Addressing the needs of diverse students:

1. Addressing the needs of diverse students: Video, VLEs and automated formative assessment Dr. Chris Armstrong Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry University of Hull

2. Mixing things in very precise quantities and ratios and measuring and quantifying them Watching for changes and finding how much energy it had Blowing stuff up (A Popular Chemistry, 1887)

3. Class of 2018/19 – prior experience and attitudes A-Level No A/AS-Level AS-Level

4. Class of 2018/19 – barriers and challenges Family commitments Part-time work Commuting from home High contact hours

5. Changes from 2016… Context Based Pure Maths Lectures Online / blended Automatically marked

6. Student approaches and behaviours “ ” What a game intends for you to do includes not only things the fiction of the game tells you to do, but also the broader things the game permits you to do. – Dan Olson, Folding Ideas

7. Student approaches/behaviours 2017 Reality Expectation Skip to final assessment Watch lectures Practice Final assessment

8. Encouraging / enforcing practice and participation through the VLE Structure (Canvas)

9. “Modules” – add requirement to pass the module “Modules” – add prerequisite to acess the module

10. “Adaptive Release” – hidden in the ‘advanced’ tab “Add Grade Centercriteria”

11. “Conditional Activities” “Restrict Availability” – add grade conditions here

12. A student case study Student A Reactions to the blended course Work experience – almost a decade of experience before university Positive – can access the material at any time, can go through it in small chunks between other commitments, resulting in a higher grade than previously obtained Child care – balancing a young family with high contact hours Negative – not a fan of the countdown clock on the practice / assessed quizzes Commuting – lives outside of the Hull city area

13. The positive effects

14. YouTube hits… Median views – 2 days before deadline 2017 (lectures + test only) Median views – 6 days before deadline 2018 (lectures + formative practice)

15. Raw summative marks… Comparable question set – i.e., not counting topics that were removed for 2018, and not including rules about dropping lowest marks. 2017 (lectures + test only) 2018 (lectures + formative practice)

16. Now for the bad*… * “critical”

17. Student approaches/behaviours 2018 Reality Expectation Open practice quiz Watch lectures Practice quiz Watch lectures Keep practice quiz open for 72 hours… Note feedback Email about problems Assessed quiz Assessed quiz

18. Attempts at the practice quiz Attempts to pass Attempts total Pass and stop? – some students continue to take the practice quiz even after passing it. But the majority get the threshold and stop.

19. Ranking most to least useful component

20. “Randomised” practice questions “Given Cp = 0.005T2 +0.15T + 12.65 J K-1 mol-1, work out the enthalpy change from [x]0K to [y]0K” • Where [x] and [y] randomised between suitable ranges • Answer calculated by a formula with variables Pros Cons • More questions available quickly and easily • More practice opportunities • Harder to write – and prone to error(s) • Student behaviour doesn’t necessarily take advantage of this

21. Some concluding remark, future development, and advice for implementation…

22. Pointers Course structure comes first Get to know your VLE This worked only because the course was chunked into 4-5 topics that were sequential They’re not just for hosting PDFs – use adaptive release, quizzes, and conditional pathways Student approaches Test everything What is your intended play, and does your course permit them to go outside this? If students can do it at any time, then you’ll have to deal with errors/problems at any time…

23. Future Embed lectures in quizzes Revaluate “randomisation” Take advantage of the main student approach to this – minimise split attention effect Address whether the random selection of questions has worked

24. Addressing the needs of diverse students: Video, VLEs and automated formative assessment