student interaction with a sakai vle in plant sciences

Sakai Conference 13th June 2007

Student Interaction with a Sakai VLE in Plant Sciences

University of Cambridge, UK

http://sakaiproject.org/


CMI Teaching and Learning Project Aims

To develop learning approaches and resources to enhance the effectiveness of small group teaching in 2nd year Plant and Microbial Sciences course

Improve learning outcomes

Engage students better

Enhance student recruitment and

retention



CMI Teaching and Learning Project

Identification of potential new practices (from literature, theory or participants)

Development of new resources to support new practices

Intervention : implementation of resources and practices

Analysis and review of effectiveness of new practices



CamTools – an integrated learning environment



Why use a wiki?• Allows intuitive organisation of content• Quick and easy way to make web pages• Organisational flexibility

o Editing rights can be set for individual pageso Editing rights can be changed at any timeo Allows easy arrangement of pages

• Possible to make links within pageso Link to e-learning objectso Link lecture topics togethero Link to appropriate webpageso Link to glossary pages

• All wiki pages are searchable



Lecture notes



Additional resources in CamTools

Exemplar essays

Self-assessment questions

Connotea library

Video explanations

Flash animations

Glossary definitions

Podcasts

3D molecules

Concept map

Metabolic jigsaw



Exemplar essays



Self-assessment questions



Connotea library



Video explanations



3D structures



CamTools usage questions

• How has usage varied throughout the year?• Have different students engaged with the site to

different extents?• What do the students think about the site?



Evaluation strategy

Site stats:- per day

- per studentQuestionnaire

Focus Groups




How has usage varied throughout the year?



Unique visitors through the year




Have different students engaged with the site to different extents?



Individual student usage



Individual student usage – content read




Student

Con

tent

rea

d



What did ‘student K’ do?

• Visited site 58 times• Sourced all past examination papers• Looked at a range of exemplar essays• Accessed practical class information• Read 7 lecture wiki pages• Accessed archived 1st year Cells notes• Watched 4 video explanations• Used a Jmol tutorial




Student

Con

tent

rea

d



How about ‘student O’?

• Visited site 60 times• Watched 12 flash animations• Sourced all past examination papers• Looked at 1st and 2.i exemplar essays• Accessed practical class information• Read 2 lecture powerpoints• Read selected wiki lecture notes:




What do students think about the site?



Student questionnaire

• How useful do they find the site and how frequently do they use it?

• During which terms and vacations did they use it?

• Rate components of site for usefulness and frequency of use

• Free text comment box




19 out of 26 students responded (73% return)




ComponentFrequency of Use (1 to 5) Component

Usefulness (1 to 5)

EXEMPLAR ESSAYS 3.0LINKED JOURNAL ARTICLES 4.5

LINKED JOURNAL ARTICLES 2.9 EXEMPLAR ESSAYS 4.3

LECTURE SLIDES 2.9 ANIMATIONS 4.1

WIKI LECTURE NOTES 2.9 LECTURE SLIDES 4.1

VIDEO EXPLANATIONS 2.9 WIKI LECTURE NOTES 4.0

ANIMATIONS 2.7 VIDEO EXPLANATIONS 4.0

SELF TEST QUESTIONS 2.3 SELF TEST QUESTIONS 3.7

GLOSSARY DEFINITIONS 2.1 GLOSSARY DEFINITIONS 3.5

3D MOLECULES 2.0 3D MOLECULES 3.1



Student comments – what they likeVideo explanations / online tutorials• “Really like the videos! Like the gene for gene one for example.”• “Tutorials are excellent.”

Past exam questions sorted by topic• “Links to Short Answer Questions and Essays grouped by topic are very helpful when

revising.” • “Grouping exam questions with their relevant topic is very useful, especially for exam

preparation.”

Links to papers• “Links to papers very helpful since they are hard to find sometimes.”

Organisational tools• “Announcements, and the schedule (for practicals etc.)”



Student comments – requests

Self-assessment questions• “More self-assessment questions. There is not much in the test yourself section at the

moment.”• [more] “multi choice questions would be ideal, they allow the student to identify holes in

their knowledge and wouldn't require extra work on the staff's part in terms of marking.”

Exemplars • “The exemplar essays are a fantastic idea, but they would have been useful to have

from the start of the Easter holidays, when revision really kicks in.”• “Putting up answers to past exam papers, particularly the practical exams and short

answer questions. This would be very helpful for exam preparation. (Engineering seem to have an efficient way of doing this).”

Videos & Animations• “More animations/ videos (as they are very useful).”



Student comments – valuing variety

• Reluctance to score any component on questionnaire below 3 as ‘useful’

• “In reference to the "references" question above, I think the best idea would be to have the online library AND to have links in the lectures.”

• “In regards to question 11, both are useful depending on the situation.”

• “I find I don’t often visit CamTools, but when I do I find lots of interesting things and spend time watching videos etc. and forgetting why I was there in the first place!”

11. Recently, a new tool called ‘references’ was added to the IB PMS CamTools. This is an online library of all the journal papers for the course. Do you prefer online references this way, or to be linked to their occurrence in lecture notes?



One year in – future development

• Exemplars for practical paper and short-answer questions

• More self-assessment questions• More videos and animations



One year in - Some conclusions and ways forward

• Strong influence of examinations• Common ideas about value of items• Usage shows a lot of variation• Value richness of the environment• Offers flexibility in supporting learning



Josh Jacobs

Lori Breslow

Warren Seering

Patrick Carmichael

Helen Burchmore

Naomi Irvine

Harriet Truscott

John Norman

Keith Johnstone

Fran Tracy

[email protected]

http://www.tfln.org


student interaction with a sakai vle in plant sciences

Documents

learning approaches

different extents

learning project aimsto

year plant

implementation of resources

new practicescamtools

new practicesintervention

retentioncmi teaching