Services (2010 - 2012)
Our services cover assistance in planning, implementation, evaluation and scholarly dissemination of innovative learning designs.
- Assistance in planning
- Implementation
- Evaluation
- Scholarly dissemination of innovative learning designs
We offer design services to individual teachers or groups of teachers who are interested in redesigning aspects of their students' learning experience. This might involve a small section of one course or a strategy that might be used in a number of courses. Good teachers have a clear purpose in mind. They teach with intention. They organize their learning materials and activities and assessment strategies with care so as to ensure alignment with the learning outcomes they wish students to attain. A learning design is a clear description of how the course will be organized. It is more than just a course outline which describes the elements of the course; it has a much greater level of granularity than a course outline. We would ensure that when a teacher wants to try out something new s/he has everything well organized.
We have first-hand experience in using a number of effective teaching and learning strategies. We are mostly willing to share our experiences with colleagues and are also always pleased to explore new possibilities. Planning service usually takes the form of consultation meetings.
We also support careful monitoring of the innovation. Implementation service usually takes the form of formative evaluations - in other words, the monitoring ensures that teachers understand positive and negative aspects of their innovative strategies as early as possible when there is still time for improvement in the remainder of the course.
We are prepared to offer the following assistance if teachers desire.
- Class observation: particularly in classroom activities, the project team members may observe the ongoing of the class and then give comments
- Short survey(s): the project team can prepare the short questionnaire to be used, administer the survey and then compile quick results for the teachers
- Quick chat with selected students: as independent third-party, the project team can talk to a number of the students how they feel about the innovative strategies under concern and then report to teachers
Summative evaluation enables teachers to understand whether the innovative strategies have achieved the intended learning outcomes. We are prepared to offer the following assistance if desired.
- Survey(s): the project team can prepare the questionnaire to be used, administer the survey and then compile quick results for the teachers.
- Focus group meetings: as independent third-party, the project team can talk to a number of the students how they feel about the innovative strategies under concern and then report to teachers.
- Performance-type data: we can also work with the teachers to collect evidence about achievement of various expected learning outcomes. Strategies may include pre and post test or contrast of the performance of student cohorts with or without the innovations.
Scholarship of teaching
We assist teachers to disseminate their work in academic conferences or journals. Work in this area includes literature search, suggestion of writing angles, writing up pre-drafts, and suggesting places to publish work.
Other dissemination
We also assist teachers to disseminate their work in CUHK workshops and events, as well as in local media if appropriate.