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0024 PK: PechaKucha 1
The value of ‘soft skills’ for blended learning
Authors
Liz Bennett
Jane Wormald
Ian Findlay
Theme
Making things happen
Tags
blendedLearning,
criticalFriendships, onlineLearning,
RogerianPrinciples
When a traditionally face to face course was redesigned for limited day
school contact supported with online methods, the teaching team wanted to
ensure that the ‘soft skills’ of group work and critical friendships were not
lost in the new model. This presentation reports on how the team planned
and implemented activities that supported the formation and development
of critical friendship groups. Rogerian principles of empathy, openness,
transparency, equality, respect, communication, honesty, integrity, maturity
and commitment underpinned setting up and nurturing the groups (1965).
The groups’ tasks included reviewing a draft version of an assignment. They
also were asked to share resources with other members of the group and
to explore the value that other students’ skills and knowledge bring to the
learning process. Online tools including email and wiki were used alongside
the institutional VLE. The paper describes and analyses the activities for the
blended learning model. Careful planning was required to avoid becoming
focused on delivery of material and losing the social and informal aspects of
learning. Critically face to face time was allocated to discussing the value of
the friendship groups using Tuckman’s model of group processes to inform
this process (1965). The paper is particularly relevant to other practitioners
moving to ‘blended model’ of learning where there is limited face to face
contact and increased use of technological tools to support the learning
process.
References
Rogers, C. R. (1951) Client-Centered Counselling. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Tuckman, B. (1965)
“Developmental sequence in small groups”. Psychological Bulletin 63 (6): 384–99
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