In summer 2022 we moved to a new version of Turnitin. As support for our previous version of Turnitin has now ceased, the historical version (known as Turnitin Building Block) will be retired on 31 August 2023.
This means that any marked assignments will no longer be accessible to staff and students.
Staff should contact the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit (elearning@aber.ac.uk) if they still need to access Turnitin assignments in the Building Block for marking purposes.
Even though access will be removed, the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit will still be able to request marked assignments via Turnitin support. If you require this after 31 August 2023, please contact the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit (elearning@aber.ac.uk).
It’s been a little while since we gave you a progress report on our move to Blackboard Ultra. We’ve been working hard to prepare for the start of our training programme and making sure that our integrations are working.
Technical Update
We have been focusing on our Course Creation process. To help colleagues with the move to Ultra, we are creating courses for next academic year much earlier this year.
This will also help with our training as colleagues will be preparing their live Ultra course.
Our integrations have also taken a lot of work to set up and get working:
Panopto: Panopto has been moved to an API connector ready for Ultra Courses.
Talis Aspire: Talis Aspire LTI is now enabled. We have been working with colleagues in Academic Engagement to ensure that this is as smooth as possible.
Turnitin: Work on moving Turnitin to a LTI connector was completed in summer 2022, and no additional changes to Turnitin are required for the move to Ultra Courses.
Microsoft Teams meetings: We will move to the Teams LTI in summer 2023. This tool will be for scheduling Teams meetings.
These are existing tools but one of the benefits of moving to Ultra is the introduction of Office 365 LTI integration. This allows you to upload documents from your OneDrive straight into Blackboard as well as offering students the opportunity to collaborate on a document together. For those of you who have been following our progress on our blog, you will see that this collaborative tool forms the basis of our Wiki solution.
Training Update
Our E-learning Essentials: Introduction to Blackboard Ultra training session has now been designed and is ready for staff departmental training sessions.
We have communicated with all Departmental Directors of Learning and Teaching to start arranging your departmental training session. If you are unable to make your scheduled session then we will be running them centrally.
As Blackboard Ultra Courses have a completely different approach to organising and arranging content, our Required Minimum Presence has been re-written. Keep a look out for our updated RMP.
Guidance Materials
We have been working on rationalising and preparing our guidance materials, including our FAQs. One change you’ll notice once we’re in Ultra Courses is that our FAQs will link directly to Blackboard help materials. These materials are available bilingually in Welsh and English.
Annual Learning and Teaching Conference
Our Annual Learning and Teaching Conference is taking place between 4 and 6 July. A key strand of the conference will be the Blackboard Ultra. Keep an eye on our blogposts as we announce our keynote speakers. A reminder that our Call for Proposals closes on 5 May – you can submit a proposal using our online Call for Proposals form.
As leader of our PGCTHE programme, I keep an eye out for resources to help staff teach effectively. These include webinars, podcasts, online toolkits, publications and more. Topics include active learning, online/blended teaching, accessibility/inclusion, and effective learning design based on cognitive science. Below I’ve listed items that came to my attention in the past week. In the interest of clarity, our policy is to show the titles and descriptions in the language of delivery.
24-28/4/2023 QAA, Assessment Festival “We will dare to be controversial, ask those difficult questions and take a forward-facing look at how assessment may evolve. The festival will bring different voices from the sector to share and celebrate assessment practices that enhance student experience.”
Costello, E. (13/4/2023),OER23: ‘A one star review’ (blog post and recordings of several keynote speakers from the OER23 conference)
Cottingham, S. & Clark, J. L. (13/4/2023), Meaningful Learning(downloadable poster based on David Ausubel’s concept of meaningful learning), One-pagers, Jamie Clark
Monthly series European Network for Academic Integrity, ENAI monthly webinarsfree open webinars on various topics related to academic integrity.
Subscribe to SEDA’s mailing list for email discussions about educational development and emerging teaching practices. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Follow University of Birmingham’s Higher Education Futures institute HEFi on Twitter for daily posts with links to pedagogical literature and more. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Join the #LTHEchat on Twitter Wednesday nights for one hour of lively discussion about learning and teaching in HE. I often find out about good resources for the Roundup from the chat.
Please see the Staff Training booking page for training offered by the LTEU and other Aberystwyth University staff. I hope you find this weekly resource roundup useful. If you have questions or suggestions, please contact our team at lteu@aber.ac.uk. You may also wish to follow my Twitter feed, Mary Jacob L&T.
As leader of our PGCTHE programme, I keep an eye out for resources to help staff teach effectively. These include webinars, podcasts, online toolkits, publications and more. Topics include active learning, online/blended teaching, accessibility/inclusion, and effective learning design based on cognitive science. Below I’ve listed items that came to my attention in the past week. In the interest of clarity, our policy is to show the titles and descriptions in the language of delivery.
24-28/4/2023 QAA, Assessment Festival “We will dare to be controversial, ask those difficult questions and take a forward-facing look at how assessment may evolve. The festival will bring different voices from the sector to share and celebrate assessment practices that enhance student experience.”
Collins, M. & Childs, M. (31/3/2023), Remixplay 5 2023: Conference-in-a-pod! (2-hour audio recording), Pedagodzilla: The pedagogic podcast with the pop culture core
Monthly series European Network for Academic Integrity, ENAI monthly webinarsfree open webinars on various topics related to academic integrity.
Subscribe to SEDA’s mailing list for email discussions about educational development and emerging teaching practices. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Follow University of Birmingham’s Higher Education Futures institute HEFi on Twitter for daily posts with links to pedagogical literature and more. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Join the #LTHEchat on Twitter Wednesday nights for one hour of lively discussion about learning and teaching in HE. I often find out about good resources for the Roundup from the chat.
Please see the Staff Training booking page for training offered by the LTEU and other Aberystwyth University staff. I hope you find this weekly resource roundup useful. If you have questions or suggestions, please contact our team at lteu@aber.ac.uk. You may also wish to follow my Twitter feed, Mary Jacob L&T.
On 28 March, the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit hosted their first mini conference of the year in person.
The mini conference’s theme was Virtual Reality. The conference materials are now available on our webpages.
The conference started with a keynote by Chris Rees who is the Executive Head of Digital Creativity and Learning Unit at University of Wales Trinity St David’s. Chris gave an overview of how UWTSD have been using two newly created immersive rooms (Swansea and Cardiff), with activities ranging from virtual reality gym training through to architectural walk throughs and health and safety training.
The conference then shifted to hearing how colleagues at AU are currently using VR in their learning and teaching. Amanda Jones and Bleddyn Lewis gave an insight into how the Healthcare Education Centre is using Wales’ Virtual Hospital. Education’s Steve Atherton makes use of VR in several modules, including placing students in different education contexts – from refugee camps through to Montessori education settings. After lunch, Helen Miles and Andra Jones (Computer Science) and Rebecca Zerk (Dewis Choice Project / Law and Criminology) ran a workshop outlining the challenges and benefits to VR. Participants also got the opportunity to sample the Dewis choice project using VR headsets.
What emerged from the event is that lots of colleagues are using VR in their learning and teaching. We’re looking at creating a space for colleagues to come together to discuss their approaches to VR. We’ve set up a Teams site. If you’re interested in Virtual Reality and would like to be added to the Teams site, email the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit (lteu@aber.ac.uk)
Anna Udalowska, from Lifelong Learning, has been awarded the Exemplary Course Award for the module XN16710: The Science of Wellbeing.
In addition to the winner, the following modules achieved Highly Commended:
Alexander Taylor from the Department of Psychology for the module PS32120: Behavioural Neuroscience
Kathy Hampson from the Department of Law and Criminology for the module LC26120: Youth Crime ad Justice
Lara Kipp from the Department of Theatre, Film and Television Studies for the module TP30020: Contemporary Drama
Panna Karlinger from the School of Education for the module ED20820: Making Sense of the Curriculum
The diverse range of teaching and learning styles evidenced in this year’s applications reflects the innovative work that is taking place across the institution.
The aim of the Exemplary Course Award, now in its eighth year, aims to recognise the very best learning and teaching practices. It gives staff members the opportunity to share their work with colleagues, enhance their current modules in Blackboard, and receive feedback on to improve.
Modules are assessed across 4 areas: course design, interaction and collaboration, assessment, and learner support. The self-assessed nature of the award gives staff the opportunity to reflect on their course and enhance aspects of their module before a panel assesses each application against the rubric.
The panel and the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit would like to thank all of the applicants for the time and effort that they have put into their applications and modules this year.
We’re looking forward to receiving more applications next year and many congratulations to the recipients of this year’s award.
This post outlines the solutions that the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit are working on for Blog activities in Blackboard Ultra. Once these solutions have been tried and tested, we will work on providing guidance for colleagues.
Background
Blogs are a collaborative tool used for a number of assessed and unassessed activities at Aberystwyth University.
The tool is not currently available in Blackboard Ultra (despite our enhancement requests) and is not on Blackboard’s roadmap of development.
The unavailability of the Blog tool has been included in all parts of the decision-making process to highlight it as a risk in the move to Blackboard Ultra.
In their very nature blogs offer students the opportunity to reflect on their learning, organise their thoughts and ideas chronologically, and comment on each other’s posts.
Whilst there aren’t blogs in Ultra, there are two fully-integrated participation and engagement tools that will offer alternatives: Journals and Discussions.
Option 1: Use the Journal tool
Whilst blogs don’t exist in Blackboard Ultra, the journal tool does remain. Journals are used in a similar way to blogs but they are private between course tutors and students. If the activity can function without making student’s posts visible to all, we recommend using this tool.
If the activity requires an interactive element between students then we recommend using the discussion tool. Here you can create a thread, organise your discussions via folders, set the discussions to be graded, encourage student participation by not viewing the thread until students have completed their initial post.
For an idea as to how discussions work, take a look at this demonstration video.
Even though our discussion board tool has changed, our principles on discussion board design and engagement still remain the same. Take a look at our discussion board design blogpost for some tips and questions for you to ask yourselves in the design of the activity.
Option 3: Use WordPress blogging tool
Whilst we recommend that discussion board activity remains in Blackboard so that student engagement and assessment can take place, there is another blogging tool supported by the University: WordPress. If you think that WordPress is the only option for you then we recommend that you get in contact with us first to discuss your activity and so we can advise further (elearning@aber.ac.uk).
As leader of our PGCTHE programme, I keep an eye out for resources to help staff teach effectively. These include webinars, podcasts, online toolkits, publications and more. Topics include active learning, online/blended teaching, accessibility/inclusion, and effective learning design based on cognitive science. Below I’ve listed items that came to my attention in the past week. In the interest of clarity, our policy is to show the titles and descriptions in the language of delivery.
24-28/4/2023 QAA, Assessment Festival “We will dare to be controversial, ask those difficult questions and take a forward-facing look at how assessment may evolve. The festival will bring different voices from the sector to share and celebrate assessment practices that enhance student experience.”
Munoz, A., Wilson, A., Pereira Nunes, B., Del Medico, C., Slade, C., Bennett, D., et al. (2023), AAIN Generative Artificial Intelligence Guidelines, Deakin University. Educational resource., National Teaching Repository
Monthly series European Network for Academic Integrity, ENAI monthly webinarsfree open webinars on various topics related to academic integrity.
Subscribe to SEDA’s mailing list for email discussions about educational development and emerging teaching practices. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Follow University of Birmingham’s Higher Education Futures institute HEFi on Twitter for daily posts with links to pedagogical literature and more. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Join the #LTHEchat on Twitter Wednesday nights for one hour of lively discussion about learning and teaching in HE. I often find out about good resources for the Roundup from the chat.
Please see the Staff Training booking page for training offered by the LTEU and other Aberystwyth University staff. I hope you find this weekly resource roundup useful. If you have questions or suggestions, please contact our team at lteu@aber.ac.uk. You may also wish to follow my Twitter feed, Mary Jacob L&T.
On 4 April Turnitin will be launching their new AI writing and ChatGPT detection capability which will be added to the Similarity Report. Before colleagues start using the AI detector, we thought that we would caveat it with the following quotations from authoritative professional bodies in the sector.
Jisc notes: “AI detectors cannot prove conclusively that text was written by AI.”
The QAA advises: “Be cautious in your use of tools that claim to detect text generated by AI and advise staff of the institutional position. The output from these tools is unverified and there is evidence that some text generated by AI evades detection. In addition, students may not have given permission to upload their work to these tools or agreed how their data will be stored.”
Please also see theGuidance for Staffcompiled by the Generative AI Working Group led by Mary Jacob. The guide outlines suggestions for how we can explain our existing assessments to students in ways that will discourage unacceptable academic practice with AI, and also red flags to consider when marking.
Turnitin also published an AI writing resource page to support educators with teaching resources and to report its progress in developing AI writing detection features.
If you have any questions about using Turnitin’s AI writing and ChatGPT detection capability or interpreting the results, please contact the Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit (elearning@aber.ac.uk).
As leader of our PGCTHE programme, I keep an eye out for resources to help staff teach effectively. These include webinars, podcasts, online toolkits, publications and more. Topics include active learning, online/blended teaching, accessibility/inclusion, and effective learning design based on cognitive science. Below I’ve listed items that came to my attention in the past week. In the interest of clarity, our policy is to show the titles and descriptions in the language of delivery.
29/3/2023 UDL UK and Ireland Network, UDL Instructional Design Workshop, “Learn how to create instructional experiences using the UDL principles as part of a structured, facilitated process called CUTLAS”
24-28/4/2023 QAA, Assessment Festival “We will dare to be controversial, ask those difficult questions and take a forward-facing look at how assessment may evolve. The festival will bring different voices from the sector to share and celebrate assessment practices that enhance student experience.”
Bozkurt, A., Xiao, J., Lambert, S., Pazurek, A., Crompton, H., Koseoglu, S., Farrow, R., Bond, M., Nerantzi, C., Honeychurch, S., Bali, M., Dron, J., Mir, K., Stewart, B., Costello, E., Mason, J., Stracke, C. M., Romero-Hall, E., Koutropoulos, A., Toquero, C. M., Singh, L Tlili, A., Lee, K., Nichols, M., Ossiannilsson, E., Brown, M., Irvine, V., Raffaghelli, J. E., Santos-Hermosa, G Farrell, O., Adam, T., Thong, Y. L., Sani-Bozkurt, S., Sharma, R. C., Hrastinski, S., & Jandrić, P. (2023), Speculative Futures on ChatGPT and Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI): A collective reflection from the educational landscape, Asian Journal of Distance Education, 18(1), 53-130
Leach, M. (20/3/2023), Like Clippy, only on steroids, WonkHE, ‘Generative AI tools are about to be ubiquitous. Mark Leach reviews the week that might have changed everything for HE.’
Monthly series European Network for Academic Integrity, ENAI monthly webinarsfree open webinars on various topics related to academic integrity.
Subscribe to SEDA’s mailing list for email discussions about educational development and emerging teaching practices. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Follow University of Birmingham’s Higher Education Futures institute HEFi on Twitter for daily posts with links to pedagogical literature and more. This is one of the sources I use when identifying useful material for the Roundup.
Join the #LTHEchat on Twitter Wednesday nights for one hour of lively discussion about learning and teaching in HE. I often find out about good resources for the Roundup from the chat.
Please see the Staff Training booking page for training offered by the LTEU and other Aberystwyth University staff. I hope you find this weekly resource roundup useful. If you have questions or suggestions, please contact our team at lteu@aber.ac.uk. You may also wish to follow my Twitter feed, Mary Jacob L&T.
