Abstract:

Professional development in teaching is a critical aspect of higher education (HE), as it helps educators stay up to date with evidence-based teaching strategies and improve the quality of their teaching. With the ever-evolving landscape of HE, it has become essential for teachers to continuously enhance their skills and knowledge to meet the changing needs of students and the fast-changing job market. One way of meeting those needs, is to move from teacher-centred teaching to how students learn, consequently plan for more active learning. When going from face-to-face teaching to online teaching or blended learning, is it even more crucial for the teachers to plan their learning design well. But it is not easy to change to another way of teaching since most teachers in HE have never experienced student active learning. They lack models to learn from.

50 years ago, universities in Norway started to give their teachers the possibility to educate themselves through attending university pedagogy courses. In recent years the number of teachers attending such courses have risen. One problem with university pedagogical courses, is that there are few proofs of them creating change in the way teaching is being delivered, hence the evaluation is often done directly after the course has ended. We have conducted research on two groups of teachers who took part in the two first runs of an online course about digital pedagogy and didactics 7 months after the courses ended. We wanted to see if taking part in such a course would lead to any change in how the participants delivered their teaching to their students. The empiric material was collected in the form of written reflections.

Our study shows the importance of creating room in the learning design of the course for the participants to experience, to reflect and to be able to plan, execute and reflect upon their own teaching during the course. The findings also show that providing a model has been vital for the teachers attending the course. The study shows that our learning design, with a focus on well-designed structure to scaffold the learning, use of active learning, and reflections, has helped the teachers to change their own teaching during and after attending the course.

This paper will present why the need for professional development possibilities, the experience of building and running a 50-hours online course regarding digital pedagogy and didactics called DigiPed for academic staff at Nord University, and the result of the research regarding the effect of attending such a course on the participants delivered teaching. The course was designed and executed by Centre of competence in Learning and Technology (KOLT) at Nord University. The team’s mandate is to help and advice educators at our university regarding teaching and the use of digital technology. The team needs to be aware of policies and research regarding teaching quality and how students thrive and learn. These considerations and the fact that many teachers in HE lacks pedagogical and methodical competences, have been important to consider in our endeavour to change how teaching is delivered.

Keywords:

Professional development, course design, Experiential learning, reflection, digital pedagogy, digital didactic, online, student learning, teaching.