UCOL Lecturer’s Online Learning Experience Shapes Practice.
For UCOL’s Veterinary Nursing and Science Education Lecturer, Dr Doris Adeyinka, completing the New Zealand Certificate in Adult Literacy and Numeracy Education on eCampus NZ was beneficial for two reasons.
Firstly, she finished the programme with a better understanding of how to integrate literacy and numeracy skills into her teaching practice.
“The courses helped me to focus on embedding literacy and numeracy skills into my work, using real-world examples,” she said.
Part of Dr Adeyinka’s work at UCOL involves helping learners prepare for their careers through the New Zealand Certificate in Study and Career Preparation.
“I’ve embedded numeracy skills into the way I teach the Level 3 and support the Level 4 programme. For example, one of the skills we teach is time management. Now, I ask students to use tables and graphs to show how they are using their time. I’ve also showed them how to calculate how much time they should spend on each section of an exam, when sections are weighted with a different number of points.”
Dr Adeyinka has received positive feedback from learners about these techniques, which have practical applications and provide them with an opportunity to practise what they’re learning in other classes.
“It reinforces what they are learning in their Maths classes too,” she said.
In addition to learning new literacy and numeracy strategies, Dr Adeyinka, who teaches one online class each week, found that her online learning experience on eCampus NZ helped her to develop her own online teaching practice.
“[Completing this qualification online] has helped me understand how my students feel, especially when they have families or are working full-time,” she said.
“I started reaching out to my students more to let them know they can talk to me – especially during lockdown. That was something that [my course facilitator] Fiona did for me as well. If she didn’t hear from me, she’d be ‘knocking at my door’. She helped me to stay on track,” she said.
“Something else I learned from her as an online lecturer was how she identified with my culture. She was interested in learning more about me. She taught me some te reo Māori, and I taught her some of my language, Yoruba. I also talked about the type of food we eat in Nigeria, and dance. That connected me to her,” she said.
“I took it into my own online teaching. For example, I’ve started using Māori greetings and signoffs. When you embrace each other’s culture, students want to learn,” she said.
eCampus NZ Facilitator Fiona Ingram found the experience similarly rewarding.
“Working with educators is always a pleasure and Doris’s warmth and enthusiasm made facilitating this course particularly enjoyable. She was enthusiastic (and serious) about the learning and it was lovely to connect, both as fellow educators and as human beings,” said eCampus NZ Facilitator Fiona Ingram.