OASIS conducts a re-orientation workshop for UPOU faculty support

The University of the Philippines Open University (UPOU) Office of Academic Support and Instructional Services (OASIS) facilitated a workshop entitled “Designing Resource-based Teaching and Learning Materials and Instructional Media Resources for the UPOU faculty” on 23-24 April 2019. This initiative from the office is aligned with its goal to provide support for the UPOU faculty, especially in terms of the development of course materials. Also, this becomes one of the office’s contributions to help promote and adopt/adapt innovative technology-supported teaching methodologies in support of effective learning, in relation to the university’s Innovative Teaching with Technology towards Teaching Effectiveness (InnovaTE) flagship program.

As a means of laying down the basic structures needed to form quality faculty orientation packages, the office invited practitioners and thought leaders in the fields of Instructional Design and Resource-Based Learning (RBL). For the morning session on the first day, Asst. Prof Leynard L. Gripal presented his take on Instructional Media Resources, focusing on the principles and considerations in the selection and development of such materials. He is a graduate of MA in Education (Educational/ Instructional Technology), current PhD student (Educational Evaluation and Research) at the University of the Philippines Diliman, and a faculty-in-charge (FIC) of courses in UPOU’s Bachelor of Education Studies (BES) program. For the afternoon session, Prof. Patricia B. Arinto, UPOU Professor and former Dean of Faculty of Education, re-oriented the participants on RBL and how its integral points may be practiced in the context of Online Teaching and Learning. Her discussion shed light on what it means to have quality instructional materials and forms of FIC support, which UPOU has continually developed and improved.

Participants of the workshop were representatives from the three UPOU Faculty offices (Faculty of Education, Faculty of Information and Communication Studies and Faculty of Management and Development Studies) and other key UPOU offices which offer services to the UPOU faculty in relation to the improvement of the course packages and instructional materials. The outputs elicited from the workshop are the representatives’ assessments of the available orientation materials for the UPOU faculty and their efforts or plans to document processes and services in relation to course development, and to a small extent, course delivery. Part of the workshop was also devoted to the Multimedia Center (MC) and the OASIS’ detailed flow charts for requesting MC services related to the production of learning objects (LOs) as supplementary course components or instructional materials. Doing so emphasizes the university’s practice of utilizing a variety of appropriate instructional resources and materials which may address the learning objectives set in any online teaching and learning context. (KMNapay)