Final thoughts

Well, here I am penning my last post of this blog for the class. It’s been an intense and, I hope, educational year for all of us (we learn too, you know!).

Thanks to everyone who took the time to write a reflective essay on their experiences over the last year (not all were posted on the blog – some students handed them in).

You might remember earlier in the year I asked everyone to get up and talk for a minute on an unprepared topic. Once the last student had finished, Beata, quite rightly, set me the task of talking on buffaloes for a minute. We (tutors) should, I believe, be always prepared to do the tasks which we ask students to do. So, in that spirit, I aim, right here and right now, to write my own reflections and evaluation of the year.

For your essay I suggested the following structure:

- Introduction – motivation and expectations
- Positive experiences
- How course could be improved
- Evaluation of your own performance
- Conclusion – what you have learned

It seems fair that I should write my reflection using the same structure …

Jerry’s Reflective Essay

So, to start, what was my motivation and expectations at the beginning of the year? (Ah yes, the old, trusty question to get an essay kick-started) Well, beside my big, fat salary, my motivation was, as always, to create a supportive but challenging learning environment to allow students to develop. That all sounds a bit woolly but I suppose that’s what teaching is for me. Sometimes the word “teach” is too blunt an instrument for my liking.

My expectation was that I would be working with a group of able and interesting students who would be ready for a challenge. I wasn’t wrong. This was my first year teaching on this Access course at Stevenson, so I was, in a sense, new as well. I think we were all up for the challenge and, although, tough at times, I think we all learned a lot along the way.

It’s impossible to predict how a class will gel, but from very early on it was clear that you all worked and, importantly, learned very well together. This intra-class dynamic is crucial to the development of a positive learning environment - it was always a pleasure to walk into your class.

This brings me to my positive experiences. To be honest, and you may accuse me of being some class of Irish charmer, but the positive experiences are really too numerous to mention. One of the most fundamental factors in teaching, I think, is developing positive relationships with learners. I feel that I was lucky in developing such relationships with each and every one of the class. So, my primary positive experience is the sum of all these relationships.

But what about improvements? (By the way, I hope you are all paying attention to my paragraphing and signposting) We always need to be aware of how things could be improved. I would agree wholeheartedly that one of the weaknesses in terms of my class was the accommodation (which is always a safe weakness to admit as it’s out of my control). The rooms we were in on the fourth floor were not appropriate for what we needed to do a lot of the time and the technological delights of room 126 came much too late to be of any great use. It’s not much comfort to you folk, but I will try to get that sorted for next year - you may not believe me but I have been trying to resolve this all year.

So what about improvements in things that I have control of (and this segues into the evaluation of my own performance)? Well, that’s trickier as it requires a degree of self-criticism.

I suppose I’m asking myself "would I do anything different?" Well, I think I might time or pace assessments in a different way next year. I was very conscious of the amount of assessments that you needed to get through this year. A few students, in their reflective essays, mentioned that we (and I think they mean all tutors) could/should have been stricter on assessment deadlines.

That’s a tricky one. I set a deadline for essays in December. And yes, I was still getting some of these essays in the last week of teaching. Should I have failed every student who didn’t make the December deadline? Maybe, but, to be honest, there wouldn’t be many folk left at the end of the course if I did. However, I did go on (and on) about how universities will be stricter on deadlines. Maybe I need to go on about that even more next year (Already I can see the rolling-eyes of students I haven’t yet met).

So, what have I learned? Well, amongst other things I’ve learned how to make an origami flower. I’ve learned how to make a camera obscura out of a Pringles can. I’ve learned about the culture and history of places such as Bulgaria and Riga. I’ve learned about the cultural significance of Bruce Lee, Che Guevara and the Moors in Spain. I’ve learned about the achievements of Rafael Nadal. I’ve learned how to hit someone without getting hit back. I’ve learned about the significance of colours. I’ve learned about disability rights in Ecuador. I’ve learned how comics can help you learn a second language. I’ve learned about movements in modern architecture. I’ve learned about the addictive power of World of Warcraft. And most of that has just been in the last month!

I’ve also learned (or re-learned) that if we’re coasting along then we’re probably not learning a lot. But when we feel we are on the very edges of our comfort zone, then, possibly, we are learning. That’s what learning feels like. It’s not always a pleasant feeling at the time - but it seems worth the discomfort in retrospect. This is an important thing for us, as tutors, to remember. We force students out of their comfort zone a lot. How often do we move out of ours?

Another way of self-evaluating for me as a tutor is asking the simple question "what did my students learn?" One way of getting a measure of that is by asking you to write the reflective essay (which you did) and unless you're all lying, it seem that you all learned something along the way.

So, to finish (and I just love cyclical structures), let's go right back to a question we started with at the very beginning of our time together: what is the purpose of education? No need to reply, but I wonder has anyone changed their mind on that one …

Take care. Jerry.

Reflective essay

As we come to the end of the course I'd like everyone to write a short reflective essay which looks back and evaluates the experiences of the last year. It seems like a long time ago since we all met up outside the Scottish Parliament. We've covered a lot of ground since then, and, I hope learned something along the way.

You can use the following structure to help put your essay together:

- Introduction – motivation and expectations
- Positive experiences
- How course could be improved
- Evaluation of your own performance
- Conclusion – what you have learned

If you don't mind others reading what you have to say (and this would be useful), you can post it as a response to this blog entry. Otherwise you can type it and email it to me. Or, even hand write it.

Poetry and music evening

Thanks to everyone who was involved in the poetry and music performance in the Music Box. I thought that it was a beautiful synthesis of words and music.

Of course, no one needed to do this. It was not required for any assessments or courses. However, for me, this is what makes these events even more valuable and memorable.

If I get a copy of the video, I'll post it here. Watch this space ....

Running order for presentations

14 May

Hannah

21 May

Pawel (two presentations - analysis and informative talks on camera obscura)

Mend (informative/instructional ... something on the European elections)

Simon (Bruce Lee - informative presentation)

Vesela (A guide to Kazanlak)

Marietta (Colour Reading)


28 May

Nadine (analysis of historical figure - Che Guevera - ties in with Evan's unit)

Emily (A Guide to Warsaw)

Vesela (analysis of historical issue - ties in with Evan's unit)

4 June

Emily (The Warsaw Uprising: what was it and why did it fail?)

Change of classroom

From Thursday the 14th of May we will be in room 126 (first floor). I'd appreciate if you'd spread the word.

Dublin student exposes sloppy journalism

We've talked a bit about the uses and abuses of Wikipedia. Follow the link below and read about a Dublin student's attempt to subvert the authority of the world's press:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/0506/1224245992919.html?via=mr

The Final Push

Today we looked ahead to the time we have left and considered what needs to be done. As everyone worked away on their reading assessment, I had a chat with folk individually to let them know what they need to complete and hand in.

We agreed in class that we’d be doing the 5-8 min informative or instructional talks on the weeks of the 14th and 21st of May (ie. two weeks today). I showed people the kind of talks that students have done in the past (see previous blog entry) and some folk seemed to have settled on a topic already – good stuff.

If anyone is unclear about what they still have to do, please get in contact. Otherwise, I’ll see you all next week.

More on reading assessment

Today we continued with the reading assessment. Most people finished off the first reading assessment and some people started on the second assessment (“How wiki-wiki can get sticky”)

Remember that the same type of questions keep coming up all the time:

What are the main ideas?
What is the purpose?
Who is the text aimed at?
What type of text is it?
How effective was the text in meeting its purpose?

We have been addressing these questions all year. The only thing that changes is the text and author. Sometimes the text has been a presentation; sometimes it has been a radio programme. Of course, sometimes you have been the authors or presenters.

A greater awareness of how texts are constructed (and how well) should, I hope, help develop your own skills as writers and presenters.

I also highlighted the fact that we need to start looking at the second (for some of you) presentation assessment. This can be informative or instructional. To give you some ideas, here are some topics that have been covered by students in previous years:

Mummification
Tying knots
The off-side rule in football
Aromatherapy
Volkswagen in Germany
Mending a puncture
Learning to play the piano
Interview skills
How to sky dive
Making an omelette
A guide to Tokyo – Vancouver – Barcelona – Amsterdam - Paris
How to make money on e-bay
First aid
How to string a guitar
The Manhattan Project
How to deal with anaphylactic shock
The West Highland Way
Meditation
How to mix cocktails
How to make a cheap vegetarian curry
The Five Pillars of Islam
The dangers of sun beds
Downhill biking
How to lose weight
A brief guide to the universe
How to book a holiday online
The VW Camper van


Remember that they only need to be 5-8 minutes in length. I’ll be asking people to decide on a topic over the next couple of weeks. Some people have already decided on their topics.

Developing analysis skills - SEC method

I know we've covered this before, but I think there's no harm making the point again as we are currently analysing texts for the reading assessment.

Everything sensible that you will say in your academic work (or your life) will, more or less, use the SEC (Statement – Evidence – Comment) method in some form or other.

- You make a statement
- Back it up with evidence
- Then, and this is the crucial part, link the two by commenting on both.

Taken together, these three steps represent analysis.

Let's look at an example ...

Make a statement

I think that Sparklehorse have re-invented country music for a new generation

Back it up with evidence

For example, they will often use slide guitars and sampling in the same song

Comment on how example helps to support your statement

The use of slide guitars shows that they are indebted to the country music heritage. Yet, they re-vitalise a very traditional genre of music by their incorporation of samples: a technique that is associated with cutting-edge music.

Now just put all the bits together:

I think that Sparklehorse have re-invented country music for a new generation. For example, they will often use slide guitars and sampling in the same song. The use of slide guitars shows that they are indebted to the country music heritage. Yet, they re-vitalise a very traditional genre of music by their incorporation of samples: technique that is associated with cutting-edge music.

The paragraph above looks like the type of thing that would (I hope) pop up in your reading and listening responses; presentations; and essays.

As I have said, the statement-evidence-comment method is not just something that you should learn and then quickly forget for college work this term. All academic essays will require you to use this method in some form or other. As you progress in your education you will find that what changes (or should) is the level of sophistication and subtlety of your statements, evidence and comments.

Indeed, SEC is something that we do at every level of “argument”:

Take the scenario of a mother reading her favourite story from her childhood to her child, again:

Young child: This is boring! (Statement)
Mother Why do you say that?
Young child Because we’ve read it lots of time before. (Evidence)
Mother And?
Young child And I’m bored of doing the reading the same thing over and over again. You like it, but I don’t. (Comment – neatly linking statement and evidence)

Once you look, you start to see SEC everywhere.

Poetry to Music Event - May

Laurie, lecturer in music, came in today to talk about his ideas and hopes for the poetry-into-music event in May.

I think it sounds great.

The dates are not finalised yet, but it will be some time during International Week (commencing 11 May). Hopefully the event will take place in the Music Box auditorium.

The details of the format need to worked out, but Laurie's idea was for you guys to give a reading of your poem, possibly followed by a discussion, and then followed by Laurie's students' musical interpretation of the poem.

Some people suggested leaving the discussion bit until the end. As I say, these details can be worked out as we go. The main thing was that everyone agreed to the idea of the event.

If you have any ideas or comments, please post them here ...

Reading assessment - 1

I gave out the first reading assessment today and everyone worked their way through the questions. Not everyone finished - we can take it up from there next week.

Again, the questions will seem very familiar from the listening assessment. Remember the purpose of these tasks is to help develop your summary, analysis and evaluation skills - the development of these skills are important, indeed crucial, for further and higher education students.

The text continues the theme from the Enemies of Reason programme and focuses on the philosopher David Hume and the Scottish Enlightenment. If you want to view the BBC programme on Hume which the writer refers to, go to ClickView, then Documentaries and look out for a programme entitled "Age of Genius." You don't need to watch the programme, but you do need to do the reading assessment.

Preparation for reading assessments

Today we took up from last week and looked at reading skills in more depth. We discussed, in more depth, the differences between tabloid and broadsheet newspapers in terms of content and style.

We also looked at the notion of readership and looked at The Metro as a case study (see link to BBC article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7942017.stm).

We looked at two articles on school shootings in the US in 2006 as reported by a tabloid (The Daily Record) and a broadsheet (The Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2006/oct/03/amishschoolshootingamericas) – sorry that Record article doesn’t seem to exist online anymore, but I have printed copies.

I stripped away the formatting from these articles and we focussed on the language only. We discussed how the language reflected the complexity of ideas and supported the two purposes.

We also had a look at an example reading assessment – both the text and the student’s responses. The questions are very similar to the questions you’ve been answering on the Word of Mouth and Enemies of Reason documentaries. Please bring these handouts next week.

The student’s answers will give you an idea of the depth and approach of your own responses to this assessment.

We will be spending the next two weeks working through the two reading assessments. On the bright side, there will be a well-earned two-week holiday at the end ….

Worst Irish accents on film

Last we we got into a discussion at some stage about bad accents in film. Here's a link which lists the top 10 worst Irish accents in film (Sean Connery and Julia Roberts appear twice):

http://entertainment.ie.msn.com/Worst%20Irish%20Accents.aspx

If you'd like to share any other examples of bad accents, please add a comment ...

Active listening and discussion on "Enemies of Reason"

Today we focussed a bit more on listening skills. We’ve listening to radio and TV programmes over the last few weeks. In many ways, these are as much exercises in note-taking and analysis and evaluation as they are listening.

However, we looked at listening today in of terms inter-personal communication. I introduced the notion of “active listening” and we did an exercise at the start of the class which focussed our attention on how we listen.

Dom observed the various one-to-one discussions and came up with three types of listeners: the note-takers; the eye-contacters; and the interactive listener. Very perceptive observations by Dom.

We discussed what talkers looked for in a listener (and what they got in the exercise).

Some of the positive listening skills which were identified were:

- Listener giving feedback
- Listener using comments to clarify
- Listener obviously engaged
- Positive body language
- Giving advice

Some people identified “giving advice” as a positive listening skill, but there was some debate whether this is always desirable.

Some of the less positive elements which were identified were:

- Lack of eye contact (although this, in fairness, was when the listener was taking notes)
- Listener inaccurate when summarising information
- Giving advice (again)
- Taking notes (is this always negative)

Part of the reason for this focus on active listening was to draw your attention to on another aspect of the course which is assessed: discussions.

These discussions assess your ability to speak clearly and accurately on a subject. It is also important that we see that you are actively listening and that you can handle questions. We've had plenty of these throughout the year and, as a class, you are very capable of having engaging and thought-provoking discussions.

Today, we had a discussion based around the Enemies of Reason programme. Everyone contributed very positively to that (although, of course, many agreed to disagree on a number of points). Thanks to all of you for engaging positively in that discussion. If you’d like to continue the discussion, feel free to do so here by using the comment function.

Nadine said that she was going to a spiritualist tonight and I’ve asked her to share her thoughts on the experience here.

Finally, I previewed what we’d be moving on to next. We will be using the same analysis skills which we used to study the various documentaries to start analysing written texts (in particular we’ll be focusing on some newspaper articles).

We discussed the difference between tabloid and broadsheet/quality newspapers. We’ll take it up from there next week.

Enemies of reason - second listening task

We moved on to look at the second listening task. Again, we are looking at the same elements when we come to analyse and evaluate the programme: summarising the content; and identifying purpose, point of view and intended audience.

The Enemies of Reason programme adopts a different style to the Word of Mouth series. When we come to evaluate the programme (or any text or piece of communication) we should do so in terms of its purpose. So, we can't dismiss something for not being objective if it's purpose was to persuade us to agree with a particular point of view. What we should evaluate, in this case, is how successful that piece was in persuading us.

There will be no class next week. When we come back we'll finish off the work on the various listening assignments.

Have a good break.

Word of mouth - first listening task

Building on the example we worked through last week, today we went down to the Learning Centre to start the first of two listening assessment tasks.

You had the choice of listening to one of two radio programmes from the BBC Radio 4 "Word of Mouth" series.

Word of Mouth 1 was about issues associated with the speech and language problems or disorders.

Word of Mouth was about bilingualism and the process of learning a new language.

Your job today was to listen to one of these and take notes (using the Cornell Method we talked about last week if you find it helpful).

I also gave out a series of general questions which can be used with either problems. The questions focus on: summarising the main ideas; the purpose and intended audience of the programme; point of view of programme; and, finally, your evaluation of the programme in terms of its intended purpose.

You'll remember, I hope, that I gave out a sample response to these questions based on the programme we listened to last week. You should look at the example as a guide when producing your own responses to the questions.

Remember that as well as summarising the content of the programme, this task requires us to analyse and evaluate the programme.

Presentations on ClickView

As I think you know by now, the presentations seem to be up on the College ClickView system.

They should be password-protected. Dieca has the password.

It would be interesting to read what you had to say about the presentations.

Top judge says young can't listen

According to the BBC, a top English judge recently claimed that young people may not be reliable jurors as they don't have the same level of listening skills as older generations.

Here's a link to a quick test based on that BBC story (although, I agree with one of the comments at the end that the test's a bit flawed): http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7715868.stm

I find it a bit ironic that a top judge accuses young people of poor listening skills. Top judges are just the kind of folk who end up in the House of Lords - a place full of, amongst others, retired judges popping off to sleep during other people's speeches.

Thinking about listening skills

Today we moved away from presentations and started to look at another aspect of communication: listening.

Although we are looking at something different, the same features of communication analysis arise. We've talked a lot about structure, purpose, audience, point-of-view in relation to essays and presentations. Then, you were the producers of communication "texts" (remember our broad definition of "text" way back in August?). Now, you are not producing texts - you are "receiving" information. In this case you are receiving information aurally (ie. via your ears) in the form of radio and television programmes.

We are now interested in how other people structure a piece of communication. We're interested in working out their purpose, intended audience and point of view. When we analyse these aspects we are in a position to judge the quality of the piece.

And hopefully we learn from what is good (and not so good) about the way they've put the piece together. We should be able to apply the principles that make a good piece of oral communication (like a presentation or programme) to a piece of written communication (like an essay or report).

Students in university and college spend a lot of time listening (or should). It is one of the main, and most traditional, ways of communicating information and ideas to students. That's not to say that it's always a good way to learn. We talked today about the future of the traditional lecture. One lecturer transmitting information to a lecture theatre of 150 students may be cost-effective for a university, but does it make sense educationally? Maybe pod-casts are the way ahead (even more cost-effective for the university: the lecturer does it once, then he/she can be fired!).

The point is that students will do a lot of listening and we need to spend a bit of time practising that skill.

Today we went down to the Learning Centre and listened to a documentary on BBC Radio 4's Word of Mouth series (see link below) on borrowing in language. Everyone seemed to find it very interesting and we had a thought-provoking chat about the issues that came up in it afterwards.

Before we went down, I showed students a method for note-taking called the Cornell Method. This method aims to help students produce more organised and meaningful notes by suggesting a two stage process in note-taking:

Stage one: on an A4 page with a very wide margin the student takes abbreviated notes.

Stage two: after the programme or lecture the student remains behind for a few minutes to review and summarise the notes in the space of the wide margin on the left-hand side.

This is probably better seen in practice. I took notes using this method when I listened to the documentary. I photocopied them and gave them out today. See the link below for more information on the Cornell Method.

Of course, we also need to assess your listening skills. We do this by getting you to listen to a couple of programmes and then answering a series of questions about the programme's: main ideas; purpose; point of view; intended audience. We also ask you to evaluate the programme.

I showed students the questions that we use. I also produced an example response for the programme we listened to today. This should give you some guidance in terms of what (and how much) you should write.

Next week we'll have a go at another Word of Mouth programme and you will have a go at the questions.

Here's the link to the Word of Mouth site. It's a very interesting series for anyone interested in language: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/wordofmouth.shtml


Here's a link to a video on the Cornell Method: http://www.dartmouth.edu/~acskills/videos/video_nt.html

Please post any comments or questions on anything relating to listening and note-taking.

Written assignments

Today I started giving students feedback on the writing pieces that were submitted before Christmas.

You need to think of your work for me as a process of building a portfolio of your communication skills. So, don't think of your essays or reports as things that need to be done as quickly as possible to pass an assessment. Rather we should see them as intellectual artefacts that you work on perfecting. It may take time and everyone will work at different rates. The main thing is that, over the next couple of months, you develop your writing skills to produce work to add to your portfolio.

One of the ways of developing skills is to pause and reflect on your current strengths and weaknesses. This awareness of your strengths and weaknesses should help you develop your formal writing skills.

Thoughts on first presentations

We started the presentations today. Hannah, very bravely, offered to do hers. It was a very interesting presentation on how the relationship between Ireland and Britain is represented through the works of three writers (Spenser; Heaney; Friel).

I'd like students to post some comments on these presentations as we go.

You should comment on your own (How did you feel beforehand? How did you think it went? What, if anything, would you do different if you did it again?). But please make any comments on the presentations in general.