The Watching Wall at CPIT Library
I’ve started to write up my notes from my study visit now, so will start to post items relating to the trip which I didn’t mention at the time.
A nice idea from Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology Library is the Watching Wall – a bank of TVs which are tuned to international channels. Surrounded by beanbags and couches they provide a place where students can watch TV programmes from around the world – great for international students to feel they are keeping in touch with home. Students use their own headphones or can borrow them. They can also watch dvds here.
very interesting – i wonder what our students would end up watching most if we had anything like this!? How long have they been doing this for – and did you get any feel for what the students reactions had been?
It could also be a really useful resource for students studying languages or those with a big international dimension. (I lived in Germany for a year before going to university and did find that watching tv helped with my German – started by watching with the small children I was looking after and graduated to watching the news with their parents)
My impression was that a lot of international students were using it to watch news programmes. A few people seem to be interested in this idea, so I will follow it up and see if I can find out more about how it’s being used