I have been marking a lot of work recently - about 70 EMAs and a large number of final TMAs.  Something that strikes me is issues around use of sources and referencing.

One issue is that many students overquote and some even seem to think that there is only a need to reference if they quote.  This seems a quite ineffective way of referring to knowledge of the course.  The references are often too wordy for the point they need to make.  Sometimes they do not make sense out of context - e.g. writing "now" or even "yesterday" when the student's work is about the situation a few years later. 

Another issue is that many students put a full stop before a reference when the reference finished the sentence.  Sometimes students even put a full stop before and after a reference.  This seems to suggest that they consider the reference as being apart from the rest of the sentence rather than an integral part of the text. 

These perhaps suggest that there need to be new ways of presenting how sources are used in academic contexts.

Final results for many of the courses I teach have just been released.  Some students have given feedback on the courses, which I think is useful for me and the designers of the courses as it indicates what students think has been particularly pertinent for their needs.

The comments are probably quite altruistic but I think they can improve the effectiveness of my future support for students on future courses.

I am experimenting with the use of screencasts to support students with study skills and content on analysing English grammar.  So far, I have made the following:

On aspects of theme https://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/cFehbwDXbm

Lexical cohesion https://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/cFnrb4o9kt

Passives https://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/cFVlbloloz

Using sources in assignments https://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/cFVX6oo6C5

Over the past few years, I have been teaching students in prison on some OU courses and it was good to discuss some of the issues at Saturday's staff development day in Bristol.

One thing that has become clear is that prisoners are very diverse and the circumstances are also very diverse.  They vary greatly in terms of how much time and space there is for study.  Some students submit early because they feel they have so much free time to fill whereas oithers have many other duties (one I taught was doing many jobs and many other courses).  Students can also be disrupted by suddenly having to share cells.  An issue I was not aware of before doing this work is that many prisoners change prisons quite frequently and at short notice.  Apparently, they are not always able to take their materials with them, which must be very disruptive.

I think OU tutors are used to being flexible and working with prisons demands this habit of being flexible.  For example, visits can be cancelled at short notice and some students submit by post and this might mean they arrive at unexpected times.  Some prisons have much stricter security procedures than others and tutors need to be prepared for long waits at the gate although sometimes entry can be reasonably quick.

A big issue for the OU as an institution is enabling courses to be accessible to prison students and courses that are completely online (eg L185 EAP Online) are not available to students.  Unfortunately, this would be a very useful course for many students in prison.

I am about to start tutoring on courses about to enter new presentations (E852. L161, LB160, L185).  It is slightly confusing that for some courses, I can post introductory messages on the Tutor Group Forum but students cannot reply - I am not really sure why this distinction is made.

For the L185 course, there are occasional OU Live chats amongst the tutors and course chairs (called "watercooler meetings") to discuss issues of concern and interest.  We had one last night and one of the issues was feedback and whether students read them effectively. 

I have the impression that students who are successful tend to read the feedback quite carefully but those whose marks are lower may not read them so carefully (if at all).  It is difficult to disentangle cause and effects here as perhaps students produce stronger assignments if they read feedback or perhaps those getting good marks are keener to revel in the praise. 

I am thinking of how to persuade students to read more of the feedback and act on it.  Something I have tried was refer back to feedback on previous assignments to show how they have/have not improved in the aspects I mentioned.  One issue is to avoid seeming tectchy if there has been little progress between assignments.

Does anyone have any thoughts?

Students on these course are just starting a new presentation.  There is beginning to be some activity on the Tutor Group Forums.

I have been thinking about the roles of the tutor group forums in supporting learners and this seems to be particularly relevant on L185 where learners face more challenging texts for TMA 4 than they had been exposed to before.

It seems to me that the following could help to scaffold them:

- encouraging top down reading strategies

- asking questions

- encouraging learners to use the "collective intelligence* of the group.

Due to circumstances, I had two Elluminate sessions on the same day last Saturday (one should have been a face to face tutorial but was changed to Elluminate as the venue was closed and many students would have found it difficult to get to Bristol anyway with the transport chaos).

It was very much more tiring than a similar amount of face to face teaching would be and the intensity of Elluminate teaching was very apparent.

I have had a busy week on Elluminate this week with sessions on consecutive evenings.  It is quite an intense way of working, especially with small groups.  I think I need to work on giving time to students to think and not be afraid of the silence as they think.

Would any of the participants like to comment?

Some useful guidelines can be found here:

http://edsitement.neh.gov/reference-shelf/tips-for-better-browsing/evaluating-online-resources