Masters Teaching: Setting New Agendas

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Masters Teaching:

Setting New Agendas

WELCOME

Pauline KnealePro Vice-Chancellor Teaching and Learning

Director of PedRIO pauline.kneale@plymouth.ac.uk

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House Keeping Facilities: There are toilets located on each floor of the building. One lift is located outside of this room, with a further lift and set of stairs located on the South side of the building.

Fire exits: Fire exits are through the main entrances/exits to the building. There are also a number of emergency exits on the ground floor, please follow the green and white signs to the nearest exit in the event of a fire alarm sounding.

The fire rendezvous point for Rolle Building is Fitzroy Car Park

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Posters, Stands and Refreshments

• All parallel session will take place in Rolle Building

• Posters and stands will be displayed on the 6th Floor of the Rolle Building

• Lunch and an afternoon tea will take place on the 6th Floor of the Rolle Building

• Tea and Coffee Breaks will be on the 1st Floor Foyer

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The Pedagogic Research Institute and Observatory

Influencing policy and practice through research

PedRIO challenge - Understand better how to enhance teaching, learning and the student experience and use this evidence in future developments of policy and practice at Plymouth University

Enhance the reputation of Plymouth University as a place to study and as a national/ international leader in pedagogic research

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PedRIO Theme Groups • Critically inclusive pedagogies and the issue of Higher

Education (pedagogy of hope) - Suanne Gibson• Centre for Sustainable Futures (CSF) – Stephen Sterling• Collaboration for the Advancement of Medical Education

Research and Assessment (CAMERA) - Julian Archer• Masters-level teaching pedagogies - Pauline Kneale and Julie

Anderson• Digital Innovation Group – Neil Witt• Quantitative reasoning: employability, engagement equity

and enterprise - Paul Hewson • Community engagement group - Jocey Quinn

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Dates for the Diary2016 events

April• Effective Evaluation Workshop,7th April 2016• PedRIO 5th Annual Conference, 8th April 2016• Deadline for papers next Friday 15th January 2016

June • Digital Learning Conference, 29th June 2016• VC’s 14th Teaching and Learning Conference, 30th June

2016. Call for Papers now open.

Visit the PedRIO website www.plymouth.ac.uk/pedrio for details of PedRIO theme group seminars, TLS workshops and seminars

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The Challenge for Enhancement in Master’s Learning

Master’s Students should be drivers, not passengersThe Quality Assurance Agency Scotland, 2013, p. 5.

Your aim for today

• Listen, and engage in dialogue, to enable transformation in our practises around M level (PGT) learning.

• Be challenged in some way and Contribute to defining what research is needed next?

• Leave with new thinking, insights and questions to share with colleagues and students.

What has reset your thinking in the past 12 months?

Graduates at this level will apply knowledge and skills to demonstrate autonomy, expert judgement, adaptability and

responsibility as a practitioner or learner. Australian Qualifications Authority 2014

At master’s level, their knowledge should not be bounded by yours,

The Quality Assurance Agency Scotland, 2013, p. 5.

Do we know what has reset our students / tutees thinking in the past 12 months?

What do you know about the M student experience?

Mixed offerings and audiences?

• Very diverse student body• Very diverse programmes• Academic Courses • Applied and professional

courses• Research training M+3

• Recent graduates• Returners• Full time • Part time • Distance learners• Adult learners

3/4 of UK PGT students are self-funded - implications for social mobility - I can do a M degree, but only locally.

How do we know what M students think?

• Role of the personal tutors? That regular 1:1 discussion, induction, family, how are you, how is the work going ...

• Surveys by the people who teach may not get an honest answer – they mark my work.

• Courses are over so fast, improvements will not benefit these students

• Should we routinely obtain feedback from students 3 and 5 years later?

Happy students?

• Just because a student appears to be listening and nodding, it doesn't necessarily mean they are engaged in learning and happy.

• What characterises a happy, engaged M student - running round, being creative, ...grabbing the pen to write on the flip chart - making ideas buzz around the room.

Transition and Induction

Who should own the classroom space?

• Are we teaching what we want to teach. The classroom can be seen as 'my space' where I talk about my own research - don't interrupt ...

• Are we teaching what students need to learn to be effective in the workplace for the next five years?

• Are we treating students as the adults they are? 22-70 years old

• Is it a real step up from final undergraduate year?

Standards and Activity

• Are modules all at level 7 – demanding enough? • These are people with experience and the skills to

co-create with you, where you can take issues where we do not know the answer, and see what they can do with them.

• It is a space where you can try to find answers, and it doesn't matter if they are not found. Marking the process of learning, not a list of regurgitated information temporarily held in a brain after revision.

Can we be more flexible in programmedesign?

• PGT is a static package nationally UK 180cr, usually 60 T + 60 T + 60 R

• For students with PhD potential, could they work in the lab / library / studio with a Prof and his team for semester 2, get the LOs / 60cr in a different way, instead?

• Could a student who finds an ideal placement do second semester with a company, producing a report / log / creation that demonstrates the LOs for 60cr?

• What could flexible learning actually look like? What does co-designed look like?

• In practice most people will take the main menu, - should students be able to tailor their learning to their personal agenda?

Students ‘feel’ the real life world of a

researcher / practitioner

Knowledge, behaviours, skills and attitudes developed Research practice and

assessment mirrors real research and practice

processes

Motivation to continue to work in the discipline area

is engendered

Students understand generic and professional competencies

Students know where and how learning can continue:

CPD, further degrees, life long learning

Module Considerations

Internationalisation

• How do we deliver effectively to international students?

• Especially people who have travelled to learn in an international context, but then spend their time with students from their own country?

• What are we offering in the class room and the 'cultural' student experience that makes it worthwhile?

• Should there be a cultural offering for all international students throughout the academic year?

• Is their research experience relevant to their home country context?

Assessment

• Is assessment enabling autonomy and research in every module?

Visibility to Undergraduates

• Where and how do we promote the PGT offer to UGs?

• How do they know this is an option - where are they meeting PGT and PGR students?

• Can the UG curriculum have elements where PGT and PGR students are properly involved? Engineering in UK and some US Universities vertical projects .... examples

• Finding ways to make PGT an aspiration for our students would be helpful

Concerns – for university?

• Coasting on our past successes is not an option. Postgraduate capacity must be at the heart of our national plans for long-term competitiveness and growth. Failure to do so puts at risk out future prosperity. HEC 2012 p18

• Are we offering degrees of the right sort: – those who want a change of direction while in work – Those upskilling for promotion– People with disposable income who are newly retired - art,

geology, creative writing, ... U3A

Concerns – for university?

• Do programmes pay their way? • Do we close programmes fast enough? • UK taught masters are very short - not Bologna

aligned• What are the Private Providers doing within nearest

50 miles? If it is making them a profit why are we not competing for that market? Are we aggressive (enough) in changing our offer to challenge the competition?

Final Thoughts – big agenda• Induction is crucial. How does this need to evolve?• Is the ‘tutor role’ active, enabling student-staff interactions every

(other) day? • Is there enough research? Do PGT students co-create with

academics and practitioners to genuinely benefit their discipline as well as their own understandings?

• How do we deliver on the benchmarks of autonomy, independence, responsibility and judgement?

• Is assessment enabling autonomy and research in every module?• Do we deliver effectively to international students? • Do we need some parallel modules to challenge students with

different backgrounds?• Can we be more flexible in programme design?