Sharing good practice: PSYC Routes: Online marking, moderation and feedback guide

We'd like to share the following piece of good practice from the PSYC Routes around online marking, moderation and feedback. A big thank you to David James for agreeing to allow us to share it.

Most written assignments for PSYC routes are marked online, within LearnUCS. The linked file discusses how the academic team have developed guidance around online marking, moderation and feedback. 

If you would like to discuss how you might include this good practice, as an individual or across a team, please contact the Elevate Team (elevate@ucs.ac.uk).

• PSYC Routes: Online marking, moderation and feedback guide for Staff

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With thanks: Images: http://www.vipkatwijk.nl/userfiles/database_good_practice.jpg

Helping students understand assessment criteria

The following shares some good practice with respect to the Elevate Team working with course teams to effectively embed technology enhanced learning within their curriculum.

We were approached by Federica Masieri (Dept STH), about how we might help them implement a project to improve students awareness of assessment marking criteria.

The background was members of the Department had identified this as a potential issues, and prioritised it within annual plan. 

There were a number of requirements;

1. knowledge transfer around the assessment marking criteria, and support routes
2. something which would engage and develop students
3. monitor if students had used it
4. a solution which could be rolled out across all their modules

The outcome was to develop the activities in LearnUCS around a quiz they'd previously mocked up. The quiz would be feedback intensive. So it would contain, "yes / no questions", and the feedback would contain all the learning materials. The quiz would also allow staff to be able to monitor students activity. 

In the first instance we've wrapped a number of resources around the quiz. So, a new navigation item has been added. This area contains, welcome message and diagnostic quiz. On completion of the quiz, a number of additional resources were released depending on their performance (used the adaptive release feature). These provided students with more directed support (on top of the quiz feedback). The new items included information on how Learning Services could support the student through understanding marking criteria.

Through the copy function within LearnUCS the resource is easily rolled out across other LearnUCS modules.

The next steps include; creating some video stories from students and staff around interpreting and understanding the assessment marking criteria, and enhancing the "where next" from Learning Services to include connections with our Assignment Toolkit, and workshops programme.

Federica and others within the Department will be evaluating the success of the pilot and disseminating the outcomes through a range of channels.

Small things do matter: some reflections on 2013/14

The following snippets capture how the Elevate Team have been working with individual at UCS to explore how they might enhance their teaching and learning.

This is part of our wider commitment to evaluating the impact of the service we provide. The aim is not to focus on large scale projects (this is done elsewhere - see link), but the intention is to capture small scale interventions which have had a positive impacted on practice.

• http://ucselevate.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/ucs-based-case-studies-which-share.html

Theme	What were they wanting to achieve? How did we help? Did it work?	Who did we work with?
Capturing student presentations for summative assessment	A request was to record student presentations. These presentations would contributed towards their final marks. Stephen want them recorded to enable him to provide more specific feedback, and provide access for the external examiner. Our role was to record the student and the presentation, edit the films to ensure the audio was acceptable, and forward the links to Stephen to share as required. The feedback from Stephen was very positive, it allowed him to focus on different aspects within the actual presentation as afterwards he would re-visited the presentation. This intervention should have enhanced the feedback and assessment process.	Stephen Sawyers
Using social media: Twitter	The Elevate Team facilitate workshops during the student induction period to raise awareness of a selection of technologies a student might use to enhance their learning. One of the activities we develop is to use Twitter as a Personal Learning Network to gather insights, resources and discourse from other students, practitioners, professionals and peers. Some very positive feedback was captured from one of the students in a blog post. The feedback shows that our session was transformational for some students. Based on this and other sessions we are exploring alternative delivery methods to widen opportunities.	More info
Sharing resources: Diigo	Trevor wished to enable his students to more effectively share, and annotate web resources which they’d discovered. The software we suggested was Diigo. To help the implementation, we trained Trevor, we wrote a short student guide, we attended a session with the students to support them, and answer questions. We also provided a follow up support session. The outcomes seemed positive, the students shared resources they’d discovered and left comments to help contextualisation.	Trevor Grimshaw
Course Validations	The Elevate Team support course teams as they prepare materials for validations and approvals. We have been exploring the different models we could use. After discussion with Allison, we attend a course team meeting, and developed a support plan. This involved providing some bespoke training sessions to the team on the effective learning designs for technology enhanced learning. This includes both online and face to face teaching. In addition, we discussed the likely student support requirements and potential solutions. This led to enhancing members of the course teams through introducing new ideas and developing their technical skills. In addition, an outcome was to collaborate on the development of an online taster course.	Allison Boggis More info
Creating and embedding multimedia resources	The Elevate Team were asked to support the creation of an online presentation for students to access anywhere, anytime. After speaking with Nickey Rooke we were aware that the presentation was currently in an online unfriendly format. To get the most out of an online presentation the Elevate Team worked with Nickey to use a screen capture tool to allow the presentation and Nickey’s voice to be captured and synchronised. The end result was a video of the presentation as it appeared on screen, with Nickey’s voice overlayed talking through the presentation. The advantage of this approach is that we were able to embed the video into LearnUCS meaning the video was accessible to all students on any device. As well as this, as this was a video, the students had full control of the rate at which they watched. They have the ability to pause, rewind, fastforward etc. allowing them to engage much more with the content of the presentation.	Nicky Rooke
Formative objective testing	The request was to design a number of regular formative assignments to monitor student progress, and provide more focussed feedback. This feedback was going to be provided in the classroom setting. The learning design was informed by a flipped classroom model. After discussing the pros and cons of various options with Will, the selected approach was to use the LearnUCS quiz engine. We trained the lecturer on the quiz engine, and discussed question management, re-use etc. We also provided ongoing support through the module. The feedback from the lecturer was very positive, and we have discussed ideas around making the process more effective for the next implementation. In the wider context this approach has encouraged more use of MCQs in summative assignments.	Will Thomas
Peer Learning & Assessment	We were asked by the Social Work team to help them identify the best way to engage students with group peer assessment using LearnUCS. After some initial talks it was decided to take the most positive elements of both face to face and online solutions. The students would use the VLE to collaboratively draft up a poster presentation, groups would then present and peer score each other face to face. The end discuss would be put up onto group wikis for each group to sign off. The end result was a collaborative effort between the e-Learning Developers and the Social Work team. Initial feedback has been very positive and we haven’t had any support queries regarding the process or technology involved.	Sue Taplin More info
Extending the classroom: Google Hangouts	The Elevate Team were approached to provide advice and support for real time, online lectures, allowing external speakers to engage with UCS students. We met with the course team to discuss and complete a requirements capture, so we would know exactly what their needs were. This introduced a new element to the scenario, they wanted the lecture to be broadcast live, publically, but then to have a closed discussion, just between the lecture theatre and the external presenter(s). Two weeks before the lecture we created a Google Hangout event in Google Plus, this creates an event page where both external presenters and students can sign-up to the lecture. Then a few days before the event we had an appointment with the external presenter(s) to invite them into a Hangout, allowing them to familiarise themselves with the tool. Google Hangouts allows you to choose when to start broadcasting, this means once the first part of the lecture was over, we could stop the live broadcast and only those in the lecture theatre and the external speakers could communicate, allow for questions without fear of personal information being publicly broadcast. After the broadcast was finished, the Hangout’s recording is processed and it becomes available from the event’s page that was originally set up, allowing students to review their time with external subject specialists.	Sarah Housden
Enhancing reflection: Mahara	As part of our Digital Literacies Programme we run an online course called e-Portfolios for the reflective learner. The course designed introduces the students to what e-portfolios are and what being a reflective learner is all about. We had 14 students complete the course and one student was willing to be recorded about how effective the tool (Mahara) had been and what she was now using it for. The feedback was positive as the student states she is now using Mahara regularly to record her reflections to use in her course.	More info
Course Team Training Sessions	As an ongoing commitment to develop staff across the Learning Network we provide ad hoc sessions at their colleges. A request from Paddy Shaw at Great Yarmouth was to run a session during their HE Professional Discussion Day. The two hour session was delivered to eight lecturers. It covered a range of topics, which were weaved together within a flipped classroom narrative. The feedback was positive, and Paddy said the session was well received. We’ll follow up with individual sessions during September and October, 2014.	More info
Audio feedback using iPads (iAnnotate)	A request from a course team was to pilot a more innovative feedback model for a formative assignment compared to current approach which was text based feedback. After discussions with the course team, they wished to try audio feedback. Our role was to loan a number of iPads, with the iAnnotate software installed. We provided staff training on the software. We ensured the student work submitted via LearnUCS was accessible on the iPad, and staff could mark it. Afterwards we transferred the annotated work back to LearnUCS, and provided advice to students on how to access their feedback. The initial feedback from the course team was very positive. The course team are indicating they would like to further explore this area in the future.	Heather Rugg

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Image Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/rae_is_kandee/2854765835/

How have you been using your Tablet (ipad or android) in teaching, learning, assessment and/or administration?

We would love to know how Staff at UCS have been using their Tablet (iPad or Android) to enhance their teaching, learning, assessment and/or administration.

This will help inform all staff at UCS about the potential of Tablets as a learning technology.

To help us gather these stories we have released a short survey (see following link). The survey will be available until Friday June 7th, 2013. So, if you have used a tablet (ipad or android) during this academic year in a teaching and learning context, we'd love to hear about your experiences.

• http://bit.ly/ucstablets

If you have any questions, please email Andy Ramsden (a.ramsden@ucs.ac.uk)

 

In discussion with ... Jean Mullin on Clickers

The video (4 mins) is part of our In Discussion with Series. Which aims to share practice in how lecturers have been using appropriate technologies to enhance their teaching, assessment and the student learning experience.

This discussion is with Jean Mullin (Lecturer in the School of Nursing and Midwifery) around how she has been using clickers (audience response systems) in her teaching. Jean outlines a number of interesting applications. Two key message I took from this were;

• her use will allow her to gauge value added from the teaching session


• the benefits of using clickers is to give all students a voice and participate in their learning

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iohb1ma-2Hw[/youtube]

For more information on how you might use Clickers in your teaching and learning, please email the Elevate Team (elevate@ucs.ac.uk)

In discussion with ... Stuart Barton on Clickers

The video (5 mins) is part of our In Discussion with Series. Which aims to share practice in how lecturers have been using appropriate technologies to enhance their teaching, assessment and the student learning experience.

This discussion is with Stuart Barton (Lecturer in the School of Applied Science), around how he has been using clickers (audience response systems) in his teaching. He outlines a number of interesting applications. Two key message I took from this was;

• his use of clickers was within a group learning context


• wanting his students to author clicker questions as part of their learning process

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMuhOmsEoJM[/youtube]

For more information on how you might use Clickers in your teaching and learning, please email the Elevate Team (elevate@ucs.ac.uk)

Prize draw ... how have you been using technology in your teaching, learning and assessment?

Are you a lecturer at University Campus Suffolk and would you like to win a £50 voucher (iTunes, Amazon)?

The Elevate Team are collecting stories from lecturers at UCS on how they have been using technology to enhance their teaching, learning and assessment. The linked form will allow us to collect your stories. We'll disseminate the stories through our Elevate Team Blog.

Your story can be as long or short as you like, as long as it is innovative to you and your teaching.

The online form is available from: http://bit.ly/XOKJR5

You'll need to enter the following information:

• Name & UCS e-number


• What technology have you been using in the last 12 months?


• How have you been using it?


• What impact has it had on you and/or your students?

There will also be a prize draw, for UCS lecturer, will be drawn to receive a £50 Amazon or iTunes Voucher when the survey completes on the 5th April, 2013 at 12.00 noon.

I would like to acknowledge the influence of the JISC RSC Eastern on the design of this survey, which is based on their Technology Feature Survey.

Good morning ... Swansea University: Desktop conferencing at UCS

Did you know you we have desktop conference software so you can present virtually to groups or invite others into your teaching session?

I think there offer significant learning opportunities from bringing external voices into the classroom. Imagine the benefits to your students of inviting an external expert into your teaching session to answer questions or share their experiences and ideas. This can be effectively achieved through the use of desktop conferencing tools, and you are supported through the process by the Elevate Team.



An recent example is Prof David Gill (School of Arts & Humanities) used the GoTo Meeting software in W407 to lecture to a 2nd year undergraduate course at the Swansea University. His presentation was based around a slide show and he was presenting to a lecture room at the University. A key challenge with this delivery was how to encourage student participation? The GoTo Meeting software allows microphones, so a person could act as the facilitator. However, this acts a potential barrier. We overcame this through including a text wall. Where any participant can submit a question to the presenter via a sms txt message, twitter or an online form. In our case David Gill simply read the questions as they appeared (see image).

If you'd like to talk through how you might use GoTo Meeting and Poll Everywhere to enhance your teaching, please email the Elevate Team (elevate@ucs.ac.uk)

 

 

 

 

 

Would you like to offer peer assessment on your course?

The following describes a pilot I ran of the Peer Assessment tool in LearnUCS on a lecture I provided for a Communication and Study Skills Module in School of Science, Technology & Health.

This was a single lecture, which included a formative assessment task. The task involved three short answer questions. In the past I have set the questions, collected the submissions, marked and feedback the work. However, I’ve always question the effectiveness of the learning activity and what do they do with the feedback. Especially, as this is a one-off piece of work, outside of their discipline context.

Therefore, this year I changed my approach and made this a peer assessed piece of work. The intention being if they marked other people’s work, they would (based on Race 2006)

• practice softer skills, eg constructive criticism


• learn from each other and place their own work


• compare themselves with their peers


• engage with the marking criteria


• engage in deep learning eg evaluation

In the past I’d worried about the administrative workload aspect of peer assessment. However, with the Self & Peer Assessment Tool in LearnUCS, the administration has been reduced.

My observations of the process are;

1. The technology is very straightforward.


2. The system managed allowed me to enter the questions, publish the marking criteria for these questions, allow me to set the timings for the key stages (student submit their work, student marks peers work, student collects they marked work, grades are released through gradebook).


3. At all stages I could check who had been doing what, I could access the submissions, the evaluations and the results


4. students didn’t seem to have a problem completing the process. Although a proportion must have been strategic, observed it was purely formative and didn’t complete it.

The following describes the broad process.

Pre-activity

Create the Peer Assessment submission using the Self and Peer Assessment Tool, which is available within the assessment area. When you create this you need to consider a number of options, for instance; the submission period, the evaluation period, the number of scripts a student will need to mark, and if you’d like the feedback to be anonymous. When you add the individual questions, you can include a model answer steer which will be made available during the evaluation period. For each question you can add a number of marking criteria.

Create time in the lecture plan to allow students to engage with the marking criteria. I released part of my lecture as a video and set this as a pre-requiste to attending. This allowed me to deliver the core knowledge which I would apply in the session. It also created time in the face to face session to set a group activity around the marking criteria and marking some scripts.

Post lecture

The submission point was available and students submitted their work. When the evaluation stage started I announced this on my LearnUCS module, and released a video of marking a number of scripts against the marking criteria.

At the end of the evaluation period, the evaluated copies became available to students. Given this was a formative exercise I read the submissions and scanned the comments. Based on their submissions I drew together some generic feedback.

I announced through LearnUCS and suggested they reflect on their assignment and feedback to answer the question “I have read the feedback provided on my assignment and I have identified areas I can improve. These include ...”

The following video is a walk through of the area in the LearnUCS module, which gives you a sense of how I approached it.

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlzwHRIMRlY

If you have any questions about how you might use peer assessment using LearnUCS, please email the Elevate Team.

Why don't flip your classroom to make more time for class activities?

Flipping the classroom is a new term for a well established educational process. The idea is to make time within face to face teaching to focus on developing the higher order skills of analysis and synthesis, as opposed to using this face to face teaching to deliver the lower order skills of knowledge and information. This division is acheived by providing the knowledge before the session in the form of videos and/or interactive tutorials, and enabling the face to face time to be focussed on active learning techniques and class discussion.

Given technology developments this is becoming much easier to achieve at UCS. The following describes why and how I flipped my classroom for a lecture and assessment I delivered on a Communication and Study Skills Module in School of Science, Technology and Health.

The learning design involved a formative assessment which was peer assessed. As identified by Race (2006) the expectation was the peer assessment process would facilitate the student practicing constructive criticism, learning from each other, engaging with the marking criteria and promoting deeper learning through evaluation.

My challenge was to deliver a significant amount of content which is time consuming while managing a class activity on peer assessment. To be effective this activity is time consuming as the students need to engage with the marking criteria. Therefore, to make time for the students to discuss the marking criteria and set up group marking exercises in class I needed to move the knowledge and information component outside the face to face session. In other words, flip my classroom.

A key requirement was to ensure there was a sense of continuation from the video (pre-session) to the face to face lecture

A few tricks I used included:

1. make the video production simple. I used a talk over powerpoint


2. in the video I included a task which they need to complete before the lecture


3. in the video I concluded with an overview of “what we’ll cover in the lecture”.


4. I used the announcement tool on Blackboard to communicate the video is available


5. in the lecture I spent some time to answering the task set in the video


6. in the lecture explicitly refer to the video to encourage them to re-visit the video after the session

What did I find?

The creation of the video (talk over powerpoint) was very simple. I uploaded it to the module area on LearnUCS. There was a need to communicate effectively with students to ensure they understand the need to watch the video before coming to the session. I was glad to see many of them had.

The resources are available below and illustrate how I tried to connect the learning activities

• Pre-session Video >>> http://youtu.be/gweZBrf7pd8


• Lecture Presentation >>> https://dl.dropbox.com/u/12497737/ELTT%20Slides/Technology_4_Learning_Lecture_Slides.pptx

Reference

Race, P. (2006) The lecturer’s toolkit: A practical guide to assessment, learning and teaching

Assessment Marking and Feedback using iPad, iAnnotate, and Dropbox

An addition to the more substantial report already posted (bit.ly/HNZH0i) about marking student work using the iPad, iAnnotate and Dropbox combo'...

Having now marked different assessments using these tools, I have to say I'm 100% supportive of developing the use of this method of assessment. Yes there are going to be a few teething problems, but on the whole I think it's a huge step forward in modernising the way we assess student work.

In terms of the teething issues, the first version of iAnnotate we used wasn't quite so easy to use as the latest version. And, there were a few issues surrounding batch file conversion into PDF documents (missing images/figures after conversion). But, this latter issue can be solved (relatively easily I believe) moving forward.

From a markers' point of view, I found the use of technology made the process of marking more enjoyable! The ability to neatly make use of different annotation tools gave great flexibility in how you present information back to the student. I think everyone wins really. The students don't need to get to the Assessment Office in person, the Assessment Office staff don't need to worry about collecting the work (and storing it), and teaching staff don't have to worry about huge piles of paperwork either. Just think of the amount of work, paper and space that it takes to get the paper copy to the marker, from the point when a student finally finishes a piece of coursework and hits save on a computer. Why not use that electronic document as it is? It's a bit like sending a telegram in the early 20th century isn't it - or at least I presume it is :-).

FYI - we've had different formats of documents submitted during this trial; it's definitely not limited to Word processed documents.

A huge thanks to the Elevate team and our course administration team in helping us start this process!

 

e-assessment, mobile devices and augmented reality posters (aurasma)

The Elevate Team are continuing to explore the use of augmented reality posters using the aurasma application. The latest in the series is a poster to support a 45 minute paper I am presenting at the RSC JISC Eastern e-assessment showcase event on the 30th March. The poster contains two videos, discussing different aspects of using mobile devices within the e-submission, and e-feedback process.

The poster is available from:

• https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1pYD8k9rD5W04Az_l9obh8lyjmQRUmyYXe02IkHQkbkc/edit

This development makes a number of good practice enhancements, for instance, the inclusion of three routes into the video content, and clearer support on downloading the application. It also allows us to further explore the distribution model, where we want to deploy interactive posters through the UCS Connect App (or equivalent). This went remarkably well, as those who already have installed the UCS Connect App simply need to open their existing app and scan one of the codes on the poster, and it works. So no need to install apps.

Another issue I'm interested in is exploring the idea of how easy is it to update the video linked to the trigger image. For instance, if I have created a video for a poster, however, a new video becomes available with updated information but I don't want to create a new set of trigger images and poster. For this poster I have only released half the story. I will be including the evaluation data / feedback from lecturers, course administrators and students next week. This scenario will let us test the best way to add content to existing trigger images and posters.

If you would like to explore how to create an augmented (interactive) poster, the Elevate Team are running a workshop for RSC JISC Eastern at UCS on the 9th May (see http://www.jiscrsc.ac.uk/eastern/events/2012/may/designing-location-aware-learning-activities-qr-codes-augmented-reality.aspx)

 

Using QR Codes in a your (student) poster assessment

Kimberley Birch, a Level 5 student studying BA Business Management added value to her poster assignment through the inclusion of QR Codes which linked to supporting information on a blog. She included a QR Code in each sub-section of the poster, and used a wordpress blog to host the additional information. This approach ensured the material displays very well on small screen devices, such as an iPod Touch. Therefore, the person reading the poster would simply need to install a QR Code Reader, and extent the learning experience through scanning to access additional information.



This approach is a low threshold application, relatively simple to do and highly effective. If you’d like more information about how you might do this, please email the Elevate Team, elevate@ucs.ac.uk

Explanation of Aurasma UCS Connect: What are we up to?

As mentioned - and previously posted - we have been working closely with Marketing to explore the innovative use of Aurasma visual browser, and have released the UCS Connect App.

The following is a recording of a recent BBC Radio Suffolk Interview (13th March, 2012, 11.40 AM), between Andy Ramsden, Nicole Taylor and Mark Murphy

• http://soundcloud.com/elevateucs/ucs-connect-radio-suffolk - 9 minutes long.

It will hopefully give you the context of what we've been doing. If you have any questions, please email elevate@ucs.ac.uk

Release of #UCSConnect in the App Store #aurasma

UCS Connect, the visual browsing application reskinned from the Aurasma Lite app has now been approved and is a avilable for download from the app store.

Shown below is the app in the app store via an iPhone, UCS Connect is also available via the Android Market Place for users with Android devices.

The app has been released to allow us to take advantage of the Aurasma Platform, allowing the new 2013 Undergraduate Publication to have video content embedded in the printed publication.  As well has the Undergrad Publication the Elevate Team are using the app/platform to assist in the dissemination of other projects/findings.

Recently we supported the production of a conference poster, allowing the academic member of staff to embed the audio files from student interviews in to the printed poster.  The poster and views of the author can be found here and here.

There is great interest for this application of bringing the physical and virtual worlds together, both from a marketing/promotional aspect and the teaching and learning.

The Elevate Team are going to be looking at how we can make this more of sustainable technology, currently it is quite niche, although getting lots of interest.  We will be working on a "Getting Started" guide to using and creating "auras", the name given to the digital interaction.  Currently we are running all of our developments through one developer account with Aurasma, we will speaking to their Partners Manager to see if there are options for allowing this development to grow sustainably.

The Elevate Team are also running a workshop on interactive posters and we will be sharing our developments with this technology.

The 2013 Undergraduate Publication is officially released on Monday and due to the nature of the technology used, the launch will supported by a press release, describing this as the first UK Institution to augment a prospectus with the Aurasma technlogy.

 

Students embracing Web 2 Social tools for Learning

Just a small post to mention more good feedback regarding our (Elevate) Student Induction sessions, the session has been rolled out this year to try and empower students to think about some web 2 tools and how they could use them for their studies. The big hitters that always come up in the sessions are Twitter and the use of Google Docs for collaborative group work, although sometimes we do go into the use of Diigo for social bookmarking and Wordpress for reflective blogging. The use of Clickers or audience response system lets the students in the session decide what we put the emphasis on.

Although it has been hard to judge any sort of uptake for Google Docs, Twitter has been great in the fact after our sessions, we are getting students follow not only ourselves but the Elevate Twitter as well.

Here are a couple of examples from our/their public Twitter accounts:





At one session, the students were so enthusiastic asking so many questions that the session ran into their coffee break!



We had multiple students add us on Twitter..



We do have more in depth feedback from a student who after attending one of our sessions, embraced the use of Twitter as a Personal Learning Network. You can read the students here -->  http://wolseyweb.ucs.ac.uk/blogs/elevate/?p=15093

We'll be using this feedback to help inform the role of the Elevate Team with respect to digital literacies at UCS.

Thoughts from author of interactive poster #aurasma

As mentioned in a previous post, we have been working with Sam Chenery-Morris (Midwifery) to add an extra dimension to her Conference Poster. As the feedback indicates below, Sam perceives this as a great opportunity and plans to be using it in the future. If you'd like to find out how we might be able to work with you on your interactive posters just email us (elevate@ucs.ac.uk)

The following responses are from Sam.

What is the background?

Here's my story. I submitted an abstract for a concurrent session to the RCN Education conference in Harrogate. I was offered a poster presentation instead. I was delighted when Aaron mentioned the technology that could be embedded as the whole point of the presentation was about the student voices, which obviously came out on the poster with Aaron's help.

What value do you think this adds to the conference poster?

The addition of the audio and video clips was a brilliant addition to the poster. It adds value because delegates can interact as opposed to just glance/ read the words, they can hear and see the effects which enhance this poster.

Would you recommend this to a colleague?

I would recommend this to colleagues as it starts a dialogue, it encourages interaction at conferences and anything that helps delegates talk and network is a good thing. The posters were judged and again, had I been there on the first day and shown the judges I feel this may have been considered for a prize, not only was it innovative it was academic and fulfilled the judging brief.

Would you use this again?

I have already submitted an abstract for NET2012, and if it were accepted I would use the poster or the Youtube links to hear the student voices during the concurrent session and encourage delegates to try on their own devices.

Positive feedback from Elevate's student induction sessions.

The latest intake of students at UCS were graced with the Elevate Team's presence during the student inductions, to not only go over our current institution services such as the VLE and the E-portfolio system but to empower students to look at personal learning networks and other Web 2 tools outside of UCS. Demonstrating the benefits of such tools as twitter, diigo etc

This has changed greatly from our old student induction approach which was very point and click orientated mainly focusing around the VLE.

It seems as though our new approach has certainly guided some students into trying some of the tools we suggested, below is a comment from a student who decided to have a play with twitter.

Further to our conversation earlier today, I write to continue my eulogising about Twitter as a resource which has helped me immensely with my post-grad studies. As a mature student, many of the social networking sites have passed me by, but following your presentation to the MACYS group in October, I promptly signed up for a Twitter account and it has been transformational in providing me with links to websites, reports, research documents, policies, headlines, and an e-streamed conference.

Despite living in a home environment where there is more modern technology than Dixons, my comfort zone was purely email and online shopping. However, discovering Twitter has been a revelation. Before your talk, I assumed it was a social space for people to detail the minutiae of their lives in 140 characters, but it would seem I assumed wrong!

To begin with I searched for St Elizabeth Hospice, an organisation for which I currently work on a voluntary basis. From finding them, I was able to link to other hospices, and through them, I have been able to access research, grief counselling resources, and sibling programmes, enabling me to use these resources within my assignments, and also in providing a wider snapshot of hospice provision. My links led me to ACT – an overarching organisation for Hospice Care, for both parents and professionals, and an e-stream of their recent Rights of The Child conference. I am now following numerous child cancer charities, such as Clic Sargent and Be Child Cancer Aware to name only 2, and have requested hardcopies of publications I have come across on such sites.

I feel that Twitter has brought to my pc information and resources that I may not have come across through searching library database journals, catalogues, and Google. Additionally, I am following a few people who are terminally ill children, and this has added another, more human dimension to my theoretical studies. Admittedly, I am lurking on Twitter, and never contribute to anything as I am unsure how, but I check my tweets daily and it is now a starting point for the day, to see what has been released since I looked last.

I thought I would be the last person to be singing Twitter’s praises, but your enthusiasm encouraged us to venture forth into territories unknown and it has been worthwhile. My husband used to refer to me as a technical luddite, but no more….

What a phenomenal tool requiring few skills but yielding such fascinating outcomes. I wish someone had espoused its benefits years ago. Thank you!!

This has been fantastic feedback for our team, demonstrating a need for students to be made aware of Web 2.0 technologies and how they can be used to enhance their learning outside of what the institution provides. We make sure that in our demonstrations, we don't push or set objectives for students to complete any tasks, but simply sell the benefits of the tools, it's then up to the students to pursue further if they feel it will benefit them.

As the student comment above shows, there maybe a lot of students who know about tools such as twitter and diigo, however not know how best to use them in a learning context.

iPad Use in Science - Using Apps to Supplement Teaching

Last week, I covered electrocardiography (ECG) with a group of my students. In addition to some 'lecture' based material, and some practical use of ECG measurement and recording in the laboratory, the students had a play with the Nova Professional Series Heart Pro III app on the iPad.

The app is developed in collaboration with Stanford University School of Medicine and East Tennessee Cardiovascular Surgery Group, and is certainly highly credible in terms of accuracy of content. The Nova 3D4Medical series offer a range of anatomical and physiological apps, that may well be worth a look for other relevant courses/departments at UCS. Certainly, I've seen software at 100 times the cost that is far less informative (and certainly less intuitive) - this app was approx. £13.

In more general terms, and perhaps more widely relevant, was how how much the students enjoyed using such tools to supplement their learning. Whilst dissecting a heart can be an excellent learning experience, you can't make an inert piece of dead tissue 'jump to your tune', and watch/re-watch simulation models of it's function. The students reported that the exploring nature of using the app was a real plus (there's a learning style definition here isn't there - help me people!). We all know the old saying of a picture can be worth 1000 words. Well in these apps, you have motion videos, created/developed by world class experts. If a picture is worth 1000 words ---- we need a new colloquialism!

Lastly, so as not to get carried away, I don't think these types of learning tools replace the need for structured learning, I think they complement it. Whilst the students were left at times to go and explore and play with it, the app was also used at key stages to visually demonstrate certain key bits of theory in a more formal/structured way. That still needs the human being to dictate that part.

Anyway, for those working in similar fields, you'll also be aware of the exorbitant costs of most educational software. This was a brilliant learning tool - and it cost less than £15 (no conflict of interest here - commission etc. :-). Any further info' wanted like specific app use during this ECG session etc., please get in touch/reply.

Gavin

Thoughts from using the iPad to create and report back on group work in classroom sessions

We (Elevate) recently participated in UCS's Learning Resources Development Day. We were set the challenge of trying to effectively use iPads in a classroom teaching situation. The development day was based around a number of short presentations with group work at the end of each session. The challenge was to look at how we might enhance the existing model of small group work based around a flip chart, then holding them up and feeding back.

We thought through some of the draw backs of the current approach. Which tended to be around feeding back as people can't see the flip chart, limited range of material you can incorporate into a flip chart, and they are difficult to collate the outputs. We also identified the advantages being low tech and very inclusive. People feel they have had the chance to contribute and the product is a genuine representation of the group work.

In an attempt to embrace the advantages and overcome the limitations we decided a key need was to be able to present the outcomes of the group work in the simplest means possible. We did not want this to involve file transfers or the likes as it would be more stressful ensuring devices are on wi-fi networks etc., Therefore, we simply told each group to plug their iPad into the data projector, and present back. I must say, this worked very well, presenters didn't encounter any problems, while people in the audience could see all which was being discussed.

At the end of the session, group leaders (the people who had had a little training on the individual apps before the day) emailed the outcomes of the sessions as an attachment, which I collated as a set of images to share with participates.

Overall, I and others thought, the technology enhanced the session as it offered more opportunities for both creating and distributing group work, while it didn't impose or dictate what we might do. For instance, the learning activity was central and the technology simply facilitated people creating and presenting their findings.

So, what apps did we use? Well, we used iBrainstorm to share post it style information, we used the camera (and encouraged use of the video) to record and present back the outcomes (a flip chart), used iThoughts for mind mapping, and comic life to produce a group poster. These are all very simple apps and many of them included within the device. The key was to use the device to enhance the presentation of the material, and this worked very well.

How might we have improved these? Well I think a little more training on navigating around a screen on the iPad. For instance, most people simply displayed the screen, they didn't zoom in and out. We'll hopefully be bringing these technologies into our workshop programmes.