Introduction

This chapter covers approaches we can draw on for increasing learner engagement in delivery and delivery design. It is supported with examples to demonstrate how these approaches can be applied, including video recordings of classes.

Delivery is critical to engaging people as encapsulated in “It’s all in the delivery”. Techniques and strategies in this area stem from thought and planning around ‘what would make lessons and delivery an interesting and engaging experience for my learners?’. Our options are wide ranging: from attracting interest and attention with novelty e.g. props, humour; including elements of gamification in activities and developing some positive habits like harnessing and projecting our own enthusiasm to attract engagement. Keep in mind, increasing engagement, as a path to increasing learning success, lies at the heart microlearning design.

This chapter covers learning design for (a) presenting information or instruction e.g., lectures; and (b) for interactive learning sessions with greater participation and interaction e.g., tutorials, workshops. Incorporating activities is important in all delivery and lesson types, including lectures, so that application of what is being covered becomes an integral part of all learning. However, this chapter also shows learning delivery is moving into a blending of presentation and interactive-activity formats toward a blended format (i.e., a combination of the two: some presentation bended in with interactivity).

The term relatability is introduced for this chapter, as an engagement construct. Relatability pertains to delivering information in ways learners can relate to easily, to increase appeal and subsequently their engagement. The challenge here is to make information as easy as possible to grasp and process or internalise.

Relevance Linking (previous chapters) and Constructivist Learning (chapter 4) are pedagogical strategies that also support our aim to design and deliver learning sessions that are relatable and thus more engaging for learners. The constructivist approach leverages through associations, from things that are already familiar (or understood) as a base for constructing understanding of new and unfamiliar information. It is a perspective which views learning, and taking on knew knowledge, as naturally an active process rather than passive process (Jarvis, 2006). A student-centred mindset is a helpful way to guide choices around relatability. Try to meet learners in the space they occupy . From a holistic viewpoint, delivery of learning in the forms of pre-recorded and live delivery recordings are an accompaniment to modules that make up a ‘textual’ component of learning packages. Modules should also include activities, some of these can used in lectures and/or interactive class sessions.

Relatability can be broken down into practical approaches that include:

1. use of easy to relate to examples (accompanied by relatable tone of voice),
2. drawing on existing learner knowledge,
3.  making learning practical and relevant e.g., for success in employment and career and in assessments (Chapter 2),
4. designing activities aimed at getting students to participate in their learning, and
5.  breaking content into easy to process bite-sized pieces (to scaffold learning and optimise cognitive load (chapters 2 and 3).

Relevance Linking and Constructivist Learning are also included to stimulate interest and support the aims of making delivery relatable for learners.

Relevance linking

Even after the process of increasing relevance in course content (Chapter 2), some may still struggle to see value and relevance, and find study unappealing and demotivating. The goal for microlearning design at this point becomes:

“What can we do to convince learners that the benefits they can gain are worth the effort?”

Here, we can draw again on relevance linking (Chapter 2) to make practical value explicit in delivery. This means frequently drawing attention to the benefits to be gained from topics and concepts as we cover them - making this central to the way we design and deliver learning.

Key points of focus for relevance linking are: (a) advancing employability i.e., professional skills and competency and (b) guidance aimed at enabling students to understand and produce sound assessments. Life skills (or transferable skills) can also be included into professional skills, and range from managing relationships, to managing demanding environments and well-being.

Relevance linking during delivery is an approach we can use to address the difficulties many learners have recognising the relevance of content. It plays an important role in increasing attractiveness to learners and helps prompt and increase engagement.

It is important to promote learning resources including any readings you have set, along with the key ideas and concepts involved. One way to link to relevance is to point to and explain how they, as practitioners in development, can benefit from the learning materials, whether live or recorded.

A prime place to ‘sell benefits’, is the opening of a lecture. Another is in Introduction to week videos (Chapter 5), as these are opportunities to ‘sell’ to students the rewards and benefits they can gain from a course’s content, including applicability of concepts, principles, theories, and lessons to be learned from case studies.

The mindset I use when selecting resources like set readings is: ‘If a resource such as a reading is good enough and relevant enough to be in the course, then surely it is worth promoting it to students?’. Especially if you want them to read it and get value from it. This also applies to videos and other learning resources.

Relevance as practical value in learning design and activities

Weaving relevant activities into microlectures helps attract engagement and aid comprehension and retention of learning, which includes the ability to apply learning.

Activities should be designed with the aims of eliciting interest and involvement in mind. Accordingly, the practical value of the activities needs to be explained and made evident. In public relations, we often use short, scaffolded writing exercises that are authentic, based on industry work scenarios and expectations, which again needs to be made explicit. In addition to building professional competency and confidence for undertaking professional work, learning activities should be linked to assessments. Be sure to explain how the activities they are undertaking have been designed to prepare them for tackling their assessments.

Learning design approach

Often, in public relations writing courses, students are told from the start they will be doing quite a lot of writing, with writing exercises. We also explain that the exercises are designed to build their skills and confidence gently and gradually, and not to overwhelm them or frighten them off. We further explain that this regular practice-based system of learning is designed to dispel fears about writing, as they will become confident writers by the end.

These writing exercises are an example of a scaffolded approach to learning, in microlearning design. Segmenting is used to break learning down into small units, that build on one another. It is a practice-based learning design, where students ‘learn by doing’ repeatedly as a way to help them become accustomed to writing i.e., build ‘reflex memory’ skill, as a public relations writing competency.

This kind of scaffolded activity-based learning helps show student-centeredness in microlearning design and one firmly based in relevance (explicit) to professional employment skills and preparation for assessments. It is natural that students would want to know how course materials and activities relate to the assessments they have been set. They are interested in being well prepared for carrying out what is expected. Linking relevance to assessments, almost unfailingly, hooks interest; for them it is seen as the ‘bottom-line’.

EXAMPLE Learning Activity: writing a media release

The following activity is from a course with the overarching aim of introducing and building understanding of public relations core principles and practices. This class activity is aimed at:

(1) developing some understanding of public relations job requirements for an entry level position

(2) an introduction to understanding and developing core skills through an activity that involves developing ideas for writing a media release.

The lesson uses an advertisement for a typical public relations job as a source of guidance for approaching the task. The exercise itself is the application of knowledge, featuring the use of early engagement and diagnostic test to formatively assess learning and provide feedback.

Design elements

• Early engagement and learning performance, formatively assess, with guidance feedback

• Elicit proactive participation: being able to play an active role in one’s learning

• Active, constructivist, and practice-based learning

• Aims to instill sense of lesson relevance and worth: value for time spent attending session (or viewing recording)

Constructivist Learning Designs

The constructivist model views learning as a process in which new information and understandings are built, utilising a person’s existing knowledge, experience and understanding (Jarvis, 2006). The taking in of new information is seen as an active rather than passive process (Lutz & Huitt, 2004). Learning can be more effective by using designs that build understanding of new content through drawing on students’ existing knowledge (Vygotsky, 1978). Microlearning utilises constructivism to engage students in ways meaningful to them, student centred.

Existing understanding can be harnessed by tapping into what is already familiar and a bridge from which to build knowledge and understanding of new information (including skills).

Connecting new information to existing knowledge (e.g. previous content) facilitates the transfer of new information from working memory to long-term memory (Kapp & Defelice, 2019). Drawing on existing learner knowledge by actively involving students in the learning process helps make learning more appealing, less confusing and thus more interesting and engaging.

Ways in which we activate existing knowledge, before we go on to utilise and build on it, can be achieved in a number of ways. One of them is to draw on previous lesson content to begin new learning sessions or units of learning.

Key approaches for harnessing existing knowledge:

(a) tapping into previous content (e.g., previous module or lesson)

(b) tapping into learners’ personal knowledge, understandings, experiences and interests

(c) tapping into common knowledge understandings

We should view these as valuable learning resources that we can use to good effect. We frequently draw on existing understanding in our natural learning processes in life. We can easily use and combine all three approaches in one lesson.

(a) Previously covered content

Microlearning draws on a constructivist approach when it seeks to build knowledge and skills incrementally with a series of short segments of clear and focused information combined with embedded performance enabling activities. These singular microlearning events fit together as a part of a wider whole, in a process we commonly call scaffolding. The harder the conceptual material becomes, the more scaffolding we need to use to optimise and ensure effective learning.

Increasing the number of learning sessions with shorter duration lessons reduces cognitive load i.e., scaffolding aids retention of knowledge incrementally. Scaffolded sessions often use additional measures, like repetition, knowledge check quizzes, and frequent practice-based activities that include feedback and appraisal of those activities to help learners grasp difficult content. These are commonly used as high-engagement design measures that aim to keep students involved and facilitate deeper level learning, advanced mastery and comprehension, and also increase retention of knowledge and skills (Darby & Lang, 2019; Lutz & Huitt, 2004).

(b) Learner personal knowledge

Drawing on learners’ life-experiences can be an effective tool for guiding students to construct their own. This approach empowers students to become more directly involved in the process of their own learning. They begin to sense their own agency because motivation is intrinsic. Playing an important role in their self-development, they become more invested in ways of learning that feel rewarding. As educators, a part of our responsibility is to help get students on board with their own learning. Our role necessarily involves ‘winning hearts and minds’, doing what we can to make learning interesting, relevant, engaging, and rewarding for our learners.

Encouraging and providing opportunities for students to draw on their personal experiences, understandings and perspectives aids their understanding of content and concepts in new learning material. It is an effective way to stimulate learner participation, encouraging active learning.

We can activate and leverage learner’s personal knowledge into content delivery, like lectures, by including activities that help them draw on their experiences and understandings.

Online Forums: We can take this a step further by setting up forum activities, providing students with opportunities to interact and learn from each other. Using an in-course online forum to prompt open discussion can lead to productive spirited and learning exchanges among students. Lecturers can join in or make contributions at points where it is helpful e.g., provide clarifications or corrective guidance, and commentary and encouragement.

(c) Common knowledge understandings

The shared knowledge and understandings in common culture provide educators and learners with a rich and plentiful treasure trove of conceptual learning resources. These are widely understood concepts and ideas that we can use as bridges for new learning and building understanding. To do this, I search for common knowledge and ideas to help introduce and build understanding of new concepts and processes, as well as build confidence and competency for tackling assessments and professional work.

An example of a common knowledge idea that could be used as a point of comparison is, ‘game’. We could use 'game' to examine a topic area like life, or life-skills (target domain).  We can leverage it as a bridging comparison point to activate existing knowledge to build new understandings and insights of ‘life’. For example, comparing ways in which aspects of life can be seen as being ‘game’ like, in some ways, e.g., it can be competitive. Another point of comparison could be - life is like ‘acting’ e.g., acting out a variety of roles, like parent, colleague, friend, etc.

Applying common knowledge to learning activities

Using metaphors (for comparisons) tend to work for activities that aim to stimulate interest and participation, generating exploration and co-construction of understanding with deeper levels of insight. We could narrow ‘life-skills’, used above, to explore interpersonal life-skills needed to make work -life effective (e.g., negotiation, cooperation, empathy), imagining work-life as like a ‘game’.

It is possible to have students explore ways in which work-life can be likened to a game by asking them to explain and justify the supporting example and scenario they use, and having it critiqued by peers in class discussion. Discussion activities of this kind should be linked to practical aspects, like what lessons can be learned, or to be knowledge gained, (e.g., by viewing work-life skills in these ways).

Further, gamification could work well for generating added interest and enthusiasm – e.g., adding a popular vote competition which may involve small prize.

In designing a presentation or lecture, you may decide to use a common knowledge concept as a starting point and centrepiece. Alternatively, it could be woven in at a later point e.g., be used as the basis for an integrated learning activity. A common option for activities that have been built into lectures is to invite students to post responses to an online forum; example to follow shortly.

Activity design

Designing engaging activities needs thought and effort. In addition to making them relevant and purposeful they should be enticing, so they hook interest and look enjoyable (e.g., gamification).­­­­ The following example is a novel ice-breaking activity also designed to introduce students to a fundamental course concept, engaging and familiarising them with social constructivism and giving them a feel for the nature of the course.

This microlearning topic and activity, placed at the start of the course should introduce and stimulate exploratory interest in social constructivism, a perspective in which everyday knowledge, or commonsense knowledge, is viewed as being socially created through shared language and culture.

Ice-breaking activities like this can be embedded into bite sized lesson recordings as an asynchronous activity, well suited for online learners. It is designed to appeal to students and thereby attract participation and interaction.

It encourages active learning as students construct their own understanding, as well as peer-driven where they are encouraged  to learn from each another. It is used to encourage students to get to know each at course commencement. It has proven popular as well as effective in orienting students to the course. Gamification is also employed as an ‘interest’ hook. It involves playing a friendly game that is softly competitive. We could intensify the competitive intensity, for example, if we were to have students rate results.

​

Common knowledge: ​​essay writing lessons

The following demonstration is a series of lessons and activities designed to help students make a correctly focused start on an essay, in the first week. These lessons provide guidance on how to approach essay writing. Guidance includes the importance of utilising course resources like set readings and the relevance of these for demonstrating learning in essay assignments.

These are public relations lessons aimed at helping students transition into their first semester of university study. Accordingly, they are designed to help students develop the skills of understanding the relevance and value in content, including the applicability of concepts and course materials to assessments and then also real-life practice.

Lesson design here takes common understandings people hold about the legal domain as a bridging comparison scaffold. It is a metaphor used to help students develop a strong understanding of what essays require and useful ways to approach the tasks involved in producing an essay. Given the approach is based on providing guidance and preparation for an upcoming essay, it serves as a demonstration of relevance linking.

The key idea being used or leveraged here, centres around how lawyers are required to produce argued cases to support a given position. An easily relatable example would be to defend someone against an accusation.

This ‘think like a lawyer’ theme is one of the most effective I have used for helping learners quickly gain a clear and firm grasp on the mindset that is conducive to helping them produce quality essays (largely by avoiding pitfalls). It has proven to be effective as a way to launch into essay writing and facilitating understanding across all aspects and processes involved, from developing well-reasoned arguments supported by credible evidence, through to the mechanics of formal writing and referencing.

STEP 1 MICRO-LECTURE – INTRODUCING TOPIC AND LINKING CONTEXT 

In this first session students are introduced to the topic: the historical development of public relations. It incorporates ethical developments and runs over the next four weeks. While the content is key in this session, it is stressed, that understanding and application of their learning will be assessed in the upcoming essay. They are advised to keep the essay task in mind as a centre point for guiding their approach and focus for their study of the topic. This is an example of relevance linking to assessment and continues as the basis for design for the lessons that follow. The following snippet from a presentation on microlearning provides an overview of lesson design for introducing topic content and linking it to the essay assessment (for Step 1 micro-lecture).

This slide deck 'Essay Writing: engagement using Relevance Linking' (PDF; CC-BY), explains placing relevance linking in lesson design.

STEP 2 INTERACTIVE CLASS Part 1 (LESSON DESIGN)

Students come to this learning session primed with information about history and ethics in public relations, knowing that they have to write an essay based on this topic area. The key learning aim here is to help students equip themselves with knowledge and perspective to help them perform well in producing the set essay assessment. It also motivates them to engage with ethical issues which remain relevant today.

Two of the biggest problems students encounter in essay writing, especially when new to university, are (1) not staying on topic (task adherence) and (2) failure to produce argument i.e., developing supported and reasoned conclusions, which results in description rather than argument.

Pointing to these two stumbling blocks to raise awareness is a brief but important preliminary step as the start of the lesson, to set the context for focus and thinking. The ‘think like a lawyer’ theme (as a key to good essay writing) is then introduced to prompt students to draw on their commonsense understandings to explore the topic (essay writing), and theme, (what makes a good lawyer?) to begin the interactive discussion activity. Narrowing focus to this one theme effectively constrains cognitive load. The following video presentation explains and demonstrates this part of the lesson.

The next video (below), 'Essay writing discussion activity: Class 1-1 Think like a lawyer', (video; 3'57", CC-BY), explains lesson design for a class on essay writing.

STEP 3 INTERACTIVE CLASS  1: Part 2 (INTERACTIVE LESSON DESIGN)

The tangible aim in the “Start your essay” session is to have students make a start on their first assessment, by making a draft essay plan. The activity is designed to prompt students firstly, to decide on and write a stated position (a thesis statement), then secondly, to choose two main points they could use to support their position, taken from topics covered in the prior lecture.

Once a thesis statement and main points are written, students have, in effect, started their essay in the course of the first week of study. This provides the platform for progressing with information and discussion activities of other components required for the essay (as covered in slides linked above). Components include strategies for (1) constructing an argument, including logic and reasoning, (2) supporting with credible evidence, (3) using formal language, (4) ensuring referencing protocols as a part of (5) effective persuasion. Notice that  exploration of these aspects and components can be continued without reference to the ‘lawyer theme’ after the value of this perspective has been established.

Threshold skills and content for essay writing

The podcasts below on academic and essay writing, cover discussion the topics areas covered in these classes, despite being in an alternative format. These podcasts are now used to serve as additional learning resources for students on critical threshold skills and content for planning and writing essays for meeting task and topic requirements. While these podcasts do not draw on a ‘think like a lawyer’ theme directly, Chapter 4 Podcast Episodes, are based on conversations with a lawyer about similarities between legal case building and essay case building, in reference to producing convincing cases and arguments and selecting evidence. 

Areas covered in these podcasts are:

• Formal persuasion: logic, reasoning
• Argument: balance and quality (what is compelling, avoid overstating)
• Clear and concise expression
• Formal language protocols (avoid casual language)
• Technical language protocol
• Evidence: sourcing and evaluating
• Referencing protocols

Participative class learning

We now move on to a stronger focus on active participation in classes, progressing from constructivist learning to social constructivist learning. This includes measures and activities we can use to attract and prompt interactivity in learning and also promote successful outcomes of community and social belonging. This fits microlearning’s first and foremost goal - to increase learner engagement - as it is a pathway to increase rates of learning success.

Constructivist learning, as discussed, is based on the principle that learning can be more effective when students have the opportunity to develop or construct their own knowledge for better understandings through active engagement with principles and concepts (Steffe & Gale 2012). We facilitate this through activities that place the student at the centre of learning (discussed earlier). We encourage students to draw on their personal and existing understandings to help learners grasp new information in ways that are meaningful to them.

The social constructivist learning approach goes on to posit further that learners construct knowledge more effectively when they are able to interact with other learners, i.e. group or peer learning is preferable (Vygotsky, 1978). This often requires effort on our part to facilitate the breaking down of ‘sense of isolation’ among learners, and even more so for online learners.

Interactive participation in activities facilitates social bonding and belonging, i.e., breaking down isolation, developing a sense of purposefulness, and building student confidence in their learning abilities.

Providing welcoming and non-threatening environments where students feel safe, supported and encouraged to express themselves, makes participation more inviting, providing them with the opportunity to develop and advance their own thinking and understandings of concepts. This kind of learning also facilitates active evaluation about the value and applicability of concepts, ideas and principles e.g., how these may be applied to professional practices and associated pitfalls overcome.

Creating supportive interactive ecosystems

As facilitators of learning, we have a responsibility to lead the way in breaking down barriers to participation by providing a positive and welcoming class atmosphere, which is genuinely supportive. To do this, it is important that we give students a genuine sense of ownership and belonging, by treating them as ‘professionals in development’ and working with them to instil their own sense of professional identity. We use this kind of relevance linking so that they can begin to recognise themselves in relation to their chosen area, connecting with it and viewing themselves as already being a part of it (i.e., instilling a sense of professional belonging).

Making all first encounters positive, enjoyable and of value to learners is critical. So, making a ‘splash’ at the beginning is a high priority for setting the tempo: establishing vibrancy, positivity and sense of purpose, belonging and appeal. Give time and thought to designing activities that are interesting and inviting to students and as enjoyable as possible. Our aim is to work together with our learners to create a class experience that inspires them to keep attending and participating. Advice to consider here is to place a light warm up activity within ten minutes of commencing, as a way to break the ice, set the tempo for participation, and include something enjoyable. We have the option of being more relaxed about purposefulness to a learning objective with a first activity.

The following questions can help ensure that an activity will work well and serve a worthwhile purpose.

‘What is the purpose of the activity?’.

So too, about the value: ‘What’s in it for me, the student?’, and

‘What is it about this activity that makes it interesting?’.

These points should also be pitched to learners’ interests. Preference quality of activities over quantity (less is more); simple activities often work best. If an activity is not working as well as expected, then move on to another or modify it midway.

Design elements, and features to include in classes and activities

The following is a checklist of design elements to keep in mind when developing learning activities and class environments, for social peer type learning (but not limited only to), in interactive class environments.

Participative learning design video examples

Classes are designed with the aim of making participation and interaction appealing to students, by providing an environment that is welcoming, supportive, enjoyable and purposeful. It is a collaborative space where everyone’s voice matters. The sense of ownership motivates students to engage enthusiastically in lessons; and discussion activities with technology functions like ‘chat’ gives those who are less confident the opportunity to participate and be included.

Video 1: Fostering a Learning Community

This first video (below) 'Class Opening - community building' (video; 1'12", CC-BY) demonstrates cultivating a sense of belonging and setting foundations for a (strong) learning community. Note, I pick up on a somewhat incidental ‘hello’ from one student to another, and use this to promote a sense of community, belonging and ownership of class learning. I then go on to address an earlier question on ‘reflective practice’. My response here validates the value of that question, and thus the student, while also providing further guidance and clarification.

Summation: It shows the adopting of a participative approach by prioritising student connections. I start with inclusive gallery view to foreground the class, to create a supportive, connected and enjoyable environment. Then student contributions and comments are also used as community-building opportunities to help make them feel relaxed, safe and encouraged to put forward their thinking and ideas.

Video 2: Interactive Discussion showing Social Learning

This segment (below) 'Activity: Benefits of Workplace Democracy' (video; 1'56", CC-BY) reflects the kind of interactive social learning I aim for in classes. This discussion activity focuses on the benefits of workplace democracy. Slides are used (PowerPoint) to present information and activities where students construct understanding by building on each other’s contributions as I type their responses onto the slides in real time. This works to validate and acknowledge the value of their efforts and contributions. Also note, I normally start activities by providing the first response to lead and to demonstrate, by example, the process of participating and formulating responses.

Students are encouraged to participate, but not placed under pressure to do this. Participation often increases as those eager to respond show the way. Students are also able to participate in ways comfortable for them, by speaking with camera on or off, or by choosing the chat function.

While the exercise used here was designed to examine benefits (of workplace democracy), a critical perspective emerged naturally and added of depth of understanding. Accordingly, guidance to redirect focus was not needed.

Video 3: Strategies for Creative Thinking

This section (below) 'Strategies for creative thinking' (video; 1'35"; CC-BY) is taken toward the conclusion of a discussion on creative thinking strategies designed to encouraged exploration and taking advantage of unexpected creative breakthrough ideas that often arise while taking a break. Also the idea of deliberately stepping away from a problem is a strategy for enabling more free and open thinking on problems. It facilitates deeper understandings of creative thinking processes and insight into strategies that enable students to apply these in study tasks, and in other aspects of their lives.

Video 4.1: Culminating Activity, Co-Teaching and Rapport (Town Hall Meeting simulation)

This segment (below) 'Practical Activity Part 1 - Town Hall Meeting Prep' (video; 2'30"; CC-BY)  showcases a learning activity where students host and facilitate a mock Town Hall Meeting with a scenario provided at the start of the course. A sense of community, rapport and confidence, using practice-based learning and positive learning experiences, had been built throughout the term in preparation for it. This final activity for the course validates the power of student-centred design approaches that empower students to take control and ownership of their learning. The video shows this approach helped equip the students with the knowledge, confidence, and skills conducive to future success, especially in community consultation and engagement work.

Video 4.2: Fostering Reflection, Appraisal and Growth (Town Hall Meeting Debrief)

This segment (below) 'Practical Activity Part 2 - Town Hall Meeting Debrief '(video; 2'27"; CC-BY) is a debrief showing students reflecting on their performance and perceived areas of strength and weakness. The debrief, combined with the whole practice activity, allows students to solidify their understanding of the facilitation processes explored throughout the course and to identify areas for further refinement and development.

This performance-based activity, in its totality, provides students with the opportunity to apply the skills and knowledge they have developed, and to reflect, and receive feedback, as well as acknowledge and celebrate their performance. Positive and supportive learning environments in the activities leading up to the Town Hall have enabled them to feel comfortable in taking risks, engaging in self-reflection and striving for continuous improvement.

Hybrid teaching: participative learning design class video examples

Hybrid delivery design is increasingly common where short bursts of information are blended with interactive activity-centred classes. Although these activities, such as polls, quizzes and breakout room discussions, are not shown in the videos here, these tools can also increase comprehension and retention of learning.

Video 5 Employment applications

This video (below) 'Job applications' (video; 2'53"; CC-BY) shows exploration on the topic of producing applications for employment, featuring a student sharing her experiences and reflections. Insights and comments by peers added further detail on applying knowledge, i.e., for producing strong job applications and increasing chances of success in gaining desirable and suitabl employment.

Video 6 Facilitation Skills (highlights Social Learning)

The recording (below) 'Facilitation skills' (video; 6'22"; CC-BY) highlights a rich array of techniques including co-teaching, where an industry guest and I both project enthusiasm for the topic. Video conferencing features are used, like screen sharing, for presenting information and learning activities. Switching between share-screen and full gallery view is used to help produce a sense of community and belonging. Typing student responses using shared screen slides gives validation and encouragement as they are able to see their responses being included in the construction of knowledge. This affirms the value being placed on their thinking and perspectives. The satisfaction they derive from engaging in their own learning encourages further participation and continuing class attendance. This is a mainstay of my teaching practice.

Critical thinking was encouraged in the examination and analysis facilitation techniques. A relaxed and positive atmosphere facilitated engagement for developing advanced understanding. The video demonstrates the benefits of a blended learning approach, use of social learning principles, use of co-teaching, and encouragement of critical thinking by students to equip themselves with the skills needed for success in this area.

Video 7 Communication as Transactional (Fostering Active Social Learning)

The transactional perspective of communication is a topic usually dealt with in lecture format. I guide students through critical concepts only, before moving on to encourage their input on what they think the transactional concept could entail, which enables the combination of peer learning and social construction of understanding. Providing only necessary information gave students a base to participate in building understanding of the transactional notion of communicator ‘credibility’, for example, factors that influence credibility and trust and these can fluctuate.

Corrective feedback fits with a social constructivist design, as it is mainly student generated. This allows students to learn from one another to refine their understanding incrementally, without teacher direction. This is demonstrated in the video below 'Communication as Transactional' (video; 4'57"; CC-BY).

Video 8 Collaborative Learning through Co-teaching and Student Enquiry

This segment (below) 'Public speaking, facilitating - prep and confidence building' (video; 3'12"; CC-BY) illustrates a collaborative online learning approach to understanding public speaking skills, including the topic of building speaking confidence. It highlights the value of having a co-teacher take an active role in sharing teaching responsibilities and coordination. Combining the strength of our different perspectives allows students to experience variety in style and expertise.

The session also demonstrates the value of student contributions in posing questions that open up discussion in ways that would be less likely without them. This allows students to cover individual needs, e.g. their aspirations, career interests, perceived areas of strength and weaknesses, and contributes to lesson quality.

Note, I hide/reserve points I do not want overlooked by changing colour of the type to white or very pale grey. They are made visible when required by changing colour back to black during class.

Video 9 Practical Application of Facilitation Skills: Facilitator Intervening

This section (below) 'Intervening as a facilitative skill' (video; 1'45"; CC-BY) shows transition from foundational information to real-life scenario type application, illustrated through a student driven inquiry about how to manage finer details in working as a facilitator; in this instance exploring circumstances where a co-facilitator should intervene. This gave visibility to the relevance of course material and practical insight with bridging between theory and practice.

Discussion points

‘Student presence’ participation is encouraged, i.e., their appearance with camera on and spoken responses to activities, as it is best suited for developing sense of community. However, there is no pressure applied, and some prefer to participate with written ‘chat’ responses and the option for not revealing their name on screen. Classes accommodate all comfort levels to foster participation, with participation the overriding goal. Encouragement to add to and continue discussion on forums also attracts student engagement, including from those unable to attend class.

When students respond incorrectly or with a degree of misunderstanding that requires teacher / facilitator involvement, I firstly affirm a correct or relevant aspect of that response. I then build on that aspect of the response with the student until s/he arrives at a point where appropriate understanding is attained.

Answer questions wrongly in Chris's class and he doesn't make you feel like an idiot. (Student feedback)

Encouraging students actively to construct their own understandings of concepts, and how they can apply these to professional practice and their assessments, is an important way to elicit participation for active and social (peer-to-peer) learning.

Classes for online students allowed us to enjoy ‘learning by doing’ with interesting activities that are practical and useful.  (Student feedback)

With HE education shifting to a more ‘active’ student-learning delivery, so too the role of teacher is moving away from information presenter into roles of learning facilitator and learning environment designer: designing environments that are student-centred, in which students have greater control and agency over their learning. It increases engagement and is a more rewarding experience.

Learning activities, like open discussion questions shown in class videos above, allow students to 'trial and error' their thinking to arrive at understandings that are valid while still largely developed on their own. It allows learners to actively work through their understandings through verbal responses - cognitive processing by talking. It is a process of learning by talking through one’s own reasoning along with thoughts and reasoning from peers and facilitator.

RECORDINGS AS A LEARNING RESOURCE

Online interactive classes are recorded as a learning resource and benefit those not attending. This kind of asynchronous involvement aids inclusivity as students can learn a good deal from observing interactions. Recordings often motivate non-attendees to join in future classes. Students unable to attend are also encouraged to contribute to class activities in online forums.

Stimulating interest and engagement: techniques

As presenters, and as hosts of learning sessions we naturally have an interest in gaining and maintaining the attention and interest of our learners. This section delves further into strategies and techniques we use to attract learner interest, that is, to make content and learning appealing. We use interest-appeals, i.e., ways to stimulate interest with enthusiasm, relatability and novelty.

Enthusiasm

Enthusiasm, one’s own interest and commitment, is critical for conveying the ‘interest’ and value of the topics and activities that we are providing to students. Perceptions that study is hard because topics seem boring is a major barrier to learning. Our aim is to show them otherwise. Harnessing or marshalling our own passion and commitment is a vital starting point. It helps us to convey information with positivity and interest and to look for ways to show that a topic is in fact interesting and has value.

Relatability

Relatability is another important delivery strategy e.g., using a relatable voice, relatable examples of value and applicability, as well as relevancy e.g. relevance to work competencies and employability, to gain and maintain student interest.

Constructivist approaches, as discussed, also facilitate relatability and effectiveness of learning using associative approaches like common knowledge comparisons. However, these are not always necessary and can be overused. The alternative, direct route approach is to convey information with clear literal explanations and definitions. This often works well and can be a better choice, especially when precision is needed, when specific definitions are best. Having said that, a combination of both approaches often works well, combining the advantages of both.

EXAMPLES: A direct explanation approach. These instructive pieces are from online presentations with a conversational tone (minimal novelty).

The first is example is drawn from 'Public Relations - Persuasion in Politics' (video; 0'45"; CC-BY)

The second example is taken from 'The Ratio Variable' (video; 3'41"; CC-BY)

Novelty

Novelty in microlearning design, as a concept and strategy for interest and attention, has wide applicability, from (1) enthusiasm and harnessing your own unique i.e. novel personality (can cross over into humour), to (2) creativity, like searching out novel scenarios or attracting interest with an intriguing twist or surprising fact (i.e., an interest hook).

Achieving good balance is important across forms of novelty used to engage interest and make learning appealing. On one hand, we are looking to make learning and content attractive and enjoyable; on the other hand, we need to instil the realisation that learning also involves challenge (difficulty) and therefore considerable effort and commitment. Learning does need to be taken seriously, and we have a responsibility to equip students with expectations and understandings conducive to ensuring their success. (We explore this issue further, shortly)

Personality

The importance of harnessing the power of your own personality and style can be underestimated or overlooked. This appeal of your natural self is driven by authenticity i.e., drawing on natural strengths to make classes and presentations interesting and captivating in your own way.

It is an approach that does not rely on imitating others’ styles, nor on being highly animated. Leveraging your own natural style can serve you well in conveying information and enthusiasm convincingly. Of course, it comes with caveats and pitfalls to avoid, like not being self-indulgent, but rather staying learner centred. This applies to areas coming up, like humour and narrative storytelling.

Interest hooks

Interest hook appeals are attention grabbers that can take many forms: format as table boxes

Interest hooks are another broad subcategory limited only by imagination. Like most forms of novelty e.g., humour, they need to be thought through with care and diligence so that they stimulate interest without giving offence or undermining the learning purpose.

We are working in a territory here that attracts wide debate around the extent to which educational delivery should be entertaining i.e. infotainment. We need to work on making learning attractive to reduce one of the biggest hurdles of all, the commonly reported difficultly that study is difficult because the content seems boring to learners.

It also draws us back to the issue of balance – balance between (1) retaining the seriousness of learning material and its purpose and (2) using reasonable measures to make learning interesting, including making room for enjoyment as a part of the experience. Decisions we make around this do need to be purposeful and justifiable. However, purpose in this case, does not always need to be directly linked to a learning objective, as stimulating interest is a justifiable purpose in itself. Overuse or reliance on interest hooks, however, undermines learning as the purpose and is not justifiable.

Humour

It is reasonable to say that infotainment needs to be a part of education: learning, where possible should be an enjoyable and uplifting experience. But we should also keep in mind that we are not entertainers; being too gregarious undermines the importance of the learning enterprise and erodes credibility. While we want to be warm and good humoured, and encourage students to be this too, we do not want to undermine their faith in us as credible and knowledgeable. We want them to understand that learning involves a great deal of work and considerable challenge, and also be aware that this is what makes learning rewarding and worthwhile (e.g. value-adding for them).

Degrees of humour can be used carefully and strategically to stimulate a positive and engaging environment to break down barriers, helping ensure learning is an enjoyable experience as well as a developmental one. Humour is a powerful ally that we should utilise, but it can also be risky if not handled strategically and thoughtfully.

Narrative - storytelling

Stories and anecdotes, both personal and professional, can work very effectively to engage and demonstrate concepts, principles, processes and lessons on effective and good practice. However, they can have the opposite effect if not well chosen. They can be unengaging and student feedback, worldwide (universally) confirms this. Having said this, narratives, including those based on personal interests, can convey information powerfully and engage interest and therefore continue to be a valuable teaching approach.

I have drawn on my interest in guitars with the Stratocaster as one example when exploring brand identity creation. This 1950s brand naming sought to capitalise on space exploration as a new and exciting frontier; the name was derived from ‘stratosphere’. It is a light touch example that takes less than twenty seconds to include, aiding understanding without requiring any knowledge or interest in music or instruments

Stories from professional practice can be a rich source of learning relevancy and authenticity. They are also referred to as war stories, by some educators. But once again, the same checks and balances need to be applied as for all forms of narrative, as outlined in check list below, like; being clear and to the point, and making the purpose explicit.

Common complaints from students

- Too many scenarios and examples that lack relevance.

- Too many personal life stories from teachers that and are too far off topic.

Note, that just because we find a story meaningful, appealing and useful, it is not enough to guarantee students will see relevance or appeal, even more so if the relevance is not explained and not kept short.

Awareness of modelling behaviour and the observational nature of learning

Modelling behaviour is a part of the package of education but, its importance is sometimes overlooked. A great deal of learning is observational: for example, how we learn language and the ability to speak in early life. For example, Social Learning Theory (Bandura, 1977) emphasises how people learn by observation through modelling by others, especially those who have influence. Students observe teachers as role models and points of reference e.g., whom they see as successful and possessing keys to success in both study and professional practice.

In the formal learning context of students, they tend to see us as being successful and knowledgeable, and naturally look to us, including our cues and behaviour patterns, as a part of the learning process. This then, includes our use of ‘interest attracting’ measures like humour and narrative.

Novelty in learning delivery examples

1. This is an example of interest hook being used to engage attention while conveying ‘the workings’ of a theory principle, so in this case it is directly linked to a learning objective. The recorded section of the lesson is instructive, about establishing understanding of the process involved in signification, a theoretical aspect on the way sign systems work i.e., how language systems work to convey meaning. Music is used as being representative of a language system to give insight into meaning creation in a similar way to musical notes. This is physically demonstrated by a playing a guitar, and so also serves as a novel prop. This is taken from 'Signification demo with music notes' (video; 2'28"; CC-BY).

2. This example shows using novel case study material to engage interest. The activity used is a student critique of a social media campaign on an endangered species which used Snapchat’s ‘disappear after 10 seconds’ after a post function. Details of the campaign are provided at start. This is an excerpt from 'Last Selfie campaign' (video; 1'50"; CC-BY).

3. Gamification can be regarded and used as a hook as it was in the Folk-theory cliché activity discussed earlier which was presented in a forum. The following 'Folk Theory trial demo activity' (video; 1'31"; CC-BY) is an online live lecture rendition on demonstrating this exercise with student involvement, in preparation for forum activity. It is also an example of pre-teaching, a short-sized introduction to basics as preparation.

Gamification is also regarded and deployed as a fully blown learning design e.g., in language learning apps, and also in higher education design. The video helps show that gamification can take many forms. It is often effective for stimulating interest in subject content by adding enjoyment and rewards. It can increase engagement in ways that promote deeper learning that is highly interactive and facilitates more efficient learning e.g., faster acquisition. It can also promote a sense of community (peer relations) and belonging when design includes student interaction.

Learning design formats

Gagné’s (1992) Instructional Design model provides a structured approach that can be used to aid planning and designing content and steps for learning sessions. Planning should begin with determining learning objectives, i.e., specific outcomes desired and then context factors like existing level of student knowledge (e.g., beginning, advanced) and the nature of the content and skill area. From there consideration can turn to the designing of approaches, techniques and specific steps for a learning session.

LEARNING DESIGNS OVERVIEW

 Using worked examples 

The following video (below) 'Public Relations Research 'mean' worked-example' (video; 1'38"; CC-BY) provides a worked example to support teaching.

The teaching in this video 'Adaptability shown in jobseeking scenario based activity' (video; 4'10", CC-BY-4) provides an example of scenario-based learning.

Discussion Point:  detail recall and 'muscle memory'

Repetition, like frequent practice (e.g., learning by doing) and performance evaluation (e.g., quiz checking) are learning design tools suited to learning where precise high-detail recall is critical e.g., from medical emergency professions, but also through to learning to drive and learning a musical instrument.  Learning by doing is a noteworthy learning retention approach used in the Information Technology (IT) support sector (IT helpers), where users are guided through problems by executing solutions step-by-step themselves with technicians who intervene only when necessary. In cliché terms, teaching someone how to catch fish is more effective and beneficial than providing them with a fish. The IT approach has shown that active engagement, e.g., the act of pushing the keys yourself aids retention. It also helps build familiarity and skills for greater independence in problems solving.

Content reduction “on the go”

Deciding what content to select for including into lessons and classes is an obvious part of lesson planning, reason being, to avoid overload.  That said, content reduction during delivery, or "on the go" has been included to here as an idea to help manage situations where you may be required to deliver a course that is too content heavy (in its present form).

Selecting content on the basis of highest priority is a common sense way to manage delivery for highly loaded content situations.  The aim in designing delivery here moves to pointing out to students content the content that is most critical, very often, what is required of them in assessments.

Ideally, learning objectives (i.e., desired outcomes), should be designed and communicated in learning sessions that clearly show how the skills and knowledge being covered are needed for success in assessments and for success in professional work and employment.

Conclusion

This chapter focused on designing activities in ways that help enable and encourage learners to build competency and confidence, which includes ability and confidence for tackling assessments and professional work tasks and duties.

Lecturers and teachers have a critical role to play in stimulating student interest and motivation to learn. This includes providing interesting content and learning sessions and striving to develop a genuine sense of ownership and belonging, a ‘students as partners’ ecosystem in learning sessions as they take place. High-engagement design features in microlearning are also aimed at deep learning which increases retention of skills and knowledge as well as mastery in applying them. Accordingly, we should encourage to learners challenge themselves to think creatively and independently, and then provide corrective guidance as needed in affirming ways and show them that all their contributions are a valuable part of the learning journey process.

Working from a student-centred design approach this chapter draws on constructivist-learning models to encourage students to draw on and leverage their own existing knowledge to build understandings of new concepts that meaningful to them and build confidence in their ability as learners to take in new information.  It is important to provide supportive and non-threatening environments in the delivery and design of classes, so they feel encouraged to actively participate in building understandings in ways that are meaningful to them including how they can apply skills and knowledge covered to professional practice as well as assessments.

Strategies and techniques underpin design needed for effective engagement. They are used to attract and sustain interest and include novelty in various forms, like drawing-in intriguing and/or surprising information (e.g., fun facts), posing thought-provoking questions, interesting and relatable storytelling as well as use of props (this can include eye catching graphics or visuals).

For learning to be engaging, it is important that learning experiences are uplifting, for instance, contain elements of fun. Strategic use of humour (novelty) is conducive to creating positive and welcoming learning sessions. Humour can break down barriers isolation and alienation to help ensure learning is an enjoyable and all-inclusive experience while at the same time one that is developmental and outcomes based.

Designs for lessons and activities include discussion-based activities for grasping and building meaningful understandings and applicability, problem/solution-based activities, frequent practice-based activities for skill building e.g., writing for media activities and quiz-check activities for evaluating recall and reinforcement of critical and essential skills and knowledge.

Hybrid learning design, which blends presentation of short units of information with predominantly activity-based learning sessions is growing in popularity and proving effective for increasing learning and engagement.

An awareness of options and possibilities allows us to select, adapt and trial methods in ways that best suit our subject areas and learners, as well as leverage our own style and teaching strengths.

References

Bain, K. (2004). What the best college teachers do. Harvard University Press.

Bandura, A. (1977). Social learning theory. Prentice-Hall.

Darby, F., & Lang, J.M. (2019). Small teaching online: Applying learning science in online classes. Jossey-Bass & Pfeiffer.

Gagné, R. M., Briggs, L. J., & Wager, W. W. (1992). Principles of instructional design (4th ed.). Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers.

Jarvis, P. (2006). Towards a comprehensive theory of human learning. Routledge.

Kapp, K.M., & Defelice, R.A. (2019). Microlearning: Short and Sweet. Association for Talent Development.

Kossen, C., & Ooi, C.-Y. (2021). Trialling micro-learning design to increase engagement in online courses. Asian Association of Open Universities Journal, 16(3), 299-310. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAOUJ-09-2021-0107

Lutz, S., & Huitt, W. (2004). Connecting cognitive development and constructivism: Implications from theory for instruction and assessment. Constructivism in the Human Sciences, 9(1), 67-90.

Steffe, L. P., & Gale, J. (2012). Constructivism in Education. Oxon: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-136-47608-2.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Harvard University Press.

Attributions

Kossen, C., C4-1 Class Activity: Media release, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., PR MICRO PREZ Ch4 Essay Writing (2.49) Microlect context , (CC-BY)

Kossen, C.,  Class 1-1 overview “Think like a lawyer”, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Start your essay ,(CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Sample 4: PR Persuasion tactics (0.25), (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 09, Ch 3 Pt 2: Essays: Analysing task and scope, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 10, Ch 3, Pt 3: Planning, thesis & scope, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 11, Ch 3, Pt 4: Developing main points, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 12, Ch 3, Pt 5: Determine & ensure ’argument’, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 13, Ch 3, Pt 6: Marking criteria - Covering all bases, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 14, Ch 3, Pt 7: Editing & proof reading, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 15, Ch 4, Pt 1: Case building, evidence & referencing, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C.,  Episode 16, Ch 4, Pt 2: Case building - evidence & sources, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)

Kossen, C., Episode 17, Ch 3, Pt 8: Case building, formality in writing, chriskossen.podbean.com, (CC-BY-4)