SPEED PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING (PBL)

for Staff Development Activities

An Open Educational Resource (OER) by the Academic Development Unit, University of Salford, 2010-11www.adu.salford.ac.uk

Using Twitter Commenting

Post your comments / thoughts throughout the day via the generic account on the laptops or your own personal account.

Please add #salfordaspire to any comment.

Remember keep it short (maximum of 140 characters)!

Generic Twitter account Username: TLCSalford Password: letmeinnow

Using Twitter Commenting

Post your comments / thoughts throughout the day via the generic account on the laptops or your own personal account.

Please add #salfordaspire to any comment.

Remember keep it short (maximum of 140 characters)!

Generic Twitter account Username: TLCSalford Password: letmeinnow

ideas for uses

Speed PBL can be used during staff development sessions to discuss different teaching and learning themes such as active learning, lecturing, using resources, group work, using technology for learning, learning spaces etc.

It will be important to familiarise yourself and your students first with PBL

find out more about PBL by accessing A Practitioner’s Guide to Enquiry and Problem-Based Learning:

Case Studies from University College Dublin available at http://www.ucd.ie/t4cms/ucdtli0041.pdf

ASPIRE

Accessible higher education

Student focused

Pedagogically excellent

Internationally orientated

Research informed

Employability and enterprise led

Speed-PBL activity: instructionsYou have been given a PBL trigger. Work in your groups to

(30min) define your learning outcomes identify any issues and develop a strategy to resolve them capture your thinking and the solution directly on the tablecloth

(20min) provide your solution using ipadio present your solution to another group who worked on the same scenario

Use the roles provided.

Be creative and inclusive!

Use available resources!

Remember, technology can extend learning and teaching!

Time: 50min

PBL: moving away from… towards…

7

Can be used: •Face-to-face•Blended•Fully online

PBL model and process (Mills, 2006)

The Salford Model (McLoughlin & Davrill, 2007)Part 1: trigger introductionSearch the problemAsk each otherList what you knowFind out what the group doesn’t knowOutcomes and goals to be set

Part 2: trigger reviewReview group learning

Part 3: presentationDisseminate

Roles

Student Student Student

Personal Tutor

Module Leader

Professional Services (eg

library)

Learning Technologist

Programme Leader

Roles

Personal TutorTo facilitate the personal development of their tutees, monitor the progress of their tutees, be a responsible, personal contact within the organisation, in whom the student can confide, intervene with the university authorities on behalf of their tutees, offer advice or assistance when it is within their competence or to refer student to an appropriate service when not.

Module LeaderTo co-ordinate the delivery of the module in line with the approved Module Specification. Responsibilities fall within four key areas: Preparation, Delivery, Assessment, Evaluation / Quality Assurance

Programme LeaderTo manage the day-to-day delivery of the programme, ensure a positive student learning experience monitor, review and enhance programme content and delivery

Trigger

“I prefer practical learning as I like to do things and get bored when just listening to someone talking. I do quite well when working in a group, as well, as it gives me more ideas and opinions.”

Trigger

“This is my first lectureship. I have been in post for almost one year which, I have to say, has been the scariest and loneliest time of my professional career. Scary not only because of the unknown, but because of the discovery that I have entered a new profession in which I am unaware of what I do not know and, for a variety of unclear reasons, fellow more established colleagues are unwilling or ambivalent about helping me to discover what it is that I need to know.

When I commenced the post, my expectations were that I would be entering a supportive environment where ideas, information and resources could be shared. I would be given the opportunity to shadow more senior lecturers that would be able to give me some insight into the profession I had joined. I expected academic life would be one in which problems are shared and discussed. Unfortunately, this is not what I have found.

Since commencing my post I have encountered a number of significant problems I have found very difficult to resolve. The main problem is the isolation and loneliness of academic life. A typical day involves a polite good morning to colleagues but, on most days, apart from talking to students I may not have the opportunity to be involved in any other conversation. I would love to hear “How did your lecture go?”, “Can I help you with that lecture?”, “I have experience of teaching that subject, shall we team teach?”, “Have you tried this strategy - it really works with students who are struggling with…” and so on. Unfortunately, the only sound I hear apart from my own voice is the deathly silence of academics sitting at their computer keeping their thoughts, knowledge, skills, and themselves, to themselves. There is no sharing of ideas.”

Trigger

“My learning experience at the University of Salford has been mixed with two of the four tutors being very good and the remaining two being adequate.

The most enjoyable sessions had a mix of styles, i.e. instruction (with some enthusiasm), Powerpoint, handouts and participation (discussions or activities).

The remaining sessions were much less participative and involved the tutor lecturing with little interaction, i.e. talking at the students. Whilst obviously having a wealth of knowledge in their subject, they didn’t convey this as well to the students. Handouts were provided but many were photocopies of text books with small text and appeared to have been photocopied many times over the years.

Students’ whose native tongue was not English struggled to understand one tutor as he did not speak as clearly as the others.

My views were shared by the other participants. “

Trigger

Trigger

Academic system

Social system

Organisational system

Professional services system

Student relations

Dispositions &

capacities

Student engagemen

t & belonging

HE system

May & Thomas, 2010

23

Staff development

Blackboard

Engaging in creative learning and teaching

Academic roles (personal tutor, module leader, programme leader)

References

McLoughlin, M & Darvill, A (2007) Peeling back the layers of learning: A classroom model for problem-based learning, in Nurse Education Today, Volume 27, Issue 4, May, pp 271-277.

May & Thomas, (2010) Student Retention and Success ‘what works’ programme [presentation]

Mills, D (2006) Problem-based learning: An overview, available at http://www.csap.bham.ac.uk/resources/project_reports/ShowOverview.asp?id=4 [accessed 15 May 2011]

provide your solutionusing your phone, any phone

Call 02033842843 You will be prompted to enter a number - at which point they can enter

9999# When prompted for the PIN enter 8015 Happy broadcasting ;o)

Please note: ipadio is provided free of charge to the international public. The 020 London number is an 'ordinary' geographic number. What this means is that if you have a mobile phone contract with free minutes, then calling ipadio on this number will count towards your free minutes.

http://www.ipadio.com/phlogs/TLCSalford

provide your solutionusing your phone, any phone

Call 02033842843 You will be prompted to enter a number - at which point they can enter

9999# When prompted for the PIN enter 8015 Happy broadcasting ;o)

Please note: ipadio is provided free of charge to the international public. The 020 London number is an 'ordinary' geographic number. What this means is that if you have a mobile phone contract with free minutes, then calling ipadio on this number will count towards your free minutes.

http://www.ipadio.com/phlogs/TLCSalford

Academic Development Unit, University of Salford, 2010-11

www.adu.salford.ac.uk