Abstract:
This project aims is to adopt new media in the curriculum for experiential and reflective learning in the context of understanding the political, social, economic and cultural dynamics in Hong Kong. By asking students to apply different forms of new media such as face timing, Skype, blogging, video-recording on their projects, students will be able to understand the process of civic engagement in a pro-active and engaging manner. Students will put their projects on the department website and can also go live on the department portal for their projects. The project will also provide a template to demonstrate how to use new media to promote independent self-learning and problem-solving technique. Through this project, we attempt to raise students’ awareness towards their surrounding and knowing that they are part of this society and they should care because they can.
There is a growing trend in combining new media with teaching and learning. In U.S, a number of universities are already adopting new media in their teaching and learning experience. In Coursera.org, for example, there are already 62 prestigious universities collaborating with this site to offer new media learning for a novel pedagogical experience. Woodie Flowers, the MIT professor also stress that “[a] change in the basic vehicle used for learning, from archetypical courses, lectures and textbooks to interactive electronically portable media, could be the seed for position change in our entire education system” (2002:94).
Code:
T0121
Principal Project Supervisors:
Keywords provided by authors:
Subjects:
Start Date:
01 Sep 2013
End Date:
31 Aug 2014
Status:
Completed
Result:
The project team finished the portal in August and had encouraged students to engage themselves into posting on the web portal. Students began to post their feelings as well as their finished products on the portal.
The result shows that in the process of civic engagement, offline experience is still the major tool in enhancing the effectiveness of learning experience. Online learning takes more a role in allowing students to reflect on their learning experience. It also enables them to appreciate more as the context is more than a routine handing in assignment process.
As the project team had not conducted some formal researches (e.g focus groups), the team is yet to formally gauge its effectiveness. However, based on informal conversation, students tend to think this is a good idea.
Impact:
The project is to encourage students to connect with the outside communities. Through active engagement and exploratory studies, students will have an in-depth understanding towards the current issues happening in the community. Students will grow in their awareness of their potential and power through using new media as their platform in experiencing civic life. At the same time, the project also allows the outside to learn about Hong Kong Institute of Education as a vibrant tertiary institute that is actively seeking opportunities to connect with the outside world.
For example, students from both the internship and the experimentation of the civic engagement projects with the asylum-seekers and refugees have been told to write on the portal on reflecting to what extent their experiential learning has impacted on the view of the life of the asylum-seekers. Students reflected that the offline experiential learning has allowed them to know something that they have never known before – that there are actually asylum-seekers and refugees in Hong Kong and they are from different parts of the world. They have also reflected by engaging with them, they understand how they are interacting with the community and how their existence has impacted the community as well.
Deliverables:
Seminars/Presentations/Sharing Sessions
Ms Isabella Ng. (2014, December). Presentation of “New Media for an Active, Engaging Reflective and Experiential Learning” at the Seminar on Teaching Development Grant (TDG) projects (2). The Hong Kong Institute of Education, Hong Kong. (No. of participants: 4)
Financial Year:
2012-13
Type:
TDG