Flexibility is a key term for the JISC CDD programme and for all institutions dealing with curriculum innovation. Greater flexibility in the design and delivery of programmes is beneficial both for learners, who have diverse needs and learning goals, and for other stakeholders such as employers and the regional and national economies that rely on graduates to have relevant, up to date capabilities. A competence-based curriculum is inherently more flexible than one defined around specific content and activities. Developments in curriculum systems can support more flexible processes, while developments in student feedback and support - often aided by technology - can enable students in diverse locations and with diverse needs to follow the same course of study. An emergent finding is that more open technologies for delivery, for example web-based services and open source software, can allow for more flexible approaches than locked-down systems (see e.g. the Cascade and Making Assessment Count projects).
Background
At the start of the JISC CDD programme, projects undertook baselining activities which included interviews with stakeholders. As a result, we have a deeper understanding of central ideas such as 'responsive', 'flexible' and 'agile' curricula, and the fact that they can mean different things to the different people involved. Flexibility can now be more precisely defined in terms of:
A review of this theme at the October 2011 programme meeting concluded that learners are now being offered more choice within modules, but there is a trend towards less choice among modules as programmes become more holistically designed. There is recognition that a coherent learning journey is beneficial in a number of ways, but that this needs to accommodate choice around start times, modes of participation, and topics within modules.
Outcomes
In the ongoing work of the JISC CDD projects we can identify several approaches to achieving a flexible curriculum:
1. Designing a curriculum that allows for flexible modes of participation on the part of students, with choice for example over time, place and pace of study, timing of assessments, and technologies used to participate.
The Duckling project used podcasts, e-readers, voice boards and participation in an online immersive environment to offer more flexible access to the curriculum.
'The Duckling interventions resulted in improved learner engagement, more flexibility in the curriulum to accommodate the needs of time-poor, work-based distance learners, and the reduction of learner isolation'
Other projects that used technology to enable flexible access, including mobile access, were Making the New Diploma a Success, MoRSE and SpringboardTV
The MAC and ESCAPE projects used technology to provide learners with more flexible assessment opportunities and more choice over how they received feedback.
You can also explore a range of case studies in personalisation from the curriculum delivery programme.
2. Developing a negotiated curriculum framework that is validated around specific values and processes, rather than specific content and activities, allowing learning to be tailored to the needs of individual students and made relevant to a range of learning situations.
The PC3 project has developed a model curriculum that places coaching at the heart of personalised curriculum development. The model can now be integrated into a wide range of programmes as a free-standing module, allowing learners across a range of subject areas to select provision suitable to their needs, construct awards access resources and learning support, and negotiate assessment, with structured support from a personal coach.
The CoEducate project has developed an Inter-Disciplinary Inquiry-Based Learning framework support the validation of programmes that are work-focused and use inquiry-based and situated approaches rather than standard content teaching.
3. Designing a highly modular curriculum which can be flexibly recombined, either to suit the personal needs and interests of learners, or to suit another stakeholder such as an employer ('pick and mix' approach). This approach involves consideration of the granularity (size/length) of award-bearing units, how units can be combined to achieve awards, the academic quality of components and the quality/level of a highly modular award relative to a more integrated offering.
While modularisation has been one response to flexibility, it can also pose problems for students who can find their learning experience a fragmented one, and for staff who have to support students taking very different pathways through their course. Modularisation requires that a programme be split into self-contained units, without necessarily drawing out the connections or keeping the big picture in mind. Dynamic Learning Maps identified this as a particular challenge for medical students and for clinical teaching staff trying to make sense of their complex 5 year curriculum. They developed a mapping approach which used semantic and web 2.0 technologies to allow personalised views of the curriculum and of students' pathways through it. This has proved a powerful means of re-integrating the curriculum around individual needs.
4. Developing more flexible institutional processes of curriculum design, review and validation, so that course offerings can be kept up to date and responsive to the needs of stakeholders. This approach overlaps considerably with the interventions described under responsive curriculum.
The Predict project has developed a new curriculum design process that is efficient, flexible, focuses on enhancing educational development and the student experience and, is supported with responsive technology. Build in to this flexibility is the capacity to involve multiple stakeholders in design decisions.
The Enable project has worked to implement elements of an enterprise architecture for curriculum systems, in order to support flexible management of the institution's portfolio of courses and modules, as well as a more flexible process for creation of new products. Guidelines and workflows are designed to encourage a culture of innovation and so to promote more flexible practices at every level of curriculum design and delivery.
Resources
View all resources on the Design Studio tagged 'flexible'
Link here to Design Studio assets on developing a responsive curriculum
PC3 model curriculum
IDIBL framework
PiP examples of flexible curriculum designs
Quotes
"Flexibility needs to have boundaries"
"Can staff contracts deliver the necessary flexibility?"
"How do we cater for different speeds of learning - and do we really want to?"
‘DLM is a flexible and interactive tool, which can be readily aligned with an institution’s Teaching and Learning
Strategy, whilst at the same time support a diverse range of specific programme requirements. It can be used to
increase transparency in the curriculum in an interactive and participative way that more closely matches the
changing experience and expectation of many modern learners.' Dynamic Learning Maps
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