Intranet for Split Location - Report Example

Running Head: RESEARCH REPORT ON INTRANET FOR SPLIT LOCATION Research Report on Intranet for Split Location Schools (November 23, 2006) Assigned by: Compiled by: Abstract Expanding economic activities and prosperity have greatly enhanced the demand for seats in good schools. Traditional one-site schools are finding the need to expand into multi locations and at the same time are faced with budgetary constraints in replicating all the needed resources in more than one site. This is leading to insufficient time for the teaching staff to interact among themselves and non-development of collective wisdom on teaching and learning experiences in that school. Advent of computers, growth of information technology and the Internet communication technologies now make it possible to overcome this lacuna. Intranet facility for all locations of a school greatly enhances the utilisation of existing resources, enables interactive student activity and improves the utilisation of time by the staff. Sharing of resources implies an exchange of information, to achieve or to improve the present teaching and learning environment, which also fosters an ethos of widening participation, teamwork, human development and above all, progression in learning. Intranet facilitates this sharing culture. Table of Contents Section Page No. 1. Introduction 3 i. Subject 3 ii. Purpose of report 3 iii. Scope 3 iv. Plan of development 3 v. Background 4 vi. Key Concepts… 4 II. Data Section 5 i. What is a good teaching strategy? 5 ii. Valuable resources, teamwork and sharing 6 a. Distance and resource constraint 6 b. Closeness and teamwork 6 c. Organisation and its influence on individuals 7 d. Owning and sharing 7 e. Peer assessment and its limitations 8 f. Participation 9 g. Fear of technology and the resultant aversion to sharing / participation 9 iii. Oral and written communications 10 iv. Limits to resources 11 v. Evaluating results of academic work 11 vi. Problem areas summarised 11 vii. Intranet 12 III. Methodology 12 IV. Achieving the research objectives 13 The research question 14 V. Summary and recommendations 14 Would sharing resources via a school Intranet, improve teaching and learning strategies in an upper school functioning on a split site? I. Introduction Changing times bring about changing needs and teaching profession is no exception. Traditionally, educational institutions formulated their strategies and budgeted resources for achieving uniformly good results, year after year. These resources were the trained faculty and other staff, libraries, physical infrastructure and programmes. With rising demand for school seats coupled with ever-new courses, many institutions are opening up branches in new locations even as budget constraints remain in the forefront. This situation can lead to differences in students’ achievements in different locations, which is not desirable. i. Subject This paper examines if sharing of resources via a school Intranet can improve teaching and learning strategies for high schools operating on split sites. ii. Purpose This report is prepared for the purpose of recording the findings of an analytical study as well as a cross section of opinions gathered on the subject from colleagues and can be used for decision making on improving the current Intranet facility. iii. Scope This report briefly reviews the essential elements of a traditional school environment, and the changed needs in the current times. It examines the advantages of going in for Intranet facility for the purpose of sharing of resources and the improvements, which can be expected. iv. Plan of development a. This report gives a brief overview of the traditional resources / their utilisation in schools. b. It examines the concepts of teamwork, motivation and sharing in the background of overcoming challenges posed by split location sites and the inevitable commuting. c. Brief description of the new technological tool, viz., the Intranet is given along with options available for confidential matters to be accessed only by authorised personnel and those for use freely by the students and the staff. d. Advantages of going in for Intranet facility and recommendations are cited. v. Background I currently teach Design and Technology at a secondary school functioning on three separate campuses in Oxfordshire. The technology department is the third largest department, developing curriculum for 1500 main school students and 500 Sixth Form students. Due to retirements there have been several changes to staffing and timetables within the technology department. These changes have highlighted apparent differences in teaching and learning resources on two sites (KS3 and KS4) to which the staff must travel, and how the teachers communicate or function within the department. This also highlights the role or influence of the organization in improving communication and the learning environment across three separate sites. The research question is therefore associated with sharing resources via a school Intranet, to improve teaching and learning strategies in an upper school functioning on split locations. vi. Key concepts & underlying themes to improve teaching and learning strategies and how ‘resource sharing’ impacts them. A] The Organisational culture B] Teamwork, people working together C] Motivation and its link to feeling valued, ownership and progression Whilst extensive secondary research exists on motivation by Daines et al (1992), Maslow (1943, 1954), and Petty (1998), there is little research as to how motivation, either intrinsic or extrinsic, is influenced by sharing or competitiveness. Similarly, little secondary research has been found in the field of how the sharing of resources would improve teaching and learning strategies. Methodology for this aspect of the project will therefore consist mainly of primary research techniques using interviews, discussions and questionnaire and the relationships within the technology department. II. Data Section i. What is a good teaching strategy? Reece et al (2004. p.36) define a good teaching strategy as, “…a purposeful combination of student activities supported by the use of appropriate resources to provide a particular learning experience and / or to bring about desired learning.” The key phrase here is ‘purposeful combination’ - that is a strategy of combining student activity with the available resources. This can best be achieved by enabling all students, irrespective of their location, to gain the same learning experience by providing access to common valuable resources, which permit interactive and self-learning process. Interaction involves among other things, quick and easy exchanges between the teacher and the taught – whether they are in a face-to-face situation or not. ii. Valuable resources, teamwork and sharing From the students’ perspective, the most valuable resource on a school premises is the teacher. Everything else is secondary. This being so, in order to achieve uniformly good results, students in different locations of an institution must be exposed to the ‘shared teaching experiences’ of their teachers while the teachers themselves must be aware of ‘shared learning experiences’ of the students! In other words, there should be constant interaction among the teachers about ‘teaching’ on the one hand, and about ‘student learning experiences’ in their respective classes, on the other. Libraries and reference books are among the other important resources on a school premises. As academic achievements are being gained with the help of teachers and libraries, the students also learn a great deal about their environs and the society at large, its value systems, etc. This takes place, like osmosis, in the very fact of being together, chatting, playing and sharing. Students’ common rooms, hostel and mess facilities, playgrounds and the like are the venues for this growing up and learning. a) Distance and resource constraint When discussing better practices, the consensus of staff opinion aired at a recent staff meeting (14th Nov., Tape 1) was that differences in resources were largely believed to be the result of geographical arrangement - problems of distance, commuting and time. Colleagues who teach on more than one site also cited problems of travelling between lessons, which compounded the problem of staff communication, teamwork and feedback on individual students and a reduction in time to prepare not only lessons but also workshops for practical lessons. b) Closeness and teamwork As a species, we inherently need a comfortable degree of closeness in order to trust the person we communicate with. Maslow (Fawbert, 2003. p.68) describes these needs as ‘physiological needs’. Maslow also implies that until these fundamental needs are met, more complex working relationships with others may not manifest. Informal interviews with both travelling and stationary colleagues suggest that the absence of ‘closeness’ or proximity is responsible for the phenomenon of autonomous sites functioning independently of each other, at the cost of academic excellence. Colleagues concerns with issues of communication, teamwork, student feedback and resources might be the symptoms developed from the sense of un-closeness or remoteness. With further research, this may link to the absence of teamwork or to the small group projects developing shortcomings in trust and motivation. The influence to be researched is that of distance being possibly responsible for developing a sense of unhealthy competition between the three sites, which may have adversely affected staff morale also. c) Organisation and its influence on individuals Handy (1999. p.34) argues, “We are primarily motivated by economic needs. We are essentially passive animals to be manipulated, motivated and controlled by the organisation.” This implies that an organisation has greater influence upon the individual than first expected. Arguably to develop motivation and / or morale, individuals need to feel that they are part or a valued member of the organisation. This also lends itself to the belief that individuals need a closeness in order to feel valued and in turn trust others. d) Owning and sharing Competitiveness seems to have an effect on motivation / moral and the individual’s willingness to ‘share’. It may also be responsible for the promotion or ethos of independent players rather than team players within the department. One colleague highlighted current attitudes towards sharing thus: “I spend many hours, sometimes days or even weeks, developing a particular resource, only to have it copied by other colleagues.” Clearly the ability to copy easily generates a sense of loss within the individual as time spent developing the resource fosters feelings of ownership. It also generates a feeling of reluctance in developing future resources and a further reluctance to share. From these comments I can conclude that it is not only important to continually acknowledge the source of materials, but also necessary to protect them. Placing the contributor’s name on the resource and storing the original on a PDF file on the school’s Intranet can achieve this - providing acknowledgment, accessibility and security to the individual teacher and the resource. e) Peer assessment and its limitations When moderating GCSE coursework, projects are exchanged which provides a window for assessing one’s own student work in comparison to ‘the other sites’. My colleague recently (3rd Nov., Tape 5) disclosed: “This form of peer assessment develops a competitive spirit between East & West”. The same staff member later said, “There shouldn’t be any competition between us. If a group of students, for whatever reason, had a bad year everyone automatically assumes that the teacher was to be blamed and this is not correct. The teacher shouldn’t be graded by the learners’ exam. Results alone.” This statement reflects not only the sense of rivalry or competition between the two sites; it also highlights how assumptions and therefore misconceptions are made in relation to examination results and student coursework. This may, however, be the feelings of one teacher and may not reflect the majority of teachers within the department. When asked, “Would you put the resources you have created or used on the Intranet?” two of my ten colleagues answered, ‘No’. At first glance, this appears to be a rejection of developing resources on the Intranet, or it could be a reflection of an incurred sense of loss as mentioned earlier. When questioned further they revealed that although they would be willing to share resources with a colleague they knew (trusted), they felt that, when viewed by others on the school Intranet, their work and therefore themselves, would become judged. This feeling / inhibition of being judged or assessed by peers, seems to be a major factor in whether a colleague would contribute resources or not, or the type of resources he or she would be willing to contribute. Colleagues overwhelmingly agreed that they wouldn’t mind developing resources in small groups – obviously to alleviate the problem of being judged personally and diverting it to group responsibility. Disturbingly, 3 colleagues thought that, “…the organisation does not foster an ethos of openly sharing resources.” Interestingly these colleagues spend considerable time travelling between sites. Clearly, the organisation needs to play a more active role. f) Participation Reece et al (2004. p.108) argues, “The level of participation of the teacher in the learning process is an important factor. To maintain active learning, the learner must be motivated and engaged”. It can be argued that teachers share similar learning characteristics as learners. In a truly successful case study that can effectively implement change or new strategies, the intended benefactor of the study must be an active participant. Handy (1999. p.33) warns, “…involvement or participation will in general tend to increase motivation, provided that it is genuine participation.” Handy’s argument concerning ‘genuine participation’ leads us to believe that the small-scale projects could play an effective role in developing resources for the Intranet and may also improve motivation. Observations of my study group indicate some teachers are inherently motivated by the approval (judgment) of others and others by overcoming challenges. Bligh (1971) and Sass (1989) also suggested that subject matter and perception of its usefulness are also important factors when assigning tasks. g) Fear of technology and the resultant aversion to sharing / participation The transition from sharing with a colleague to up loading onto the Intranet may also be influenced by a relatively new phenomenon called techno phobia. Advances in hardware and software technology and the pace of change can have dramatic affects upon people. While some welcome change, others find technology ‘downright intimidating’ (Rosen et al 1995. p.2). Comments occasionally made by staff (including myself) such as ‘if I push the wrong button, the machine will break’ or ‘everybody knows this but me’ hint to what Rosen describes as ‘cognitive technophobes’ who frighten themselves internally when they have to use technology. Another form of techno phobia is, according to Rosen, anxious technophobes who develop the traditional anxiety symptoms of increased heart rate, sweaty palms, headaches and even nausea. What Rosen fails to mention, however, is the task the user is trying to achieve, its degree of difficulty and the time required to achieve it. These factors influence not only the performance. Anxiety levels can also be affected by the knowledge that we use computers to work more efficiently or faster, therefore we feel need to work faster and more efficiently in a work place environment. To clarify if this is a valid reason, more research in this area is required. iii. Oral and written communications Teaching interalia involves a great deal of documentation – either documents produced by the teacher for conducting the classes or by the student for submission / assessment etc. In a multi-site school, problems associated with the production, storing, assessing and communicating about the various documents are accentuated. A student’s work these days is based on his own activity to master the subjects introduced in the classrooms. This activity, although apparently a self-study, is a highly structured one, with the teacher acting as a guide and philosopher at every stage of the work – introducing a subject, identifying time schedules, clarifying the learning outcomes, pointing out sources of information for broad based learning, and assigning project work with a view to evaluate the extent to which the student succeeded in learning. The importance of oral and written communications, between the teacher and the taught cannot be over-emphasised. iv. Limits to resources It is practically not possible to replicate all the resources at all locations in a split site school environment. Limitations occur in libraries, books and periodicals, and storage space – most of which have a bearing on student activity directly. Time is another important limiting resource if one considers the given set of staff to cover the academic activity. Time available for the staff to concentrate on the academic work or to interact with fellow-teachers in the staff room is reduced to the extent of travel between the different sites. Reduced interaction in the staff room or in the departmental meetings, caused by time constraint, leads to differing approaches to issues relating to teaching and the student feedback. v. Evaluating results of academic work While the academic terms pass in quick succession, the institutional academic committees sit back and take a look on the results achieved. Bell (1990: p.8) stated that, “It is therefore essential that any practice in the field of education, even that deemed exemplary, is regularly monitored and reviewed, if the highest standards are to be achieved and maintained.” This in itself involves collection of data, recording, storage and retrieval, comparison and analysis, from time to time. Resources for this activity ought to be centralised for management review and follow up action. This results in compulsory sharing of the resource by all the school sites. Intranet facilitates this sharing. vi. Problem areas summarised Educational institutions that operate on split sites face more problems for maintaining uniformity of teaching and learning experiences due to the constraints on financial resources, time constraint for the staff, the extensive documentation work that needs to be done, the sharing of available resources, records creation and maintenance, review work etc. This summary indicates that an improved communication system can mitigate many of the problem areas. In addition, if the improved communication system also acts as the online source for much of the teacher/student needs, it is like adding flavour to fragrance. vii. Intranet Intranet is a private version of Internet. It is a communications facility that connects all the computer systems of an organisation. Coupled with Internet access, it acts as a powerful tool. It permits sharing of resources by: a) Providing access to online resources for student activity. b) Enabling interaction between the teachers, the students and between the teacher and student, as and when needed. c) Reducing the time or need for travel between sites and thus increasing the time at the disposal of the staff for planning and delivering quality academic work. d) Having common pool of records and data on academic problems, plans and results. e) Enabling documentation work to be prepared and submitted completely online, thus releasing further amount of time available both for the teachers and the students. f) Enabling limited access to certain areas of data and general access to others areas. III. Methodology “Different kinds of research approaches produce different kinds of knowledge about the phenomena under study” Blaxter et al (2002. p.59). Similarly Hult & Lunnung, (1980), West et al (1995), Mc Connell (2000) argue ‘Action research is concerned with problem solving to extend knowledge.’ This method of qualitative research is therefore aimed at not only developing my own knowledge by ‘extending’ problem solving skills, it also redefines understanding and knowledge of a particular problem and will redefine my role within my selected group. The information presented in this paper is based on interviews, questionnaires and feedback that I have gathered over a period of time from my esteemed colleagues in the staff room, and departmental meetings on an ‘action research approach’ basis. As Cohen and Manion (1994) point out, “An important feature of action research is that the task is not finished when the project ends. The participants continue to review, evaluate and improve practice.” The present research question is based upon qualitative research which particularly lends itself to problem solving in a cyclic manner, because it involves a planned reaction to problem, followed by feedback, evaluation, critical reflection and discussion, to redefine issues concerned with the sharing of information. IV. Achieving the research objectives The number of staff that contributes to it and how often the resources are used and if the resources provided are developed further will measure the success of this research project. Widening participation will also, therefore, be a key objective. FEFC (1998) argues, ‘Widening participation means access, achievement and progression’. Optimistically, by encouraging staff to contribute utilising their advice and specialist skills within different aspects of the project, an ethos of widening participation could be achieved. For example, one member of staff is a professional paper engineer, and has already volunteered to review and develop paper-engineered projects such as pop-up books.As pointed out by Reece et al (2003. p.341), “The basis of achievement relies on the generation of evidence.” Implying that this research study needs to produce tangible evidence to achieve its aims. The number of hits the site has received has increased in volume, I am however unable to identify individual groups such as teachers and learners. A comment from colleagues does suggest that staff is also using the site; the physical evidence increased staff resources, suggests that the research objective of widening participation has been achieved. The National Curriculum in the United Kingdom advocates that pupils look for ‘needs, wants and opportunities’ upon which to focus their designing. One interesting development at curriculum team meetings is the amount of discussion and focus around the subject of resources. Colleagues are now generating ideas and examples of resources they use in open forum; perhaps for some colleagues the study has highlighted the ‘needs, wants and opportunities’ of us as learners. I personally feel a sense of achievement; the study has provided me with a medium to develop relationships and I feel valued within the department. In contrast, I also feel a sense of sadness as the project develops, knowing I will have to relinquish ownership or control for it to develop further. The research question “Would sharing resources via a school Intranet improve the teaching and learning environment”? Yes, as sharing implies an exchange of information, to achieve or to improve the present teaching and learning environment which also fosters an ethos of widening participation, team work, human development and above all, progression in learning. V. Summary and recommendations Resources available for an educational institution operating in different locations are generally shared and this sharing is always not done efficiently. Time is at a premium in view of travel between sites; interaction among staff and between staff & students is limited by time factor; resources like libraries and common rooms are too expensive to replicate; documentation needs cannot be taken care of adequately; indifferent results and difficulty to redress becomes the norm. Intranet (coupled with Internet and online resources) facility can contribute substantially in reducing the burden on the staff and students and overcoming the time constraint. It greatly improves interaction for the staff and the students. It can be used as a management tool for research into academic performance and to take corrective action. 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