Restrictive Release

Case studies

Using Release Conditions to restrict access to further learning materials and ensure understanding
Rachel Mansfield, School of Architecture, Design and the Built Environment

Background

Property management and development courses, leading to degrees accredited by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors
This eLearning unit was taken as part of a level one module, Understanding Professional and Business Skills. It covered the transition to higher education, some of the skills that are necessary to perform well academically and details of academic misconducts and good practice with referencing. This material had previously been delivered via three lecture sessions with supporting seminars.

Rationale

The lecture sessions had been poorly attended and, in the following seminars, the students had showed little evidence of having understood the material. We felt that a traceable system where we could examine each student's progress would be beneficial. Furthermore, we could incorporate elements such as surveys and assessments where the students had to actively engage with the material and check their understanding.

Changes to practice

The material was delivered in four blocks on NOW, each nominally representing one week (although students could access it flexibly at their convenience). The weeks covered material as follows:

Screenshot of content area within NOW, illustration purposes only

Week one: What are the expectations, and what are the rules?
Students' expectations of university and our expectations of students. Basic guide to regulations

Week two: How can I do well?
Managing time and finding sources of information

Week three: What is academic misconduct, and why is it important?
Discussion of academic misconduct, with a particular focus on plagiarism and collusion

Week four: How can I write and reference well?
Harvard referencing and good academic writing

For each week, the students were required to read material and carry out activities. At the end of each week's material, students were asked to complete a checklist to confirm that they had carried out activities, understood concepts and accessed core documents.

ScreenShot of week one checklist illustrating the points the student needs to check off

Checklist completion enabled an end-of-week assessment to be completed; this was multiple-choice and could be repeated until 100% correct answers were gained. A score of 100% enabled a student to access the following week's material. When all four weeks' material had been covered, a final assessment was used to revise previous concepts:

Screenshot of an assessment illustration

The material had to be created and loaded onto NOW. The change in delivery meant a substantial rewrite of the material to suit the new format; assessments, checklists and surveys needed creating.

The eLearning advantage

Students could access the material flexibly and return to it when needed. The material was delivered in smaller parts that were easier to take in than a traditional lecture, and it was easy to link external documents to the material. The ability to add restrictions so that students had to gain 100% on the end-of-week test before the next week's material was available was very useful and ensured full coverage of material.

For the purposes of administration, it was useful to see how far each student had progressed. Checklists online have the advantage that they are recorded. For example, students are required to tick to say that they have had their attention drawn to attendance regulations or the Academic Misconduct Code of Practice. Additional benefits for staff include more focused contact time with the students, direct questions and requests for support can be dealt with as opposed to general large class seminars.

Key points for effective practice

The structure must be carefully thought through so that the progression is logical. The instructions for gaining access must be very clear; students were directed to an initial document but several did not read it so did not understand how to access the different parts of the material. There was an assumed level of student competence with the NOW learning environment. The structured approach that tested students' understanding at regular intervals was a great advantage over the lecture delivery. In this first year of the material, its completion was not assessed. This was deliberate; it was thought to be desirable to have a trial run without assessment, in case problems were evident. However, only 37% completed the whole of the material.

Conclusions and recommendations

The online delivery made students more actively involved and enhanced their understanding of transition to higher education. In a questionnaire delivered a couple of months after the online material ended, 97.7% of students who had completed the material agreed that they had learned something they did not know from the material, and 93.1% agreed that the material would be useful for their further study. 82.7% agreed that online material had enabled them to study effectively.

In the next academic year, the score in the end-of-material assessment will count as a small percentage of a first year module mark. It is hoped that this will encourage full completion. It is also hoped that the material will be changed to encourage more active participation; the incorporation of discussions on discussion boards is a possibility.