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Learning Technologies Annual Report 2013-14

Introduction

During the period 2013-2014, Learning Technologies delivered key technology updates to core web

applications that support teaching and learning across the University. These included the upgrading

of myCourse, myPortfolio and Portal to include the emergent responsive design web technology.

This ensures that staff and students are able to access these core applications from any device

including smart phones and tablets. This work further affirmed Learning Technologies at the leading

edge of Moodle, Mahara and Portal developments in the H.E sector both in the U.K and

internationally. The Learning Technologies team also welcomed fact-finding delegations from several

universities and organisations from the U.K and Europe keen to see and learn from the work of the

team.

During this period the team also started the process of examining lecture capture technology and

kicked off a pilot study to include around 30 lecturing staff and around 400 students. A second pilot

study was also initiated to investigate the viability of the extensive Lynda.com video training library.

This pilot included all SSU staff and around 3,000 students. Both pilots are interacting with staff and

students across the spectrum of courses and disciplines.

Other key developments included delivering a website for the Solent TV initiative, moving the

University’s committee documents as well as key policies and procedures into the Content

Management System that were then published on the Portal.

The team continued to research and publish on its work and findings.

Key Statistics 2013-2014

The Portal

There are approximately 7,418 web pages in the Portal. From September 2013 to September 2014

the Portal was visited by 199 countries. The Portal had over 10 million page views.

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Top countries:

1. United Kingdom - 3,852,849 visits

2. United States - 14,359 visits

3. Saudi Arabia - 10,195 visits

4. Germany - 8,842 visits

5. Cyprus - 8,014 visits

6. Greece - 7,008 visits

7. Spain - 6,394 visits

8. France - 5,856 visits

9. Norway - 5,254 visits

10. Bulgaria - 4,286 visits

Monthly Comparison Yearly Comparison

September 2014

Home page had 413,983 page views

September 2013 – September 2014

Portal visited by 199 countries

Home page had 4,467,259 page views

September 2013

Home page had 339,722 page views

September 2012 - September 2013

Portal visited by 201 countries

Home page had 5,234,537 page views

September 2012

Home page had 446,040 page views

September 2011- September 2012

Portal visited by 182 countries

Home page had 5,905,816 page views

September 2011

Home page had 356,651 page views

September 2010- September 2011

Portal visited by 176 countries

Home page had 5,785,797 page views

September 2010

Home page had 488,350 page views

September 2009

Home page had 344,611 page views

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Contensis

The Contensis content management system has 340 current active users.

In the period between 01/08/2013 and 31/07/2014 there were 140 Contensis users created and 76

users trained on Contensis in 35 training sessions. A further 3 users were trained on the new

Contensis document management process for committees. There were 2 demo sessions for the new

committees area.

MyCourse

The myCourse VLE has 14,586 users and has 722 unit and course area editors.

Academic

Year (1 Sept-

31 Aug)

2006-7

Learnwise

2007-8 2008-9 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13++

Moodle 2

2013-14

Editors (e.g.

tutors)

426 450 724 1,159 717

(editors of

units and

courses

only)

722

(editors of

units and

courses

only)

Units

1259

1300 1436 1452 1511 2816* 3261* 3423*

‘Course’

page

120 188 212 234 331 276 378

Misc pages - 198 215 222 236 349 239++

Active

Users+

1st-14th

March

3,780 4,581 8,197 TBC TBC 10,489 10,093 10,011

Total Unique

Users

- 10,570 12,842 TBC TBC 12,077 13,961

(active

users)

14,586

+sample period for a ‘everyday use’ fortnight in semester 2 to avoid start of term and assignment submission peaks

*pages created automatically from Quercus data

** 1st Aug 2012 - 22nd Oct 2012 - myCourse2

*** some roles moved from local tutor permissions to global limited admin roles, eg all faculty admins, ASQS, LRC, Library staff.

+ + excluding all other projects and non-academic related pages

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myPortfolio (mahara)

The myPortfolio system has approximately 1000 students are engaged with myPortfolio for

assessment purposes.

Key Achievements 2013-2014

Working to enhance teaching and learning

Upgrade of the myPortfolio (Mahara) online portfolio system.

Continued roll out of the model of support for technology enhanced teaching, which

involves comprehensive staff self help in myCourse along with proactive, peripatetic and

targeted support.

Support for the implementation of myCourse minimum content.

Collaboration and integral support to the course teams online distance or blended courses

including MSc Shipping Operations, MBA, MSc Management, Chartered Institute of

Marketing, Business FDA and Top-up courses.

Supporting the work of the Teaching Fellows.

Running workshops at Solent Exchange.

Attendance and support at faculty conferences and away days as well as student forums.

Attendance at new associate lecturers’ induction events.

Teaching about ‘good TEL practice with myCourse’ on the PGCert TLHE.

Learning Technologies ‘standard’ staff development training for myCourse, myPortfolio and

Turnitin (each session is available regularly).

Learning Technologies ‘special’ lunchtime staff development sessions including the establishment of a Community of Practice around Mobile Apps ('Get Appy').

Specific training and support for digitising student appointments.

Specific training and support for engaging an audience with polling technologies.

Supporting and encouraging staff participation in the Solent Teaching and Learning Community through editing of the Dialogue journal, organising a teaching and learning conference which includes guest speakers and updating the T&L portal pages.

Organising and supporting information forums for Associate Lecturers and new teaching staff.

On-going telephone, email and drop in support to teaching staff.

Participating in new course development meetings and advising staff on the options regarding e-assessment & feedback and their implications on designing the curriculum.

Delivered mini conference on classroom technology as part of TELCOP. This included delegate team from Linköping University in Sweden and presenters from Bath University.

Initiation of Lynda.com pilot study

Initiation of lecture capture pilot study

Enhancing the student experience

Staff attendance at induction event sessions.

New design of myPortfolio

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Delivering ‘Invited speaker’ workshops to students of all levels on ‘Developing your

professional online presence with social media’

Working with Students

Numerous students have worked in Learning Technologies on video editing, myCourse

migration and web page authoring.

Graduate associate recruited to work in team.

Several staff are Associate Lecturers on a range of courses

Guest lecture sessions on courses in all three faculties.

Digital Literacies projects involving students as change agents.

HEA funded mini project entitled The Decision Tree. A collaborative project, working with

the Students' Information Centre and two students, who lead the project with support and

input from LT.

Working across the University

Trained and supported staff across the University to create, edit and approve web content for the University websites

Trained and supported staff across the University to upload and manage official documents

for online publication

Implemented Management of Information Policy and webmaster approval for Portal content

(including creation of new official documents and committees areas and transfer of

documents into Contensis)

Organisational, creative and technical support of the Solent Exchange event including live

webcasts, online booking, publicity artwork and interactive portal pages.

Co - development with course teams of blended and distance courses including MSc

Shipping Ops, MSc Management, MBA, Chartered Institute of Marketing, FDA Business and

Top Up.

Organising events in conjunction with the Teaching and Learning Fellows to support cross-

University initiatives. These include two Associate Lecturers Forums, bid application

workshop and TELCOP events

myCourse training across all faculties.

Support for Curriculum Plus units from enrolment through to assessments to both students

and unit leaders, and preparing reports for TLSC.

Reporting on funding opportunities to the TLSC.

Live streaming of graduation.

Began working with the Warsash Superyacht management and marketing team on revision

and upgrade to Superyacht website.

Developing external links

Developing a course for Sydenhams Football League (Wessex) to be delivered commencing

February 2015

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Working with doctors at Southampton General Hospital on the development of an online

course on Nutrition.

Working with the charity, Kick It Out on the development of an online course on Equality

and Diversity.

Presentations and papers at conferences – see appendix for full results.

Membership in the MARTHA project team as e-learning specialists.

Various members from LT presenting in the British Computing Society

Members from LT attended Zengenti conference in Birmingham.

Transferred and rebuilt FDF materials that were hosted at ULCC (working with Pam

Baker/Charles Pickford).

Building a working partnership with Pacer University, New York, to develop the usability of

the e-portfolio system and share practice.

Appendix: Staff Development, Research and Consultancy Activities 2013/14

Education and Professional Qualifications

Employee's Name Title of Course Dates of study Mode of study Studying/Completed Qualification achieved Professional membership

Timos Almpanis PhD E-Research &

Technology

Feb 2009 - July

2014

Online distance

learning

Revisions were

required

Qualification to be

awarded in the

summer/autumn 2015

Roger Emery EdD October 2014 - p/t

Andrew Doig Fellow HEA February 2014 n/a n/a n/a Fellow HEA

Short Courses, Conferences & Seminars

2010/11

Employee's Name Title of Course, Conference etc Date(s) of course Mode of study

Jenny Watson

Training course on Effective Project Management run by Optamor.

Office 365 training on myCourse and Lynda.com.

JISC 2 day workshop on change agents’ network at University of

Winchester

17-18 July 2014

12 July 201

18-19 February 2014

Training

course/workshop

attended

Steve Hogg

Hogg, S & Marchbank, P. Telling Their Stories, a Community

Research Project . Presented at the Research and Enterprise

Conference, Southampton Solent University,

13th May 2014 Conference

presentation given

Andrew Doig ALDinHE – Huddersfield (“A Collaborative Learning Development

MOOC.”) 15/04/2014 Conference workshop

International Virtual Conference: Giving Feedback to Writers Online (from Oxford Brookes University) 26/06/2014

Online workshop

Timos Almpanis Solent eXchange presentation titled 'Implementing TEL in UK HE'

Sep 2013

Future of Technology in Education Oct 2013

BETT Jan 2014

Turnitin user group meeting Feb 2014

Prince 2 Foundation & Practitioner course

May/June 2014

Solent eXchange presentation on lecture capture Sep 2014

Christina Ryan Solent Teaching & Learning Conference 8/3/14 Poster on CLL Project

Julian Prior

Prior, J (2013) What do we mean by ‘Digital Literacy’? Presentation at Changing the Learning Landscape: Developing Digital Literacies Workshop, 25th October, 2013, Southampton Solent University. Prior, J and Taylor, S (2013) Rethinking Pedagogy with New Technologies. Presentation at Solent Exchange 2013: Building for Our Futures: New Space, New Technology, New Learning, September 17th, 2013, Southampton Solent University. Prior, J (2014) Students as Producers and Change Agents: A Radical Model for Solent Student Engagement? Presentation at the Third Solent Teaching and Learning Conference 2014, April 8, 2014, Southampton Solent University.

October 2013

September 2013

April 2014

RogerEmery

28-31 July 2014 Conference Panel Presentation (International) Anstendig, L., Egan, S., Emery, R., Forte, M.,

Gordon, B., Hoeppner, K., Sevigney, M., Taylor, S.

Reflecting and Connecting with the Mahara

Community. Association for Authentic,

Experiential and Evidence-Based Learning

(AAEEBL) 5th Annual Conference, Boston, USA, 30

July 2014

18 July 2014 Conference Paper TAYLOR, S. & EMERY,R. Mahara: Winning hearts

and minds Presented at MaharaUK14

Conference, Brighton, UK. July 18th 2014

17 July 2014 Conference Paper EMERY,R. HODGE, J. SINCLAIR,D. User groups and

community engagement. Presented at

MaharaUK14 Conference, Brighton, UK. July 17th

2014

15 July 2014 Online Webinar Presentation Young, H., Kingstone, J., Shipley, L., Emery, R.

Using embedded Reading lists to enhance

learners experience JISC Online Innovation Week

15th of July 2014 via Blackboard Collaborate

3 July 2014 Conference Paper EMERY, R. ALMPANIS, T. HUGHES, C. Tackling

Plagiarism in the Digital Age. Presented at JISC

RSC SE e-Learning Fair 2014, Southampton 2014

15 April 2014 Conference Paper Emery, R. & Price, D. “Many a Mickle Makes a

Muckle: A multitude of Moodle mods to enhance

the student learning experience” Presented at

MoodleMoot Edinburgh 2014, Edinburgh, 15

April 2014

3 April 2014 Conference Poster PEOPLES,A., PORCHER, L., EMERY, R “Sensory

Enhancement Technologies for Learning” Solent

Teaching and Learning Conference, 2014,

Southampton Solent University

2 April 2014 Finalist for Awards JISC Regional Support Centre, South-East, SETS

Awards (South-East Technology Showcase).

“Reading List System”

31 March 2014 Chair, Host, Presenter Launch and first meeting of MUGSE – Mahara

User Group Southern England, Brighton

12 March 2014 Online Conference Paper (Webinar)

(International)

Emery, R., Prior, J., Almpanis, T., Lee, B.

Introduction to OER – Use and Reuse. Presented

at Open Education Week 2014, Online,

https://virtual.solent.ac.uk/oer, 12 March 2014

2013/14 Programme Committee member Moodle Moot UK&IE 2014 Edinburgh. Invited

Programme committee member, setting

programme and theme reviewing papers,

chairing sessions

9 Oct 2013 Host, Chair, Presenter JISC RSC SE Moodle Users Group

Sept 2013 Conference Paper ALT-C 2013 – Nottingham. Your Business Future –

Final Project Report

Consultancy, Partnerships and Other External Activities

Employee’s Name Activity undertaken Date(s) Learning Outcome(s)

Andrew Doig

Working with Kick It Out

Collaborating with the Kick It Our charity on the development of

an ‘Equality & Diversity Awareness’ course that will delivered

online via myCourse for their ‘scholars’ and SSU students.

July 2014, ongoing Exploring the LT role in helping faculty work with externals.

Working with Sydenhams Football League (Wessex) Invited by FBSE (Richard Elliot) to work with the Sydenham’s League on the creation of online training course for admin staff.

May 2013, ongoing (course commenced in February

2014.

Exploring the LT role in helping faculty work with externals.

Southampton General Hospital Contacted by Microlink Plc. Intention is to develop an online course that teaches student doctors about nutritional health. Demo developed. Course development now ongoing.

Feb 2014, ongoing

Refining our model of working

with externals on online course

developments.

Editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, including residential at Glasgow Caledonian University

First appointed August 2013, ongoing ,

Residential, January 2014

Improved knowledge of

effective research and academic

writing

Editor of the Journal of Pedagogic Development First appointed January

2014, ongoing

Improved knowledge of

effective research and academic

writing

Andrew, Roger, Christina, Sam, Jenny

Hampshire Fire & Rescue Visit 05/12/2014

Enhancing our collaborative

relationship with this key

external Moodle partner.

Nick Papaconstantinou Transferred and rebuilt FDF materials that were hosted at ULCC

(working with Pam Baker/Charles Pickford)

05/14 - 08/14 Resources now ready to use

Roger Emery

2 July 2014 Consultancy for External Kumamoto University, Japan. Presentation of

Mahara e-portfolio provision and support

16 May 2014 Consultancy for External Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service. Presentation

of VLE provision

1 April 2014 Consultancy for External Swedish Higher Education Authority visit.

Presentation of e-learning provision

27 Feb 2014 Consultancy for External Plymouth University. Webinar Consultancy for e-

Learning Team Moodle procurement

16 Jan 2014 Developmental partnership Pace University, New York. Developing Usability

and support in Mahara

16 Jan 2014 Consultancy for External Visitor Canterbury University, E-submission & marking

Policy

14 Nov 2014 Host, Consultancy for External Visitor Aalto University, Fnland.

Publications

Employee's Name Publication Reference Date(s)

Timos Almpanis ALMPANIS, T. (2014) MOOCs: a first-hand experience on EDC MOOC and a speculation of their future impact in Higher Education, Dialogue: Journal of Solent Learning Community 4 http://ssudl.solent.ac.uk/2588/

Jan 2014

Roger Emery

UCISA TEL Survey 2014 and Solent TEL Case Study

2014 TEL Survey Report

2014 TEL Case studies

27 Jan 2014