Tutors’ Perceptions of Effective Online Pedagogy - The Learning Activity Analysis Tool

The role of the tutor in online learning is critical and the tutor s pedagogic understandings influence the nature of the learning experience. In order to support the creation of an effective online environment for learning, tutors need to explore the relationship between their pedagogic beliefs and understandings and the strategies they use to support their online learners. For those working in Higher Education, this exploration of pedagogic understandings and strategies can be problematic for several reasons and these represent barriers to effective practice. For example: pedagogic language can be quite specialised and subject discipline specific; theories of teaching and learning are not well understood by most Higher Education lecturers/tutors and are often treated with some suspicion as being part of the Education subject discipline area and not perceived as applicable across disciplines; teaching and learning strategies that are used are developed through personal experience and therefore tutors can tend to be quite defensive about these and as a result a critical discussion of practice can be problematic. This paper explores the use of a reflective analytical online tool, the Learning Activity Analysis Tool (LAAT), which was designed to explore ways of developing a tutor s pedagogic understandings that addresses these barriers.