1 / 15

eLearning: Why Bother?

eLearning: Why Bother?. Dr Max Jones (University of Manchester) max.jones@manchester.ac.uk. Challenges. How to improve teaching and learning in large humanities courses with reduced contact hours? How to make seminars more effective? How to support Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs)?.

isleen
Download Presentation

eLearning: Why Bother?

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. eLearning:Why Bother? Dr Max Jones (University of Manchester) max.jones@manchester.ac.uk

  2. Challenges • How to improve teaching and learning in large humanities courses with reduced contact hours? • How to make seminars more effective? • How to support Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs)?

  3. Blackboard – Strengths • Course Outline Easily Accessible. • Improve Access to Secondary Sources. • Harness Online Resources. Some online resources may only be used on secure Virtual Learning Environments (VLE). • Direct Seminar Preparation of Students. • Provide Framework for GTAs.

  4. Blackboard - Weaknesses • Substantial initial investment of time. • Reliance on technology beyond lecturer’s control. • Perception that new technology is intended to replace contact with staff. • Humanities students become overly reliant on online resources, and don’t learn how to use library. • BB login very slow at Manchester….

  5. Project Revamp Level 2 Modern British History course – c.120-students. 1 lecture + 1 seminar per week. Students must complete a “Seminar Worksheet” before each seminar

  6. Seminar Worksheet Single A4 Sheet with 4-6 questions. The questions direct students’ engagement with assigned primary and secondary sources. Students email a copy of worksheet to GTA before each weekly seminar.

  7. Seminar 6. The People’s War?: 1939-45. • How does Rose explain the particular anxieties provoked by “good-time girls” in wartime Britain? • Why does Rose believe inter-racial sex provoked particular tensions? • Choose one example from the article, which you could use in an essay to illustrate Rose’s argument. • How could you use Fires Were Started to support or challenge Rose’s argument? • How is the period 1914-39 presented in the Labour Party manifesto? • How does the manifesto describe the Labour party’s attitude towards “freedom”?

  8. Questionnaire Results ‘The material available on-line significantly enhanced my learning’ Mean score of 1.81 Highest score of 140 UG course units with over 30 students in 2007-08

  9. Online Survey 1 ‘I learned more in my weekly seminar, if I had completed a Seminar Worksheet’, • 38 ‘Agree’ • 7 ‘Mostly Agree’ • 6 ‘Neither Agree nor Disagree’ • 3 ‘Mostly Disagree’ • 5 ‘Disagree’

  10. Online Survey 2 ‘The Seminar Worksheets helped me engage with and analyse primary sources (films, speeches etc.)’ • 39 ‘Agree’ • 16 ‘Mostly Agree’ • 4 ‘Neither Agree nor Disagree’

  11. Focus Group 1 Student1: There were lots of links from [BB] to like all the primary stuff was really, really good because it just made it a lot easier I mean because you could link directly to lots of the primary resources and lots of the primary articles and all the stuff, and there weren’t any books on like the bibliographies and reading lists that weren’t available. I mean I’ve had a couple of courses where they say “read this, read that” and you can’t find it anywhere like Student 2: yeah like there’s one copy of it to go around, what 50-60 people…. Student 1: it was definitely the most student friendly course.

  12. Focus Group 2 E-Learning A Strategy to reduce Contact-Hours? • Student 1: if anything I think it makes, on this course it made your contact time more valuable because you’ve really sort of, you don’t have to ask a lot of basic questions because it was all there for you.

  13. Focus Group 3 • Facilitator: did you prepare more for your seminars because of them [the ‘Seminar Worksheets’]? • Student 1, 2 and 3: yeah

  14. Focus Group 4 Facilitator: what sort of things did you prepare? How did you prepare differently because of them? Student 2: for modules in the past when you’ve not had any sort of framework you don’t really know where to start, and what direction to take. But when you’ve got questions, like “examine this article or explain this, that and the other” it gives you a more focused approach to how you’re working and narrows it down a bit on what you need to know. Student 1: … I think it gives you extra confidence because you kind of don’t come away from an article thinking “god I don’t know what that was about” and you know what you’re looking for so you tend to find it easier to find it…. I think I’ve definitely, because of all the resources were so available, I just definitely read everything properly, I mean with like all the questions and worksheets I haven’t skim read any the articles you’re meant to read, you can’t get away with it, so you don’t do it, it , so it was quite good.

  15. Focus Group 5 Facilitator: so how would you feel about them if they were introduced to other courses you’re taking? Student 2: what the worksheets? Facilitator: yeah, would that be a positive thing? Student 2: yeah Student 3: yeah I think they would be a good idea certainly. Student 1: I think it’s cos most other seminars were kind of read this, and there’s… you’re not given a framework to why you’ve got to read it and it is useful to go into a seminar and already have your ideas down like what you’ve got from the source, where as you get and someone asks you this and you have to think about it for ages. It means that you’re writing, I really like them

More Related