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This resource is a digital toolkit to support students in health and social care professions who are learning clinical and professional competencies through technology (including telepractice and simulation). The toolkit includes interactive resources to support learning and enhance technology-enabled practice education.

This OER investigates the role of digital technology in the acquisition of practical skills in health sciences. While it is commonly accepted that theoretical knowledge can be imparted using technology, how best to use technology to support practical skill acquisition is a growing area which presents many opportunities.

Show your students maths at work outside the classroom in Maths Week
This October, show your students how maths is relevant to their everyday lives with I’m a Mathematician!
Connect your students with people working in a diverse range of careers which use maths in this student-led enrichment activity.
Explore more: https://imamathematician.ie

The toolkit is a set of 8 modules, delivered and accessible asynchronously, online, incorporating elements of information literacy, critical thinking and academic writing skills to allow students prepare for and complete an assignment in line with best practice in academic integrity.

Assignment Toolkit

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Tutors is an professional and intuitive platform for the creation of compelling educational content. It is open source, well documented and now used by upwards of 160 modules at Waterford Institute of Technology. The platform employs the latest thinking in the production of media-rich web content, with a focus on delivering a simple, easy to navigate, elegant and compelling student experience. A central goal of Tutors is to fostering the sense on an online community of learners. These interactions are promoted by a set of non-intrusive measurements (we call TutorsTime) which help students and educators understand the use of the student’s time on a module.

A book chapter was also published as part of the initiative, which can be found here https://reader.tutors.dev/#/talk/wit-hdip-comp-sci-showcase.netlify.app/unit-3/talk-1-course-philosophy/course-philosophy.pdf

Developed from the initiative ” Enhancing Online Language Learning: Training the trainers and engaging the learners” the LILAC Project aims to help language teachers and learners to transform digital challenges into opportunities and acquire the digital proficiency needed to maximise the benefits afforded by e-learning.

Bookended by puberty and culturally defined adult roles, it is now established that adolescence extends from age 10 to age 24. Funded by the National Forum SATLE2019 scheme, and launched during VIT&L 2021 week, the new Canvas course Brainpower developed by Dr. Eithne Hunt (Occupational Science & Occupational Therapy / Graduate Attributes Programme, UCC); Dr. Samantha Dockray (Applied Psychology, UCC); and Professor Yvonne Nolan (Anatomy & Neuroscience, UCC) with input from students and higher education staff explores the ramifications of this research and gives participants an opportunity to reflect on what this information may mean for them within their work or role in higher education.

The inner workings of the adolescent brain and how these workings develop and are expressed in behaviours and engagement with the external world have been the focus of an explosion of research inquiry. Seated in the pre-frontal cortex of the brain, cognitive abilities such as decision-making, planning, self-control, social interaction and self-awareness are only fully developed by the mid-twenties. In addition, the brain regions governing risk-taking and reward are intensely active in adolescence, and so influence behaviour, which is also shaped by context and expectations of others.

To realise student success, higher education (HE) institutions must take into account that the majority of their students are still adolescents, without fully developed cognitive, social, emotional and self-regulatory capacities, living and learning in a socio-cultural environment that offers less external regulation than ever before. The knowledge that many students in higher education are in developmental transition spotlights opportunities to construct academic and campus contexts that supports this transition.

Brainpower is a free, online, self-paced course, focusing on harnessing the power and potential of adolescent brain and behaviour for enhanced learning, wellbeing and student success in higher education. Within each of the six modules (each approximately 60 minutes duration) there is a variety of instructive media, including recorded Panopto lectures, videos and short readings. Supplemental information in the form of suggested reading lists, podcasts, and videos is provided. The Brainpower modules are provided in a predefined sequence with content unlocked step by step. Modules will be unlocked once the previous module is completed. 

FYMMO – Final Year Matters – Moving On is an initiative that supports students in their final and penultimate years in their undergraduate degree, as well as graduates. The purpose of the initiative is to provide information, guidance and advice to help transitioning students; it works in conjunction with our First Year initiative as a ‘bookend’ to the undergraduate student experience. Additionally, it supports the lecturing staff with resources that are available to them to utilise and reinforce their teaching.

The aim of this interdisciplinary initiative is to create a sustainable, long-term intervention to embed technology enhanced learning in research led teaching, ensuring that students have a highly developed awareness of the potential for proactive learning through digital methodologies, and to help teaching staff further develop their capacity to integrate our portfolio of digital resources and datasets into their teaching materials.

These resources – A web page “Short Guide 8: Reimagining Practicals” and article “The Use of Virtual Reality in the Teaching of Challenging Concepts in Virology, Cell Culture and Molecular Biology” (link below) – come from the initiative: Enhanced Active Learning in Virology, cell culture and molecular bio Technology (ELEVATE).

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frvir.2021.670909/full

The ELEVATE initiative brought together disciplinary experts from the School of Microbiology, the School of Computer Science and IT, and the Centre for the Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning (CIRTL) at University College Cork. This initiative was built on a strong pedagogical foundation and it was guided by a vision to create and explore experiential and immersive learning approaches to teaching and learning, in partnership with students. In addition to co-creating innovative bespoke virtual simulations in Virology and Molecular/Cellular Biology, the team also applied active learning approaches to the study of abstract molecular concepts.

The successful development of bespoke virtual simulations was a significant breakthrough for the ELEVATE initiative and it provides a roadmap for future initiatives to follow. Multilingual realisation of abstract challenging concepts has been made possible and the knowledge gained through this experience will be shared openly with colleagues. It is important to note that while the technology underpinning virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) has advanced at pace, knowledge around the integration of virtual simulations into teaching and learning practice remains scarce, particularly in the areas of virology and molecular/cellular biology. Dissemination through the ELEVATE initiative will therefore provide leading guidance to disciplinary and non-disciplinary experts.

In this special publication, colleagues from across the Connacht Ulster Alliance (CUA), including GMIT, IT Sligo and LYIT, share insights and innovations on their teaching and learning practice over the last 18 months. Many will touch on their experiences of adapting to remote learning and teaching during COVID, and also reflect on lessons learnt and plans for the future. The DigitalEd.ie Knowledge Platform forms part of the iNOTE project, funded by the Higher Education Authority (HEA) Ireland.

This is a Moodle alternative to tools like Trello, Padlet, wallwisher etc. The plugin has many advantages over the existing commercial alternatives including areas such as accessibility, data protection and the fact that the student contributions when they use this tool can be easily used for assessment. The plugin will be available for all Moodle users worldwide free of charge.

This is a resource developed from the project: Re-Making the Creative Arts Canon, Re-Imagining the Creative Arts Curriculum.

This T&L initiative brought together more than 100 NUI Galway students working in Music, Film, Drama, English, and Digital Humanities, to work together to address the neglect of key figures from the Creative Arts Canon (as performed by arts organisation) and the Creative Arts Curriculum (as taught in universities).

The Festival of New Work

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This report arises from the #Openteach: Professional Development for Open Online Educators project, which is funded by the National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education.The #Openteach project team are based in the Open Education Unit (OEU) at Dublin City University (DCU).

The main aim of the #Openteach project was to produce, and evaluate, evidence-based open professional development for part-time online educators. In anearlier phase of the project a literature review called Teaching Online is Different: Critical perspectives from the literaturewas completed in order to identify online educator roles and the associated competencies for effective online teaching (Ní Shé, Farrell, Brunton, Costello, Donlon, Trevaskis, Eccles, 2019). Concurrently, we conducted a needs analysisreport of the target population, online students and their online educators (Farrell, Brunton, Costello, Donlon, Trevaskis, Eccles, Ní Shé, 2019). These reports were used to guide the development of the professional development resources for the #Openteach open online course.

Teaching online is different. In this report we attempt to explain why. This report arises from the #Openteach: Professional Development for Open Online Educators project, which is funded by the National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education. In this project we plan to uncover and promote the keys to effective online teaching practice, while recognising that effective teaching is an art, craft and science. We aim to harness this knowledge to support the professional learning of online educators. Ultimately we want to support online students to learn online by helping and inspiring their educators. This report was developed to help lay a foundation for the project through a critical analysis of relevant literature