Welcome

Developing Professional Practice in Partnership

Fiona Milne

• Developing and Supporting the Curriculum (DSC) HEA Enhancement Themes Funding

• Professional Practice: the process of transition through CCI that encompasses elements of Learning, Teaching and Assessment such as Employability, PDP, Graduate Attributes and Work Related Learning

Design and Development

• ePortfolio: ‘purposeful collections of information and digital artefacts that demonstrate development or evidence learning outcomes, skills or competencies, including synthesis of ideas, reflection on achievements, self-awareness and forward planning’ (Cotterill, 2007)

• Why?: Increased competition in the workplace requires a strong evidence base of skills, abilities to meet employer and industry expectations and clear articulation of them

ePortfolio Approach

• Aim of Project: In consultation with staff, students and industry practitioners, create step by step instructions and learning materials to enhance engagement with Mahara, including building exemplar ePortfolios and provision of examples of how to use Mahara’s built in social networking tools to develop communities of practice

Aim of Mahara Project

ePortfolio and Personal Tutoring

Introduction to, and ongoing online support for, Mahara;

online presence; PDP; WRL; Employability

Self assessment; reflection on experiences; SMART

development targets; support on Moodle site

Engagement with WRL opps; reflection; recording to help meet targets; preparation for

PT meetings

Discussion with Personal Tutor, including reflections,

goals, opportunities

Assessment and credit where appropriate

(it is not feasible or appropriate for all Professional Practice to be

assessed/credit rated)

Ladder of Student Participation in Curriculum Design

• Students control decision-making and have substantial influence• Students in control • Partnership - a negotiated curriculum

• Students have some choice and influence• Student control of some areas of choice • Students control of prescribed areas

• Tutors control decision-making informed by student feedback• Wide choice from prescribed choices • Limited choice from prescribed choices

• Tutors control decision-making• Participation claimed, tutor in control • Dictated curriculum – no interaction (Bovill and Bulley 2011)

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• Implementation of Mahara• Lack of engagement with reflection and PDP• Recruitment of designers• Finding the ‘right’ Alumni• Content and Use of language• Relevance of examples of evidence• Access after Graduation

Challenges

• Peter Stewart• Video and Production• Editing: instructions• Acting

• Clare Kelly• Collections

Successes? Judge for Yourself

• Increased feedback• Testing with students• Engagement with staff and students• Curriculum design with colleagues• Continuous enhancement and updating

Next Steps

Bovill, C Cook Sather, A and Felten, P (2011) Students as co creators of teaching approaches, course design, and curricula: ‐ ‐implications for academic developers, International Journal for Academic Development, vol 16, no 2, pp 133-145 Bovill, C and Bulley, C (2011) A model of active student participation in curriculum design: exploring desirability and possibility . In Rust, C. Improving Student Learning (18) Global theories and local practices: institutional, disciplinary and cultural variations. Oxford: The Oxford Centre for Staff and Educational Development, pp 176-188 Cotterill, S (2007) What is an ePortfolio?, available at: www.eportfolios.ac.uk/definition [Last accessed 1 April 2013]Fotheringham, J Strickland, K and Aitchison, K (2012) Curriculum: Directions, decisions and debate, Glasgow: QAA, available at: www.enhancementthemes.ac.uk/pages/searchresultdetails/docs/publications/curriculum-directions-decisions-and-debate [Last accessed 28 April 2013] McCulloch, A (2009) The student as co-producer: learning from public administration about the student–university relationship, Studies in Higher Education, vol. 34, no 2, March 2009, pp 171–183 Neary, M and Winn, J (2009) The student as producer: reinventing the student experience inhigher education, in Neary, M, Stevenson, H and Bell, L (ed) The future of higher education:Pedagogy, policy and the student experience, pp 126-38, London: Continuum Neary, M and Winn, J (2009) The student as producer: reinventing the student experience inhigher education, in Neary, M, Stevenson, H and Bell, L (ed) The future of higher education:Pedagogy, policy and the student experience, pp 192-210, London: Continuum

References