A blueprint for change: Introducing flexible delivery into teacher education

This paper charts my plan for the application of flexible delivery to a large first year unit in educational sociology that all Education students must complete at QUT. It examines QUT's flexible delivery policy framework and critically assesses the need for flexible development in this unit that will satisfy the curriculum's pedagogical imperatives.

The paper recommends the incorporation of one module of online lectures, the maintenance of face to face contact hours in tutorials, and considerable technological literacy skill development to support students' involvement in web based learning, discussion forums and email communication. It also explores an online lecture format that breaks away from merely uploading lecture material or notes onto the web. This format combines the lessons learnt from traditional, paper based open learning or distance education and the need to reframe our print age teaching and learning methods and thinking to adjust to the imperatives of our online future. It seeks to broach the physical distance between teacher and learners and the impersonal interface of the screen and to provide students with a series of genuinely interactive exercises that facilitate their learning.

Any realistic plan to introduce flexible delivery into a unit must also consider the technological and curriculum design expertise available within the university and the key constraints of staff time, funding and students' access to and familiarity with technology. It also needs to incorporate evaluation exercises that will reliably access the effectiveness of these technological strategies.

Introducing flexible delivery into units in teacher education can be pedagogically sound and realistic, but it must be done carefully and critically in a way that consistently foregrounds students' learning needs.