Prioritising human solutions is one of the findings of the UNESCO International Commission on the Futures of Education meeting on 8 April 2020 to reflect on the COVID-19 issue. According to the World Economic Forum, rethinking the educator's role is one way COVID-19 might influence how future generations are educated. Besides, one of the World Bank's core concepts for EdTech in tertiary education is to empower educators by increasing their ability and capacities for teaching and learning. As a result, educators should begin to develop and experiment with online technologies, which may result in the continuation of online pedagogies in the future. However, how can educators create learning tasks that better prepare students for life and work in the 21st century?
As highlighted in the WeCWI and the Science of Instruction, the roles of an educator need to be transformed into becoming a Web-based Cognitive Instructor (WeCI) or Web-based Cognitive Language Instructor (WeCLI) for designing a personalised learning environment by developing a pedagogy-supported instructional tool to be integrated into the lesson using adaptive learning technology. Educators worldwide attempt to develop rich learning environments by combining current instructional tools with specific pedagogical applications in the lesson to help students learn more effectively. Based on the WeCWI's research and innovation routes toward becoming an Education Innovator or EdNovator, the creative designing mind is a prerequisite. Educators must recognise and comprehend the chances for students to develop 21st-century skills that learning tasks provide.
What, Why, and How Is WeCWI Created?
Web-based Cognitive Writing Instruction or WeCWI first appeared at The Digital Education Show Asia 2014 at KLCC, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, after presenting a paper titled L2 Writing Challenges for Undergraduates: A Performance Analysis and a Literature Review on SIL Domains at the 3rd ACLL: Annual Asian Conference on Language Learning on April 25-28, 2013 in Osaka, Japan. The development of WeCWI is a result of my doctoral study, in which Web-based (We) represents an Internet-based or e-framework; Cognitive (C) suggests a brain-based foundation; Writing (W) describes the writing process and outcome, and Instruction (I) denotes a guided orientation. Internet use is becoming increasingly mobile; its incorporation into this framework has resulted in "interactivity" as the most significant benefit for WeCWI in becoming a hybrid e-framework.
Based on previous WeCWI research as seen in Publications, the poor writing skills of Malaysian undergraduates in language and content perspectives, as identified in the performance analysis, are supported by previous studies prescribed in the system (S), instructor (I), and learner (L) or SIL domains, which have summarised nine second language (L2) writing challenges: lecture time, institutional e-learning system, internet and communication technology (ICT) research, instructional methods, ICT interest, L2 writing style, reading habits, language competency, and first language. Furthermore, there is a great demand for additional web-based instruction (WBI) and a comprehensive framework to effectively address the L2 writing challenges from seven different perspectives in the higher education context:
the complexity of writing skill
low literacy skills
interlanguage errors
low language proficiency
lack of critical thinking
low information literacy
L2 writing anxiety
Furthermore, the learning management system (LMS) should not be the exclusive platform of e-learning used in higher education; instead, web-based instruction (WBI) generated through Web 2.0 should be regarded as the future e-learning mode, especially in language teaching practice. After assessing the course content, WBI is appropriate for integration into the content creation of a report writing course. It is an effective tool for integrating into current English courses, focusing on building learners' writing skills to write a research report. Moreover, the development of WBI through the WeCWI framework is supported by the demands of Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) students and teachers. It should be included in a writing course. Most students in the Faculty of Civil Engineering chose to learn about Reinforced Concrete Steel Fibers (SFRC) by using a website as an educational tool built on the WeCWI framework.
The instructional activities and resources provided on the WeCWI-enabled instructional tool that focuses on free reading, enterprises, and a guided writing approach have aided learners' literacy development. To accommodate the two dichotomous learning styles (sensing and intuitive), a web-based instructional tool with two alternative interface designs (widgetised and non-widgetised) should be developed. An educational tool containing web widgets is far more effective than hypertext in improving learners' writing performance and critical thinking abilities, regardless of learning style. Furthermore, sensing learners may write and think more critically after using widgetised educational technologies. When non-widgetised tools were assigned to intuitive learners, they performed better.
How Does WeCWI-Enhance the 21st Century Learning Design? Solutions
WeCWI is a set of theoretical and pedagogical principles for designing and developing a WBI as a kind of instructional delivery or tool. Through the design and integration of reading, discussion, and writing tasks as part of the pedagogical instructions within the e-learning environment, the WeCWI-enabled instructional tool can improve learners' language and cognitive development. WeCWI theoretically combines language acquisition principles, cognitive theories, composition studies, and e-learning to provide an effective framework based on learners' information processing preferences. These four primary theoretical rationales are seamlessly interwoven at the core of WeCWI, which is summed up in an equation known as the WeCWI Integrated Formula (Language acquisition + Composition studies + Cognitive theories) E-learning = Language and cognitive developments.
WeCWI focusses on creating an interactive online learning environment that will allow learners to connect dynamically, collaborate actively, and think critically using the Internet as a tool. It provides a framework for developing language skills and improving critical thinking through instructional system design (ISD), which employs an iterative process of planning outcomes, designing effective strategies for teaching and learning, selecting relevant technologies, identifying educational media, and measuring performance. It may be integrated into existing ID models, such as the ADDIE model, notably in the design and development phases, which serve to organise learning and are separated into five phases:
Analysis
Design
Development
Implementation
Evaluation
The 21st Century Learning Design (21CLD) rubrics were created and evaluated globally for the Innovative Teaching and Learning Research project in 2009 and 2012, as shown above, which was piloted in multiple countries, including Russia, Indonesia, Senegal, and Finland, as well as joined by Australia, England, Mexico, and Brunei. The most important finding is: Design learning is the key element in developing the 21CLD. Thus, the 21CLD curriculum is based on the ITL research approach, and it offers a collaborative, practice-based process that assists educators in changing how they construct enriched learning experiences for their students. It is also one of Microsoft's key areas of transforming education by concentrating on 21st-century skills. The understanding of how to apply technology tools in the six different 21CLD domains is assessed through the Microsoft Certified Educator exam.
21st Century Learning (21CL), which is also known as Pembelajaran Abad ke-21 (PAK21), is the Ministry of Education Malaysia (MOE)'s initiative that promotes a student-centred learning process guided by five elements: communication, cooperation, critical thinking, creativity, as well as values and ethics (4C1V). Hence, 4C1V is a collective desired output from the learning tasks or activities students do as part of their academic study based on 21CLD. It might be a one-time activity or a multi-week endeavour that occurs both within and outside the classroom. The six critical skills that need to be focussed on to create the 21CLD learning tasks include knowledge construction, skilled communication, collaboration, self-regulation, the use of ICT for learning, and real-world problem-solving and innovation.
What Is WeCWI-Enhanced 21CLD?
To achieve the five core competencies of 4C1V, four components of WeCWI—reading, writing, discussion, and e-learning—are integrated with the six critical skills of 21CLD, including knowledge construction, skilled communication, collaboration, self-regulation, the use of ICT for learning, as well as real-world problem-solving and innovation. WeCWI-enhanced 21CLD is a synergy between WeCWI (know-what) and 21CLD (know-why), which transforms learning into an enriched pedagogical experience (know-how). It offers six pedagogical tasks: Read to construct knowledge; write to communicate skilfully; discuss to collaborate; learn electronically using ICT; design to self-regulate; and innovate to solve real-world problems. The details of the six pedagogical tasks or activities are listed as follows:
Read to construct knowledge.
Read to construct knowledge as the main requirement and apply the knowledge in a new and interdisciplinary setting.
Write to communicate skillfully.
Write to communicate with a particular audience using extended or multi-modal communication with the required supporting evidence.
Discuss to collaborate.
Discuss collaborating with shared responsibility for making a substantive decision interdependently.
Learn electronically using ICT.
Learn to use ICT as a requirement to facilitate knowledge construction through reading among learners who are ICT product designers.
Design to self-regulate.
Design to self-regulate for completing a task by examining the learning goals and associated success criteria to plan long-term with the opportunity to revise the task based on feedback through discussion.
Innovate to solve a real-world problem.
Innovate to solve a real-world problem by discussing or implementing ideas outside the academic context.
How to Implement WeCWI-Enhanced 21CLD Pedagogical Tasks? Solutions
A. Read to Construct Knowledge as the Main Requirement and Apply the Knowledge in a New and Interdisciplinary Setting
Knowledge construction occurs when students do more than simply copy what they have learned; they move beyond knowledge replication to form new ideas and understandings. Knowledge construction skills are frequently called "critical thinking", which requires students to interpret, analyse, synthesise, or evaluate information or concepts. Suppose a learning task requires students to do a technique. In that case, they are already familiar with, or if the activity provides students with a set of steps to follow, this task does not necessitate knowledge construction. Students are replicating knowledge when they are required to seek material and then produce a paper that just reports what they discovered; they are not creating knowledge because they have not been asked to interpret, analyse, synthesise, or evaluate anything. If a task requires students to develop their own process, it necessitates knowledge construction.
The main requirement is the task component, which students spend the most time and effort on and which instructors grade. When students utilise the information they have produced to support another knowledge-construction activity in a different environment, they must apply their existing knowledge. Students must apply interpretation, analysis, synthesis, or evaluation to decide how to apply what they have learned in this new setting to be deemed an application of knowledge in a new context. Interdisciplinary learning tasks contain learning objectives, including content, key ideas, and methodologies from various academic disciplines. Subjects taught jointly in your nation do not qualify as multidisciplinary. Because information and communication technology (ICT) is frequently used to supplement other topics, this activity is also not considered multidisciplinary.
a. Rubrics and Decision Steps
The learning activity does NOT require students to construct knowledge.
Students can complete the activity by reproducing the information or using familiar procedures.
The learning activity DOES require students to construct knowledge by interpreting, analysing, synthesizing, or evaluating information or ideas, BUT the activity’s main requirement is NOT knowledge construction.
The learning activity’s main requirement IS knowledge construction, BUT the learning activity does NOT require students to apply their knowledge in a new context.
The learning activity’s main requirement is knowledge construction. It does require students to apply their knowledge in a new context, but it does not have learning goals in more than one subject.
The learning activity’s main requirement IS knowledge construction AND the learning activity DOES require students to apply their knowledge in a new context AND the knowledge construction IS interdisciplinary.
The activity DOES have learning goals in more than one subject.
b. Let's Ponder!
Which task is considered knowledge construction?
Students read articles on global warming, comparing and contrasting information gleaned from various sources.
Students read articles on global warming and discuss information found online or in books.
Which task's main requirement is knowledge construction?
Students receive 70% of their scores for extracting information and 30% for analysing what they read.
Students receive 30% of their marks for extracting information and 70% for analysing what they read.
Which task requires students to apply their knowledge?
Students read the textbook, discuss it, and conduct an experiment to assess the quality of their school's tap water. After collecting data, they use it to assess which water filtration system is best for the school.
Students read the textbook, discuss, and experiment to assess the quality of their school's tap water. They test the water and repeatedly alter the technique until they obtain the correct results.
Which students' knowledge construction task is interdisciplinary?
Science students read the manual and use technology to show the class their findings.
Science students read the manual and plot points on a graph based on their experiment results.
B. Write to Communicate with a Particular Audience Using Extended or Multi-Modal Communication with the Required Supporting Evidence
When students must ensure that their communication is acceptable to specific readers, they need to plan their communication for a specific audience. It is not enough for students to communicate with a broad audience on the Internet. To construct their message effectively, they must consider a specific population with unique demands. When communicating with a specific audience, students must choose the tools, information, or style they will use to reach the audience.
Extensive communication is required when students are needed to generate communication that conveys a group of related concepts rather than a single straightforward thought. Extended communication in written work is the equivalent of one or more whole paragraphs rather than a sentence or phrase. Communication is called multi-modal when more than one communication medium or tool is utilised to transmit a coherent message. When students must clarify their views or defend their thesis with facts or instances, they must provide supporting evidence. The supporting evidence is necessary to clarify the idea and convince the audience to take action.
a. Rubrics and Decision Steps
Students are NOT required to produce extended or multi-modal communication.
Students ARE required to produce extended communication or multi-modal communication, BUT they are NOT required to provide supporting evidence OR design their work for a particular audience.
Students ARE required to produce extended communication or multi-modal communication, AND they ARE required to provide supporting evidence.
They must explain their ideas or support a thesis with facts or examples OR they ARE required to design their communication for a particular audience BUT NOT BOTH.
Students ARE required to produce extended communication or multi-modal communication, AND they ARE required to provide supporting evidence, AND they ARE required to design their communication for a particular audience.
b. Let's Ponder!
Which learning task requires extended communication?
Students text through WhatsApp to discuss with students from another school to arrange the performance they will put on about the novel they read.
Students text through WhatsApp to discuss the novel they read with classmates.
Which task possesses multi-modal communication?
Students produce a written script for their oral presentation on water pollution for their journalism class, including an audio podcast.
Students produce blog posts on water pollution for their journalism class, including a recorded video of the conditions and an additional poster.
Which task requires supportive evidence?
Students write an essay about deforestation and its causes.
Students write an essay about deforestation.
Which group of students is required to design their communication for a particular audience?
Students produce a report about their ideas for improving a particular product.
Students produce a report to a company, suggesting improvements to a product.
C. Discuss Collaborating with Shared Responsibility for making a Substantive Decision Interdependently
Students collaborate when the task requires them to work in pairs or groups to discuss a topic or problem. Individuals from outside the classroom, such as students from various courses or schools and community members or experts, may be included in students working in pairs or groups. Students can also collaborate in person or via technology. Students must share responsibility when discussing in pairs or groups. Shared responsibility entails more than simply assisting one another: students must collaboratively own the task and be mutually responsible for its accomplishment.
Suppose the group activity involves students or people from outside the classroom. In that case, it qualifies as shared responsibility only if the students and the participants shoulder the blame for the work's outcome. When discussing critical issues that will influence their collaborative work, students should make significant decisions collectively. Substantive decisions impact students' work content, technique, or outcome. When all students contribute to the team's success, the students' work becomes interdependent. To meet these criteria, students must create an interdependent product or other interdependent outcomes. The majority of interdependent work is divided into two levels of accountability: individual accountability and group accountability.
a. Collaboration Rubrics and Decision Steps
Students are NOT required to work together in pairs or groups.
Students DO work together, BUT they DO NOT have shared responsibility.
Students DO have a shared responsibility, BUT they ARE NOT required to make substantive decisions together.
Students DO have a shared responsibility, AND they DO make substantive decisions together about the content, process, or product of their work, BUT their work is not interdependent.
Students DO have a shared responsibility, AND they DO make substantive decisions together about the content, process, or product of their work, AND their work is interdependent.
b. Let's Ponder!
Which task is considered as working together?
A small group of students discusses the best learning strategy together.
A whole class discusses the best learning strategy.
Which task requires shared responsibility?
A student interviews a peer in another country to discuss the famous local food.
A student interviews a peer in another country to discuss the development of a joint website.
Which task needs a substantive decision?
Pairs of students discuss doing an oral presentation about ozone depletion and decide what causes to write about.
Pairs of students discuss choosing which environmental issue they will study.
Which of the students' tasks is interdependent?
Students discuss, and each creates a webpage about their local area's history, culture, attractions, or people that will be linked to the class homepage.
Students discuss creating a tourist website presenting their local area's history, culture, attractions, and people.
D. Learn to Use ICT as a Requirement to Facilitate Knowledge Construction through Reading among Learners Who Are ICT Product Designers
When students use ICT directly to perform all or part of a learning task, this is referred to as student use of ICT. The use of ICT by the educator to offer resources to students does not count as student use: students must have control over their own ICT use. It is called ICT use if students are expected to use ICT or may utilise it to perform a task. Students construct knowledge by generating new ideas and understandings through interpretation, analysis, synthesis, or evaluation. When students utilise ICT directly for knowledge construction as part of a learning task, ICT helps knowledge construction. Students also use ICT to indirectly help knowledge construction by completing one component of a task using ICT and then applying information from that component in the knowledge-construction part of the task.
The knowledge construction enabled by ICT must be about the activity's learning goals; learning to use ICT does not qualify. Knowledge construction also includes the evaluation of Internet resources connected to learning objectives. When ICT helps students undertake knowledge-construction tasks that would be difficult or impractical without ICT, it is essential for knowledge construction. However, many tasks that involve knowledge construction may be performed without the use of ICT. Students who develop ICT products that others may utilise are designers of ICT products. The product transcends the learning task and can be utilised or enjoyed by a wider audience. ICT helps students solve real-world problems and innovate when they behave as designers.
a. Rubrics and Decision Steps
Students do not have the opportunity to use ICT for this learning activity.
Students use ICT to learn or practise basic skills or reproduce information. They are NOT constructing knowledge.
Students use ICT to support knowledge construction, BUT they could construct the same knowledge without using ICT.
Students use ICT to support knowledge construction, AND ICT is required for constructing this knowledge, BUT students do NOT create an ICT product for authentic users.
Students use ICT to support knowledge construction, AND the ICT is required for constructing this knowledge, AND students DO create an ICT product for authentic users.
b. Let's Ponder!
Which one of these tasks considered the students' use of ICT?
Students learn about cell division using a software simulation to explore the process.
Students learn about cell division by watching the educator demonstrate a software simulation.
Which of the uses of ICT tasks supports knowledge construction?
Students use Excel spreadsheet software to total up the numbers together.
Students use Excel spreadsheet software to analyse the data of an experiment.
Which task is ICT required for knowledge construction?
Students use a computer-based simulation to investigate how planets are formed.
Students use a spreadsheet to compute totals that they will use to analyse their raw data.
Which group of students are the designers of an ICT product?
Students create videos of their own interviews with local community members to submit to the educator for the end-of-year assignment.
Students create videos of their own interviews with local community members that will air on a local television program about "our community".
E. Design to Self-regulate for Completing a Task by Examining the Learning goals and Associated Success Criteria to Plan Long-Term with the Opportunity to Revise the Task Based on Feedback through Discussion
Learning tasks that allow students to develop self-regulation skills must be long enough to organise their tasks across time. It also provides insight into defined learning goals and success criteria that students can use to plan and monitor their own work. If students work on a learning task over an extended time, it is termed long-term. If the learning task is completed in a single class period, students do not have time to organise their work process or enhance it across numerous versions.
Time is a fundamental requirement for students' ability to self-regulate. Students may analyse the progress and quality of their work while studying if they have the learning goals and related success criteria before completing their task. When feedback is offered and used to enhance the work before it is submitted or finalised, students can improve their tasks based on it. Feedback may be provided by the educator or by peers. Students may also be able to revise their work depending on their own deliberate self-reflection process.
a. Rubrics and Decision Steps
Pre-requisites for self-regulation are NOT in place.
The learning activity is NOT long-term OR students do NOT have learning goals and associated success criteria before completing their work.
The learning activity IS long-term, AND students DO have learning goals and associated success criteria before completing their work BUT students DO NOT have the opportunity to plan their own work.
The learning activity IS long-term AND students DO have learning goals and associated success criteria in advance of completing their work students DO have the opportunity to plan their own work BUT students do NOT have the opportunity to revise their work based on feedback.
The learning activity IS long-term, AND students DO have learning goals and associated success criteria before completing their work, AND students DO have the opportunity to plan their own work, AND students DO have the opportunity to revise their work based on feedback.
b. Let's Ponder!
Which task is long-term?
Students keep a journal about their calories burnt over a week.
Students document what they drank on two different days.
Which one are the students planning their own work for?
Over two weeks, students work in groups to research and debate water pollution with their classmates.
The educator assigns specific roles to each student.
Students make their own deadlines for completing their research, writing their speeches, and practising them.
Which one do the students have the opportunity to revise work based on feedback?
Students write argumentative essays that will be assessed according to a rubric the educator shared with students at the beginning of the learning activity.
Students use the rubric to reflect on their own essay drafts and make revisions.
Students use the rubric only after returning their graded essays to see why the educator gave them a specific score.
F. Innovate to Solve a Real-World Problem by Discussing or Implementing Ideas outside the Academic Context
Problem-solving includes a task with a specified challenge for the learner. Problem-solving occurs when students are required to create a solution to a new problem, perform a task they have not been taught how to complete, or design a sophisticated product that fulfils a set of requirements. Learning tasks that support problem-solving do not provide students with all the knowledge they need to accomplish the task or define the entire method they must take to arrive at a solution.
The primary need of the learning task must be problem-solving. Real-world problems are genuine circumstances and needs outside of an academic context. Students must provide solutions for a specific, plausible audience other than the educator as an assessor. When students utilise information to solve an issue, they use genuine data, not data created by an educator for a lesson. Putting students' ideas or solutions into practice in the actual world is required for innovation. Besides, innovation has value beyond completing the objectives of classroom activity. When students lack the authority to put their own ideas into action, innovation occurs only when they communicate their ideas to persons outside the classroom who can put them into action.
a. Rubrics and Decision Steps
The learning activity’s main requirement IS NOT problem-solving.
Students use a previously learned answer or procedure for most of the work.
The learning activity’s main requirement IS problem-solving, BUT the problem IS NOT a real-world problem.
The learning activity’s main requirement IS problem-solving, AND the problem IS a real-world problem, BUT students DO NOT innovate.
They are NOT required to implement their ideas in the real world or communicate them to someone outside the academic context who can implement them.
The learning activity’s main requirement IS problem-solving, AND the problem IS a real-world problem, AND students DO innovate.
They are required to implement their ideas in the real world or to communicate them to someone outside the academic context who can do so.
b. Let's Ponder!
Which one is a problem-solving task?
Students must rewrite a story from the perspective of a character other than the narrator.
Students read a story and then take a quiz about what they read.
Which one is a real-world problem?
Students use their town’s bus map to propose where pedestrian crossings should be added in a fictional town.
Students use their town’s bus map to propose where pedestrian crossings should be added in their town.
Which one of these tasks requires innovation?
Students analyse statistics on the basketball team’s past performance and create mathematical models using Microsoft Excel for the coach to illustrate targeted improvements for both team and individual performance.
Students analyse data about the basketball team and use Microsoft Excel to graph performance patterns for the overall team and individual players.
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