Units

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Sample subject outline - Semester 1 2013

Note: Subject outlines often change before the semester begins. Below is a sample outline.

Rationale

Because of rapid social change, there is tension today between the scope and complexity of learning and the spaces and places, in which learning is experienced. Changing information and communication technologies render learning spaces and places as concurrently physical/geographic and digital/online because they alter understandings about time and space for learning and teaching. The design of learning spaces, can work to enhance, inhibit, position and order the ways in which learners and teachers interact and the ways in which learning and teaching occurs. Educators and learners engage in a variety of spaces and learning environments - school libraries and other information centres, classrooms, studios, laboratories, online. This unit provides opportunities for educators and information professionals to examine familiar contexts for pedagogical work, and to be proactive and innovative in designing more effective learning spaces. The unit is included in the course because, in this moment of radical social change, educators are seeking to critically evaluate social, cultural, technological and pedagogical forces that impact on their learning spaces and practices. MEd(Teacher-Librarianship) students are encouraged to consider the school library as learning space.

Aims

The aim of this unit is to extend your understanding of the complex relations among space, place and learning pedagogies appropriate to the designing of innovative, adaptable, supportive spaces for learning in futures-oriented educational contexts.

Objectives

At the completion of this unit you should be able to:

1. Show how critical theories and current pedagogies influence educators' perceptions of learners; (GC: A, B)

2. Explain how educational and other discourses influence understandings of learning and teaching spaces in the digital age; (GC: A, B, C, D)

3. Engage with the theory and practice of designing learning spaces in relation to current pedagogical trends; (GC: A, B, D)

4. Investigate the interdependent time-space relationship within physical/geographic and digital/online/virtual spaces and places for learning; (GC: B, D, E)

5. Apply a set of reasoned principles to the re/designing of a learning environment in your own context. (GC: A, B, C, D, E, F)

Content

This unit will cover the following topics:

• Socio-cultural and technological contexts of education: critical reflection on international, national and system/school/organisation statements and policies influencing understandings about learning and teaching which have the potential to influence the designing of the spaces and places of learning and teaching.



• Critical theories and current pedagogies: analysis of theoretical and pedagogical discourses relevant to education contexts, learners and learner identities.



• Space-time and place: development of an appreciation for changing concepts and interrelationships between space, place and time with respect to teaching and learning.



• Designing learning spaces: (i) locating design theory within education contexts; (ii) collaborating with relevant stakeholders in designing of learning spaces; (iii) creative application of design principles to specific learning spaces (physical/geographic and digital/online/virtual).

Approaches to Teaching and Learning

Learning experiences in the unit are available through the QUT Blackboard site. Materials are developed through content commentaries; collaborative engagement with colleagues in 'wiki' and 'blog' co-constructions; recommended readings; site visits; visual and conceptual representations of space and design relationships; problem based approaches to design criteria. Learning processes, resources and assessment experiences support the development of analytical and critical approaches to the evaluation of influences on designing learning spaces and encourage application of collaborative, innovative designing methodologies.

Assessment

Formative assessment
Support is available via phone, email and face-to-face meetings; engagement in online participation in the activities of the unit; establishing connections with professional networks and mentors, and in direct correspondence with the lecturer related to individual needs.Formative Assessment
Students are provided support through: individual or group face-to-face consultation with staff, email, online discussion forums and tutorials, peer feedback, and engagement with professional networks and mentors.

Summative Assessment
Written feedback will be provided to students through constructive, critical commentary using track changes and/or handwritten comments on hard copy of assignments.

Assessment name: Essay
Description: Independent work
Equivalent to 2000 words
Relates to objectives: 1, 2, 3 & 4
Weight: 45%
Internal or external: Both
Group or individual: Individual
Due date: Mid-Semester

Assessment name: Project (applied)
Description: Written Discourses
Equivalent to 3000 words
Relates to objectives: 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5
Weight: 55%
Internal or external: Both
Group or individual: Individual
Due date: End-Semester

Academic Honesty

QUT is committed to maintaining high academic standards to protect the value of its qualifications. To assist you in assuring the academic integrity of your assessment you are encouraged to make use of the support materials and services available to help you consider and check your assessment items. Important information about the university's approach to academic integrity of assessment is on your unit Blackboard site.

A breach of academic integrity is regarded as Student Misconduct and can lead to the imposition of penalties.

Resource materials

It is not anticipated that students will need to purchase materials for this unit. All learning resources are available either through the Course Materials Database on the unit's Blackboard website, or alternatively from the library.

Risk assessment statement

Usual workplace health and safety protocols will be followed. There are no out of the ordinary risks associated with this unit.

Disclaimer - Offer of some units is subject to viability, and information in these Unit Outlines is subject to change prior to commencement of semester.

Last modified: 14-Jan-2013