Month: September 2023

Welcome to our Student Digital Champions for ’23-24!

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Banner with Student Digital Champion

A warm welcome to our Student Digital Champions who joined the Digital Skills Team at the start of September! They will be working with us throughout the academic year to encourage students across the university to develop their digital skills and to provide valuable insights into what support students want.

Noel Czempik

“Hi! I’m Noel, I’m an undergraduate Genetics student with a particular interest in personalised medicine. I’m also a musician and enjoy being creative at work, whether in a lab or a recording studio. My hobbies include painting, interior design, live music, road trips, nature walks, foraging and cooking. I also collect records and ghost figurines.

I applied for the Student Digital Champion role to engage in creative and meaningful work and further develop my digital skills. I’m passionate about the student experience at university and curious about the health and social implications of digital living. I look forward to supporting the Digital Skills Team, particularly in advocating for digital wellbeing.”

Joel Williams

“Hi, I’m Joel Williams, I am a 3rd year student studying geography. My areas of interest are volcanology and the impacts of climate change, focussing on how both impact people. I applied to become a Student Digital Champion because it gave me the opportunity to build upon my own digital skills, whilst also improving the student experience at Aberystwyth University for others.

Since my second year I have been an Academic Rep for my department. I have really enjoyed this role as it enabled me and my peers to voice our opinions to University and then see the tangible results of this. My hobbies include, photographing landscapes and wildlife, Swimming (normally in a pool), and until recently I played American Football for the University.”

Laurie Stevenson

“Hi, I am Laurie and I am in my fourth year of a Wildlife Conservation degree. I am looking forward to working with the Digital Skills Team again this year as a returning Student Digital Champion. I really enjoyed the role last year and how it helped me to develop skills in communication and digital creativity as well as pushing me out of my comfort zone in leading focus groups and conducting interviews. I am hoping to continue to learn new skills this year and I am very excited to be working alongside two new champions!”

🔔 Follow our Student Digital Champion category to keep up-to-date with all the exciting content that the champions will be publishing on our blog throughout the year, in addition to across the Information Services’ social media channels!

DigiTip 4 – Increase your productivity whilst helping the planet with the Forest App 🌱

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Do you want to increase your productivity whilst helping the planet? The Forest App will help reduce your procrastination and distractions whilst giving you the extra incentive to stay productive, by growing trees and earning virtual coins to unlock new plants depending on how long you have stayed productive for.

As your forest grows, you can see what your focused time distribution looks like over time, with various detailed charts included in the app. 

With the Forest App partnering with a real-tree-planting organisation, when users spend their virtual coins on planting new trees, the Forest team can donate to the real-tree-planting organisation to create planting orders!

You can download the Forest App through the App Store on iOS and Android devices. 

For a quick preview, take a look at these screenshots to see what the Forest App may look like on your mobile device.

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!  

Launch of the new ‘IS Digital Essentials for teaching’ Blackboard site

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We are pleased to announce the launch of the IS Digital Essentials for teaching, a new Blackboard Learn Ultra site designed to support new teaching staff at Aberystwyth University. 

This site brings together all of the advice and helpful information from Information Services that new teaching staff will need, ensuring that they are ‘digitally’ prepared for teaching. Whether that’s guidance on using the OneDrive to store work; how to set up a new module in Blackboard Learn Ultra; or finding guidance on lecture capture.  

With a helpful checklist and automatic access for all through Blackboard Learn Ultra, we hope that the site will save valuable time for staff, as well as being a helpful resource for all departmental staff. 

Please take a look at the introduction to the Blackboard site to learn how to get started. 

On Wednesday 11 October (2-3pm), we would like to invite new teaching staff to join us for a cup of tea or coffee in D54, Hugh Owen (instructions on how to find the room). This will be an opportunity for new teaching staff to meet each other and to meet colleagues from Information Services. There is no need to book for this event.

If you have any questions, or if you’d like to provide any feedback, please contact the Digital Skills Team (digi@aber.ac.uk). 

DigiTip 3 – Organising your Outlook 📧

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Do you have too many emails coming into your inbox? Are you struggling to find a specific email you need, or are you lost in all your emails? 

Time to organise! 

Did you know you can create subfolders in Outlook to help organise your emails.  

You can use these folders to clear your inbox so only unread or important emails remain. You can also use this to group emails together that will make them easier to find in the future. You can name folders whatever you like and can even create sub-folders within these folders.  

Either watch the below video or follow the instructions below: 

Simply: 

  • Go to your inbox 
  • Right click and select new folder 

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!  

Action needed: Staff with LinkedIn Learning content embedded within their Blackboard Learn Ultra modules

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From Wednesday 27 September 2023, we will be enabling a new version of the tool which allows staff to embed LinkedIn Learning content within their modules on Blackboard Learn Ultra. There are many advantages to enabling this new version, however it will require staff who have already embedded LinkedIn Learning content within their current modules to follow a few steps before and after this date.

What do I need to do if I have LinkedIn Learning content embedded in my current Blackboard Learn Ultra modules?

  1. Before Wednesday 27 September, you will need to make a note of which LinkedIn Learning courses you have already embedded within your modules.
  2. You can then delete these courses from your module.
  3. From Wednesday 27 September, you will need to re-add these courses using the new version of the tool (how do I do that?)

Please note: Any embedded LinkedIn Learning content that were added using the old version of the tool will appear as broken links to students from 27 September.

What are the advantages of this new version?

  • Embedding content will save staff time as it will automatically pull through the content title and description for you.
  • Staff can search for the LinkedIn Learning content they wish to include in their modules directly in Blackboard Learn Ultra.
  • Previously, staff could only embed LinkedIn Learning courses within their modules. The new version allows other types of content from LinkedIn Learning, including videos, audio files, and Learning Paths, to be embedded.
  • Students will be able to view the content directly in Blackboard Learn Ultra, without having to login to LinkedIn Learning separately.

From 27 September 2023 all staff can embed LinkedIn Learning content within their Blackboard Learn Ultra modules using the new version of the tool – further instruction is available from this FAQ.

The below video (no audio) demonstrates how easy it will be for students to access LinkedIn Learning content within Blackboard Learn Ultra if they have been embedded using the new tool.

For any queries relating to embedding LinkedIn Learning content in Blackboard Learn Ultra, please contact the Digital Skills Team (digi@aber.ac.uk).

DigiTip 2 – Check your Welsh text using the Cysill app 📝

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Cysill is part of a language software package called Cysgliad that you can download on your PC, and Cysill will be able to identify and correct Welsh-language errors in your text. You can use the online version of Cysill, but you can check your text much easier if you download the app (how do I do that?).

Once you’ve downloaded the Cysill app, take a look at the video below or follow these instructions: 

  • Open the Cysill app and your Word document (or wherever your Welsh-language text is located) 
  • Highlight the text you want Cysill to check 
  • Type Ctrl+Alt+W on your keyboard (this will copy and paste your text directly into Cysill) 
  • Check all the errors that the app suggests need changing 
  • Click Cywiro (Correct) if you’re happy with a correction that the app suggests
  • Once you’ve worked through all the suggestions, the app will automatically copy and paste the corrected text back into your Word document 

To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!  

Digital Skills Training: Semester 1 ’23-24

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Are you interested in learning what resources are available to help you assess and develop your digital skills? Or, perhaps you’re interested in learning more about how you can support your students to develop their own digital skills?

We will be delivering several training sessions for staff throughout Semester 1. If you are unable to attend any of these sessions, please feel free to email digi@aber.ac.uk to arrange a conversation with a member of our team.

Welsh-medium sessions:

English-medium sessions:

Develop your digital skills each week with our new DigiTips! DigiTip 1 – Bookmark your favourite webpages 🔖

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Each week we’ll be posting a useful DigiTip to help you make the best use of technology. To follow our DigiTips, subscribe to our Digital Skills Blog. Or alternatively, you can bookmark this webpage, where a new DigiTip will be added each week!

Do you want to be able to find the exact webpage you are looking for without wasting time going through several different webpages? For webpages that you visit often, you can bookmark them and even create folders for different categories of bookmarks, meaning that you will never have to navigate through the internet to find that specific webpage again! 

Follow these steps to bookmark a webpage: 

  • Open your choice of internet browser 
  • Search for the webpage you would like to bookmark 
  • Click on the star icon which is located on the right-hand side of the webpage address bar 
  • Choose a name for the webpage you would like to bookmark and click Done 

To manage your bookmarks: 

  • Right click on the bookmarks bar and select Bookmarks manager 
  • To create a new folder for your webpages, right click on the bookmarks bar and select Add folder