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NUTELA Small Grants Fund: Enhancing student learning through innovative scholarship conference, Bristol 2018

Alison Clapp, Lecturer, Faculty of Medical Sciences Graduate School

Thanks to NUTELA funding my travel, and the FMS Graduate School funding my attendance, I spent two days in Bristol University last summer listening to what other universities (and Newcastle too!) are doing to enhance their students’ learning. Overall it emphasised the practicalities with many presentations on enhancing feedback, technology enhanced learning and student wellbeing. Here is a flavour of the conference:

There was much about student mental health which, in my role with older, part-time, distance students, is not something I have paid much attention to. We should be considering this…. the government is going to make it mandatory for undergraduates (‘UK Step-Change Framework’) and we do need to show we are thinking about it for postgraduates including our online students. We are not meant to be qualified counsellors, but we do need to flag up problems and communicate with students about them including suggestions for getting professional help. The keynote speaker, Fabienne Vailes, will be at the Three Rivers Conference in September. Continue reading “NUTELA Small Grants Fund: Enhancing student learning through innovative scholarship conference, Bristol 2018”

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Numbas workshop and new version

We have just released another major version of Numbas, incorporating some exciting new developments which greatly expand Numbas’ capabilities. We’re also looking forward to running a workshop here at Newcastle University next month, ideal for those of you who would like to get started with maths e-assessment!

Introduction to Numbas workshop – 18th June

We are hosting an Introduction to Numbas workshop on 18th June, 10am-12pm, as part of the Learning and Teaching Development Programme.  This hands-on session is ideal for academic or technical staff who would like to create mathematical e-assessments and deploy them through Blackboard.

The session will cover:

·         getting started on the Numbas public database and editor

·         selecting existing questions to make tests

·         writing your own questions

·         using the Numbas tool in Blackboard

You can book on to the workshop via elements.ncl.ac.uk. Or for more information, drop us an e-mail to numbas@ncl.ac.uk

New release of Numbas

Over the past few months, Christian has been working tirelessly towards the release of Numbas v4.0, with a number of brilliant new features.

Full details can be found in this blog post on the Numbas website. They include:

  • a new pattern-matching system allowing, for example, to specify a pattern that a student’s mathematical expression must match in order to be marked correct.
  • more number types, including support for very small and large quantities using scientific notation. Useful for chemists and the like!
  • a new extension for geometrical figures, with particular attention to accessibility.

In addition, questions and exams on the Numbas Editor can now be shared with a permanent link. You can send a link to your students, to have a go at a question or test without any scores being recorded, like this. And items are embeddable, for example in a blog post, just like this one!

That one is from our Transition to University project, a collection of questions and tests written by students, alongside our e-learning unit, to support students making the transition from school to university.

I hope to see some of you at the Numbas workshop in June. Otherwise, if you are interested in finding out more about Numbas please don’t hesitate to drop me an e-mail to christopher.graham@ncl.ac.uk.

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OLAF Service Capacity

Due to the success of the OLAF service and the capacity to support online exams across LTDS, Exams and Awards and NUIT, the service is currently not available to support new online exams for fewer than 30 students during the assessment periods.  New exams for more than 30 students will go onto a waiting list and be considered based on student numbers, with exams with highest numbers of students being prioritised.

Outside the formal exam period there is no capacity for additional in semester assessments, however The OLAF Service will continue to support all online exams that have previously used the service.

Resit exams  cannot be supported through the OLAF service if there are less than 15 students, the OLAF service will not be available for these exams. The exams could still be run through Blackboard, although this would be without the use of the locked down browser or the University invigilators. Staff can utilise self-help resources well in advance of the resit assessment periods if they wish to run the exam online themselves.

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Language Resource Centre

Inside the Language Resource Centre

By Holly Pennal, Language Resources Centre Assistant

The Language Resource Centre is a dedicated centre for language learning available to ALL Newcastle University students and staff. Awarded the Government’s Customer Service Excellence award, the members-only centre (register your smartcard at: ncl.ac.uk/language-resource-centre), is always staffed and has a Language Learning Support Officer on duty Monday to Friday.

  • As well as 110 work stations with 90 PCs, the LRC has bookable spaces including a Meeting Room, a 16-Seater PC cluster with teaching area, and three glass Talk Shops – perfect for group study or to watch films. These can be booked at reception, as well as one-on-one self-study advice appointments with our Language Learning Support Officer if you need some advice on how best to start learning – or improve – your target language. With most of the materials within the centre now being loanable, we also have a feedback box for any suggestions of new resources.Pods in the Language Resource Centre
  • The LRC runs the university IPTV (Internet Protocol TV) site: a world TV and film video streaming service, available for FREE to all Newcastle University students and staff. It hosts a large database of over 3000 foreign & English language films, viewable on demand, and over 20 Satellite TV channels in languages from all over the globe.

Continue reading “Language Resource Centre”

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LILAC award: Terry Charlton

Congratulations to Terry Charlton who won a LILAC  Digital Award for Information Literacy 2019.

Terry won the award for his fantastic work  in the University Library Liaison team developing Newcastle University Library’s Online Learning Resources.

What did the project involve?

The project started with in depth consultation with students. This highlighted a preference for rich media and short,  focused videos that could be viewed on a range of devices when students needed them.

After listening to student views a number of videos were produced to cover information literacy skills areas such as literature reviews, finding information and evaluating information. Attention  was paid to the style of  these videos which included background illustrations and animations. Other team members were the friendly face of the videos, which involved a bit of green screen acting. Take a look at one of the videos below:

The second phase of the project included the development of a new search planner tool which is a step by step approach to planning a literature search. This results in a personalised search strategy and can be shared with others, for example supervisors or the library liaison team.

Project successes

  • Over 9000 views of the videos in the first 6 months
  • 94% of survey respondents rated the videos as ‘very good’ or ‘outstanding’
  • Greater student understanding of information literacy issues
  • Using a flipped classroom approach enabled lectures to focus on areas where students demonstrate less understanding
  • A fivefold increase in visits to dissertation pages
  • The resources are accessible, responsive, device independent and mobile friendly.

Find out more

Terry has recently moved to work in the Learning and Teaching Development Service and if you want to find out more you can contact him at terry.charlton@ncl.ac.uk

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RAISE 2019- The impact of student engagement

RAISE: Researching, Advancing and Inspiring Student Engagement
Dates: 4-5 September 2019
Location: Newcastle University, UK

Delegate registration is open for the Researching, Advancing & Inspiring Student Engagement (RAISE) Conference.

Student participation is particularly welcomed (students pay a very low fee). This year there is a two day format  but this is followed by a Development Day on the 6th with workshops and SIGS at the same venue.

The conference aims to offer a forum and platform showcasing practice and research about, student engagement (SE) and working in partnership. Staff in all roles, all students, and others interested in university and college higher education are welcome.

There are over 100 presentations and keynotes from Cathy Bovill, Brice MacFarlane and Colin Bryson.

There is still capacity for posters (those accepted will benefit from the presenter discount).

For full details of the programme and to register http://www.raise-network.com/events/conference-2019/ 

Note the early bird rate ends on May 30th and the final date for registration is June 30th.

Contact for any queries or proposals for poster submissions (send a 300 word max abstract): raise@ncl.ac.uk

Join the email list to keep up to date on Conference and other RAISE news.

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British Conference of Undergraduate Research: Student blog

Guest Student Blog and picture of Jan

This year 18 Newcastle University students attended the British Conference of Undergraduate Research at the University of South Wales.

Ján Dixon, from the School of Medical Education was one of the 12 students who successfully applied for funding to attend the conference. Ján presented his research to fellow undergraduate students on the day.  Read more from Jan below.

I applied for BCUR19 and was lucky enough to receive a scholarship from Newcastle University to attend. I submitted an abstract to BCUR because of the impact of presenting to such a large and diverse audience. The opportunity to present to an audience outside of the research field allows for an excellent shared learning experience; encouraging the presenter to distil the essence of their work and the audience to explore topics outside of their subject.

Continue reading “British Conference of Undergraduate Research: Student blog”

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Pedagogies of Scholarship and Teaching (PoST) Insights Series Presents CONVERSAZIONE

Image of two people talking

An informal discussion on pedagogy in higher education with              Professor Colin Bryson, Newcastle University, and Professor Sally Brown, Independent Consultant

 This conversazione offers an informal opportunity to hear from two extensively published authors in the field of learning, teaching and assessment in a semi-structured conversation. Each will outline how they got started in writing for publication, including discussion of their rationales for the kinds of publications they have produced, and the impact this has had on their careers and on colleagues around them.

Colin and Sally will make suggestions for those newly embarking in writing and publishing on higher education pedagogy. They will illustrate their perspectives from their publication journeys with anecdotes and stories about mishaps and pitfalls on the way, in ways that will help others avoid their mistakes and move on with their own publications confidently.

1st May @ 1pm in King George VI Building,  Room 1.43B

Sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/conversazione-post-series-event-tickets-60568119877

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Learning and Teaching Conference 2019: Resources

Delegates at the conference

The changing landscape of Higher Education

3 April 2019

Over 250 delegates attended this year’s conference to celebrate learning and teaching here at Newcastle University.

The packed programme included  45 presentations, workshops and lightning talks, as well as keynotes from  Professor Alison Shaw, Vice-President, National Foundation for Educational Research and Founder, North East Futures UTC and Chris Millward, Office for Students.

You can find a full range of resources from the conference below, including ReCap recordings and copies of presentation slides.

Don’t forget to save the date for next year’s conference which will be held on  2 April 2020. You can also sign up for the conference reminder service if you want to find out when the call for submissions and registration opens.

Welcome

Professor Suzanne Cholerton, Pro-Vice-Chancellor Education

ReCap recording

Curtis Group Shot

Continue reading “Learning and Teaching Conference 2019: Resources”

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NUTELA 3Ps: Using Video in your teaching

Are you interested in using video in your teaching?  The latest NUTELA pizza, pop and practice event looked using ReCap outside of the lecture theatre, Microsoft Stream and Box of Broadcasts.

Resources

If you are interested in finding out more  and accessing some of the resources join the NUTELA Team where you can also share ideas with colleagues.

Thanks to Carol Summerside, LTDS, Dr Chris Graham, School of Mathematics, Statistics and Physics, Graeme Redshaw-Boxwell, LTDS and Marc Bennett, NUIT, for delivering the session.

Find out more about NUTELA

Get in touch with the Steering Group if you want to find out more about NUTELA and future events.