Complete thesis - Murdoch University

in the context of implementing CreativePBL.7.2.3 What actually happenedThe timetabling of the classes did not change from 2002 – sessions of two hours durationtwice a week (Tuesday morning and Thursday afternoon, allowing students time for theself-directed learning required by the process in between).In order to ensure the teams had the opportunity to integrate, the students were initiallyprovided with a very small problem to define. This problem introduced them to the MurSoftenvironment, and also served the purpose of introducing PBL, making it explicit and therefore‘open’. Web-based support material was indicated, and the class as a whole worked throughthe problem with the teacher, visiting each phase of the PBL process (how the phase was‘entered’, what was to be achieved, how it could be tackled, what needed to be producedat the end of it). Students are also given some little time to familiarise themselves withaspects on group dynamics and teamwork (since the rest of semester was to be spent oncollaborative tasks), and with the lecturer, who takes on the role of academic consultant(not the client, but a resource students have access to), providing scaffolding and othersupport for the completion of the problems. This process occupied the first two workshopsessions. Most students completed this task relatively easily – in effect what was offered wasa mini-apprenticeship, with the process modelled and discussed. However, unlike previousyears, some students had not been aware that the unit was ‘different’ – in particular thearticulation students were confronting their first semester at the University with all theirother units taught traditionally, and they were unprepared for ENG206.Session three to eight were not as smooth as the first sessions had indicated they mightbe. Once students had to grapple with the PBL mode, they floundered (don’t know whatis going on; hard to follow 1 ). Each phase of the PBL process caused them problems. Thefirst issue, encountered during session three, was to try to identify the learning objectivesin the problem (what do I need to know?). Students did not know what to look for. Toease this problem, keywords in the triggers were highlighted, so for example a memo thatstated it would be appropriate for your people to prepare a project scope for us might highlight‘project scope’. Students could use the web topics and textbook to gain an understanding of a‘scope’ (phase 2 of the PBL process). However, even these resources caused problems (Week4 comments included on-line material is too confusing; on-line material not uniform/notorganised; website is a bit messy; webpage needs to be streamlined), although no changeshad been made to those pages. Some students did manage to navigate the resources by1 Student comments (in italics) drawn from Year surveys304