Wednesday 5 July 2023

Digital Curriculum Questionnaire

Throughout my first year in my previous support role in the Institute of Health and Allied Professions (IHAP), I had strategic ambitions to collect this kind of information to capture current student experiences to create a data source to inform future digital and online developments and priorities.  Of which such activity was well documented in the first version of my digital curriculum operations plan.  To ensure the most appropriate and best digital and online experience throughout our students learning journey, and that they have a voice in shaping the support I offer to them and our future students.  Therefore, as part of my appraisal objectives for 2022/2023, I set myself the following objective to conduct a deeper piece across our whole digital curriculum area.  Of which will eventually align to the learning design and continuous improvement work outlined in my blog post 'Digital curriculum - engaging colleagues in the process'.
 
Objective description: 
Scope and evaluate IHAP digital and online practice sampling year 2 and 3 nursing and paramedicine BSc students. To identify areas of improvement and inform and progress our digital and online learning and teaching offer and position in the healthcare higher education market."

Output measures: 
"a. Produce and obtain approval of a draft ‘IHAP digital curriculum questionnaire’ to conduct between December 2022-January 2023 (B.6 operations plan).
b. Analyse and interpret questionnaire outcomes and translate into actions for current and future course improvements, to collaborate with PLs on (B.6 operations plan)."

Later refined and confirmed to collect data from only 3rd year nursing and paramedicine students on their wider digital and online experience in our courses; the knowledge, skills and attitudes in accessing and navigating the online aspects of our online course learning rooms, content and digital tools required to successfully engage and participate.  Including what support they require in order to learn effectively.  With the overall aim to inform further digital and online developments and priorities within IHAP – creating an information source, rather than just what I anticipate, to support the production of the digital learning strategy; using the responses as a mandate to stimulate continuous improvements across our institute and for decision making, another aspect of being an effective digital leader.  The online questionnaire was designed with open, closed and rating scale questions.  Prospective respondents were invited to share their experiences and perspectives in relation to the digital and online learning-related questions.  The questionnaire includes questions on their VLE module and course learning rooms, PebblePad and workbooks, Virtual Reality (VR) immersive learning and digital literacies.

Data collection occurred from 14th December 2022 to 31st January 2023.  Responses were collected from 3rd year nursing and paramedicine BSc courses.  Out of approximate 110 students (80 nursing, 35 paramedicine), 78 responses were received.  63 from BSc Nursing including fields: adult nursing; mental health; learning disabilities.  15 from BSc Paramedic Science.

The following summarises the general outcomes, that aim to have an impact on the student learning experience through appropriate changes in their use of our learning technologies and access to meaningful online learning material.

The full report can be found at the bottom, 24 pages.


  • PebblePad
    • Workbooks need to be more user-friendly and intuitive for students
    • Student PebblePad guidance needs to be clearer, visual and consistent
    • PebblePad student and external induction training needs to be standardised across courses
    • Significant workbook changes need to be made to be communicated to students
  • NOW learning room content
    • Creating online asynchronous interactive activities and resources, to enable further variety and opportunities for students to learn in the online elements of their course
    • Developing high-quality online instruction for online activities and resources
    • Lecturers need support, protected time and safe environments to develop their knowledge and skills in digital pedagogy
    • Develop a NOW learning room quality process
  • VR and immersive learning
    • VR and immersive learning needs to have a clear purpose and alignment to our curriculum areas, and to develop effective immersive learning experiences
  • Digital literacy
    • Digital literacies need promoting and embedding across our curriculum
  • Other comments and suggestions related to IHAP digital curriculum
    • NOW course and module learning rooms need consistency

Today 5th July, in our monthly department meeting I presented the visual summary below, where I briefly walked through the outcomes.  The full report will be published later this month.  I ended the presentation by asking the following questions, which created some discussion on the topic and ways we can build on this in the coming academic year, providing a baseline for future evaluations: Is there anything that surprises you in the results?  What challenges do you foresee in taking action towards making such improvements?  What specific support will be helpful to you in creating asynchronous online activities and resources?


It is interesting to see the difference between nursing and paramedicine students responses.  But there is a difference in roles and digital confidence and competence; paramedicine are typically more digitally-minded in the use of digital technology.

The following are positive verbatim comments were made during the presentation.  Recognising the value and wider impact my report outcomes will have on NOW in our institution moving forwards.  Showcasing the importance of this significant piece of work.

Anne Felton Head of Department, introduction to presentation- "It's helpful for people to have in mind when they're listening to it, that it happens to quite unintentionally coincide with a school audit of NOW learning rooms. And every department in the school has been found wanting, shall we say, in terms of NOW learning rooms. And I won't focus too much on it now, ironically. But next, academic year we will be looking at how we can support people and what we need to do around standardising NOW learning rooms. So just something to bear in mind that, you know, this kind of data helps us feed into that that work which will be coming later on in the timeline."

Jo Rutt Principal Lecturer in Nursing, post-presentation - "Thank you Dan, for that and I think it's really important for us to know the fundamental things of remembering that when we copy over not everything would automatically work. And because it's easy to kind of think I know I've got that, I'll get that across.  So it's a really good reminder of making sure to check on links and update the elements that we need to. So thanks for all of that information."

Anne Felton, post-presentation - "I think it's really useful to have that data from our students as well isn't it as the NOW audit gives us it from an institutional point of view and expectations for that feedback from the students is interesting."…"But it's telling us that it's alright, which I think is a really good position to be at this stage. You know, given I know some of your dates have picked up that rooms with the modules already running or, you know, the clustering hasn't always worked properly, so people are needing to make last minute changes. So I think that these stats are good and given those circumstances.  But then I think it also gives us a good baseline to move it forward over the next couple of years with that."

I am confident that the questionnaire has fulfilled its purpose, despite some question changes.  Whilst I trust students know what is being asked, there are some yes and no options which could have benefited from a not sure option or scale to ascertain levels of understanding.  Yes and no is too vague for some questions.

The questionnaire is its first and promises to provide lots of information to inform the way I approach and lead our institute forward.  I'm confident that it will prove to be a valuable source of information and inspiration for the department, and would be great to conduct perhaps every 2 or three years, and maybe open up to other course cohorts.  I foresee the impact on this questionnaire to be very significant and that when re-conducted it would provide opportunities for comparison and where success has been achieved.  As I mentioned in my MSc, I can use this information to build on the Jisc strand ‘use the outcomes of organisational research for decision making’ from the competencies profile of Jisc’s of ‘being an effective digital leader’.

EDIT:

I shared the report with my Head of Department ahead of my publishing it.  On the 4 August 2023 she commented:

"Thank you for this project report and all the work that has gone into it.  It’ll provide a really value spring board for next years developments.

I was wondering who the audience for this report is?  There’s obviously lots of work gone into it but I am mindful of the capacity of people to digest the detail.  I wonder whether a two page executive summary might be helpful which sign posts people to the full report for the detail.

Please do come and present this in SLT.  I haven’t got the dates in yet as I am waiting for my new PA to start on Monday but when they are in the diary we can book a slot.

Thanks again for this excellent piece of scholarship Dan, look forward to putting some of the recommendations into practice next year."

I originally thought of the report as a two-pager, but decided to make it a full scholarship-type report as it deserved a deeper analysis.  So I'll create a brief two-pager to meet this need.  I also said that we [I and my Head] need to think about the dissemination plan; how do we want academic staff to use it or is this better shared with PLs/senior leadership team (SLT).  Looking forward to presenting this to SLT and generating discussion and plans.

On 6th September when I eventually shared the full report and two and a quarter page short version.  Sporadic annual leave and new academic year preparations delayed this.  The outcomes will form part of our digital priorities moving forwards through the production of a digital learning strategy.  Lecturers, or anyone who supports learning, are also encouraged to use this to inform changes to their digital learning practices.  Exciting innovative times ahead!  Jan Royal-Fearn, Principle Lecturer, responded with the following, which chimes with my plans to conduct with other cohorts for comparison:

"Thanks for this and I had a look at the summary which is a useful overview.

I’d be interested to see if current students S21 onwards,  feel PebblePad instruction / information is improving as we settle into it all and more NTU specific resources are produced?"

Full report:

























Short version: