Social media: a guide for researchers

This guide has been produced by the International Centre for Guidance Studies, and aims to provide the information needed to make an informed decision about using social media and select from the vast range of tools that are available. One of the most important things that researchers do is to find, use and disseminate information, and social media offers a range of tools which can facilitate this. The guide discusses the use of social media for research and academic purposes and will not be examining the many other uses that social media is put to across society. Social media can change the way in which you undertake research, and can also open up new forms of communication and dissemination. It has the power to enable researchers to engage in a wide range of dissemination in a highly efficient way.Research Information Networ

As academic blogging becomes mainstream, science communication must facilitate depth and breadth in online discourse.

Having recently attended a conference session on the role of online forums for science communication, Alan Cann reflects on the extent to which academic blogging is currently embedded in academic practice. Blogs are still the centre of serious online academic communication but there is still a long way to go until the Republic of Blogs is established and academic blogging moves from being a spare time activity to a mainstream output

USING WEB 2.0 TO CULTIVATE INFORMATION LITERACY VIA CONSTRUCTION OF PERSONAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

The objectives of this project were as follows: To enable students and library users to engage with information literacy in the widest sense and broaden their use of scholarly resources via the use of web 2.0 tools. To investigate whether the participation culture of web 2.0 can be utilised to give students more control over how and when they learn, and so that Library staff can focus on and respond more directly to individual needs. To use the experience gained to develop new skill sets in Library staff and to inform future Library practices in areas of training and interaction with Library users. In order to achieve this, we proposed to embed web 2.0 tools in the MBChB Medical Law and Medical Ethics modules; to run tutorials for Library users to demonstrate the appeal and power of rapidly evolving contemporary social software/web 2.0 tools; to use the experience gained from this project to develop new skill sets in Library staff which will ensure sustainability of the project.

Extended matching sets questions for numeracy assessments

Extended matching sets questions (EMSQs) are a form of multiple choice question (MCQ) consisting of a stem (the question or scenario) followed by an extended number of possible answers (Wilson & Case, 1993). An EMSQ is defined here as a question with ten or more alternative answers. EMSQs have been most frequently applied to medical education (Case and Swanson, 1994; Alcolado and Mir, 2002), but can also play a valuable role in assessment of numeracy

Reflection on-line or off-line: the role of learning technologies in encouraging students to reflect

This paper presents case studies that describe the experiences of the two authors in trying to use learning technologies to facilitate reflective thinking in their students. At the University of Leicester, a Web-based biology tutorial called ‘How Now Mad Cow’, which covers the topics of bovine spongiform encephalopathy and a new variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease (nvCJD). At the University of Southampton, a web-based hyper-mail discussion list to support teaching on a first year psychosocial science module for occupational therapy and physiotherapy students has been established. In both examples, the tutors had attempted to create a learning environment that would engage students in the learning experience and facilitate reflection by helping them to create meaning from the learning experience and see things in a different way. The evaluation data from both case studies provides some evidence that the learning technologies helped to facilitate reflection for some students. However, the evidence for reflection is not overwhelming and the data provides some evidence that four key factors may have influenced how successful the use of learning technologies were in facilitating reflection. These factors are the way the learning technology is used, the nature of the student groups, the role of the tutor and student preferences for ‘off-line reflection’. These are discussed and ways forward are identified

THE EFFICACY OF FEEDBACK IN THE FIRST YEAR PROGRAMME: A COMPARISON OF THE VIEWS OF STUDENTS AND STAFF

Feedback has been defined as "information about the gap between actual performance level and the reference level, which is subsequently used to alter that gap". It is now widely acknowledged that feedback forms an essential part of the learning cycle, allowing students to assess their performance and make improvements to future work. However, despite acceptance of the importance of feedback by academics, results from the recent National Student Survey (2005) have highlighted students' general dissatisfaction with the feedback they receive. The purpose of this study was to examine the efficacy of feedback on the first year of the Biological Sciences degree at the University of Leicester, by comparison of the perceptions of students and staff on a number of aspects of the current feedback process. Although a structured approach to giving feedback is encouraged within the School of Biological Sciences, there will be remaining differences in the way staff and students conceptualise the roles of feedback and its format. The views of students studying on the 1st and 2nd years of the Biological Sciences degree were ascertained using a questionnaire addressing various aspects of feedback including, quantity, timing, use and quality. The response rates to the questionnaire were high for both years and the views of students with a range of academic abilities were represented; statistical analysis showed the data obtained to be reliable. In addition, focus groups were used to further explore the views of 1st year students. Semi-structured discussions were led by non-teaching staff, allowing for an informal environment to encourage full participation from students with a range of academic abilities. Staff views on the feedback process were sought during semi-structured one-on-one interviews, again allowing an informal environment for discussion. The staff cohort comprised the majority of 1st year module course convenors, a group of 1st year personal tutors, representative of most departments within the School of Biological Sciences and staff from the Student Learning Centre

Selective mechanical transfer deposition of Langmuir graphene films for high-performance silver nanowire hybrid electrodes

In this work we present silver nanowire hybrid electrodes, prepared through the addition of small quantities of pristine graphene by mechanical transfer deposition from surface-assembled Langmuir films. This technique is a fast, efficient, and facile method for modifying the opto-electronic performance of AgNW films. We demonstrate that it is possible to use this technique to perform two-step device production by selective patterning of the stamp used, leading to controlled variation in the local sheet resistance across a device. This is particularly attractive for producing extremely low-cost sensors on arbitrarily large scales. Our aim is to address some of the concerns surrounding the use of AgNW films as replacements for indium tin oxide (ITO); namely the use of scarce materials and poor stability of AgNWs against flexural and environmental degradation

Finite-size scaling in silver nanowire films: design considerations for practical devices

We report the first application of finite-size scaling theory to nanostructured percolating networks, using silver nanowire (AgNW) films as a model system for experiment and simulation. AgNWs have been shown to be a prime candidate for replacing Indium Tin Oxide (ITO) in applications such as capacitive touch sensing. While their performance as large area films is well-studied, the production of working devices involves patterning of the films to produce isolated electrode structures, which exhibit finite-size scaling when these features are sufficiently small. We demonstrate a generalised method for understanding this behaviour in practical rod percolation systems, such as AgNW films, and study the effect of systematic variation of the length distribution of the percolating material. We derive a design rule for the minimum viable feature size in a device pattern, relating it to parameters which can be derived from a transmittance-sheet resistance data series for the material in question. This understanding has direct implications for the industrial adoption of silver nanowire electrodes in applications where small features are required including single-layer capacitive touch sensors, LCD and OLED display panels

Carbon nanofoam supercapacitor electrodes with enhanced performance using a water-transfer process

Carbon nanofoam (CNF) is a highly porous,amorphous carbon nanomaterial that can be produced through the interaction of a high-fluence laser and a carbon-based target material. The morphology and electrical properties of CNF make it an ideal candidate for super-capacitor applications. In this paper, we prepare and characterize CNF supercapacitor electrodes through two different processes, namely, a direct process and a water-transfer process. We elucidate the influence of the production process on the microstructural properties of the CNF, as well as the final electrochemical performance. We show that a change in morphology due to capillary forces doubles the specific capacitance of the wet-transferred CNF electrodes