SELF funded projects 2008-09
- SALTIRE received 7 applications to the Strategic Enhancement of Learning Fund (SELF) seeking funds totaling £16,471.90.
- The following four applications were successful and received awards totalling £9414.
Evaluation of the impacts of a workshop to reduce communication associated anxiety in medical students
Bute Medical School: Gozde Ozakinci, Alex Collinson, Anita Laidlaw and Student Services: Rob Warren
Amount Awarded: £2250
Enhancement Theme(s): Research-Teaching Linkages
Social anxiety is an increasingly common anxiety disorder, involving a dread of social situations based on the fear of acting in an embarrassing way. People with social anxiety often avoid social situations, which can seriously impact on education and work prospects. Medical students are often taught communication skills in workshops where they must perform in front of others; for students with high levels of social anxiety, this type of experiential workshop will be very anxiety-provoking. Anxiety related to communication is therefore an issue of concern for medical students. This project aims to address the problem by providing a workshop to help students recognise and cope with communication-related anxiety and improve self-reflection. Pre- and post-questionnaires will be used to determine the short-term impact of the workshop, and long-term effects on communication skills will be measured by comparing communication OSPE results before and after the workshop. In addition, the project will measure whether the introduction of the workshop reduces demand on Student Services by the student cohort involved.
See the Communication Anxiety Workshops final report (PDF, 81 KB).
Content Creation for Educationally Appropriate MUVEs (CREAM)
Computer Science: Colin Allison, Alan Miller and Classics: Rebecca Sweetman
Amount Awarded: £2434
Enhancement Theme(s): Employability, Flexible Delivery, Research-Teaching Linkages
Multi-user virtual environments (MUVEs) offer a flexible interactive environment that can be customised to meet a range of educational goals, including the provision of activities that would be otherwise infeasible. (For example, allowing students access to a virtual archaeological dig, where an actual field trip might be prohibitively expensive. Or providing a virtual laboratory where students can conduct experiments that would be dangerous in the real world.) The project team has already implemented a variety of innovative projects within the commercial MUVE Second Life (see links below). The existence of a large user community, online resources and development tools has allowed rapid progress to be made with this platform. However, there are also various problems, such as the restrictions of a proprietary system, lack of control of software updates/downtime, and the presence of irrelevant/problematic content elsewhere within the virtual world. This project will use the Open Simulator Project to develop an open-source MUVE that meets the needs of educationalists and avoids the problems associated with a commercial platform. It will involve the creation of exemplar content as well as a bespoke user registration tool.
(See also the FILTA 2007-08 project 'Real Learning in a Virtual World' and the FILTA 2008-09 project 'A WiFi Virtual Laboratory in Second Life'.)
See the CREAM final report (PDF, 275 KB).
YouCube: teaching mathematics for economists by interactive video clips
Economics & Finance: Manfredi La Manna, Bram Boskamp
Amount Awarded: £2400
Enhancement Theme(s): Flexible Delivery, Responding to Student Needs
Students wishing to enter Honours Economics have to pass the "Mathematics for Economists" module (EC2004). As many students have not taken mathematics at A-level or equivalent, a significant fraction find the module very challenging. This project aims to supplement the existing teaching provision (lectures, laboratories) and additional support provided by the Maths Support Centre with a flexible and interactive facility whereby students can access a suite of short video clips showing how specific mathematical problems can be solved. This will benefit both students experiencing difficulties as well as those students who want more practice in solving economics-related mathematical problems. The clips will be accessed from a dedicated website which will also have tools that allow students to grade each clip by value of content, as learning aid, and by delivery mode, as well as to add comments and links to other resources.
See the YouCube final report (PDF, 231 KB).
Responding to Student Needs: Web-Based Enhancement of Teaching and Learning French Linguistics
Modern Languages (French): Elise Hugueny-Léger, Jennie Parkinson
Amount Awarded: £2330
Enhancement Theme(s): Flexible Delivery, Responding to Student Needs, Assessment
This project has three main aims. First, it will respond to student needs by forming a key part of the re-design (for AY2009-10) of the linguistics strand of the French 2000-level course. The new programme will facilitate student learning through the provision of a wide range of web-based, self-access graded exercises, designed to enhance the quality and quantity of individual feedback. Second, the project will promote independent, flexible learning through the provision of a series of resources designed to reinforce understanding of key concepts in French linguistics. Students will be able to assimilate at their own pace ideas and examples covered in lectures, and to identify and focus on areas which they consider require further study/discussion during seminars. Third, the web-based practical exercises designed for this project will be closely related to the assessment methods used in the new programme, thereby allowing students to engage in formative practice before submitting summative work.
See the Web-based French Linguistics final report (PDF, 20 KB).