• Define the learning objectives, the target audience, and expected outcomes;
• Follow a blended learning format including web-based learning that encourages participant interaction;
• Emphasize peer learning that is interactive, participatory, experi ential, action-oriented, and directly linked to participants’ work programme and daily tasks;
• Add web components to enhance the course and transmit course documents and other resources;
• Seek assistance from an instructional designer;
• Coordinate with other branches of WBI to identify partnering countries, ensure alignment with corporate and operational priori ties, assess demand by the prospective countries, identify local partners for content devel opment and course delivery, and undertake localization of course materials and content, including translation.
Pedagogy of computer-based learning The course that resulted from the QER aims to apply a distance learn- ing methodology to strengthen par- liamentary capacity regarding over- sight, legislation and representation – the core functions of parliament – by modifying the way parliamentary work is performed, thus strengthen- ing the practical application to partic- ipants’ own job situations. Following the suggestions of the
QER,the new courses included a blended learning methodology includ- ing face-to-face training, self-paced learning modules,web-based learning, and videoconference training. The shift towards e-learning when the programme’s audience is primarily in the developing world may seem to naïvely limit learners who on the surface appear to have internet access that is inadequate to benefit from an online learning pro- gramme. However, according to an EdStats quer, internet access in the developing world is growing rapidly, with already three quarters of the population of low and middle-
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income countries with regular access by 2004 (see the table). In considering our particular
audience, parliamentary staff, there is also a very clear international move towards an E-Parliament.A “Survey of Facilities and Services available to Commonwealth Parliamentarians” conducted by the CPA in 2003 showed that the majority of Commonwealth governments sur- veyed, provided access to the internet to parliamentary staff, albeit some- times through shared facilities. These findings were further sub- stantiated when the Global Centre for Information and Communication Technologies in Parliament conducted the first ever world e-Parliament report in 2008, which drew on information provided by 105 assemblies of the world to establish a baseline of how parliaments were using, or planning to use, ICT to fulfill their responsibilities and connect to their constituencies. While the report concluded a sig- nificant gap between what is possible with ICT and, when inadequate, what has actually been accomplished by parliaments thus far, the Global Centre’s survey responses clearly demonstrated that most Parliaments were acutely aware of the strategic importance of ICT and had plans to improve their use of technology to support their work.
The advantages of the internet Making the course available through the internet not only makes the course content available to the parliamentary participants, but also encourages more
The group of delegates at La Trobe.
Parliaments to increase the resources they allocate towards internet access for their MPs and staff.As a result, access to these learning programmes would be increased. Distance learning also allows our often overworked pri- mary audience of professional parlia- mentary staff, the flexibility to partici- pate in the learning programmes with- in the confines of their busy schedules privately, should they not be able to join the group learning programme locally or internationally. Furthermore, the distance learning methodology allows for a lower cost course, and thus an increase in opportunities for moderated course delivery. Finally, with the material publicly available on the internet, anyone with an interest in parliamen- tary strengthening, even for cross- curricular use by those outside of the parliamentary community, can gain access to the material, further increas- ing the learning programme’s poten- tial educational impact. A unique feature in course design
was the on-going briefings by the course designers, from both WBI and CPA,to the Commonwealth’s Society of Clerks at the Table – a professional group comprising Clerks and Secretaries General from both national and sub-national parliaments through- out the Commonwealth. Feedback received from the Clerks helped ensure that the course content was in line with the needs of parliamentary staff.
How we blended learning The blended learning modalities that were included in the new learning