Category: STEM Higher Education

Experiential Learning in Vietnam

8/3/2018

I recently led a workshop in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, on my research at a Vietnamese STEM university. I co-led a workshop on Project-Based Learning methodology. The two workshops were:

22 August
Experiential Learning Methodology Workshop with Mr. Paul McAfee

23 August
Training on "Project-Based Learning" with Ms. Nguyen Thi Huyen and Mr. Paul McAfee

August 22 Experiential Learning Research

Project-Based Learning Workshop

What To Do for STEM in Vietnam?

8/3/2017

My first paper summarizing the 2016 student survey and the 2017 instructor and student interviews at the STEM university in Vietnam is in the final editing stage. Here were the questions for the 2017 interviews:

Questions of Interest for Student Interviews:

To what extent are students in the Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, STEM university aware of experiential learning?
To what, if any, experiential learning methods have the students been exposed?
How do the students define experiential learning?
How do the students feel about these methods?
Do the students prefer experiential methods, which may put them in ambiguous and poorly defined situations, to classical lectures, or do they prefer the classical lectures (teacher-centered learning)?
Would the students prefer more or less exposure to experiential learning?

Questions of Interest for Instructor Interviews:

To what extent are instructors in the Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, STEM university aware of experiential learning?
How do the instructors define experiential learning?
To what, if any, do the instructors incorporate experiential learning pedagogy?
How do the instructors feel about these methods?
What obstacles do the instructors encounter in implementing experiential learning methods?

In the conclusion, I should offer recommendations for future research, and possibly for improvement in teaching methods. The U.S.A.-Vietnamese organization, Vietnam Education Foundation (VEF), published a report in 2006 that covers general recommendations at several levels of education management. I am sharing their suggestions for the university level. The VEF list is long, so first I'll share my simplified suggestion for improvement:

Conduct an annual assessment of instructors' use of, and students' exposure to, experiential (or active) learning methods. Ask them what they have done, how the methods affected their learning, and how they feel about the methods. Create a double loop feedback system that informs instructors of opportunities for improvement based on what is learned from the annual assessment.

Here is what VEF suggested. The following is verbatim but without quotes.

A scenario for change led by individual universities includes the following activities to be considered:

Revising curricula, consolidating courses, and reducing the number of courses in order to conform with top level universities, typically requiring a credit system of 120 to 130 credits for an undergraduate education.
Reducing the number of courses that instructors teach each semester. However, it is important that reducing the teaching workload does not create financial disadvantages for teachers. This change might be accomplished by paying teachers a total combined salary/income that adequately supports them for working a full work week of approximately 40 hours that includes professional responsibilities of required teaching, research, and service to one’s home institution. With a revised compensation system, teachers would not require outside jobs. It is crucial that the number of courses taught be independent of salary/income.
Changing the reward system so that a teacher’s merit-based pay and other financial rewards are based on conducting professional service (advising students, instructional development, and faculty governance) and doing research, in addition to teaching, at one’s home institution.
Instituting instructor development and evaluation programs as the basis for promotion beyond the position of lecturer. The department chairperson might consider conducting an annual evaluation that focuses on performance and is related to increases for merit that is reflected in one’s base pay. The promotion program might take into consideration criteria related to evidence of student learning outcomes, course evaluations by students, quality of publications, conference presentations, course development, research funding, effective links with industry, and service to the department and institution.
Creating faculty handbooks that clearly define procedures and steps for the reward system (e.g., promotion, recognition, merit-based pay, and tenure).
Establishing Centers of Excellence in Teaching and Learning at each university (with the support of VNU and MOET resources). It is important that these Centers have experienced staff and both written and electronic resources to provide pedagogical, instructional, and professional development support. These Centers could potentially offer targeted workshops and other training activities by international professionals, who have general skills in pedagogy and instructional design and development as well as specific expertise related to teaching particular content areas such as computer science, electrical engineering, and physics.
Offering opportunities for administrators and faculty to go abroad for study or professional programs to observe first hand the use of active learning and other effective pedagogical practices.
Providing up-to-date printed and electronic resources (books, journals, etc.) for faculty and students to facilitate teaching, learning, and research. This might be accomplished by working cooperatively with MOET and VNU.
Providing teachers with adequate access to high speed/bandwidth Internet and an adequate number of up-to-date computers for instruction.
Modernizing laboratory facilities and equipment so that it is possible to develop experiments, exercises, and projects that promote higher order thinking and problem solving skills.
Creating an Institutional Effectiveness Plan (IEP) that provides strategies, tactics, timelines, and criteria for making the improvements that are deemed of the highest priority.

Reference
Stephen, W., Doughty, P., Gray, P., Hopcroft, J., & Silvera, I. (2006). Observations on undergraduate education in computer science, electrical engineering, and physics at select universities in Vietnam. Retrieved from https://home.vef.gov/download/Report_on_Undergrad_Educ_E.pdf.

Qualitative Research Tech Tools

7/15/2017

As I write my analysis of active and experiential learning in my 2016 student surveys and 2017 instructor and student interviews at a STEM university in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, I am trying to use technology tools. What I have discovered is that the learning curve is steep. There are three tools I am using:

NVivo from QSR International - www.qsrinternational.com/
1. This is a powerful analytic system that I am finding difficult to use. The issue I am facing is formatting and importing interview transcripts. I have decided to bypass this software until after my paper is done, and then return to it when I do not have time pressure to finish.
Voyant Tools - voyant-tools.org/
1. This is a free online tool for frequency and associated analysis. It works, and it is easy to use. There are some issues with the way I collected my data that limit the utility of the results from this tool, but I will use it and explain the limitations.
EndNote - endnote.com/
1. Anyone who has written research papers has at least tried to use EndNote. This is for citations and references and works within MS Word. Because I want to ensure that I have properly cited everything, I'm going to tough it out and figure out how to use this properly

I share this for my academic friends. If you have suggestions, please post them in response to this blog update. If you are going through similar learning processes for these tools, get in touch. Maybe we can help each other.
Back to the writing grind ...
Paul

Learning How To Conduct Research Interviews

7/1/2017

I have realized two important things about my 2017 interview process.

First, I asked too many closed-ended questions. The results are too many short Yes or No responses. These types of responses require me to analyze my questions, more than the interviewees’ responses. In a sense, I created a closed-ended data set that depends on my questions, and on how I posed the questions. This limits the depth and richness of the respondents’ answers.

For my dissertation interviews, I will need to capture the desired demographic and other closed-ended data at the start of the interview, and then more to an almost entirely open-ended interview process.

The other realization is that the nature of the responses, with many of them being very short, inhibits analysis of what the respondents were thinking and feeling. Also, the questions used key phrases, such as experiential learning, the use of this type of descriptive language prompted the respondents to use the same phrases and words. This complicates the effort to assess word frequencies and other aspects of meaning from the interviews. Too many responses include the words I used in the questions.

For my dissertation interviews, I will need to carefully construct my questions to open the discussion by the respondent in a way that he or she will use his or her own words. This will be a difficult task, but the analysis of these 2017 pilot interview data will help me to design the interviews for the dissertation research.

The image below is the setting for all of the student and instructor interviews I conducted this spring in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam. This is in the Nikko Saigon Hotel. The setting provided a comfortable environment. Although there was background noise, such as music and the voices of other patrons in the lobby, the background served as white noise, giving my interviewees and me privacy.

What is experiential learning?

4/20/2017

This image is a word cloud built from the frequency of words used by technology (STEM) students at a university in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam, in response to the survey question, "Please provide a definition in your own words of experiential learning, based on one or more courses you have taken at the university [in which you are studying]." The study that generated the word cloud took place in 2016 among technology students. That study was a mixed methods survey comprising quantitative Likert-scale type questions as well as qualitative open-ended questions.

My experiential learning research continues. This week, I interviewed a professor and a student in this program. My first learning point is that "experiential learning" is not a term that is used at this Vietnamese university. The closest word here for this type of teaching is "Active Learning." The professor knew this term because the university has been educating its professors on active learning methods in an effort move away from purely lecture-based teaching methods.

In the two one-on-one interviews this week, working on projects arose as the example most provided by both the professor and the student that they considered to be active or experiential learning. I will be transcribing these interviews this week. I will begin to analyze them in detail using phenomenological research analysis methods over the next couple of weeks. As I gather sufficient information, I will share thoughts about the feelings the professor and student expressed about active or experiential learning.

I learned a lot this week, as a researcher, but also as a teacher. The student, as he explained his feelings toward his expoure to experiential learning, opened my eyes to the challenges my students face when I have them work on projects in my classes. I am thankful to both the professor and the student for their candid and heartfelt responses during the interview. They both have contributed to improvement in my own teaching methods.

April 18th, 2017

4/18/2017

I have conducted University at Buffalo Institutional Review Board (IRB) approved pilot studies in Singapore (2014) and Ho Chi Minh Ciy (Saigon - 2016). These studies comprised mixed methods surveys of students to learn the extent to which they have been exposed to experiential learning, and their attitudes toward, and feelings about, experiential learning. The image below is a word cloud of students responses in Saigon when asked what they thought comprised experiential learning.

This week, I have started a third IRB approved study in Saigon. I am interviewing students and instructors, continuing with research questions that explore exposure to, and attitudes toward, experiential learning in a STEM higher education environment. The first instructor interview took place yesterday. His insights into experiential teaching methods, and his commitment to those methods, would match an of the university instructors I know in the USA or elsewhere, including myself.

I selected a suitable environment for the interview. We met in a spacious lounge at a five-star hotel near the university, getting us into a relaxed and quiet space without interruptions. I put the computer away before we started so that it would not be a distraction.

Experiential Learning in Vietnam

What To Do for STEM in Vietnam?

Qualitative Research Tech Tools

Learning How To Conduct Research Interviews

What is experiential learning?

April 18th, 2017

Paul mcafee

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