A Study of Teacher-Student Collaboration on Course Design with Technology at Wenzao Ursuline College of Languages in Taiwan

  • Yachen Kao

    Student thesis: Doctoral ThesisDoctor of Philosophy

    Abstract

    To survive in the continuously changing information environment, many institutions in Taiwan have increased their demand for technologically literate faculty. To date, few faculty of Wenzao Ursuline College of Languages (WUCL) consider themselves well prepared to create effective web-based learning resources. The problem is that developing high-quality web-based learning resources and maintaining online communication will increase faculty's workload and create additional time demands on faculty who are already overburdened with traditional face-to-face instruction involving large class sizes. If the amount of time spent on designing web-based learning resources could be reduced, faculty would have more time to manage online interactions with students as well as to track students' learning progress. This study developed a teacher-student collaboration model to assist WUCL faculty to create effective web-based multimedia instruction resources. The goal of the study was to create a teacher-student collaborative learning culture that transcends the one-size-fits-all approach that has hitherto failed to facilitate faculty professional development with technology. A case study was conducted to obtain a deeper understanding of the partnerships of WUCL discipline faculty and students, as they participated together in a technology-related course design activity. In addition, discovering evidence from multiple sources that were aligned with the emerging themes was used to negate research bias and enhance the exploration of multiple perspectives. In addition, presenting WUCL faculty participants' experiences in working with students resulted in an authentic perspective and created a deeper and richer understanding of a situated technology professional development. The results of the study contribute to WUCL administrators' understanding of the role of students as catalyst for faculty development in technology as well as how and what discipline faculty learned to integrate technological with pedagogical and content knowledge through students' help.
    Date of AwardJan 1 2011
    Original languageEnglish
    SupervisorLing Wang (Supervisor), Martha Marie Snyder (Advisor) & Helen St. Aubin (Advisor)

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