Facilitating active learning in the classroom

In the context of a relatively traditional second year module in for mechanical engineering students, Strength of Materials, changes were made to module delivery to facilitate more active learning. The motivation was a perceived need to improve the level of understanding achieved by the students. Justification for the changes was an assessment of student learning style preferences, which indicate a strong preference for active learning. Results show that changes in how lecture and tutorial activities were managed increased the level of student engagement during classroom sessions. In addition, 'small step' approaches to problem solving proved popular among students. The study also indicates that both students and lecturers need time to become practiced in the new approach, and that benefits of changes to traditional 'talk and chalk' lecturing may take time to become apparent

Students' engagement with technology-enhanced resources in first year non-specialist undergraduate mathematics modules

While students undertaking first-year undergraduate mathematics modules report using technology-enhanced resources (YouTube, Khan Academy, Wolfram Alpha) for their studies, and lecturers invest time and effort into developing such resources using tools such as GeoGebra and Matlab, there has been little research on the factors that encourage students to engage with particular technology-enhanced resources or in what ways students use these resources to support their learning. While a recent OECD report found that an increase in the use of computers in mathematics in schools correlated negatively with students’ performance in mathematics, there are suggestions that the effectiveness of educational technology is not being adequately determined due to the lack of frameworks of evaluation. Additionally, more information regarding the implementation of the resources is required. I worked as part of a team of academics from four higher education institutes in Ireland, who developed a suite of resources, called Technology-enhanced Resources for Mathematics Education (TeRMEd), for first-year non-specialist mathematics modules. My specialist role within the team was to evaluate the resources developed or implemented. The main aim of my research was to explore why, and in what way, first-year students engaged with these resources to support their learning for non-specialist mathematics modules and to determine what factors of the implementation environment impacted on this engagement. This research consisted of five stages: (1) literature review; (2) research design; (3) analysis of the TeRMEd evaluations; (4) development of the TeRMEd classification framework; and (5) supplementary investigations of first-year engineering students’ engagement with Matlab and other technology-enhanced resources. The outcomes of this research will inform mathematics educators on appropriate evaluation of technology-enhanced resources and on how best to implement them to ensure appropriate student engagement. The research will increase our knowledge on how students engage with technology-enhanced resources and will inform practice in the field

‘Bottoms up’: A case study on integrating public engagement within a university culture

This study tracks the integration of public engagement within the systems, structures and culture of a university in Ireland. Public engagement, as an activity of research institutes, is gaining increased attention from policy and funding sources across Europe. However, little has been heard on the processes and practices which bring public engagement to the fore of conversations and activities in such institutions. In this practice case study, we track the evolution of a community of practice of public engagement in an Irish university over three years, through a bottom-up approach taken by a small group of faculty and staff, and organized through collective leadership to maintain momentum over the time period. With the support of key leadership figures, who provided top-down financial and structural support, we trace the narrative of defining public engagement within the university through stakeholder workshops, recording relevant activities with an institution-wide census, updating university public engagement reporting metrics, and establishing an active community of practice. Four key learnings are identified from this collective narrative: (1) the need for patience in attempting to instigate change within an institution; (2) the importance of establishing a shared understanding; (3) the importance of enacting collective leadership as a community; and (4) the necessity of leadership support with grass-roots activity. Reflection on these learnings suggests that the embedding of public engagement in institutions requires both personal and institutional investment

Students' engagement with technology-enhanced resources in first year non-specialist undergraduate mathematics modules

While students undertaking first-year undergraduate mathematics modules report using technology-enhanced resources (YouTube, Khan Academy, Wolfram Alpha) for their studies, and lecturers invest time and effort into developing such resources using tools such as GeoGebra and Matlab, there has been little research on the factors that encourage students to engage with particular technology-enhanced resources or in what ways students use these resources to support their learning. While a recent OECD report found that an increase in the use of computers in mathematics in schools correlated negatively with students’ performance in mathematics, there are suggestions that the effectiveness of educational technology is not being adequately determined due to the lack of frameworks of evaluation. Additionally, more information regarding the implementation of the resources is required. I worked as part of a team of academics from four higher education institutes in Ireland, who developed a suite of resources, called Technology-enhanced Resources for Mathematics Education (TeRMEd), for first-year non-specialist mathematics modules. My specialist role within the team was to evaluate the resources developed or implemented. The main aim of my research was to explore why, and in what way, first-year students engaged with these resources to support their learning for non-specialist mathematics modules and to determine what factors of the implementation environment impacted on this engagement. This research consisted of five stages: (1) literature review; (2) research design; (3) analysis of the TeRMEd evaluations; (4) development of the TeRMEd classification framework; and (5) supplementary investigations of first-year engineering students’ engagement with Matlab and other technology-enhanced resources. The outcomes of this research will inform mathematics educators on appropriate evaluation of technology-enhanced resources and on how best to implement them to ensure appropriate student engagement. The research will increase our knowledge on how students engage with technology-enhanced resources and will inform practice in the field

Evaluations of post-disaster recovery: A review of practice material

This paper reviews evaluations of post-disaster recovery efforts. The focus is on operational material and other ‘grey literature’ from disasters that have occurred in Australia, New Zealand and internationally. We develop a typology that categorises disaster events and includes whether evaluations were undertaken; the methods used; and whether the evaluations focused on the processes or outcomes of the recovery program. The review finds a lack of evaluation of post-disaster recovery. Where evaluations have been conducted, they are mostly process- rather than outcomes-based. There is a need for guidance for post-disaster recovery programs to support evaluation practice to determine the effectiveness, efficiency and appropriateness of post-disaster recovery interventions. There is significant investment in post-disaster recovery programs, with little known of their effectiveness. This review identifies useful case studies and methods to evaluate post-disaster recovery efforts, and informs the development of a national post-disaster evaluation framework

Cascading Conversations Across Professional Development Open Courses and Community in Teaching and Learning in Irish Higher Education: Embedding and Sustaining the National Perspective from Within.

This study is aimed atteaching and learning staff,academic leaders/senior managers, educational/academic developers, and will offer an opportunity to explore together the long-term vision of a valued and informed teaching and learning culture in Irish higher education and the impact of national conversations on professional development in teaching and learning.The momentum in PD offered by the success of the Open Courses, the sudden national move to online/remote teaching and learning in recent months, and the evolving education policy context (in Ireland), have combined to present a unique opportunity to make strategic forward motion regarding teaching and learning enhancement.By the end of this session, delegates will be able to: •Critically discuss the Irish framework of professional development of all who teach in higher education and the national conversations taking place on teaching and learning pre-and-during covid times.•Explore the approach taken to implementing a suite of 20 flexible open-access professional development (PD) Open Courses for national recognition.•Challenge current conversations around professional development, in particular on their ability or inability to empower academics to make a difference to individual practice and collective T&L responsibility.•Reflect on lessons learnt from this work including how this PD initiative can encourage the HE community to consider how top-down initiatives influence informal T&L conversationsand vice vers

Partnering through Open Courses: A National Model for Sustaining Engagement and Community with the PD Framework for all who Teach in Irish Higher Education.

Throughout 2019-20, the National Forum have embraced workingin partnership with higher education institutions and organisations to grow its nationally recognised Open Courses suite of professional development (PD) opportunities for the sector. These have involved forging partnerships in the development of Open Courses with AHEAD and UCD in the large-scale implementation of Universal Design of Learning(UDL), IUA Campus Engage in Community Engagement Learning and initial work taking place with QQI on the Professional Standards Framework.These new partnerships have evolved on the basis of the success of the integration of nationally recognised digital badgesinto the Open Courses platform. This national-level badge ecosystem, in existence since 2017, and developed for all academic and professional staff who have a teaching role,consistsof 15 courses on popular teaching and learning topicsmade availablein three delivery modes: face-to-face/blended; fully online; self-study.Such PD opportunitiesoffer participants adynamic blend of autonomous study and live networking opportunities, with authentic professional instruction that can be appliedimmediately in theirteaching and learning practice.The integrated suite of Open Courses wasdesigned as an entry route to staff engagement with the PD Framework1as well as enhancing PDthrough digital badging. The key to understanding these credentials is not so much the technology or the badging, it is more the PD pathways that national recognition can provide

Conjecturing tasks for undergraduate calculus students

We present a hypothetical learning trajectory for a sequence of tasks designed for a calculus module. The purpose of the tasks was to give undergraduates opportunities to use technology to experiment and make conjectures while developing their understanding of the effects of translations on graphs. We consider data from task-based interviews with two students. The hypothetical learning trajectory for this sequence of tasks is compared with the actual learning trajectory of the students, and we conclude there was some evidence that our learning goals were achieved

Role of example generation in implicit and explicit conjecturing tasks

Conjecturing is crucial to mathematics and an activity in which it is believed mathematics learners of all ages should engage. It has been found that mathematicians productively generate examples when they are formulating conjectures. In this paper we explore whether this is also the case for undergraduate non-specialist mathematics students by means of an instrumental case study. We label conjecturing tasks as either explicit or implicit to distinguish between tasks which explicitly ask students to make a conjecture and those in which conjecturing is evoked implicitly, and we discuss the benefit of Comprehensive Example Generation (by which an example set is generated sequentially and systematically) in the context of such conjecturing tasks. The consequences of using a digital environment for such tasks are also discussed

Conjecturing tasks for undergraduate calculus students

We present a hypothetical learning trajectory for a sequence of tasks designed for a calculus module. The purpose of the tasks was to give undergraduates opportunities to use technology to experiment and make conjectures while developing their understanding of the effects of translations on graphs. We consider data from task-based interviews with two students. The hypothetical learning trajectory for this sequence of tasks is compared with the actual learning trajectory of the students, and we conclude there was some evidence that our learning goals were achieved