Group Admins
Description
Session Description
Imperial College London (School of Medicine) was one of the first HE institution in the UK to provide all undergraduate students with Apple iPads to support their learning.
The iPads are used to record medical sign-off information during clinical training (Years 3, 5 and 6), and the Apple iBook software is used to deliver module handbooks to all year groups.
Following informal feedback of the student and staff experience of the iBook software, it was determined that the process for updating and distributing module handbooks was time consuming, and that there was no mechanism to collect data to inform on student engagement.
An analysis against key criteria identified that an open source framework (WordPress) would be the best candidate to update the provision, delivering the following benefits:
– A simplified content-editing process for staff
– Transparent statistics on student engagement and device use
– An improved student experience by integrating handbooks with wider programme information
– Improved accessibility on non-Apple devices
Content and functionality were refined following a detailed consultation with staff, students and administrators; after which a pilot of the system with an undergraduate cohort was conducted in April 2018. Based on the feedback to date, it was agreed that all undergraduate module handbooks (70+) should be moved to WordPress by September 2018.
This presentation will focus on the process that the Imperial College London Medical School implemented in order to demonstrate the need for change, manage risks during transition, measure improvements in the student and staff experience, and finally how lessons learned will inform future development of such applications.
This presentation will also propose wider benefits of moving from proprietary software e.g. Apple, to an open source solution, in terms of flexibility and opportunities for innovation by allowing the rapid prototyping of new applications and functionality.
This talk will be useful to a varied demographic, including teachers, learning designers, academic developers, content developers and learning technologists, who may feel restricted in delivering learning content through traditional VLEs.
Session content: evaluation and reflection
This session is based on a project which implemented an open source solution to replace existing proprietary software. It is being evaluated by student and staff feedback, and a large part of presentation will focus on that feedback and how it informed an iterative development cycle.
We will also share our own reflections on what went well, what went poorly and share those lessons learnt with the audience.
References
Sembrat, Eric 2018
Unbundle Your Institution: Building a Web Ecosystem
Available at : https://online.wpcampus.org/schedule/unbundle-institution-building-web-ecosystem/
Cutforth, Rob. Hardaker, Simon. Cappelli, Tim. 2017
Developing a Learning Environment in WordPress
Available at : https://altc.alt.ac.uk/blog/2017/03/developing-a-learning-environment-in-wordpress/#gref
Lees, James 2017
From Moodle to WordPress – what we learnt and why we moved
Available at : https://online.wpcampus.org/schedule/from-moodle-to-wordpress-what-we-learnt-and-why-we-moved/
Hamilton, Mark 2014
First Year of the Digital Curriculum at Leicester
Available at : https://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/medicine/student-staff/students-update-ezine/ezine-june-2014/use-of-ipads-by-first-year-medical-students
