Peeragogy – The Evolution of Active Learning

by Hsiao-Ting Wang, PGY1 Pharmacy Practice Resident, University of Maryland Medical Center

In a world of information overload, what is the best way to keep updated?  Other than reading through textbooks, guidelines, and journal articles, where can I learn from the wisdom of other’s real-world experiences?  Prior to starting my residency, I discovered Dr. Bryan Hayes’ twitter feed, @PharmERToxGuy, and was stunned by the abundance of knowledge shared between practitioners across the country.  One can learn about the hottest debate or the latest scientific findings in emergency medicine simply by reading 140-character tweets (aka messages)!  These are real-time conversations among experts in the field.  This is also self-directed learning conducted through peer-to-peer interaction, but without a facilitator!  The concept of peer-to-peer learning was first described in 2011 and subsequently called “Peeragogy.”^1,4  Before going further into peeragogy, I think it is necessary to take a step back to review the evolution of peer-based learning.

Traditional peer-based learning refers to the “active learning” component of instructional design where students are encouraged to formulate their own answers, participate in discussions, and engage in group work.  Teachers play the role of facilitator by selecting appropriate topics for discussions and raising questions when necessary to prompt students to think critically and deeply about the subject matter.  According to Alice Christudason, there are four common peer-learning strategies to choose from¹: buzz group, affinity group, solutions and critic group, and teach-write-discuss.  Buzz group is when students are divided into smaller groups for discussion in class and, following the small group discussion, one member of each small group presents during the whole class debrief.  Affinity group is similar to buzz group but it requires each small group to find their own time outside of the class meetings to discuss.  Solutions and critic groups work by pairing up two small groups together – one is responsible for teaching the whole class on a selected topic and the other for evaluating the presentation.  Lastly, the teach-write-discuss method utilizes a whole classroom discussion at the end of the instruction to examine how much students have learned from a lecture.

In addition, students can acquire new knowledge through other peer-to-peer instructional techniques such as role-play, debates, case studies, and group projects.  The key to successful traditional peer-based learning relies not only on students’ enthusiasm about active learning but also the teacher’s role in selecting and orchestrating the learning exercise.  In our digital world today, learning opportunity extend beyond the physical boundaries of classrooms.  One of the first peer-learning communities, Peer 2 Peer University (P2PU) was created in 2009 to provide inexpensive (free) higher education with quality content to millions of learners on the Internet.  There are many other online peer-learning communities similar to P2PU.  The newest platform is the Massive Online Open Classes (MOOCs), most notably Coursera.  These online communities still employ an instructor to facilitate learning with open forums for discussion between learners around the world.

Joe Corneli and Charles Danoff coined the term “Paragogy” to describe the self-directed learning that occurs through connections among peers.²  Literally, “para” means along side and “gogy” means leading.  Paragogy applies Knowles’ principles of androgogy (adult learning) to peer-based teaching and learning³.  There are five working principles of paragogy.  These principles along with authors’ definition of each principle are:

• Decenteralized center: Understanding the concept of shared context is more important than understanding one’s self-concept.
• Meta-learning as a source of knowledge: There is a lot to learn about learning.
• Peers have different but equal perspectives: Learners must confront and make sense of the difference among them as part of the learning experience instead of seeking to confirm what one already knew.
• Learning is distributed, not linear: It is important to learn how to work around a given social field as side-tracking is allowed.
• Realize the dream (if you can), then move one: Learners should attempt to fulfill their personal motivations but shouldn’t dwell too long.

Essentially, these working principles serve as the guidance for learners to facilitate their own learning without having a facilitator to remind them of the rules.  

To make the concept of self-driven peer-to-peer learning easily understood, Howard Rheingold coined the term “Peeragogy” in his Regent’s Lecture at the University of California, Berkeley in 2012.⁴  While parallel to paragogy, Mr. Rheingold combined social media with paragogy to describe peeragogy as the “future of high-end online learning in which motivated self-learners collaborate via a variety of social media to create, deliver, and learn an agreed curriculum.”⁵  Each learner serves in the “instructor” role and creates the syllabus and strategy to promote critical thinking and thoughtful discussions.⁶  In other words, for a peeragogical design to work, the group needs to establish a group consensus for expectations, learning objectives, media technology, and the social contract of the course.  The group needs to formulate a process for communicating with one another, how to respond to questions, give feedback in a timely manner, and evaluate performance at the completion of the course.  Last but not least, there needs to be a process to translate changes to the learning environment to be implemented in the next cycle.

Reflecting back on Dr. Hayes’ twitter feed, it is obvious that this online forum has provided a platform for information exchange among peers with similar interest and expertise in a particular field.  This fulfills the definition of a learning community as described by Mr. Rheingold.  To carry out peeragogy, the next step would be to establish a learning contract among followers and put it into action!

Reference:

1. Christudason, A. (2003). Peer learning. Successful Learning, Center for Development of Teaching and Learning (CDTL), National University of Singapore. (accessed 1 October 2014)
2. Corneli, J. and Danoff, C. J. (2011). Paragogy: Synergizing individual and organizational learning. (accessed 1 October 2014)
3. Knowles, M. S. (1980). The modern practice of adult education: From pedagogy to andragogy. Chicago: Follett.
4. Rheingold, H. (2012). UC Berkeley Regents' Lecture: Social Media and Peer Learning: From Mediated Pedagogy to Peeragogy. Presented by Berkeley Center for New Media. (accessed 19 September 2014)
5. Rheingold, H. (2012). Toward Peeragogy. (accessed 19 September 2014)
6. Rheingold, H, Corneli, J, Danoff, C. J. et al. (2014). The Peeragogy Handbook v. 2.0 (accessed 1 October 2014)

Stress and Anxiety: A Faculty Perspective

by Wesley Oliver, Pharm.D., PGY-1 Pharmacy Practice Resident, University of Maryland Medical Center

Anxiety, particularly related to public speaking, has been an issue I have had to deal with my entire life.  When I was younger, I would do anything to avoid speaking in public.  If speaking in front of others was unavoidable, I would reluctantly meander to the front of the group — sweating, shaking, and heart racing — mumble and stammer through my presentation, then sit down as quickly as possible.  Public speaking has never been easy for me; however, I have developed strategies to deal with my anxiety and I continue working on my public speaking skills.  Stress and anxiety are not detrimental if they are appropriately managed and I foresee the anxiety subsiding with repeated practice and become more comfortable presenting in a variety of settings.

When I explain my anxiety to others, they always give the same response: “Everyone gets nervous when speaking in front of others.”  While I have accepted this to be true based on my research on the subject, I have wondered if stress and anxiety can affect faculty in other areas of their work.

To my amazement, a quick search on the Internet reveals numerous areas where faculty experience anxiety and how it can affect them both professionally and personally.  Common themes include: maintaining heavy workloads, trying to meet unrealistic demands from administration, conducting research, applying for grants, making time for students, and creating work-life balance.^1-3  It is easy to imagine how someone experiencing excessive anxiety and stress in one area of their work life (e.g. applying for grants) can negatively affect and influence other areas (e.g. teaching).

In addition to these common themes, there are some specific areas that can cause anxiety and stress for faculty.  The first is grade anxiety.  These feelings arise as a faculty member is giving back grades to students.  It appears that the anxiety is highest in those that interact directly with students in a personal environment; however, even those teaching large groups can experience this anxiety.  The reason for this stress and anxiety is that the faculty member realizes some students worked really hard and the faculty member has invested a lot amount of time teaching these students, only to have some of them score low grades.⁴

Grade anxiety is closely related to exam anxiety.  Exam anxiety consists of faculty members experiencing stress because of the test they have created.  They are unsure of how the students will perform and whether or not they have created a “fair” test.  Anxiety also arises in faculty members questioning whether they have taught the information effectively or whether the information they taught is being tested appropriately.⁵

Finally, many faculty experience stress and anxiety at the beginning of their course every year.  Imagine having a new group of students, each with different personalities and expectations, and having to create new ways to reach them each year.  This can be very stressful.  One faculty member expressed the thoughts racing through his mind on the first of class this way: “Have them like me, Have them think I like them, Have them think I am funny, Have them think I know what I am doing so they will learn, Have them fear me because I know what will be on the exams and they do not, Not bother myself about what they think at all and just lecture.”⁶

There are many theories as to how stress and anxiety can affect performance.  The oldest theory, known as the Yerkes-Dodson or inverted-U principle, claims that a certain amount of arousal, such as stress or anxiety, is needed for a person to reach maximal performance.  However, once a person is exposed to too much stress or anxiety, performance will start to decline until the person can no longer function.⁷  Those that experience a little anxiety can perform very well, while those who experience too much are unable to perform at all.  Thus, it is important for someone to manage his/her anxiety in order to perform at a high level.

There are two methods to combat stress and anxiety as a teacher.  First, is to prepare for stressful situations and address them before beginning teaching.  The other is to identify those affected by stress and anxiety and institute programs to help them.  Both can be instituted simultaneously.  Faculty should go through training to teach them to effectively assign grades, administer exams, prepare for classes, and manage the demands of faculty life.  While this instruction will help diminish the stress and anxiety, programs will still be needed for those that need more help.  Given the risk of isolation for faculty members experiencing stress and anxiety, proactive methods to identify those that might need more help should be implemented.  These individuals can then be referred to receive cognitive behavioral therapy to help them deal with excessive stress and anxiety.⁷  A recent blog series focused on mental health issues in academia.  The author states that it is easy for those in academia to feel isolated.  Most do not feel comfortable approaching colleagues about their feelings.^8,9  Thus, it is very important to recognize stress in colleagues and strive to create an appropriate work-life balance to keep from becoming too stressed.

Stress and anxiety not only affects students but also those that teach them.  The best way to address faculty stress and anxiety is to implement programs to assist in preparing for and deal with these emotions.

References:

1. Kraus MW.  Do Professors Live a Stress-Free Life? [Internet].  Psychology Today; July 2013 [cited 2014 Sep 30].
2. Shaw C. Overworked and isolated-work pressure fuels mental illness in academia [Internet]. United Kingdom: The Guardian; May 2014 [cited 2014 Sep 30].
3. Smith D. Dealing with anxiety as a professor [Internet]. University Affairs; May 2014 [cited 2014 Sep 30].
4. Grade anxiety for professors [Internet]. Science Professor: The questionable life of a science professor; October 2010 [cited 2014 Sep 30].
5. Gabriel ME. Exam jitters? Professors battle test anxiety, too [Internet]. Madison (WI): University of Wisconsin-Madison College of Letters and Science News; December 2013 [cited 2014 Sep 30].
6. Kakela P. Start-up Anxiety: Professor shares his fears as a new semester begins [Internet]. Faculty Focus; December 2013 [cited 2014 Sep 30].
7. Staal MA. Stress, Cognition, and Human Performance: A literature review and conceptual framework [Internet]. Hanover, MD: NASA Center for Aerospace Information; August 2004 [cited 2014 Oct 11].
8. Blog + Mental health: a university crisis [Internet]. United Kingdom: The Guardian; July 2014 [cited 2014 Sep 30].
9. Shaw C, Ward L. Dark thoughts: why mental illness is on the rise in academia [Internet]. United Kingdom: The Guardian; March 2014 [cited 2014 Sep 30].