DRAFT Technology Enhanced
Learning Implementation Plan
This policy is also available in PDF format
Introduction
This implementation plan details the actions that the university intends to take to achieve the aspirations of the Policy for the Development of E-learning 2007 – 2010 (ELP)*, created as a supporting policy to the university’s Learning Teaching and Assessment Strategy 2007 – 2010, and should be read in conjunction with it. This plan is therefore written with regard to the four main aims of the ELP, viz:
- To develop effective methods by which the use of technology can be embedded into the curriculum.
- To support and empower academic colleagues to take advantage of technology to stimulate and enhance the effectiveness of their teaching and to recognise the contribution technology can make to successful learning outcomes.
- To ensure that the technical and organisational infrastructure supports staff and students in their use of e-learning technologies.
- To ensure that e-learning is integrated into strategic planning processes at all levels of decision-making in the university.
Whilst all four of these aims are of equal importance and value, any implementation plan must prioritise the actions to be taken with regard to evolving technical and educational environments and the feasibility, financial and otherwise, of planned action. This plan therefore addresses all four of these aims, but there will be particular emphasis on those aims that are felt to need more detailed action plans than those in the ELP.
Please note: As the phrase “e-learning” is increasingly being replaced by “technology enhanced learning” in the literature, and amongst practitioners, the title of this implementation plan reflects that change.
Overall direction
It is always undesirable to try to legislate on the use of technology to enhance learning, as learning is such an individual, diverse and dynamic process. The university also supports a varied range of subjects, professional disciplines and modes of study, and that variety is a real strength. The overall direction of this implementation plan is therefore to optimise the use of technology to enhance learning processes for all our students, whilst at least maintaining, or preferably increasing, the variety of approaches. It is also important to stress that assessment and feedback are key elements in effective learning processes, and this plan applies to the use of technology to enhance all forms of assessment and feedback.
This implementation plan also takes account of HEFCE’s revised approach to its e-learning strategy (HEFCE 2009, p2), which recognises that “…technology has a fundamental part to play in higher education, but that institutional contexts and strategies are key”. This implementation plan focuses upon the three benefits stressed by HEFCE, viz.
- efficiency
- enhancement, and
- transformation.
The university has a significant number of students studying for entry into professions such as law, health practice, social care, planning, architecture, environmental studies and so on. The ability of emerging technologies to support the creation of realistic and effective simulations of real life experiences as aids to their learning, and as effective means of assessment, is a particular focus of this strategy. Colleagues are beginning to develop simulated experiences for their students, using a range of technologies from traditional static web pages, through communication and social networking technologies and on to the use of 3D environments and virtual worlds.
Aims and actions
Aim 1: To develop effective methods by which the use of technology can be embedded into the curriculum.
The action on faculties and schools to provide their own, more detailed, policy statements, rationales and processes is clearly articulated in the ELP, as is the requirement to produce appropriate guidance for students on the use of technology to enhance learning (TEL). As the nature of the subjects taught differs so widely across the university, and therefore the approaches to teaching and learning, it is neither feasible nor desirable to write detailed policy and process at university level. However, the ability to create effective processes does rely, in part, on the access to reliable information regarding the current and potential uses of technology to enhance learning in particular fields. At the moment that information is patchy, anecdotal and collected on a somewhat ad hoc basis.
The university was part of the HEA Benchmarking initiative in 2005/06, but due to the changes in structure being planned at that time, did not take part in the institutional e-learning audit carried out by many other universities. As a result we have an information gap regarding:
- current and potential use of technology to enhance teaching and learning,
- staff needs for development and training and
- the adequacy of our technical infrastructures to support current and future development of technology enhanced teaching and learning.
Some faculties and schools have attempted to carry out information gathering activities, but the results of these are not comparable across the university due to the different techniques of data gathering. There is therefore a need for a university-wide technology enhanced learning audit that can provide an overview of staff development and infrastructure needs as a base line, and can also be drilled into by faculties for more specific information regarding specific subjects.
Action 1
The E-learning Development Unit will carry out a university-wide audit covering the three bullet points above between March – June 2009. The audit will be carried out using questionnaire and focus group methodologies. The analysed results of the audit will be available for publication at the start of the September 2009 academic year.
Action 2
Aim 1 of the ELP also states that the university will recognise and reward innovation in, and effective dissemination of, the use of e-learning technologies. To this end it is proposed to the University’s senior management that a technology enhanced learning fund should be created to which colleagues can bid for support, beginning September 2009. Bids will be invited annually, and successful bidders will take part in dissemination events in successive years.
Aim 2: To support and empower colleagues to take advantage of technology to stimulate and enhance the effectiveness of teaching and learning, and to recognise the contribution technology can make to successful learning outcomes.
The ELP has 5 specific actions under this aim that relate to workload assessment, investment in staff development, self-development, support from the ELDU and support for research and development activities. The overriding emphasis of this aim is on staff development and support and this is therefore one of the major drivers of this strategy.
Staff development activities occur in a number of locations, from specific departments or schools through to centrally provided training and support. The provision is available in both planned and responsive modes, and covers both generic and targeted subject areas. Colleagues therefore have access to the type of training that best suits their needs. But, access to training is only one aspect of effective staff development. Colleagues need time and support to attend necessary training and development sessions, and to put new approaches to teaching and learning into practice. Also, providing effective training and development schedules requires an understanding of the needs across the university and this is currently lacking, as referred to in Aim 1 above.
Action 3
The results of the institutional TEL audit will be analysed to identify the training and development needs, particularly in relation to emerging technologies such as social networking and virtual worlds.
Action 4
The ELDU and the Learning and Development Centre will develop a training programme that responds to the needs identified in the TEL audit and will begin to deliver that programme in September 2009.
Aim 3: To ensure that the technical and organisational infrastructures support staff and students in their use of e-learning technologies.
Increasing use of existing technologies and the demands placed on our network and hardware systems by emerging technologies require us to keep the network and hardware capable of delivering the functionality needed to support teaching and learning effectively. This is a significant challenge, both technically and financially.
Our current network system has some problems in coping with the types of media that are now being used to support learning, e.g. synchronous live classrooms, and a proportion of the hardware being used across the university is below the specification needed to run virtual worlds, for example. The situation is further complicated by the university having both thick and thin client networks. Thin client is used by both administrative and teaching colleagues, and this, in its current configuration, cannot deliver the necessary functionality for interactive content creation, nor the graphics capability needed to run emerging technologies effectively.
Action 5
To carry out a review of the current capabilities of our internal networks and hardware provision, and compare that review with the needs that emerge from the TEL audit.
Action 6
To produce and action a 3-5 year network and hardware development plan that places learning and teaching needs at its heart. This plan to be finalised by November 2009 and to inform the financial planning round for 2009/2010.
Aim 4: To ensure that e-learning is integrated into strategic planning processes at all levels of decision-making in the university.
At present technology enhanced learning as a wider issue lacks a focus in the university’s committee and communication systems, and is discussed in a number of disparate locations, e.g.
- LTAC has an overview of all matters relating to teaching, learning and assessment which, of course, includes technology enhanced learning.
- As the university’s VLE, Blackboard currently has a two-committee hierarchy of users and managers that respond to each other, and then on to LTAC if specific issues arise.
- ISCG considers technical issues that may impinge on teaching and learning.
But there is no focus for joining up all these various discussions and opening them for wider participation. Students and colleagues use a wide range of technologies to support their teaching and learning including Wimba, Sharepoint, Pointe Cast, external blogs and wikis, video repositories and so on, and the MyUWE portal also has potential for uses that relate to teaching and learning. The use of Blackboard has developed well past the point of being a project, to become an embedded process that the university develops and supports, alongside a range of other enabling technologies. The focus on Blackboard as “the” e-learning technology is no longer appropriate.
Action 7
To restructure the current Blackboard Management and User Groups into one technology enhanced learning group with staff and student representative membership from faculties, and the facility for interested staff and students to attend on an ad hoc basis. Consideration will also be given to subsuming the current MyUWE Management Group into the TEL group. The remit of this group will cover all technologies that are used to enhance teaching and learning. There will be a number of small operational groups that are concerned with the physical, day to day running of these systems that can advise the TEL group on technical feasibility, likely costs of plans and keep them informed of upcoming changes and enhancements to the systems. The TEL group to be formed between February – March 2009, with a first meeting to be held before June 2009. It will report directly to LTAC.
References
HEFCE (2009). Enhancing learning and teaching through the use of technology: A revised approach to HEFCE’s strategy for e-learning. March 2009/12. HEFCE.
