ReCap (Panopto) is moving to the Cloud!

Find out what the move to the cloud means for you – it’s all good news!

(Article reproduced from LTDS Newsletter)

In July 2023, the University will upgrade the ReCap service to the latest version of Panopto (the software that provides ReCap) and transition the service to being cloud hosted.

To achieve this there will be a period of downtime for ReCap during week commencing 24 July 2023. NUIT and Panopto are finalising the exact dates and duration of this downtime and further details will be communicated to colleagues when available.

All current functionality for the service will be maintained and existing content migrated to the cloud hosted service in line with the University’s retention policy (6 years for teaching room recordings and indefinitely for other content e.g. ‘My Folder’ content, conference recordings).

The benefits of upgrading include:

  • Improved copying within Canvas – making sharing links to recordings from previous years easier and quicker for colleagues, with automatic updating of links reducing the number of students encountering error messages.
  • Improved live streaming functionality – facilitated by the capacity provided by cloud hosting.
  • Captioning improvements – including an update to automatic speech-to-text that has improved ASR captions quality, and additional functionality within caption editing including ‘find and replace’ and confidence highlighting.
  • Distributed recording – allowing presenters in different locations to join the same recording.
  • Better integrations with other centrally supported software –  including Zoom, Teams and H5P. A programme of communication will take place in the coming months to make colleagues aware of the downtime. During the 2023/24 academic year, we will also provide support in using the upgraded and new functionality.

Please send any questions about the upgrade, or any other aspects of the ReCap service, to ltds@ncl.ac.uk.

2021 Showcase

A showcase of some of our work from 2021 and our submissions to the Learning and Teaching Conference 2022.

The FMS TEL team have collaborated on a wide range of projects throughout 2021, some of which we have submitted to the internal Learning and Teaching Conference 2022.

Adopting a flexible approach to professional written exams during COVID

Staff from the School of Dental Sciences and FMS-TEL have collaborated throughout the pandemic to ensure summative assessments continue in a robust fashion to satisfy regulatory requirements. This required a flexible approach to online assessment which continues to be important as the uncertainty continues. This presentation details the challenges we have faced and solutions we have utilised, offering practical advice for those who may wish to run online exams in the future on any platform.

Sarah Rolland and Luisa Wakeling, School of Dental Sciences

Audio Commentary and Structured Asynchronous Teaching of Communication Skills in Dietetics and Nutrition

Role-play and peer observation are widely used as educational methods for teaching communication skills in healthcare education, which has become a greater challenge to implement during the pandemic. In the context of dietetics and nutrition, our students developed communication skills using innovative audio resources. This video will discuss student voice survey findings regarding engagement and quality perceptions of the resources, and advise those wishing to create similar tasks, including task setup and technical support.

Susan Lennie, Biomedical, Nutritional and Sport Sciences

Can Scaffolding help Reflective Practice?

This workshop sets out the aims of incorporating reflective practice with scaffolded approaches in your teaching contexts and invites you to explore their potential value in your programmes or modules. Structured reflective templates are one of the key developments of the new NU Reflect system, which are currently being piloted. This session will also offer case studies to demonstrate how colleagues have implemented reflective templates to support the student reflective process within their contexts.

Patrick Rosenkranz, Simon Cotterill, Sam Flowers, David Gillies, David Teasdale

Content Evolution

A brief look at the FMS bespoke VLE Ngage, and its special features which were designed for our distance learning programmes. This session will cover how we migrated our content into Canvas without losing functionality and the challenges we encountered. We will also discuss how the content has evolved during the pandemic and the changes made to enhance the student experience.

Emily Smith, FMS TEL

Creating and Using Animations to Explain Concepts

This video demonstrates a how animations can be used to demonstrate concepts in teaching. It showcases advanced animations that are used to show complex concepts and allow for dynamic and interactive content to be shared on screen. Should you not have access to high-end software, the video also shows what can be achieved using PowerPoint animations and shows some tools that can be used to develop understanding beyond static diagrams or simple videos.

Ashley Reynolds, FMS TEL

Designing Convertible Teaching

This workshop provides colleagues with practical tips on how to design teaching that can be converted between online and offline, and synchronous and asynchronous delivery styles with minimal effort. Participants will think through resource design using examples, and apply this knowledge to their own resources brought to the session. Participants will take away technological shortcuts that reduce the burden when changing delivery styles, as well as an understanding of how to design inherently flexible resources.

Eleanor Gordon, FMS TEL

Exploring 3D Anatomy: Collaborative Development of an Inclusive Online Course Supporting Universal Enhancement of Transferable Observational Skills

This talk covers the development of a MOOC which develops students’ skills in 3D Spatial Awareness in the context of the study of anatomy. This collaboration between Newcastle University and the University of Cape Town focuses on specific art-based and technology enhanced learning exercises to develop skills that will enhance students’ capabilities in clinical observation, diagnosis, and surgical training. Prior research and development of specific observation methodologies, their deployment in an online environment, and students’ learning outcomes will be shared.

Iain Keenan, School of Medical Education

Flipping case-based learning online in response to the pandemic

This presentation shares practice from rapid changes made to ‘flip’ learning and teaching in MB BS, in response to the pandemic. This is in the context of a new Clinical Decision Making course, originally designed to use online cases to supplement primarily face-to-face learning and teaching in both UK and NuMed. The pandemic gave need to rapidly shift to predominantly online delivery with more asynchronous delivery. We will demonstrate adaptions made and discuss lessons learned.

John Moss, David Kennedy, Dan Plummer

Staff development: collaboration across continents for using TEL

A study across campuses of Newcastle University into perceptions of TEL use found that staff in the NUMed and Singapore campuses felt they lagged behind in training for using TEL. The FMSTEL team responded with an online conference, collaborating with NUMed, at a time accessible to all. Various topics included specific technologies and embedding online transnational cross-campus teaching in the curriculum. Successful, it may become an annual event.

Alison Clapp, David Kennedy, Ruth Valentine, John Moss and Bhavani Veasuvalingam, FMS and NUMed

Using Canvas Commons to Supply and Support Student Learning Opportunities

What is Canvas Commons, how does it work, and why is it useful for disseminating online learning material? I will present examples of tutorials I have shared and induction material. By using Commons we can promote our material and the University to the wider Canvas Community. This will address the theme of Changing Practice through the Pandemic by focusing on the use of Canvas to provide excellent learning opportunities.

Michelle Miller, FMS TEL

Inspera Launch Events – Updates

Inspera is the new Digital Exam System available at the University. Inspera offers a wide range of features covering a large variety of exam styles. Colleagues wishing to learn more about Inspera are strongly encouraged to attend the event below, and explore the online guidance available on the LTDS website.

Further to our previous post, there have been some changes to the launch events as below.

  • 12 October 2021 10:00 AM – 11:30 AM UK, 5:00 PM-18:30 PM Malaysia (via Zoom)
  • 9 November 2021 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM UK (Ridley 2)
  • 10 November 2021 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM UK (NUBS)

Find out more about Inspera

Digital Exams with Inspera Assessment webpages.  

Inspera Guidance Canvas course, simply click the link to self-enrol.  

LTDS blog post about Inspera

If you have any questions about the launch events or Inspera Assessment, please email digital.exams@newcastle.ac.uk

New Digital Exams System: Inspera

Inspera is the new Digital Exam System available at the University. Inspera offers a wide range of features covering a large variety of exam styles. Colleagues wishing to learn more about Inspera are strongly encouraged to attend the event below, and explore the online guidance available on the LTDS website.

Have you seen the latest updates on Inspera?

Come along to one of the online events for live demonstrations, the chance to speak with our Inspera colleagues and to find out more about uses for digital assessments.

The first rollout will involve modules already using digital assessments.

Find out more

Digital Exams with Inspera Assessment webpages.  

Inspera Guidance Canvas course, simply click the link to self-enrol.  

LTDS blog post about Inspera

If you have any questions about the launch events or Inspera Assessment, please email digital.exams@newcastle.ac.uk