European Journal ofPsychology ofEducation1995. vst.x. n"2. Ill-130c 1995. I.S.P.A.

Improving Student Learning in DistanceEducation: Theory, Research and Practice

Alistair R. MorganOpen University, Milton Keynes, United Kingdom

The aim ofthis paper is to examine how project-based learning indistance education can be seen to make a distinctive contribution to"improving student learning ". How has this approach to course designand assessment been put into practice in an Open University (OU)course and what assumptions about teaching and learning are involvedin this course development process. The paper also looks briefly at howthis project component has been evaluated by describing students' andtutors ' exp eriences of learning and teaching in the form of "actionresearch" so to reflect critically on practice and so initiate change.

Introduction

The point of departure of this paper is how can course design and assessment in distanceeducation be developed to encourage students to tackle their studies so as to ensure "quality"in the learning outcomes? By putting the notion of "quality" in a central position in the debateabout course design and assessment, we have to realise that the idea of "quality" is a highlycontested concept. Different "stakeholders" in the teaching and learning process, and the orga­nizational and administrative context will bring a variety of power struggles on the aims ofhigher education in to the foreground. For example, Barnett (1992) identifies four conceptionsof higher education which are primarily concerned with inputs and outputs of the system,rather than with detailed concern for the nature of the educational processes involved . He con­trasts these four conceptions, the institutional and systems concerns, with those concernedwith detailed content and experiences of students, as follows:

"The second four [conceptions] ... in contrast, are educational in orienta­tion and are concerned with the development of the minds of individualstudents and inevitably prompt concern with the educational processeswhich promote the desired states of mind. It is, I would contend, educa­tional conceptions of higher education of this latter kind which arelargely absent from our current debates over quality." (Barnett, 1992, p.8) .

Barnett was debating conceptions of quality in relation to the various sorts of perfor­mance indicators which could be used (or imposed) by government and called for action to

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voice what he called "the educational orientation of quality". He is calling for methods whichare appropriate for making educational jud gements.

In terms of making judgements about the qualit y of students ' educational experience,many stud ies of student learning (e.g., Ramsden , 1992) show the importance of encouragingstudents to adopt a deep appro ach to learn ing, in contrast to a surface approach to learning, i fwe are to ensure quality in the content of the learning outcomes (Marton & Saljo , 1976). Manystudies show the crucial influence of course des ign and assessment for influencing studentsapproaches to learning. For example, Biggs (1994 ) summarises the aspects of course designwhich are likely to foster a deep approach to learning under four key elements:

(I) Motivational conte xt: Students are likely to take a deep approach if their motivationis intrinsic, so students need to be involved in selecting and planning their learningso they can feel "ownership" of their work .

(II) Learne r activ ity: Stude nts must be active in learning, not passive. Also they must behelped to reflec t 0 11 the ir learning experie nces and relate them to exis ting knowl­edge and unders tandings.

(III) Interaction with others: Negotiations of meanings and learning through discussionare power ful ways to facilitate students to adopt a deep approach. Interact ion neednot on ly involve a tutor: peer tutori ng, student peer groups or self-help groups areusefu l ways to help students "construct" meaning from their studies.

(IV) A well structured know ledge base: In presenting new ideas and conce pts, they mustbe related to students' existing knowledge and conceptual frameworks, as well asprese nting new material in an integrated whole structure .

Although Biggs was writin g prim arily in the context of conventional ed ucation, much ofwhat he says applies to distance education and open learn ing, and it seem s particularly rele­vant when the bound aries between conventional education and open and distance educationare rapidl y becoming blurred . In a scrutiny of our practice in open and distance learning, it isuseful to examine to what extent course design can "del iver" the requirements set out byBiggs (1994). Project-based learning has the potent ial to embod y the first three elements, par ­ticularly the first two , intrinsic motivation and learning activity.

Course design in distance education

For many practitioners in open learning and distance education the predominant approachto course des ign is the structured corre sponde nce teachi ng text, which includes activities intext and self-assessment quest ions . This sort of teach ing tex t has its origins in programmedlearning and behavioural psychology and has sometimes be described as the "tutoria l-in-print"(Rowntrec, 1992). Although many distance educators may not now subscribe fully to the or i­gins in behavioural psychology, the aim is still to influence students study behaviours in sucha way that is deemed to be necessary for them to gain a complete understanding of the text. Inspite of the preva lence of this approach, the research suggests that students are not as easilymanipulated by the instructional devices, as course designers might imagine (Lockwood,1992). It is interes ting how Rowntree in his most recent publication contrasts the tutorial-in­print, where "the learning is assumed to happen while the learner is interacting with the pack­age", with the "Reflective Action Guide " . In the case of the "Reflective Action Guide" itassumes that:

" the important learn ing will take place awa y from the packa ge . Thematerial in the package is offered as a guide to action elsewhere-realsituat ions , perhaps with other people . The aim is not to have the learnermaster a body of knowledge but to attain personal insights or practicetowards some kind of competence." (Rowntree, 1992, p. 135).

IMPROVING STUDENT LEARNING IN DISTANCE EDUCATION 123

This approach of Rowntree to course design is a radical departure from the assumptions,which underpin (implicitly perhaps) the traditional distance teaching text and teaching pack­age. He suggests that the ultimate form of a reflective action guide could be a "package" pro­vided for learners to enable them to do an independent project as part of a course, as follows:

"It may contain guidance about how to choose a topic, sources of data,techniques of analysis, forms of reporting, the role of the tutor , and soon. But it may contain nothing of substance that has to be learned . Thesubstance is all out in the real world" (Rowntree, 1992, p. 136)

So we can see a rather different notion about quality in learning, emerging in the work ofRowntree ; the learner is engaged in constructing meaning and "going beyond the informationpresented". Human agency then is to be seen as a crucial element for understanding studentlearning and for improving our practice . There is now a diverse range of researchers and prac­titioners in education, psychology and sociology identifying "human agency" as central to ourunderstanding of education. For example Bruner (1990) in "Acts of Meaning" stresses thehuman concerns in education , which he claims have been lost in cognitive psychology throughthe influence of computing and cognitive science . He outlined two key factors for understand­ing the "self' so as to take account ofculture and history, as follows :

"The first is human reflexivity, our capacity to turn around on the pastand alter the present in its light, or to alter the past in the light of thepresent. Neither the past nor the present stays fixed in the face of thisreflexivity. The "immense repository" of our past encounters may berendered salient in different ways as we review them reflexively, ormay be changed by reconceptualization. The second universal is our"dazzling" intellectual capacity to envision alternatives - to conceive ofother ways of being, of acting, of striving. So while it may be the casethat in some sense we are "creatures of history", in another sense weare autonomous agents as well." (Bruner, 1990, pp. 109-110).

There seems to be a clear parallel here to the work of Giddens (1984) and his elaborationof structuration theory emphasising the dialectical relationship between "structure" and"human agency". Evans and Nation (1989) have adopted ideas from social theory and thework of Giddens (1984) in setting out "critical reflection" as an approach for looking at theoryand practice in distance education (and education as a whole) . In looking at how humans cometo "really understand" things , Evans and Nation (1989a) argue that "dialogue" should be thecrucial element in the learning process . Dialogue is thus central to humans engaged in makingmeaning out of their experiences:

"We use the term [dialogue] as a general descriptor of the communica­tions wich take place between teachers and learners ... we load the termwith meaning for our own purposes : dialogue involves the idea thathumans in communication are engaged actively in the making andexchange of meaning, it is not merely about the transmission of mes­sages ." (Evans & Nation , 1989b, p. 37).

The views of Evans and Nation are directed in opposition to approaches to teaching andlearning in distance education and open learning, which foster "instructional industrialism"and other technical solutions to interaction between student and teacher . They argue for anapproach to teaching and learning which in contast places dialogue as the critical ingredient asfollows:

"It is essential to recognise that the key to the successful enactment ofdialogue in distance education rests not with matters of technique overassessment, course design and delivery, or on media technology selec­tion, but rather it rests on the philosophy of distance education which

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informs decisions about techniques and technology. We arc advocatinga philosophy which recognises students autonomy and strives for dia­logue. It is most important that students are understood as the keyagents in their own learning and that both individually and collectivelythey can (and often do inspite of their closed course materials) shapetheir own learning, not just in the ways they learn, but also what theylearn. Thus dialogue should be encouraged not just between teacher andstudents, but also between students themselves (study groups, tutorialgroups, self-help networks etc.) and between them and those in thesocial contexts within which they live and work. In this respect, dia­logue should be encouraged through the course materials by providingthe students with knowledge, skills, ideas and values which are relevantto their needs and interests, and which they can use actively to under­stand, manage and change their social worlds through dialogue withtheir fellows ." (Evans & Nation, 1989b, p. 39).

In distance education and open learning, with the requirements of detailed curricularplanning and the influence of a systematic approach to course design (Rowntree, 1982) thenature of the teaching and learning leads to contested views about quality . In the OU forexample where the correspondence text forms the predominant approach to teaching, the com­plex division of labour involved in the knowledge production and distribution process createsan educational organisation, which has been described as "instructional industrialism" (Evans& Nation, I989b). There are parallels between Fordist models of industrial production and theknowledge production and distribution in mass distance education systems. Although consid­erable effort goes into the preparation of sci f-instructional texts with the structuring of activi­ties to encourage student engagement with the text (Lockwood, 1992), one can question thetaken for granted notion that a "quality" course assumes a highly structured didactic peda­gogy. This is not to imply that material should be made intentionally confusing, ambiguous orbadly structured. Rather the untheorised notion of what a course consists of and the prevailingorthodoxy in course design and assessment can obscure debate about alternative approaches tocourse design. As Evans and Nation point out, the instructional industrialists fail to recogniseor encourage adult learners to take control of their own learning. It seems as though after yearsof their directed schooling and higher education, many distance teachers seem to assume thatstudents "need to be guided, checked, cajoled and tested throughout their adult learning"(Evans & Nation, 1989a, p. 249).

In terms of course design and assessment the key questions are how can we enable stu­dents to "construct meaning" from their studies, or to use more formal terminolgy, how canwe design learning activities to encourage students to adopt a "deep approach" to their learn­ing? (Marton & Saljo, 1984). And how can we recognise our students as adults and grant themsome degree of responsibility for their learning? In a previous article I elaborated the theoreti­cal foundations of project-based learning and suggested that it provides a unique contributionto the curriculum in distance education (Morgan, 1983).

It is in the context of these theoretical issues that J want to examine the way project-basedlearning has been put into practice in a recent OU course entitled "The Environment", whichis a broad interdisciplinary course (I have been a member of the course production team, witha course development responsibility particularly for the project component) .

Designing project-based learning

In the "Environment" course (OU course code U206)1 there are three broad aims whichinform the course, albeit at a very general level: Awareness, Analysis and Action . It is the con­text of this third aim "action" that the course team embarked on the design of a project. A pro­ject component in the course , where students could examine an issue of environmental concern

IMPROVING STUDENT LEARNING IN DISTANCE EDUCATION 125

in their own locality, seemed an appropriate course design for students to tackle in parallel tothe more conventionally taught part of the course, contained in specially produced textbooks.

The guidance for the project component is all contained in a substantial "ProjectHandbook", which students receive at the start of the course. The introduction to thisHandbook conveys the aims of the project as follows:

"Your project will be a major part of achieving the third of the courseaims - evaluating desirable courses of action. It would be improper forthe course team to tell you how to act, or even that you should act, butwe are asking you to develop skills by behaving as if you were going toact. We are asking you to investigate a local environmental issue, towrite a short report and to draft a letter to an appropriate decision-mak­ing body advocating a particular outcome" (Project Handbook, p. 2).

The project is intended to involve students in three ways which the more conventionallytaught part of the course (teaching text, TV, audio-tapes and assignments) does not. The pro­ject topic or issue under examination should meet the following requirements.

- The issue should be local, and preferably one where the outcomes affect you directly.

- We are asking you to draw on experience and skills which you already possess.

- You will have to develop new skills of enquiry, interpretation and advocacy if you areto solve the problems you set yourself.

As a result of these factors, most students who do projects find that they generate muchstronger feelings than the more passive learning elsewhere in the au system. The job of thisProject Handbook is to provide a framework to help you to take on this challenge successfully,so you can emerge with strong positive feelings rather than the disappointment that can resultwhen projects go wrong. We have written this booklet and scheduled feedback from your tutorto minimise the opportunities for error, but the nature ofa project is that the ultimate respon­sibility is yours' (emphasis added, Open University, U206 Project Handbook, 1991, p. 2).

I have used this quote from the introduction to the Project Handbook , as I think it con­veys how different the project is from the rest of the course (and also the orthodoxy of the auteaching in the undergraduate programme). The overriding aim in designing the project com­ponent was to allow students some degree of control and responsibility for deciding what theylearnt and how they learnt it. At the same time the framework within the Project Handbookwas set out so as to encourage a series of interactions between the student and tutor (corres­pondence tuition) to minimise the chance that students would get "stuck" with their projectactivities.

As wel1 as allowing students this responsibility in learning, we also wanted to encourageand facilitate their "reflection in learning" and " learning from experience"; these approachesto adult learning seemed to be especially appropriate in view of the local focus of the projecttopics . The course design set out to adapt the concept of "experiential learning" as a basis forstructuring the project, derived from the Kolb "Experiential Leaning Cycle (Kolb & Fry,1975), which has been elaborated more recently by Baud, Keogh and Walker (1985) and alsoby Gibbs (1988) . The model of experiential learning has four stages as follows: (I) the imme­diate concrete learning experience is the starting point, which is the basis for (II), reflectionand observation; (Hl) these reflections and observations are incorporated into the existingunderstanding (or theory) and (IV) the incorporation of these observations leads to new impli­cations and active experimentation.

So as to encourage students to engage with the concept of experiential learning, the firstassignment related to their project topic, (where they set out their initial ideas and choice oftopic) requires them to go through the various stages of the experiential learning cycle. TheProject Handbook sets out the four stage model, as follows: experience, observation, concep­tualisation, experiment. It provides explanation of the ideas underlying the stages of the cycle.So for example under "conceptualisation", students are asked to consider issues of power, whoserves to benefit from a particular environmental change and what are the conflicts of interest

126 A.R. MORGAN

involved . The assessment requirements for the project are structured through four of the nineassignments in the course in the following way.

Choosing a topic [Tutor Marked Assignment erMA) OIlPlanning your investigation (TMA 03)Collect ing and interpreting information (TMA 05)Reporting your findings - recommendations for action (TMA 07)

The aim of this assessment structure is to ensure that students are in contact with theirtutor at various stages throughout their project. Also, by scheduling the project into alternateassignments, students will always have received the correspondence tuition on their previoussubmission before they have to start work on the next stage of the project.

The Project Handbook provides students with guidance for each stage of their work. Sofor example to help students to choose a topic and to convey to them the "feel" of possibleproject topic, three "ways" in" are explained .

(I) A "lifestyle approach", where the impacts and interactions of an individual'slifestyle are examined in terms of environmental impacts; for example, energy con­sumption, rubbish and recycling or the use of pre-packaged processed foods.

(II) Your "surroundings" - what is going on in your local area in terms of change in theenvironment, buildings, land-use, traffic densities etc.

(lll) A "media file" approach, where a collection of local newspapers over a number ofweeks will identify the currently contested issues which have an environmentalimpact.

Finally, students are taken through the various stages of the experiential learning cyclewith an example of traffic congestion and transport planning. The aim of this ProjectHandbook is to stimulate students' ideas and teach them about the notion of experiential learn­ing, rather then provide a set of ready-made projects. In terms of Rowntree's (1992) writingabove, the Handbook is an example of what he calls a "reflective action guide ." To summarisebriefly then, for each stage of student's work, the Handbook provides guidance and with anAppendix on how to find information.

So from this brief description of the course design. we can see that the underlyingassumptions and the demands of the learning tasks for students are very different from thoseinvolved in studying the highly structured correspondence teaching text, which I have calledthe "orthodoxy" in distance teaching and open learning. How do students experience theirnewly found freedom in learning? To what extent are they able to cope with the demands.

Research and evaluation

During the first year of presentation of the course, research and evaluation was carriedout to find out more about students' experiences of the project component. This work was car­ried out as an "action research" project , and to take account of the views of students and part­time tutors . The aim was to document the first year's experience of the project component, soas to form the basis for "critical reflection" on practice and change in practice for the teachingin subsequent years .

Data were collected from tutors at two points during the course, half way through and atthe end of the course , by means of an open-ended questionnaire. Tutors, a total of 82, weredivided into two groups, so each of them completed one questionnaire. Response rates were75% and 62% respectively . Essentially, we asked tutors to write to us about how they foundthe project component as a tutor. and what sorts of problems their students had encountered onthe course so far. Students were also asked about the project, and the course as a whole, at thesame two places in the study schedule. For the students we used a self-completion postal ques­tionnaire, containing both pre-coded and open ended questions . Two random samples of stu-

IMPROVING STUDENT LEARNING IN DISTANCE EDUCATION 127

dents were sent the questionnaires . Response rates were 56% and 81%. A brief outline ofsome of finding from qualitative data from the open-ended questions is now presented.

Tutors' experiences

In some respects the views and insights of the part-time tutors in the OU are under-val­ued. This is partly due to the power relations between the central faculty course teams and thepart -time tutors within the University and also a "culture" which tends to view them as"peripheral", offering remedial tutorials for students, or just teaching the course as prescribedby the central course team. However , the tutors are in a unique position to judge how studentsare coping with a course; they can be seen as a sort of "extended course team" or "externalfaculty" . If curriculum plans of a course team turn out to be disastrous with students, it is thepart-time tutors who are usually the first to know about it!

Many of the comments related to the broad interdisciplinary nature of the course and tothe pedagogic style of presenting the didactic teaching through commercially produced co­published textbooks. There seemed to be a general view amongst tutors that the idea of theproject component is important for the pedagogy and content of the course . Although somestudents find it difficult , it seems that this difficulty is associated with a lack ofconfidence andproblems of finding out what a project is really going to be like. This can be seen as a sort of"academic socialisation" into a particular form of discourse, which some students arc notfamiliar with. The project requires them to change their conceptions of learning and teaching.A comment on face to face tutorial sessions brings this issue to life:

"It is difficult to find the right balance between "teaching" and time forthem [the students] to discuss their problems, ideas, etc. for their pro­jects. Some students still sit there with pen and pad ready waiting to belectured at and I think feel somewhat "cheated" if they do not get a neatset of notes to take home."

Not surprisingly, previous experience and background is valuable to get students goingwith their projects.

" It is very evident that the "well educated" students have generallygone about things more effectively. This is because I believe they seeth e goal more clearly, hence my s uggesti o n that the " Proj ectHandbook" should include more outlines of what projects could looklike, so as to help bridge the "perception gap" for the weaker students'.

This typ e of feedback from tutors serves as vivid reminder that many au students,although mature adults , do not possess the "cultural capital" of more conventional students interms ofknowing the requirements and academic genre of a project. Hence the crucial impor­tance of the "Project Handbook" for helping students as well as the support from their tutors.

Overall the impression we gained part-way through the course was that the project"works" , although it does create a certain amount of apprehension and difficulty for some stu­dents . In spite of this, there was a strong view from the tutors that the project plays a uniquepart in the course and that it brings "alive" environmental issues for students , rather than justhaving more academic study.

Similarly at the end of the course, tutors were of the impression that students were copingreasonably well, although timetabling and scheduling created unforeseen problems for womenstudents.

"The submission of the Final Report in August is an oppressive burdenfor students who have young children - it may be an ideal time forworking men, but it is certainly the hardest time of the year for workingwomen with children - so move it to early September".

128 A.R. MORGAN

There were some suggestions that the project was linked to drop-out as a "make or break"issue at around TMA 03 (submission of Project Plans) and that this also created a heavy work ­load for tutors . However, in spite of some of the problems, none of the tutors was saying thatthe project is "too difficult" or posed "too many problems" for students or that it should beabandoned altogether. In general they supported the course design and pedagogy of the pro­ject.

"On the whole I think the project component is excellent - it encour­ages (forces?!) the development of "independent learners" and the con­solidation of some of the course issues with students" real life. I feelthat most of my students got a huge amount out of this and they pro­duced some excellent work."

So in terms of reflection on practice these views from tutors highlight problems oftimetabling, the number of possible topics in TMA 01 (Project Proposals) and a general ques­tion about the quality of the Project Handbook and how less experienced students come to seethe requirements of the project.

Students' experiences

How do studen ts' experiences match up to the perceptions of their problems as reportedby the tutors? We asked students to describe what they regarded as the best and worst featuresof the project and what they would like to see changed for future years . In general the benefi­cial elements of projects were also noted by the students .

" I was worried initially - never having done a project that has involvedso much work - however, the help I have received has been mostencouraging and I have got completely wrapped up on the topic,"

"I have found the stage by stage help on the project is extremel y help­ful and has removed a lot of self doubt has given a real interest in alocal env ironmental topic ."

On the negat ive side, there were many comments about the workload and the feelings ofuncerta inty about the way the project was progressing.

"It has been fairly time consuming and I feel uncertain as to the direc ­tion I am taking sometimes. More guidance would be helpful. I feelsometimes that the project detracts from the course, as I spend timeworrying about it rather than getting on with the course work or theproject"

"This type of work needs continual guidance and is not an ideal thingfor a distance learning course - it has caused me a great deal of anxietyand worry."

There were many comments from the students that the word length for the final submi s­sion was an unhelpful constraint and generally frustrated the progress of the project. Besidesthe actual time required, some students complained about the "extra hidden" costs .

"The project has occupied a great deal of time and energy, beyond thatwhich was "allocated" in the study plan. There are also cost of postage ,telephone calls, travel to interviews and libraries which have been aconsideration and prove difficult for people low incomes. It has beenvery difficult without access to a private phone."

There was a clear theme through the comments about the degree of guidance required .

IMPROVING STUDENTLEARNING IN DISTANCE EDUCATION 129

On one hand there seemed to be a view that more "conventional approaches" are needed , 'justgive us a list of options", and on the other, the view that the freedom was welcomed, the guid­ance was quite good and suggested changes to the course were about study schedules andworkloads.

Conclusion

Clearly there are many contested views from the studen ts about the problems they haveencountered with their projects and possible ways to modify the practice . The important issueis to take account of the diversity of views when we engage in "reflection on practice" .Following the work of Schon ( 1983), research and evaluation will not provide clear prescrip­tions for what to do. Rather it will serve to raise the awareness with teachers and coursedesigners of what seem to be the critical issues from the views of the students and also thepart-time tutors , and so feed into "reflection-in-action" as the process of addressing change inpractice in distance education (Morgan, 1993). Project-based learning can be put into practicesuccessfully in open and distance learning. It changes our views about what will constitute"quality" in learning, beyond the notion of the teaching package . It will counter tendenciestowards "transmission" modes of teaching and help students to take a deep approach to learn­ing, with the resulting influence on the quality of the learning outcomes.

Notes

Envi ronment (U206) is a full credit course. Six credits are needed for a degree .

References

Barnett, R. ( 1992) . The Jdea of Quality: Voicing the Educational. Higher Edu cation Quarterly, 46, 3- 19.

Biggs. J. ( 1994). Student learnin g research and theory: Where do we current ly stand? In G. Gibbs (Ed.), Impr o ving

Student Learning: Theory and Practice (pp . 1-19). Oxford: Oxford Center for Staff Development.

Boud, D., Keogh, R., & Walker, D. ( 1985). Reflection: Turning Experience into Learn ing . London : Kogan Page.

Brune r, J. (19 90). Acts of Meaning. Cambrid ge: Harvard University Press.

Evans, T., & Nation, D. (1989a). Critical Refl ections 0/1 Distance Education. Brighton : Palmer Press.

Evans, T., & Nation , D. (1989b) . Dialogue in practice , theory and research in distance education, Open Learning. 4, 2,

37-46.

Gibbs, G. ( 1988). Learning by Doing . London : Further Education Unit.

Giddens , A. (l9 8~). The Constitution ofSociety . Cambridge: Polity Press.

Kolb, D. A., & Fry, R. (197 5). Towards an applied theory of experiential learnin g. In C. L. Coop er (Ed .), Theory of

Group Processes. London : Wiley.

Lockwood, F. ( J992). Acti vities in Self-Ins tructional Texts. London: Kogan Page.

Mart on, F., & Sa lj o, R. ( 1976) . On qualit ative differences in learn ing I. Outco me and process. British Journal of

Educationul Psychology. 46, 4- 11.

Mar ton, F., & Saljo, R. ( 1984) . Approaches to Learning. In F. Marton, D. Hounsell , & N. Entwistle (Eds. ), The

Experienc e ofLearn ing (pp. 36-55). Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press.

130 A.R. MORGAN

Morgan, A. R. (19&3). Theoretical aspects of project-based learning in higher education. British Journal ofEducational

Technology, 14 (I l, 66-78.

Morgan, A. (1993) . Improving your Students ' Learning: Reflections on the Experience ofStudy. London : Kogan Page.

Open University (1991). Environment (U206) Project Handbook. Milton Keynes: Open University.

Ramsden, P. (1992) . Learning 10 Teach in Higher Education. London: Routledge.

Rowntree , D. (1982). Curriculum Development and Educational Technology. London: Harper and Row.

Rowntree, D. (1992) . Exploring Open and Distance Learn ing. London: Kogan Page.

Schon, D. (1983) . The Reflect ive Practiti oner. London :Temple Smith.

Key words : Course design, Course evaluation, Project-based learning.

Received: November 1994

Revision received' December 1994

Alistair R. Morgan . Open University , Milton Keynes , United Kingdom .

Current theme ofresearch:

Research in student learning, curriculum design in open distance learning.

Most relevant publications in the field ofPsychology of Education:

Morgan, A. (1983). Theoretical aspects of project-based learning in higher education. British Journal of Educational

Technology, 14 (I), 66-78.

Morgan, A. (1993). Improving your students' Learning: Reflexions on the experience of study. London: Kogan Page.