Category Archives: Other

News

Reading group in LTDS

6 May, 2021 Suzanne Leave a comment

A little while ago we started a small reading group for colleagues in the Learning and Teaching Development Service to share ideas and discuss current issues and publications related to learning and teaching in Higher Education.

We set ourselves a couple of parameters to encourage engagement, as we had tried a journal club previously to not a great deal of success.

This time we decided to limit ourselves:

to things that could be read or digested in around less than half an hour
to try too keep the readings short and digestible
to keep the discussion sessions to 30 minutes
to use small groups for discussion of themes, impressions etc

Over the past few groups we have:

Discussed David White’s blog post on The need for presence not contact hours
Looked at the OfS brief on Principles Based Regulation
Listened to Inventions in Sound: where the poet Raymond Antrobus explored the art of translating sound for the eye, looking at the poetic possibilities of closed captions.

Our next group will explore microcredentials by looking at the recent QAA quality compass paper – which way for micro credentials.

This will be the first meeting of a slightly expanded group which includes colleagues from FMS TEL .

We have one person running the group for 6 months (Me!) and I look after collating suggestions which come in from anyone who wants to suggest something. I try to have a range of different types of materials and cover a range of learning and teaching related viewpoints as our group has people who work in policy, practice, pedagogy, quality assurance, data and governance, professional development and all the intersections thereof.

Last time we listened to a radio programme about closed captions, which really made me think about how we approach captioning in HE. Some great ideas resulted from the session and it certainly got us talking!

Canvas, News, Other

Coming Soon: Interactive Content Made Easy with H5P

22 July, 2021 Nuala Leave a comment

^{Example H5P Hotspot item – click the + to try it out}

Adding engaging and interactive content to your online course materials will get easier very soon. The University has bought an enterprise licence for H5P for use by colleagues for a year. Towards the end of August we’ll be making it available to all Canvas and MLE Teachers giving them the ability to make accessible interactive widgets, like the ones on this post. H5P isn’t just restricted to Canvas and MLE, it can be used on web sites too.

We’re particularly excited about H5P! Once it is turned on there will no longer be a need to be an HTML guru to do things like:

Add accordions
Add single question formative quiz questions
Generate branching scenarios
Create 360 degree virtual tours … and much more

H5P has been successfully used by our friends in other universities– it’s very well documented and each content type has its own tutorial.

We will be using the fully supported (H5P.com) version of H5P and, while we are plumbing this in, if you would like to have a peek at what is in store do check out H5Ps web pages for their documentation. We would recommend holding fire on creating accounts on H5P.org and wait instead until we have our Newcastle H5P site up and running. It won’t be long!

How you can help us?

We have H5P for a one-year pilot initially – so we will need feedback on how you are using it, how your students are finding it, and how you would like our H5P support to develop.

If you would like to get early access to H5P, receive updates, or help our evaluation please JOIN OUR H5P COMMUNITY by filling out this form.

^{Sample H5P Course Presentation – try moving between the slides and answering the questions}

Other

The Art of the Possible 2021 – A look back.

12 July, 2021 Ben Leave a comment

Firstly, thank you to everyone who joined a session this week and engaged with the new material we released for Art of the Possible 2021. A big thank you to all our hosts who delivered wonderful online sessions to full or nearly full capacity.

The week started with a welcome message from Tom Ward to introduce the week, and continued with a really thought-provoking keynote session with Helen O’Sullivan Chair of the Association for Learning Technology, and DVC at Chester University. Helen’s session was called ‘Preparing students for their future, not our past: How the pandemic pushed us past the tipping point into education 4.0.’ And really dug deep into how education has changed and adapted since March 2020. Participants said they really enjoyed the session, the session was recorded (please note all video will require a Newcastle University log in and closed captions are currently being added) and can be viewed at any time.

Independent researcher Helen Beetham delivered a fantastic two-part session on designing online activities for university learning. This was a great opportunity for participants to learn, discuss, and reflect on some of the work they have been doing and what others have been doing, to give the best possible education to students, especially in an ever-increasing digital world. Highlights from part one and part two can be found online and viewed at any time.

Nuala Davis and Graeme Redshaw-Boxwell delivered two sessions called ‘Saving time and enriching your courses with Canvas Commons’. These sessions looked at how we can use Canvas Commons and how it can enhance our courses. Further information can found in the session slides and Canvas Orientation course.

Dr Cees van Der Land led a session entitled ‘A Series of lightning talks and Q&A about virtual fieldwork and virtual labs’ that looked at some of the inspiring, inventive, and innovative ways we have adapted our teaching to give the students great learning experiences in the absence of present in person land and fieldwork. Eight speakers did a series of lively presentations giving a cross university perspective of the work that has been done to move the hands on elements of a students experience to a digital platform. You can find all seven videos on ReCap.

Throughout the week we have been releasing a series of new case studies that will take you through some of the creative and innovative ways we have adapted since March 2020. These case studies really highlight the fantastic work we’ve achieved.

Finally, we were extremely excited to release the first two episodes of the Learning &Teaching @ Newcastle university Podcast. This fortnightly podcast will explore some of the great things we’ve been doing in Learning and Teaching here at Newcastle University.

You can download the first two episodes right now and it is available to download wherever you get your podcasts.

Remember to download, like, and subscribe, and you won’t miss an episode.

Other

Conversations about Canvas Commons

12 July, 2021 Nuala Leave a comment

All colleagues who have a Teacher role in Canvas can access and contribute to a huge repository of content in Canvas Commons. You can use Commons to share content with the global Canvas community or choose to restrict its visibility to teachers at Newcastle University. You can also share content with yourself!

For the Art of the Possible we hosted workshops to explore Commons with Colleagues. Our participants got stuck in enthusiastically.

What we liked:

Commons is a great way to access generic content e.g. getting started with the library, or to share content across programmes. (Our induction project team are using Commons to share induction materials with schools this year.)
Even if you don’t want to use the content it’s helpful to see how others have approached teaching your subject – it can give ideas and inspiration
The ability to gather quiz questions to adapt
It could help improve consistency between modules / courses
Commons is a good way to hold content that needs to be included in all/some courses – assignment templates, school policies, supports consistency.
You can use Commons to hold content that is private to you – making it easy to add content into multiple courses.
It makes it easy share content across the institution – rather than importing/exporting or adding permissions

Why would you share content to Commons?

A way of sharing effective practice, building your reputation, and that of the University
Evidence your impact / influence for promotion
Building in consistency
When you don’t know who specifically will need to access the content
By sharing you are contributing to the educational community
To share knowledge and expertise

Some Cautions

Several participants commented on the huge amount of material in Commons, we saw how we could filter this by stage (UG/PG) or restrict our searches to content shared just with the Newcastle University. We saw how we could share permalinks to content elements in Commons to make finding resources easier.

Canvas Commons content isn’t policed so we had good discussions about the need to check content for accuracy, and also to look out for international differences (eg prescribing guidance, legal regulations etc…). We spoke about how different creative commons licenses could be added to support reuse and about how to give attribution to Commons Content shared with CC licenses.

You can see our slide-deck
Visit our Canvas Orientation course to find our more – or view the Canvas guides on Commons.

Other

Eportfolio redevelopment workshops

14 May, 2021 Sam Leave a comment

The ePortfolio system is being redeveloped and relaunched for academic year 2021/22 and we would like your feedback. We aim to develop a system that emphasises reflection and supports students to capture and develop their learning activities whilst at Newcastle University, supporting employability in the future.

After consultation with colleagues and students, prototype designs have been created to show how the key tools within ePortfolio will appear in Canvas.

The ePortfolio team will be holding 30-minute workshops for colleagues on Thursday 20 May to explore the prototype designs and to answer any other questions. To sign up, please declare your interest in this sign-up sheet.

Workshop times:

09:00 – 09:30
09:30 – 10:00
12:00 – 12:30
12:30 – 13:00
16:00 – 16:30
16:30 – 17:00

Your feedback is valuable in helping us to redevelop the system to support student reflection and enhance skills development.

If you have any questions regarding ePortfolio, please contact ltds@newcastle.ac.uk

Other

Sharing effective practice from Strategic projects in blended learning

5 May, 2021 Suzanne Leave a comment

A recent DELT Forum here at Newcastle looked at the outputs, lessons learned and what works from four strategic projects which are now running with students.

As the covid-19 crisis hit, these projects were the four which needed to carry on, as they were, about a year ago, in active recruitment.

The four projects were:

Level 7 degree apprenticeships and CPD in the School of Computing, under the Institute of Coding project
Executive Education PG programmes in the Newcastle University Business School including case studies onLearner-Centred Curriculum Design using the ABC Method and Engaging work-based learners in online spaces through the development of digital residency
Laboratory safety work in the School of Biomedical, Nutritional and Sports Sciences including the FMS BNS Health and Safety Case Study
Flexible first year, General Engineering UG programme in the School of Engineering. Including a case study on using OneNote class notebooks as digital logbooks.

The last three were supported by strategic investment by the University in developing capability and capacity under Priority Actions 10 & 11 of our Education Strategy (formerly known as the TEL Roadmap).

The outcomes from all four were fascinating with intriguing insights into the programme level design processes which took place, the types of content produced to support learning key concepts, and the blends of online and face to face delivery which stood the teams in good stead as they had to move to wholly online.

The teams produced videos, presentations and case studies for each project and presented headlines at the DELT Forum, for which a slide deck is available to Newcastle University staff.

Each project above is linked to a webpage where you can see finished films and case studies – which will grow in number.

If you have ideas for strategic projects, please talk to your Faculty in the first instance. Or you can contact ltds@ncl.ac.uk

Other

Learning analytics resources

29 April, 2021 Sam Leave a comment

The University is currently exploring the use of learning analytics to support students’ learning. To find out more about our approach to analytics and how you can use analytics to enhance the student experience, visit the learning analytics pages on the Digital Learning website.

Here you will be able to find out more about the benefits of using analytics in your programmes, how you can use the analytics tools available to you, and answers to frequently asked questions.

Canvas New Analytics

As part of the learning analytics available to colleagues, Canvas New Analytics is an interactive tool that offers insights into students’ performance and engagement within courses in Canvas. The Canvas New Analytics pages on the Digital Learning website have been updated to include guidance on using New Analytics in your courses, as well as answers to frequently asked questions, and possible scenarios where analytics can be used to support student engagement and performance.

Canvas New Analytics workshop

An Introduction to Canvas New Analytics workshop will take place on 27 May 2021 at 13:00. The workshop is available to all colleagues who would like to know more about using the New Analytics tool within Canvas courses.

The workshop will provide an introduction to the tool, and explore how you can use it to measure student participation and engagement with course materials.

If you would like to know more about learning analytics at the University, please contact ltds@newcastle.ac.uk

Other

Assessment resources on Digital Learning website

14 April, 2021 Rebecca Leave a comment

Resources are available to help staff prepare for the semester 2 assessment period, including:

Exams

Information about setting take home exams using Canvas, including an updated cover sheet for take home exams.
Assessment guidance for students is available, including how to submit an assignment and advice about accepted file types and file size that will help answer student queries. This page can be shared with students as part of assessment instructions.

Assignment set up

Guidance is available on whether to use a Canvas Assignment or a Turnitin Assignment.
It is important that module teams agree which assignment type to use before it is set up in Canvas, and that marking is done in the correct tool. SpeedGrader (link to Canvas Orientation course) must be used for a Canvas Assignment, Turnitin Feedback Studio (link to screencast) must for a Turnitin Assignment.
When an assignment is created, the maximum number of marks available (for example 100) must be entered in the Points field. The points should never be set as zero, as this causes technical issues.

Marking and moderation

Delegated marking can be managed using Sections for a Canvas Assignment to assign submissions to markers. This option is not available for a Turnitin Assignment, but there are work arounds to delegate marking for a Turnitin assignment.
Guidance on using Canvas for moderation of assignments is now available. Note that blind double marking can be managed using a Canvas Assignment, this must be set up before marking is started.
It is possible for Professional Service staff to temporarily switch off anonymous marking for administrative purposes.
It’s now possible to import marks from Canvas into NESS.

Further help

Guidance on avoiding common issues with digital assessment tools
Digital learning guides on all centrally supported technology enhanced learning tools.
If you would like training, webinars on digital assessment tools are available to book. On the same page you’ll also find digests on topics including Marking with Turnitin and Effective Rubrics for digital assessment.
For help with Canvas queries contact Canvas Support by clicking the Help icon at the bottom of the Global Navigation Menu in Canvas.
For help with Turnitin and other technology enhanced learning tools contact IT.ServiceDesk@newcastle.ac.uk.
You can also speak to an LTDS colleague by attending one of our regular online drop in sessions.

Flexible Learning, Other, Video

Sharing video – ReCap or Stream?

22 March, 2021 Nuala Leave a comment

In an earlier post we showed demonstrated how to host videos on ReCap and Stream and then add them to Canvas. But how do they compare?

Let’s take a student perspective what are the differences between these two as a consumer? If you are making notes from video you’ll value things like variable playback speed, the ability to view full screen and the option of viewing or searching the caption/transcript — all of these are easy to find whether video is hosted on Stream or ReCap.

ReCap

ReCap has a handy rewind facility – if you miss something you can go back 10 seconds with one click. It also lets you make private timestamped notes on the video – so you can mark places you want to go back to. If the video is long you can help students find their way around by adding Content items.

Stream

Stream videos can be added to a watchlist, they can be liked and, if you permit it, students can add comments to the videos. These will be visible by anyone with permissions to view the video. Stream helps you find your way around content by converting any timestamps you put in comments or the video description into clickable links.

There are good reasons to turn comments for particular circumstsances – eg are providing feedback, pointing out helpful sections or taking part in peer review.

Permissions

Stream videos are only available to people with @newcastle.ac.uk email addresses, so you’ll need to sign in to view the content above. ReCap videos are normally shared with those on a particular course, but you can make them public as we have done with the first video here.

Announcements, Case Studies, News, Other

What works? Sharing effective practice with online/blended learning

14 December, 2020 Suzanne Leave a comment

A recent DELT Forum was a great impetus for collecting some new examples of what works with online/blended learning here at Newcastle University as the current situation has meant that lots of colleagues have been doing lots of really great stuff to make student learning experiences rich and meaningful.

There are 9 new case studies to explore right now and more to come soon at the case studies site.

A team drawn from LTDS and FMS TEL drew together examples of effective practice in action on three themes:

Supporting and promoting a sense of community for students in online environments.
Providing pathways for students through online modules/programmes to help them structure their studies and learning.
Achieving, promoting and maintaining student engagement with online learning.

The slide deck from this event is available to all Newcastle University staff.

It contains examples from all three Faculties together with supporting resources and pointers to more developed case studies and contact details for colleagues.

If you have something you’d like to share please let us know by emailing ltds@ncl.ac.uk and we will get back to you.

Canvas, Flexible Learning, Other

Guiding students through your Course

2 December, 2020 Nuala Leave a comment

When you are working remotely it is really easy for students to be confused about what needs to be done and what’s important week by week.

Here are 3 simple ideas to help.

1. A module “roadmap”

Here are examples of roadmaps from a number of modules – they show what is happening week by week and help make connections between what is happening.

View examples from Law, NUBS and HaSS PGCert in more detail or read the case study from Ros Beaumont to find out more.

2. Use Canvas modules to set a flow through your course

Use your Canvas modules to direct student’s activity week by week or topic by topic. Every Canvas course has a sample structure that you can adapt to match your teaching pattern. You can hide or lock materials that aren’t yet relevant and even set requirements so that student need to view or complete certain conditions before they can move on.

See our updated information on Canvas modules in the Canvas Orientation course.

3. Suggest timings for activities

Without the normal structure of face to face time on campus it’s harder for many students to structure their time.

HSS8007 indicationg timings on activities

Add a weekly overview to give students an idea of your expectations for how much time to spend on the activities for a given week. This will help them plan their time, and make sure they give their attention to the things that you signpost as being most important.

From overwhelmed to ordered

It will take a bit of time to consider ordering, signposting, and setting a flow in your modules, but this need not be onerous and it’s one way you can help your students feel less overwhelmed in these strange times.