The University for business

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Staff Development for WebCT Vista Meeting Staff
Needs
Neal Sumner Instructional Designer E Learning
Unit City University WebCT Regional Users Group
meeting 09.03.05
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In the Beginning.

• The ELU was established at City in June 2003
  with 5 members of staff
• 2 Instructional Designers on the team were
  charged with creating and delivering a staff
  development programme with an initial target of
  40 online modules by September 2003.
• The aim of this presentation is to describe the
  initial programme, the changes that were made for
  the 2004-5 academic year and to discuss some of
  the reasons for the changes.

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City Online Staff Development 2003-4
City Online Staff Development 2003-4
The quick and dirty solution to the initial
challenge was to implement a two-day training
programme for staff. The first of these days
Introduction to E Learning - was devoted to
introducing some of the underlying pedagogy of E
Learning, giving staff an opportunity to discuss
how to map their courses onto WebCt and to become
familiar with some of Vistas tools and
functionality. The second day Course Design
covered the roles of Designer and Instructor,
together with hands-on practice at building
courses. These sessions were supported with
additional workshops on specific tools such as
assignments and assessments, using and
facilitating online discussions as well on wider
issues of E Learning. The Instructional
Designers continued to offer face to face and
telephone/email support for users following on
from these sessions.
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Who came?

• In the academic year 2003-2004 the ELU trained
  over 250 staff on how to use the system.
• Although not all these staff developed online
  courses, by the end of the year there were more
  than 200 online modules.
• About half of these staff had some prior
  experience of online teaching and learning.
• Perhaps inevitably these early adopters tended
  to be confident users of ICT and were keen to
  champion E Learning as part of their teaching
  provision.
• The sessions were generic brought staff
  together form many different schools with
  different e learning goals

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Was the 2003-4 programme a success?

• In terms of numbers of staff trained, online
  courses created and impact of E Learning across
  the institution the initial programme of staff
  development must be counted a success.
• However in the course of the year it became
  apparent that it was difficult for many
  interested staff to take 2 full days out of their
  busy schedules to attend the staff development
  sessions.
• The sessions themselves covered a lot of skills
  and knowledge, not all of which stuck.

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Why change?

• Need to reach out beyond the self selected
  audience of early adopters
• Need to provide a more flexible and comprehensive
  programme that would better meet the diversity of
  staff needs
• Need to anticipate increased demand for our
  programme due to policy changes to the
  universitys e presence
• Need to provide shorter sessions that would not
  require staff to give up 2 whole days
• Need to practice what we preach use the e
  learning platform itself to provide a more
  hands-on staff development experience

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Staff Development 2004-5

• The new programme consists of 6 strands.
• These strands are each designed to be delivered
  over lunchtime and last 1 1/2 hours.
• These strands are offered as generic sessions
  open to all and each is run twice during the
  academic year.
• The strands are also available to departments to
  book bespoke sessions.
• We continue to support staff with individual
  consultations as required.

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The Six Strands
Getting Started an online induction for staff to
work through at their own pace.
Designing Online Courses
E Assessment and Evaluation
Legal and Administrative Framework
E Learning Futures
Building Online Communities
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How the strands are organised and delivered

• Each strand is introduced with a face-to-face
  workshop.
• The presentations that frame each strand are made
  available in our Teaching and Learning Online
  staff development module.
• Each strand is supported with Guidance Notes on
  technical as well as pedagogic aspects.
• An online discussion forum is made available
  within each strand where staff are encouraged to
  follow up issues raised in the workshops/presentat
  ions

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An example Building Online Communities
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Guidance Notes
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Other aspects of our staff development programme

• The E Learning Champions scheme
• The Open and Distance Learning Group
• E Learning Resource Centre
• Developing the E Learning Unit website to support
  staff
• Accreditation?

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The story so far.

• This year we have already doubled the number of
  staff who have completed an online induction
  more than 500 in total
• There are now more than 400 online modules the
  largest deployment of WebCT Vista in Europe?