Results only work environment(ROWE) .... in a classroom.
Here is the assignment; here are unfettered computers to get the work done. Here is the deadline, say about a week for three or four projects per unit, five units per course. Tests given on the day that the assignments demonstrating your learned skills are due. I will test you on what skills you have learned for yourself.
So far, this appears to be going well. Similar set ups to online course I have taken in the past - towards a better carrot; or to not get stuck by a sharper stick.
I should think that some students would use me as an internet service provider and chat on facebook, and play online poker, if they showed up at all. As long as they hand in their work on time, I'm not concerned with how or where they get their work done, right? I think some students would fritter their time away, thinking I was an idiot until the timing caught up with them; then they'd be removed. If any piece of work is late, it is not accepted and they would have to withdraw from the course. I've had to withdraw from a course as I was too stupid to realize that I would have no time to get work done. Basically, I ran out of time every day until it was too late.
Some students would take advantage of the system, using their time semi-wisely. Looking at things they like, all the time getting a little of the work done each day. Small incremental steps towards getting the work in on time. They'd be the ones showing up "late" and leaving "early" in order to get some work done on days that it suits them. I've been successful at doing this several times in online courses, and at other times in my life.
Some students would get the work done quickly, having the work done way ahead of time and then sitting on it until it was due, or try to hand the work in early. I think I've done this once or twice in online courses, for a few assignments. I don't think most people work this way.
How might a system like this be used in a traditional classroom? I think teachers, by reason of the collective agreement, would show up to work the same ways, be in the classrooms/learning environments already established and students would appear during general business hours and at certain times. Accountability, right?
I think this is the method that the Gary Allen centre uses... however, a lot of personal anecdotal evidence does not help me think that students switch over to a new way of thinking, being stuck in that first group, listed above.
I think that Daniel Pink might say they have not yet been engaged; that they see autonomy as being something along the lines of freedom to do nothing. Which, I'm sorry to say, gets one nowhere except removed from a ROWE classroom and back into a carrot and stick one.
So .. how does one teach that ROWE can work in a classroom ... I mean I think that should be the first lesson; "I don't care what you do, as long as the assignments are complete and done to the best of your ability - anything less will not be rewarded with autonomy." As Pink says ... "extrinsic motivators vs intrinsic motivators ..."
