CLIPP Board

Durham BB users conference

This is the first of two blog posts covering the recent Durham Blackboard
users Conference .

This post will concentrate on the presentation on day two of the conference
by Greg Ritter, Director of Product Management with Blackboard Learn. He
covered the details for Bb service pack releases, their current support
websites, and future plans. I’m also going to comment upon a panel
presentation covering recent experiences of Bb mobile.

Firstly I’ll cover the Bb plans, drivers,new products and  enhanced support services. Then I’ll highlight the new features in service packs 10,11, and 12.

Greg was keen to underpin his presentation with their primary drivers, which
have are summarised into four major challenges driving product development. They are: recruitment, instructor efficiency, student engagement & retention, data
driven decision making. He also commented upon their new automated testing on
Bb platform. What took 3-4 days now is is done overnight. A mixture of auto
and manual testing.

So the new products (i.e, Blackboard Connect text 2), and a wealth of new
inbuilt and optional analysitcs tools really highlighted the increasing
importance of accurate data driven decisions across modern educational
organisations. I’ll cover some of these later in the post. One of the main
conference sponsors http://www.eesysoft.com/ offers analytic solutions for
educators to measure VLE impact/ ROI / engagement! Let’s not forget Bb’s own
analytics tool  that offers the ability to extract a wealth of data for various stakeholders.

Greg was also keen to highlight the new and improved websites offering
specific guidance to users, including new upgrade cohorts, the improved help
site  , etc. The list:

• blackboard.com/bits - Blackboard Innovative Teaching Series
• blackboard.com/digitalcontent – Integrating 3rd party resources
• blackboard.com/cohort – Upgrade Cohort Programs
• blackboard.com/rubrics – using and sharing rubrics
• blackboard.com/trial – free guided trials
• go.blackboard.com/faculty – train staff, innovate and share effective
• practice
• blackboard.com/bie – idea exchange, get involved in product development
• blackboard.com/usergroups – join online networks to share practice
• blackboard.com/catalyst – exemplary courses
• Not forgetting Coursesites  - who offer free  online courses & training for educators

Getting Mobile

I watched a very useful panel discussion by five institutions (HE & FE) who all launched Bb mobile last year. They either bought the product, or just enabled the option on Bb to allow students to access Bb via native apps. The common themes were; soft launch, and unfounded concern about staff and students inability to cope! All five panel members remarked that the process had been far less painful than envisaged, and all had experienced far less support calls that expected. Mobile access continues to increase across all institutions, a positive result! There was only one institution (Liverpool John Moore’s) to provide staff training/support and regular forums exchanging ideas. The rest just quietly launched it! The Blackboard mobile users group met at the conference. This blog post by Sharon Flynn  of NUI Galway is worth reading to find out about future mobile plans – including a new native app this summer.

Let’s Xplor!

Perhaps the most interesting new product was announced off the back of Greg’s
comments about their MooodleRooms  acquisition last year, and their
Sakai support. So it seems Bb are strategically aligning themselves
as a multiple VLE support company now. Therefore the Xplor (in beta) tool
has been created to enable cross platform creation and sharing of learning objects/resources using OER and Creative Commons licensed resources. Resources can be embedded  into all supported VLEs. You can also create and manage content from xplor,
including links,assignments, assessments, and discussions. Fewer question
types available than BB Learn. This is an interesting move for Bb – embracing
cloud based content creation and sharing. It could provide a viable
application to allow staff to “easily” create and share learning resources.
Service packs 10,11,12

To finish off let’s have a look at the highlights out now, or soon to be
released.

Read more

JISC funding- elevated

I noticed a recent article entitled ” How to make your JISC funding bid stand out from the crowd” on the CETIS news pages recently.  I thought it was nigh time that I posted a similar bid writing guide that Christa Appleton (JISC RSC West Midlands) and I crafted last year.  The Aston Research Support Unit have assisted us previously with the (TRAC) costing process of JISC bids – this aspect not to be underestimated!

Along with the above guide, JISC have also announced a new method of bidding for smaller project funds using their Elevator service.  The new service is designed for innovative projects that need to  gain funding up to £10K – without having to adhere to the strict criteria of their usual project funding programmes.

As Martin Hawksey has already Tweeted – it would be useful to see collaborative ideas with students pitching for funds.

Media and Learning Technologies’ Portfolio

You can now browse all the significant teaching and promotional projects which Media and Learning Technologies (CLIPP’s media service) has produced in the past three years on our Portfolio pages on the Aston University website. There’s a brief summary of each project and what we ended up delivering, as well as links to the video content itself (where possible).

I’m really pleased that we now have this resource as a testimony to what we can achieve, but it’s really just a small part of what we do. With every new project, we’re adapting and developing our skills and knowledge further, to ensure that we continually improve  the creation of high-quality learning and promotional materials which effectively reach their target audiences. Please check the Portfolio pages regularly in the future as I will be adding not only the latest completed projects as we deliver them but also some of the classic work we did between 2004 and 2008, and hopefully even earlier.

Should you need any more information – or have any comments – about any of the projects on the Portfolio pages, then please don’t hesitate to contact me on 0121 204 4232 or at n.w.birch@aston.ac.uk.

Issues and solutions regarding student assessment

This blog is my feedback from the Student Assessment and Classification Working Group (SACWG) meeting, held in London on 24 Nov 2011. SACWG is an informal group of UK academics and administrators who have a shared interest HE assessment, including assessment criteria, grading, and the honours degree classification. The meeting was attended by about 50 people from various universities, the HEA and QAA. Aston was represented by Professor Alison Halstead (invited speaker) and me (Stuart Wallis, delegate). I attended, because I know that assessment & feedback is such a big issue in HE, and I wanted to hear about other universities’ problems and solutions.

The day consisted of presentations, discussion groups and a question-and-answer session. The presenters were:

• Dr. Marie Stowell (Director of Quality & Educational Development, University of Worcester)
• Professor Alison Halstead (Aston’s Pro Vice Chancellor of Learning & Teaching Innovation)
• Professor Chris Rust (Associate Dean for Academic Policy, Oxford Brookes University)
• Professor Paul Hyland (Head of Teaching & Learning, Bath Spa University)

Marie Stowell set the context, by stressing the importance of good assessment and feedback (e.g. for student retention and completion) and by describing some of the challenges facing those who assess. Alison Halstead painted a very positive picture of how we are addressing the challenges here at Aston. Her PowerPoint slides are below. Edited highlights include: personal response systems (Optivote) being used by Audiology and Psychology to check students’ understanding in class, and the consequent increase of student engagement; the use of lecture capture (Aston Replay) – students like being able to review lectures, and lecturers do not report reduced attendance; the identification of the reasons for staff resisting e-marking and the consequent provision of large computer screens to staff in Psychology. In response to a question about how to manage the adoption of e-marking, Alison disagreed with another panel member who suggested a top-down decree, and stated that if management can’t demonstrate the benefits from within the discipline, then they should not be forcing a change. As I listened, I felt glad to be working at Aston.

Here are some of the issues/tensions/problems that were discussed by the presenters and delegates throughout the day, and possible solutions:

Issue: A lack of coherence across a programme, due to the tendency for lecturers to design module assessments in isolation.
Solution: Move away from assessment of a module towards assessment of a programme. For example, Coventry Business School uses an assessment that is marked by 3 lecturers, each of which is looking at different aspects of it. But, the increase of modules size (e.g. 40 credits) means that a students who fails it ends up being re-assessed on more material than if the module was small (10 credits).

Issue: How do we ensure good quality assessment & feedback when class sizes are increasing?
Solution: Have fewer summative assessments. This may release time for more formative assessments, which can be ‘quick and dirty’.

Issue: How can we get students to engage with peer/self assessment, if they think that assessment is the lecturer’s job?
Solution: Spell out the benefits of being a peer-assessor, and spell out that these skills are graduate attributes; give training on how to assess; make it a compulsory part of the module.

Issue: How do we get students engaged with formative assessment that carries no marks?
Solution: Specify that it is a stage towards a summative assessment (“Here’s your chance to practice before the real thing”); make it interesting.

Issue: How can early re-assessment be managed?
Solution: The University of Worcester has recently moved re-assessments from August/September to June. The idea was that lecturers are more likely to be available to help students (and not at conferences), and that this would lead to better pass rates. At Worcester it did, but at another university it did not. Also, this system placed increased pressure on staff during June.

Issue: How do we encourage students to be co-producers of learning, rather than consumers of teaching?
Solution: Manage their expectations by providing clarity about what is being offered, e.g. through a student charter.

Issue: How can we encourage all (rather than just some) of the students to read the feedback comments on their work?
Solution: Initially provide the feedback without the mark, and only supply the mark after a response has been made to the feedback (e.g. “What I have learnt from these comments is…”); if supplying audio feedback, embed the mark at an unexpected place in the audio (not at the beginning or end).

My overall impression is that it was a very useful day. I particularly enjoyed the opportunity to network, and by meeting people from other universities I realised that Aston really is a refreshingly responsive place to work.
If you would like to know more about the SACWG event, or wish to respond to any of these issues, please post a comment on this blog, or contact Stuart on extension 5171 or at s.a.wallis2@aston.ac.uk.

Alison Halstead’s PowerPoint slides

ALT webinars

ALT + eLN have two lunch time webinars planned that look very interesting:

Panopto Lecture Capture Workshop 2011

For those of you not familiar with Panopto, they are a company that make a lecture capture system called “Focus”. At Aston this is also known as Aston Replay. We have used the system now for several years and generally we are very happy with it. So much so that last year we actually hosted a SCHOMS event that was centred around lecture capture, with Panopto invited to talk to the delegates about their product.

Workshop time has come around again and Panopto have organised a “Lecture Capture Workshop” at the University of Birmingham. Members of CLIPP will not only be in attendance but Paul Gorman will be giving a short presentation about some research we have been working on related to Aston’s usage of lecture capture.

Here’s what Panopto have to say about their event:

Location:   University of Birmingham

Date:         Wednesday 19th October

Time:        10.30am – 4.30pm

Register today! (Note that our ‘South’ user day will be held on 2nd November at University of Southampton – if you are interested in this, please contact us here too and we will be in touch)

Networking opportunity for users of Panopto

The University of Birmingham is kindly co-hosting this event with us. It will give users of Panopto an opportunity to discuss technological and pedagogical issues relating to using Panopto’s software and will provide an opportunity for you to network with other universities.

Introduction for those new to lecture capture

If you are a university that is interested in learning more about Panopto’s lecture capture, this event will provide an ideal opportunity for you to hear from other institutions and talk to Panopto about how our platform works.

The day will include talks by Birmingham and Aston universities, as well as product updates from Panopto.

Lunch will be provided and there will be plenty of time for round table discussions. Faculty members who have used Panopto or are interested in it are also encouraged to sign up.

Register your attendance today – email us, confirming the name of your institution, number of colleagues attending, along with their names and job titles.

Once you have registered, we will send you a final agenda and more details. Meanwhile, we look forward to hearing from you and don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any further questions.

3D solutions

Further JISC case studies here.

Aston University has been identified as pioneers in the use of 3D virtual worlds to help develop students’ employability potential. The new JISC guide entitled Emerging Practice in a Digital Age , includes a collaborative project between Aston University and The University of Derby.

The PREVIEW-Psych course team developed four avatar-driven clinical scenarios designed around a family experiencing a range of common mental health disorders, closely linked to content from the University of Derby and Aston University‟s first year psychology teaching modules. The aim was to emulate campus-based learning using interactive lectures, seminars and group work.

Using problem based learning approaches in a blended context is certainly proving beneficial in this discipline, and we shall look out for future research publications by Jon Wood , who feaures in the above video.

Diverse Conference June 2011

The 11th DIVERSE (Developing Innovative Visual Educational Resources for Students Everywhere) Conference, held at the Dublin City University Campus, Eire, is intended as a showcase for excellence and innovation in the field of video and videoconferencing in education: teaching, research, management and so on.

This year saw presentations around the themes of Digital Video Projects, Visual Literacy in New Media, E-health, and Social Media and saw contributions from academics, learning technologists and other interested parties from Europe, Africa, North America and Australasia.

It was to be a special conference for me because I was presenting a poster for the first time – more of that later. After being serenaded by a close harmony quartet (surely every conference starts like this, doesn’t it?) we kicked off with Professor Roy Pea of Stanford University introducing the revolutionary DIVER camera. This was an eye-opening and exciting piece of kit that had evolved out a dual need to capture panoramic video of a single event, and to be able to select areas of that video for re-editing. The camera uses a simple but high-quality panoramic lens and has advanced software that ‘undistorts’ the resulting image into a full panoramic video recording. Sections of the captured video can then be highlighted as separate ‘Dives’, which can be annotated too. The cameras are being successfully used in all manner of teaching environments, not least teacher training, and I’d certainly like to investigate their use here in the near future. There’s even an iPhone lens attachment that allows panoramic recording straight onto your phone!

While some of the sessions may not have trodden the new ground that they could have done, there were plenty of interesting presentations to be had. Mike O’Donoghue from the University of Manchester gave a very pertinent talk on creatively designing video for teaching and learning which was very interesting to practitioners like me and a wider teaching and learning technologist audience alike, referencing his 20 or so years experience in this field. He has some very interesting guidelines and educational videos which have been formulated for the MA in Digital Technologies, Communication and Education at Manchester.

Over in the e-Health arena, there was a good presentation by Aoife Ni Mhuiri from the Institute of Tralee about how screencasting can be used to provide a reusable learning object to support teaching and learning of Anatomy and Injury Management. It uses video clips of injuries to players/athletes during major championships, races or games for analysis along with interactive anatomical images/graphics to provide a short DVD or interactive web-based courseware. It was a very impressive and comprehensive teaching package that is already showing great successes in teaching and treatments alike.

The time came for me to present my poster about how Media & Learning Technologies support final year Spanish Language students in a module which requires them to write a dramatic script and make a short film. I opted to make something that was different from the traditional A0 paper poster; instead coming up with a video poster. This was a good way of incorporating both the explanatory text and plenty of video clips that documented the production process and compared materials from before and after our interventions. It went down very well and plenty of debate arose about some of the technical proficiencies and artistic abilities which we ascribe to Digital Natives, that may not actually be present in the first place.

All in all, a good conference with plenty of food for thought.

SCHOMS Conference May 2011

The focus of this year’s annual SCHOMS conference, hosted at Newcastle University, was very much around technology enhanced learning spaces. Prof Stephen Heppell provided an inspirational opening keynote based on the premise that it was no longer acceptable to just “satisfy” students, he saw the provision of designed-for-purpose technology enhanced learning spaces as key to institutions’ responsibility to “delight” them. He supported this argument with a survey of current GCSE students who, while not quite sure what University would be like, naturally expected that the environment and technology would be significantly better than what they had at school. A well-illustrated presentation of numerous case studies featuring modern schools and academies proved just what a challenge most Universities now face to meet these expectations.
Prof Mike Neary’s following session took a much more academic approach which challenged the concept that students know, or even have the right to demand, what they want from higher education. At Lincoln this has led to a new initiative called Student as Producer which will replace the traditional Learning and Teaching Strategy – something definitely worth tracking over the next few years.
The first day rounded off with a session from Jos Boyce, Senior Research Fellow of Learning Spaces at the Centre of Excellence in Teaching and Learning through Design (CETLD) and author of “Towards Creative Learning Spaces”. Through illustrated examples of learning space design from around the world Jos challenged the concept of students as “rational consumers” and identified post-occupancy evaluation as one of the most important tools to really inform effective future spaces.

Day two started with a tour of Newcastle’s new “zoned teaching cluster” – a 170 seater PC lab which is divided into four colour coded zones but without any physical partitions. One zone is permanently accessible to students for open access learning but the others are bookable for teaching either as three individual or one large area. Despite some skepticism particularly about noise overspill, the area has been received very well by both staff and students with very impressive utilisation rates.
Most of the rest of the day was given over to the extensive suppliers’ exhibition in The Great North Museum which proved a useful opportunity to network with equipment providers and colleagues across the sector. The formal proceeding were concluded by a presentation by Mark McCallister, Associate Director, Office of Academic Technology, University of Florida and current President of CCUMC – the SCHOMS equivalent in the US. It was encouraging to see so many similarities in both organizational structures and challenges and offered many opportunities for closer collaboration. Mark was particularly interested in the unique SCHOMS Benchmarking Survey which was announced at the SCHOMS AGM earlier in the day.
The conference dinner was held at the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Arts with an impressive view over the Tyne and concluded with a special commissioned tilting of the Millennium Bridge (see photo above).

The final day focused on case studies around technologies and spaces at other HE institutions. Particularly interesting sessions came from Jim Sheach (U of Edinburgh) on the growing demand for and use of informal learning spaces and Oliver Ireson (U of Birmingham) on the development of a Learning Technology Adoption toolkit but recordings of all sessions will be available to members on the SCHOMS website shortly.

GradeMark – nose to tail

The presentation given by Dr Cath Ellis here at Aston last week really illustrated how the GradeMark tool (part of Turnitin) can be used as an effective feedback and diagnostic tool.  Before I delve into the way Dr Ellis has been using GradeMark in quite innovative ways, I should first mention the overarching e-marking/e-submission strategies at Huddersfield. I’ll also share with you our own Aston University guidance notes for those considering larger scale adoption of using Turnitin, to complement exisitng academic misconduct procedures.

The University of Huddersfield is four years into an e-submission policy that allows for paper submission alongside those who want to adopt e-submission methods. They chose Turnitin to fulfil the needs of both e-submission and text matching.  This thoughtful rollout process caters for the nurture and support of early adopters, and also supports for those who still want (and need) to use paper.  This parallel process ensures that organic (peer driven) growth is supported, whilst ensuring no one is alienated or marginalised.   The new student body is also pivotal in the process of pushing for greater use of e-marking and e-feedback.  A print contract with a local firm means that scripts can be bulk downloaded from Turnitin and sent to the printer for paper copies within 24 hours – at a competitive cost. Therefore the onus is not placed on the student to print out paper versions. This means that everyone can use Turnitin to submit, and then outsource the printed versions for those whom still prefer to mark on paper. The print process is still an overhead to consider, but their outsourcing contract does offer a more flexible and innovative approach.

Just as important as this outsourced print contract, is the streamlined workflow process. The entire process is being continually monitored and refined to ensure that administrative bottlenecks can be gradually eliminated from the entire submission /marking process, leaving support staff to concentrate on other tasks.  Dr Ellis refers to this important factor as a “nose to tail workflow.”
So we have a number of important facets pivotal to the large scale adoption;
1)    A university wide e-submission  policy
2)    Continual refinement of administrative workflow processes
3)    Methods that ensure that e-submission and paper marking can happily coexist
4)    Early adopters that can share the vision
5)    Pressure from the students to adopt more flexible practices

Dr Ellis demonstrated the use of the (drag and drop) GradeMark rubrics as an efficient way of adding comments to student scripts, which helps to ensure a consistent quality of feedback for all. Sometimes she used a fairly lengthy comment saved in her own list of rubrics, thus eliminating the need to rewrite feedback, common to particular mistakes.  But the most impressive use of GradeMark was the ability to download and analyse the comments left on entire cohort’s scripts to diagnose recurring problems.

This diagnostic aspect (see graphs in presentation) of analysing the frequency of rubrics enabled Dr Ellis to plan teaching interventions based upon a higher frequencies of for example a particular grammatical misinterpretation. By downloading the frequencies of rubrics and displaying them as simple histograms (see above), Dr Ellis was able to quickly pinpoint recurring problems across and between academic years.

“..go into your inbox and click on GradeMark Report which is next to the roster synch button. You can then drill down to the grademarks and export the data as excel files.”

The last tip Dr Ellis demonstrated was the shortcut method (see above) to overlay the originality report over the GradeMark screen. This means that whilst you are marking online and providing feedback, you can be checking the script for text matches highlighted – all on the same screen. Time saving indeed!