Abstract:

In this research project, running from 1st October 2009 till September 2011, seven institutions of higher education and five university faculties will conduct pilots on how to use web lectures effectively in order to face the challenges of the on-going innovations in higher education: the increase in distance education enrollments, flexible learning paths, diversification of learners, and the implementation of "guided independent learning", which is the directive educational concept at the University of Leuven and its affiliated institutions of higher education.

As well as to offer a solution for the quantitative reduction of physical contact time between students and lecturers (seat based lessons), the project will promote the use of web lectures as an innovative teaching method to improve the quality of contact moments, whereby the teaching method evolves towards ' guidance of the individual learning process of students'. Students can use web lectures in the preparation for lectures and lab exercises or can use it for revision, thereby enhancing independent, self-regulated learning. A third group of researchers will develop applications for remedial teaching. A fourth group of lecturers will pilot streaming video during the lesson. Four interdisciplinary research groups with members of different institutions will develop the pilot experiments and implement them with their own students.

We use a broad definition of web lecture:
A web lecture is an instruction method whereby the combination of video, audio and digital presentation material is registered and distributed via internet, electronic learning environment, or i-pod (mobile learning). It can be a complete recorded lesson as well as a section or highlights of a lesson, or it can be produced separate from the lesson.

The output of the project will be: a practical toolkit with hands-on scenario's for effective use of web lectures,
• didactical guidelines how to embed it in the total learning process
• criteria for instructional design of the web lecture itself
• technical guidelines on the usage of different production techniques and multi-media software: screencasts, powerpoint with narration, automated filming, webcam shots, ...

The paper presents the results from the first phase of the project: the didactic concept and didactic scenario's for a good educational use of web lectures, derived from literature review and SWOT analysis of (best) practices. It describes also the experimental design of the ten case studies/ pilot projects that will be carried out. The result of the case studies are primarily meant to optimize the didactic scenario's . Secondly, the indicators for measuring 'effects on learning' are explained. The methodology for generating and selecting pilots is problem-based. The rational is that the 'added didactic value' in improvement of study results as well as in study behavior will be more obvious when a problematic teaching/learning situation can be solved. This is intrinsically motivating to the lecturers carrying out the pilots . A convincing result will maximize the dissemination impact.

Keywords:

Web lectures, guided independent learning, distance education, flexibel learning.