Using Storify as an Engaging Learning Tool, by Dr Jamie Bailey

Student Engagement
Social media that helps students engage with their learning, through co-creation, co-learning and co-designing with other stakeholders (Healey et al., 2014), is often used as a tool to facilitate knowledge development.

However existing methods that use social media as an inclusive learning tool, although proven to be effective in some instances for instance helping to facilitate and support student-centred learning activities (Halverson, 2011), may also cause distractions and also preclude some learners (e.g. international students).

Storify?
One approach that I have used to address some of these issues is Storify (www.storify.com). Storify is a free online tool through which online resources are used to create ‘stories’ in order to showcase specific topics, products, news events and so on. One of the benefits of this for facilitators is that when it is set up, it can be easily added to and changed, making it a resource that can offer ongoing support and that develops over time.

Stories comprise of a variety of resources - web links, images (Flickr, Getty and Instagram), videos (YouTube), Tweets, Facebook links, music (Soundcloud) (Fig. 1). Generally if it is on the internet it can be used.

Fig 1. Online resources that can be incorporated into ‘stories’

Storify as a learning tool
From a student perspective the benefit of these stories for students is that they can view a topic and related content all in one place. This focused resource then can help support knowledge development (by linking case studies, news articles, and other articles), revision and crucially co-creative engagement. Furthermore, access to the stories requires no login and can be embedded, making it an ideal tool for inclusive learning activities.

I have introduced this in Digital and Marketing Communications, a level 5 marketing module. Students use Storify to help relate theoretical content to real-life examples. Marketing as a topic is perfect for this, due to the constant examples and ever changing context, but it is easily adaptable to any subject that encourages critical thinking and expansion beyond the prescribed curriculum.

Fig 2. A digital marketing story embedded in the Keele Learning Environment

So has it been successful? While it is not without small issues (e.g. encouraging students to provide resources for inclusion), there are about 500 views for each topic at the time of writing, and this will more than likely increase now that exam period is approaching. Students have also reacted positively to this resource, noting the extra support, engagement, and contemporary knowledge of the marketing environment that it offers.

Dr. Jamie Bailey
Marketing
Keele Management School
www.storify.com/KeeleMktGroup

If you would like any more information on Storify as a learning tool, or wish for a more in depth demonstration of how it could be incorporated into modules, please feel free to contact me at j.bailey3@keele.ac.uk.

References
Halverson, E (2011), "Do social networking technologies have a place in formal learning environments?," On The Horizon-The Strategic Planning Resource for Education Professionals, 19 (1), 62-67.

Healey, M., A. Flint, and K Harrington (2014), "Engagement Through Partnership: Students as Partners in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education." York: Higher Education Academy.

Neier, S, and L Zayer (2015), "Students’ Perceptions and Experiences of Social Media in Higher Education," Journal of Marketing Education, ISSUE, 1-11.

Taylor, S, G Hunter, H Melton, and S Goodwin (2011), "Student Engagement and Marketing Classes," Journal of Marketing Education, 33 (1), 73-92.


Using Storify as an Engaging Learning Tool by Dr Jamie Bailey, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Tune in to the TuneIN Calendar: Academic, professional and personal development opportuntities for all, Dr Chris Little

The Tune In calendar (Available via (www.keele.ac.uk/studentlearning/tuneincalendar/) is a central calendar of developmental workshops and opportunities which all students and staff can attend at Keele University. This calendar is part of the Development Strand, which in turn is part of the Distinctive Keele Curriculum (Keele University, 2016a). Workshops are offered by colleagues from Student Learning, the Library, Health Library, Careers and Employability Services and Counselling and Mental Health Support Services. The live TuneIN calendar can be seen below

Many students and staff are unaware of these opportunities and this short piece will detail the provision which the Student Learning (SL) team contribute to the Tune In calendar.

Allen and Clarke (2007) note importance of such metacognitive and generic skills, like those featured on the Tune In calendar, as crucial to success both in HE and in the careers of our learners. While they do note that it is beneficial to have these types of skills developed within academic programmes, providing our students, and staff, with additional opportunities to develop further. These opportunities promote a reflective mindset and afford more opportunities to work towards Keele’s graduate attributes.

Student Learning Tune In workshops

The Student Learning team offers several academic, personal and professional skills workshops each week which run from October to May each academic year. These are advertised to students via two means: firstly, the workshops are advertised via the Tune In calendar website; secondly, all undergraduate and postgraduate students also receive a weekly email, named the ‘Study Skill Digest’, detailing our workshops.

These free workshops, designed to complement Keele’s academic programmes, are open to all staff and students at Keele. This presents a number of challenges for us as lecturers. Firstly, we have some idea, through our electronic booking forms, how many students will attend, but this does not always hold true so requires a degree of flexibility on group tasks and other teaching methodologies within the session. Secondly, it is not uncommon for us to need to cater for a significant range in academic levels. Any one session could have 1st year undergraduates through to final year PhD students within and our materials and delivery need to be flexible enough to handle this variety.

In the 2013/14 academic year the number of students attending these optional workshops rose to 350, a significant leap from the 50 that attended in 2012/13. The following data, gathered from student evaluative questionnaires (SEQ) at the end of each workshop, indicates a positive experience for learners at our sessions. SEQ’s have a contested worth in evaluating teaching practices, with some feeling they can ‘dumb-down’ discussions about and data surrounding teaching and learning (Johnson, 2000). However, for services such as ours which can, in some areas, have little long-term contact with students, they represent a valid and useful method of gaining feedback about the sessions themselves (Parlett & Hamilton, 1972), if not their longer term impact. Table 1, however, demonstrates a comparison across the last two academic years from SEQs:

	2013/14	2014/15
Number of students attended workshops	340	182
Average feedback score (1-5 scale)	4.5	4.5
% of students that would attend another workshop	94%	97%
% of students that would like to see these sessions embedded in their programmes	85%	89%

Table 1: Comparative data across 2013/14 and 2014/15

The data for 2015/16 has continued to echo the above, although we have changed the SEQ questions this year to further enact Kirkpatrick’s (2006) evaluative framework. In 2015/16, we have achieved an average feedback rating of 4.6/5 and 100% of students who attended the Student Learning workshops from the Tune In calendar felt it would have a positive impact on their studies and would recommend the workshops to students wanting to further develop their skills. We are currently working on a means of evaluating the longer term impact of the studies and hope to disseminate these findings at a later date.

While we have seen a decrease in attendance at freestanding workshops, this could be explained by the significantly larger number of students accessing our embedding study skills workshops, detailed in Issue 5 of the Journal of Academic Development and Education (JADE) (Little, 2016). One could infer from this that more students are getting this explicit learning development in their programmes thus not needing to perhaps visit freestanding, extra-curricular workshops.

We have also seen a dramatic increase in the number of students attending our Write Direction Study Skills service (Keele University, 2016b). The Write Direction is a confidential one-to-one tutoring service which allows students to work on any area of their academic, personal and professional skills on an individual basis. We predominantly focus on academic practices such as essay planning and academic writing but do also focus on other skills such as presentation skills and time management to name a few. If you feel a student may benefit from seeing us advise them to contact the team on student.learning@keele.ac.uk. Alternatively they can come to our drop in service which runs every Wednesday afternoon 2-4pm in the Tawney building.

Conclusions: What next?

The Tune In calendar is a valuable addition to Keele’s academic programmes and to many student’s surprise, attendance at any of the workshops is completely and utterly free of charge! If colleagues would like more information please do visit http://www.keele.ac.uk/studentlearning/tuneincalendar/ to view the Tune In offering. Alternatively, feel free to contact the Student Learning team on student.learning@keele.ac.uk to learn more.

Reference List

Allan, J. and Clarke, K. (2007) 'Nurturing Supportive Learning Environments in Higher Education through the Teaching of Study Skills: To Embed or Not to Embed?', International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. 19 (1): 64-76.

Johnson, R. (2000) 'The Authority of the Student Questionnaire', Teaching in Higher Education. 5 (4): 419-434.

Keele University. (2016a). Distinctive Keele Curriculum. [Online]. [Accessed 29th February 2016]. Available from: http://www.keele.ac.uk/distinctive/

Keele University. (2016a). Tune In Calendar. [Online]. [Accessed 29th February 2016]. Available from: http://www.keele.ac.uk/studentlearning/tuneincalendar/

Keele University. (2016b). Write Direction: Study Skills Advice. [Online]. [Accessed 29th February 2016]. Available from: http://www.keele.ac.uk/writedirection/Kirkpatrick, D. L. (2006). Evaluating training programs: The four levels. 3rd edn. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler.

Little, C. (2016). The DKC People? The Student Learning team and the growth of embedding learning development in academic programmes. [Online] Journal of Academic Development and Education. 5: 58-63. [Accessed 29th February 2016]. Available from: https://jadekeele.files.wordpress.com/2016/01/jade-fifth-edition.pdf

Parlett, M. and Hamilton, D. (1972) Evaluation as Illumination: A New Approach to the Study of Innovatory Programs. Occasional Paper, London: Nuffield Foundation.

Tune in to the TuneIN Calendar: Academic, professional and personal development opportuntities for all, by Dr Chris Little, Keele university is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Seeds for Solutions, How does the past inform the future? Innovation projects from 2014/15 #KATS2015

Project Title: Students' Psychophysical Responses to Feedback
Project Leader(s): Yvonne Skipper and Russ Crawford

Research examining the impact of feedback suggests that different forms can lead to different responses to failure. Some forms lead students to persist and succeed while others can lead students to give up (Dweck, 1999). However, the reasons for this have largely been discussed as being due to thoughts about intelligence.

By using physical measures and combining ideas from both psychology and medicine, results from this research will tell us more about how the body and mind respond to feedback together. Perhaps some forms of feedback create more of an adrenaline-mediated ‘fight or flight’ response which could hinder learning.

Students' Psychophysical Responses to Feedback - Final Project Report

Students' Psychophysical Responses to Feedback by Yvonne Skipper and Russ Crawford, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Project Title: Can Interactive Classroom Technologies Improve Student Engagement and Performance?
Project Leader(s): Jan Hoole and Tracy Lovatt

Increasing student engagement with learning materials during lectures and tutorials is a challenge for every lecturer. This project evaluates three freeware and one licensed programme, each offering ways of optimising student/teacher interaction. The student can offer free-text responses to lecturer questions and answer multiple-choice questions. In addition some of the software is suitable for real-time student feedback in the form of ‘confusion rating’ of individual slides and of teaching evaluation questionnaires. The research will enable tutors to quickly choose appropriate free software for the particular application they require, reducing preparation time and improving interaction between student and tutor.

Can Interactive Classroom Technologies Improve Student Engagement and Performance? - Final Project Report 

Can Interactive Classroom Technologies Improve Student Engagement and Performance? by Jan Hoole and Tracy Lovatt, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Project Title: Personalised Immersive Learning: Using Virtual Reality Headsets to Provide Engaging and Flexible Clinical Learning Opportunities
Project Leader(s): Mel Humphreys, Luke Bracegirdle, Pete Lonsdale, Tim Smale, Daryl Kerr and Ian Wood

New virtual reality headsets allow us to provide students with personal, immersive environments where they can take part in simulations of clinical episodes. Building on previous work between the Schools of Pharmacy and Nursing & Midwifery, we will be extending existing work on the Virtual Ward to allow access by a greater range of students from more diverse settings, and utilising a variety of scenarios. Students will be able to immerse themselves within clinical environments, interacting with patients and healthcare teams to explore the essential skills of teamwork, communication, and meaningful decision making in an authentic and safe setting.

Personalised Immersive Learning: Using Virtual Reality Headsets to Provide Engaging and Flexible Clinical Learning Opportunities by Mel Humphreys, Luke Bracegirdle, Pete Lonsdale, Tim Smale, Daryl Kerr and Ian Wood, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Seeds for Solutions, How does the past inform the future? Innovation projects from 2014/15 #KATS2015

Project Title: Welcome to the World of Research: an Undergraduate Research Conference for Biochemistry and Biomedical Science Finalists
Project Leader(s): David Watson, Sheila Hope and Trish Procter

Final year research projects are integral to most undergraduate programmes, usually assessed as a project report. Wider dissemination of research work in the context of professional practice is through conference attendance with delivery of an oral and/or poster presentation. Whilst many courses also include these additional assessments, often based on the final year research projects, few students are afforded the opportunity to attend professional conference. This project will establish a two-day undergraduate research conference for final year Biochemistry and Biomedical Science students, designed to give students real-life experience of conference presentation in an environment more akin to professional practice.

Welcome to the World of Research - Final Project Report

Welcome to the World of Research: an Undergraduate Research Conference for Biochemistry and Biomedical Science Finalists by David Watson, Sheila Hope and Trish Procter, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Project Title: An e-learning Platform to Promote Active Learning through Screencast Technology
Project Leader(s): Laura Hancock

The use of screencasts to supplement learning is becoming commonplace in higher education but there are concerns that their use may promote mostly passive learning. The aim of this project is to create an e-learning platform that provides the appropriate scaffolding to stimulate active learning in chemistry by combining screencast technology with interactive quizzes to deliver instant feedback. Users of this resource will be required to demonstrate recall and understanding of basic concepts before gaining access to higher level screencast material, allowing users to construct their own knowledge and discouraging a passive approach to learning.


An e-learning Platform to Promote Active Learning through Screencast Technology by Laura Hancock, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Seeds for Solutions, How does the past inform the future? Innovation projects from 2014/15 #KATS2015

Project Title: Using Twitter in Sociology Teaching and Learning
Project Leader(s): Ala Sirriyeh and Emma Head

The aim of this project is to assess the use of Twitter as a tool to promote enhanced student learning and engagement on a sociology module. The research will evaluate the use of Twitter as a learning tool in a new level seven module 'Race', Racism and Resistance, which will run in semester one, 2014-15. Twitter activities will be designed to connect the online and offline tasks that students are engaging in. This project will contribute to wider debates around the use of social media in higher education teaching and learning.

Using Twitter in Sociology Teaching and Learning - Final Project Report

Using Twitter in Sociology Teaching and Learning by Ala Sirriyeh and Emma Head, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Project Title: Intelligence' and Success at University
Project Leader(s): Yvonne Skipper

Students can think of intelligence as being fixed or malleable. Research suggests that those with a malleable view are more likely to choose challenging learning goals, cope well with setbacks and perform better. This is because they believe that intelligence can be changed with effort.

This project involves delivering an intervention to encourage students to feel that intelligence and success are due to their efforts more than their abilities. This will involve a lecture during Freshers week and reflective activities cross the year. Students will also complete questionnaires to examine how the intervention may have impacted their views and performance.

Intelligence' and Success at University - Final Project Report

Intelligence' and Success at University by Yvonne Skipper, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Seeds for Solutions, How does the past inform the future? Innovation projects from 2013/14 #KATS2015

Project Title: The Use of 3D Printing to Enhance Teaching in the Natural Sciences
Project Leader(s): David Thompson, Matthew O'Brien, Graeme Jones, Jane Essex and Dave McGarvey

The ability to visualise in three dimensions is key to understanding many concepts within the sciences. It is widely acknowledged that this can be difficult for students. This results in a barrier that can impact their ability to progress. To overcome this molecular models are used to help visualise the chemical entity in question. Traditional molecular models represent a reasonable investment for an individual but have significant limitations. This project aims to evaluate the use of 3D printer technology to develop inexpensive models that can overcome this barrier and enhance a student’s learning experience.

The Use of 3D Printing - Final Project Report

The Use of 3D Printing to Enhance Teaching in the Natural Sciences by David Thompson, Matthew O'Brien, Graeme Jones, Jane Essex and Dave McGarvey, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Project Title: Gamification of Information Retrieval from the British National Formulary: A Novel Approach to Student Skill Development
Project Leader(s): Katie Maddock and Jonathan Berry

The British National Formulary (BNF) is a comprehensive resource for information on all drugs available for prescription in the UK. Many drugs have more than one clinical indication and to become safe and efficient practitioners, pharmacy students need to be able to retrieve information from the BNF quickly and accurately. The legacy will be multiplatform, game-based training tool providing a safe, competitive and fun environment in which healthcare professional students can develop and practice these information retrieval skills. Instant, formative feedback will be given for all tasks, fostering and developing deeper learning based upon the information found.

Gamification of Information Retrieval from the British National Formulary: A Novel Approach to Student Skill Development by Katie Maddock and Jonathan Berry, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

An example of increased student engagement through ‘Student Choice’ in the School of Life Sciences

The need for change

Keele University has focussed on differentiating itself in its market sector by introducing a ‘distinctive’ element to the curriculum: a framework that articulates the opportunities for an individual to design their own student experience:

Every student is encouraged to develop their own knowledge, skills and attitudes in order to make a difference to their own world – and create a ‘personalised learning experience’ (Campbell, et al., 2007) (Department for Education and Skills, 2004). However, when it comes to study skills and professional development sessions we, as academics, identify the needs of students through our own experience of student problems – these might be common mistakes in written assignments, visible difficulties in class discussions, or the personal assessment of capabilities during coaching sessions.

In Biochemistry & Biomedical Science we decided to turn things around and let the students drive their own development!

Research suggests that significant benefits are realised if students are in control of their own destiny – these are seen as improvements in ‘general well-being, behaviour and values, and academic achievement’ (Kohn, 1993). These finding are echoed in the work of Kay & LeSage (2009) who looked closely at the relationship between personalisation and achievement. Streeting & Wise (2009) also suggest that student engagement will follow if students are actively involved in the decision-making process, invited to help in curriculum design and given some control over the learning environment.

As teachers, the task at hand is to establish ways of achieving student engagement (the motivation, self-discipline and reflection that leads to a deeper understanding) when we are faced with large groups of diverse students with differing interests, abilities and needs.

We decided to try to tailor a learning intervention in the form of a skills conference.

A different approach

In the first instance we created a ‘conference style’ matrix of study skills sessions and we asked students to select which sessions they would like to attend. The Google booking form (see Fig 1) gave us a comprehensive picture of which students had replied and how many students were booked in to each session. We asked students to assemble in a main room for an opening and introductory few minutes before they then divided and made their way to their own programmes of study. This created a real buzz around the event and there was a lot of discussion between students about what they had chosen and why. The feedback from the conference was extremely encouraging. Students appreciated the choice element and did feel in control of their study.

Encouraged by the initial success, we ventured further into the choice element for the Year 2 students! In this case we sent out a questionnaire asking the students what they would like to see on offer in a Year 2 skills conference so that they could drive what was on offer. The responses that we received were extremely helpful (see Fig 2). They allowed us to tailor inputs to meet specific requests and ensure that all needs were catered for (see Fig 3).

It was not all plain sailing as you can imagine. Students need to be encouraged to book onto the sessions, and constantly reminded that this was important! Questionnaires needed to be followed up, and the session bookings were not entirely reliable since some students did not book in time or changed their minds on the day! However, the end result in terms of engagement far outweighed any difficulties experienced.

Figure 1: Biochemistry & Biomedical Sciences (Year 1) - Skills Conference

Figure 2: Skills Conference Content- Student Requests

Year 2 Conference Outline

Figure 3: Biochemistry & Biomedical Sciences (Year 2) - Skills Conference

How did we do?

The feedback that we received was very rewarding. The comments were reflective and indicated a deep level of engagement with the session content:

“I will start to practice now on the online (psychometric) tests and find more volunteer work.” “I will present myself better at the future interviews.”

“I will identify more of the transferable skills and state them in my CV. I will make my CV more specific.”

“I will analyse the situations I go through and really think about the skills I gain and how they can help me in the future.”

“… the KUSP - it’s been on my mind and I'm happy I've got more info and begun it.”

“It has kicked me in to gear to start the KUSP as I have been putting it off for a while, also, informing me that I need to start looking at internships.”

And the best comment to receive after trialling this approach was:

“I found picking the courses most relevant to me made it more interesting.”


A student-driven model for success

The two skills conferences now form the foundation blocks to an integrated development programme that ends with a student-led conference for Biochemistry In Practice students in their third year (see Fig 4).

Figure 4: Biochemistry & Biomedical Science Transferrable Skills Development

References

Campbell, R. J. et al., 2007. Personalised Learning: Ambiguities in theory and practice. British Journal of Educational Studies, pp. 135-154.

Department for Education and Skills, 2004. A National Conversation about Personalised Learning, Nottingham: DfES Publications.

Kay, R. & LeSage, A., 2009. Examining the benefits and challenges of using audience response systems: A review of the literature. Computers & Education, Volume 53, pp. 819-827.

Kohn, A., 1993. Choice for Children - Why and how to let students decide. [Online]
Available at: http://www.alfiekohn.org/articles/
[Accessed 20 July 2015].

Streeting, W. & Wise, G., 2009. Rethinking the values of higher education - consumption, partnership, community?, Gloucester: The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education.

An example of increased student engagement through ‘Student Choice’ in the School of Life Sciences, Keele University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.