Experience self-directed learning for yourself: A workshop for teachers

As part of the „weiter.digital“ project, Michelle Pippig from Center for Open Digital Innovation and Participation (CODIP) of the Technical University of Dresden, together with her colleague Jana Riedel, held a three-hour, practice-oriented workshop on the topic of “Self-directed learning in vocational education” for teachers at the Academy of Business and Administration (AWV) and the Academy for Vocational Education (AFBB) Dresden on May 9, 2022.
By self-directed learning we mean learning processes in which the learners perceive and use didactic decision-making, design and action scope. The learners can, for example, determine the goals, content, methodology or path of their learning process themselves or co-determine it and thus adapt it better to their personal needs. In further training courses, self-directed learning takes place, for example, when learners express their own topic preferences or bring them with them. Through close cooperation with Jana Riedel, who developed the handbook "Self-directed learning in professional development" and is currently investigating solutions for mapping and storing acquired professional skills in the BMBF-funded research and development project "MyEduLife", valuable synergies with a thematically related research project could be created and utilized.

In the workshop, teachers were shown the importance and methods of self-directed learning and given new impulses for implementation in their practice. They are of great importance because the conditions and requirements for learning in vocational education have changed significantly in recent years. On the one hand, the COVID-19 pandemic, among other things, has led to an increased need for learning that is independent of time and place. On the other hand, professional practice demands increasingly diverse didactic skills from employees. Self-directed learning meets these requirements and promotes the skills required for this, which is why it is becoming increasingly important in vocational education. The role of the teacher is developing from purely imparting knowledge to accompanying the learning process. In this respect, too, teachers were sensitized in the workshop and encouraged to consider their teaching.

The workshop began with a keynote presentation designed to introduce the topic and spark the participants' interest. Following this, participants had the opportunity to design a self-selected learning sequence using a newly introduced method for self-directed learning. For this, they utilized a web-based toolkit of methods (developed in a previous project at TU Dresden). The resulting ideas and designs were then discussed in a plenary session and can now be tested by the instructors in their own teaching.

The ILIAS learning management system was used in the workshop. The learning materials were provided, the tasks completed and the results saved for the long term. This supported, among other things, a further transfer of knowledge from the participating teachers to their colleagues. At the end, the AWV thanked the course leaders for the interactive and exciting workshop.

Authors: Jonathan Dyrna, Michelle Pippig, Jana Riedel, Julia Zawidzki