LTI

New learning spaces in Clement House

LTI have been working with LSE Estates and AV to improve teaching and learning spaces at LSE, our most recent project has been to revamp some spaces over 6 floors in Clement House.

Students have made it clear that they don’t have enough spaces around the campus for independent study, for collaborative work, to power their devices or to simply sit between classes (especially where they don’t have to pay for food and drink, or share the space with the public). Our aim was to design spaces in Clement House that are flexible and fulfil a variety of functions; allow students to own and shape the space, to provide and support social interactions and engagement (conversations and community), to offer personal spaces with no distractions (retreat) and to provide resources (power, natural light, work spaces). We want these spaces to represent what it means to study at the LSE. These spaces are an opportunity to bring society and London into the School environment. To inspire curiosity and creativity in students. To offer students space to develop the trans-disciplinary skills of collaboration and communications. To enhance the community feel of LSE informal learning spaces.

Each floor has its own world city theme, (as IR is the home department in the building) with corresponding artwork and technology (including Apple iMac, Mac mini, Smart Kapp board, collaborative tables) and furniture to enable different types of learning activities.

Floor 2 - Rio de Janeiro
Creative, maker space, that is flexible with emphasis on writing. Contains one whiteboard and one interactive smart board to share ideas direct from the board to your devices
clm-floor-2-by-irina-zakharova
Floor 3 - New York
Cafe style break space, wooden bench for individual work & laptop use, an Apple iMac is available for use
clm-floor-3-by-irina-zakharova
Floor 4 - London
Conversation space, informal meeting layout to encourage discussion
clm-floor-4-by-irina-zakharova
Floor 5 - Sydney
Collaborative space - standing height seating and writing with white board
clm-floor-5-by-irina-zakharova
Floor 6 - Tokyo
Connectivity and team working - technology to facilitate sharing, can plug devices into screen and a Mac Mini available for use
clm-floor-6-by-irina-zakharova
Floor 7 - Cape Town
Comfortable quiet reading quiet space, with comfy chairs and plants for a more homely feel
clm-floor-7-by-irina-zakharova

We also commissioned some original digital artwork to be displayed on screens outside of classrooms on two of the floors. Entitled ‘What are we Thinking?’ the animation by local artist Isabel Garrett interprets the brief of bringing London and the world back into the spaces at LSE. You can see the video (with sound) online

clm-animation-what-are-we-thinking-by-isabel-garrett-photo-by-irina-zakharova
In a few weeks we will be adding all of the first year IR318 videos to the screens (with subtitles) in order to celebrate the students work from the innovative project delivered by IR with the support of LTI.

In addition to feedback from students we will be conducting observations of how people use the spaces.  Let us know what you think of the spaces, all completed surveys will be entered into a draw to win Amazon vouchers.

 

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October 26th, 2016|Learning Spaces, Projects, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on New learning spaces in Clement House|

Successfully implementing Ed Tech

Reflections from an EDx course

I recently undertook a Mooc (Massive Open Online Course) hosted by EDx and accredited by MIT on the Implementation and Evaluation of Educational Technology.  Although I was very much a lurker rather than an active participant on the course (one of the main criticisms of Mooc’s), I did find some of the resources useful, particularly the video interviews with individuals mentioned in this blog post.  More importantly it made me reflect on the processes that we carry out here in LTI when evaluating and piloting the use of educational technology.

As learning technologists we constantly test out, explore and critically evaluate educational technology but perhaps we don’t always communicate the specifics of this activity to colleagues.  Different tools have various benefits and constraints which must be taken into consideration including; the scalability, accessibility, associated pedagogy and use, data privacy and storage issues, costs and potential training or support required.  The same tool will have different considerations in different contexts and as technology is always changing and updating this is an ongoing process.  It is also vital to remember that Educational technology does not operate in a vacuum see Tim Monreal’s article which calls for critical digital pedagogical approach.

Pedagogy is always fundamental to the process, (hence the Learning in LTI).  When LTI are contacted by a department or individual with a request for a new technology or tool the question we always ask is ‘what are you trying to do with this tool?’.  What are your learning goals and then we can look into the possible technology and pedagogy to support them.Tools by Yamanaka Tamaki on Flickr_z
One of the key readings on the implementation of ed technology section of the MOOC was Jennifer Groff’s (Groff, 2008) work on developing a framework to identify different barriers to using technology or innovation in the classroom.  Groff points out you can’t just pick a technology and expect the learning environment to change.  Work has to be put into ensuring that staff and students are supported in the use of technology and the teaching and assessment methods suit the learning outcomes.  This resonated with me as I have experienced projects where time poor academics have added the technology but not changed their teaching leading to disappointing results.

Groff identified that lack of innovation (introducing new curricula, new types of assessment or new pedagogy) in education can be due to multiple factors including the structural policies and practices of learning environments, school culture, personal beliefs and attitudes, students expectations and beliefs about learning and teaching and lack of research or the suitability of technology.  Although these barriers can be extremely frustrating being aware of them is half the battle.  LTI are currently working on various projects to listen to the various stakeholders involved in education in order explore possibilities for the future including:

2020Vision; involved speaking to LSE students about their current experience of technology in education and what they would like to see going forward.

SADL; project to work with students to better understand their existing digital and information literacies, share good practice and develop peer support.

NetworkED; seminar series invites speakers from education, computing and related fields to discuss how technology is shaping the world of education.

SparkGrants: provide an opportunity for Academic departments to gain funding and work in collaboration with LTI on projects that innovate teaching and learning.

In a short video interview as part of the course the Executive Director of MIT Justin Reich pointed out that often professional development is just as important as the technology itself and this is something that everyone here in LTI is very much aware of.  Although we have always provided research and training around using educational technology we are now investigating ways to further embed training into projects and how to better communicate the necessity of devoting time not only to learn the practicalities of how to use particular technology but how to use it well in an educational context.  This usually requires taking time to change teaching and learning practices so they embed the technology.  As a team we work with small scale projects to try out new approaches to teaching, learning, assessment and feedback.  Taking part in and evaluating each project allows us to find the tools and teaching methods that can be scaled up and applied to other areas.

Those colleagues that work with us here in LTI are often innovators who should be celebrated and praised for leading the way for others. Integrating change to enhance the student experience, involves renewing your teaching practice, requires dedication and is courageous.  The very nature of technology is that it is constantly changing and it does fail.  As learning technologists we do not know how to use all the tools that are out there and can’t be expected to, what we can do and what we can try and teach others (staff and students), is to learn and adapt as you go.  To realise that it is about developing your own digital literacy so that you have the confidence to give things a go, to try things out and not be afraid to fail.  Innovation and change gets messy (loud and chaotic) and can be hard work (technology may need adapting and usually requires more planning particularly when trialling new things) but the reward is that everyone involved is learning from the process, even more so if you involve your students and enable them to be part of the dialogue.

Successful implementation of educational technology is not only down to the personal development of staff but also students Dr Halverson, Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at the University of Wisconsin Madison was a talking head on the Mooc who raised the issue of the ‘digital divide’.  Dr Halverson argued that rather than discouraging the use of technology in classes we should be educating students to take advantage of the technology they have and use it to amplify their academic experience, to explore and use tools to create their own shared learning environments.

Finally course contributor Jeff Mao, (currently at Common sense Media, previously Policy Director of the Maine Learning Technology Initiative) pointed out that when you are considering implementing technology there is no point reinventing the wheel.  If you are going to use technology it should do more than substitute your current practice, while it is often useful to digitise processes, technology allows you to redefine and do things you couldn’t do before.  This is an important point and I think that staff and students are only just starting to explore the new possibilities for teaching and learning.  Technology enables students to connect with each other but to connect with their community.  It provides the opportunity to build things and make things within your institution but also with collaborators around the world providing the social context of learning. While the beauty of creating online resources is that they can be built on year on year and shared with the wider world.   For example asking students to write a 1,500 word private blog post that is only read and marked by the teacher is not that far removed from asking students to write an essay.  But if students are asked to publish a 500 word blog post which includes; linking to and commenting on a relevant news article or resource, reading two other students blog posts and adding comments and feedback to their peers work then the assessment and learning that is taking place is significantly different.

As my first experience of participating in a MOOC my overall impressions were mixed.  Although I did engage with the material and ideas presented in the course I did not carry out the assessments as I felt that the activities were aimed more at those working in schools rather than higher education.  I also found that there was a US bias to the discussions.  However both these factors highlighted that despite the differences some of the big issues surrounding the implementation and evaluation of educational technology are common throughout the education sector.

References
Course content from EDx MITx: 11.133x_2 Implementation and Evaluation of Educational Technology including video interviews with Jennifer Groff, Justin Reich, Jess Mao and Dr Halverson.

Groff, Jennifer, and Chrystalla Mouza. 2008. “A Framework for Addressing Challenges to Classroom Technology Use.” AACE Journal 16 (1): 21-46.

Monreal, Tim 2016, ‘Beyond Surface-Level Digital Pedagogy’ published on Hybrid Pedagogy 23 August 216

Beyond Surface-Level Digital Pedagogy

 

October 18th, 2016|Digital Literacy, LTI Grants, Projects, Reports & Papers, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Successfully implementing Ed Tech|

Musings on Moodle part 3 – Embedding Moodle activities into your face to face teaching

light_cmyk by Helen Page for LTI

Light for LTI by Helen Page www.helenlouisepage.com

Students are expected to do a substantial amount of their learning outside of the classroom and technology such as Moodle can be used to engage with resources and carry out active learning.  All too often staff and students use Moodle to simply access and download material.  However good use of the different activities and features can enable more interaction outside of class in order prepare students for in class activities and support students to develop peer learning.

Embedding Moodle activities into your face to face teaching can be aided by introducing them at the outset and referring to activities in lectures and classes.  Student engagement can be encouraged by ensuring that activities relate to course content, referring to readings, lecture content and seminar discussions.  Participation should be expected (set out as a course requirement) and contributions should be encouraged and supported through teacher engagement.  Some examples of successful activities used at LSE include;

Pre-course discussion activities:

These help start to develop a learning community but also get students used to contributing and participating online.

Ice breaker
Students are asked to introduce themselves and say a bit about their background and why they are interested in studying the topic.

Resource discussion
Students are required to watch a short film clip or other relevant resource and post some thoughts about it onto a group discussion forum before the first lecture.

Preparation for lectures and seminars:

These encourage early engagement with course readings and help students to be more prepared for face to face discussions and activities.  Participation can be encouraged by making contributions count towards assessment.

Blog posts
Students have to write one blog post in response to the allocated week’s readings.  All students should visit the blog before coming to class and make a comment on the entry posted for that week.  The blog entries are then viewed at the start of the seminar each week before moving on to a more general discussion of the week’s topic.

Presentations
Require students to post or even record presentations before class. Other students must come ready with questions.

Discussion forums
Teachers can post answers to common queries and reach the entire cohort or class rather than having to send multiple individual emails.  Relevant items of interest can be posted by teachers, talks, news items, interviews and students can be encouraged to share their own questions and discussion topics.

Collaborative (students as producers) activities:

These encourage students to apply their learning to create and collaborate.  Asking students to re-contextualise or critically evaluate theory and concepts develops deep learning skills.     

Wiki’s
Students work in groups or individually to write wiki entries.

Glossary
Students are asked to add glossary entries.  These can be definitions of key concepts or relevant images, videos or news stories.

Assessment and feedback:

the majority of activities already mentioned can be used as part of a formative or summative assessment but there are also specific activities that enable e-assessment.

Quizzes
These can be used to diagnostic purposes before courses start or to test understanding of key concepts at various stages throughout a course.  Feedback can be given immediately within Moodle so students can complete at their own pace and reassess understanding as many times as they want. Common areas of misunderstanding can be reviewed in seminars and lectures.

Peer assessment and feedback
Students are required to submit an assignment online and then use marking guidelines and or rubrics to grade and give feedback to a peer. Teachers review the work and feedback.  Final marks take into account the peer feedback and the peer marking activity.  Students gain a greater understanding of the marking process and find marking another’s work allows them to reflect on their own assessment.

Collective feedback
Teachers provide collective feedback for the cohort/class that goes over some common mistakes and provides model answers.  Feedback can be given via video, audio, or text.  Model answers can be annotated to illustrate links to marking guidelines or learning outcomes.

Course evaluation and student feedback:

Allows teachers to find out what students views on what worked and what can be improved.  Activities can be used in conjunction with course restrictions to ensure engagement, for example students cannot upload an assignment until they have completed the activity.

Questionnaires
These can be used to gain feedback on your own teaching.  Responses from students can be anonymous.

Quick poll
These can be used to answer one specific question.  Students can only see the overall responses once they have submitted their individual answer.

Hot topic
Students can post questions for lectures and rate each other’s questions.

To see more examples of embedding Moodle activities into face to face teaching see our Moodle portal.  If you have any queries or questions about how you can use Moodle in your teaching see our Moodle guides, book a training session or contact LTI.Support@lse.ac.uk;

 

October 4th, 2016|Assessment, Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Musings on Moodle part 3 – Embedding Moodle activities into your face to face teaching|

Musings on Moodle part 2 – layout and design

Computer_CMYK design for LTI by Helen PageAs the previous blog post in this series indicated students often experience dissatisfaction with inconsistencies among layouts and types of information provided on Moodle courses.  With over 1,307 standard Moodle courses and an additional 172 Summer School courses on Moodle there is a huge variety in approaches to using Moodle.  The most common complaint that students have is not being able to find material.  Setting up a well structured course design can avoid this problem.

 

 

Clear signposting

Your course should have an intuitive logical structure, this can be linked to the course structure (course topics) or face to face teaching (week 1,week 2) but it should be consistent and easy to navigate.  Keep assessment information in one place and use clear titles and labels (see more on labels below).   You may want to include a simple statement on how students are expected to use the course or particular resources and activities.

Avoid the ‘scroll of death’

Moodle courses can all too often develop into extremely long page of resources and activities with users finding they have to scroll down and endlessly search to find anything.  Several of the new themes such as ‘collapsed topics’ or ‘grid’ format help to signpost and divide up your Moodle course in easy to navigate sections.  (A guide to different Moodle formats can be found on our Moodle portal).

Use labels
It is always worth using labels to identify different aspects of your course.  Labels can be images as well as text, remember to use creative commons images and attribute appropriately.  When providing titles for resources and activities make sure they are clear, consistent and work out of context, generic titles like ‘summative assessment’ can cause confusion.

Make it accessible

Any images should contain a description for screen readers.  Different colours and fonts can be useful to make distinctions between information but make sure they can be read clearly and will work on all devices.  Check out the Government Digital Service guide on the ‘Dos and don’ts on designing for accessibility’. When adding files or links make sure that you select ‘automatic’ for the display option under appearance settings to allow for pop up blockers or devices that will not download files.

Remove clutter

A cluttered course can be difficult to navigate.  You may want to use the book or lesson activities to group resources together.  Make sure that you update your course each year, are the resources from 3 years ago still relevant?  Do the links to external resources still work?

Apply restrictions

Access restrictions can hide and then reveal activities so students cannot progress until they have met certain requirements.

Groups and groupings can ensure that students only see material that is relevant to them.  Class groups are created automatically from timetable information so using the groups option in activities allows teachers to view student participation by each of their class group.

Activity completion
One way signpost the suggested or compulsory activities on your course is to use the activity completion feature.  If you can combine this with course completion it provides students with a clear indication of how they are progressing on the course and can give you a quick snapshot of how students are engaging on the course.

Mix it up

Using a variety of resources; images, video, tv, web, audio, can keep students interested and engaged in course content.  Alternative formats can allow for different approaches to study (listening to a podcast on the commute) and help students to apply concepts and theories from classes and lectures to real world case studies and develop critical thinking skills.

Similarly a mixture of activities can develop students understanding and indicate that they are expected to be active learners. See post 3 for more details on how to embed moodle activities into your face to face teaching.

To see some examples of good Moodle design see our Moodle portal.

September 27th, 2016|Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Musings on Moodle part 2 – layout and design|

Musings on Moodle Part 1 – the standardisation or baseline debate

Over the Summer LTI had a lively email discussion on the pros and cons of Moodle baselines and the issues raised prompted this series of blog posts on making more of Moodle.

I've got a clan of gingerbread men by Poppy on Flickr_z Ways to standardise the VLE

Some institutions use a baseline or template to ensure that all courses have a bare minimum of features and some degree of consistency on the layout and content.  For example, UCL introduced a baseline in 2011 after consultation with students indicated that they found inconsistencies with layout, navigation and types of information available on Moodle.  York St John University introduced University wide minimum expectations in 2015.  Research into sector wide opinions and approaches to baselines carried out by Peter Reed at Liverpool University indicated that there are three common approaches to creating standardised VLE’s (simple checklists, detailed checklists, and detailed rubrics).

What to include?

Peter Reed’s (2015) research indicates a growing number of UK HE institutions have opted for some kind of standardisation of the VLE (of the 24 institutions that responded 75% already had some form of minimum standard and 25% were looking to introduce some minimum standards 21 March 2014, http://thereeddiaries.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/sector-wide-subscription-to-vle-minimum.html).  But then the obvious question is what a best practice VLE should look like?  Internal surveys at Liverpool indicated that while staff and students often favoured the introduction of minimum standards there was some inconsistency regarding what should be included in a course.  Students appeared to be most interested in accessing quite practical course information and resources (Lecture Notes (95%); Past Exam Papers (93%); Further Reading (88%); Timetables (86%); Module Leader Contact Details (83%)) rather than learning activities.  However analysis of what students do on the VLE has indicated that when such material are available they are not always accessed.  Which brings us neatly to the main issue that LTI have with introducing a baseline or checklist at LSE;

Simply including certain tools or resources on a Moodle course does not guarantee that they will be used, either by students or staff.  

Every Moodle course could be automatically set up with a discussion forum (just as the course announcements feature is a default in all courses) but simply having a discussion forum available does not mean that it will be used well or at all.  Measuring how well tools are used is fairly difficult to ascertain but analysis of how much tools are used indicates that currently discussion forums are often set up and then remain empty.

 

Improving the learning experience

Over the years LTI have debated the pros and cons of developing a template or best practice for Moodle courses and have researched the differencing opinions across the sector.  As learning technologists the LTI team are most interested in using technology to enhance teaching and learning.  Devising a long list of requirements for every course can easily turn into a bureaucratic tick box exercise that adds more to teachers workloads than improving students experience of Moodle.  A good learning experience needs to consider the design of the course i.e. navigation, usability, consistency etc. (see post 2) and how activities can be used to contribute to the learning objectives (see post 3).

Although a baseline can be useful, especially for online only courses, LSE Moodle editors currently have the freedom to choose the structure and content of their Moodle courses and LTI encourage best practice and offer training, advice and guides on using Moodle.  The best way to ensure that a Moodle course is well used is for the teacher to be engaged with the editing to ensure that it is relevant and useful for students.

See our guides on how to use Moodle for teaching and book a one to one training session via the training and development system.

References

Peter Reed Staff & student perspectives on introducing minimum standards VLE, November 12 2013

http://thereeddiaries.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/staff-student-perspectives-on.html
‘Hygiene factors: Using VLE minimum standards to avoid student dissatisfaction’ Peter Reed and Simon Watmough E-Learning and Digital Media, January 2015 vol. 12 no. 1 68-89.  Published online January 29, 2015, doi: 10.1177/2042753014558379

 

 

September 20th, 2016|Moodle, Reports & Papers, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Musings on Moodle Part 1 – the standardisation or baseline debate|

Making more of Moodle

Education Reform by Opensource.com on Flickr_zHere within LTI and in the wider learning technology community there has been a longstanding debate on how to make more of Moodle and ensure that it is used to it’s full potential as a learning tool.  In an ideal world the VLE(1), in our case Moodle, plays an essential part in the learning process, allowing students to go at their own pace through material, test their understanding of key concepts or theories, work with others to develop and produce content, gain feedback on their progress and build a learning community.  Online course features should interweave with face to face teaching, link to the course learning outcomes and follow a clear sequence of activities which build on each other and are referred to in lectures and classes.  That is how it could be used, but how is it currently used at LSE and what can we do to improve things?

In these three blog posts I have explored the issue of how we can make more of Moodle.  These short Musings on Moodle are grouped under the three themes of standardisation, layout and design and embedding Moodle activities into face to face teaching. 

Part 1 – the standardisation or baseline debate

Part 2 – layout and design

Part 3 – embedding Moodle activities into face to face teaching

 

(1) Virtual learning environments (VLE’s) are online interactive platforms that are designed to support educational courses, by providing a consistent way for staff and students to store and access resources and tools.  These online learning spaces allow teachers and students flexible access to material and provide ways of communicating and assessing collaboratively and individually.  Here at LSE we use Moodle as our VLE with the aim that it will support ‘blended learning’, (a combination of online and face to face learning).

September 20th, 2016|Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies, Uncategorized|Comments Off on Making more of Moodle|

How at home are you online?

How do you use digital tools? Are you constantly online and using social media or management tools to record your every action, or do you just dip in and out of online resources using them as and when you need?

Visitor by Bill Smith on Flickr

 

LSE students who have recently taken part in the Students Ambassadors for Digital Literacy project were asked to map their digital footprint to find out more about how they fitted on the Digital Visitors and Residents model (V&R).

 

 

 

Sofa

The students found significant difference in their use of institutional tools, such as Moodle, LSEforYou, LSE email and their library accounts and personal tools such as Google, Skype and Dropbox.

The exercise encouraged students to think about the overlap with these tools and perhaps how they could utilise them more effectively.

 

“Drawing a pair of axis, one ranging from Visitor to Resident and the other outlining the nature- Personal or Institutional, we populated the graph with various tools- social media, organisational, entertainment and fitness- from all realms of our being and analysing where we stand for each of them. This method of analysis offers a refreshing way of looking at digital engagement- capturing both the extent and the nature. It allows for subjective interpretation of each tool and hence is not limited by strict definitions. For example, I could put in Microsoft OneNote which I exclusively use for work related documentation.”

Simran map
However, it may still be too simplistic since it does not account for overlaps well and does not factor in the nature of some tools that are only meant for visitor purposes- eg Moodle. No tool could be on two extremes of a dimension without sketching it in twice- making the chart less succinct. Furthermore, there are other characteristics of engagement that could be factored in with more dimensions: regulated use, open source, within the personal space (entertainment or personal development). These are things we take as banalities and its not until we stop, think and categorise that we can alter and optimise our use of these tools and this would be the biggest takeaway for me from the task”

Simran Masand

 

“This process was stimulating as it was good to take a step back from our normal online activities and to understand the extent to which we personally interact with these services.  By creating the map, it was significant for me as I noted how we do not always need to act either as a “Visitor” or “Resident”, but rather, this model should be viewed as a continuum. For instance, in my map, I noted how Facebook, even as used as a residential tool, both was within the personal and institutional category due to the fact that I have joined LSE specific groups whilst also having a personal interaction with it.

Alex map

One point that I came away with from this task was the questioning the extent to which it is possible to be off the scale on the map (i.e. is it possible to be anonymous). However, thinking about this, even for users who may not login to services at all, they will still be classed as a “Visitor” on this model. Therefore, perhaps it is not possible to be completely anonymous whilst we are using online services.”

Alex D’Arcy

Most of the maps showed that students were more likely to act in a visitor mode when accessing institutional tools and behave as residents when using tools to manage their personal lives.  This indicates something about how students are engaging and learning at the LSE but also how these tools are presented to them by the School.  There is a wider debate about the place of personal tools such as social media in teaching, but perhaps some of the institutional tools are not being used to their full potential.  For example Simran mentions in her post that Moodle is “only meant for visitor purposes” yet in fact Moodle is designed using social constructionist pedagogy with the idea that learning is a collaborative cultural event which would encourage ‘resident’ use.  Moodle supports the use of discussion forums, peer assessment and feedback, collaborative writing, group submissions, anonymous Q&A, Wiki’s, blogs, and many more activities.  If designed well a Moodle course can encourage an online community which supports and extends beyond face to face work carried out in the classroom.

The maps raise several questions about how we separate out our behaviours and identities online.  LSE students appeared to leaving a large digital footprint with their use of external applications in their personal life but did not seem as comfortable in creating a professional persona on apps like Linked In or Twitter.  One of the aims of the SADL project is to work with students in order to discuss strategies to build a positive online presence and expand their networks.  Workshops involve sharing and testing online tools to see how they can be adapted from personal use to manage their academic work.

The student blogs about the workshop and more information about the SADL project can be found on the SADL blog.

Celebrating LTI’s Moodle men!

AwardThis week two members of the LTI team were recognised for their work at the 2016 IMT awards.

Chris Fryer the LTI Systems Manager was awarded ‘unsung hero’ for his behind the scenes efforts to ensure that Moodle is always up and running and working well with other LSE systems.

 

He is a very deserving recipient of this award as LSE Moodle has the highest rates of ‘up time’ across the whole of the UK compared to other HE institutions.  Over the last academic year it has been online 99.99% of the time, this means that the system was ‘live’ for all bar 42 minutes in 2015/16!

LSE Moodle has supported the running of 1651 active Moodle courses across all departments, the IPA, language centre, TLC, HR and LSE Enterprise (a 50% increase from the previous year and that doesn’t include those courses in the Summer School and TRIUM).  Moodle courses were accessed by over 22000 unique users and facilitated over 15.5 million ‘participating actions’ (actions where students and staff click to do something on Moodle).

His work has not gone unnoticed by those in IMT with staff recognising his dedication to the job:

Awards2016_CF

“Chris Fryer doesn’t seem to ever truly take a holiday.  Regardless if he is hiking through Italy or looking after his kids, if there is an emergency he will take time to fix it”.

 

 

 

In addition, our very own ‘Moodle Man’, Milan Popovcic was awarded “Excellence in Customer Service” for his work on responding to LTI.Support@lse.ac.uk emails.  Recent analysis of the LTI emails has illustrated that LTI responded to queries from every academic department, centre and institute across the school from staff and students alike.  Moodle is the most common query but topics also included questions on online assessment, the use of forums and social media, how to record audio feedback and requests for training.  The number of emails received has gone up year on year, with 4667 emails received for September 2015 to June 2016.

LTI support emails

Awards2016_MPMilan is often the member of staff that responds to these calls for help and was one of the most nominated colleagues across several categories with positive comments from customers and colleagues.

“Delightful manner, patience of a saint, really cares about helping academics with their problems, not just answering their queries but also developing them to help themselves.  Milan is a joy to work with”.

We are currently working on developing more resources and support to go on our new website which should be up and running before the start of Michaelmas term 2016.  In the meantime if you have any queries, Moodle or otherwise please contact lti.support@lse.ac.uk

June 23rd, 2016|Announcements, Moodle, Teaching & Learning, Tools & Technologies|Comments Off on Celebrating LTI’s Moodle men!|