In Higher Education Focus Groups and Nominal Group Technique are two well-established methods for obtaining student feedback about their learning experience. These methods are regularly used for the ...enhancement and quality assurance. Based on small-scale research of educational developers' practice in curriculum development, this study presents the use of a combined approach that potentially offers more benefits than the use of Focus Groups alone. It proposes a combined method, 'Nominal Focus Group', which includes the benefits of in-depth discussion of a Focus Group and the prioritising of results of Nominal Group Technique. These benefits include questions for further exploration, initial data analysis and increased ownership of the process by students. In practice, the method gave rise to rich data and actionable outcomes that were used to make informed curriculum enhancements for the programme teams.
Given that universities have significant choices to make about what is retained from our emergency measures, the authors set out to use the record of our biweekly meetings to examine the choices that ...we have made during the pandemic and how we have made them. In this collaborative reflective article from authors from five different institutions in the UK and Australia, we demonstrate that student-centred decision making emerged unanimously as the core value driving our decision making during the pandemic. In our reflections, supported by our diary notes, we explore and document our decision-making processes relating to educational technology through the lens of agile values and principles in the context of crisis leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic. We discuss four prominent drivers for student-centred decision making: a) collecting and rapidly sharing student voice data, b) offering more choice in anticipation of diverse needs, c) giving a high priority to equalising access to technology and d) taking responsibility for students in difficult circumstances. In addition, we discuss five emerging data-driven themes - leadership, operational continuity, student welfare, pedagogy and technology infrastructure - and offer insights into student-driven decision making with examples from our respective institutions. The ultimate aim for our reflection is to establish approaches that we value in higher education leadership that we should sustain and to formulate principles for student-centred agile leadership for university education which can serve us during the pandemic and beyond. Keywords: educational leadership, educational technology, student-centred leadership, COVID-19 pandemic, agile values and principles, higher education
Aim: Learning about professionalism occurs through collaboration, with peer groups being important sources of support for students Sandars J, Homer M, Pell G, Croker T. 2008. Web 2.0 and social ...software: The medical student way of e-learning. Med Teach 14:1-5. Accessed 2008 February 14. This study aimed to discover whether the use of wikis (collaborative websites) could enhance medical students' development of professionalism.
Methods: An online wiki was made available to four problem-based learning (PBL) groups, involving 32 students. Data collection comprised a small-scale student survey and four focus groups eliciting their views about wiki use, triangulated with facilitator interviews and wiki usage statistics.
Results: Several factors affected individual student and group engagement with wikis, such as positive group dynamics. Students shared web links, helping clarify PBL discussions and increase their confidence.
Conclusions: Two main benefits of using wikis for the development of professionalism with medical students were revealed. First, wikis acted as a shared knowledge base for hard-to-find resources on professionalism. Second, it was precisely when students reflected on the difference between interacting in wikis and their online social spaces, or when they considered whether or not to post a resource that their sense of professionalism emerged.
Undergraduate final year research projects are part of many degree programmes and help students enhance a variety of transferable skills. A challenge for supervisors is encouraging students to ...develop as independent learners, while simultaneously providing support and structure for a successful, timely completion. In this project, we trialled a student-centred supervision approach where all supervisory meetings were concluded by producing audio recordings of students summarising the discussion. The recordings were emailed to the students who were instructed to write and return a short reflection to the supervisor. Students found that the audio summaries ensured that they stayed engaged and focused during the meetings. The recordings helped them understand and remember the issues discussed and encouraged them to take ownership of their project. Willingness and ability to reflect, however, were patchy, indicating that students may need more training in the skills of reflection earlier on in their studies.
Recent years have seen a focus on responding to student expectations in higher education. As a result, a number of technology-enhanced learning (TEL) policies have stipulated a requirement for a ...minimum virtual learning environment (VLE) standard to provide a consistent student experience. This paper offers insight into an under-researched area of such a VLE standard policy development using a case study of one university. With reference to the implementation staircase model, this study takes cue from the view that an institutional VLE template can affect lower levels directly, sidestepping the chain in the implementation staircase. The Group's activity whose remit is to design and develop a VLE template, therefore, becomes significant. The study, drawing on activity theory, explores the mediating role of such a Group. Factors of success and sources of tension are analysed to understand the interaction between the individuals and the collective agency of Group members. The paper identifies implications to practice for similar TEL development projects. Success factors identified demonstrated the importance of good project management principles, establishing clear rules and division of labour for TEL development groups. One key finding is that Group members are needed to draw on both different and shared mediating artefacts, supporting the conclusion that the nature of the group's composition and the situated expertise of its members are crucial for project success. The paper's theoretical contribution is an enhanced representation of a TEL policy implementation staircase.
Graphic elicitation, i.e. asking participants to draw, is an interview technique used to focus the interviewee on the given topic or gain extra meaning not covered verbally as part of the interview. ...This study analyses two interview contexts which included visual elicitation. It describes a successful example in which the researcher maintained control over the mode of the planned research task (diagram) as well as another example in which slippage occurred between the mode of the planned research task (drawing) and the resulting artefact (diagram). Through this analysis, strategies for maintaining researcher control over the mode of elicitation are identified, increasing our understanding about the theory and practice of both drawings and diagrams as two different modes of visual elicitation. The paper concludes that the required control does not necessarily comprise an increase in task structure (directing participants as to how to draw). Moreover, the subject and purpose of the task are equally important. Successful researcher control then comprises a careful balance between all the three aspects of purpose, structure and subject.
The use of graphic representations of experience and the social environment in the data collection process is an emerging approach. The terms diagramming, mapping and drawing are often used ...interchangeably, with no common interdisciplinary understanding of what they mean. The lack of a unifying terminology has resulted in simultaneous but separate developments undermining a more coherent approach to this emergent method. By defining what a diagram is and examining where diagramming fits amongst other data collection approaches, this paper proposes the term diagrammatic elicitation to refer to the use of diagrams in the data collection process. Two subcategories of this approach include: (a) participant-led diagrammatic elicitation, where participants create original diagrams and (b) researcher-led diagrammatic elicitation, where the researcher draws the diagram during the data collection process for discussion or participants edit a researcher-prepared diagram. Establishing these terms will allow researchers to share best practice and developments across disciplines. Keywords: Data Collection, Diagram, Drawings, Diagrammatic Elicitation, Concept Maps, Elicitation, Focus Groups, Interviews, Mind Maps, Qualitative Methodology, Tables, Visuals, Visual Methods
Feedback can be an important element of learning, but only if students engage with it. Students are only likely to engage with feedback that they find useful. This study aimed to identify ...characteristics of written feedback perceived by students as effective. We used a mixed‐method approach, integrating quantitative and qualitative data that were collected through the analysis of feedback that was identified by students as good, a student questionnaire, as well as interviews and a focus group exploring students’ views on what good feedback looks like. Although the results show that length and composition of ‘good’ feedback can be extremely variable, some common characteristics could be identified, leading to a set of recommendations for staff marking written assessments. According to students, good feedback should be detailed and specific, and it should tell students how they can improve. Students also find it important that feedback is honest and constructive. In addition, positive reinforcement was identified as important by the focus group, although few examples of good written feedback on the assignment contained any direct praise. Surprisingly, feedforward which might help students in other modules did not feature highly in students’ perceptions of good feedback, possibly indicating a focus by students on improving the current assignment rather than on future assignments.
We all want to do our best when it comes to providing feedback to students. But what does ‘good’ feedback look like? In this study, we explore the characteristics of written feedback that was perceived as good feedback by students. Based on these ‘good feedback’ characteristics and student views, we provide some recommendations on how to give good feedback.
Placements are often an extra‐curricular activity of a science degree. This study reports on the outcomes of a final‐year credit‐bearing 6‐week placement module that was specifically designed to ...develop and enhance students’ employability skills. A key element of this module was that the student placements were not only evaluated from a science perspective, but also evaluated with an emphasis on meaningful reflection and evaluation of employability skills development. Students recorded their levels of confidence in skills before, during and after the placement via an Online Reflective Log, as part of a module’s summative assessment. The results showed that taking part in the placement and conducting their own independent research helped students to make connections between their scientific knowledge, otherwise constrained within the walls of the undergraduate science laboratory, and the wider impact of their research on society. Another theme that emerged concerned career choices and aspirations, and the placement experiences either confirmed prior choices or opened new horizons. The Online Reflective Log helped students to feel supported by their university supervisor who were at a distance. Feedback on their tasks prompted students to reflect on the scientific and personal skills while being engaged in scientific activities during placement. Students agreed that they had further developed their employability skills during the placement and acknowledged that it was challenging to acquire evidence of skill development. However, students appreciated the usefulness of this reflection in relation to their future career development.
Using an Online Reflective Log as summative assessment during a 6‐week, credit‐bearing placement module, students record their perceptions of skills development and planned activities, supported by their university supervisor. Even during a short placement, this structured and reflective approach has shown to help students achieve better awareness of their skills, connecting their scientific understanding to real‐world research and skills development.
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