Introduction The Centre of Excellence in Interdisciplinary Mental Health (CEIMH) used the learning it developed over the five years of its operation (2005 to 2010) to disseminate good practice throughout the main institution (The University of Birmingham). An event was held to enable colleagues to learn how to create enquiry-based blended learning designs. The following journal article provides a detailed exploration and feedback from the event. Learning to Create Enquiry-based Blended Learning Designs: Resources to Develop Interdisciplinary Education.
Background In planning, we decided against holding a "show and tell" type event, instead the purpose of DiBL was to actively encourage participants to engage with resources and software to learn through hands on experiences, how to create enquiry-based blended learning designs. Coaches from across the University (including members from CEIMH, Schools of Education, Chemistry and the Central E-Learning Team), facilitated the academic teams in developing their blended learning designs and digital triggers.
Outcomes Over the two-day event, all the teams actively engaged in the learning process and produced a number of complex designs and digital triggering events. During the presentation phase (on the final day), the feedback from different groups indicated they had all learned a great deal from the enquiry-based learning method adopted for the event. Feedback suggested they had enjoyed and valued the time and hands on experiences offered. Video feedback from the final day is provided below, along with links to the freely available resources used. Please feel free to use these to develop your own designs.
Learning to Create Enquiry-based Blended Learning Designs: Resources to Develop Interdisciplinary Education. Abstract Interdisciplinary teaching and learning in social work education can improve service user outcomes by promoting collaborative working between professionals. Educators must ensure that students are given opportunities to gain the skills, knowledge and experiences required for collaborative working. Blended learning can overcome barriers of time and place to create spaces for interdisciplinary students to engage in interactive and collaborative learning experiences. Little has been written in social work education outlining how educators can gain the competences required to develop blended learning designs. This paper provides access to a set of resources aimed at guiding educators through the complex processes of creating interdisciplinary enquiry-based blended learning (EBBL) designs. The context, ethos and rationale for the development of these resources are outlined along with an evaluation that suggests they were successful in guiding an interdisciplinary group of educators through the complex processes of creating interdisciplinary EBBL designs.
Cooner, T 2011, 'Learning to create enquiry-based blended learning designs: resources to develop interdisciplinary education', Social Work Education, vol. 30, no. 3, pp. 312-330. https://doi.org/10.1080/02615479.2010.482983