LTEO Innovations Week

Trevor Day reports:

 A discriminating audience gathered to watch three contenders compete for the £2,500 pot to fund a learning and teaching initiative. The Dragons’ Den panel – Tim Bilham and Cassie Wilson from the School for Health, Gwen van der Velden from LTEO, and George Charonis, Students’ Union Vice President for Education – were rather less intimidating than their tv counterparts. In the end, however, they asked similarly searching questions albeit in a rather more relaxed style. This year all three proposals were seeking to fund transfer of existing learning resources and practices to online environments.

James Copestake, Reader in Economics of Development, wanted to fund time to employ a natural environment economist to help fine-tune James’s climate risk management simulation game and create an online version. James highlighted that it is challenging for undergraduates to really engage with ‘messy economics’ – economics at the interface of politics. He has found that a convincing simulation that mirrors the challenges of real-life decision-making in a complex, swiftly-changing negotiating environment is a good way of getting students to tackle issues of trust and public good. James aimed to test the online version with postgraduates before using the refined version with undergraduates.

Tim Francis, Teaching Fellow and IT Coordinator from the English Language Centre, wanted to create online language tools to better help international students really engage with the meaning and use of English words. Bite-sized units would provide students with key words and phrases as prompts, to help them appreciate the deep meaning and function of words in their context within sentences. These modules would be used flexibly, with or without staff supervision, and their use would be monitored and student feedback invited.   

 Baris Yalabek, Lecturer in Management, presented the ‘Innovation Strategy Game’ proposal on behalf of himself and Sinead Carey. Similar to James Copestake’s proposal, in being an existing simulation game to be refined and developed for online use, the focus of this game was on getting students to bring an innovative product to market. Baris explained how developing a marketing strategy is influenced by factors that change swiftly, such as responding to the presence of competitive products in the marketplace. ‘Hands on’ involvement in a game is one way for students to appreciate that more than one strategy can be successful, and that flexibility of response is key. This project proposed to use any funding to hire a web developer.

 After the 10-minute presentations, and questions and answers, the audience voted, with all three projects coming neck-and-neck. Once the Dragons added their votes, a leader emerged. The ‘Innovation Strategy Game’ won the £2.5K funding. Given the similar aspirations of the ‘Climate change negotiations’ project, I’m sure the experience gained from the winners’ project will prove of value to others at the University.

Trevor Day reports:

Paper lunches, launched at Bath last year, are an opportunity for a group of people to meet round a table over lunch and discuss a paper on some aspect of teaching and learning, which acts as a springboard for reflecting on our own practice and sharing our ideas, challenges and achievements on the theme. Present at today’s lunch were a very wide range of people, from Accounting, Physics, Foreign Languages, Lifelong Learning and Learning & Teaching Enhancement. This lunch’s theme, based on a Trotter and Roberts (2006) paper, was ‘Enhancing the early student experience.’ The paper is wide-ranging, but the discussion soon settled on three themes: personal tutoring, teaching and learning, and assessment.

Despite the wide range of viewpoints, a consensus gradually emerged from the stimulating discussion. Suki Ekaratne, Senior Academic Staff Developer and the meeting’s chair, encapsulated it well, with the notion that the undergraduate’s first year is a period of transition in which we might aspire to support them in moving from a more dualistic position to a more relativistic one. In other words, that the student might arrive with a fairly cut-and-dried view of knowledge, as something they might gain in a fairly transmissive way and demonstrate in exams, to a much greater awareness of the relativistic nature of knowledge and of their active engagement in their own learning, working collaboratively with peers and with staff. The discussion around which qualities we might wish students to develop led to the question, ‘Do we want students who can pass exams or students who can contribute to society?’ The answer just might be both. But the question did raise the issue of the true value of exams and just who does benefit from the present exam system.

This brought us on to how we might wish to make assessment more a part of the learning process rather than being a purely or mainly summative practice. Peer assessment was seen as one way to blend learning and assessment in a way that would benefit students and not overburden a lecturer. The discussion ended with the thought that if, among other things, a student’s first year had aroused their intellectual curiosity then this would have been time well spent. 

Each of us, suitably invigorated, left the lunch pondering just how we might incorporate some of the discussed ideas into our own practice.

The paper referred to was Trotter, E. and Roberts, C.A. (2006). Enhancing the early student experience. Higher Education Research & Development, 25(4), pp. 371-386.

A paper on supporting students’ intellectual development recommended by Suki Ekaratne: Kloss, R. J. (1994). A Nudge is Best: Helping stuidents through the Perry scheme of intellectual development. College Teaching, 42(4), pp. 151-158

Without knowing exactly what they were, I have faced and acknowledged threshold concepts in my studies before without even realising it. Ray Land shone a light on what was going on and highlighted the importance of the crucial moments wherein basic memorising and learning turns into imperative and deep understanding- this is indeed the quintessential nature of mathematics at a higher level.

The most striking thing to note is that perhaps counter-intuitively, these ‘eureka’ moments do not occur at a steady rate. Nor does their frequency particularly correlate with the amount of time spent studying. I can promise that sometimes it takes but a few minutes to understand one lecture, yet in other situations, one short statement in another lecture can take hours or even days to understand. Anyone who’s studied mathematics at university would know that often the most innocent and simple looking theorems own the longest, most subtle and intricate proofs. Facing a time limit during revision period, studying often becomes a wrenching and nerve-wracking process, since you can’t be exactly sure when you’ll gain enough command of your course to tackle the exam. It is therefore obvious that in an ideal situation, the threshold concepts are grasped during the semester and re-enforced as much as possible before the exam period. We note that this is furthermore important since understanding of focal points early in the course more often than not underpin most of the fundamental ideas that follow. For example, passing a second year course in statistics would be unfortunately difficult if you didn’t understand or pass the corresponding first year course in statistics.

But what are the main problems concerning mathematics students’ threshold points? I list some of them below, in no particular order:
1) Many academics are very absorbed in their research and as such their view of teaching quality do not necessarily match the student views.
2) Not understanding one concept may well underpin the understanding of many others. Never do many of my friends or family believe the fact that I enrol on courses whose titles I do not understand! For example, last year I started a course called metric spaces without knowing what a “Metric Space” was. This was covered in the first lecture, after which, not knowing what a metric space was would render you helpless.
3) Unlike other subjects, most topics in pure mathematics are can remain completely nonfigurative for the duration of a course. The application of some knowledge, for example abstract algebra, would be usually only accessible to the most brilliant mathematicians. Therefore often the point in studying such a course would be self contained- learning for the sake of learning! This can be limiting for many people, including mathematics students.
4) You must think like a mathematician in order to progress in your learning. The subject is essentially applications and uses of rigorous logic- memorising everything someone could ask you about a certain idea would be somewhat difficult.
5) The subject requires students to be comfortable with new a new vocabulary and language. Before this comfort level is reached, it remains difficult to express any understanding, and states of liminality can be perpetuated.

A problem specific to British universities is the ‘cramming culture.’ In sciences and engineering in particular, most courses are assessed by one exam worth 100% of the mark at the end of semester. This means that many students get away without attending lectures or doing homeworks/problem sheets, until right at the very end. Lecturers may therefore not be able to identify student progress. Furthermore, the lack of recursion for some students means that these thresholds may never be properly solidified. Put shortly, if a student doesn’t participate during the semester, you can’t know whether they are stuck or not. Perhaps with a change in assessment style, students’ understanding could be more closely monitored, and appropriate changes to teaching could be made to match their needs.

Some interesting questions for me from the session were, how do I (the lecture) in my large classes know they (the students) are stuck, i.e., encountering troublesome knowledge, and how can I help them become unstuck?

I’m putting my “use to teach large groups hat on”

My idea struck an accord with some learning technologies and approaches being used at the University of Bath.

The how do I know they are stuck is the relatively straight forward, and Ray focussed on the efficiencies from using clickers (audience response). A set of questions mapped against the key concept (or identified troublesome knowledge) would work very nicely. This would indicate to the lecturer and the student if they are achieving the threshold concepts. This could be further enhanced by getting the students to write the questions, and I, the lecturer select a few.

The above is starting to be explored in Computer Science by Alan Hayes et al., and funded through last years Dragon’s Den

The question is, what do you, they, do to get them unstuck? Yes, Ray suggested re-visit the concept using a different approach / media / style. Also the message came across thatI could encourage them to take more responsibility as independent learners (Nicol et al.,).

However, how do I make this more explicit? A couple of things springg to mind, firstly, a common message from the presentation was the way to learn troublesome knowledge was to teach it. Now, this might not work given logistics. However, the next best thing might be to mark it. As students are required to understand the concepts, the marking criteria etc., So, peer assessment activities would be a very useful tool to use.  I would introduce a number through the course. So also creating the opportunity of ongoing / continuous assessment compared to one piece of coursework and an exam.

Another requirement is engaging the students to take some responsibility as independent learners. This is key to help motivate participation. Thinking of this made me think of Cassie Wilson’s work on the feedback agreement (another Dragon’s Den funded project). Perhaps a feedback (honour) agreement could be drafted around how we would work through the unit.

So on reflection, if I was still teaching large classes, I might be able to start designing my curriculum to ensure I can identify when people become stuck around certain key concepts and thresholds and use certain approaches to facilitate students working together to overcome these blocks. There are still some issues I face, prticularly in terms of how this implemented, however, that would be for a later post.

The peer mentoring session was attended by a mix of staff and students. Inputs about what peer mentoring is and what are the benefits for those involved in such schemes plus the department and institution as a whole were provided by, Georgina Eggleston from LTEO. Christine Edmead from Pharmacy and Pharmacology (and part-time LTEO) talked about the peer mentoring scheme she is involved in within her department and provided some insights as to how such schemes can be created and developed. Carol Lacey from AWARE in the SU described the training they offer to mentors in support of such schemes.

What was of particular interest in this session was hearing from two students about their different experiences of being peer mentors in different schemes. One, Kirsty from MASH, was involved in a more structured formal arrangement offering peer support to students in Maths problem-solving classes. The other, Tom from Computer Science, had set up a more informal mentoring scheme linked in with the Computer Science Student Society. Both schemes were very successful.

Students attending the session benefitted at the end by being able to talk about their ideas in setting up schemes in their departments with those who had presented. They also had the chance to learn from them some of the useful ways to get such schemes off the ground and to avoid any pitfalls. In addition the web pages offering a range of resources and support was of relevance and interest to all those who attended. These can be found at: http://www.bath.ac.uk/learningandteaching/resources/peermentoring/index.php

Trevor Day reports:

Gwen van der Velden, Director of Learning and Teaching, launched Innovations Week with this week’s appeal to focus on student learning – the heart of this week’s theme ‘Enhancing the learner experience’. Gwen reported that the new University Learning and Teaching Strategy had recently been passed by Senate. It has an operational focus and emphasis on student engagement. Those present then adjourned to three rooms and were treated to 15-minute presentations from University staff pushing ahead with innovations in teaching and learning.

Dyfed Griffiths, Professional Studies Advisor (Placements Tutor) for the Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering, explained current practice for undergraduate Architecture students, who experience 6-month placements in their second and third years. From each placement, students write a 2,500-word report and normally complete at least one professional development record (PDR) that contributes to their final professional accreditation post-University. One of the scheme’s key benefits is students’ rapid maturing as they come to apply theoretical knowledge to the real-life work environment. A current focus is on closer engagement with employers and students, harnessing feedback to improve placement benefits and seeking to raise standards and expectations for all concerned: students, employers and University staff. Visit the scheme’s webpages.

Computer Studies Director of Teaching Alan Hayes and Lecturer Marina de Vos described their experiences using two kinds of audience response systems: electronic voting system technology (EVS) and Responseware. They are using EVS to encourage deeper learning, with students having opportunities to revise their initial responses to questions after discussion in peer groups. The use of Responseware invites more open-ended responses to questions and is providing a mechanism for students to give lecturers more immediate feedback on the quality of the learning experience – a challenging but invaluable experience for the lecturer! View the project’s 2009 Dragon’s Den submission.

Cassie Wilson, a Senior Lecturer from the School for Health, reported on her project’s experience of systematically gathering views on giving feedback to students. Expected benefits from doing so included more closely aligning students’ and staff’s expectations and to invigorate practice on giving feedback. This has culminated in a feedback agreement between staff and students, plus action on four main points: giving students more information about coursework and exams; providing skill development sessions led by staff; more opportunities for personal tutors to give students individual feedback on progress in coursework and exams; and more self-directed tasks for students. In addition, guidance for future improvement is now a specific item on assignment feedback given to students. View the project’s 2009 Dragon’s Den submission.

 Day One of Innovations Week has begun with plenty of ideas to stimulate engagement with students’ learning: harnessing student feedback to enhance the learner experience; encouraging deeper learning through the use of technology; and maximising the value of work placements. There is plenty more to come this week.

In preparation for the e-learning taster on Tuesday, the slides are available from: http://www.bath.ac.uk/lmf/download/41706

I’d like to welcome you to the supporting blog for the Innovations Week 2010. The week starts on 22nd February, 2010. It is a week packed with opportunities to learn from others and contribute to our understanding of how to enhance the student learning experience. To find out more, see our web site:

• http://www.bath.ac.uk/learningandteaching/events-workshops/coursepages/IW2010.php

Throughout the week we’ve a number of people blogging from the events they attended. Their thoughts will be available from this site. However, I strongly encourage you to submit you thoughts about events you’ve attended, and how you might take some of the ideas raised into your learning and teaching.

I hope you enjoy the week.