• Multi-institutional approach
• Collaborative Learning
• How Moodle was used
• Future research ideas

3
Some fundamental questions

• How do you motivate students?
• How do you make learning a very big adventure?
• What happens when students collaborate?
• How do you ensure learning takes place?

4
PISE

• Professional Issues in Software Engineering
• The legal, ethical and social consequences of
  the design, development and use of computer
  systems
• Objective
• To encourage students to develop the ethical
  foundations of good professional practice in
  computing
• A major theme is the relationship between ethics
  and the legal and social consequences of being a
  computer professional

5
Multi-institutional approach

• Previous study focused on the use of
  collaborative learning involving students from
  three institutions using Bb
• University of Limerick, Ireland
• Sacred Heart University, USA
• de Montfort University, England
• This study involved two universities, UL and
  University of East London (UEL).
• Courses had similar focus
• Pedagogical approach was teaching and learning
  collaboratively in groups

6
Why Collaborative Learning?

• Collaboration with other students has been shown
  to stimulate activity, make learning more
  realistic and to stimulate motivation
• Research has also shown that moral dilemmas in
  computer ethics encourage group discussion
• Teamwork encourages social facilitation, better
  learning and higher cognitive skills
• Groups can produce better solutions to moral and
  ethical problems than individuals
• Collaborative learning supported by instructional
  technology can lead to deeper understanding and
  new knowledge creation

7
Problems with Collaborative Learning

• A major problem with the use of group-based
  approaches is individual assessment
• Free-Riding some individuals gain more (in
  terms of grades) than they have put into the
  process (this grows more problematic with larger
  groups)
• Domination by the stronger students

8
Moodle use

• Management self-organisation of students into
  groups, selection of topics, tutorial times and
  presentation times
• Accessing learning materials and other resources
• Communication
• lecurer to lecturer
• lecturer to student
• student to lecturer
• student to student
• Collaboration using self-regulated discussion
  groups
• Assessment of individual contributions

9
Moodle activities

• Groups
• Forums
• News
• Social
• Case study
• Glossary
• Resources
• Plain text
• Uploaded file
• Web link
• Web page

10
Topics

• Introduction and socialisation
• Forming groups
• First glossary entry
• Upload group minutes
• Interim reports

11
Assessing contributions

• Quantity
• 186,000 forum views
• Rated
• Analysis of cognitive presence Garrison et al,
  2001
• Triggering
• Exploration
• Integration
• Resolution
• Grading of threaded discussions

12
Future work

• Repeat cycle with new collaborators
• Extend network to involve universities from Asian
  countries (EU/Asia fund)
• Develop more exercises for virtual learning
  community establishment and sustainability
• Incorporate more activities (journal, workshop)
  to enhance collaborative learning

13
Contact details

• Joe Griffin
• Department of Computer Science and Information
  systems
• University of Limerick
• Limerick
• Ireland
• Email joe.griffin_at_ul.ie