1. Teacher education via distance
Development and status
Sólveig Jakobsdóttir, associate professor, soljak@hi.is
Þuríður Jóhannsdóttir, assistant professor, thuridur@hi.is
Presentation for visitors from University of Trondheim
April 20, 2012

2. Teacher education (B.Ed.) at a distance
at KHÍ-HÍ - Overview
Period - Pro- Special Developments
years gram program
Director 4 year
(not 3)
1 1993- x x Campus sessions +online teaching and learning:
2002 (e-mail, discussion boards, webs, LMS‘s)
2 2003- x Aim that all courses are available as DE, up to 50%
2007 students or more DE
(WebCT, netmeetings)
3 2007- Curriculum changes, course content, size, number, drop-
2008 out problems among DE s‘s; co-teaching starting
4 2008- Merging with University of Iceland;
2009 economic crash
5 2010- Co-teaching DE and campus students in most courses
2011+ (Moodle adopted)

3. For further information
Period 1
• Jón Jónasson. (2001). On-line distance education: a feasible choice in teacher education in Iceland? M.Ed. thesis, University of
Strathclyde, Glasgow. http://notendur.hi.is/jonjonas//skrif/mphil/thesis.pdf
Period 1-2
• Jóhannsdóttir, T. (2010). Deviations from the conventional: contradictions as sources of change in teacher education. In V. Ellis,
A. Edwards & P. Smagorinsky (Eds.), Cultural-Historical pespectives on teacher education and development (pp. 163-279).
London: Routledge.
• Jóhannsdóttir, T. J. (2010). Teacher education and school-based distance learning: individual and systemic development in
schools and a teacher education programme. PhD thesis, University of Iceland, Reykjavík. http://hdl.handle.net/1946/7119
• Jóhannsdóttir, u., & Skjelmo, R. (2004). Flexibility and Responsibility in Teacher Education: Experiences and Possibilities in
Iceland and North Norway. In L. Pekkala, W. Greller, A. Krylov, O. Snellman & J. Spence (Eds.), On Top of It: Overcoming the
Challenges of ICT and Distance Education in the Arctic (pp. 85-98). Rovaniemi: University of the Arctic Press, University of
Lapland.
Period 3
• Jakobsdóttir, S. (2008). The role of campus-sessions and face-to-face meetings in distance education. European Journal of Open,
Distance and E-Learning, 2008(II).http://www.eurodl.org/materials/contrib/2008/Jakobsdottir.htm
Period 4
• Geirsdóttir, G., Pálmadóttir, H., Ólafsson, R., Jakobsdóttir, S., Pálmason, o. og Jóhannsdóttir, u. (2007). Mótun stefnu í
fjarkennslumálum hins sameinaða háskóla - Lokaskýrsla verkefnishóps - [Translated: Shaping the distance education policy for a
joined university - final report]. Reykjavík, Iceland: Kennaraháskóli Íslands, Háskóli Íslands.
http://www.hi.is/files/asset/stjornsysla/kennslusvid/kennslumidstod/071116_verkefnishopur_um_fjarnam_lokaskyrsla.pdf
Period 5
• Jakobsdóttir, S. og Jóhannsdóttir, T. (2010). Merging online and "traditional" courses and student groups: A "natural" trend or a
temporary tactic - why and how? In A. Tait og A. Szucs (Eds.), Media inspirations for learning: What makes the impact?. EDEN
2010 Annual conference book of abstracts. Budapest: European Distance and E-Learning Network.
• Þuríður Jóhannsdóttir og Sólveig Jakobsdóttir. (2011). Samkennsla stað- og fjarnema við Menntavísindasvið Háskóla Íslands:
Reynsla og viðhorf kennara og nemenda – togstreita og tækifæri [Co-teaching campus-based students and distance students at
the School of Education, University of Iceland: Experience and views of teachers and teacher students – conflicts and
opportunities]. Netla - veftímarit um uppeldi og menntun. http://netla.hi.is/menntakvika2011/033.pdf

4. Merging of two Icelandic-uni’s, 2008
Iceland University of
Education (IUE) University of Iceland (UI)
Many different committees set up to ease the merging including a
DE policy group
Workgroup to
Workgroup to identify ways to: identify ways to:
reduce DE drop-out reduce drop-out
Organize f2f sessions rate

5. Some challenges and opportunities
Challenges Opportunities
Divide - differences Dividend- what can we learn
from each other?
Lack of data Collect data, take a close look at
the situation
Lack of policy, benchmarking Work on vision, policy,
benchmarking
Drop-out Find ways to reduce
Organization, blend of f2f and Find ways to improve?
online
Teaching methods Increase variety?
LMS, learning environments Go to open source? More use of
social software?

6. IUE + UI: Merging universities: no of
DE students in each, 2007-8
No and Kennaraháskóli Íslands University of
% of Iceland University of Education Iceland
students Under- Grad. Total Total
grad.
No of 1.703 679 2.382 9.783
students
No of DE 920 679 1599 267
students
% DE 54,0 100,0 67,1 2,7
students

7. DE – more differences
IUE UI
• 52% of courses DE • 5% of courses DE
(100% of the post-grad) (0-14% by department)
• DE since 1979, • DE since 1997,
online/blended since 1993 videoconferences, online;
• Main LMS: WebCT from ca. DE students co-taught in
2001 with students in f2f courses
• Long list of systems/tools • Main LMS: Moodle
email/postlists, open webs, • Some earlier experience
Webboard, WCB, with WebCT, and It’s
LearningSpace, It’s learning. learning
More recently Elgg (PLE),
wiki’s...

8. Vision (a draft)
• UI is the nation’s university which aims at providing/doing
outstanding teaching, research and support services for students
and teachers. UI policy in DE will help establish those goals
• The UI will in the next years increase flexibility in learning and
teaching by offering more distance and blended learning options.
By doing so the united university can increase equality, improve
access to higher education, and enable cross-curricular learning
• Within the next five years DE will be a real choice within all
departments and a way to strengthen the UI competitive edge.

9. Needs
• Needs/rights of individual and groups for access
to education regardless of place or their situation
• Needs of the knowledge society where
economice growth is based on education level
• Needs of the university to spend money well,
create better service for students, improve
learning/teaching and provide a better
competitive edge

10. Groups/individuals
• People who live outside the capital area or abroad
• People who want to work with their studies
• People who need to stay at home (e.g. Because of family, illess, handicap)
• Icelandic students who want to take courses at foreign university
• Foreign students who want to study at UI
• Campus students who want to take part of their studies via distance
(cross-curricular, scheduling problems, convenience ...)
• High school/junior college students who want to take college
credit/advanced placement

11. Some main goals
• The united university will icrease DE substantially (at least
to 25% overall)
• Schools/departments will decide and be responsible for
which programs and/or courses are available based on
awareness on the needs and demands for their respective
fields
• The unversity will provide structure for the planning
process and necessary support for the development
• Quality issues, international benchmarking

12. 2008

13. Need to reduce costs
• LMS – moving to Moodle (from Blackboard)
summer 2011 - in sync with global trend
towards open software and OER’s
• Co-teaching distance and campus-based
students – rule rather than exception, 2010-?
„Flexible learning“ in place of distance
learning? A “natural” trend or a temporary
tactic?

14. Co-teaching
• Most academic staff at UISE teach both in the
DE and regular program
• A few years ago, some started co-teaching
when they were teaching both types of
courses at the same time
• In the spring semester 2009
– 19 cases where the two course types had been
merged

15. Co-teaching
 Advantages can include
• Less workload when utilizing online resources for both groups
• Courses have been available which otherwise could not have been offered (too few
students)
• Less expense to run a combined class
 Disadvantages can include
• Increased work-complicated planning
• Difficulties running live f2f sessions (low attendance or technical problems)
• DE s’s sometimes feel left out during live sessions
• Campus s´s: technology during recordings bothersome
Scheduling difficulties for online/ synchronous meetings
• Worry by some t’s: more tendency for dropout

16. Co-teaching campus-based and distance students
Experience and views of teachers and students
• Study to examine the experience of co-teaching campus-
based and distance undergraduate students at the Faculty
of Teacher Education
• In the school year 2010–2011, it was made a rule rather
than the exception to merge teaching of these student
groups, before it had only been done when student groups
were small
• Data gathered with questionnaires among teachers and
students and with interviews with 9 teachers and 22
students in 8 courses

17. Results
The experience was mixed
• Majority of teachers and students felt that the co-teaching model was not as good as
teaching separate groups
• The distance students complained that they were not as well served in the co-teaching model
and on the other hand the campus-based students worried about getting fewer face-to-face
lessons
• The teachers shared those worries and among their concern was how passive the distance
students were on the course-webs
• The main benefit of teaching the two student groups together appeared to be that the
courses would otherwise not be taught
• However, the majority of participants thought that this teaching mode should be developed
further but not abandoned
• Preliminary data indicates ca. 25% cost cutting regarding teaching cost (working hours)

18. Teacher education (B.Ed.) at a distance
Number and % of DE students at UISE (IUE) preparing
to teach at the primary and lower secondary level
500
471
463
450 425
412 416
400 375
355 355
341
350
300 287
DE students, no.
250
DE students %
190 Reg. Students, no.
200 180
150
100
47 42 49
34 41
50 31
0
2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

19. Question
• Is our distance education "cool (ing down)"?

20. For further information
Danaher, P. A. og Umar, A. (Eds.). (2010). Perspectives on distance
education: teacher education through open and distance learning.
Vancouver, Canada: Commonwealth of Learning.
http://www.col.org/resources/publications/Pages/detail.aspx?PID
=332