Surrey ExciTeS 2017 - University of Surrey · 4 surrey.ac.uk/dhe Surrey ExciTeS 2017 5 1A (Room LTA) Student Engagement Naomi Winstone The effectiveness of students’ learning, as

Surrey ExciTeS 2017

Excellence in Teaching Symposium

Wednesday 4 January 2017

PROGRAMME

32 surrey.ac.uk/dhe Surrey ExciTeS 2017

PROGRAMME

Time SessionStrand A

LTA

Strand B

LTB

Strand C

LTJ

Strand D

LTH

Strand E

LTF

09:00Registration and Coffee

Lower Concourse, Lecture Theatre Block

09:30 1 A B C D

10:35 Keynote Lecture

“Researcher-led Teaching” with Dr Richard WingateLecture Theatre E

11:35 AwardsGraduate Certificate Presentations

Lecture Theatre E

11:45Coffee Break


12:00 2 A B C D E

12:353 A B C D

E (i)

(13:05) E (ii)

13:35Lunch Break


14:15 4 A B C D E

14:50 5 A B C D E

15:25 6 A B C D E

16:00 Close

* Please note that the programme may be subject to some alteration.

WELCOME

Welcome to Surrey ExciTeS 2017

It is our pleasure to welcome you to Surrey’s fourth Excellence in Teaching Symposium (Surrey ExciTeS 2017). The overarching theme for this year’s symposium is ‘Researcher-led Teaching’.

We are excited to have a range of presentations, workshops and discussion forums in which colleagues present and discuss the experiences and innovations in teaching practice that are taking place across the University of Surrey.

We hope that this symposium will provide an opportunity to both reflect upon and share good practice, as well as to start or continue building a network with like-minded colleagues who share your interest in Higher Education pedagogy. We hope that the symposium will also provide you with a forum through which to establish new links and work collaboratively with colleagues involved in teaching and the support of learning from across the institution.

The symposium is hosted by the Department of Higher Education (DHE). DHE supports and promotes excellence in learning and teaching at the University of Surrey, through providing courses, workshops and development events for academic and academic related staff; fostering approaches to learning, teaching and educational policy that are informed by current research, and; maintaining a focus on enquiry into student learning.

For further information on DHE provisions please consult the websitesurrey.ac.uk/dhe, or if you have any bespoke requests for support with developing your practice then please contact Dr Simon Lygo-Baker [email protected].

We wish you a wonderful symposium and a very happy new year!

surrey.ac.uk/dhe 3Surrey ExciTeS 20172


1A (Room LTA)

Student Engagement

Naomi Winstone

The effectiveness of students’ learning, as well as their resilience and success, are dependent upon the strength of their motivation and engagement. Particularly within a climate where students invest considerable financial resources in their education, promoting intrinsic motivation to engage with their discipline as a whole, rather than just lecture content, can be perceived as a challenge. As a result, much attention has been directed towards understanding and supporting engagement; McInnes (2001, p.14) recognises that ‘we are in urgent need of creative ideas to address the changing nature of student engagement’.

This workshop will explore the key concepts underpinning engagement, and through the discussion of a series of case studies, will consider how best to design lectures, tutorials, seminars and assessments to maximise student engagement. We will discuss how best to foster autonomy in students, and how to support students in reflecting upon their own approaches to study. We will also interrogate common (mis)conceptions of student engagement, and discuss how staff and students can share responsibility in promoting the conditions for engagement, recognising the need ‘to re-conceptualise the undergraduate experience as a process of negotiated engagement rather than assuming disengagement is an intractable problem and that students are to blame’ (McInnes, 2013, p.13)

5

1B (Room LTB)

‘If you build it they will come’ – MOOCs:

Pipe Dreams or Field of Dreams

Roger Rees, Colin Loughlin and Irina

Niculescu

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) emerged in 2008 and have rapidly taken hold with over 35 million students active in over 4,000 courses globally. The most popular examples attract hundreds of thousands of participants and develop a high profile for the institutions, departments and academics that offer them.

This workshop will showcase an example of a MOOC developed at the University of Surrey. This will be used to introduce and provide fresh insights about this increasingly diverse area, and support participants to consider the opportunities offered for departments and individuals at Surrey. These include the chance to make your research and educational offerings available to a potentially global audience, and to stimulate deeper engagement from potential students. MOOCs can also provide a convenient platform for CPD offerings. The session will also highlight opportunities to collaborate with the Department of Technology Enhanced Learning to develop your ideas and meet future goals.

SESSION 1 09:30 – 10:30 WORKSHOPS1C (Room LTJ)

Maintaining a Sense of Humour

Simon Usherwood

When we talk about strengthening our teaching practice, we rarely think about our sense of humour, which is a big loss. Learning is a joyful and playful experience – that’s probably why you’ve stuck with it – but too often we lose sight of this. In this workshop, we’ll explore some different ways to bring a bit of fun into what we do, and consider why this helps both you as the instructor and the students as learners. Humour is not only an excellent vector for embedding learning, it’s also good for you in managing the learning environment and building your resilience. Plus, it’s just generally good to have a laugh now and again.

PEDAGOGIC FRAILTY

PEDAGOGY AND

DISCIPLINE

RESEARCH TEACHING

NEXUS

LOCUS OF CONTROL

REGULATIVE DISCOURSE

increases with perceived distance toincreases with lack of

explicit and shared

increases with lack of embeddedness between

increases with unresolved tensions within the

Informs

links between

requires agentic engagement with

must

inform

requires

iterative dialogue

with

1D (Room LTH)

Exploiting the Pedagogic Frailty Model to

Support Reflective Practice

Ian Kinchin

The pedagogic frailty model has been developed with colleagues at Surrey as a framework to support reflection on teaching and the factors that facilitate or impede academic development. The model may be used by colleagues engaged in Surrey’s CPD Framework to help target areas within their practice that would benefit from more extensive exploration, possibly through dialogue with colleagues. This session will guide you through the model and will then offer a practical exercise to get you to grapple with one or more aspects of the model by ‘mapping’ your personal perspective.


Room LTE

“Researcher-led Teaching”

Dr Richard WingateHead of Anatomy in the Department of Developmental Neurobiology, King’s College London

"Higher education is characterised by a rhetoric of

research-led teaching that can described anything

from the way a curriculum is designed through

to how up-to-date lecturers are on their subject

knowledge. We speculate that it is the almost

intangible, embodied expertise of the researcher

that gives distinctiveness to the university

classroom."

Response: Prof Jane Powell, Vice-Provost Education and Students, University of Surrey

The human brain is by far the most complex structure on Earth. Consider that it contains a thousand billion neurons, of a thousand or more different, individual types, and that each neuron is wired up to as many as five hundred other neurons; this allows the possibility for a really vast number of alternative wiring configurations - more, it has been estimated, than there are molecules in the universe. Yet the elaborate pattern of connectional networks between neurons that constitutes the machinery for sensation, movement, emotion and thought, is remarkably similar between individuals. Indeed, the basic plan of the brain - the layout of its command and control centres and all but the smallest details of its wiring diagram - appears to be virtually identical between individual humans and recognisably similar between human and mouse.

Furthermore, this 'ground plan' of the brain is genetically determined, or 'hard wired', leaving only the fine details of network construction to be influenced by the electrical activity of circuits and environmental experience. Such is the complexity of the brain's construction, however, that neurobiologists are still far from a complete structural and functional understanding of its basic operations, such as those we have in common with chickens and mice, let alone even beginning to understand the nature of the higher functions - such as thought and consciousness - of which possibly only the human brain is capable.

Source: www.kcl.ac.uk/ioppn/depts/devneuro/About-Us/index.aspx

KEYNOTE LECTURE 10:35 – 11:35 Session 2 12:00 – 12:30 PRESENTATIONS

2A (Room LTA)

How do Student Demographics Correlate

with Drop-out Rates? An Evaluation to

Facilitate Targeted Student Support

Ian Bailey, Alfred Thumser, Sarah Trinder

and Asma Adjerid

Student progression and retention statistics are of vital importance as they impact both the league table position of the institution and the life of the students who drop out. Drop-out statistics are published by HEFCE and an evaluation was undertaken to test for causal relationships within the demographic data.

Student drop-out data for the period 2005/06 to 20010/11 were compiled and a ranked scoring system was developed based on the percentage of each demographic grouping which did not continue. Scores of each demographic grouping were then applied to a framework which could be used to calculate the risk of an individual student dropping out, based on their demographic input.

We will discuss how this framework may be applied in a student support setting.

Chair: Emma Medland

2B (Room LTB)

The Flip Module: Engaging the

Undergraduate Student

Simon Bettles and Claire Tarrant

Meeting the challenge of the theory-practice gap needs a more proactive approach. We are using the theory on experiential learning to create a blended, flipped approach to learning and teaching for Post-Anaesthetic Care module for the second year ODP students. Focusing learning activities via VLE content to include self-directed individual and group work, as well as high impact, high fidelity simulation, supported by guided reflection and a range of TEL.

Chair: Anesa Hosein


2C (Room LTJ)

Implementing the Assessment and

Recognition of Prior Learning: A University

and School Perspective

Allison Wiseman and Svetlana Reston

Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL), formerly APEL, has received increased emphasis within Higher Education (HE) following the updated Quality Assurance Agency for HE (QAA, 2014) guidance. RPL requires clarity of audit trails, processes and widened access to HE.

The University of Surrey’s journey will be presented from revised QAA guidance to revised code of practice for the assessment of RPL and their implementation. RPL usage varies across the University with the highest in the School of Health Sciences, arising from the unique needs of students and Professional and Regulatory Bodies influence on curriculum design.

A case study from the School of Health Sciences will be presented demonstrating: • partnership working with other HEIs• retrospective data• integration of School and University

processes• support available for academic staff,

administrators and students

Finally, future developments will be explored with the audience to help develop an action plan for future RPL development across the University.

Chair: Dawn Morley

2D (Room LTH)

Road Map Through the Glass Ceiling:

Teaching Students to Self-guide Towards

Achieving Better Grades

Kathrin Cohen Kadosh and Katarina

Zajacova

Achieving lower grades than anticipated is a common and frustrating experience for students. Students also often report helplessness, and that they simply ‘don’t understand what else they could have done’ to improve assignment outcomes. Here we feedback from a new approach that we developed to bring more transparency into how grades are given for assignments. Specifically, we provided students with a road map in the form of a list that was to be ticked-off during the completion of the first assignment for Module PSY2019. For each step on the map, we offered concrete examples of what is expected for each grade level. Moreover, by clarifying on the specific expectations for each grade level, we hope that the students will complete the assignment successfully and gain a better understanding of their own achievement levels. We are currently trialling the road map and will report the outcomes/student satisfaction ratings in this discussion forum.

Chair: Ian Kinchin

2E (Room LTF)

SURJ as a Collaborative ‘Learning Space’

Alison Yeung and Nadya Yakovchuk

Two years on from its launch, Surrey Undergraduate Research Journal (SURJ) has become a ‘learning space’ based on multi-layered collaborations between undergraduates, doctoral researchers and University staff involved in the Journal. Not only has the Journal evolved through collaboration, but collaborations have evolved through the Journal. In this way, the space for learning continues to grow as the collaborations upon which the Journal is based respond to the developing needs of the Journal.

This presentation reflects on the experiences gained from the collaborations involved in SURJ to seek a possible answer to the following question:

What are the benefits and challenges of allowing a learning space to evolve through collaboration?

As part of the presentation, the audience will be invited to consider possibilities for developing collaborations between SURJ and academics across the University to further enhance student and researcher writing and thinking skills.

Chair: Naomi Winstone


Session 3 12:35 – 13:35 WORKSHOPS

3A (Room LTA)

How Crucial is Work-based Learning?

Dawn Morley, Leona Archer, David Williams,

David Curran, Mig Burgess and Vicky

Milligan

The value and significance of work-based learning is central to the University of Surrey ‘professional training year’ and to the many professional courses that are offered to students at the University. The consultation for the Teaching Excellence Framework year two specification makes it explicit the importance of progression to employment and that ‘students acquire knowledge, skills and attributes that are valued by employers and that enhance their personal and / or professional lives’.

Dawn will chair a 30-minute panel discussion with colleagues from varying disciplines. Through their teaching, and their study on the Graduate Certificate in Learning & Teaching or the MA in Higher Education, these academics believe that placement preparation, support and its integration into the curricula are crucial to students’ success. Although each presents the perspective from their own students’ discipline, the common issues and complexities of ‘learning in practice’ will be raised.

Following the panel discussion, participants will have the opportunity to work in small groups with the academics to identify ‘best practice’ in the areas that have been discussed. A learning resource will be compiled from this work that will be distributed to participants and made available on the Department of Higher Education website.

3B (Room LTB)

Measuring Learning Gains in Higher

Education

Jekaterina Rogaten

The introduction of the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) has increased interest in ways of assessing students’ learning gains, which has been defined as growth or change in knowledge, skills, and abilities over time that can be linked to the desired learning outcomes or learning goals of the course. At the Open University, Oxford Brookes University and the University of Surrey, we are running a three-year longitudinal mixed-method study aiming to develop scalable approaches for measuring students’ learning gains.

In this ExciTeS symposium, we will share and compare the different perspectives on how universities might measure and act upon learning gains of students. Part I will focus on how multi-level growth-curve modelling of 45,000 students can help to unpack learning gains, whereby preliminary results showed that there were marked differences between different disciplines and modules in students’ initial achievements and subsequent learning gains. Part II will focus on more fine-grained, lived experiences of students with different learning gains using mixed-method approaches. Finally, in Part III we will share insights of how the University of Surrey is using learning gains. The advantage of applying ABC framework in conceptualising learning gains, use of multi-level modelling for analysing complex academic performance data and mixed-method design for holistically capturing progress in HE will be discussed.

3C (Room LTJ)

Dealing with ‘Stuckness’: A Lego Serious

Play Approach

Rachel Stead and Charlotte Barton

A hands-on, interactive workshop providing participants with the opportunity to explore an alternative way of thinking about or viewing a problem or project, through 3D models and reflection.

3D (Room LTH)

Supporting the Development of External

Examiners’ Assessment Literacy

Emma Medland

External scrutiny of HE courses is evident worldwide, but the UK’s external examining system is recognised internationally as an example of best practice. However, mounting criticisms of the system has led to a ‘tentative downgrading’ of the role by the Quality Assurance Agency. A key assumption underpinning the role of the external examiner is the expectation of both subject and assessment expertise (i.e. assessment literacy), although national criteria for appointment arguably focus on the former. The aims of this workshop, therefore, are twofold:

• outline the findings of a research project focused on investigating how assessment literacy is conceived and enacted by external examiners

• engage in a discussion aimed at identifying how assessment literacy might best be supported and developed within the University of Surrey

If you have been or are an external examiner, and would like to inform understanding of how external examiners might best be supported in their role, please come along to the workshop to share your experiences.


3E(i) (Room LTF) - 30 minute presentation

12:35 – 13:05

Special Relativity Concept Inventory: A

Surrey Perspective

Arnau Rios Huguet

Concept inventories are standardised tests aimed at quantifying improvements on expert competence. In physics education, they have been used for over 20 years in an effort to quantify teaching and learning quality. A concept inventory on Special Relativity was recently developed and tested over one cohort at the Australian National University (Aslanides, 2013). A few deficiencies were identified in this initial run, and improvement efforts require more student data.

In this presentation, I summarise the results obtained after deploying the Special Relativity Concept Inventory in Academic years 2014-15 and 2015-16 for a cohort of Year 1 Physics undergraduate students at the University of Surrey. I will extract some conclusions from the test results regarding teaching practice, student understanding and potential gender bias in Special Relativity. (Aslanides, 2013)

J. S. Aslanides & C. M. Savage, Relativity concept inventory: development, analysis, and results, Physical Review ST Physics Education Research 9, 010118 (2013).

Chair: Esat Alpay

3E(ii) (Room LTF) - 30 minute presentation

13:05 – 13:35

Using SurreyLearn to Maintain Student

Engagement in Guest Lectures

Alireza Behnejad

The level of student engagement is one of the important factors in high quality education. Also, a constant challenge for academics is how to maintain this level. Furthermore, the situation gets more complicated when guest speakers are involved.

The Presenter was responsible for the organisation of guest lectures (8 sessions in the semester) in a module for first year undergraduate students in 2014. The low level of student’s engagement in the lectures was observed and the Presenter designed a procedure to overcome the problem. The procedure is based on the available facilities on SurreyLearn and is being implemented during the first semester of 2016-17 for the same module. The presentation aims to share the experience of the implementation of the procedure, as well as some further suggestions.

Chair: Esat Alpay

4A (Room LTA)

The Use of Embedded e-Textbooks at the University of Surrey

Adam Hill

Embedded e-textbooks are a relatively new learning and teaching technology. In the ever-evolving Higher Education landscape student expectations of their learning environment and resources are changing. The Library and Learning Support Services (LLSS), in partnership with academic departments, have been investigating the possibilities that embedded e-textbooks would bring to the experience of students and academics here at the University of Surrey by carrying out a pilot project. This presentation will cover the story of the pilot project so far, it will be an opportunity to find out more about embedded e-textbooks, and also to consider the advantages and appropriateness of this approach

Chair: Roger Rees

4B (Room LTB)

Ethics Education for Care Givers: A Series of Epiphanous Events

Ann Gallagher

This presentation will detail findings from a two-year ethics education research project – ‘Researching Interventions to Promote Ethics in Social Care’ (RIPE). The focus will be on the responses of participants to one of three interventions: an immersive simulation experience. Video footage provides descriptions of the experience and its impact from the perspective of residential care givers. The views of the project funder and researcher are also presented regarding the meaning and aims of ethics education.

Chair: Ian Kinchin

Session 4 14:15 – 14:45 PRESENTATIONS

4C (Room LTJ)

Less is More? A Four-year Reflection on

Changes to Marking Criteria, Training and

Student Satisfaction in Undergraduate

Engineering Labs

Erin Henslee

Assessment and feedback are critical aspects in both the teacher and learner experience. Despite its importance, this area continues to receive the lowest marks on NSS and MEQ evaluations. This presentation evaluates several aspects of assessment and feedback with respect to undergraduate labs in the Mechanical Engineering Sciences department over a four-year period. A series of interventions including changes to lectures, manuals, and marking rubrics, increased demonstrator training, and conversion to online marking were all assessed against student ratings of feedback and assessment for the module. This included student quantitative surveys, focus group questionnaires, comment analysis on reports and a demographic study across discipline, gender, and academic year. Interestingly, most had little effect on student satisfaction and in some instances a negative result was implied. This talk will focus on the analysis and interpretation of these results with time for audience input and discussion.

Chair: Emma Medland


4D (Room LTH)

Using Threshold Concepts to Inform

the Restructuring of an Undergraduate

Programme in the Biosciences

Sarah Trinder, Alfred Thumser and Ian Bailey

Threshold concepts are desirable milestones in the development of a learner without which they cannot progress, i.e. when a learner “gets it”. We are currently discussing a potential restructuring of the BSc Biochemistry programme, and to inform this process, we plan to apply threshold concepts, in addition to programme learning outcomes, to develop programme content that is applicable to Biochemists in the 21st century. Furthermore, we can use these threshold concepts to assess student learning and progression during the course of the programme. There are several layers to this project, namely: • identification of threshold concepts from the

literature• integration of the threshold concepts into a

revised Biochemistry programme• survey of students and staff• iterative modification of the concepts• application of concept tests in the revised

programme• assessment of student learning during the

course of their studies

Chair: Darren Gash

4E (Room LTF)

Research and Development: Enhancing

Students’ Learning Development Through

Research-informed Practice

Heather Barker, Laura Barnett and Charlotte

Barton

Evidence-based research informs learning development activities and projects undertaken by the SPLASH learning development team. Pedagogically-informed approaches support students learning within the Library, as well as across the wider University where SPLASH works closely with academic staff to enhance students’ learning development in curriculum-embedded, subject-relevant contexts. This presentation highlights recent research, providing insights into initiatives to enhance students’ orientation and progression. Short case studies will be presented, including research:• helping to inform rethinking of how

students are orientated to library services to enhance retention through inculcating ‘belonging’

• exploring key transitions for students, specifically transitions pedagogies and themes of student identity, sense of belonging, self-efficacy and resilience

• investigating curriculum-centring assessment of information literacy when developing students’ academic and information literacies in HE and beyond

Our experience of research-informed practice will be discussed through an exploration of these projects. Participants will be invited to consider possibilities for collaboration around themes discussed.

Chair: Simon Lygo-Baker


5A (Room LTA)

From A4 Folders to e-Folders: An Evaluation

of the Use of e-Portfolios in Coursework

Assessment and Feedback

Jo Franklin

Portfolios are traditionally a widely-used form of assessment within the drama conservatoire, particularly in the field of stage management and technical theatre. These are submitted following a practical project and include project documentation, background research, photos, sketches and other evidence. In 2014 staff on the Theatre Production course at Guildford School of Acting decided to trial the use of e-portfolios, a tool available within the University’s SurreyLearn VLE, to replace the ‘show folder’ as a means of coursework assessment. In 2016 a small evaluative study was carried out with focus groups of staff and students to assess the perceived advantages and disadvantages of the use of e-portfolios for feedback and assessment. This presentation looks at these findings and asks what future developments could be considered to make the most of this technology.

Chair: Anita Eves

5B (Room LTB)

The Drama of Ethics

Pat Colliety and Amy Dopson

This presentation outlines the value of a collaboration between Theatre Studies students and child branch nursing students. Nursing students are taught ethical principles but they also have to deal with ethically challenging situations in practice regularly. We wanted to develop a forum which allowed them to explore these ethical principles in a safe environment with the support of their peers and tutors.

A collaboration was developed between Stuart Andrews from Theatre Studies and Amy Dopson and Pat Colliety from the nursing team. A two-part workshop evolved where in part one, the theatre studies students acted an ethically challenging scenario to the child branch students, who were able to interject with comments and suggestions as the scenario evolved. The second part of the workshop involved nursing students taking part in scenarios.

Learning was evaluated in classroom discussion six months later and in an evaluative research study.

Chair: Cathy Derham


5C (Room LTJ)

Joined-up Feedback: Staff and Student

Reflections on a New Reflective Feedback

Process

Erica Hepper and Sophie Russell

It is commonly recognised that students often do not make the most of feedback to improve their work. Among many reasons, two barriers are: (a) students’ tendency not to reflect deeply on feedback after receiving it, and (b) students’ tendency to perceive each feedback as separate and not transfer points across assessments, especially in modular curricula. Both issues impair effective self-regulation and learning cycles. This presentation summarises an initiative that attempts to encourage joined-up thinking by adapting assessment materials for coursework in the School of Psychology. Specifically, we introduced a page in the coursework submission document in which students can explain how they have built on previous feedback in preparing their work, and a section at the end of the feedback form in which students can reflect on feedback and set action points. We will share feedback gathered from staff and students on the process and welcome discussion and suggestions.

Chair: Naomi Winstone

5D (Room LTH)

Support Staffs’ and Early Career Researchers’

Experience of the GradCert upon Teacher-

Efficacy

Laura Barnett

Teacher-efficacy can be understood as an individual’s belief in their ability to succeed in learning and teaching activities, and to accomplish successful student learning. Teacher-efficacy is important because an educator’s sense of efficacy can impact on student learning outcomes, including self-efficacy, motivation and sense of achievement.

This presentation will explore the challenges of entering Higher Education (HE) as a PhD student / member of professional service staff with minimal prior formal training in learning and teaching, but an expectation to deliver high quality teaching. This account will explore the impact that a relative lack of prior training has upon teacher-efficacy. Following on from this initial account, a series of findings from my Graduate Certificate in HE research project (Exploring Learning Development Staffs’ and Early Career Researchers’ Experiences of the GradCert upon Teacher-efficacy) will be presented. This will provide insights on how undertaking the GradCert has capacity to influence teacher-efficacy in nuanced ways.

Chair: Rick Woods

5E (Room LTF)

Inclusive Doctoral Supervision: Challenges

and Best Practice

Dawn Duke and Rebecca Neblett

Supporting, guiding and mentoring the next generation of doctoral scholars as they push beyond the barriers of current academic knowledge can be one of the most rewarding, but also challenging aspects of an academic’s role. This is even more so as the doctoral population becomes ever more diverse and the timelines for milestones and completion ever more rigid. Supervisors must support a variety of new researchers, who may have specific learning differences, such as dyslexia, dyspraxia or be on the autism spectrum.

In this workshop, we invite supervisors to share challenges and examples of practice in supporting doctoral researchers with a variety of different needs. The discussion will be led by the managers of Researcher Development Programme and of Additional Learning support, who will bring their own expertise in researcher-support to the sessions. The outcomes of this workshop will be used to inform further supervisor training sessions.

Chair: Shirley Price


6A (Room LTA)

Exploring the Potential Benefits of Online

Discussion Forums in Enabling Students to

Become Agents of Researcher-led Teaching

(Student Discussion Panel)

Chris Wiley, Kirsten Parry (student), Karen

Taylor (student) and Jadene Doak (student)

Departing from previous Surrey ExciTeS presentations that have addressed the use of SurreyLearn and online discussion forums to support undergraduate teaching (Paul Hodkinson in 2014, Dawn Marley in 2015), this panel explores questions around how students may themselves effectively become agents of research-led teaching by using an online learning environment to share knowledge and opinions gained through their own independent research on a given topic. The panel’s focus will be the use of an online discussion forum as part of a summative assessment for the final-year Musical Theatre module of the BMus Music programme from 2015–17, and it will comprise students who have previously taken this module who will articulate differing viewpoints concerning the value of the tie-in online discussion forum to their learning.

Chair: Dawn Morley


6B (Room LTB)

Using Online Assessments and

PollEverywhere to Enhance Student

Learning

Alfred Thumser, Ian Bailey and Sarah Trinder

The aims of this project were to: (1) ease in-class assessment ‘bunching’, (2) decrease exam anxiety, and (3) enhance the use of MCQ tests to assess critical thinking. We therefore initiated the use of online MCQ tests, through SurreyLearn, with four assessments spread over separate one-week periods, thus allowing the students to decide on the time of their test. The tests were time-limited (20 minutes, 20 questions), randomized and open book. As factual recall was not being tested, we targeted conceptual understanding as one of the main aims when writing the tests; framework concepts, think-pair-share exercises and PollEverywhere were used to develop critical engagement during lectures. We will review the successes and pitfalls of our approach, including effects on essay writing skills, and discuss modifications for future iterations of the module.

Chair: Darren Gash

6C (Room LTJ)

Innovative Support for Part-time and

Distance Doctoral Researchers

Carol Spencely and Sam Hopkins

Doctoral research can be isolating, especially if the researcher is not on campus, amongst peers (Edwards 2010). Isolation can lead to students leaving their courses (Ali & Kohun 2007); so, to increase communication and enhance the researcher community, the Researcher Development Programme (RDP) has created a programme of activities suitable for all doctoral students but designed to appeal to part-time and distance researchers. The provision includes:• virtual writing retreats• 23 things for research (online social media

course)• 23 things for academic publication• workshops offered in evenings and at

weekends• private Facebook group • one-to-one coaching sessions in evenings

and at weekends • e-mentoring

Feedback has outlined how appreciative the part-time and distance students are for these opportunities. This session will outline what we, as researcher developers, see as the issues for part-time and distance researchers and how we are tackling these. We will invite discussion from other perspectives and ideas for solutions.

Chair: Anesa Hosein

6D (Room LTH)

Dynamic Learning at a Personal Level

Hossein Peyvandi

Despite e-learning, dynamic learning is known as a technology-based methodology for learning delivery towards enterprise level. However, we show that it can also apply at a personal level. This presentation demonstrates the impact of dynamic learning at a personal level as an alternative to the traditional system for both sides, the teacher and the learner. It aims to store knowledge in learners’ minds through developing novel skills of gathering information through a problem-orientated approach. Both sides communicate ideas that evolve novelty in sharing of knowledge, generating learning activities, and creating new classroom environment. The personal level development of such a dynamic learning approach is that students learn how to observe, think and reflect, whilst the content can change in each class. We will discuss the approach with examples based on experiments and implement a pilot during the presentation.

Chair: Simon Lygo-Baker


6E (Room LTF)

Open Badges: Acknowledging Soft Skills

Acquisition

Julia Anthoney, Charlotte Barton, Heather

Barker, Laura Barnett, Colin Loughlin and

Irina Niculescu

The STARS programme has recognised students’ participation and engagement via presentation of paper certificates; yet production and administration proved expensive and cumbersome. Additionally, there was no ‘depth’ to the certification: no appropriate supporting evidence to validate claims that students had successfully demonstrated, for example, understanding of the complexities of leadership or the ability to reflect meaningfully.

A joint project team was formed to explore the possibility of replacing certificates with Open Digital Badges. Two reported benefits are their portability (badges can be uploaded to social media sites such as LinkedIn), and demonstration of progression through different badges collected.

Following analysis of students’ requirements (focus groups and surveys), a first tranche of STARS Digital Badges were designed, created and subsequently awarded to participants. 2016-17 will see further development of evidence-based skills badges. The session will present our research and explore possibilities for wider and systematic adoption of badging across Surrey.

Chair: Ian Kinchin


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A B C D E F G H

LT

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Key

Bus Stop

Bus Route

FINDING YOUR WAYAll sessions are conveniently located in the Lecture Theatre Building, which is marked LT on the map below.

1

8061-1116

Department of Higher Education4th Floor, Elizabeth Fry Building University of Surrey Guildford, Surrey GU2 7XH, UK

E: [email protected]

surrey.ac.uk/dhe/surrey_excites

Documents

Surrey ExciTeS 2017 - University of Surrey · 4 surrey.ac.uk/dhe Surrey ExciTeS 2017 5 1A (Room LTA) Student Engagement Naomi Winstone The effectiveness of students’ learning, as