learning - Academic Conferences Limited

Linda Martin et al.
While it is commonly argued that negative experiences have a greater impact than positive ones
(Normann,2000) it is important to address the overarching anxiety, unease, discomfort and lack of
confidence remembered by the students. These feelings threaten to outweigh and override the more
positive experiences stated by students as the pilot progressed. New challenges by their nature
threaten existing comfort zones but confidence in one's ability to meet the challenge is vital to
success. Failure will only compound one's lack of confidence and feelings of inadequacy. A pilot of
this nature has the propensity to discourage students from further participation on the programme and
a as result limit the potential to deepen their learning. For inexperienced students and for those
already failing, further consideration needs to be given as to whether the benefits promoted from
previous research of increased self confidence and motivation (Race, 1998) and enhanced
assessment outcomes (Race 2001, Coleman 2006) are likely to be realised through this process.
Critically, there are or can be significant differences between contrasting types of course presentation
i.e. on line, distance learning or on campus programmes. This programme seeks to market itself on
the strength of opportunities for interaction and shared learning that derive from online course
delivery. Students initially value this but a common reason given by students who withdraw from the
programme is isolation. As a result interaction and engagement may be processes they expect other
students to provide, but of which they are passive recipients. Peer assessment is underpinned by the
principle that you have to give on order to receive. However, this may be a principle that today's
students are struggling to give priority to. Krause (2005) found that part-time students, who are also in
paid employment, were less engaged than full-time students with more than half of part-time students
stating that their paid work interfered with their studies. Rather than seeing a need to negotiate with
their employers or make adjustments to their commitments, they expected study to fit around their
lives. McInnes (2003) suggests that engagement can no longer be taken for granted as a shared goal,
it needs to be negotiated with students and Yorke (2006) highlights the need to differentiate between
performance and learning goals. For some students this has been a confidence-boosting exercise,
but this seems to have resulted from a sense of their own work being of a better quality than that
which they have marked, rather than from learning from each others' work and feeling able to write a
better assignment as a result. It appears that whilst tutors continue to be dedicated to students'
learning, students may be more focused on their individual achievement. While research suggests a
close link between engagement and achievement, this is based on an understanding of achievement
resulting from a process of learning rather than completion of a task. Without a commitment to
learning, students are unlikely to move from surface to deep learning, focusing narrowly on successful
task completion, and may therefore only gain more surface level understanding of the subject. They
may be extremely committed to complete each task but, reflecting the world in which they work, are
outcome rather than process orientated and fail to see the benefit of tasks which do not appear to
have a direct correlation with the achievement of their immediate goal. Peer assessment is an attempt
to re-engage them with the process of learning, but there may be more fundamental issues which
need to be addressed with students before they value the potential benefits rather than being taskfocused
alone. Zepke and Leach suggest that higher education needs to adapt to the changing
expectations of students by negotiating "a strategic approach to learning in which students choose
which approach to adopt in any given situation" (2010: 173). The implication of this is that while peer
assessment may be a tool that can be used to exercise engagement, it may only be effective when
students have first embarked upon a commitment to learning and see peer assessment as a positive
part of that process. The issue in question then is not their understanding of learning requirements but
their motivation to learn. So the challenge for tutors is how to incentivise approaches to learning. This
needs to be addressed at point of entry onto a programme, prior to students embarking upon
assessed work, for without this commitment students are unlikely to reflect on the peer assessment
process as a learning experience and will judge it only as a task. The dilemma is whether
inexperienced students who are operating in a very different environment in the workplace can
continuously shift between two such contrasting sets of expectations.
For part-time students in employment it can no longer be assumed that they are engaged with a
concept of learning in its own right. It may have become inextricably linked with achievement and
career progression to the extent that they measure their learning through their employment status. It
is with this in mind that the course team will progress to meet the challenge of extricating the two with
a view to introducing students to the joys of learning and the fulfillment that is achieved through the
acquisition of new knowledge and the development of wisdom.
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