E‐teacher Challenges and Competences in International Comparative Social Work Courses

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E-teacher Challenges and Competences in International Comparative SocialWork CoursesAnne Karin Larsen a; Robert Sanders b; Andres Arias Astray c; Grete Oline Hole a

a Bergen University College, Norway b Swansea University, UK c Complutense University, Spain

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To cite this Article Larsen, Anne Karin, Sanders, Robert, Astray, Andres Arias and Hole, Grete Oline(2008)'E-teacher Challenges andCompetences in International Comparative Social Work Courses',Social Work Education,27:6,623 — 633

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E-teacher Challenges andCompetences in InternationalComparative Social Work CoursesAnne Karin Larsen, Robert Sanders, Andres Arias Astray& Grete Oline Hole

This paper focuses on how technology used by the Virtual Classroom for Social Work in

Europe (VIRCLASS) enables the development of multimedia learning material, creates a

supportive learning environment for students and teachers, and promotes communica-

tion across national borders. One significant outcome of this programme has been that

the process of developing a common curriculum plan and the learning material has

triggered the development of digital competence on the part of the teachers. The paper

discusses the impact on the teachers’ role of using a Virtual Book with screen lectures,

audio-visual triggers and a video-case.

Two cohorts completed the programme between 2005 and 2007. The discussion of the

development of a new teacher role, where teachers can be seen as a Community of

Learners, is undertaken from a socio-cultural perspective where data from the first cohort

are important as a backdrop for the discussion.

Outlined from the teachers’ experiences, four important e-teacher competences

emerge—facilitator competences, ICT competences, supervision/coaching competences,

and collaboration competences. From this, knowledge, skills and attitudes are explored.

Keywords: International Social Work Education; ICT Competences; Teacher Role;

Teacher Competences; Learning Communities; Teacher Collaboration; Digital Learning

Material; Facilitating Collaborative Learning; Teaching Skills; Teaching Attitudes

Introduction

In a growing and changing globalized scenario, different realities and demands, such

as student diversification, student mobility, a student-centred approach to learning,

Correspondence to: Anne Karin Larsen, Associate Professor, Faculty of Social Education and Social Work, Bergen

University College, Bergen, Norway. Email: [email protected]

Anne Karin Larsen, Bergen University College, Norway; Robert Sanders, Swansea University, UK; Andres Arias Astray,

Complutense University, Spain; Grete Oline Hole, Bergen University College, Norway.

Social Work EducationVol. 27, No. 6, September 2008, pp. 623–633

ISSN 0261-5479 print/1470-1227 online # 2008 The Board of Social Work EducationDOI: 10.1080/02615470802201671

Downloaded By: [ABM Utvikling STM / SSH packages] At: 09:19 11 August 2008

internationalization, and the cost-efficient availability of ICT have led to the

development of innovative pedagogical experiences and initiatives. Online teaching

and learning methods are presented as a complement to, or as an alternative to,

traditional campus studies (Dick et al., 2002; Gibbons & Gray, 2002).

Different aspects related to these educative experiences have been studied and

debated extensively in the field of social work education: computer-mediated

learning, cooperative learning, problem- and evidence-based training, portfolio use,

curricula internationalization, etc. (Cooner, 2005; Frey & Faul, 2005). In this context,

analysis of, and proposals related to, the competence-based model have also been

a central but critical theme in the specialized literature (Kelly & Horder, 2001;

Cox & Hardwick, 2002). While most of the attention has focused on the students’

competences, little has been written about those of the teachers. This is particularly

true when it comes to social work and international e-teaching. The main objective of

this paper is to offer a critical examination of the competences needed (knowledge,

skills and attitudes) and the challenges faced by e-teachers when arranging a

collaborative digital learning environment for international social work students.

This paper presents the experiences of and empirical data generated by the authors

who participated in an international online social work education project called ‘the

Virtual Classroom for Social Work in Europe’ (VIRCLASS) (Larsen & Hole, 2007a,

2007b; Larsen et al., 2007). The VIRCLASS project has been thoroughly evaluated

over the years. An extensive literature review has been conducted, but the limitation

of this paper precludes including this here. The VIRCLASS project is briefly described

and the pedagogical principles and working methods are outlined in contrast to the

teacher role in traditional pedagogy.

VIRCLASS: Pedagogical Principles and Working Methods

VIRCLASS is a collaborative, international educative project that developed the

online academic programmes ‘Social Work in Europe—Commonalities and

Differences’, and ‘Comparative Social Work—European Perspective on Core

Aspects of Social Work’. The courses are offered as options to social work students

in Europe, confer 15 ECTS credits, are graded on a scale of A–F and include various

elements from the Bologna process (Bologna website; Hole & Larsen, 2007). A

detailed description of the study programme can be obtained from http://

www.virclass.net.

Since 2005, three cohorts of students (total number5150) from 15 countries in

Europe and 15 teachers and assessors from 10 European countries have participated.

VIRCLASS works under the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) it’s learning. With

the second cohort, the course launched a Virtual Book (Larsen, 2006), in which

students and teachers can access short screen lectures, triggers and a video case study.

Based on a socio-cultural learning perspective (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Wenger,

1998), e-learning and e-teaching in VIRCLASS are understood as the result of

situated activities and social processes occurring in a community of e-practitioners

and not as the students’ passive acquisition of knowledge from teachers’ instruction.

624 A. K. Larsen et al.


Both learning and teaching are considered active processes of constructing and

reconstructing knowledge, skills, values and attitudes from previous and new

experiences that participants share when they proceed from peripheral to full

participation whilst socializing into the new learning environment.

The overriding concepts of learning in VIRCLASS are creating a virtual learning

environment where students feel inspired, safe and confident; problem-based or

task-oriented learning; cooperation; interaction and dialogue among students

and teachers; self-reflection on learning as a tool for professional development;

transparency and evidence-based writing (Larsen & Hole, 2007a, 2007b).

Method

VIRCLASS has been evaluated using a pragmatic methodological approach (Cresswell,

2007). In this present study, VIRCLASS e-teachers explore how they met the challenges

and developed the necessary competences. Surveys were undertaken of e-teachers who

participated in the first two cohorts of the programme (2005 and 2007), using the

VIRCLASS platform facilities. Each survey was followed up by a structured face-to-face

group interview. The interviews were analysed using Atlas-ti (v.5.0), qualitative data

analysis software. The numbers participating are set out in Table 1.

Findings

For brevity, these findings integrate both survey and meeting material.

E-teachers as Learners

E-teachers discussed how much they learned themselves (about both social work and

learning and teaching) by participating in the programme. This development leads to

a process in which e-teachers and students are learners together, undertaking learning

that is both similar (social work commonalities and differences within the European

context) and different (what it is like to be an e-student; what is required to be an

effective e-teacher).

It was found that the differences and commonalities observed by students about

social work practices between their respective countries, whilst representing

considerable learning, needed to be supplemented by more material coming from

students about the socio–politico–historical contexts accounting for those variations.

‘Why are there these differences?’ was as important to ask as ‘What are the

differences?’

Table 1 E-teacher Participants

Survey Meeting

Cohort 2005 6 9Cohort 2007 7 11

Social Work Education 625


Interpersonal knowledge was considered to be very important. It was felt that both

students and e-teachers needed to share more information about themselves at an

early stage—to make themselves ‘visible’ to others from the outset.

Challenges for E-teachers

A particular challenge for e-teachers is how to create engagement at one step removed,

to establish an active/communicative virtual classroom. Emphasis was placed on the

online chats where students and e-teachers engage in simultaneous exchange of ideas

about issues. These were both valuable and challenging, and important for

establishing a sense of group cohesion. As noted by one e-teacher:

This time I felt that we really succeeded in building a learning community—I couldsee the students as persons, and I also think the students much more felt they werea part of a group. (Discussion 2, Teacher 2—D2, T2).

Planning and preparation for these exchanges was vital—who will be online, at

what time? The ability to be flexible as changing circumstances affected the chats was

essential. A chat with six students was felt to be too many; it was difficult to keep

track of what was going on. Every voice was considered important, and non-

participation in chats caused concern for the e-teachers. The ability to set agendas for

chats and to moderate them was an important skill that needed to be developed. One

or two questions for a chat were enough, and keeping to time was very important (an

hour was sufficient). Letting students have influence in managing the chats (who,

when, etc.) was found to be useful. One e-teacher commented (about the first chat):

I used the chat to let the students tell me their preferences for cooperation withpeer-students, and divided them in groups after this chat. (D2, T3).

Giving online feedback to students proved a challenge for some tutors, requiring

considerable skill to manage.

Both due to the differences in the students’ levels of knowledge and communica-tion skills; but also due to the problems with giving written feedback in English—will students accept this? Sometimes it can be tricky to really know if I get theirmeaning! (D2, T4).

The emphasis in the e-teaching role on supervision, rather than straightforward

instruction was important, and indeed this process was seen as being facilitated by the

availability of much of the digital learning material in the Virtual Book, which freed

the e-teachers to take on a more guiding role. The surveys also provided e-teachers

with an opportunity to comment on the skills acquired in the production of the

Virtual Book. One e-teacher described it as ‘central to the new way teachers have

worked’ (Survey 2). It was seen to increase student motivation and their ‘perception

of the quality and seriousness of the courses offered’. It was seen as a tool to enable

students to make the link between theory and practice.

Developing teaching methods skills (for example, competence-based approach)

required e-teachers to be flexible in the ways that they approached pedagogy and an



openness to try new ways of working. This included developing the skills required to

make short screen lectures, triggers and the case study. In the surveys e-teachers

commented on the new skills in digital technology that they were pleased to be learning

to use, and also focused on how much more comfortable they felt using the existing

VLE technology with the second cohort in 2007. All the e-teachers had to get to grips

with the steep learning curve in using the VLE. E-teachers commented on their

increasing skill in structuring the VLE courses and in producing digital learning

material for the Virtual Book. They expected that these skills would be transferable to

their role as e-teachers on their own campuses.

E-teaching Skills’ Transferability to Campus Teaching

The surveys provided e-teachers with an opportunity to focus on skill transferability,

which is the extent to which the skills of e-teaching might be transferable to their own

campus teaching. Several of the e-teachers referred to the increased emphasis on

using triggers and audiovisual material. One e-teacher planned, as a result of

participating in the programme, to emphasize case study material more in their

campus teaching. A number of e-teachers indicated that e-learning modules were

becoming integrated into their home campus social work curriculum as optional

modules. Several also indicated that knowledge of the social work e-learning courses

had raised the profile of social work within the university, demonstrating excellence

and innovation in teaching of which others were previously unaware.

The increasingly task-centred nature of the programme, as evidenced in the

portfolio approach (developed between 2005 and 2007) was also noted as an area of

developing competence.

Teacher Collaboration and Commitment

E-teachers exchanged views freely and frankly about what they considered to be

important. Highest on the list was the importance of making a commitment in terms

of the time required for the delivery of the programme. Information was obtained

through the surveys about the time the e-teachers contributed. For module 1, which

lasted for nine weeks, the time commitment from teachers for the whole course was

on average just under 120 hours; for module 2, which lasted for 16 weeks, the average

was just over 160 hours. Overall teachers were putting in on average more than 10

hours per week during the time the course was running. This is in addition to

considerable time commitments in terms of course material preparation, liaison with

colleagues and post-course assessment work.

While the programme was running at least daily access to the VLE was considered

necessary, to provide quick responses to student contributions. As noted in relation

to students:

And they felt really lost when they had to wait for a long time. Am I noticed? Is itimportant for me to be here? (D2, T5).



After commitment, the second most important issue addressed was feedback. Being

able to focus on student feedback rather than curriculum development (which

became easier with the second intake) was considered vital. For most e-teachers it was

quite unusual for all students to be given access to the feedback provided to an

individual student. One e-teacher found the open feedback to students very positive,

despite expectations:

I was opposed to feeding-back openly—providing one student feedback so all theothers could see—but I have changed my mind! I’m happy to say that the studentsobviously benefit a lot from looking at the feedback other students get, so, it seemsto work well. (D2, T6).

One reason for this opposition was because it was counter to traditional

practices of providing student feedback which is highly individualized. This

transparency was seen to contribute to a sense of a ‘learning community’ which was

better achieved in the 2007 cohort. There was a stronger sense that students

identified themselves as a group. The ability of students to share values in the

context of the online chats contributed to this emerging sense of a student group

identity. This was also facilitated by the process in which the e-teachers would kick

off the chats, but then let students take more responsibility for the flow of the

discussion as the chat progressed.

Feeding back frequently and in depth, whilst very time consuming for the

e-teachers, was considered very helpful for maintaining student involvement in the

programme. Student retention was a serious problem on the programme (feedback

suggesting this was largely due to the excessive workload demands experienced by

students), and an early contact from the e-teacher to sort out a minor technical

difficulty, or to provide early feedback to the student about material placed on

the platform, could make all the difference between a student continuing or

withdrawing.

E-teachers working together as a team, both within the module and as a group

responsible for the overall programme, was considered very important. Feedback

between teaching colleagues was seen to contribute to this process. E-teacher

collaboration, for the most part, was highly rated and considered to be quite

successful. The majority of e-teachers were very satisfied with their work as an

e-teacher.

Also highly valued by the e-teachers was the emphasis in the second cohort on

multimedia approaches. The Virtual Book, with its case study and triggers, allowed

the students to focus on practice in a very concrete way, providing a better

opportunity for students to integrate theory and practice.

In summary, when analysing the data coming from e-teachers in the surveys and

discussions we find an emphasis on e-teachers as learners in the process working

alongside the students. The challenges that had to be met were related to creating and

maintaining engagement and establishing vibrant communication with, and among,

students in the virtual classroom. Other challenges included moderating chats (and

finding a time when everybody could participate), and giving feedback and



supervising students’ tasks in a transparent classroom. Developing new teaching

methods’ skills and producing digital learning material (e.g. short screen lectures)

required teachers to think in another way about their teacher role. Through extensive

collaboration teachers addressed the time-consuming nature of e-teaching and other

challenges by giving and receiving feedback in an open learning environment.

Working together as a team, when running the courses, was seen as very important

and stimulating.

Discussion

This article focuses on an analysis and examination of the competences needed, and

the challenges faced, by e-teachers in VIRCLASS as contrasted with the traditional

teacher role.

E-teacher roles are substantially different from traditional campus roles

(Laurillard, 2002; Salmon, 2004). Therefore, it follows that some of the competences

needed to succeed as an e-teacher will be different when compared with the

knowledge, skills and attitudes required for on-campus teaching.

Before the courses started, VIRCLASS e-teachers assumed the role of curricula

developers, but this role was carried out within a community of colleagues from

different cultural and academic backgrounds. They needed to agree both on the specific

process of, and tools for, teaching; and on the specific academic contents and intended

learning outcomes. In line with this, and under the same conditions, they also played

the role of multimedia content developers when they worked with the construction of the

screen-lectures, the triggers and the video-case of the Virtual Book.

The traditional didactic style, where the teacher as ‘expert’ gives the necessary

knowledge to the students as one might fill an empty vessel, must be avoided. The

role of the VIRCLASS teacher is not to instruct the students, but to help and support

students by facilitating collaborative learning, enabling them to construct significant

and reflective knowledge, to increase their skills, and to contrast and transform their

attitudes and values when necessary. This facilitator competence, which entails a

constructivist conception of knowledge and learning, has an optimal context in an

educative virtual environment like VIRCLASS (Cooner, 2005), and is also in line with

the more problem- and experience-based approaches to social work education

advocated by many (White et al., 2006). A student-centred approach, unlike

standalone teaching, might both help to bridge the gap between academia and

practice and give students the opportunity to develop broad lifelong learning

competencies (Gibbons & Gray, 2002).

Moreover, and significantly, this latter role implies that teachers, like the students

in the course, are also learners—perhaps with a bit more experience, a little more

reading, and maybe higher degrees, and such, but in the end, yet another apprentice

learning e-teaching ‘by doing’.

In considering the e-teacher competences needed when creating a good virtual

learning environment for social work, the following four competences are important:

Facilitating, ICT, Supervision/Coaching, and Collaboration.



Facilitating a Collaborative and Task-centred Approach to Digital Learning

The experience of simultaneous learning by both e-teachers and students is perhaps

one that is frequently disregarded in traditional thinking about learning and teaching,

but fits in very well with a socio-cultural learning environment perspective. In the

surveys, e-teachers commented on their emerging familiarity with new approaches to

pedagogy—the different ways that students can learn, and the impact of that for their

role as e-teachers.

Because of the way in which students and e-teachers interact with each other, a

competence and task driven approach was felt to be the most appropriate, but a

number of e-teachers were not familiar with this approach from their experiences of

campus teaching. This meant re-thinking ways in which teaching can facilitate

learning, and the use of small units (tasks) provided students with a way of absorbing

the material more easily. It also provided opportunities for students to interact with

each other in a more manageable way, rather than discussing large topics in the

abstract. In effect it helped to make the material more concrete for the students.

Developing ICT Competences

As with any other type of skill development, excellence is achieved through

repetition. It was noted by e-teachers that there was a significant feeling of ease in

terms of handling the material in the second cohort. When developing the digital

learning material in the Virtual Book, teachers had to learn how to make short screen

lectures, construct audio-visual triggers, and write and dramatize a family-client

video case. This provided new virtual learning material to use in the second cohort,

underscoring the necessity for the e-teachers to have an approach that emphasized

not one-time learning (learning once and for all how to do it) but ongoing learning.

An acceptance of the need to continually be prepared to get to grips with newer

technology that is designed to facilitate the learning and teaching process is necessary.

Online access to the audiovisual material also meant that it could be accessed at

will, at times convenient to students, as well as repeatedly (given the range of English

proficiency of the students). Online lectures were also available as pdf-files giving

students dual access to the material (watching it online, and reading it). This is a

significant advantage over the use of audiovisual teaching aids in the classroom

setting.

Supervision and Coaching

VIRCLASS teachers found like other e-teachers that giving feedback online differs

from giving feedback at campus-based learning. This was a time-consuming and

challenging part of the job because of language difficulties, differences in the way

feedback is ordinarily given, and teachers lacking the opportunities for oral feedback.

Transparent feedback is not a common means of supervising students, and was a

challenge, but turned out to be a time saving way of working.



Collaboration and Teamwork

During the development of the curriculum plan and the construction of the course

material, as well as through co-teaching during the running of the courses,

collaboration and teamwork among the e-teachers was necessary and very close. This

has been of utmost importance for creating a committed and enthusiastic partnership

among the teachers, and also a strong commitment to the often very time-consuming

job of an e-teacher. Thus VIRCLASS comprises not only a community of learners but

also a strong community of e-teachers.

As shown, our experiences are in line with others facilitating e-learning in a

collaborative learning environment (Laurillard, 2002; Salmon, 2004; Cooner, 2005;

Huntington & Sudbery, 2005).

Summary of Competences

Table 2 shows a summary of the required competences from VIRCLASS teachers

based upon their experiences over two cohorts of students, outlined in terms of

knowledge, skills and attitudes. When consulting the data less about knowledge is

found, but the knowledge lying behind the teachers’ work has been based upon the

socio-cultural learning perspective and the task-centred approach to learning. In

addition, interpersonal knowledge and personal presentations of both teachers and

students are important for creating a good learning atmosphere. Knowledge about

how to use the VLE and other software promoting teaching and learning, knowledge

about feedback, supervision and coaching methods, and reflection as well as

knowledge about how group and teamwork can enhance dialogue for learning—all

these have provided the knowledge base for the four competences.

Neither of the attitudes concerning teaching and learning are explicitly outlined in

the data, but the activities can be translated in terms of the following values. Students

are actively participating learners and beliefs about equality and respect make

students and teachers learners together. Enthusiasm, courage and creativity towards

digital learning and the use of ICT open new possibilities to international

collaboration in social work education. The principle of transparency as well as the

student-centred approach to learning enable the students’ voice to be heard and

respected, and the teachers’ transparency of feedback opens the possibility for

teachers to learn from each other. Collaborative learning is built on the belief that

knowledge is constructed by dialogue and collaboration among people.

The required skills are more explicitly expressed by the teachers and presented in

the findings summarized in Table 2.

Conclusion

Clearly, more research needs to be added to clarify competences needed for

e-teachers in social work education. We hope that the contributions from the

VIRCLASS partners presented here will contribute to further development and



discussions about the e-teacher role in social work education and stimulate

discussions more generally about pedagogy in social work education, and in

particular, the principles of learning drawn upon in our institutions. As noticed

the transferability from e-teaching strategies to campus teaching is possible and

teachers have a lot to gain from taking the stand as apprentice learners, learning

e-teaching ‘by doing’.

Table 2 E-teacher Competences

Competences Knowledge Skills Attitudes

Facilitatorcompetences(Student-centredteachingcompetences)

N Socio-culturallearning perspective

N Skills in developing goodtriggers and tasks thatcontributes to learning

N The students areactive participatinglearnersN Task-centred

approach tolearning

N Skills in making personalpresentation by using theVLE

N Students andteachers are learnerstogetherN Interpersonal

knowledge N Communication skills N Equality and respectN Awareness andattention to theimportance of quickresponse to studentswork and requests

ICT competences N About VLE andother softwarepromoting teachingand learning

N Ability choosing the righttools suitable for specificeducational purposes

N Openness, courageand creativitytowards digitallearning and creativeuse of ICT

N Making digital learningmaterial

N ICT opens newpossibilities tointernationalcollaboration inSocial WorkEducation

N Using available Internetresources

N Chat moderating skills

Supervision/Coachingcompetences

N Knowledge aboutsupervision,coaching methodsand reflection

N Skills in creatingengagement

N Let the studentsvoice be heard andrespectedN Skills in giving

constructive writtenfeedback

N Skills in different ways ofstimulating students workand reflection on learning

N Openness amongstteachers, as wellamongst students –learning from eachother(Transparency)N Ability to empower students

Collaborationcompetences

N Knowledge aboutgroup and teamworking andmethods to triggercommunication anddialog in e-learning

N Skills in different ways ofusing the VLE forcommunication, like;Chat, discussion room,bulletin board

N The belief thatknowledge isconstructed bydialogue andcollaborationbetween humanbeings

N Allocate time forcollaboration

N Interpersonalknowledge

N Set up decision makingin groups

N A group orientedattitude



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E‐teacher Challenges and Competences in International Comparative Social Work Courses

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Transcript of E‐teacher Challenges and Competences in International Comparative Social Work Courses