Transcript You can’t believe it’s not PowerPoint!

Staff Development Centre
Staff Development Centre
Handouts that work!
A research based approach to
developing teaching handouts
Content
The questions about handouts that we hope to
address in this session include…
• What roles do handouts play in learning and
teaching?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of different
approaches to handout production and use?
• Can familiar technological tools enhance the impact
of the handouts we produce?
• What ‘transparent’ tools can we use to aid this
process?
Introduction
• The handout is written into the warp and weft of
academic life
• Not only do students want – even expect – a
handout to accompany teaching sessions…
• …but we want one too
How many of us would leave sessions like this
feeling a bit cheated or negligent if we didn’t take
away a set of handouts?
How our practice had developed
• We had defaulted to using PowerPoint handouts;
occasionally 6 to a page, usually 3 to a page
• Very convenient, because once prepared your
teaching slides
– are ready to photocopy and hand out
– to put on the Web or a VLE
but… we had reservations
1. Inflexibility of layout
– …linked to visual patterning of notes
– Imagine being a student getting 4 or 6 of these a
week!
2. Problems for note taking and supplementing
content of the handouts.
3. Problems for those with a range of disability and
learning problems.
4. Key pedagogical issue was producing handouts
that would help participants learn as much as
possible
What are the functions of notetaking,
and how do lecture notes assist?
There are two generally recognised functions of
notes (DiVesta and Gray [1972])
i) encoding – where students record and make
sense of teacher given material
ii) external storage – which covers not only
the keeping of material, but also reviewing it.
This gives us three conditions,
a) encoding only - taking notes but not
reviewing them
b) storage only – reviewing material taken by
or provided by someone else
c) encoding and storage – taking and
reviewing notes
Research shows that the encoding and
storage condition is most consistent with better
student learning and recall
Importance of Encoding
Students learn best when
– they learn actively
– they engage cognitively with material
– handout should encourage – and allow for – student
engagement
• N.B. Good reason not to bow to student requests for ‘complete
texts’
Problem is that students not all very good at recording key
material left to own devices
• students typically record only 20-40 per cent of important lecture
ideas Kiewra (2002)
• Processing is so complex not all students will manage well.
In encoding teachers bear responsibility not just to present material
but to cue it in such a way so that key points can be recognised
Importance of External Storage
Taking notes is not enough
In order to learn and recall information, access
to and reviewing also important
This means filling in and thinking about material
during and after the session, and not merely
using it for revision.
Which forms of handout help do
this?
Many studies have looked at whether
• students compiling their own notes,
• using outline material or
• using complete material
produce the best outcomes
– e.g. Russell et al (1983) reported by Dehn (2003) and
Kiewra and colleagues (2002)
• the idea of the outline form emerges well…
• …especially if accompanied by review and
extension
What types of handout
do you use?
HOW? With style(s)
• The Advantages of Using Styles…
– Well structured & accessible
• Support the learning process
– Easily amended
– More easily converted to web pages
HOW? Creating a presentation
• Start with a WORD document
•
•
•
•
Use the styles hierarchy
FILE > SEND TO > POWERPOINT
Tidy up the resultant PowerPoint slides
Create any diagrams in PowerPoint
HOW? Styles hierarchy
• HEADING 1 – creates a new slide
• HEADING 2 – creates an item in a bullet-point
list
• HEADING 3 etc – creates a further indented
item in a bullet pointed list
• NORMAL – explanatory text that will appear in
the handout but not in the presentation
• Use VIEW > OUTLINE
Handouts initiative
TECHNOLOGY
PEDAGOGY / /
Technology
Pedagogy
A new blend
WHY? Advantages over
starting with PowerPoint
• Well structured & accessible
• Support the learning process
• Easily amended
• More easily converted to web pages – and
to multimedia resources
WHY? The virtual lecture
• Module: Optical Fibre Communication
(EG3024), Engineering
• Tutor: Professor John Fothergill, University of
Leicester
• Online lectures - 15 minute learning objects on key
topics; PowerPoint presentations converted using
Impatica (www.impatica.com)
• Online supporting materials – existing course
materials; publishers materials (eg OU book and video);
formative assessments
• Online discussion boards – ‘no e-mail’ rule (except for
personal matters); tutor support for discussion threads
The Results
Optical Fibre Communications mark distribution
100
90
2004
80
Mark M%
70
60
50
1998
40
1999
30
2000
20
10
0
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
Percentage of students with mark <M
90
100
Professor John Fothergill (2005)
Examples of e-Staff Development
Recent work of the Staff Development Centre at
Leicester include…
Principal Investigators Project
• Leadership
• Selection
http://www.le.ac.uk/researchleader/
Staff Induction & Development (SID)
• Diversity
• Workstation audit
http://blackboard.le.ac.uk
https://blackboard.le.ac.uk/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab
=courses&url=/bin/common/course.pl?course_id=_4112_1
What are the strengths and
weaknesses of this handout format?
Feedback
Weaknesses
• Less engaging/drier
• Still two documents?
• Linear nature of PowerPoint?
Strengths
• Adaptable for students with specific learning
needs
• Reinforcement in 2 different formats
• Ability to include notes and exercises
• Paper saving?
Strengths of our handout template
• Note sets take on distinctive and individual
shapes
• Easily configurable by students according to
individual needs
• Allow exercises, discussions etc to be included
• Forced us to think about appropriate level of
detail to put in… and what to leave out
Weaknesses of our handout
template
• If developing/improving a session, both
PowerPoint and Word versions need to be
updated
Caveats and Next Steps
• Handout notes are not a panacea to solve
teaching problems
– only if allied to good structuring
– cue giving
– blending of delivery and engaging activity
• Our approach is but one way of using the
research evidence to develop handouts as
learning resources
• If you develop other models, please keep it
touch – even to discuss work in progress
Further developments
• A new process
• Capacity
• Flexible delivery
A New Process
• Storyboard (and Handout)
• Presentations
• Multimedia resource
What transparent e-learning
tools do you have access to?
Capacity
• Reducing the technical barriers to content
creation
• Enables practitioners to participate in the
creation and redrafting
• Easy reversioning
• The key development has been:• Pedagogy and design are now the key
criteria in appointments (not technology)
Flexible Delivery
• Preparation
• Integration
• Innovation
Examples of e-Staff Development
Recent work of the Staff Development Centre at
Leicester include…
Principal Investigators Project
• Leadership
• Selection
http://www.le.ac.uk/researchleader/
Staff Induction & Development (SID)
• Diversity
• Workstation audit
http://blackboard.le.ac.uk
https://blackboard.le.ac.uk/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab
=courses&url=/bin/common/course.pl?course_id=_4112_1
eThe development of
learning
E-learning
1.0
2.0
•
Lectures
•
Seminars
•
Workshops
Formal
learning
•
Library
•
Web search
•
Discussions
•
Learning diary
•
Portfolio
•
Observations
Summative assessment
Informal
learning
TheCommunication
development of learning
5.Knowledge
Development
building or
4.reflection
Knowledge
exchange
Communities
of practice
3.Within
Knowledge
a course
orexchange
programme
Blended
course
2. Socialisation
Little or no
1. Access &
communication
motivation
Repository
Source of Pre-structured
information course
Content
Co-structured
course
(after Collis & Moonen
and Salmon, 2002)
How would you use such
capacity?
• What have you done to include e-learning
in your courses?
• What advantages (and disadvantages)
does such an approach have?
• What e-learning would you like to include
in your courses?
E-Learning:
Resource Development & Student Support
Course Objective:
To enable participants to develop online learning
materials and become better online Tutors
(option of 15 ‘M’ Level credits)
Tutor: Tony Churchill, University of Leicester
Content:
Over ten weeks participants access:– Discussion groups - a wide range of activities taking 15 minutes
per day (on average)
– Tasks focus on planning, designing and creating a learning
resource
– Pilot & critique resources created by other participants
…and create their own e-tivities!
Caveats and Next Steps
• Handout notes are not a panacea to solve teaching
problems
– only if allied to good structuring
– cue giving
– blending of delivery and activities to engage students actively
• Our approach is but one way of using the research
evidence to develop handouts as learning resources
• If you develop other models, please keep it touch – even
to discuss work in progress
• [email protected] & [email protected]
Staff Development Centre