Month: December 2019

Digital Experience Insights 2019-20: How do you rate technology at Aberystwyth University?

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Aberystwyth University is taking part in the Digital Experience Insights project aiming to explore our students’ experiences of technology. The project is based on online surveys designed by Jisc and used by different institutions across UK.

It allows us to get better insights on how students use technology and benchmark our results against other HE intuitions in our sector.

We would greatly appreciate your help in promoting this survey to all students:

 

Mini Conference: Group Work and Group Assessment, Monday 16 December, 10.30am

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Mini Conference Programme

Mini Conference Logo

On Monday 16th December, at 10.30am, the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit will be hosting this year’s Academy Mini Conference.

The Mini Conference is a smaller version of our Annual Learning and Teaching Conference which allows us to pull together a series of presentations and workshops around a particular learning and teaching topic.

This year the Mini Conference has the theme of Group Work and Group Assessment.

We’re excited to confirm our programme:

  • Professor John Traxler, Professor of Digital Learning, University of Wolverhampton: Working (Groups) in the Digital Age
  • Dr Jennifer Wood & Roberta Sartoni (Modern Langauges): Group Work as an Active-Learning Tool in Translation Classes
  • Janet Roland & John Harrington (Student Support Services): Supporting students who find group work challenging
  • Dr Gareth Llŷr Evans (Theatre, Film and Television Studies): Prosesau Creadigol Agored ac Asesu Grwpiau Bach
  • Dr Ian Archer (Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit): Learning Environments and your personality preferences
  • Mary Jacob (Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit): Designing and Assessing Group Work

We hope that you’ll be able to join us for this event. Places at the Mini Conference are limited so please book your place via this booking page.

 

Changes to Component Marks Transfer Process

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Last year we introduced Component Marks Transfer, a process where marks were transferred from the Blackboard Grade Centre into the module record on AStRA.

Following its introduction, we have been working on enhancing this process, which has resulted in some changes. For the most part, the concept of Component Marks remains unchanged. For those of you who undertake Component Marks Transfer, you will notice that with the new system, the interface is slightly different when it comes to map the columns and transfer the grades. We will now be using Apex, an online application tool, to map, confirm, and transfer the marks into AStRA.

You’ll be able to access the Component Marks Transfer tool in the same way as before by logging into Blackboard, navigating to the module, expanding Course Tools under Course Management and selecting AStRA:: Map Columns. As with before, you will need to have a Departmental Administrator or an Instructor profile on the modules that you wish to transfer.

Enhancements include:

  • Map columns to multiple modules. The ability to map the same column to a different module enabling Parent-Child modules to be mapped
  • Preview the marks before you transfer. The new interface has a preview function allowing you to double-check that you have mapped the correct column before confirming that they are correct.
  • Visible checks for 0 marks. In addition to the preview, any marks with 0 given a visual cue for you to double-check that all is correct.

In order to support this change, we have our E-learning Essential: Introduction to Component Marks Transfer sessions on:

  • 03.12.2019, 10am-11am
  • 06.01.2020, 2pm-3pm
  • 13.01.2020, 11am-12pm
  • 06.05.2020, 2pm-3pm
  • 19.05.2020, 11am-12pm

These sessions can be booked online. In these sessions, we will be covering the concept of Component Marks transfer as well as introducing and guiding you through the new interface.

Our online Component Marks Transfer guidance has been updated to reflect the new interface and is available on our webpages.

In addition to the training, we’re also happy to offer bespoke training for groups of 5 or more colleagues. If you’d like to arrange a bespoke training session, please email elearning@aber.ac.uk.

If you have any queries regarding this process, please contact elearning@aber.ac.uk / 01970 62 2472.