Blogpost by Laurie Stevenson (Student Digital Champion)
As part of a project organised by the Student Digital Champions, we will be publishing a weekly series of interviews with graduates of Aberystwyth University about their use of digital skills in their lives since graduating, whether that is in their current job, Postgraduate studies, or career pathway. We’ll also hear about the skills they wish they had developed further before they left Aberystwyth University.
We will be releasing four profiles this semester, one a week on Thursdays, and the other half will be released in Semester 2. The first profile will be published this Thursday and will be available from this page on the Digital Skills Blog, but in the meantime take a look at the JISC Digital Capabilities Framework, the framework we follow here at AU, to learn what digital skills are and why they matter to you.
Keeps your eyes peeled on Thursday for our first profile!
Do you want to learn or develop your digital skills but not sure where to start? With our LinkedIn Learning digital skills collections, you can now develop your digital skills further with easily digestible courses and videos that are tailored more specifically to what you are looking for. With a variety of content to choose from in LinkedIn Learning, we have developed 30 new collections (15 for students and 15 for staff) to support you all at Aberystwyth University to find the most appropriate content suited for what you want to learn most. Each collection contains 9 resources, and these resources can range from short 3-minute videos to more in-depth courses.
If you have any questions about these LinkedIn Learning collections, please contact the Digital Skills Team (digi@aber.ac.uk).
Sometimes, you may need to set some time aside to concentrate on a particular piece of work, but how can you show other people who are also online that you’re busy? Microsoft Teams allows you to set your status to Do not disturb, meaning that you won’t be interrupted by Teams notifications or calls (unless you choose to receive these from specific people), but it can be too easy to forget to turn this status off once you’re finished.
Luckily, Teams allows you to set your status for a set duration. Take a look at the video below or follow these instructions:
Open MS Teams and click on your profile picture
Click on your current status
Select Duration
Choose Do not Disturb (or whichever status you want to appear)
Choose for how long you want this status to appear
A member of the team will be available each week to support both students and staff at one of our weekly Digital Skills drop-ins.
We can help you find resources that you can use to develop your digital skills; give you general advice about developing your digital skills; and we are also very happy to discuss your Digital Discovery Tool reports.
📍 We’ll be at the Skills Hub (indicated by the star on the image below) on Level D of the Hugh Owen library on the below Tuesdays and Wednesdays throughout Semester 1. If you have any questions, please email digi@aber.ac.uk.
Are you working on one screen and struggling? Are you tired of swapping between two windows?
Did you know that you can split your screen to view two things at once making it much easier to view two windows at the same time. This means that you can work on documents, tabs and much more side-by-side.
On your keyboard, to the left-hand side of the space bar there is the Windows button.
Hold the windows button and then tap any arrow key you would like. For example, hold the windows key and then tap the left arrow key.
This will move your document to the left-hand side of your screen.
You will be shown all the open windows you have to fill the remainder of the screen. Simply select which window you would like to open.
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!
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.
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.
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 bookfor 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).
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:
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?
Before Wednesday 27 September, you will need to make a note of which LinkedIn Learning courses you have already embedded within your modules.
You can then delete these courses from your module.
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).
