Evaluation framework used for Ikarus

As researchers, we were also interested to discover to what extent did culture play a part and to what extent did the inherent design of the Ikarus course mitigate any overt/explicit (or less obvious/implicit) misunderstandings between students or between students and tutors.

Thinking back to our own MEd course, we were pretty quick to explore & deal with any misunderstandings but we considered what it would be like if we were using English as a second language. We hoped that any implicit lack of rapport, evidenced by the lack of a reply (or unsupportive reply) could lead us, as researchers, to acknowledge that the meaning conveyed within the threads was not all it should or could be.  In order to discover any cultural barriers, we were interested to know if our question could be rephrased thus: “how can I discover implicit lack of understanding or how do I judge ineffective collaboration?”
 
All these considerations went into the melting pot that the two researchers dipped into when framing their enquiry.
 
To see how they managed to tackle their evaluations of Ikarus, you will have to read their accounts. This should be particularly revealing since one is an ex-student from the course and the other is not. Maha will research as an ‘insider’ while Ged will adopt the ‘outsider’ perspective.

When the two evaluations are completed, it will be interesting not only to see how well the Ikarus course meets learners’ needs but also whether it is possible to compare the two approaches by observing how closely any conclusions correlate.