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June–Sept 2008

Journal

This edition of the Teaching Fellows Journal has been restored from an archived online edition, hence the simplified form.

Edinburgh Napier University is a registered Scottish charity. Reg. No. SC018373

ISSN 2050-9995 (Online)

Please note - Some links and content within this document may now be out of date.

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EditorialThree months at Napier…

Rowena Pelik, Director of Academic Development

In the previous edition of the Teaching Fellows Journal, Fred Percival reflected on his 25 years at Napier and, for this edition, I have been invited to offer some initial reflections on my first three months here. I cannot do much by way of looking back at Napier but a number of my experiences at Salford parallel those outlined by Fred. I will take the opportunity to say a little about my background, but will mainly focus on the current process of adapting to a new nation and organisation and on looking forward.

Fred’s account of multiple line managers and office moves is very familiar – although I only had four line managers, I did eight office moves over four sites in my 16-plus years at Salford. I joined Salford College of Technology as it was becoming independent of local authority control, after which the University of Salford validated awards. The University didn’t quite work to the CNAA (Council for National Academic Awards) model but it was still an event with the new kids in the home team presenting to a daunting panel of old guard. A few years later, in 1996, the College formally merged with the University of Salford bringing the CNAA tradition of the College into a Chartered ‘old’ university. We, too, went through the process of modularisation and then semesterisation. We had always used a 20-credit base for undergraduate programmes (with half and double modules allowed) although we did shift from 20 to 30 credits as the base for postgraduate taught provision which wasn’t too painful. More recently, in true illogical style, a ‘third semester’ was added.

It might be useful if told you a little about why I chose to come to Napier and my background. My academic background is in cultural history and for many years I taught design history and cultural theory to art and design students in Bath and Exeter before joining Salford. There I rapidly became a subject leader then programme leader before becoming a Head of Department some 15 years ago. With academic restructuring, the School of Art & Design was created from three existing departments and I became its inaugural Head in 1999. My first task was to bring together these three quite distinct and separate departments into a single unified School – and in that there are some parallels with the current creation of Academic Development from three hitherto separate

Contents2 Editorial

4 Eureka!

6 Reports

7 Review corner

9 Web spotlight

Edition Editors

Angela BenziesSenior Teaching Fellow and Senior Lecturer in Academic Practice

Coordinator of the Teaching Fellowship Scheme

Margaret Nairntfj Web Editor and Publications Officer

At time of publication:Academic Development, Bevan Villa,Craighouse Campus, Edinburgh

Current enquiries to:Office of the Vice Principal (Academic)Sighthill Campus, Sighthill Court,Edinburgh EH11 4BN

Email: tfj@napier.ac.uk

http://www.url.napier.ac.uk/tf

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disappointment and dissatisfaction with graduate skills and work-readiness and complaint about the extent to which they need further training upon employment. There is some fear of an over supply of graduates despite the overall relatively low skills and qualification levels compared with so many OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries. Reports in Scotland suggest a more general satisfaction with graduates and a stronger and clearer agenda for skills development for a ‘Smarter Scotland’.

Who pays for HE is also a crucial difference. In England although it’s accepted that the country gains from a better skilled workforce, the individual is seen as benefiting in direct financial ways – thus, faced with the underfunding of HE, students are asked to pay through the ‘variable’ fee. As employers clearly gain from graduates, the current move is to encourage and develop ‘co-funding’ – getting employers to contribute. Scotland, as you will all know, has quite a different approach to the question of ‘who pays?’.

Placing stress on enhancement is a powerfully different approach to quality assurance and one which I am looking forward to being involved with, particularly seeing how enhancement works in practice and continuing to move forward. But the enhancement approach can have its dangers, the chief of which is paying insufficient attention to how academic standards are set, maintained and assured and how the institution knows this. There is no guarantee, simply because it was done well at one point, that it still is. However, the stress on enhancement is one of the things which I find attractive about the system in Scotland. For me there have to be tangible benefits from the processes that surround quality and it is essential to make sure that these are realised. Those benefits may be for our students – in improving the quality of their learning experiences through the quality of our programmes, the staff who teach on them, those who support learning or provide the learning resources that underpin learning. They may be benefits to staff – through a better, more satisfying experience of teaching or by reducing the burden of processes. Or there may be benefits to the institution – producing information that is useful and valuable about academic standards or academic quality, identifying good or innovative practice that we can then exploit more widely and which helps us to learn and to change as an institution.

Therefore, not surprisingly perhaps, I see the Teaching Fellows as one of Napier’s real strengths. The strengths are manifest in several ways: in the individual contributions of Fellows to the development

services. However, at Salford I was aided by the fact that we had our QAA Subject Review just six months later and that helped focus hearts and minds as we worked together towards a common goal.

At the end of my four-year term of office as Head of School I was appointed to a central post in the newly created role of Director of Quality & Standards. Again, there are echoes of my current task as then I had to define and create a role for something new in the form of a small Academic Quality & Standards Unit. However, another four years on I had been at Salford for over 16 years and I needed new challenges. I felt that I was on over-familiar ground. It was time for a change.

Napier seemed an ideal opportunity for me. It built on areas of established strength and experience and also will take me into new areas with new challenges. There is a broadly similar subject mix, a commitment to widening participation and a strong student focus. I was impressed by Napier’s ambition and the way it seeks to manage change. I had long been attracted to the enhancement-led approach to quality and had been trying to move Salford in that direction, so the idea of moving to Scotland appealed strongly too.

These early weeks have flown by. I seem both to have come a long way up a learning curve yet have only scratched the surface in terms of all the people and things I need to know.

The differences between English and Scotland HE has been interesting. There are, of course, the obvious ones such as the four-year honours degree and an enhancement-led approach to external quality assurance. Then there are things which will continue to confuse me for some time such as the different numbering of levels (in England the HE levels are 4 to 8). I have to do some very conscious checking to make sure that I am not about to mis-understand something fundamental in a conversation or in what I am reading. Other differences include things such as the imminent move of ordinary degrees to the same level as honours, and the fairly universal 2+1 model for HNDs. Foundation degrees are a whole different matter. The accelerated honours (2 calendar years) is testing attitudes to the ‘first cycle’ in much of Europe.

There are interesting differences in the ‘skills’ agenda too. The Leitch Report, although apparently UK wide, does not reflect the same picture as the various reports on higher-level skills in Scotland. The government response is notably different. It is interesting that in England there is some sense of

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of student learning, teaching and assessment; in the Fellows as a network and what you represent as a body of expert and innovative teachers committed to the quality and richness of the student experience; and in representing long-standing institutional commitment to supporting, enhancing and celebrating teaching. I am looking forward to the re-launch of the scheme and working with the Teaching Fellows in new ways, using the fund that has been identified to continue to

support the Fellows and to develop further the culture of student-focused, effective learning and teaching at Napier.

Maybe best of all though I remain delighted to be here and am looking forward tremendously to getting to know my new colleagues and the University better and to moving forward with the agenda for Academic Development. •

Eureka! Bullets hit the target for me – to my surprise!

John Cowan, Napier Visiting Professor

I have had three experiences recently in which I pushed myself to think reflectively about various aspects of teaching in higher education – in bullets. This seemed to work very well for me, and so I’d like to share that experience for your consideration. Inevitably what follows is somewhat staccato; for I cannot get the habit of thinking in bullets out of my mind. I conclude with a list of questions. These are currently much in my mind, for the reasons I explain here. I hope you may find it worthwhile to ponder on one or two of them.

Experience one: It all began when I gave a keynote recently at Huddersfield University. I had been asked for ideas to assist them with retention at first-year level. I believe it went well. I was asked back to run a ‘Master Class’. I had never run a Master Class; the only one I had ever seen was given by Yehudi Menuhin on TV. I suspected Huddersfield had something different in mind but they didn’t tell me what!

So I suggested they recruit one person per faculty, seven in all, each to meet with me individually for an hour on day 1 and each having emailed me beforehand with what they wanted to tackle next in their teaching. I thought about these emails on the train, on the way south during the day before the event. This prompted me to note some questions for which I would seek answers.

The seven meetings on day 1 were not what I had predicted. Most began to tell a tale that went beyond their declared topic. They talked around a range of issues. I often interrupted to volunteer informal suggestions taken from my own past experience. Perhaps these were the first airings of mastery, in

this Master Class? I simply offered ideas which had succeeded for me in my past. They, in turn, often interrupted me to learn more about these fragments of my experience. Few of the several issues raised in each meeting were resolved in the hour available to us.

I was left on my own that evening, to gather my thoughts and assemble brief notes containing (hopefully helpful) suggestions. Again all were based upon experiences which had been effective for me. I chose to assemble my constructive ideas in somewhat disjointed bullet point lists.

The suggestions were in two categories. I had assortments of ideas for each person, relating to their particular (and very different) challenges. I felt that in these I offered specific and feasible suggestions – usually more than one. I did not expect them to be of interest to other than the person who had raised the issue. I also had lists of general ideas and tactics which seemed to me to have been emerging from the meetings as pertinent to them all. These, I felt, were our shared wisdom in this Master Class.

The meeting on day 2, like those on day 1, was a surprise to me. Naturally I first circulated the bullets covering my general notes – our shared wisdom. There wasn’t much mood for discussion there – just a few points for clarification. Thus the content which I had expected to make up the bulk of our agenda was speedily disposed of. Possibly these general points had been established in the individual discussions of the first day? Maybe more mastery and wisdom had been osmotically transferred than I had appreciated? The specific suggestions had also all been circulated, and had provoked no questions or comments so far.

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I thought that they would only be of interest and use to the person to whom they were addressed. So I prepared for an early finish and wondered if we could respectably spin out day 2 until lunch time.

Then one of the group politely expressed interest in what had been suggested to the others. He wondered what the person concerned was going to do about them. So we moved on to the first of the individual suggestions. The discussions just exploded. Almost all were keenly interested in most of the very particular ideas for others, and their plans arising therefrom. I became a part of that discussion, often responding to questions or comments in the dialogue. Sometimes the progress of the erratic discussions prompted me to offer more examples from my experience. Clearly all seven were making notes and picking up useful thoughts and ideas. The motivation and enthusiasm were tangible. The agenda we covered was beyond my expectations. The verdict when we had to close at 3 o’clock was very positive. It seemed that everyone had found the cross-disciplinary immersion enormously worthwhile and fruitful.

We had concentrated on individual challenges. The discussions of the second day had thus been rather like a classical action learning set, but with two great differences. Firstly, members of such a set, and their agendas, usually and usefully have a great deal in common. This Master Class group came from diverse disciplines, brought diverse challenges, and diverse experience. Yet they planned to continue to collaborate, constructively, and have done so since the event. Secondly, this group had on its periphery a so-called expert or master, who frequently chipped in with experiences, when these seemed appropriate to the very rambling but intense discussions.

Thoughts: I was left wondering if we in higher education make enough of the potential of truly cross-disciplinary groups, engaging intensely like action learning sets, covering individual aspirations and challenges, and if the discussions in such interactions can be greatly expedited by allowing an expert or master, on the margins, to chip in with experiences which seem relevant to the discussions or issues they contain.

As I have pondered subsequently on this experience, I have read an almost relevant reflection dealing with a critical incident experienced by someone for whom this is their first year of teaching (in another Scottish university). He had as usual been allocated an inappropriate two-hour slot. Carefully he had tried to balance inputs and buzz group and other activity,

to break up this long spell. As a tour de force, he had assembled a collection of interesting, relevant and thought-provoking video clips from YouTube and elsewhere. He had done this before, with only modest success. But he had tried again. Imagine his horror when he discovered that the cable supplied to enable him to project from his laptop was unsuitable. Attempts to obtain the correct cable quickly failed. In desperation, he invited the (relatively small) class to cluster around his laptop and watch the clips. Conversation buzzed. He was bombarded with questions – thoughtful, searching, valuable questions. This part of the session was much more lively, and imbued with more motivation and interest, than anything he had planned and delivered previously.

As I thought on his experience, as on mine, I wondered if we plan too carefully beforehand to cover our intended learning outcomes. I wondered if we disregard the quality and value of dialogue between teachers and learners which can occur in totally informal settings.

Experience 2: My second experience came hard on the heels of the first. After more than fifty years in higher education, I found myself with a second invitation in one year to offer a Master Class. This was to be on educational development, for SEDA. I declined. The time allocated to me was to be 90 minutes and I didn’t see how I could do anything useful in that time. I noted with marginal interest that they proposed to follow my Master Class with a 30-minute presentation from a follow-up speaker. This was to be a ‘new developer’s story’ featuring an educational developer in a university and faculty where I happen to be a consultant.

I didn’t like to be too negative. I thought back to my youth in which I recalled a TV programme presented by John Freeman. It was called Face to Face with…whoever it was. Freeman was seen and lit from behind. Only the guest whom he confronted was illuminated – starkly. He grilled his guests searchingly and remorselessly and it made good television. I suggested to the SEDA team that they might try this format. Perhaps it could be Face to Face with John Cowan. I also suggested that they go for an acerbic questioner, like Lewis Elton. I admire Lewis greatly, but we differ on many aspects of HE. In exploration, I committed myself to paper – a bullet point list on one side of A4 – on the principles and approach I try to follow in bringing about educational development. Already I could imagine Lewis having a field day, grilling me on my assertions.

Out of interest, I sent this list to the follow-up speaker,

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and asked how well my list aligned with his own approach. A rich and very profitable discussion quickly ensued. Apparently our thoughts were fairly well attuned.

Thoughts: Again I was left wondering if we devote enough ‘time out’ to identify, discuss and compare our tactics and rationales for educational development. Might it help such exchanges along to summarise our rationale and tactics in bullet point lists? Certainly many of the issues and thoughts of that short, intense discussion are still much in my mind. Some I shall be following up – to good effect, I hope. But would it make a good replacement for the desired 90-minute Master Class?

I wonder if we (I?) use too many words to convey ideas, and to initiate discussion and collaboration. Maybe that’s something worth exploring, too. I recall my experience of working behind the Iron Curtain, in situations where they provided for consecutive translation. That meant speaking for less than half the time I would take, if I were being understood in English. It meant careful planning of my next sentences, while the previous ones were being translated. My impression was that short, crisp sentences, and time for the audience to digest what had been translated for them, led to better comprehension.

Experience 3: The third incident in my developing story features my discovery that SEDA was advertising me as a 90-minute Master Class at the SEDA Summer School this coming July, despite previously declining! My first reaction was to tell them that it wasn’t on! But then, musing over the thoughts in this brief note, I felt a total hypocrite. I don’t know what a Master Class

should be like. So what gives me the arrogance to ‘know’ that 90 minutes is insufficient time? And why am I disregarding these thoughts about the merits of communicating tersely? So I told SEDA I would take the risk. I already had a plan in mind. I would let those who chose to attend fire questions at me, stemming from challenges in their mind, but expressed as terse questions. I would try to respond succinctly giving a relevant example from my own past experience. And then I would take the next question. It is a risk. I wonder if it will work? I hope so.

Conclusion: These, then, are the questions upon which these experiences and reflections have left me pondering, and which have contributed to the plan for the second Master Class at SEDA in July:

• Do we use too many words to convey ideas, and to initiate discussion and collaboration?

• Do we plan too carefully beforehand to cover our intended learning outcomes?

• Do we disregard the quality of dialogue between teachers and learners which can occur in totally informal settings?

• Do we make enough of the potential of truly cross-disciplinary groups, covering individual aspirations and challenge?

• Can we usefully go beyond traditional bland facilitation of groups, and contribute from the margins with experiences which seem relevant?

They say that any fool can ask questions, which it takes a wise person to answer. Are there any such wise people out there reading this? •

Reports In reports we have updated information on Napier’s staff conference in January and a report from John Cowan, Napier Visiting Professor, on a recent visit to Sweden.

The website for Napier’s staff conference Linking research and teaching to enhance learning, held in January, now contains all the information and resources from the conference proceedings – the keynote presentations, paper and workshop summaries and presentations, as well as posters and a link to the publication launched at the conference, Linking disciplinary research with teaching at Napier University: case studies of practice.

John Cowan, Napier Visiting Professor, describes a recent visit to Sweden as part of a group from Napier

Return Visit to Karlstad University

In late April an assorted group of nine Napier representatives, led by our Principal, headed for Karlstad University in Sweden, on a return visit following a visit from Karlstad representatives to Napier in 2007. Karlstad University is located in a pleasant situation, in attractive buildings and with ample space. As at Napier, construction progresses. Our team enjoyed a wonderful welcome, a feature of which was the assumption that we came from a

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culture in which we suffered from malnutrition! The hospitality, and especially the warmth of the welcome and the frankness of the academic interchange, was exceptional. In the extra-mural part of the programme, the Napier delegation enjoyed visits to the mill which weaves linen for the Nobel celebrations, an art gallery, and a summer house in which we were entertained by a delightful choir.

But we also engaged in the business which brought us together! In the three-day formal part of the visit, we exchanged information about our current priorities, and areas of development. Both universities are relatively young; they have a strong commitment to links with local industry and the provision of employable graduates; and they see considerable potential in links with industry and industrial concerns.

The Napier team was therefore especially impressed by the strong links between Karlstad and local industry clusters, with various types of outcome in mind. We were intrigued, en passant, by the fact that Karlstad University also has an ‘egg’ – in their case, a three-dimensional egg shape almost detached from the supporting and encompassing structure, and offering an intimate space for conferring, plus an external display of visual material to an audience on stepped seating. We concluded, amicably, that their egg is more egg-like, even if ours is larger!

Karlstad University is keen to initiate exchanges uniting three institutions internationally. Napier is interested in this possibility. This (second) exchange was thus focused on the development of initiatives made during the Karlstad representatives’ visit to Napier last year.

From Napier’s point of view, the meeting concluded with tentative commitments to further exploration in a number of areas:

• Professional services; by a nominee from our Principal

• Peer evaluation and review of e_Learning provision: Fred Percival

• Timber research: Sandra Cairncross

• Entrepreneurship: Susan Laing

• Nursing exchanges: Morag Gray

• Creative industries: Sandra Cairncross

• Business School/foreign students’ programmes: Rob Wilkinson

Additionally, and importantly, there will be discussions in the autumn anent possible links with a Finnish institution, thereby strengthening the collaboration to a three-way exchange, which funding provision is more likely to favour. •

Review corner Morag Gray, Associate Dean (Academic Development), Faculty of Health, Life & Social Sciences, and Senior Teaching Fellow, reviews Enhancing learning through formative assessment and feedback by Alastair Irons (2008)

Abingdon, Routledge ISBN 978-0-415-39781-0 158 pages £15.99

Many Taylor & Francis and Routledge books www.tandf.co.uk are now available as eBooks from www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk

This text by Irons (2008) is one of a series published by Routledge (Key Guides for Effective Teaching in Higher Education) which aims to provide very pragmatic teaching tips and guidance that are underpinned by a clear rationale and relevant theory.

The main thrust of this text is to get the reader to reflect on the usefulness of formative assessment and feedback on the student’s learning experience. There is an emphasis on three important aspects making up the lecturer/student relationship: feedback, quality of feedback and timeliness of feedback.

The first chapter, Principles of formative assessment and formative feedback, challenges the reader to consider that the current environment is one in which summative assessment is dominant and that a change in culture is required to both value and embrace the

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principles of formative assessment and feedback. Irons cites evidence that asserts that formative assessment is positive and can make considerable difference to the quality of student learning.

‘Formative assessment is different from summative assessment in what it seeks to achieve. The primary focus of formative assessment (and formative feedback) is to help students understand the level of learning they have achieved and clarify expectations and standards. It is important that formative assessment activities and formative feedback should be aligned to module learning outcomes and where possible indicate where and how they contribute to programme learning outcomes’ (p17).

Irons argues that an issue with formative assessment and feedback is that students often do not appreciate its usefulness to the learning process. He argues that it is incumbent on lecturers to make sure that students are aware of the benefits of, and indeed how to effectively use, formative assessment and feedback. He continues by asserting that formative assessment is a safer way for students to take risks and try out new techniques and ideas in their learning.

Chapter 2, Student learning environment, starts off by exploring students’ motivating factors and drivers generally and specifically in relation to assessment. Irons makes the valid point that as well as feedback being motivating it can also have a de-motivating effect particularly if students perceive it to be unfair, unclear, incomprehensible, irrelevant, late, overly critical, and/or non-constructive. This chapter explores how these de-motivating factors can be avoided as well as fostering the view that we should enter into a dialogue with students about feedback – perhaps part of the role of the Personal Development Tutor?

In the third chapter, Irons focuses on using formative assessment and formative feedback in learning and teaching. He places particular emphasis on both the design of formative activities and the associated workload issues.

‘Implicit in getting students to take responsibility for their learning is the need to develop skill in self-assessment. Formative activities will provide opportunities to practice self-assessment. Embedding self-assessment will help students make more effective use of formative feedback – particularly in appreciating what students need to do to ‘close the gap’ in their understanding’ (p56).

At Napier there are very useful guidelines for both

academic staff and students regarding self-assessment and peer-assessment that can be found in Area 6 of the CIA 2 Briefing Papers available from the Principal’s Office website on the staff internet, then follow the link to ‘Academic Development’, then ‘Assessment Practice & Progress’.

In designing formative activities, Irons asserts that they should be based on three underlying principles: alignment of the activity to the learning outcome(s); encouragement of dialogue between lecturers and students; and the provision of timely and constructive feedback. The remainder of the chapter focuses on a number of methods and techniques for incorporating formative activities and feedback into teaching practices.

Chapter 4 focuses entirely on time-saving and efficient ways of providing formative feedback. Irons provides a number of examples of good practice and some pragmatic teaching tips. He finishes the chapter with examples of ‘not-so-good’ practice in order to underline how best to avoid these.

Chapter 5 focuses on making use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in formative assessment and formative feedback. Irons makes the case for using ICT appropriately, emphasising the need for academic staff to be suitably trained in order to make effective and productive use of the tools available.

Chapter 6 emphasises the benefit of using formative assessment and feedback for academic staff. Irons makes some suggestions of how our own teaching practices can be improved in this way including the use of peer observation and mentoring and its use in reflecting upon personal and professional development.

Chapter 7 contains some very useful case studies that have been provided by a variety of contributors from various higher education institutions. They include: formative feedback as part of studio learning; the incorporation of peer assisted study sessions (PASS) into the core curriculum of a first-year chemistry module; formative assessment with large student numbers using an online electronic feedback tool; formative assessment and feedback in UK Law Schools; formative assessment at the University of Durham; and peer assessment and feedback in a first-year bioscience module.

The last chapter provides a summary and recommendations.

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Overall, this is a really good read – whether you are fairly new to teaching or an experienced academic. For the former, the text will provide you with some very

useful information and teaching tips; for the latter, it will perhaps provide the inspiration to adopt different forms of formative activities and feedback. •

Web spotlight Are you involved in, or would like to become involved in, using video in learning and teaching? Then here’s your chance to find out how.

C&IT Services now has a video streaming service for uploading, streaming and sharing video teaching materials. Details are available from the C&IT website on the staff intranet, then follow the link to ‘Information for Staff’, then ‘Video Streaming Service’.

C&IT Services has also prepared four User Guides to help you convert your files to the correct format (RealProducer 11) and to create links to your uploaded videos. These guides are also available from the C&IT website, as above, then follow the link to ‘Video Streaming Service User Guides’.

Also take a look at the websites below that facilitate video sharing.

• Vimeo at www.vimeo.com

• Teacher Tube at www.teachertube.com

• Viddler at www.viddler.com (allows comments and tags on the video timeline)

Helen Booth and Colin Gray, both Acting Academic Development Advisers Online Learning, EdDev, have run workshops as part of the Academic Development professional development programme 2007-8 and will be happy to provide more details on using video for your learning and teaching. •