providing learners with an extended set of free tools - mystudybar

New College NottinghamNew College Nottingham

ALS and My Study BarALS and My Study Bar

New College Nottingham is a large City College with a number of diverse sites spread across the city.

Each separate campus has students with differing levels of learning difficulties and needs.

These students (and some staff) are supported by a large team of ALS specialists.

Students are supported in one to one sessions. They may also be supported in the classroom.

• My Study Bar provides a 24/7solution for staff and students.• It is open source and therefore free.• It can be used on any PC anywhere in College and at home or in the workplace.• It has 16 useful programmes

“We never anticipated the demand would be as much as it is. I initially thought that it would be of use for my ALS team, but the demand from across the College just keeps on rising as it is so easy to use and reliable”

“One of the consequences of using it is that ALS staff need to spend less time explaining how to use it. Another consequence is that we've had fewer requests for specialist software, which can be expensive. So, overall, the impact has been to make our budget stretch further.”

Michelle Iannantuono, Head of Foundation and Supported Learning New College Nottingham

Deployment for staff and students

USB Memory stick is themost versatile way of deploying

My Study Bar

We supplied all our ALS staff with a number of memory sticks each with the software preloaded. (over 1000 memory sticks)

Promotion and Availability

• We worked closely with College Learning Centres to promote My Study Bar with displays and through Learning Centre curriculum liaison

• We highlighted My Study Bar throughout our College Technology Day

• We made My Study Bar available in every Learning Centre for Students and Staff to install on their own memory sticks

“There was lots of discussion and sharing of ideas across different curriculum areas. One of the most important things to come out was that it was seen as a tool for all learners not just the ones supported by the ALS team.” Maria Nicholas, Head of Learning Centres and ICT

Training

We tried a variety of approaches – what worked best?

We let people explore for themselves using the clips from JISC

ALS put together a programme of training across College

Conclusion – Clarena Renfrew Vermont USA

http://technologicalconundrum.blogspot.com/2011/01/my-study-bar-is-just-what-teacher.html

Further Resources

This presentation was part of the RSC East Midlands e-fair 2011“Becoming an agile learning provider” for more information and to see all the resources go to http://moodle.rsc-em.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=227