Abstract:

In this presentation we introduce StudySpark, an interactive online tool for students to find out how to enhance their work and ultimately their academic performance. This learning platform offers an online collection of themed bite-sized learning units aimed at improving student learning and scholarship. The activities are designed to be short and engaging and accessible by students at any time. The tasks provide insight and practice on how to improve marks by developing key skills simply and easily – topics such as referencing, time management, composing essays, basic maths, presentation skills, understanding feedback are covered. In addition to its current iteration as a skills guide, StudySpark provides a platform for educators to develop their own online resources, with a menu of short building block activities that once populated can be assembled into learning sessions.

Students’ success in HE is often limited by their academic skills, including their confidence with writing, reading, referencing and understanding academic feedback on their coursework. Although our university offers some additional support in these areas, student support is inconsistent and varies from faculty to faculty. The initial aim of this project was to design a set of resources to support student academic skills when transitioning from one HE level to the next. The content of the topics was decided by an iterative process of focus groups and individual interviews with academic staff and students from across subject areas

Once the design of the site began, it became apparent that before building a content based site, we needed to first design a framework within which to present the content. The outcome was a generic online learning resource site versatile enough to be used by any educator, to deliver material on any topic. With a focus on bite-sized learning units, the site allows an educator to create a thematically organised collection of mini-lessons. Each lesson is built from the available diet of media and activities which simply need to be populated with subject-relevant content. This then offers students a learning resource which is interactive, involves passive media as well as activities for them to engage with, an opportunity to reflect on and evaluate their skills, along self assessment tools. Each learning unit is short and focussed and the students can revisit activities to consolidate their learning, evaluating their progress on each visit.

Once deployed, a learning unit can be used within a class or referred to students Automatic feedback can be enhanced by embedding a link to the study skills resources into comments.

Keywords:

Online tool, transferable skills, learning resource, interactive.