Teaching for Understanding Online

David Eddy Spicer, WIDE Research Manager and HGSE doctoral student
Shannon Martin Croft, WIDE Community Manager and Instructor; TIE 2000
Heidi Soule, TIE master's student; former WIDE Local Facilitator, Namibia
Respondent: Bob Fogel, HGSE Dean for Administration

December 5, 2003

WIDE World offers online professional development for educators and teachers alike. Designed and run through HGSE's Project Zero, WIDE World brings the concepts of Teaching for Understanding to a global audience by drawing upon more than a decade of research, innovative practice, and emerging technologies.

David Eddy Spicer began the seminar with an overview of the theoretical framework and extensive research history behind Teaching for Understanding, the pedagogical model which guides the practice of WIDE. Then Shannon Martin Croft illustrated how WIDE implements Teaching for Understanding online, including the structure of learning teams, small groups supported by coaches (often WIDE alums), and communicating with instructors (mostly trained at HGSE).

Along with e-mail exchanges documenting the excitement and engagement of WIDE participants, Shannon also showed some unique support devices and tools, including the Collaborative Curriculum Development Tool (CCDT). Heidi Soule described another kind of support mechanism, sharing her personal experiences working in the field with teachers in Namibia -- where the National Institute for Educational Development enrolled 40 teachers in a WIDE online course in spring, 2003.

The WIDE World community of learning represents one way that teachers can learn about best practices over distance and time. In other words, teachers can improve their pedagogy regardless of where they live or when they are able to meet. In a field riddled with completion failures, WIDE boasts an unparalleled 80% completion rate. Personal attention, sustained discussion, and scaffolded tools like the CCDT are crucial to WIDE's unique success.

Following the WIDE team's presentation, Bob Fogel, Dean for Administration, responded by drawing on expertise he gained from his work as director of executive education at the Harvard Business School, and at its online subsidiary, HBSi. He raised several questions for WIDE and the audience to consider, all revolving around the cost of operating WIDE and the benefits it provides -- in Fogel's words, the customer-value and institutional-value equations.

From the audience, WIDE co-principal investigator Stone Wiske, and executive director David Zarowin, contributed to this discussion. While the mission of WIDE is to improve teachers' pedagogy, the pragmatic reality is that WIDE must become self-sustaining by the end of its current long-running grant. Instead of viewing the two forces in opposition, WIDE managers see a scalable professional development model and a viable economic model as complementary.

The value-added experience that differentiates WIDE from other online learning environments is the interaction and professional relationship established between the learner and the coach. While research-based teaching strategies drive the course of instruction, equally valuable is the continuing community of practice WIDE classes establish.

The enthusiastic discussion period included questions about evaluating WIDE's effectiveness; marketing the project to potential domestic participants, including under-performing school districts; and balancing the possibly competing goals of continuous innovation and reliable delivery of services.

-- By Kristen DeAmicis and Edward Dieterle, with additions by Joe Blatt