Emerging Themes from the KEEP Seminar Series

In the past few months in our seminar series at partnering universities, KEEP had the opportunity to connect with many experts who are spearheading their institution’s learning development programs as well as professors who are experimenting with ways to incorporate new teaching methods into their classes. We saw many affirming the value in a platform like KEEP, especially through partner projects that shared the same mission to transform the e-learning industry in Hong Kong and beyond. We also see the potential of future partnerships looking into the future, especially revolving around the themes of gamification, teaching tools, and analytics.

Many institutions demonstrated gamification as a method to enhance engagement and motivate students through entertaining means. Before partnering with KEEP, The University of Hong Kong had already focused its education development on gamification. HKU used the Rubik’s Cube as a pedagogical tool and designed a game for their MOOC on Epidemics. City University had also developed a comprehensive RECIPE model to guide the production of a successful MOOC course and emphasized on allowing students shape their own education path, like that in video games. KEEP is in conversation with partners to continue to incorporate gamification tools into our platform.

At the core of e-learning remains the development of different education tools and programmes kick-starting innovation. Universities like Lingnan University developed teaching facilitation programs (Student Consulting Program) and established the Centre for Advancement of Outcome-Based Education (CAOBE) to constantly monitor the university’s teaching methods, especially in the liberal arts context. Hong Kong Baptist University had spotted a market void of tools aiding students to reflect on learning in higher education, and therefore created a social annotation tool called Web Annotation & Sharing Platform (WASP). The Education University of Hong Kong had also developed a MOOC course called “English you didn’t learn at school” and a project to provide graduated professional development support experience called Blended & Online Learning & Teaching (BOLT). Such projects challenge educators and students, and platform providers like KEEP, to never stop exploring the evolving landscape of teaching and learning.

Lastly, in moving toward a more data-driven education environment for both learners and teachers, the seminars also highlighted the trends, importance, and concerns revolving around the use of analytics in education. At the Polytechnic University of Hong Kong, we discussed the potential of big data analytics for recommendation systems. At the Chinese University of Hong Kong, concerns revolving privacy issues were brought out that presented some potential barriers to earning trust from the mass e-learning users. At Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, we saw innovative developments for tracking tools that could be incorporated in learning platforms. Analytics will continue to be a key focus for KEEP as we work with different partners.

KEEP’s partners were all active in promoting education and pioneering the new era of technological teaching methods. We were thankful that the seminars served as launching pads for the future collaborations we’ll have in shaping an innovative education system for the next generation of learners and educators.