Education Commons^™

A Health Check Of Avondale's Distance Education Program: Where Have We Been? Where Are We Going Next?, Jason Hinze, Maria T. Northcote, Peter W. Kilgour, Beverly Christian, David Bolton

Peter Kilgour

Avondale College of Higher Education has been offering tertiary courses for over 120 years. In the past two decades, this institution has extended its programs to include distance courses for students who opt to study online or are not able to attend on-campus courses at Avondale’s Lake Macquarie and Sydney campuses. While all of the institutions courses are evaluated on a regular basis, no formal evaluation had ever been undertaken of the distance education program as a whole. During 2017, a mixed methods research project was conducted to gather evaluative data from recent and current distance students using questionnaires and …

The Virtual Mentor Program: An Initiative To Support First-Year Students And Students At Risk, Anthony Williams, Maria T. Northcote, Peter W. Kilgour, Ben Stewart

Peter Kilgour

The college/university culture of study is rarely the same as high school, making the transition difficult even for talented students. In many countries, the massification of higher education has opened up education to all, with the only limiting factor being a student’s ability to meet entry requirements and pay for subjects. A virtual mentor program can provide support to all first-year students regardless of whether they are in online, blended, or traditional learning environments. One such initiative, implemented by The University of Newcastle in Newcastle, Australia, and later by Avondale College of Higher Education in Cooranbung, Australia, also supported students …

Valuing Early Career Teachers: Putting The Brakes On The Exodus, Marion Shields, Peter W. Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

The attrition of early career teachers has been

identified as an international issue. This paper

reports on an Australian study that sought to

identify the lived experiences of beginning

teachers in one independent school system

in their first three years. Areas such as the

teacher’s job satisfaction and impacting factors

were addressed. Data revealed that the main

drivers for teachers terminating their teaching

career in the first few years are connected to

work/life balance, the level of support from

administration, the teacher’s mentor, and the

level and appropriateness of the professional

development they are permitted to attend.

Online Learning In Higher Education: Comparing Teacher And Learner Perspectives, Peter W. Kilgour, Maria T. Northcote

Peter Kilgour

Higher education teachers’ and learners’ experiences of online teaching and online learning are tempered by their respective perceptions of their online educational environments. While much research has been undertaken in recent years to explore students’ or teachers’ perceptions of online education, less research has been conducted that investigates the perceptions of both groups in parallel contexts. Utilizing a mixed methods research approach, focus groups and questionnaires were administered to three cohorts of students and their teachers, across three institutions. Results are presented in terms of teachers’ and students’ perceptions of preferred online learning environments, including their most and least agreed …

How Engaged Are Our Students? Using Analytics To Identify Students-At-Risk, Anthony Williams, Jason K. Morton, Peter W. Kilgour, Maria T. Northcote

Peter Kilgour

Learning Management System (LMS) analytics have become an area of increasing interest and development. The potential to better understand our students’ levels of engagement provided by the systems have, to date, has been underutilized information resources. The study reported here looks at the relationship of student and staff engagement in the LMS and considers the levels of predictability in student behavior leading to failure. Also considered is the impact of the lecturer on the student engagement of poor and high performing students.

Reactions, Reflections, And Responsibility: A Responsive Evaluation Of An Emerging Blended E-Learning Subject, Peter W. Kilgour, Phil Fitzsimmons

Peter Kilgour

In the decade since Schrum and Hong’s comment that “online learning has rapidly become a popular method of edu - cation for traditional and non-traditional students,” this approach to tertiary learning has morphed through several generational forms and platforms to the point where it has become firmly entrenched in the Australian tertiary landscape. As a broad generalization, e-learning, online, or flexible learning in many universities represents a spectrum of “information communications technology” (hereafter referred to as ICT) usage that ranges from little or no actual real-time interaction or “face-to-face” contact with associated viewing linkages such as YouTube through to teaching …

Using The Perceptions Of Online University Students To Improve The Pedagogy And Practice Of Distance Educators: Them Helping Us To Improve It, David Bolton, Maria T. Northcote, Peter W. Kilgour, Jason Hinze

Peter Kilgour

This paper reports on the findings of an investigation into the experiences of undergraduate and postgraduate distance education students from one higher education institution, Avondale College of Higher Education. All of the institution's current students who were enrolled in a distance course or who had previously completed a distance component of their course were surveyed using an online questionnaire. A subgroup of this population also contributed to focus group discussions. Findings from an analysis of the combined data gathered from the online questionnaire and the focus groups were used to inform the institution's professional development (PD) program that supports lecturers …

Old School Or Cutting Edge? An Examination Of Ellen G. White's Views On Education From A Best Practice Twenty-First Century Perspective, Peter W. Kilgour, Beverly J. Christian

Peter Kilgour

Ellen White was an inspired writer who was influential in the development of Adventist education in the late nineteenth century. She wrote prolifically on the philosophy of Christian education, its goals and its practice. This article explores her views, as written over a century ago, and compares them with several twenty-first educational concepts that impact pedagogical practice today. The concepts chosen are: neuroplasticity, differentiation, holistic education and well-being, metacognition, education for employability, visible learning and heutagogy. The comparison revealed that when White’s views were analysed in terms of purpose or in terms of underlying principles, they aligned with several educational …

Stem Down The Track: Two Christian Schools' Further Experiences, Peter W. Kilgour, Phil Fitzsimmons, Tieren Kilgour, Jennifer Merriman

Peter Kilgour

Students’ perceptions of what STEM is and

how it has been implemented in their schools

is reported in this paper. Students were asked

in focus groups about what STEM is and how

they had seen the progress their two respective

schools had made in its implementation. The

data showed that students were very familiar

with what STEM is and how it was developing

in their schools. While younger students

enjoyed the fun and the challenge, secondary

students could see the potential for the STEM

they are doing at school to help in their future

employment. Another interesting factor revealed

in …

Coherence - The Right Drivers In Action For Schools, Districts And Systems, Peter W. Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

No abstract provided.

Government Funding In Australian Independent Schools, Peter W. Kilgour, Anthony Williams

Peter Kilgour

This chapter gives a history of government funding of Australian independent schools with a focus on Seventh-day Adventist education identities. It covers the evolution of the methods of funding, the politics of funding, the controversies from interest groups on such funding, and Ellen White’s advice on receiving government funding for Adventist schools.

The Funding Of Adventist Schools In The Solomon Islands, Peter W. Kilgour, Joseph Pitakia

Peter Kilgour

This chapter explores the history of schooling in the Solomon Islands, the current state of education in the Solomon Islands, the place of Adventist education in the history and current practice of schooling in the Solomon Islands, the introduction of Adventist schools’ use of government funding in the Solomon Islands education system.

Using Threshold Concepts About Online Teaching To Support Novice Online Teachers: Designing Professional Development Guidelines To Individually Assist Academic Staff (“Me”) And Collectively Guide The Institution (“Us”), Maria T. Northcote, Kevin P. Gosselin, Peter W. Kilgour, Catherine Mcloughlin, Christopher Boddey

Peter Kilgour

As online learning expands across the higher education sector, individual university lecturers are required to take on roles that incorporate responsibilities for designing and teaching online courses. Their growing capacities to fulfil these roles are sometimes supported by professional development (PD) programs within their institutions while some staff engage in staff development activities outside their home institutions. These programs and activities may take place within Communities of Practice (CoPs) while others are conducted on an individual basis. While much research has been undertaken into the field of online teaching and learning, including investigations into the most useful technological tools to …

How To Develop The Habits Of Outstanding Teaching, Peter W. Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

No abstract provided.

Getting On Board With The Stem Revolution: Two Christian Schools’ Experiences, Peter W. Kilgour, Phil Fitzsimmons, Vanessa Baywood, Jennifer Merriman

Peter Kilgour

No abstract provided.

Engaging In Deep Cultural Learning Through The Intersection Of Multiple Contexts, Maria T. Northcote, Peter W. Kilgour, Daniel Reynaud, Phil Fitzsimmons

Peter Kilgour

The type of learning that takes place in teacher education courses typically results in pre-service teachers developing a mixture of knowledge, skills and values that enable them to become effective teachers in schools in the future. During their journey to become qualified teachers, pre-service teachers typically engage in coursework and experiential-based learning.

By engaging in coursework experiences, an overseas practicum and an overseas study tour, students experienced a range of reflection-promoting activities and contexts during which they broadened and deepened their understanding of cultures other than their own.

Using a cross-case analysis approach, the data gathered in these three cases …

Student Perceptions Of Classroom Environments In Streamed Middle Secondary Mathematics Classes In Australian Christian Schools, Peter W. Kilgour, Tony Rickards

Peter Kilgour

This paper reports on a study into the perceptions students have of the learning environment in Year 9 and 10 mathematics classrooms when the classes are streamed. The sample consisted of 581 students in Years 9 and 10 in 7 different Christian independent schools across Australia. The What is Happening in the Classroom (WIHIC) inventory was used along with a qualitative analysis of interviews with a subset of participants. Results included: students in lower stream mathematics classes report significantly less positive perceptions of their classroom learning environments than students in upper stream mathematics classes, the areas rated most negatively by …

Threshold Concepts About Online Teaching: Progress Report On A Five Year Project, Kevin P. Gosselin, Maria T. Northcote, Daniel Reynaud, Peter W. Kilgour, Malcolm Anderson, Chris Boddey

Peter Kilgour

The burgeoning expansion of online education has presented the challenges of articulating an appropriate pedagogy for online education (Stevens, 2003; Runnels et al., 2006; Gosselin, 2009) while also contending with perceived and real deficits in lecturer competence (Shephard, 2007). Conceptually, the identified areas of concern are viewed as troublesome knowledge (Perkins, 1999), or knowledge that is counter intuitive to traditional teaching face to face teaching. To meet the emerging difficulties of new modes of distance teaching, researchers have focused on transformative learning using threshold concepts, or new portals, that allow understanding of concepts through new modes of thinking (Meyer & …

Mathematical Manipulatives: Creating An Environment For Understanding, Efficiency, Engagement, And Enjoyment, Ashlee Cockett, Peter W. Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

This study examines the impact of using manipulatives in Mathematics on student understanding, efficiency, engagement and enjoyment in a lower primary classroom. Manipulatives are concrete physical objects that students can use in a hands-on approach to learning. During this research, 32 students were involved in various mathematical activities involving different kinds of manipulatives and also in activities where manipulatives were not used at all. The types of manipulatives used were clocks, coins, MAB blocks and the interactive whiteboard. Quantitative data was collected using a survey while qualitative data in the form of observations was also collected. The results showed that …

Role-Playing: A Smorgasbord Of Learning Types, Peter W. Kilgour, Jason Hinze, Kevin Petrie, Warrick R. Long, Kevin C. De Berg

Peter Kilgour

One tertiary institution sought to research the perceptions that tertiary students have of role-plays as a means of learning. Role-plays were used across a range of disciplines at that institution including: teacher training, business and chemistry. Each of these disciplines used a role-play in their classes and then collected opinions from the students on the usefulness of the activity. It was discovered that students value role-plays as a means to challenge preconceived ideas, encourage creative thinking, assist students in applying theory to practice, make lessons fun and provide active learning experiences that increase student learning and engagement.

Pre-Service Teachers' Reflections On Critical Incidents In Their Professional Teaching Experiences, Peter W. Kilgour, Maria T. Northcote, Wendi Herman

Peter Kilgour

Pre-service teachers typically engage in a series of professional development experiences throughout their teacher education courses. These periods of learning enable them to develop as reflective practitioners under the mentorship of experienced school teachers. After these periods of intense learning, sometimes characterised by pedagogic epiphanies, they frequently report extreme experiences of success or failure which influence perceptions of their future teaching career. This study aimed to capture final year pre-service teachers' reflections of critical incidents in their past professional experience by especially focusing on their worst lesson experience. The qualitative research approach incorporated elements of critical incident research design from …

Problems Arising From Streaming Mathematics Students In Australian Christian Secondary Schools: To Stream Or Not To Stream?, Peter W. Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

This article focuses on selected sections of a wider research study that investigated the perceptions of students in upper, lower, and mixed-ability stream mathematics classes, regarding their classroom learning environment. The study collected data from a representative sample of Year 9 and Year 10 students, employing recognised, reliable survey instruments. The most significant finding of the study, resulting from the analysis of quantitative data, was that lower stream students not only had more negative perceptions of their classroom learning environment, but wanted less change. This negative perception is seen to be worse in Year 10 than in Year 9, particularly …

Why Did My Mentor Teacher Only Give Me A Credit?: The Lonely Task Of Grading Your Pre-Service Teacher, Beverly Christian, Peter Kilgour, Andrew Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

The placement of pre-service teachers in

schools to integrate theoretical learning with

practical experience is an integral component

of many tertiary education courses. Issues with

both the reliability and validity of assessment

grades in a workplace environment suggest

a call to strengthen the level of academic

rigour of these placements. In this study,

professional development lecturers in one

education program [Avondale College of Higher

Education, NSW] constructed a standardsbased

grading rubric designed to assist mentor

teachers assess the performance of pre-service

teachers. After implementation of the rubric

for two Professional Experience sessions,

mentor teachers were surveyed to assess the

effectiveness …

Research: What Potential Does It Hold For Teacher Practitioners?, Anthony Williams, Peter Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

The teaching profession finds itself at the crossroads

at this time. because the crowded curriculum

and the emphasis on core competencies including

literacy and numeracy can have the tendency to push

research training into the background. The question

should be asked though, is research capability a skill

practicing teachers should be engaging with? Is

reconstructing the curricula of universities to make

research preparation a priority worth pursuing?

The following paper considers the issue of research

and what it can add to teacher practitioners’ “arsenal”

of capabilities. The authors believe that there is value

in reconsidering the curriculum of teachers, as …

Role-Playing As A Tool To Facilitate Learning, Self Reflection And Social Awareness In Teacher Education, Peter W. Kilgour, Daniel Reynaud, Maria T. Northcote, Marion Shields

Peter Kilgour

Meaningful learning in the tertiary sector benefits from the inclusion of a variety of teaching and learning techniques including active learning. Role-plays are one type of active and participatory learning activity that creates interaction between students and a simulated scenario. This reality can serve to open the minds of participants to issues they need to be able to deal with in their chosen careers. This paper reports role-plays in four different learning applications: the first was in a multicultural education class and simulated a microcosm of society where students took on the roles of minority groups. The second reports on …

The Application Of Multiple Intelligences In Two Year 7 Textile Technology Classes, Brianna Cameron, Gail Ormsby, Peter Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

In a teaching and learning environment that

embraces innovation, inclusion and effectiveness,

it is essential to acknowledge students’ individual

learning styles to promote optimum learning.

While multiple intelligences (MI) theory considers

students’ interest, it has been more often applied

in teaching mathematics, science and music

subjects. This study applied the theory of MI within

two year seven textile technology classes. Data

were collected from student group assessments,

surveys and daily engagement levels. The results

of the study show that groups whose members

shared similar MI reported having a more positive

experience than groups that were not specifically

MI assigned. Further, …

Faith Formation: Perceptions Of Primary And High School Students In Australian Adventist Schools, Beverly Christian, Peter Kilgour

Peter Kilgour

Faith formation is a topic of considerable interest

for those involved in Christian education. In

this quantitative investigation, 580 students

from Years Four, Six, Eight and Ten from eleven

Adventist schools in Australian were surveyed

to determine their perspectives of their own

faith formation in four areas of their lives: Vision,

Gospel, Lordship and Presence. Additional items

measured student satisfaction with their Biblical

Studies classes. The results indicated that

students, on the whole, were positive about their

faith formation. Trends revealed that younger

students overall were more positive towards

their faith and Biblical Studies classes than high …

Reactions, Reflections And Responsibility: A 'Responsive Evaluation' Of An Emerging Blended Elearning Subject, Peter W. Kilgour, Phil Fitzsimmons

Peter Kilgour

This paper discusses the findings of a qualitative investigation that sought to illuminate the perceived benefits of undertaking a blended learning subject at one tertiary institution. While there are several studies detailing the benefits of online learning, this study focussed on the student’s perceptions. What emerged from the analysis process were a series of themes related to the notion of authentic learning. Key processes of this perceived optimal learning site and space were the elements of group and individual reflection, and risk taking. Thus a heightened sense of ownership was developed. While the students believed that this form of tertiary …

Development Of An Evidence-Based Professional Learning Program Informed By Online Teachers' Self-Efficacy And Threshold Concepts, Kevin P. Gosselin, Maria T. Northcote, Daniel Reynaud, Peter W. Kilgour, Malcolm Anderson, Chris Boddey

Peter Kilgour

As online education continues to expand across varied educational sectors, so does the demand for professional development programs to guide academic teaching staff through the processes of developing their capacities to design and teach online courses. To meet these challenges at one higher education institution, a mixed methods research study was implemented to identify the professional learning needs of academic teaching staff for the purposes of developing a tailor-made professional development program. The principles of self-efficacy and threshold concepts were used to inform the design of the study. Data were systematically gathered from the participants to determine self-efficacy, concerns, and …

Navigating Learning Journeys Of Online Teachers: Threshold Concepts And Self-Efficacy, Maria T. Northcote, Kevin P. Gosselin, Daniel Reynaud, Peter W. Kilgour, Malcolm Anderson

Peter Kilgour

Higher education institutions are developing more and more online courses to supplement and augment the courses they offer in on-campus modes. In fact, some universities now offer the majority of their courses through online contexts. However, for academic staff who design and teach these courses, the transition from teaching on-campus courses to teaching in online learning environments is not always speedy or smooth. Academic teaching staff require support, mentoring and professional learning programs to develop their existing capacities and apply them to an online context.

This paper reports on Phase 2 of a research project, which takes into consideration the …