RUSTLE issue 6

Really Useful Stuff on Teaching, Learning Etc. Summer 2010

RUSTLE Sussex recently welcomed Dr Marion Birch from Manchester University to lead a Teaching and Learning Development Event on Just-in-Time Teaching (JiTT). The topic had been suggested by Simon Peeters (Physics and Astronomy) who had made contact with Marion whilst carrying out a research project on JiTT for his PGCertHE.

What is Just-in-Time Teaching?

JiTT is essentially about a feedback loop in students’ learning. Students are re-quired to do some specific learning in their non-contact hours, and often this is by using online materials in a Virtual Learning Environment like Study Direct (SyD). The next stage is an online quiz that tests students’ understanding of the material. The results from this quiz allow the lecturer to decide, just before the lecture, which aspects of the topic need to be addressed in the face-to-face teaching. The lecture is then interactive, with students able to engage with the concepts they have studied in advance.

Marion explained how JiTT has been used in conjunction with e-learning and peer instruction in her first year Physics module to encourage students to take responsibility for their own learning, con-struct their own understanding of the material, develop a deeper conceptual understanding – and perform better in exams. Inevitably these quite radical changes did not all work perfectly first time, but Marion shared her ‘warts and all’ story, explaining the modifications that have been made to the teaching approaches over the last few years and the ex-cellent results that are now being achieved.

E-Learning for JiTT

Harnessing the power of online learning to engage students and to deal quickly and effectively with the pre-lecture testing

Bumper Summer Issue: news and ideas to keep you thinking until the Autumn!

Just-in-Time Teaching

New e-learning modules for Doctoral Researchers

Short Case Studies on: Computer-based labs and PowerPoint in lectures

Sussex Teaching Awards

Assessing Group Work

Lecture Capture

The Engineering Subject Centre

Teaching Tips

Technology Tips on: recording a short video and using Delicious, Twitter and RSS feeds

Sussex Plus and Skillclouds

Sussex Teaching and Learning Conference

Events around the UK

The Sussex Pathway to Associate of the Higher Education Academy (AHEA)

TLD Events for the Summer term

has made the weekly cycle of learning, testing and interac-tive lecturing possible. In the case of Physics, e-learning can be enriched by embedding small internet-based pro-grams – or Physlets as they are known. Simon explains that Physlets ‘enable the instructor to pose questions that are not possible using pen and paper. For example, an astrophysics instructor can ask the students given several

animated planets circling a sun, which one does not obey Keppler’s law (and is therefore unphysical). This will pro-duce a deeper conceptual understand-ing of the underlying theory than merely solving the relevant equations’.

Simon sees other benefits of e-learning for his students as ‘a PC is patient, non-intimidating, non-judgemental and always available’ and of course the advantage for the lec-turer is that ‘a computer is able to di-rectly store and summarise the results of attempts made by many students’.

The Interactive Lecture

Traditional lectures have their strengths, but they are essentially uni-

directional and largely passive on the part of the student so Simon argues that ‘they fail to provide both the lecturer and the student with direct feedback’. As one of the aims of JiTT is to encourage students to take responsibility for their own learning, a mode of teaching that includes greater feedback is necessary. This is where the interactive lecture comes in. Simon explains that ‘the interactive lecture ... takes place only after the students have studied the mate-rial and completed the (web-based) questions on it. This means that the students have seen and thought about the content of the lecture before they go to it and gives the

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Just-in-Time Teaching

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AHEA successes and a new pathway.

Seven associate tutors have recently become Associates of the Higher Education Academy. They achieved their AHEA status by successfully completing the AHEA portfolio course run by TLDU, but in future, ATs will be able to achieve this recognition by following the new Sussex Pathway. This is a professional recognition scheme which is designed to be flexible, work-based and aimed at supporting people in the development of their teaching role. Participants will take one of the Starting to Teach Courses for ATs, then in the following term they will undertake a teach-ing observation process and attend at least one development event related to teaching and learning. During a third term participants will be able to apply to the HEA for recognition.

Web Links and Contacts Higher Education Academy: www.heacademy.ac.uk HEA Professional Recognition pages: http://tinyurl.com/HEAprofreg Information on the AHEA Pathway and AT courses: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/events/at For enquiries about the Sussex Pathway: [email protected]

Congratulations to the new AHEAs

Tomer Czaczkes, Biological & Environmental Science

Nikki Luke, Psychology

Vincenzo Marra, Biological & Environmental Science

Adrian Martin, Mathematics

Deeptima Massey, Geography

Andy Mealor, Psychology

Achim Rosemann, Anthropology

opportunity to interact on the material much more than a conventional lecture’.

Marion uses a combination of Personal Response System ‘clickers’ (like the Turning Point system we use at Sussex) and peer instruction to engage her students in the lecture and deepen their learning. During lectures a multiple-choice question is posed and, without conferring, students ‘vote’ for their preferred answer. The responses are displayed on the screen and students are then given a couple of minutes to discuss their answers with a neighbour. A second round of ‘voting’ follows – and at this point many more students usually get the right answer. The lecturer can then briefly recap the answer – or if it is clear that significant numbers of students do not understand, a further explanation can be provided.

Could JiTT work for your course?

At Manchester, the adoption of JiTT enabled Marion and her colleagues to turn around a first year module that was

(Continued from page 1) ‘one of the worst in terms of student feedback, satisfaction and exam results to being one of the best’. It did involve more faculty time because of the need to prepare a number of options for lectures, but the benefits in terms of student learning were clear.

JiTT can be adapted to different contexts so although it has its roots in Physics courses it has been successfully used in other disciplines. The non-contact hours learning can be done online or in more traditional ways, but an online quiz is probably the most efficient way for lecturers to identify the material to include in the interactive lecture. The face-to-face learning session could take different forms, as long as the emphasis is on interactive engagement.

If you would like to know more about JiTT and explore the possibilities for your own teaching have a look at the Web Links below or contact the Teaching and Learning Develop-ment Unit (TLDU)

Web Links and Contacts Find out more about Just-in-Time Teaching: http://jittdl.physics.iupui.edu/jitt/ JiTT in Geoscience – including video clips: http://serc.carleton.edu/introgeo/justintime/ JiTT in Biology – journal article: www.lifescied.org/cgi/reprint/3/1/49.pdf Physlets: http://webphysics.davidson.edu/Applets/Applets.html Simon’s project report: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/resources/rustle Personal Response System ‘clickers’: www.sussex.ac.uk/elearning/personal_response_systems.php Simon Peeters: [email protected] If you would like to use ‘clickers’ in your teaching contact Jan Pryse in TLDU: [email protected] For future TLD Events see back page or www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/events/tldevents

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had successfully purified their allocated protein from the mixture, they were able to submit their result and get in-stant feedback. Students who had successfully purified their first protein, were encouraged to purify another so that by repeating the process they were able to further clarify their grasp of the processes of protein purification. At the end of the session I provided a solution key which gave the most favourable protein purification strategy for each pro-tein which together with the information handout given at the start of the session, could be used for revision.

Following the final session, I emailed all students on the course encouraging them to try the simulation and another 24 students logged on and submitted their work (an extra 25%, equating to a total of 62% of students from the course that participated in the simulation). Although perhaps not as effective as coming to one of the group sessions, students were able to submit their purification strategies and there is a good possibility that their knowledge of protein purification was increased.

Results / Outcomes: Questionnaires from students who attended sessions provided the following information:

43% of students were not sure whether (28.6%) or didn’t think (14.3%) the Biological Chemistry course provided enough practical experience and almost 46% of students were not sure whether (25.7%) or didn’t think (20%) their other courses provided enough practical experience. Fif-teen students (42%) used the practice simulation prior to the session, all of whom found the practice exercise useful. Some students were unsure whether there was sufficient information accompanying the practice simulation.

All the participants found the protein purification simulation sessions helpful in becoming more familiar with a number of protein purification methods. 80% thought the simulation was directly relevant to topics covered in lectures and all participants thought the sessions were directly relevant to the practical work covered in the course. Encouragingly, almost all students (97%) would like the session to be a permanent module of Biological Chemistry. Additionally, most students (97%) thought the group size for the work-shop was satisfactory. Interestingly, many students worked with others during the second stage of the protein purifica-tion simulation session, even though this was not compul-sory, and most people felt helped by this (67%).

Philip Jordan, Sussex Centre for Genome Damage and Stability.

Context: Biological Sciences (Biological Chemistry course C7024)

Challenge / Problem / Issue: Undergraduate students studying biological sciences generally obtain low levels of practical experience, particularly in the first two or three years of study. In 2009, the Graduate Recruitment Bureau stated that: ‘Lots of graduate scientists encounter problems where they have a lack of practical experience. They will have strong theoretical knowledge without the technical skills to back it up. The need for relevant practical experi-ence can't be stressed too much’.

Intervention: One possible way to increase students’ practical knowledge is to introduce a computer-based simulation of a laboratory ex-periment. I used a computer-based protein purification practical developed by Dr. Diana Bajzek and Dr. Gordon Rule of Carnegie Mellon Uni-versity that I found on the Multimedia Educational Re-source for Learning and Online Teaching (MERLOT) website.

The simulation involves the use of protein purification tech-niques to purify a particular protein from a mixture, which fits directly with the learning outcomes of Biological Chem-istry (C7024) as it covers the biological chemistry of pro-teins, provides the theory and simulates a variety of labora-tory methods used to study the biological chemistry of pro-teins, and it involves enzymatic activity calculations.

The simulation was made available to students on a volunteer basis and 35 of the 95 students took part in sessions. Beforehand, students were given a link to a practice version of the simulation and encouraged to use the practice simulation to familiarise themselves with the program and techniques.

The session was in two parts; first, we worked together to purify two selected proteins from the practice simulation. The purification process involves a number of steps and students were asked to share their purification strategy for each step with one another and come to an agreement. They then shared their agreed strategy with me and gave reasons for their answer. I discussed their answer, encour-aging them and reasoning with them and asked what other ideas they had come up with. I suggested alternative meth-ods for the step if necessary, and then performed the de-cided strategy using the computer connected to the projec-tor for all to see. We proceeded in this manner until we had successfully purified the selected proteins. Students then worked independently or in pairs to purify one or two pro-teins from a new mixture. When a student had decided they

Computer Based Learning This is the first in a series of short case studies that will be featured in RUSTLE. Many of these come from successful PGCertHE research pro-jects, but if you have a small-scale teaching and learning research project that you would like to present as a Sussex Short Case Study please

contact [email protected]

Web Links: Phil’s full report: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/resources/rustle MERLOT: www.merlot.org/merlot/index.htm

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Sussex Teaching Award Winners

Earlier this year posters appeared across campus asking for nominations for the new Sussex Teaching Awards. This year the Schools and their students were more involved in the process and the eye-catching posters asking questions like ‘who inspires you?’ and ‘who deserved to be noticed?’ brought in many nominations. A total of 39 colleagues from across campus have been recognised with a Sussex Teaching Award, either individually or in teams. Congratulations to everyone who re-ceived an award and a big thank you to the students and staff who made the nominations.

Individual Awards go to: Sergio Catignani, Global Studies; Andrew Chitty, History, Art History and Philosophy; Diana Conyers, Institute of De-velopment Studies; Abi Curtis, English; Dimitrios Dalakoglou, Global Studies; Andrew Duff, Media, Film and Music; Darrell Evans, Brighton and Sussex Medical School; Ana Fernandes, Business, Management and Eco-nomics; David Harper, Life Sciences; Philip Harris, Mathematical and Physical Sciences; Alvaro Herrera, Business, Management and Economics; Graham Hole, Psychology; Jessica Horst, Psychology; David Howlett, Brighton and Sussex Medical School; Istvan Kiss, Mathematical and Physi-cal Sciences; Margarete Kohlenbach, English; Andrew Liddle, Mathemati-cal and Physical Sciences; Julie Litchfield, Business, Management and Economics; Chris Long, Engineering & Design; Graham McAllister, Infor-matics; Ben Oliver, Media, Film and Music; Polly Ruiz, Media, Film and Music; Yusuf Sayed, Education and Social Work; Josh Siepel, Business, Management and Economics; Daniel Steuer, English; Celine Surprenant, English; Gonzalo Varela, Business, Management and Economics; Claire

Ward, Careers and Employability Centre; and David Young, Informatics.

Team Awards recognise: Paul Newbury and Phil Watten, for Technology-Enhanced Learning, Informatics;

John Bateman, David Green, Emmet Hayes and Richard Sykes, Tutorial Fellows, Business, Management and Econom-ics.

Ross English, Catherine Reynolds, Sarah Robins-Hobden and Jannie Roed, Effective Researcher Team, Professional Services Group.

Assessing Group Work Small group work has many advantages in terms of student learning, and assessment is a great motivator for learning, but assessing group work is not always straightforward. Here are some questions we need to think about when assessing group tasks, and some links to further guidance and case studies.

What are we assessing in group work? When planning the assessment of group tasks it is important to think about what we are trying to assess. Is it just the end product that we are concerned about? Or do we also want to assess the process involved? If one of the purposes of group working is to develop a set of skills around organisation, co-operation and joint responsibility then we are unlikely to be able to assess those outcomes adequately just by looking at a final product such as a presentation, lab report or other piece of writing. When planning a group assessed task it is important to decide whether we are assessing product and / or process as this will determine how we assess.

How can we assess group work? If we are only concerned with as-sessing the product of group work, then this can be assessed in much the same way as individual tasks (though there will be issues around fairness as discussed below). But if we want to assess the process as well as the product we will need some way of getting ‘inside’ the group as they work towards their goal. Often this is done by including an ele-ment of self and/or peer assessment, alternatively, we could require groups to report on their progress at various stages, perhaps by keep-ing a log of activity or notes from meetings.

Is it fair? One of the big concerns, for faculty and students is whether assessment of group activities can fairly reward the contribution and learning of individuals. If we only assess the product of group work it can be difficult to know who has contributed what. In a group presenta-tion, for example, one student may do most of the talking, but quieter members of the team may have contributed a lot of research and understanding. This is where self and peer assessment can contribute to the fairness of the final grade, with students rating their own and each other’s contributions to the end prod-uct. There are many ways of doing this and the TLDU web pages will provide some links to different models and case stud-ies.

Web links TLDU resources on assessing group work: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/ideas/grp

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and summaries feeds directly into some of the educational concerns surrounding the use of PowerPoint. For example, one student declared that the most important function of PowerPoint was ‘having all the relevant information in a clear way.’ Yet the slides for that particular lecture con-tained no more than a few hundred words, including cap-tions and quotations. Was the student suggesting that the other 4,500 words or so that made up the rest of the lecture were ‘irrelevant’?

This small study contrasts with the results of others which have revealed significant student unhappiness at the way in which technology, especially PowerPoint, is being em-ployed in lectures. Students questioned in other studies have criticised lecturers who too often either read Power-Point slides out verbatim or waste class time fumbling with software. Such a positive student response in my own sur-vey has reassured me that I must be getting certain things right – such as lighting, font size, the balance between spe-cial effects and information and so on. But the more funda-mental issues over the use of PowerPoint continue to con-cern me, particularly its tendency to substitute a more com-plex picture with basic summaries.

When reflecting on the results of my project and reading the pedagogical literature, I was struck by the parallels be-tween concerns over PowerPoint and theories of deep and surface learning. It would seem that too often the use of PowerPoint can encourage a surface approach: highlight-ing key words and sentences but providing little sense of a coherent whole.

It is of course important to remember that students of differ-ent abilities will be advantaged or disadvantaged by Power-Point in different ways. The most academically able will be able to use the PowerPoint slides as a starting point for further research, and from their own reading should be able to make the links and see the coherent whole necessary to achieve a deep understanding of the subject. For the weak-est students, the PowerPoint slides provide the barest bones of a subject with which they might otherwise not engage at all. The danger, however, is that for the most substantial middle group of students, an over-reliance on PowerPoint slides provides a surface grasp of a topic, but fails to encourage them to move beyond that.

Interested? for more details or a copy of the project report please e-mail Hester Barron: [email protected]

Hester Barron, History.

Context: Lectures for the course Britain in the Twentieth Century

Challenge / Problem / Issue: The use of PowerPoint in lectures is becoming ubiquitous. Yet, as the traditional lec-ture increasingly comes under criticism for creating a pas-sive learning environment, the use of PowerPoint arguably further encourages students to become unengaged mem-bers of an audience, rather than responsive participants in the learning process.

Research: There were two main objectives to my study. Firstly, I wanted to improve my own use of PowerPoint in lectures. Secondly, I wanted to look more generally at how my students responded to it: how far did they think it bene-fited them in terms of their learning experience, and did they value it in the same way as I did? Following a lecture on ‘Immigration, race and ethnicity’, I asked students to complete questionnaires asking them a variety of questions about the use of PowerPoint in the lecture. As a quick way of checking if students were engaging with the slides I also asked them to identify three images that had been shown during the lecture.

Results / Outcomes: The 36 responses received were universally positive towards the use of PowerPoint in my lectures: 15 ‘liked’ it and 21 ‘really liked’ it. Several students said that they used the slides as a learning resource before the lectures and even more did so afterwards. What was also clear was that the students had actively engaged with the presentation. Most were able to recognise the images later: the majority of students (27/36) identified all three images correctly, and none picked more than one incorrect answer. Asked how they thought that PowerPoint aided their learning, students were appreciative of the inclusion of pictures, quotations, lecture structure outline and key argu-ments, with the majority suggesting that this improved the learning experience. I was pleased with such a positive reaction, and felt that such responses fitted with my own opinions regarding the value of the tool.

However, no fewer than 16 students also suggested that the most important function of PowerPoint was its ability to summarise or illustrate the most important points in a lec-ture. This is potentially very concerning, and at odds with my own conception of learning. Such an approach to PowerPoint means that many may not be getting the best learning experience from it, and their focus on key points

PowerPoint as a Teaching and Learning Tool

This is one in a series of short case studies that will be featured in RUSTLE. If you have a small-scale teaching and learning research project that you would like to present as a Sussex Short

Case Study please contact [email protected]

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The Engineering Subject Centre (ESC) is one of the most active of the Higher Education Academy centres and although the focus of their activities is ‘to improve the student learning experience in partnership with the UK engineering community’ many of the materials on teaching and learning that they produce are used by a much wider audience. Like most of the sub-ject centres, the ESC’s work falls into several strands.

Developing and Sharing Good Practice: Funding is available for small projects and teaching awards provide an opportu-nity for engineering academics to receive national recognition for the high quality of their learning and teaching practices. Events and workshops are run all over the country and twice a year, Engineering Education, a peer-reviewed, international journal is published.

Bringing the Engineering Education Community Together: An email list brings together over 600 members to share information and there are contacts in departments delivering HE Engineering programmes across the UK – the Sussex con-tact is Rupert Young (contact details below). A newsletter is produced 3 times a year and the ESC works with UK Engineer-ing organisations as well as being involved in international networks for Engineering education.

Helping You to Enhance Your Students’ Learning: The ESC's Resource Database has direct online links to around 1500 approved engineering-specific and general learning and teaching resources, such as guides, reports, case studies and or-ganisational sites. The website features RSS feeds that let you embed ESC news and events in your own websites, and Study Direct sites. Student awards motivate students and practical advice is available - if you have a question about any aspect of engineering education the ESC will try to help and if they do not know the answer will try to find someone who does. They are keen to work with individual departments (or schools/faculties) and their staff in the development of teaching and learning practices - from making a visit to a department through to participation at staff development events or Learning and Teaching Days. The Centre also offers a portfolio of workshop topics where the session can be customised to meet the department's needs.

(Adapted from the Engineering Subject Centre web pages)

Web Link and Contact The Engineering Subject Centre: www.engsc.ac.uk Sussex Engineering Subject Centre Contact: [email protected]

Introducing the Subject Centres: Engineering

Teaching Tips Prepare yourself by reading what the students are reading and refreshing your memory of the key texts. This is important if you are teaching a topic for the first time, but also if you have been teaching the same topic for some time.

Make connections within the curriculum by encouraging or leading students to see how aspects of the current course overlap with other aspects of the same course and with other courses within the degree programme. This aids retention of material and promotes informed, broad and critical perspectives.

Make connections beyond the course to engage students and enhance their learning. Does the subject under discussion have any relevance to students’ own personal life experi-ences? Do the points of debate have real world legitimacy? By making explicit some of the links between the subject material and students’ lived experience and/or prior learning we can help them to construct their own understanding of the subject.

Create a happy atmosphere, perhaps using humour if appro-priate, because students are more likely to be engaged if they feel relaxed.

Web Links Previous RUSTLE Teaching Tips: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/resources/rustle/tips Share your own tips by e-mailing RUSTLE at: [email protected] Constructivist learning theory: www.learningandteaching.info/learning/constructivism.htm Humour and teaching in higher education: http://tinyurl.com/humour-teaching

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Sussex Plus and Skillclouds are two complementary University of Sussex projects which work together to help students to identify and articulate the skills they develop during their degree.

SussexPlus is managed by the Careers and Employability Centre and provides a process and framework of development opportunities which help students identify and record evidence of skills, knowledge and ex-perience gathered at Sussex in academic studies, work experience and extra-curricular activities. Students link these to their professional devel-opment and options for the future and present them in a webfolio which can be used when applying for jobs or further study.

Skillclouds is an online resource, embedded in Sussex Direct and man-aged by the Teaching and Learning Development Unit (TLDU) which uses tags and tag clouds to present students with the main skills they are developing on their degree programme.

Together these projects encourage students to:

think about and plan for future employment or further study

develop their skills by getting involved in extra-curricular activities

understand the skills they are developing on their degree programme

be confident in articulating their skills

stand out in a competitive graduate jobs market.

Web Links and Contacts Careers and Employability Centre: www.sussex.ac.uk/careers Find out more about Sussex Plus at www.sussex.ac.uk/sussexplus For latest news see SussexPlus Blog at www.sussexplus.wordpress Contact SussexPlus: [email protected] View the Skillclouds demo in Sussex Direct at: http://tinyurl.com/skillclouds For information about Skillclouds contact Clare Hardman: [email protected]

Recording a short video can be a great way to explain a concept, recap on a topic or walk through a website. Screen capture soft-ware can record any activity that is happening on your computer screen and will also record a voiceover. There are some screen capture tools available that are free and simple to use.

Jing can be used on either a PC or Mac and you can record up to five minutes of video. It produces a file that you can link to from your website or Study Direct site. You can’t edit Jing videos using their free version.

Camstudio records in the AVI format that you save to your computer. The advantage of this is that you can then edit the video afterwards. You can, however, only use this on a PC.

Both of the above tools require you to download the software. With Screenr there is no download required. You can record up to five minutes of video and it can be used on a Mac or PC. Once recorded, it’s very easy to link to your video from a Twitter account. Alternatively, you can make the link available in a Study Direct site, upload it to YouTube or download the file and edit it later.

Just remember, as with any service that is holding your data and objects you create, check you are happy with their terms and conditions.

Web Links Jing: http://www.jingproject.com/ Camstudio: http://camstudio.org/ Screenr: http://screenr.com/

Technology Tip: Recording a short video

Sussex Plus and Skillclouds

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A Universal University? Teaching and Learning for All This year's Sussex Teaching and Learning Conference on 3rd June takes as its theme the internationalisation of teaching and learning. Four external speakers will join Sussex colleagues focusing on:

The national context and work of the HEA Teaching International Students project Internationalisation at Sussex

Assessment of international students

Improving interactions between international and home students

Developing the cross-cultural capabilities of home students

Supervision of international students

The guest speakers will be Jude Carroll, Co-Director of the Higher Education Academy Teaching International Students project ; Valerie Clifford, Deputy Head of the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development and leader of an online course for staff on Internationalising the Curriculum; David Killick author of Cross-Cultural Capability & Global Perspectives: Guidelines for Curriculum Review and editor of Hands-on Internationalisation and Sheila Trahar, Senior Lecturer in Educa-tion and Director of an MEd Programme in Hong Kong whose research has focused on cultural influences on learning and teaching in higher education and international higher education.

Web Links For more information and online booking: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/events/conf/2010

The library is introducing a new tool that integrates reading list material into the course context, making it available via Study Direct course sites as well as the Library. This new system offers flexibility and integration into existing e-learning tools and ensures that course materials are embedded into your teaching and your student’s learning.

Aspire is already available for students to view via the Resource Lists link from the Library Catalogue and via the Library block inside Study Direct sites and allows students to personalise their lists by adding their own notes for items on their list and mark items to track their reading. It also provides links through to the full text of electronic journals, digitised text and e-books as well as linking to Library print holdings.

Aspire uses web 2.0 technologies to ensure that you can easily update or cre-ate your own lists giving back control of how a reading list looks and how it fits into your course structure. Simple tools allow you to organise lists by week, theme or importance and link sections within your StudyDirect content. Just add an Aspire bookmarking tool to your browser to gather together the resources you want your students to use from the Library catalogue, the Electronic Li-brary, websites, podcasts or YouTube.

The Library will still process lists submitted to the Library using Aspire and are keen to invite academics to use this system and work with them to make it work

Web Links and Contact For information about developing your list: www.sussex.ac.uk/library/teaching/resourcelists.html Emma Walton, Library Learning and Teaching Support Manager: [email protected]

Aspire to Better Reading Lists

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someone practically explaining something to you and it is really good because it is only 2-3 minutes long’. Mike finds the equipment ‘very easy to use’ too because ‘recording a lecture is just a matter of clicking on the icon at the begin-ning and giving it a name that will allow me to find it later’ and there are just a few steps involved in ‘claiming’ and uploading a file in Study Direct.

About twenty percent of Mike’s students are accessing the uploaded lectures, but he says that ‘it is so little effort, it is a no-brainer to put it on even if they only use it once or twice in the term – and more will probably access the lectures nearer the exam’. For Evelyn’s students who have an exam

some time after the end of the course the captured lectures will be particularly useful in the summer ‘to refresh their memory and remind themselves what the slides are about’, but also provide an opportunity for deeper learning because ‘when students have done some reading they can link back to the lecture in an iterative process’.

Both Mike and Evelyn now find that students are look-ing out for the recordings to be uploaded and although

Evelyn feels that captured lectures ‘lose the lecture atmos-phere and it easier to be distracted on your sofa at home’ as Mike says ‘Echo 360 is easy to use and a significant minority of students have shown evidence of appreciating it and making the most of it and given the minimal effort it takes it is worth doing’.

Web Links More events on the TLDU website: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/events/heaevents Easy to browse table at: www.heacademy.ac.uk/business/events/events_table

21st Century Universities - New roles, new responsibili-ties for Technical, Laboratory and Support Staff? London,

2nd June http://tinyurl.com/21stCentUni

Enquiry, Autonomy and Graduateness: achieving an outstanding student learning experience, Sheffield Hallam

University, 15th -16th June http://tinyurl.com/cpla2010

Fifth International Blended Learning Conference, Uni-versity of Hertfordshire, 16th -17th June http://tinyurl.com/blended2010

Psychology Learning and Teaching conference, Edin-burgh Napier University, 30th June - 2nd July http://tinyurl.com/PLAT2010

Future Learningscapes: a 21st century challenge, Green-

wich, London, 7th July http://tinyurl.com/learningscapes

Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences: ‘GEES Learning and Teaching to 2020’, University of Plymouth,

7th - 9th July http://tinyurl.com/GEES2010

Research informed Teaching, delivering participation, engagement and enquiry, Staffordshire University, Stoke

-on-Trent, 14th July http://tinyurl.com/RIT2010

International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning conference, ‘Global theories and local practices’, BT Convention Centre, Liverpool, 19th – 22nd

October http://issotl10.indiana.edu/

Teaching and Learning Events around the UK

Readers have said that they want RUSTLE to bring them news of external Teaching and Learn-

ing events. So here is a selection of upcoming

conferences and one-day events.

Evelyn Ferstl (Psychology) and Mike Collyer (Geography) talked to RUSTLE about how they and their students are using the Echo 360 lecture capture system.

For Evelyn, recording lectures was not new because ‘in the large lecture classes in Psychology it is pretty much stan-dard that we try to record it’. With up to 300 students in the class there are always a number who are unable to attend and ‘it is good for them to be able to go back and listen to the lecture’. Students can go through a recorded lecture at their own pace so Evelyn also sees it as ‘a good opportu-nity for students with learning difficulties such as dyslexia’.

For Mike, it was seeing one of his students recording the lecture for her own use that prompted him to try Echo 360. He had ‘assumed that recording lectures would discourage students from attending, but this was evi-dence that even students who come to lectures are interested in keeping some version of it so that they can look back’ and he has found that it is ‘particularly keen students who are enthusias-tic about using the system to listen again to lectures they attended’.

Capturing a lecture with Echo 360 gives more than an au-dio recording, though – as Evelyn realised when she first uploaded a lecture to Study Direct, and saw the ‘really neat interface with slides’ which she thinks is ‘wonderful’. Evelyn also likes the short video that explains how to use the sys-tem (link below) which she says is ‘brilliant - you have

Web Links Sussex Lecture Capture web page: www.sussex.ac.uk/elearning/podcasting.php How to use Echo 360 – video and written guides: www.sussex.ac.uk/elearning/lecture_capture_how.php

Playing It Again - Lecture Capture at Sussex

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Web Links What is RSS? www.press-feed.com/howitworks/what-is-RSS.php Delicious, RSS feeds and Twitter on Study Direct: http://tinyurl.com/TLDR-SyD TLDU bookmarks as a Delicious tag cloud: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/resources/web TLDU Twitter strand: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu Twitter: http://twitter.com Twitter for academia: http://tinyurl.com/twitteracad

The Higher Education Academy's EvidenceNet service promotes and supports the use of evidence in higher education learning and teaching. It signposts resources, events and networks from across the HE sector to provide easy access to the broad evidence base for as many people as possible. It aims to allow busy academics to use evidence to reflect on their teaching, or to make changes to (for example) the way they manage feedback to students or approach equality and diversity in their teaching.

To make it easier for busy academics to record and evaluate their experience of using a new or innovative tool, technique, or approach, a new online EvidenceNet Case Study template has been created. It provides the opportunity to reflect on your own work and to help others to inform their own practice. The online form is designed to make the process of sharing your experiences as easy as possible, and should only take 10-15 minutes. The aim is not to collect extensive and rigorously researched case-studies, but to capture practical insights of working academics in a quick and easy manner. EvidenceNet have also added new functionality to the website that allows you to contribute your own work or that of others into Evi-denceNet by completing a quick online form for single items, by emailing a spreadsheet (for multiple items), or by creating a dynamic link between your website and EvidenceNet so that EvidenceNet users can be directed to resources on your web-site.

Web Links EvidenceNet: www.heacademy.ac.uk/evidencenet Case Study template: www.heacademy.ac.uk/EvidenceNet/submission_case_studies Information on contributing: www.heacademy.ac.uk/EvidenceNet/contribute

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndi-cation and it really is simple to start using RSS feeds to enhance your students’ learning. You can quickly add an RSS feed from relevant pub-lications to your Study Direct course

site so that the current headlines are always dis-played. Use the ‘blocks’ option to add a remote RSS feed then edit the block to choose the feed(s) you want and set display options. There are lots of feeds to choose from, or you can add a new one from any site where you see the RSS symbol. To see an example look at the Teaching and Learning Development Resources SyD site (link below) you will see RSS feeds from Times Higher Education (THE) and TLDU’s Twitter thread.

Twitter allows the sharing of short messages (maximum 140 charac-ters) known as tweets. At a basic

level, a user of Twitter can choose to ‘follow’ users whose tweets they wish to receive, and others will follow their messages. It can be used in a more sophisticated way than that, but for many people it is about receiving and passing on (re-tweeting) interesting information. When it comes to using twitter for teaching there is some evidence that students do not use Twitter as much as other social networking sites such as Facebook, but some people are using it to encourage discussion and community-building between students (see below) meanwhile Twitter is growing as a space for making professional contacts and following news. This is the way that many at Sussex use Twitter, for example if you follow TLDU on Twitter you will re-ceive news of teaching and learning events and resources at Sussex and nationally. Why not have a look at the Twitter strand on the TLDU website to get an idea of what you are missing?

Delicious is a social bookmarking site that allows users to share bookmarks with colleagues, friends, students or the general public. Many people like using Delicious because it allows you to view and use your favourite bookmarks from any computer, and because it uses a system of tags rather than folders so you can organise your links in many different ways. For example, a resource on assessing groups from the Engineering Subject Centre could be ‘tagged’ as engineering, assessment and groups. Bookmarks can be viewed as a list, sorted in various ways, or displayed as a ‘tag cloud’. You can also display your links on Study Direct sites. To see Deli-

cious in action see the TLDU tag cloud on the website and on a Study Direct site (links below).

Making Connections: free and easy technologies to share What are all these little symbols that are springing up all over the www? And which are of use in teaching and learning? Here we introduce three of the most common free technologies that you might want to use to enhance your professional practice and students’ learning.

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Modules are accessed through Study Direct (using ITS username and password), and all doctoral and post-

doctoral researchers have been automatically enrolled to the site, and can access it via the DR2 web-site. DR2 E-Learning enables re-searchers to access high quality training online at the time and place need arises, which is particularly important for part-time and distance researchers.

DR2 (Doctoral Researcher Devel-opment Resources) falls under the umbrella of the Doctoral School and is managed by the Teaching &

Learning Development Unit. The website aims to support doctoral researchers in all aspects of their professional development, and provide a single gateway to development resources and opportunities on campus, online and be-yond.

It is over a year since the first edition of RUSTLE and it has grown and developed in that time. Last summer we asked what you wanted in future is-

sues and as a result have included more teaching tips, information on subject-specific HEA material, case studies, updates on new teaching techniques and facilities, articles on assessment, question banks and podcasting. To help us make sure that future issues contain the ‘really useful stuff’ you want please complete this quick online survey.

Survey: www.survey.bris.ac.uk/sussex/rustle2010

As a result of the Doctoral School's commitment to the pro-fessional development of Sussex researchers, an exciting new Study Direct site has been launched. DR2 E-Learning for Re-searchers presents fourteen online study modules that focus on essen-tial research skills at doctoral level and beyond. The modules are in-tended for use by doctoral research-ers, post-docs and early career re-searchers.

Many of the skills that researchers need for their careers are covered by this new training resource. The modules are interactive, with visual and audio content presenting solid advice, examples, and exercises based on the real-life experiences of professional researchers at all levels and in a range of disciplines. Learners are able to actively engage with the content, and access the latest professional knowledge and expertise.

Linking Discipline-Based Research and the Curriculum The Scottish QAA has produced resources on a number of Enhancement Themes including Assessment, Responding to Student Needs, Employability, Flexible Delivery, Integrative Assessment and The First Year. The latest set of resources and guides to be made available are on developing effective links between discipline-based research and the curriculum and bring together reports and case studies from disciplines and institutions, written by academics, which are available to download or as free paper publications.

Web Links Research-Teaching Linkages: www.enhancementthemes.ac.uk/themes/ResearchTeaching/ All Themes: www.qaa.ac.uk/scotland/qualityframework/enhancementthemes.asp

What do you want from RUSTLE?

Current topics include

Research Methods (in the Arts and Humanities; Sciences; Social Sciences)

Research Methods in Literature Review

Getting Published (in the Arts; Sciences)

Ethics & Good Research Practice

Ethics & Working with Human Subjects

Intellectual Property in the Research Context

Project Management in the Research Context

Career Planning (in the Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences; Sciences)

Managing your Relationship with your Research Supervisor or Principal Investigator

Selecting a Conference, Presenting & Networking

with more topics coming soon!

DR2 E-Learning for Researchers

Web Link and Contact DR2 website: www.sussex.ac.uk/dr2/e-learning For queries about the modules, or to provide any feedback contact [email protected]

RUSTLE

RUSTLE is produced by the Teaching and Learning Development Unit (TLDU)

and is online at www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/resources/rustle

If you wish to comment or contribute please e-mail [email protected]

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Web Links TLD Events 2009-10: www.sussex.ac.uk/tldu/events/tldevents Materials from sessions and related resources: http://tinyurl.com/TLDresources (this is a Study Direct site).

Teaching and Learning Development Events TLDU offer an exciting programme of seminars and workshops on a wide range of topics related to teaching, learning, assess-

ment, supervision and innovation. These events have been designed to be of value to all staff with teaching or tutoring responsi-bilities and are varied in terms of topic, format, timing and location so that as many colleagues as possible can take part. The

Summer term sessions are listed here and session outlines and online booking are available on the TLDU website.

Personal Response System

Examining a doctoral thesis and conducting a viva

There’s more to learning than Google

10 minutes of Fame – your lecture in the spotlight!

Learning in Large Groups

Researching Teaching Practice

Learning in Small Groups

Effective Lecturing

Inclusive Teaching

Finding & using SOTL

Giving Effective Feedback

Course Design and Approval

Student learning: some concepts and approaches

Preparing a Teaching Portfolio

Designing Assessment

Academic Advising

Thursday 22nd Apr 10 -11am

Tuesday 27th April 12.15 -1.45pm

Wednesday 28th April 12.15 -1.45pm

Thursday 29th April 10am -1pm

Thursday 6th May 12 - 2pm

Tuesday 11th May 12 - 2pm

Thursday 13th May 10 -12am

Tuesday 18th May 10am -1pm

Thursday 20th May 10am -1pm

Wednesday 26th May 2 - 4pm

Thursday 27th May 2 - 4pm

Tuesday 8th June 10 -12am

Tuesday 15th June 10 -12am

Wednesday 16th June 12.30 - 2pm

Wednesday 23rd June 10 - 12am

Tuesday 29th June 12 - 2pm