Aileen Watson, Andrew Fowler, Jacky Burrows

1. Engaging practice-based learners:
Yorkshire and Humberside Circles of
Support and Accountability
Volunteers
Andrew Fowler
Aileen Watson
and
Jacky Burrows

2. context
• Penal Voluntary Organisations are charitable, self-
defined voluntary agencies working with prisoners and
offenders in custody and the community (Corcoran 2011:
33)
• Offender Management Act (2007) opened up criminal
justice market for service providers from voluntary,
commercial and statutory sectors
• Transforming Rehabilitation: A Strategy for Reform
(MoJ, 2010)
• increasing role for penal voluntary organisations

3. The project
• Joint project between SHU and YHCOSA
▫ Stand alone academic module
▫ Aimed at volunteers working with sex offenders in
the community
▫ Heavy focus on 'practice', skills, and reflection
▫ 30 credits, level 4
▫ Blended learning delivered jointly

4. The students
• 11 started, 8 finished
▫ 1 withdrew for serious health reasons
▫ 2 withdrew for personal reasons
• Completers were all female
• All students had previous experience
undergraduate level
• All had completed at least one 'circle'

5. The module
• MODULE AIM
• To enable COSA volunteers to develop skills and knowledge that will
underpin their professional development and enhance their practice in
working with offenders within the community.
•
• MODULE LEARNING OUTCOMES
• By engaging successfully with this module a student will be able to:
 articulate, discuss and apply conceptual and theoretical frameworks that
underpin community based support, rehabilitation and re-integration of sex
offenders
 develop and demonstrate core skills that support the community
reintegration of sex offenders
 recognise and apply the multi-agency context of volunteering within COSA,
taking account of diverse roles, responsibilities, partnerships and
accountabilities
 discuss and respond appropriately to issues of diversity and difference
within the context of voluntary work within COSA

6. Blended learning
Blended learning Volunteering with sex offenders module
• 1 SHU face to face
session
• 12 SHU online
lectures
• 4 face to face COSA
sessions (more skills
based)
• interim and final
assignment

7. Online component
Three blocks of four sessions:
• Effective engagement
• Risks, rights and responsibilities
• Rehabilitation and reintegration
Mixture of written information, exercises, video
excerpts, case studies and prompts for reflection.

8. Andragogy
Knowles (1980 (cited in Chametzky
(2014)
Volunteering with sex offenders module
Models of assumptions:
• 1) self management of learning
• 2) empowerment of learners to
increase motivation
• 3) reliance on learners own life
experience to aid learning
• 4) objectives of learners for taking
the course
• 5) the practical real-world
solutions to problem encountered
on the course
• 1) in on-line environment more
active in knowledge acquisition
• 2) by being self directed learners
feel empowered - learn anytime
anywhere - flexible learners
• 3) In Circles - this experience
provides the figurative hooks
• 4) Our brief - learners ideas
• 5) opportunity to address real-
world situations in andragogic
learning environment

9. Social Constructivism
learning theory Volunteering with sex offenders module
• Constructed by learners as
they attempt to make sense of
their experiences. Learners,
therefore, are not empty
vessels waiting to be filled, but
rather active organisms
seeking meaning (Driscoll,
2005, p. 387)
• students question existing
knowledge, beliefs to problem
solve in highly fluid situations
(Cooner 2005)
• emails with tutor
• BB for debate
• simulation - real world
problems
• Using existing experience as a
basis for learning
• Critically reflective practice -
• course identity
• reflection - lectures -
assessment

10. Sustaining motivation & maximising potential
HOOKS
INCREASED
MOTVATION
INCREASED
DESIRE
Chametzky 2014

11. Meaningfulness and engagement
• needs to be worthwhile - working more
independently - needs to enhance their own
practice
• when meaningful - engaged with course
materials / peers - stronger vested interest in
learning
• more likely to attain skills in upper levels of
Bloom's taxonomy (Tsai 2009)
• resolution of real-life problems than memorizing
information (Pollock 2013)

12. Student perspective
Initial evaluation Final evaluation
• High levels of confidence
• Highly motivated
Key areas for learning:
• Sex offender rehabilitation
• Academic research around
COSA
• Challenging offending
behaviour
• Understanding risk
• Diversity
• Mixed response
• Generally positive about
quality of materials but less of
a 'professional' focus
• More connection between
online and face to face input
• More face to face contact with
tutors

13. What did we learn?
• Blended learning needed to be more unified - not two
separate components
• We needed greater clarity of purpose and course identity
• We needed to make more effective use of VLE to provide
clearer hooks and increase motivation
• We could have incorporated student experience into the
learning materials more creatively to enhance
engagement and make the module as a whole more
meaningful to the students.

14. Conclusions and recommendations
• Use of multi-media, for example, podcast, skype
• Enquiry-based Blended Learning - Community
of Enquiry Framework for Enquiry based
learning
• Continuing the action learning sets in the VLE
• Developing sense of course identity

15. References
• Driscoll, M. P. (2005) Psychology of learning for instruction (3rd Ed.) Boston: Allyn and
Bacon
• Chametzky, B. (2014) Andragogy and Engagement in Online Learning: Tenets and
Solutions. Creative Education, 5, 813-821. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ce.2014.510095
• Cooner, Tarsem Singh (2011). Learning to Create Enquiry-based Blended Learning
Designs: Resources to Develop Interdisciplinary Education. [online]. Social work
education, 30 (3), 312-330
• Corcoran, M. (2011) Dilemmas of institutionalization in the penal voluntary sector. Critical
Social Policy 31 (1): 30-52.
• Higher Education Academy (2015). Flexible Learning [online].
https://www.heacademy.ac.uk/workstreams-research/themes/flexible-learning
• Ministry of Justice (2007) Offender Management Act.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2007/21/pdfs/ukpga_20070021_en.pdf
• Ministry of Justice (2010) Transforming Rehabilitation: A Strategy for Reform.
https://consult.justice.gov.uk/digital-communications/transforming-
rehabilitation/results/transforming-rehabilitation-response.pdf
• Pollock, D. (2013) Designing and Teaching Online Courses
http://fsweb.bainbridge.edu/QEP/Docs/DesigningandTeachingOnlineCourses.pdf
• Tsai, M. J. (2009) The Model of Strategic E-Learning: Understanding and Evaluating
Student E-Learning from Metacognitive perspectives. Journal of Educational Technology &
Society, 12, 34-48. http://www.ifets.info