Reusable Content for IT Education JISC RePRODUCE Strand

2. Presenters Angelo Conti Graham Ashman Owen Phillips Reusable Content for IT Education JISC RePRODUCE Strand • Project Manager Professor Tony Toole • Project Officer Owen Phillips • Project Concept Kate Pearce • Technical Graham Ashman

3. Aim: Reuse ICT materials in three different curriculum areas with three different Institutions Objectives: • Repurpose/reuse a 10 credit ICT module • Develop appropriate complementary/new content in three programmes of study delivered by • Swansea Metropolitan University (HE) • Swansea College (FE) • Coleg Sir Gâr (FE)

4. Initial Issues and Concerns • Project approval delayed • Project Team Changed • Late Start • Throughout Project a series of unfortunate staffing issues – Redundancies, Staff Changes • Comprehensive Risk Assessment and Control Procedures – Proved essential for project completion • SMT Support – quick reaction times

5. Repurposing Plan • Evaluation of original material • Enhancing material - forum, wiki and chat facilities, whilst retaining the ‘look and feel’ of existing material • Recontextualisation: Modification to make content more generic, providing flexibility for delivery tutors in creating final assignments • Construction of supplementary material (including PowerPoint topic) • Assessment using Phoebe • Sharing content with other institutions

6. Learning platform Interoperability and Recontextualisation • Import into Swansea College Moodle, NVQ Management • Sharing of Swansea College Moodle with Partners • Export to Coleg Sir Gâr Moodle, Law Course • Export to SMU Blackboard environment, Skills Development Course

7. Repurposing operation Repurposing Redesign content for ease of upload to multiple Platforms Transference of materials between VLEs Generic Assignments for a range of purposes Moodle Key decisions “Book Module” used (not a default) to provide continuity of structure IMS compatible package Blackboard Four sub-modules exported as IMS compliant zip files available for uploading to other VLEs (Blackboard) and JORUM Material “shaped” to match institutional delivery requirements

8. Recontextualisation Curriculum Areas and Learners Timescale: Small scale project originally devised for 12 month operation, compressed to 9 months total. Pilot started in November 2008 Swansea College: NVQ Level 4/ILM Management – mapped to criteria. • National Health Service. Practicing and aspiring managers. • Blended and classroom delivery: 24 learners age >28, 2 groups Coleg Sir Gar:HNC Law/legal Studies Yr 3 (franchised course). • Classroom delivery with online elements: 6 learners , age group >27 Swansea Metropolitan University: B.Sc. (Honours) - Business Information Technology, Computing and Information Systems . • Blended and workshop delivery study skills module 23 active learners age group <24

9. Challenges/Solutions • Time • Slippage against deadlines • Fear that classroom delivery time spent on ReCITE could be detrimental to learners’ course of study (specific issue on modular courses) • Key personnel becoming unavailable (maternity, illness, redundancy, business pressures) Contingency • Time allocation for suitably experienced /qualified tutor to repurpose the assignments for the curriculum area and support the learners Communication • Effective interaction between project support team at institutions • At least two face to face meetings per term • Supported by weekly video conference meetings. • It was not possible to replicate this activity between all tutors/curriculum specialists, due to conflicting work patterns.

10. Observations • Interaction with social networking/ internet based skills appeared to be reflected in the age profile of learners; FE learners appeared more comfortable communicating by email/telephone rather than by forums, wikis and chat • Where IT usage is high in main area of study, use of ReCITE material is also high • ReCITE usage would have been increased if material could had been made available prior to the learners starting their main course • Involvement of curriculum specialist staff at project inception improves project workflow.   • Structure is paramount. A good structure for learning materials eases the repurposing process

11. Conclusion • ReCITE demonstrates that material can be successfully repurposed and recontextualised, with benefit for learners, tutors, institutions, employers and other stakeholders • Learners benefit from the new web and technology delivered resources. The ReCITE material has proven to be well liked by users, easy to navigate and effective in supporting and enhancing individual IT skills • Skills based courses appear more straightforward to repurpose rather than academic based courses, but with less longevity in terms of content (e.g. changes in Operating Systems and software) • Feedback was positive, with learner demand for newer subject material (e.g. Office 2007) within the same structure.

12. Future Development The ReCITE project has informed the concept of Repurpose and Recontextualisation and future developments will include: • Reuse of structure for other curriculum areas and industry sectors • Development of new learning objects and materials based on Microsoft Office 2007 (or other office packages), to be “dropped in” to existing structure with minimum modification • Each partner institution plans to continue using the ReCITE material developed when the funding cycle is completed, with the potential for enhanced collaboration between institutions • Plans include the use of ReCITE for staff training and for pre-entry courses. These will be frontloaded over summer/early September to ensure a baseline of learner skills prior to committing to the main area of study

13. Project Teams Swansea College • Kate Pearce • Graham Ashman • Kristian Besley • Simon James • Angela Dixon • Shelley Evans Coleg Sir Gâr • Dave Howells • Byron Davies • Louis Dare • Louisa Walters Swansea Metropolitan University • Ian Wells • Sue Maw • Simon Gibbon

14. Thank you Questions? Contacts • a.conti@swancoll.ac.uk • g.ashman@swancoll.ac.uk • owen.phillips@swancoll.ac.uk