Ha! Really glad to report that Plymouth, which has an unusually large proportion of students with disabilities (12%), has just announced that alternative assessment options designed (by law) for such students are to be made available to all students. So the needs of people who found themselves on the margins have drawn attention to what is likely to be good for all. As Rumi says, 'blessed are the cracks, for they let in the light'! Eloïse Learning Development with Plymouth University www.learningdevelopment.plymouth.ac.uk<http://www.learningdevelopment.plymouth.ac.uk/> From: learning development in higher education network [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Sandra Sinfield Sent: 04 June 2013 15:09 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: hhhmmm? Great response, John! I think you also touch on an issue that has frustrated many of us in re WP. Surely the point of opening the university's doors to difference (as well as ethics, social justice...) should be to embrace and benefit from that difference rather than just to subjugate it? Instead as Lillis and Thomas and others have argued - we have a demonising of the WP student who is accused of dumbing down the whole academic system and bringing the nation to its knees - and then - hardly visible out of the corner of your eye - a subtle little flick of the academic wrist and rather than opening up opportunity, embracing multi-modality and creating and recognising as valid many ways to be different within academia ... we have created instead a two-tier HE system. We *should* have expected the Spanish Inquisition! Best, Sandra On 4 June 2013 13:53, John Sutter <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: Hello all, This is a fascinating thread! I'm also new to this forum, and come from an adult language/literacy teaching background, where there's also a growing degree of scepticism about 'skills-based' approaches to learning. So the article which kicked this discussion off seemed very familiar to me in it's critique of 'skills'- yet also extremely conservative in terms of conclusions, in particular: 'The educational interventions that make most difference to student performance are not to do with improving teachers or curricula, and certainly not with policy or organisational changes, but involve improving students' In my field, there's already been something of a swing towards more socially-situated views of learning and a social practices approach, very much emphasising the importance and particularities of the context(s) in which students encounter new language and literacy practices. Much of this swing has been provoked by some of the theoretical and research literature around literacy/social practices - e.g. Brian Street's seminal work (one item already mentioned in this string I think) on how literacy practices are 'ideological', the New London Group, James Paul Gee's "Social Linguistics and Literacies" and Alastair Pennycook's work on language practices, as well as growing awareness of the multimodality of 'real' communication, academic or otherwise (ie it's not just the words or the texts, but all the other elements through which humans interact - visuals, sounds, the body, physical environment etc). But twinned with this, there's also been a growing disillusion amongst many language and literacy teachers with the skills-based national curricula currently used (imposed) in Adult education, where, for example, complex activities such as 'reading' are broken down into ever smaller decontextualised and 'transferable' 'sub-skills'. This 'skills' approach has been further officially reinforced (unfortunately!) in FE with the arrival of 'Functional Skills' quals, which explicitly test the students' ability to 'transfer' skills in language or maths from one context to another. A 'practices' approach (as well as a lot of research) casts doubt on the tranferability of skills from one context to another, - and casts doubt of the very existence of decontextualised 'skills' in any meaningful sense. In other words, it's all about learning/joining/engaging with the 'practices' one meets in different contexts - and the old idea of a university as representing one context in which there is a particular way to do 'academic' talk or writing is hopelessly naive: universities contain a huge multiplicity of different contexts and practices that can't be reduced to a set of 'skills'. This connects with why, as Gibbs says, 'good' writing or note-taking on one course may not be considered 'good' writing or note-taking on another (in terms of success in getting high marks). The other key factor a practices-based view of learning brings in is power. If all 'practices' are socially situated, they are 'neither natural, nor universal, nor ideologically neutral' as Kern puts it, but are culturally constructed. So if we find that some 'dominant' social or academic practices effectively disadvantage some students, our real energies ought not to be going into remedial teaching, (which could be read as a kind of Foucauldian 'disciplining') but asking why, and into reshaping (and helping students to reshape) the practices themselves. This means focusing our attention on the curriculum and on the course teaching as much as on 'supporting students' - the opposite in fact, of Gibbs's claim above, though funnily enough also arrived at through a critique of 'skills'.Of course, this presents us with a whole other set of problems: but it's what many universities are struggling with around inclusion, internationalisation and WP, where increasingly we're finding whole groups of students who are effectively 'othered' by the dominant academic practices they encounter. (E.g. - to be provocative! - why should curricula and assessment practices be so potentially fraught for dyslexic students - couldn't things be done differently? (going further than just 'alternative assessments for dyslexic learners'). Shouldn't a properly internationalised university also be a multilingual university? Why should academic writing be 'impersonal' or detached', when such claims rather contradict the essence of much of the postmodern theory our students are asked to engage with?) In other words, we (and students) need to ourselves take a critical approach to concepts like 'critical thinking', 'academic writing', 'research' 'objectivity' etc..... phew! - seems like enough for now... all best to all John John Sutter Programme Manager, EAP University for the Creative Arts Falkner Road Farnham Surrey, GU9 7DS UK Tel: +44 (0) 1252 892991<tel:%2B44%20%280%29%201252%20892991> Mob: 07813 836559 Skype: jssutter www.ucreative.ac.uk<http://www.ucreative.ac.uk/> On 4 Jun 2013, at 11:44, Norman, Kay wrote: My first post ---- a newbie Dear Jeanette I wholeheartedly agree with you; how are they supposed to 'be able to do' or 'know' something that they have never been introduced to before. So many mature learners come forward embarrassed that they don't have certain 'academic skills' (actually, most of the younger learners don't either, but they aren't reflective enough to realise and admit to that until later on in the course.. another story!) that they can apply successfully to the different modules and assessments they face. They are the ones I've got such reward seeing 'transform' as they so often already have life skills to realise that they are 'lacking' something and endeavour to fill the gap. Just showing them how to apply reflective/critical skills to their studies transforms their whole approach and understanding of HE and their role within it. I am currently in the situation where I may (through force of numbers) have to focus on the 'remedial' rather than coach the self-selecting, and I'm a little apprehensive.... Kay Study Coach Anglia Ruskin -----Original Message----- From: learning development in higher education network [mailto:[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>] On Behalf Of Janette Myers Sent: 04 June 2013 11:13 To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: hhhmmm? Dear Kal, this is a really interesting point which kept me occupied on my new exercise regime which involves walking to a much further tube station! I think you're right in that part of my problem with 'remedial' is that I simply don't like it, it is a knee jerk reaction. It has all sorts of connotations which a background in adult ed brings up. It's used a lot in medical education and also in dealing with doctors whose performance is sub standard. (incidentally it's interesting that the discourse around underperforming doctors is around identification in order to remediate, whereas that around underperforming teachers is of identification in order to sack- but that's another story) However, I would take issue that difference in what people are able to do leads to remediation issues. I think that many of the things students have to do in HE are new, we wouldn't expect them to have acquired high level criticality through pre HE study, or knowledge about certain discipline areas and we wouldn't expect them to have certain practical skills, such as suturing. This doesn't make them 'remedial', but 'lacks' in other areas do, and I don't know how or why we choose those areas as the ones we expect them to already know, but not others. At the very least we should be able to clearly articulate that and we by and large don't. Does it make a difference in an Eng lit course if students are already familiar with texts? Does being unfamiliar make you remedial? Does not knowing that you don't just talk about what you liked and hated in a text make you remedial? What is the role of the programme of study in conveying a body of knowledge production and outcomes? I'm starting to burble now, so will stop. Many thanks for posing such a provocative question Regards Janette On 03/06/2013 16:51, [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> wrote: Hi, I'm also relatively new to this list, and enjoy the conversations and resource sharing. I agree that this article makes good points, and with the sentiments about the embedded, metacognitive and transformative nature of the work. I have a question though. I'm guessing that most would agree that some students are in more needed of learning development than others - some are already competently reflective, self-regulatory, critical learners; others are less so. So surely, the remedial piece is a part of LD work. Not all, clearly, but surely 'remediation' is a term that shouldn't be considered a dirty word, isn't it? After all, helping those students who have encountered barriers they struggle to overcome, or who have failed courses, is perhaps the most challenging and interesting aspect of learning development work. And if we don't help them, who will? Why is it so common to deny the remedial part of LD? Really curious, Kal Winston Study Adviser, Bangor University Quoting Janette Myers <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>>: Thanks for circulating this Gordon. I thought it a very positive piece, making some succinct key points. It will be of use to me in supporting some of the things I try to convey about embedding, metacognition and the non-remedial (and transformative Sandra!) nature of LD regards Janette On 03/06/2013 13:11, Gordon Asher wrote: *Raising awareness of best-practice pedagogy* 30 MAY 2013 Graham Gibbs asks what 'study skills' consist of and whether they can actually be learned by students http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/news/raising-awareness-of-best-practice-pedagogy/2004204.article SOURCE: *ALAMY* <http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/news/raising-awareness-of-best-practice-pedagogy/2004204.article> Tunnel vision: giving students 'how-to' guides to learning does not encourage the kind of flexible thinking that is required to get the most out of higher education When I was at The Open University in the 1970s, I tried to teach adults who were studying for the first time in their lives what they needed to do in order to learn effectively. When I was based at Oxford Polytechnic (now Oxford Brookes University) in the 1980s, I was teaching students whose study habits had got them through their A levels but were unequal to the larger and more complex tasks of higher education. And when I later worked at the University of Oxford, students were still asking for help with "study skills". Their intelligence and achievements were intimidating, so what was the problem? The educational interventions that make most difference to student performance are not to do with improving teachers or curricula, and certainly not with policy or organisational changes, but involve improving students: changing what it is they do in order to learn. For example, teachers can often help students more by encouraging them to tackle feedback differently than by altering the feedback itself. So what does "improving students" actually consist of? "How to" guides on study skills - how to take notes, how to structure an essay and so on - contain what appears to be sound enough advice (although the similarity between them is both striking and suspicious). However, attempts to back up this consensus with evidence of the effectiveness of the techniques described have had little success. Students' scores on "study habits inventories" - questionnaires made up of lists of the kinds of things contained in these books - hardly correlate with examination performance at all. An exception is how to be organised (by managing one's time, for example). "Organisation" predicts performance where the use of most "skills" does not. Students also rarely use the methods they read about in how-to-study books or are taught on study skills courses, and for all kinds of reasons. Most importantly, the skills may be too rigid to span the range of demands that students actually face. For example, lectures may primarily convey facts, or explain procedures, or exemplify the use of the discourse of the discipline, and so on. Each requires a different kind of note-taking, and students have to be able to spot these varied demands and do something different in response, not simply use the same methods every time. Disciplines also vary in their demands and conventions: a student studying sociology and history may find that their writing gains good marks in one but not the other. *Fit for purpose* It appears that successful students (and successful academics for that matter) do an extraordinary variety of things when they take notes or set about writing. They have found, often through trial and error, idiosyncratic ways that work well enough for them, given their purposes and the particular learning tasks in front of them. It is possible to train students to use specific technical skills, but they transfer very poorly from one context to another (for example, from a training course back to everyday study, or from studying one subject to another). It is much better, instead, to develop a learner's ability to study a subject within that subject. For example, efforts at some Ivy League universities to improve students' writing by hiring experts in communication who run generic courses in how to write have tended to be abandoned. Instead, postgraduates within subjects are trained to give feedback on assignments that leads students to reflect on their writing, rather than only on the content of the assignment. When I acted as a "study skills counsellor" at Oxford Polytechnic, I noticed that many of the bewildered students in my caseload were unable to describe what they did when they were studying (such as reading a chapter in a book, for example). Their studying was habitual and unreflective. In contrast, effective students can tell you all about how they go about their task, have a sensible rationale for doing so and change what they do when they notice that the context or task demands are different. In the educational literature, this is termed "metacognitive awareness and control", and it is the most influential of all aspects of "study skills". Improving students appears to involve raising their awareness of what they are doing, increasing their repertoire so that they can choose to do different things when it seems appropriate and tuning them in to task demands so that they can recognise what is required. *Right answer, wrong approach* Two crucial aspects of studying effectively are not about "skills" at all but about understanding. Research at Harvard University into why its very bright students sometimes study in unintelligent ways has revealed how important it is for students to understand the nature of knowledge and what they are supposed to do with it. The study found that unsophisticated students would try to spot the right answers in lectures, which they would note down in order to memorise for a test, a method described in the literature by the phrase "quantitative accretion of discrete rightness". They were fantastically efficient at this and it had served them well at school, but it was the wrong thing to do at Harvard. Similarly, studies at the University of Gothenburg have revealed that students have quite different conceptions of what "learning" means, and these conceptions evolved through experience until, ideally, learning is seen as attempting to "apprehend reality". Skills have to serve the purposes associated with these evolving conceptions of knowledge and of learning: without appropriate purposes, the skills can be worse than useless. PRINT HEADLINE: Article originally published as: /Self-reflective improvement/ (30 May 2013) AUTHOR: Graham Gibbs is professor of higher education at the University of Winchester. -- I work Mon-Thur at St George's Dr Janette Myers SFHEA Senior Lecturer in Student Learning and Support, Division of Population Health Sciences and Education, Section for Medical and Healthcare Education, 6th floor Hunter Wing, St George's, University of London Cranmer Terrace London SW17 0RE 020 8725 0616 ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program. -- I work Mon-Thur at St George's Dr Janette Myers SFHEA Senior Lecturer in Student Learning and Support, Division of Population Health Sciences and Education, Section for Medical and Healthcare Education, 6th floor Hunter Wing, St George's, University of London Cranmer Terrace London SW17 0RE 020 8725 0616 -- Sandra Sinfield University Teaching Fellow ________________________________________________________ CELT Learning & Writing Development (www.londonmet.ac.uk/celt<http://www.londonmet.ac.uk/celt>) LC-206 London Metropolitan University, 236-250 Holloway Road, N7 6PP. 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