COMMUNITY BUILDING AND CROSS-BORDER COLLABORATION THROUGH ONLINE COURSES IN WIND ENERGY

A new online course in wind energy has been developed by the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) as part of the EU-funded project Virtual Campus Hub (FP7 RI-283746, www.virtualcampushub.eu). The course builds upon a successful physical course which has been offered to the wind energy industry for more than 20 years. The course objectives are:

1) To teach participants to use the Wind Atlas Analysis and Application Program (WAsP)
2) To provide participants with enough theory about wind power meteorology to avoid the major pitfalls in wind resource assessment.

The learning design of the online WAsP course is based on a research based scaffolding model for building up communication and participation for learners online (Salmon, 2011). The theory of the model is a social constructivism and constructionism approach to learning, which means that learners will benefit from interaction with others in their learning process. Fellow participants and the teachers support the learner’s cognition and their critical reflection as they go through structured online activities called ‘E-tivities’ together. As the course progresses, participants become more independent and responsible for their own learning. The five-stage model has been implemented successfully at universities but here we use it in connection with continuing education courses.

The WAsP course is designed to run in a synchronous manner with a duration of 10 weeks. A new course module opens every week. The modules consist of 3-4 E-lessons and participants have the flexibility to work any time they want as long as the modules are completed by the weekly deadlines.

The Learning Management System (LMS) ‘itslearning’ is used as a learning platform for course materials e.g.presentations with speak, screen capturing videos, and structured online activities. The platform also supports messaging and online discussions in forums and it comes with functionalities, which the E-moderators can use to support users and give them feedback in their progress of learning. Whenever a participant gets delayed, the E-moderator takes contact and tries to motivate the participant. The LMS and the course components can be accessed from any web browser and from mobile devices with an internet connection.

A trial run has been performed with 24 participants. The participants were divided in two groups to facilitate team work and networking. The participants were very active in the discussion fora. Some participants went quickly through the course modules whereas others were slower and therefore able to benefit from the comments raised by the ‘forerunners’. The fraction of participants who completed the course and received a diploma was close to 100%. Another outcome of the intensive contact between the participants, who shared an interest in wind energy, was that networks were established and information exchanged openly.

The WAsP online course is one of several E-learning applications which are currently being linked together in the Virtual Campus Hub project. The project represents a pioneering effort in using high-speed European E-infrastructures (Géant) and single sign-on for cross-border collaboration. This is advantageous in connection with joint educational programs and any other kind of international collaboration between universities and the industry.

References
Salmon, G.: E-moderating. The key to teaching and learning online, Routledge Falmer, 2011 (third edition 2011).