Situation

  • Ileana de la Teja

  • Karin Lundgren-Cayrol

PID_00148218
All rights reserved. Reproduction, copying, distribution or public communication of all or part of the contents of this work are strictly prohibited without prior authorization from the owners of the intellectual property rights.

1.Introduction

Government training has traditionally been given as face-to-face (F2F) seminars, workshops, training modules, tutorials or oral or written news briefs. The internet has drastically changed this way of informing and training, and most government agencies today have their own website where information and training courses are posted and delivered. Although online training offered an interesting solution to reach employees that could not attend a class, it soon became evident that some benefits of face-to-face learning were missing, and that a mix of online and F2F training could be a better solution. However, changing delivery modality also includes changing instructional strategies as well as using a plethora of different media. This is where principles of blended learning design appear to be needed.
As many organizations, the National Government Training Department (NGTD) is interested in enhancing the effectiveness of the training services they provide to government managers and employees in country as well as distributed around the world. Therefore, they would like to know more on the blended learning approach. What is blended learning (BL)? Why, when, and how to implement it?
In search of an answer to these questions, the NGTD has launched an offer of services open to consultants to take on the challenge of informing on the state-of-the-art of blended learning best practices. The mandate will result in a report that would help to taking informed decisions on the design, development and delivery of courses using BL.
The NGTD notes that consultants working on this mandate need to have good working knowledge of Instructional Design, and in particular of the ADDIE instructional design process. A senior instructional designer at the NGDT will supervise the work with the consultants. The supervisor will lead, facilitate, give feedback and mark all the work carried out by each consultant (you as a student) appointed to the mandate.

2.Training Conditions

As part of the information provided to you in the context of the mandate is a description of the training conditions at the NGDT. In brief, courses given at the government aims at equipping civil servants with better language skills, i.e., to improve writing, presentation and synthesis, cultural issues, ethics in the workplace, but also many courses in human relations such as leadership, conflict resolution and team work. The latter are higher level skills and often demands collaborative instructor led units of learning in face-to-face settings. However, they also demand that students read up on theoretical issues regarding these skills, which in turn are well fitted to autonomous online learning.
To teach conflict resolution and leadership skills, case studies and role playing techniques are often used. In general, these courses are offered during the fall, winter and spring. A full course usually last about 8 weeks, including introductory and closing sessions. Civil servants are not graded but must submit, on a yearly basis, a progress report informing the employer on which courses they have completed. Civil servants employed by the NGDT are also evaluated by the Manager. This evaluation is based on their performance according to their job description's competency profile. The common core competency profile includes 8 groups of competencies for civil servants' in general.

  • Legislation –Able to read legal documents

  • Analysis – Demonstrate clear thinking and sound analytical skills

  • Evaluation – Able to consider issues and their practical and political impact

  • Teamwork – Able to work flexible as a part of a team

  • Interpersonal skills – Demonstrate effective leadership and ability to resolve appropriately a conflict in the work place, may it be of cultural, ethical or other nature.

  • Synthesis – Effectively, efficiently and adequately briefly describe new situations

  • Language and presentation – Effectively and clearly express opinions and ideas both orally and in writing

  • Adaptability – Able to adapt to change

There are ten (10) obligatory courses offered yearly assuring the fundamental competences of a Civil Servant. There are about 50 workshops offered every year dealing with practical issues within the domain of human relations.

3.The Mandate

Your mandate, as an appointed consultant is to produce a report including the following points:
1) A working definition of blended learning
2) Main characteristics of different types of blended learning
3) Advantages and limits of the use of blended learning
4) A synthesis of major design principles for blended learning
5) A blended learning scenario for a 15 hour Workshop on Conflict Resolution
6) An annotated bibliography for blended learning
7) An introduction and a conclusion that encapsulates the outcomes from each activity. The report should incorporate your opinions and recommendations to implement blended learning in a government setting.
Deadline:
The mandate has to be fulfilled within six weeks after the appointment of the consultant. It is intended to involve between 25 to 30 hours of work.
Target population of the report:
The readers of your report are expected to be instructional designers working for the NGTD who are familiar with ID language and the ADDIE process. Their goal is to design effective blended learning solutions for any type of training sessions in their department.
Strategy:
A set of 7 activities will help you answer to the demands made in the mandate. The outcomes of the activities will form the body of the expected final report. You are asked to put each outcome into your e-Portfolio (Gmail document), which is also accessible by the Supervisor, who will give you feedback and marks.
The activities are organized into 3 sections:
1) Preparing your Case
2) Analyzing the Case
3) Solving the Case
Each activity contains:

  • Competencies to develop in the course (including the transversal competencies)

  • Objectives

  • Project Management Tasks

  • Task list

  • Guiding questions to facilitate the reading of the case

  • Situation (information on the case to analyze and upon which the report will be built)

  • Expected outcomes

  • Resources and references to help answering the questions and produce /present the outcome of the activity

Depending upon to the activity, you might be required to search additional resources and references and add them the annotated bibliography that is part of the final report.

4.General Course Resources

The resources refer to documents and tools accessible through links that will help you get a broader understanding of the case and the theoretical underpinnings of blended learning. Your essential kit of resources is the following:
Management: Outlook or Gmail calendar, task progression tool.
To manage the project, you will use a calendar of your choice (e.g.: Outlook or Gmail Calendar). This will allow you to keep an agenda and enter deadlines that you need to keep, either as prescribed by the course or for your personal aims.
The task progression tool is a Word document created to let you tick off what you have or have not done at a regular interval during the course. It is another way of keeping you on the track and not to procrastinate. It will also help you understand what takes more time because of your previous experience and knowledge base and thus help you adjust your agenda to better fit your rhythm.
Storage and Presentation: Gmail Document as an ePortfolio and annotated bibliography
To collect the information of your report you will use an ePortfolio. The ePortfolio will provide evidence of your ID project's development and will include project documentation such as checklists, definition, examples, etc. The Gmail document feature allows you to create an evolving document and to make it available to the Supervisor and or other colleagues. It is suggested that you open two documents, one for the ePortfolio and one for the annotated bibliography. You might want to use these documents separately, and only collate them while writing the final Report. The ePortfolio includes different sections that correspond to the outcomes of each activity. The sections are as follows:

  • Working Definition

  • Main characteristics

  • BL Types

  • ID Principles

  • Contextual Considerations

  • Example Scenario

  • Bibliography

Based on your work that will help build your ePortfolio, you will be able to prepare a Report (section 4.1.2).
Annotated Bibliography: use a word document and add into the ePortfolio
A standard way for professionals around the world to present a bibliography and include references is provided by the American Psychology Association. It is called he APA style. You are required to use this standard in your bibliography. For more information on the APA style, consult this website www.apastyle.org. The following sections are especially helpful:
The 6th edition of the APA guide comes out on July 1, 2009. You can get an overview at http://www.apastyle.org/whatsnew.html.
The Annotated bibliography should contain an APA style reference and a brief description including the argument (75 to 150 words).
Here is an example:
McIvor, S. D. (1995). Aboriginal women's rights as "existing rights." Canadian Woman Studies/Les Cahiers de la Femme 2/3, 34-38.
This article seeks to define the extent of the civil and political rights returned to aboriginal women in the Constitution Act (1982), in its amendment in 1983, and in amendments to the Indian Act (1985) (1) . This legislation reverses prior laws that denied Indian status to aboriginal women who married non-aboriginal men. On the basis of the Supreme Court of Canada's interpretation of the Constitution Act in R. v. Sparrow (1991), McIvor argues that the Act recognizes fundamental human rights and existing aboriginal rights, granting to aboriginal women full participation in the aboriginal right to self-government (2) .
For more information, please see Knott, D. (2008). Writing an Annotated Bibliography. Retrieved on June 13, 2009, from http://www.writing.utoronto.ca/advice/specific-types-of-writing/annotated-bibliography
Notes and Reflection: Blog
It is recommended that you use a personal blog in order to note questions, ideas and opinions during the course. This way of keeping a 'journal' of thoughts can be very useful at the end, to compose the final Report. If you are working in collaboration with other students, you may invite them to comment on your ideas, opinions and or suggestions.
Here is a definition of 'Personal blogs":
"The personal blog, an ongoing diary or commentary by an individual, is the traditional, most common blog. Personal bloggers usually take pride in their blog posts, even if their blog is never read by anyone but them. Blogs often become more than a way to just communicate; they become a way to reflect on life or works of art. Blogging can have a sentimental quality. Few personal blogs rise to fame and the mainstream, but some personal blogs quickly garner an extensive following. A type of personal blog is referred to as 'microblogging', which is extremely detailed blogging as it seeks to capture a moment in time."
Retrieved June 13, 2009 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
Support:
Technical support
Learning environment: UOC technical staff
Other tools see their websites for help (examples of these tools are FAQ's and tutorials).
Content support

  • A facilitator is appointed to assist you with feedback on graded productions, and methodological advice on how to carry out all tasks. This person will play de role of Supervisor of the Mandate.

  • The UOC online library is to your disposal

  • Internet Search

  • Online resources for each activities

Outcomes and evaluation:
Course Section
Outcome
Weight
Preparing the Case
Definition, Main characteristics, Types of Blends
25%
Analyzing the Case
ID principles, Contextual Training Information
25%
Reporting the Case
Example Scenario and Final Report
40 %
Evaluating the Case
Course Evaluation
Personal Learning
10%