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"Case Studies"
As part of the University Institute of Learning and Teaching funded Parklife project, Nick Cartwright has been piloting the use of a hybrid laptop. The project involved students working in open spaces of their own choice with Nick’s support, so a device capable of taking notes and sharing information with small groups of students was considered worthy of inclusion to support the process.
The device used – a Lenovo Yoga 2 11.6″ – was selected on the basis that it was capable of using the University’s common applications installed on staff and student PCs and that it appeared to offer flexibility in its physical use – it has a touch screen and can be used in stand, tent and tablet configurations, along with a standard laptop layout.
As many of the activities Nick would be carrying out mirrored some of the potential practices that might be used at the new Waterside Campus, LearnTech agreed to record Nick’s experiences to share with Waterside stakeholders. This is the first of a number of reviews we intend to publish – though we are not recommending the University or members of staff purchase this or any other particular model of laptop. We are just seeking to identify the strengths and weaknesses of such devices in the workplace and classroom.
The Yoga has been used to record notes and observations during Parklife sessions but – in practice – it has been relatively little used to share information with small groups of students. While Nick was impressed with the ability to be able to hook it over a chair back as an informal display, in practice the small screen didn’t make it practical to share with more than two or three students.
Aside from general web browsing and Office applications, Nick found it an excellent device to prepare Prezis with but found Turnitin did not respond well to the touch screen. That said, he did complete all his marking using the Yoga successfully. Its particular strength seemed to be that he could quickly move away from an area of disturbance to a quite corner with minimal disruption. Battery life was acceptable – enough for 3-4 hours and a fast one hour recharge was useful. Ultimately, Nick would like to be able to dock to a large screen with a full keyboard for more intensive text work but has found that almost all his work has been possible on the Yoga.
Its main drawbacks are the small screen and weight when used as a tablet – compared to an iPad (around 500g), 1.4 Kg would be uncomfortable to use for a long period – but the flexibility may well be worth this if the device is used in more than one mode. Some reviews suggest that the 802.11n only wireless connect might be an issue, but Nick has noticed no significant wireless connection problems. The mini-HDMI port is the only physical way to connect to an external screen or projector, so this needs to be borne in mind when considering use cases and the available infrastructure. But the fact that a colleague purchased the larger screen version of the Yoga 2 for herself after trying this machine over a period of time is a clear indication that this is a useful device.
Nick is continuing his evaluation in his Law teaching and hopes to try out Panopto at some point as the included web camera appears to be of very good quality. We will follow up on his experiences later in the year.
“First Year Education Studies students have been participating in a joint project with students at HAN University in Nijmegen and Arnhem in the Netherlands. An ongoing email correspondence with regard to preconceptions of and stereotyping within England and the Netherlands culminated on Wednesday 25th March with a SKYPE seminar and conversation between students at the two institutions.
Contributions and discussions were lively and both cohorts of students were able to expand on cultural and social traditions in their respective countries. The UoN students will form part of a group travelling on a study visit to Nijmegen in June – it is intended that a meeting with the Dutch students who participated in the SKYPE seminar will form part of their itinerary.” (Tony Smith-Howell)
The students reported that talking with their peers oversees in this way it felt no different from being in the classroom. The tutors are already planning further meetings and online mentoring. They captured their feedback of using SKYPE for the session, via the magic of iPad….. http://www.kaltura.com/tiny/marig
Please contact the Learning Technology Team if you would like to find out more about using Skype for your students.
School of Education Early Years students, led by Dr. Eunice Lumsden, recently engaged in a Tweetchat with students from Sheffield Hallam over two days, using the hashtag #epcrep . This was to respond to the new All-party Parliamentary group report ‘Early Years – A Fit and Healthy Childhood’, which has been co-written with contributions by SoE Faculty, and presented at the House of Lords in March. The Tweetchat was moderated by Dr Damien Fitzgerald, Principal Lecturer. An overview of responses has been created in Storify: https://storify.com/teacheruni/all-party-healthy-childhood-report-our-responses-e Students reported that this was an exciting way to engage, and are keen to continue using Twitter as part of their professional development.
If you would like to explore how to use Twitter for Learning & Teaching, please contact the Learning Technology Team.
Dr Estelle Tarry outlines the development of the URICA Undergraduate Journal, which publishes selected undergraduate dissertations from the Faculty of Education & Humanities.
View the full case study here (PDF, 542KB)
Visit the journal website here: http://bit.ly/URICA
Dr Terry Tudor, Senior Lecturer in Waste Management, introduced structured online learning activities (e-tivities) into his Masters modules after attending a CAIeRO for individuals course development workshop. Read the case study to see how these activities have helped to link his distance learning students with his learners on campus – and also helped them to improve their writing skills.
Karl Flowers, Senior Lecturer, Institute for Creative Leather Technology assesses his students through presentations and has often found that it is difficult to schedule face-to-face time slots where all the required parties can make it. Allowing his students to independently record their presentations and submit them through NILE’s video streaming tool, Kaltura, overcomes scheduling issues, enables more use of technology for the students and enables sharing good practice between year groups.
In 2010, Roshni Khatri presented on students perceptions of online audio and online text based feedback. Her experiences on feedback were also further disseminated in the Submission and Grading Electronically (SaGE) working group on 17th December, 2014 as they were felt to be still relevant to current cohorts.
Roshni indicated that the majority of students preferred the audio feedback when compared to the online feedback.
Students commented that:
- ‘The online written feedback was visual and suits my learning style.’
- ‘I heard my name and I paid attention!’
- ‘really helpful for me as I am able to go over the proposal and know which bits you are explaining about. I find this more helpful than having written feedback.’
The presentation noted benefits and problems with the process and made suggestions for further work.
Thursday the 23rd of October saw the appearance of the Follow Northampton app in the App Store. The app is a freely available interactive guide to Northampton, and it offers a fresh perspective on Northampton’s rich historical, architectural and cultural heritage. The app, and the associated website, were created and developed by staff and students at the University of Northampton and members of the wider Northampton community. The project leads were Dr. Drew Gray, Senior Lecturer in History, and Sabine Coady Schaebitz, Director of the Collaborative Centre for the Built Environment. Technical support and advice was provided by Rob Farmer from the Learning Technology Team, and the app was built by Chris Collinge from wedoApps. Content was developed by BA History students (Roseanne Belcher, Gabrielle Cairns, Jasdeep Dhillon and Steve Robinson), photographs were provided by a BA Photography student (Peter Holmes), and audio recordings were made of a number of (actual and honorary) Northamptonians, particularly Peter Aiers, Andy Clarke, Peter James Norman, Professor Nick Petford, and Dr. Toby Purser.
The app and website were made possible by the award of a Learning Enhancement & Innovation Grant from the University of Northampton. And the great news is that work on the app and the website is set to continue, as a second Learning Enhancement & Innovation Grant was recently given, and this will allow the project to cover more locations, and will allow the inclusion of extra features into the app. We are hoping to launch a second version of the app in March 2015, which will include full offline access to the locations, improved navigation, and additional locations. A third version is planned for July 2015 which will include design and layout updates, the addition of social media sharing options, and even more locations. In the longer term, we hope to add videos, iBeacons, and augmented reality, and to make an Android version of the app.
Get the iOS app: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/follow-northampton/id919466161?mt=8
Visit the website: http://www.follownorthampton.co.uk
“Changemaking is simply where someone spots a social problem and does something about it.”
The Changemaker Certificate has been created and implemented by Fr Tim Curtis in the School of Health as a way of encouraging all staff and students across the University to explore what it means to be a Changemaker and also to award engagement with Changemaking through the completion of a Social Venture Canvas (SVC) that would be capable of attracting financial support.
The Certificate sits in two places at present: (1) tied to academic modules offered from the School of Health – SWK1051 and SWK3025; and (2) as an extra-curricular award not tied to academic credit. The route taken will depend on whether or not the academic modules are offered as part of individual programmes, with the idea being that anyone across the University can therefore participate.
Through a series of coursework activities that all feed in to and contribute towards attainment of each section, participants prepare a draft proposal for an SVC that will be both self- and peer-assessed. Work is assessed using a newly-designed ‘CM Assessment Rubric‘ that draws on and modifies a number of identified 21st Century Skills. Achievement comes either through attaining the Certificate in isolation at either bronze, silver or gold level; or, for students on SWK1051, the rubric provides clear links to either the gold, silver or bronze certificates, but uses submission deadlines and the standard UMF scores to determine achievement levels. While it may depend on the social venture being addressed and the work carried out by the student, students completing SWK1051 are most likely to attain the bronze certificate (which is around concepts of thinking and exploring a social venture idea), with some credit at silver. The final venture canvas would still require to be submitted to the Changemaker Certificate system however.
- For more on the Changemaker Certificate case study, please see Changemaker assessment final.
- To enrol on the Changemaker Certificate for yourself, please click here.
