eLearning lecturer workload: Working smarter or working harder?

Lecturers who move into the online learning environment often discover that the workload involved not only changes, but can be overwhelming as they cope with using digital technologies. Questions arise, given the dissatisfaction of lecturers with lowering morale and increasing workload, whether future expansion of this teaching component in tertiary institutions is sustainable. The challenge facing lecturers now, and in the future, is about learning workload management strategies which effectively manage the workload they encounter in the online learning environment. This paper describes a case study (which is a work-in-progress) examining the perceptions of online workload cf. face-to-face teaching of lecturers who are experienced in e-teaching. As well, it identifies strategies the lecturers have developed or adopted to manage this element of their workload

Using the YARC Secondary with adult Arabic L1 learners of English: an exploration of L2 learners’ reading comprehension and their ability to learn new words

The York Assessment of Reading for Comprehension Secondary Test (YARC) was originally designed by Stothard, Snowling, Clarke, Barmby and Hulme (2010) for secondary school students in the UK between the ages of 11 and 16 (both monolinguals and learners of English as an Additional language). Since tests that were developed for a particular group are not necessarily suitable for other groups, the aim of this research was to find out to what extent the YARC Secondary reading comprehension test could be used to measure reading comprehension among Arabic L1 adult L2 learners of English. As vocabulary knowledge has often been found to be a key predictor of reading, we administered two offline vocabulary tests (measuring depth and size of word knowledge) in addition to the YARC Secondary to 30 native English-speaking and 28 Saudi Arabian learners of English attending university courses in their home country. The findings showed that YARC scores correlated significantly with scores on the vocabulary tests, and that scores on the Single Word Reading Test (SWRT) for adult L1 Arabic learners fell within the range for children in the UK aged 11 years and three months. Evidence of the suitability of the YARC texts was also obtained through an analysis of students’ ability to retain meaning and use (in a sentence) of non-words encountered in the YARC texts. We conclude that the YARC Secondary can be used with some groups of adult L2 learners of English, provided adaptations are made to the reading comprehension texts to ensure the vocabulary levels are appropriate for the target group

Psychosocial outcomes as motivations for urban gardening: A cross-cultural comparison of Swiss and Chilean gardeners

The range of benefits provided by urban greenspaces is reasonably well understood and a broad consensus has been reached that they provide habitats along with social ecosystem services, such as restoration, health and food. Domestic gardens, which are a primary node of contact between city residents and nature, typically represent a significant portion of the urban greenspaces, so the gardeners who manage them play an important role in maintaining the greenspaces within a city. In this way, gardeners voluntarily provide a public service so should be encouraged, but the motivations of individual gardeners have not been sufficiently studied. In this study, we address this research gap by using a 14 item ‘motivations for gardening’ scale to evaluate the motivations for gardening held by gardeners in different cultural contexts. We used questionnaires to collect data in three Swiss cities (Lausanne, Bern and Zürich; N = 409) and one Chilean city (Temuco; N = 167) and analysed the responses at both item and scale levels. Although significant differences between Swiss and Chilean responses were found for all individual scale items, a principal component analysis revealed nearly identical component structures for both the Swiss and Chilean samples. Three clear components were identified; restoration as the motivational component receiving the strongest agreement, followed by socialization, and then food production. Nearly identical component structures were found, with the same scale items loading against the same components, when the sample was divided according to age, gender, education and income. These results suggest that motivations for gardening are not context dependant but rather represent an inherent human condition that frames how gardeners manage and interact with their gardens. Acknowledgement of these human needs: especially regarding the restoration benefits that people gain from these spaces, in public policies related to management and regulation of green urban areas has the potential to contribute to the survival of urban gardens

Studying learning and innovation networks – a conceptual and methodological framework

This paper outlines the main concepts and methodology that the SOLINSA project uses in its study of learning and innovation networks. This project aims to identify barriers to the development of Learning and Innovation Networks for sustainable agriculture (LINSA). In such networks, social learning processes take place, and knowledge about sustainable agriculture is co-produced by connecting between the different frames and social worlds of the stakeholders with the help of boundary objects. Studying such processes at the interface between different knowledge spheres of research, policy and practice requires a specific methodology. A transdisciplinary reflective learning methodology addresses the complex question of understanding learning and innovation. The paper highlights the challenges of this approach that involves stakeholders already in the phase of defining the research objectives and strategies. Results from a first round of application of the conceptual and methodological framework will be presented and discussed

SwITch at Northumbria University

The iBorrow project benefited from the experience of other institutions undertaking a similar journey, albeit with alternative technology and in different contexts. This case study from Northumbria University is an opportunity to compare and contrast the respective problems and solutions encountered in each project. Northumbria University Library has a reputation for delivering innovative, student-focused services positioned at the heart of the student experience. It is renowned for its excellent customer service and is a holder of the Cabinet Office’s Customer Service Excellence award. It has been developing flexible, technology-enhanced learning spaces for a decade enabling students to study in state-of-the-art spaces within a hybrid resources environment

Non-continuous and variable rate processes: Optimisation for energy use

The need to develop new and improved ways of reducing energy use and increasing energy intensity in industrial processes is currently a major issue in New Zealand. Little attention has been given to optimisation of non-continuous processes in the past, due to their complexity, yet they remain an essential and often energy intensive component of many industrial sites. Novel models based on pinch analysis that aid in minimising utility usage have been constructed here through the adaptation of proven continuous techniques. The knowledge has been integrated into a user friendly software package, and allows the optimisation of processes under variable operating rates and batch conditions. An example problem demonstrates the improvements in energy use that can be gained when using these techniques to analyse non-continuous data. A comparison with results achieved using a pseudo-continuous method show that the method described can provide simultaneous reductions in capital and operating costs