To Access, Cite, Watch, and Share this Presentation:
Ambrose, G. Alex, Railton, Jason (2021) “Evaluating & Understanding the Dual Mode Classroom, Technology & Experience During COVID” University of Texas El Paso Scholarship of Learning Conference.
To watch the 55 min recording click here
To access and comment on the slides click here
Click here to download or zoom in
Citation:
Serafini, Tiziana, , Rouamba, Guieswende, Ambroe, G. Alex (2021) “Translating Authentic Italian Text in a Technology-Enhanced Active Learning Classroom” Midwest Scholarship of Teaching & Learning (SoTL) Annual Conference. Virtual.
Abstract:
Beyond textbook readings: Are you interested to see how learning and teaching transform in a state-of-the-art active learning classroom? Through this poster presentation, you will be able to learn how integrating reading strategies into instruction in an active learning classroom made beginners enthusiastic about reading an authentic book in Italian.
Context:
In the summer of 2017, the University of Notre Dame was awarded a $65K furniture grant from Steelcase Educations’s Active Learning Center. Notre Dame’s Office of Facilities Design and Operations contributed $50k in classroom renovation funding and the Office of Information Technologies $25K in technology funding to renovate Debartolo Hall 232 into a state-of-the-art prototype flexible classroom to maximize interactive learning.
Research Goal:
Increase student confidence in reading authentic texts through instructional strategies in an online platform.
Research Questions:
• RQ1: Does the teaching of reading strategies enable elementary-level learners to successfully understand and translate an authentic Italian text without external aids?
• RQ2: How does technology support the development of reading skills in lower-level classes?
Lit Review:
Over the last few years, the shift toward a communicative classroom has resulted in reading being relegated to “the wayside” (Aski, 2000, p. 495). Despite being “one of the most obvious source of authentic FL language,” (idem) reading is often shunned by teachers and learners alike. Teachers may find it challenging to expose their students to unfamiliar vocabulary and grammatical structures, and students, in turn, may feel frustrated at syntactical and lexical complexity. How to come out of this gridlock? Some researchers chose to focus on text types and reading skills (Lee and Musumeci, 1988, p. 174). They asked whether establishing a hierarchy of text types and a corresponding hierarchy of reading skills constitutes an accurate tool to assess reading performance. Others turned their attention to the learners themselves, and analyzed the relationship between L1 (skill proficiency in ) and L2 (language knowledge) in successful readers (Bernhardt and Kamil, 1995).
Another line of inquiry centers upon cognitive psychology, and examines the ways in which learners and teachers can tackle authentic texts by learning and teaching reading strategies. Carrell and Eisterhold argue that at an elementary level “low-proficiency readers are more word-bound and [..] for them meaning tends to break down at the word level.” (1983). Schulz confirms that low-proficiency readers “engage in word-by-word decoding and translation,” (1983) and are often unable to gain a general understanding of a text. For this reason, Aski proposes teaching elementary-level students those strategies that focus on global meaning (top-down strategies). In contrast to bottom-up strategies, which concentrate on discrete, and oftentimes too challenging linguistic elements, top-down strategies allow readers the possibility to make logical inferences about general aspects of a text. Readers can then use that knowledge as a starting point against which they can test comprehension accuracy.
Is it, however, viable and constructive to also teach bottom-up strategies at a lower level? Is it possible for low-proficiency readers to apply both bottom-up and top-down strategies to an authentic text that is well above their reading level?
Methodology
A combination of quantitative and qualitative analysis.
Scholarly references
Aski, Janice. “Effective Integration of Reading in the Communicative Italian (FL) Classroom,” Italica, 77, No. 4, (Winter 2000): 495-508.
Bernhardt, Elizabeth, and Michael Kamil (1995). “Interpreting Relationships between L1 and L2 Reading:Consolidating the Linguistic Threshold and the Linguistic Interdependence Hypotheses.” Applied Linguistics 16 (1995): 15-34.
Carrell, Patricia, and Joan Eisterhold, “Schema Theory and ESL Reading Pedagogy.” TESOL Quarterly 17(1983): 553-573.
Lee, James and Diane Musumeci, “On Hierarchies of Reading Skills and Text Types.” The Modern Language Journal 72 (1988):173-87.
Ambrose, G. Alex (2019) ” Building Flexible Learning Spaces Utilizing Faculty & Student-Driven Design.” Educause Annual Conference, Chicago, IL
Ambrose, G. Alex (2019) ” Building Flexible Learning Spaces Utilizing Faculty & Student-Driven Design.” Educause Annual Conference, Chicago, IL
Click here for the full slide deck
Click here to enter a virtual tour of a Notre Dame typical and prototype classroom.
Abstract:
The session will open with an introduction and problem identification within the context of higher education. Many IT, facilities management, and registrar units work in silos in designing, building, allocating, managing, and renovating classrooms. Additionally, the problem of missing key stakeholders’ voices (students & faculty) in the learning space design process will be defined. Next, a tour of our active learning classrooms will be provided.
An interactive presentation supported by a digital handout and backchannel will provide a history and evolution of the University of Notre Dame’s learning space research & design methodology. This approach captures faculty and student voices to create data-driven design decisions. Some of the questions we will be able to answer with our framework and tools are: How do you get faculty and student voices into the learning space design process? What do four semesters of learning space evaluation surveys from over a thousand students and dozens of faculty from multiple disciplines tell us? What can we learn from designing and testing medium Active Learning Classroom prototypes to guide future classroom design and budgets? Where do we get the most “bang for the buck” with regard to furniture, technology, or space? What are student/faculty learning space perceptions, recommendations, and impacts? Which data-driven design decisions were made to continually improve our process? What bottom-up partnerships, processes, and guidelines did we develop that were aligned to top-down strategic visions and goals?
Finally, the session will conclude with a Q&A discussion and a return to the digital handout with a review of the backchannel best questions and resource sharing.
Participants will:
Related Posts:
IFALC Poster Presentation on our Learning Space Report Card
Steelcase Active Learning Classroom Grant Report
Photo from the Workshop in the Steelcase Interactive Room
Quick Link here: https://tinyurl.com/2019educauseND
Click here to download and zoom into the infographic poster presentation as a pdf
Click here to enter a virtual tour of a Notre Dame typical and prototype classroom.
Citation:
Ambrose, G. Alex, Burchett, Brian (Aug 2019) “Building Flexible Learning Spaces Utilizing Faculty & Student Driven Design.” International Forum on Active Learning Classrooms (IFALC), University of Minnesota.
Title:
Building Flexible Learning Spaces Utilizing Faculty & Student Driven Design
Abstract:
Many IT, facilities management, and registrar units work in silos in designing, building, allocating, managing, and renovating classrooms. Additionally, the problem of missing key stakeholders’ voices (students & faculty) in the learning space design process will be defined.
How do you get faculty and student voices into the learning space design process? Learn how faculty and student-driven data design can evolve a campus’ learning space design process. We will provide a history and evolution of the University of Notre Dame’s learning space research & design methodology, an approach which captures faculty and student voices to create data-driven design decisions. Some of the questions we will be able to answer with our framework and tools are: How do you get faculty and student voices into the learning space design process? What do four semesters of learning space evaluation surveys from over a thousand students and dozens of faculty from multiple disciplines tell us? What can we learn from designing and testing small, medium, and large Active Learning Classroom prototypes to guide future classroom design and budgets? Where do we get the most “bang for the buck” with regard to furniture, technology, or space? What are student/faculty learning space perceptions, recommendations, and impacts? Which data-driven design decisions were made to continually improve our process? What bottom-up partnerships, processes, and guidelines did we develop that were aligned to top-down strategic visions and goals?
Click here to enter a virtual tour of a Notre Dame typical and prototype classroom. You will notice the 9 key design features that shifted from the typical to the prototype classroom:
-Doubling the density occupancy data from 17.7 to 32.33 square foot per student.
-Replacing rolling single tablet armchairs with varied and flexible tables (1-5 person) and chairs.
-Switching and increasing from a single projector to 4 LCD screens.
-Switching and increasing from 1 chalkboard to 3 marker boards and 30 huddle boards.
-Reconfiguring the room from 1 fixed teaching zone to 4 flexible learning zones.
-Relocating the instructor station from tethered in the front of the room to the rear.
-Reorienting the room from a clear front of the room to no clear front of the room.
-Improving from no BYOD compatibility to floor plugs and power extension cord towers and video cables to connect to screens.
Related Posts:
Steelcase Active Learning Classroom Grant Report
Learning Space Design Experiment Ignite Talk
Ambrose, G. Alex (2019) “Building Flexible Learning Spaces Utilizing Faculty & Student Driven Design.” Steelcase Active Learning Center Grant Report
ABSTRACT
In the summer of 2017, the University of Notre Dame was awarded a $65K furniture grant from Steelcase Educations’s Active Learning Center. Notre Dame’s Office of Facilities Design and Operations contributed $50k in classroom renovation funding and the Office of Information Technologies $25K in technology funding to renovate Debartolo Hall 232 into a state-of-the-art prototype flexible classroom to maximize interactive learning. Over the next two years the team at Notre Dame developed and refined a five-step methodology to evaluate the design impact of our prototype learning space to answer five guiding research questions:
1) How do we assess and visualize the comparison of a prototype learning space to a typical classroom?
2) How were specific learning space design features perceived by faculty and students?
3) Which learning space design dimensions (furniture, technology, or environment) do faculty and students value the most?
4) What are the impacts of the learning space on faculty and students?
5) What were the major challenges and lessons learned from this learning space innovation grant?
The two biggest conclusions from our learning space report card and evaluation survey instrument were a) faculty and students in the prototype gave more than a letter grade higher (C–>B+) than their counterparts in the typical classroom b) seven out of the 9 (77%) of our design feature changes to the prototype classroom had a positive and improved effect on faculty and students.
“From Learning-Centered Design & Research to Evaluating the Impact of Emerging Learning Spaces,” given on 6/19/19 at Steelcase NY, NY.
To watch the 7 min youtube video ignite recording see:
Click here to enter a virtual tour of a Notre Dame typical and prototype classroom. You will notice the 9 key design features that shifted from the typical to the prototype classroom:
-Doubling the density occupancy data from 17.7 to 32.33 square foot per student.
-Replacing rolling single tablet arm chairs with varied and flexible tables (1-5 person) and chairs.
-Switching and increasing from a single projector to 4 LCD screens.
-Switching and increasing from 1 chalkboard to 3 marker boards and 30 huddle boards.
-Reconfiguring the room from 1 fixed teaching zone to 4 flexible learning zones.
-Relocating the instructor station from tethered in the front of the room to the rear.
-Reorienting the room from a clear front of the room to no clear front of the room.
-Improving from no BYOD compatibility to floor plugs and power extension cord towers and video cables to connect to screens.