Overassessment in higher education: does less mean more?

In spite of recent claims of the need to reduce overassessment in higher education, there is a surprising lack of consensus of what this term really means together with a lack of empirical evidence of the effects of multiple assessments on student learning and achievement.  This study explored the relationship between student achievement and number of assessments, and their potential links to student satisfaction, based on data from modules of the School of Natural Sciences and Psychology, LJMU during 2014/15.  The trends found suggest that there is no relationship between fewer assessments and improved academic performance.  Indeed, there was a slight trend showing the opposite and, further, modules with more assessments recorded higher feedback (module appraisal) marks.  This paper discusses the potential implications of the results in the context of overassessment concerns.  Suggestions are given for practice to clarify the concept and shed light into its potential implications

Block teaching and the three A’s: attendance, attainment and attitudes

This paper examines results from a small study that looked at the relationship between intensive teaching in blocks and its impact on students’ attendance and attainment.  The research also looked at students’ perceptions of block teaching and their engagement with the taught topic, and whether the students felt that block delivery method enabled them to learn more than traditional delivery methods.  The results indicate that students prefer to be taught in the block format and that they feel more engaged.  Students’ attendance when taught in blocks is significantly improved which could contribute to attainment.  Ideas which might help inform embedded practice are listed at the end

Sector reports review: February to August 2016

This paper provides a summary of key reports and papers published by UK HE sector organisations between February and August 2016.  The organisations covered include: Action on Access; Higher Education Academy (HEA); Higher Education Commission; Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE); Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI); Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA); Jisc; Leadership Foundation for Higher Education (LFHE); National Union of Students (NUS); Office for Fair Access (OFFA); Office of the Independent Adjudicator (OIA); Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA); QS Digital Solutions; Scottish Funding Council (SFC); Teach First; The Sutton Trust; UK HE International Unit; University Alliance; Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS); Universities and Colleges Information Systems Association (UCISA) and Which?The themes covered in this paper include: the Teaching Excellence Framework; institutional capability in supporting teaching excellence and innovation; student satisfaction; the student experience; student complaints; university identity; supporting transition; transition to postgraduate studies; equality and diversity; the digital experiences of students; learning analytics; impact of continuous professional development; learning spaces; pedagogic research; resource discovery; teaching and freedom of speech; academic misconduct; employability; post-graduation experiences; studying abroad; internationalisation; transnational education; and alternative providers

Mining institutional data for hidden truths

While a great deal of thought and effort is devoted to developing assessment strategies, policies and processes, there is little evidence that the re-assessment of students who fail at the first attempt receives the same level of scrutiny.  This Viewpoint paper is stimulated by a research project, discussed at the HEIR (Higher Education Institutional Research) Conference (LJMU, September 2016) that explored the success rates of undergraduates who have had Level 4 re-assessments.  One of the purposes of this research was to understand more explicitly how re-assessment policies can contribute to the retention, continuation and success of students, one of the metrics referred to in the higher education White Paper, ‘Success as a Knowledge Economy’

Self-directed learning: a toolkit for practitioners in a changing higher education context

Although self-directed learning (SDL) first emerged as a pedagogic model over forty years ago, recently it has been all but mandated as a fundamental principle of higher education.  This paper examines recent literature from the Quality Assurance Agency and Higher Education Academy, published research and research projects by the author.  These sources inform discussion about implications for teachers of SDL in contemporary practice, with particular reference to changes in the student profile in higher education: where might it be most appropriate, how might it be facilitated, and what cautions might need to be exercised?  The paper concludes with a basic toolkit of principles and ideas for practitioners who may be interested in implementing SDL in their own teaching.The concepts presented in this paper were initially given in presentations delivered at the Liverpool John Moores University 2014 Learning and Teaching Conference (16-17 June), and the Higher Education Academy 10th Annual Conference (2-3 July 2014), Aston University, UK

Book reviews

Books reviewed in this issue:James L. Lang (2016) Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning, San Francisco, CA: Jossey Bass (978-1-111-894449-3 [Hbk], 256pp) Barbara Allan (2016) Emerging Strategies for Supporting Student Learning: A Practical Guide for Librarians and Educators, London: Facet Publishing (ISBN 978-178330-107-2, 240pp) Sandra L. Enos (2015) Service Learning and Social Entrepreneurship: A Pedagogy of Social Change, New York: Palgrave Macmillan (ISBN 978-1-137-55443-7 [Hbk], 96pp) Elizabeth Boling, Richard A. Schwier, Colin M. Gray, Kennon M. Smith and Katy Campbell (Eds.) (2016) Studio Teaching in Higher Education, Abingdon: Routledge (978-1-138-90243-5 [Pbk], 300pp) 

Student expectations: what is university really about?

Students spend 12 to 14 years in school learning in a carefully controlled and structured system.  It appears that many students enter university with unrealistic conceptions of what is expected of them in many aspects of teaching and learning, including assessment. Hence, when they reach university they are faced with the challenge of adjusting to radically different styles of teaching, learning and assessment. It follows that this lack of preparedness is key reason why students drop out or take longer to complete their studies.  To compound the issue, university teachers may not fully appreciate students\u27 expectations and are unable to anticipate and address these in curriculum development and delivery.  Therefore, developing a better understanding of students’ perceptions, expectations and experiences is crucial to being able to deliver programmes of study that support students in the transition from school to university and as they move through their university life.  This paper explores the perceptions of Level 5 and Level 6 students on two LJMU programmes in the Faculty of Education, Health and Community with the overarching aim to investigate key aspects of the student experience relating to induction, support and transition.  By exploring students’ ideas around key areas we hope to be able to better understand what the student expectation is and identify strategies to bridge any gap that exists between staff and student beliefs

TEF plus transformational learning: the key to enhancing student learning and improving the student experience?

Current discussions around the Teaching Excellence Framework provide numerous opportunities and challenges for the HE sector.  An awareness of transformational learning, with its focus on understanding the connection between a student’s overall sense of the world together with personal components, such as knowledge, skills, values and beliefs about one’s own experiences, is especially pertinent in these times of change and scrutiny in the sector.  A focus on excellent teaching with transformational learning at its core can build on the strengths of the university.  A strong network of educators creating innovative pedagogy, for maximum impact, and disseminating their finding provides sound basis to deal with the new challenges of competing as an HE institution nationally and internationally

Personal tutoring: positioning practice in relation to policy

Most academic staff will at some point in their career be asked to take on the role of being a personal tutor for a group of students.  It can be an ill-defined role that lacks focus in terms of what it is trying to achieve.  This paper is a reflection on my own practice as a personal tutor, and views this within the context of the policy drivers and changing nature of higher education.  In particular, it identifies three levels of interaction: the macro, meso and micro.  The macrolevel is informed by the wider national and strategic debates on issues such as retention and transition; the mesolevel’s focus is on staff responsiveness to enact policy; and the microlevel on student well-being and satisfaction.  The paper argues that there are tensions between how personal tutoring is identified and pursued, especially if it is approached with managerialist intentions

The lecture is broken: a manifesto for change

oai:openjournals.ljmu.ac.uk:article/47Let me start by saying that I love lecturing. I take pride in preparing high-quality slides and standing in front of the class imparting my knowledge to a captive audience who seem to appreciate it, on the whole.  But if I’m honest, I’m just not convinced the lecture is fit for purpose.  There is growing evidence that the traditional didactic lecture is past its use-by date.  Students are now sophisticated IT-literate learners who demand a rich, multimedia experience from their studies.  They have grown up on a diet of rich media (YouTube, iTunesU, podcasts, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, Google, etc.) and are fully conversant in finding information quickly to satisfy their needs.  Didactic lectures are often delivered in rooms that serve multiple purposes and fail to address the unique needs and desires of aural, visual and kinaesthetic learners with a single, blunt instrument (often a PowerPoint presentation).  Attendance patterns in lectures exhibit some large variations and if the main tool in our arsenal is the lecture, there may be over 40 per cent of our students who may regularly missing (or avoiding) this mechanism.  This paper highlights some of these problematic areas and propose some radical ideas for a future teaching environment in which the lecture takes a back seat in favour of a ‘didactic mash-up’ of engagement activities and exploitation of the full power of the Internet as a learning tool.  This includes looking at how our IT facilities are used, how staff-student ratios can be better applied, how our future learning spaces should be constructed and how academic staff can guide students through the mass of online learning that is available 24 hours a day via the Internet