THE DEGREE COURSE IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCES AND TECHNIQUES OF SAPIENZA AND UNITELMA SAPIENZA UNIVERSITY OF ROME: TECHNOLOGY ENHANCED ACTIVE AND COLLABORATIVE LEARNING

Abstract

The online degree course in Psychological Sciences and Techniques is delivered by Sapienza and Unitelma Sapienza (Rome, Italy) since 2017. The course integrates a classic e-Learning model with a participatory and collaborative approach, thanks to three fundamental pillars: 1) a theoretically strongly-anchored design, 2) an experienced team of teachers and tutors, and 3) a flexible and rich Learning Management System. Each of these aspects will be described in details: 1. The courses design is mainly inspired by the socio-constructivist approach and it is developed through a template called TTIT (Traditional Teaching - Interactive Teaching). The template is meant to support teachers in effectively balancing the contents provided according to the classic self-training concept and the interactive activities introduced to promote active participation. These activities can be configured as individual or collaborative. Collaborative activities are supported by specific teaching strategies and techniques, such as Role Taking, collaborative writing and others. Participation in the activities is always optional. 2. The team consists of 2 teachers in Experimental Pedagogy coordinating the course plus process tutors and content tutors: the former are responsible for offering organizational support, while the latter are assigned to individual courses and work in close contact with the correspondent teacher, setting up the online environment, preparing and monitoring the interactive activities and so on. Overall, tutoring efforts are geared to accompanying students in their distance learning experience, through constant support, both online and in person. 3. The PST course is delivered through Moodle, within which each course has its own course page, structured according to a common template: a first introductory section and a content section, built by following the TTIT template, thus including video-lessons and resources needed to implement the interactive activities (e.g.: glossary, questionnaires, tasks, workshops and so on). First year of the course certainly represented a challenge from many points of view: the organizational synergy between two main institutions while defining effective operational models and practices; the need to carefully balance traditional and interactive teaching, and to support a strong sense of identity and community in the students; the management of inevitable technical issues, during students’ and teachers’ familiarization with new tools and resources. However, results from the exploratory study we will describe were quite positive. It is based on students’ answer to the mandatory survey they are requested to answer for each course. Specifically, 248 surveys were collected during the first academic year, related to 7 courses. The answers to the 12 closed questions (Likert Scale: 1-4) reported a generally good evaluation (avg: 3,26) with 81,3 % of the students claiming to be satisfied with the course. Particularly: teachers and tutors are considered to be very supportive (3,36), technological and organizational issues are well managed (3,36), teachers and course contents are considered to be adequate (3,30). Students were also asked to provide feedbacks on how to improve each course, by choosing suggestions from a given list. 31,22 % asked for more exam sessions, followed from 15,84 % asking for a better coordination between the different courses so to reduce their learning efforts.