Here in #becomingeducational we have encouraged you to follow
this blog to revise the course and gather fresh insights. We have asked you to ‘write
to learn’ in your own blogs – and to share those blogs with each other. We have
wanted the various blog spaces to encourage learning dialogues between us and
you – between you and us - and between you and each other.
Blog it: In this final run in to the end
of the course – we want to use this blog rather than emails to answer out-of-class
questions about assignments. More importantly – we want you all to start
answering each others’ questions rather than relying on us.
You are Becoming Educationalists – and we are becoming
obsolescent!
So here are our notes on the report;
the logs; the essay… if you want more, we will be covering the writing in class
– and you can help each other here in this blog.
The
Report
The Report part of your Research Project is where you report
your findings – you discuss what the raw data might mean – you draw conclusions
as to their relevance to *this* context (for you were analysing an aspect of HE
study) – and where applicable you make Recommendation for Practice, that is,
suggestions for how to improve the learning for University students, based on
your analysis of your research data. This is the formal structure required:
Findings
Discussion
Conclusions
Recommendations for
Practice
Bibliography
Tip: stop worrying about this as ACADEMIC WRITING; stop worrying about this as an ASSESSMENT: think about it as having
something to SAY to REAL PEOPLE.
Of your RESEARCH PROPOSAL readers would have been asking:
So what are you going
to investigate? - INTRODUCTION
Why are you interested
in that topic? – BACKGROUND/CONTEXT
What have other
academics already discovered about that topic? – LITERATURE REVIEW
How will you carry out
your own research? - METHOD
Why have you chosen to
carry out the research in that way? - METHOD
Of your RESEARCH REPORT readers will be asking:
So what happened when
you conducted your research? What are the key highlights? – FINDINGS
What do your findings
mean? – DISCUSSION
What overall
conclusions do you draw about University teaching/learning? – CONCLUSION
What should we do
differently because of what you have found out? – RECOMMENDATIONS
In a 1000 words – be concise and analytical.
TIPS:
- Talk to other people in the
class: what is baffling when we are alone with our worries becomes
sensible and do-able when we work with other people!!
- Read and Model: read the free online journal:
Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education covers exactly the
sort of research that you are doing – and will offer excellent models for
how you should write up your work: http://www.aldinhe.ac.uk/ojs/index.php?journal=jldhe
The
Learning Logs
The Learning Logs are worth 30% of the overall mark for the
course as a whole – so STOP – THINK: what do you think you will have to do to
get those marks? What do you think a great reflective log will have to look
like?
Three half pages of notes won’t do it will they?
Show you
know
The point of the learning log and the blog is to improve the
quantity and quality of your learning by making the learning conscious. You do
this by engaging in reflection and what we call meta-cognition: realising what
we know – how we know it – and how we might apply it and so forth.
Good reviews should indicate an awareness both of the ‘point’
of a lesson – and the ‘point’ of the review process itself. Reflections should
be crisp and clear – but relevant and useful. Some of you have already shown
some brilliant, detailed and most important of all ENGAGED blog posts, submit
those! For those of you who are less certain about what to do – at the very
least your reflections should follow a trajectory like this:
What:
what are all the different things that
we did this week?
Why:
for each activity - WHY did we do that – what was the purpose?
Reaction:
how did engaging in those activities make me feel? Why did I react in that way?
How can I harness my positive reactions? How can I harness my negative
reactions?
Illustration:
how would I illustrate this week’s learning to make it more memorable?
Learned:
what have I learned or gained or become aware of – through ALL of the different
activities that we did? How might I apply this learning in my practice now as a
student? How might I apply this in the future in my professional practice as an
educationalist?
Next steps:
what reading, writing or other follow up activities will I do in the light of
al these reflections? Then – evidence that you did do some of that
follow up work…
Appendices:
given that you will be submitting three pertinent log/blog extracts for
assessment, add Appendices – where you demonstrate the application of the
learning and the follow up activities that you did.
Tips: Appendices might contain notes
of further reading that you did, pictures of further collages that you made,
links to artefacts that you produced to illustrate your learning, short free
write extracts …
The
Essay
We have covered the essay generally and this essay in
particular over several weeks already – check out http://becomingeducational.wordpress.com/2014/03/13/w22-becomingeducational-the-essay-our-essay/
Things
to think about:
What is an educationalist? What is an inspiring and empowering
educationalist? What sort of educationalist do you want to become?
Why have we designed the module the way that we did? Think
about the module contents – and also the teaching and learning style – the
different things we have wanted you to think about and do… the ways that we
have wanted to you to act and interact… What was the point of all that?
Tip: Check out our Conference
presentation – delivered in class in W26 – and delivered at the ALDinHE
Conference over Easter – MOST IMPORTANTLY read our summary of how Etienne
Wenger-Trayner describes education as becoming:
http://lastrefugelmu.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/aldinhe-conference-2014-learning.html
What
THREE things are you going to write about?
- Did
you enjoy the interactivity – all those discussions and presentations?
- The
research project – from participant observation to digital artefact?
- What
about the Developing Digital Me project – where we asked you to engage in #ds106
or a MOOC as part of your ‘reading’?
- Were
you engaged by the Visual practices (collage, drawing, illustrated notes)
or the role playing and simulation
or that we wanted students in charge (peer mentoring, conference workshop,
student workshops)?
- Were
you surprised by the free writing or the topic mediated dialogue?
- Was
the Music or the Dance workshop the thing that made a difference?
- Was
there anything that you thought was interesting – or well designed – or
powerful – or effective…?
Tips: Do not DESCRIBE, ANALYSE;
refer to the LITERATURE to justify your arguments; think about these questions:
what was the point of that? Did it work? How and why did it work? How might you
use yourself in the future?
Help
each other
From now on, we really do not want to be answering individual
email queries about the assignments. We have designed all the assignments to
promote active learning – they are assessment as
and for learning – not just of learning (though
do enjoy the opportunity to show what you have learned). We will be covering
the assignments as part of our active learning in class over the last few weeks
of the course.
BUT – if you have queries, comments,
suggestions and examples – POST THEM HERE – so that your class mates could
answer – and so that if we answer, that answer is going to every body in the
class and not just one person!
All the best – enjoy these last few weeks – and enjoy helping
each other in class and here in cyber space.
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