Humanizing Online Activities: Lessons Learned from Digitizing Work-the-Walk (WTW) Approach

Abstract

Work-the-Walk (WTW) is a teaching and learning approach that uses a type of blended learning model, which is flipped classroom, as its basis. The philosophy lies in the absence of lectures during face-to-face sessions, and the approach relies heavily on Socratic Dialogues and classroom activities to enhance the understanding of lessons of the day. With the outbreak of COVID-19, education at all levels must continue. Often, the challenge is on ensuring that students, who must attend remote learning are able to own their learning process, and that they are also able to relate to their environment. The objective of this paper is to discuss how to humanize students’ learning experience and environment by observing how digitization of WTW promotes the sense of ownership through active learning. This paper addresses two questions, including the implementation of WTW during remote learning (Digital WTW or D-WTW), and students’ understanding on the lessons of the day when D-WTW is used. The methodology adopted for this research was qualitative by means of observations of students’ participation during online synchronous activities. Two important findings are evident when D-WTW is used. The first one is that students become more confident in their articulation of ideas, and second, they become more engaged during the remote learning sessions. These could be contributed to the concept of humanizing online activities and the learning environment that allow them to explore and tap into their potential, and ultimately, these strengthen their learning experience.

Students’ Perspective on Sustaining Education and Promoting Humanising Education through e-Learning

“…This may increase the quality of education for all that supports the fourth SDG. The finding also indicates that moral values need to be added as part of education quality criteria, which is supporting Balakrishanan [34], Juhary [35], and Khilji [36] statements.…”

A Digital Approach to Teach Synthesis Writing for a Defence University: A Needs Analysis

“…It eases students' learning journey and creates a nurturing environment that facilitates exploration and mutual learning. Furthermore, this preference for collaborative learning harmonises with military pedagogy (Juhary, 2022), underscoring its adaptability and relevance across various educational contexts.…”

“…Previous research proved that this strategy is effective in increasing students' competence and comfort in learning (Musaljon et al, 2021). Collaboration is one of the strategies derived from constructivism, suitable for a military learning environment (Juhary, 2022). This strategy is also effective when paired with digital approaches (Ngamsomjit et al, 2022;Khan et al, 2021).…”

Digital Humanization of Education in the Light of Geopolitical Challenges

“…On the other hand, such humanization contributes to the formation of human-oriented understanding of the future professional activities, whichever industry alumni work in (Zagorodnya et al, 2020). Also worthy of mentioning are range of scientific papers that explore the issue of educational humanization in the context of digital transition and online learning (Mehta & Aguilera, 2020;Golz et al, 2019;Juhary, 2022). The above-mentioned authors claim for a new human-oriented pedagogical paradigm that concerns innovations, technological expansion and irrevocability of a mixed online-offline learning.…”