Hi Guys!

Just been to a double session on using videos to communicate various things to students (Frank Greig (SoC) - Supporting Students through Video Tutorials & Karen Campbell (SNMNSC) - Experience of Using Screen Capture JING for teaching and learning).

Both speakers talked about their experiences of using videos to communicate various types of messages to students adn demonstrated how they learned about and used the various technologies in the teaching. A lot more user friendly than I thought before this sessin - and a lot more innovative and positive than I first imagined.

Both talked about the potential of this type of technology to enhance their practise and student learning, however, a big issue that Edinburgh Napier seems to need to address is where, how and by whom the outcomes of these activities can be safely stored and streamed at a low cost. This is a potential barrier to the use of this technology and may put people off from using or trying to develop it - a bit of irony when people are being increasingly encourage to this type of technology.

Any thoughts? 

Couple of resources

http://www.nchsoftware.com/capture/ (free)

http://www.jingproject.com/download/ (free)

http://www.etrusoft.com/ (free)

http://www.snapfiles.com/Freeware/gmm/fwscreen.html (free)

http://www.jingproject.com/download/ (expensive)

Hi Bloggers

Just come from a session on interpreting Turnitin reports by Dr Claire Garden (SLS). Very interesting presentation and discussion on the issues of how to introduce Turnitin and the issues related to how people make sense of theTurnitin outputs. Main issues seem to be around:

• students and staff intrerpret reports simplistically
• ensuring that staff see it as an active process where they need to use their own common sense when they are interpreting reports and not to be passive recipients of Turnitin as this is only a tool but the decision on plagiarism is a judgement that lecturers make
• students who don't pick up their assignments won't look at thei Turnitin reports
• in the early stages, students need help and support to practise paraphrasing, referencing and with the conventions surrounding sources and the use of quotations
• be clear abouit the aim of using this tool and don't try to do too much too soon
• in order to help staff and students to understand Turnitin reports she has developed a checklist which can be used to help them get an understanding of what the report means

This iwas one of the questions about teachers and their conceptions and experiences about the technology we use that jumped into my head when listening to Richard Hall's keynote speech this morning. Being overly concerned and focussed on the technology may be a barrier to effective teaching, learning and engagement.

Another question related to the appropriateness of Edinburgh Napier's MLE following Richard's mention of the JISC report entitled: 'Thriving in the 21st Century: Learning Literacies for the Digital Age.' Does ENU have the right MLE or should it be VLE?

Hi there,

Looking forward to Friday but I'm wondering how the weather will affect us!! No matter, good to join you on the Edinburgh Napier Education Exchange.

Norrie