Assessment and University problems with Coronavirus!

Sally Brown and Kay Sambell have designed a document describing possible ways of dealing with the current situation. I think it’s really useful, and may pave the way towards permanent changes in the balance of assessment formats we use in higher education.
You can get to Sally’s web post containing a link to download the document directly from this link: https://sally-brown.net/2020/03/13/assessment-alternatives-at-a-time-of-university-closures/

Visit to Cadiz

This week Sally and I are celebrating our roles as Visiting Professors at Edge Hill University by supporting the amazing NTF, John Bostock, at the Evaltrends 2020conference  in Spain.  The photos show Sally and John in action, and participants working.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s lovely to see friends and colleagues from Spain and Australia here, including Victor Lopez Pastor, Jan McArthur and David Boud, and to make lots of new connections too!
Sally and I are now in Seville for a short holiday, and the sun is still shining!

A draft table: assessment, feedback and contract cheating in perspective

I’ve been working on a draft table for Denise Chalmers and Lynne Hunt’s forthcoming new edition of  University Teaching in Focus coming out later in the year, in a chapter which Sally and I are writing. I’m attaching a draft version of the chapter to this post, and will really welcome feedback on it – particularly what’s missing in the list of assessment types, and anything else you can add. Please email me at phil@phil-race.co.uk  Next, I’ll need to decide which CD to listen to (they’re all on iPods of course as well). Table-w.docx (1458 downloads)

Catalysing learning?

Will this be the title of my next book, now that the Toolkit (see posts a few below) is completed? Or will it be a discussion on the web?

Catalysts tend to be expensive, and precious. That’s why catalytic converters often get nicked from cars. One definition of a catalyst is along the lines of ‘something that accelerates a process, remaining more or less unchanged by the process’. Straightaway, however, this doesn’t quite apply to learning, as everyone who is intimately involved in making learning happen does not remain unchanged (hopefully). But whatever we do to help learning to take place, we could regard ourselves as catalysts to the process – making it faster (that’s kinetics), more complete (that’s about the position of equilibrium), less arduous (possibly by reducing the activation energy needed to get the learning under way), more fun, the extensions to the metaphor are endless.

The main thing in my mind at the moment is that not just teachers, but everyone who helps learning to happen can think of themselves as catalysts to the process. And like catalysts, our role is intimately involved in the process, not just as bystanders or observers. We can even hope to help initiate a chain reaction, where after we’re not needed in the process, and learners carry on under their own steam. Also, like catalysts, we can play our part over and over again with different learners. Also like catalysts, we can succumb to being ‘poisoned’ and having our effectiveness and efficiency impaired.

It’s not just kinetics of course – nothing is. Thermodynamics are necessarily involved. We can think of learners’ motivation states involving wanting to learn and needing to learn, for example. We can play our part in increasing both of these motivation states, as well as causing pathways whereby the motivation can be harnessed by learners and result in successful learning (and confidence and self-esteem).

Now this is just a start in my thinking linking catalysis, kinetics and thermodynamics to helping learning to be successful. I’m hoping lots of readers might wish to chip in with all sorts of related ideas, and that’s why I’ve posted this today and tweeted a link. Please do email me at phil@phil-race.co.uk with thought and reactions, or tweet to @RacePhil.

In at the deep end: video and booklet

Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh have produced a short video of me giving some reassuring and practical advice for those new (or old!) to teaching in higher education, accompanying their new production of ‘In at the deep end’ which you can download as a booklet from their website.  https://lta.hw.ac.uk/resources/#in-at-the-deep-end 
Also downloadable from their site are some leaflets in a series called ‘Watt Works’, about various aspects of learning, assessment, feedback and related things, mostly written by Sally Brown, Kay Sambell and me. Thanks to Martha Caddell of Heriot Watt, for organising the creation, production  and circulation of these open-access resources.

Just in: link to the ‘Box Set’ of videos of Sally and I at Heriot Watt:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmhOCPbOa9jVMDVKufGLuGw

More to come! Do give us feedback on these please.
Enjoy – and Happy Christmas all.

Guest appearance at Southampton Solent University

This week, Sally is working at Southampton Solent for 3 days, and I was allowed a guest input to her workshop on Assessment and Feedback. After that, Paul Maple led and recorded some short video interviews with each of us, and took this photo of us with Karen Arm of Southampton Solent.
Entering into the festive spirit, afterwards Sally  took a photo of me posing at Santa in the joyous Christmas market at Southampton.

14th-15th November: at SEDA Conference in Leeds

Great conference, see Tweets at #sedaconf. Particularly enjoyed Mark Glynn’s keynote, David Killick’s workshop, and Michelle Morgan’s keynote. The slides for my workshop on 14th November are here: SEDA-ws-2019-w.pptx (1205 downloads) . Great emergent outcomes post-its, downloadable from this link: Emergent-learning-outcomes-from-workshop-w.docx (943 downloads)
Here are my keynote slides from 15th November, SEDA-keynote-2019-w.pptx (1163 downloads) with a couple of pictures added. Your postcard replies to ‘one thing I’m going to do, as a direct result of being at this conference…’ are transcribed below as a download: SEDA-keynote-postcard-data-w.docx (894 downloads)
What an exciting list.

 

 

 

 

5th edition of ‘The Lecturer’s Toolkit’ out now!

Happy October to you.
I’m pleased to say that the 5th edition of the Toolkit is now available – well done everyone at Routledge who have helped get this done ahead of schedule.
They’ve also done a flyer for the book, with 20% discount for anyone ordering a copy online, using the code at the bottom of page 1 of the flyer, which you can download here: The-Lecturers-Toolkit-Flyer-1.pdf (2417 downloads)

I’m enjoying my retirement now – but am still popping up occasionally for ‘specials’, for example at Plymouth College of Art (related resources are here: plymouth-college-of-art-w.pptx (888 downloads) UKPSF-grid-latest-March-2019.docx (730 downloads) UKPSF-recognition-slides-w5-July-2019-1.pptx (589 downloads) and Heriot Watt University this month Heriot-Watt-Keynote-on-bringing-your-teaching-to-life-f.pptx (859 downloads) , and at the SEDA Conference in Leeds next month, and on the #LTHEchat tweetchat on some Wednesday nights at 800-9.00 pm.