Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Formazione continua e classe virtuale lapprendimento del linguaggio Java tramite tecnologie di formazione a distanza Riccardo Mazza SUPSI-Scuola universitaria professionale della svizzera italiana Galleria, Manno (Switzerland) -

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Swiss virtual campus A national program founded by the Swiss Confederation (30 Million CHF) for years Universities participate with 50% of costs. 50 ongoing projects, almost every Swiss university participate Three main aims: –Take advantage of the opportunities now available through new information and communication technology –To strengthen collaboration between the universities, a system of credits should be set up –To develop high-quality, multilingual, teaching materials –To improve the quality of student learning processes SUPSI participate in 7 projects as partner, heads of MACS project

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Experiences with new learning technologies Evaluation of the realised courses in order to improve their quality Plan to introduce NLT in other post grade and basis courses The realisation of continuous education courses in the Studio postdiploma in informatica avanzata (MACS) of the Dipartimento di Informatica ed Elettronica (DIE) C. E. courses are a simpler situation than basis education courses Computer science courses have an experienced audience Goals of the MACS project

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Facoltà di scienze della comunicazione (USI) ISPFP, Istituto svizzero di pedagogia per la formazione professionale Eduswiss, partenariato universitario per la formazione continua IDSIA, Istituto Dalle Molle di studi sullintelligenza artificiale (USI-SUPSI) CSCS, Centro svizzero di calcolo scientifico Partners

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana 2001: The Java programming language –wide interest ("beginner course") –in Italian –offered mainly in Ticino (near Italy and to italophones in Switzerland) –Started at March 20th 2001 (first F-T-F meeting), finished on May 29th 2001 (exams) –24 students participated (3 from other regions, 2 from Italy) 2002: Data Mining –advanced course –in English –open worldwide Choice of two types of course

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Face-to-face or synchronous meetings: introduction mid-time meeting weekly chat meetings examination (in presence!) Temporal structure red thread/fil rouge The virtual class: how to create the learning community

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Study materials online reading materials (mostly text): theory, examples, etc. links to other materials online proposal of books to read during the study Different kinds of learning activities: automatic comprehension tests open exercises discussion forums individual (closed) exercises group assignments … The virtual class (2)

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Collaborative learning: especially in the situations student-to-student and one-to-many not easily realised even in traditional approaches new technologies can be helpful important in order to create the virtual learning environment … and to avoid dropouts The role of the teacher become even more important and also more difficult and time-consuming The virtual class (3)

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana During the courses: surveys (before, during, at the end and later) monitoring of the online access … and of the various collaborative activities feedback through the solution of individual exercises … and following the online discussions After the course: elaboration of strategies to improve the quality of learning Evaluation

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana

Riccardo Mazza, AICA 2001, 20 sett Scuola universitaria professionale della Svizzera italiana Some outcomes A mixed approach (on-line and face-to-face) can be useful to avoid some typical problems in distance learning (students feels alone, lacks of interactions, …) Is useful to create a red-thread of the course to help students to maintain a pace during the study Teacher needs to spend more time in a on-line course rather than in ex-cathedra course (62h instead of 48h) Students have more time to spend in solving exercises and to collaborate in discussions Is fundamental the supervision of teacher in discussions and synchronous events