Learning outcomes and their assessment: putting Open University pedagogical practice under the microscope

The Open University (OU) is the United Kingdom's only university devoted to distance learning. It is also the UK's largest university with over 200,000 students overall. Around 150,000 students are studying undergraduate level courses. Over the last decade major policy changes have impacted on UK higher education. Following the recommendations of the National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education (Dearing Report, 1997) and the establishment of the Quality Assurance Agency, all UK universities have been required to define learning outcomes for their programmes and link learning outcomes to teaching and assessment. This major pedagogic shift led the OU to establish the Learning Outcomes and their Assessment (LOTA) project to re-examine the ways its courses are planned, designed, delivered and assessed, and to initiate necessary institution-wide changes. Explicitly linking outcomes, assessment and teaching, actively using assessment for learning, and supporting academic staff development are key elements in enhancing student learning

Taking ownership: The story of a successful partnership for change in a Pacific Island science teacher education setting.

This paper explores an example of a partnership approach that appears to be producing sustainable change in a Pacific Islands education setting. The people involved report on the way science education staff from the Solomon Islands School of Education (SOE) and staff from the Faculty of Education University of Waikato (UOW), New Zealand worked together on the redevelopment of undergraduate science education courses for the SOE. Together we sought to identify significant factors supporting the process. The development required significant change and posed a number of challenges yet resulted in local staff producing high quality materials and programmes and taking ownership of ongoing development. More importantly, there was significant personal professional learning in both science education and initial teacher education for local Solomon Islands staff. Factors contributing to the success of the partnership are explored through the perceptions of the participants and include the quality of relationship, mutual respect, emphasis on conceptual agreement when working together, and the involvement of local staff in decision-making

eCPD Programme - Enhanced Learning.

This collection of papers (edited by Kevin Donovan) has been produced by the Association for Learning Technology (ALT) for LSIS. They are based on the summaries used by presenters during workshops at the 2009 launch of the eCPD Programme

Effective Organizational Practices for Middle and High School Grades

At the request of the Accountability Review Council, Research for Action identified effective organizational practices used by better performing schools serving substantial numbers of low income middle and high school students in the School District of Philadelphia. These practices are organized into three spheres: Conditions for Teaching, Student-Centered School Community, and Instructional Program. For each sphere, the report offers broad strategies and specific practices to enact the strategies. Nuanced school case studies show how the practices can work synergistically and coherently in schools to help students succeed

A Model of an E-Learning Web Site for Teaching and Evaluating Online

This research is endeavoring to design an e-learning web site on the internet having the course name as "Object Oriented Programming" (OOP) for the students of level four at Computer Science Department (CSD). This course is to be taught online (through web) and then a programme is to be designed to evaluate students performance electronically while introducing a comparison between online teaching , e-evaluation and traditional methods of evaluation. The research seeks to lay out a futuristic perception that how the future online teaching and e-electronic evaluation should be the matter which highlights the importance of this research

Academic staff development in the area of technology enhanced learning in the UK HEIs

This paper reports on a study on staff development in the area of technology enhanced learning in UK Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) that took place in November 2011. Data for this study were gathered via an online survey emailed to the Heads of e-Learning Forum (HeLF) which is a network comprised of one senior member of staff per UK institution leading the enhancement of learning and teaching through the use of technology. Prior to the survey, desk-based research on some universities’ publicly available websites gathered similar information about staff development in the area of technology enhanced learning. The online survey received 27 responses, approaching a quarter of all UK HEIs subscribed to the Heads of e-Learning forum list (118 is the total number). Both pre-1992 (16 in number) and post-1992 Universities (11 in number) were represented in the survey and findings indicate the way this sample UK HEIs are approaching staff development in the area of TEL. The survey’s main research question was ‘what provision do UK HEIs make for academic staff development in the area of technology enhanced learning’. Twelve questions, both closed and open-ended, were devised in order to gather enough information about how staff development needs in the area of technology enhanced learning are addressed by different UK institutions. Following the justification of the adopted research methodology, the findings from the online survey are analyzed and discussed and conclusions are drawn

Developing whole-school assessment

"Getting assessment systems right in schools is not an easy task. We think there are five main challenges to meet, summarised here [in this document]. The later section on auditing practice includes questions to test the state of play in your school regarding each of them." - Page 3