Then yesterday a connection of mine on LinkedIn shared a Times opinion piece about ADHD and autism being 'over-diagnosed'. (Not sharing that one, because obviously I not only disagree, I actually find it deeply unhelpful and frankly trollish.)
I think what I find most annoying is the inertia in higher education as a whole.
When I was working as a schoolteacher we learned a lot about scaffolding learning. You don't just ask a kid a question, get the wrong answer and move on to someone who gives you the right answer. You stay with that child and backtrack to something they do know, then step-by-step build them up so that child is able to answer your question. Kids like being able to answer tough questions, they dislike feeling stupid.
My students are currently preparing presentations for SM123 (Physics and Space). They've had a recorded tutorial in which I gave them heaps of helpful pointers, a template presentation for them to fill in and expand as needed, and a guidance document. Their instructions are to produce a Powerpoint presentation and a Word document giving the entire script word-for-word. Because we are entirely online and distance learning there is no live presentation component to their work. I mark only the two files as submitted to me. All the students do this exercise, whether outgoing and extraverted or shy, anxious and autistic. Seemingly many of them enjoy it thoroughly and find it to be confidence boosting. I think the way the OU do this in my module is a great leveller. I like to think that should they ever be asked to do a presentation again in the future, the positive experience on SM123 will have encouraged them as to the steps necessary so that it is less intimidating. Isn't that what good university education is about? Don't we want to leave our students better than they were when they came to us?
The SM123 presentations are a great example of Universal Design for Learning - everyone does the same thing but it was designed from the outset to be accessible.
The end of the WonkHE podcast the contributors were discussing that HE has to change, because whatever the Times opinion piece may say, disabilities exist and are inherently disabling. But not everyone who has a disability will know that, especially if it's not physical and immediately obvious to all around. So we must expect undiagnosed disabled people to be in HE as students (and I would also add staff, but whatever). And it isn't good enough to just do things the way that 'we' had to do them. Those academics are on average about my age. When we had much fewer numbers of ethnic minorities, people from working-class backgrounds, people whose parents hadn't also been to university. When we were students most universities were far from enablers of equality. University in the 1990s was rubbish to be frank. I'm told Oxford and Cambridge were OK because of their tutorial system. But the rest of the instittutions herded us into enormous lecture theatres to be talked at for hours on end. It was not conducive to learning then and it's not conducive to learning now.
Thoughts on disability (again)
I was listening to the WonkHE podcast about the University of Bristol appeal case a few weeks ago and have been mulling it over in my head ever since.
Then yesterday a connection of mine on LinkedIn shared a Times opinion piece about ADHD and autism being 'over-diagnosed'. (Not sharing that one, because obviously I not only disagree, I actually find it deeply unhelpful and frankly trollish.)
I think what I find most annoying is the inertia in higher education as a whole.
When I was working as a schoolteacher we learned a lot about scaffolding learning. You don't just ask a kid a question, get the wrong answer and move on to someone who gives you the right answer. You stay with that child and backtrack to something they do know, then step-by-step build them up so that child is able to answer your question. Kids like being able to answer tough questions, they dislike feeling stupid.
My students are currently preparing presentations for SM123 (Physics and Space). They've had a recorded tutorial in which I gave them heaps of helpful pointers, a template presentation for them to fill in and expand as needed, and a guidance document. Their instructions are to produce a Powerpoint presentation and a Word document giving the entire script word-for-word. Because we are entirely online and distance learning there is no live presentation component to their work. I mark only the two files as submitted to me. All the students do this exercise, whether outgoing and extraverted or shy, anxious and autistic. Seemingly many of them enjoy it thoroughly and find it to be confidence boosting. I think the way the OU do this in my module is a great leveller. I like to think that should they ever be asked to do a presentation again in the future, the positive experience on SM123 will have encouraged them as to the steps necessary so that it is less intimidating. Isn't that what good university education is about? Don't we want to leave our students better than they were when they came to us?
The SM123 presentations are a great example of Universal Design for Learning - everyone does the same thing but it was designed from the outset to be accessible.
The end of the WonkHE podcast the contributors were discussing that HE has to change, because whatever the Times opinion piece may say, disabilities exist and are inherently disabling. But not everyone who has a disability will know that, especially if it's not physical and immediately obvious to all around. So we must expect undiagnosed disabled people to be in HE as students (and I would also add staff, but whatever). And it isn't good enough to just do things the way that 'we' had to do them. Those academics are on average about my age. When we had much fewer numbers of ethnic minorities, people from working-class backgrounds, people whose parents hadn't also been to university. When we were students most universities were far from enablers of equality. University in the 1990s was rubbish to be frank. I'm told Oxford and Cambridge were OK because of their tutorial system. But the rest of the instittutions herded us into enormous lecture theatres to be talked at for hours on end. It was not conducive to learning then and it's not conducive to learning now.