Developing digital spaces that enable students to become co-creators in Akure, Nigeria

Professors Peter Aborisade and Funmi Olubode-Sawe represent the Blended Learning Research Group at the Federal University of Technology Akure, Nigeria.

They both teach English for academic purposes to undergraduates at the General Studies Unit. There are about 4,000 students taking the course each year, supported by 10 instructors.

The programme has two dimensions. The first part is a remedial course where students are instructed on how to read and write for academic purposes, as well as being introduced to techniques for managing their time and studying effectively. The second part is a more integrated reading and writing course where the students are engaged in creating their own content by way of projects and term papers.

The effort involved in managing large classes and a determination to improve the quality of learning available to students inspired the group to explore blended learning.

From the students’ perspective, lectures were felt to be boring and unexciting, note Professors Aborisade and Olubode-Sawe, but the introduction of technology to the learning process energized the programme and made the students more enthusiastic.

The project was originally started in 2009 using a the PBWiki platform. At the time this was free to use, but it soon became proprietary. Without resources to pay for platform, the team sought out free alternatives and discovered Moodle.

Lacking expertise to install and deploy Moodle, they turned to the university’s Computer Resource Centre who helped them to set up a learning management system.

Course facilitators post existing content that has been designed for online learning and to enable self-paced learning on the Moodle platform. Some of the content is created in PowerPoint, some in Word, and in some cases additional materials are gathered from other sites. The Blended Learning Group pride themselves in applying instructional strategies to enhance learning. They analyse their learner community before deploying the course, set clear course objectives and structure the content into manageable units. They also seek feedback from learners and use it to improve the programme, and undertake regular evaluations. Most of the content created for the course and during the course is original.

The students are assigned to work in small groups and given topics which they work on collaboratively, co-creating knowledge on the learning platform’s wiki. After this, their term papers are submitted to the platform’s blog. The facilitators use wikis, blogs and discussion forums as well as Moodle’s quizzes and survey tools in order to support learning and engage students. In this way, explain Professors Aborisade and Olubode-Sawe, instructors and students co-construct knowledge together.

Professor Aborisade defines innovation as being able to create something new from whatever resources are available. Professor Olubode-Sawe locates the innovation in the repurposing of existing materials to fit their needs and those of their students, and in their efforts to make students producers of knowledge, enabling them to build on their own skills and interests as they learn.

While the group evaluates the students, the instructors’ efforts and the system at the end of each semester, there is not yet an institutional quality assurance process to evaluate the way the course is conducted.

It has not been without its challenges. The group have relied on their personal resources and the technology available to them to sustain the project over the years.

At first the programme developed through trial and error, as the group taught themselves through reading, video-casts and podcasts. Over the years they have attended several conferences and workshops, both as participants and resource persons, with some sponsorship from the university. These events have made a substantial impact on their digital practices.

As the project matured, and as its value to the university became clear, the administration became more supportive, providing technical expertise and a computer laboratory.

The university has organized training programmes and invited the group to share their experience with other teachers as a way of encouraging them to embrace e-learning. The group have also carried out training for departments who requested help to start up their own e-learning programmes.

Only a few departments have taken part, but the pandemic has since pushed many members of staff to start exploring alternative methods of teaching with technology.

The lack of a university policy on digital learning has challenged the sustainability of the programme. Many students join the university with little or no digital literacy, and many lack their own digital devices. Unfortunately university facilities are also inadequate. Interruptions to the power supply, insufficient bandwidth, and the costs of mobile data for both lecturers and students are daily challenges to digital learning, and the group does not have access to a studio in which they can create videos.

Professor Aborisade believes that because Moodle is an open-source tool it should be easier to sustain the initiative, if the university can provide training and cover the costs to maintain and develop the platform. The Nigerian Tertiary Education Trust Fund is currently sponsoring a project, which the group is involved with, which is providing training to selected institutions to enable them to adopt Moodle and to introduce blended learning approaches. If the pilot is successful they hope it will be replicated more widely.

Professor Aborisade feels that national and institutional policies are needed to drive wider adoption of e-learning in the higher education system.

Interview conducted by Oluchi Okere, Federal University of Technology, Akure