12244 research outputs found
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We need formative assessment now more than ever [blog post]
No full textConsideration of the role of formative assessment in responses to Covid-19 school closures
Play as a design tool: co-designing shared community space
No full textEvery city, town, village and neighbourhood are home to shared community
spaces, buildings and amenities that play a fundamentally important role in the
lives of local people. Spaces such as parks, recreational areas and community
buildings have significant social purpose and encourage integration. This
research investigates community engagement in the consultation process. The
study proposes that for the development of shared community spaces public
consultation requires a shift to more collaborative approaches with the local
people. A new method to build effective dialogue to encourage a shared
understanding of places, their challenges and their potential is developed. A
methodology is established that provides participatory design interaction
between, and within, the local people and urban design professionals using play
as a design tool.
The Localism Act (2011) aimed to facilitate the devolution of decision making
from central government to local councils and local communities. One of the
measures within the Act was to consult local communities before submitting
planning proposals (2011:13). The levels and methods of public consultation
vary with the requirements of the project and despite the importance of
engaging local communities, the success with which the local community is
engaged varies greatly. This variation in the success of the public consultation
process motivates this study to investigate the opportunity to develop a codesign
framework that uses symbolic object play for co-creating shared
community spaces, for use by architects, designers, consultation companies
and local councils.
Using three case studies this research explores how the nature of shared space
allows a collaborative playful approach to successfully engage local
communities in the design of their future environments. The case studies
chosen are recreational, community spaces situated in the UK. Insights from
these case studies, supported by the examination of existing research,
investigate practical ways that the findings could be disseminated into a design
framework for others to draw from. The conclusions of this research support a
‘Play as a Design Tool’ user guide and an animated illustration of the process.
Presented as part of the PhD exhibition, the research practice delivers
resources for the target users to efficiently support them to utilise the methodology, thereby inviting wider implementation of this new model for codeveloping
shared community spaces
Student perspectives on learning research methods in the social sciences
Get PDFThis paper addresses the perspectives of students of social science research methods from a UK study of their holistic experience of learning during two years of their postgraduate research training/ early careers as researchers. Unusually the ten participants span diverse institutions and disciplines and three became co-authors. The study used a diary circle combining online diary method with face-to-face focus groups to generate dialogue. Data were analysed narratively and thematically to produce two individual learning journeys and a synthesis of common experiences. Findings show the active, experiential learning of the participants alongside salient themes of difficulty and struggle. This leads to discussion of the emotional dimensions of methods learning and implications for teaching. The iterative role of the diary circle in the learning journey is also examined. The paper argues that teachers and supervisors should attend more carefully to the social, emotional, active and reflective nature of methods learning
Causal manipulation of feed-forward and recurrent processing differentially affects measures of consciousness
Get PDFIt has been theorized that cortical feed-forward and recurrent neural activity support unconscious and conscious cognitive processes, respectively. Here we causally tested this proposition by applying event-related transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) at early and late times relative to visual stimuli, together with a pulse designed to suppress conscious detection. Consistent with pre-registered hypotheses, early TMS affected residual, reportedly ‘unseen’ capacity. However, conscious perception also appeared critically dependent upon feed-forward processing to a greater extent than the later recurrent phase. Additional exploratory analyses suggested that these early effects dissociated from top-down criterion measures, which were most affected by later TMS. These findings are inconsistent with a simple dichotomy where feed-forward and recurrent processes correspond to unconscious and conscious mechanisms. Instead, different components of awareness may correspond to different phases of cortical dynamics in which initial processing is broadly perceptual whereas later recurrent processing might relate to decision to report
Scores in time: exploring the use of sound as a medium for notation in musical composition
Get PDFThis commentary deals with my compositional practice from 2014-18, which was
concerned with staging first encounters between performers and scores through
different types of scoring practices, particularly aural notation. Through the lens of
performance studies, I discuss the rehearsal process and how it relates to the idea of
finished works of art. Applying the theory to musical contexts, and drawing on
musicological studies, I discuss the connections between works, rehearsals, and the
concert tradition as a framework for analysing my own work.
Through a survey of experimental scoring practices over the last fifty years, I then
contextualise the aural notation practice which I developed from 2015 onwards. I
discuss how this type of work enables renegotiated agency for composers and scores
in performance contexts, drawing links with uses of language in verbal notation and
characterological theories in performance studies. The final part of the commentary
turns towards specifically using headphones to communicate audio scores to
performers. Placing this work in the context of similar practices in the fields of
theatre, TV, dance and music, and using analytical frameworks from the field of
composition, I discuss several of my works written from 2015-18 which use
headphones as a medium for communication to performers. The compositional
methods of these pieces are explained and analysed, before some aesthetic
ramifications are discussed, and avenues for future research elaborated
The curious promise of educationalising technological unemployment: what can places of learning really do about the future of work?
No full textUniversity education is full of promise. Indeed universities have the capacity to create and shape, through staff and students, all kinds of enthralling ‘worlds’ and ‘new possibilities of life’. Yet students are encouraged increasingly to view universities as simply a means to an end, where neoliberal education delivers flexible skills to directly serve a certain type of capitalism. Additionally, the universal challenge of technological unemployment, alongside numerous other social issues, has become educationalised and portrayed in HE policy, as an issue to be solved by universities. The idea that more education can resolve the problem of technological unemployment is a political construction which has largely failed to deliver its promise. In this article, we look at educationalisation in hand with technologisation and we draw on a Critical Discourse Analysis of HE policies, to demonstrate the problems arising from taken for granted visions of neoliberal social development related to education, technology, and employment. To disrupt the tired visions of ‘techno-fixes’ and ‘edu-fixes’ we identify in these texts, we call for a radical re-imagining of HE policy. Instead of attributing responsibility for social change to abstract notions of education, market and technology, a new shared vision is needed where more agency is explicitly attributed to the researchers, teachers, and students who are the genuine human future of work
Doctoral apprenticeships and the ‘ladder of opportunity'
No full textPurpose
This discussion paper supports the new development of Apprenticeships at Level 8 of the UK’s Framework for Higher Education Qualifications (QAA, 2014). This exciting development, one that employers and universities had been waiting for paves the way for, apprenticeships, sold as the ladder of opportunity, to go all the way to the top.
Design/methodology/approach
Here, we explore in brief the emergence of the new apprenticeship landscape and the importance of the addition of this new highest of levels.
Findings
Importantly, however, we make the case that such progress needs to be met with an equally progressive approach to the design of the new doctoral pathway.
Research limitations/implications
We sketch out a possible shell for the assessment of a Doctoral Apprenticeship, one that allows for flexible occupationally relevant inputs to create an applicable role-based and academically rigourous whole.
Originality/value
The importance of such a design is discussed within the context of the potential for impact in three priority areas: social justice, broadening the talent pool and ensuring the relevance and sustainability of the doctoral award
The digitally resilient student [blog post]
No full textGoing to university is a transition – the opportunity for students to develop learning and often to become more independent. Technology has given students the opportunity to interact in new and exciting ways while also opening up many avenues for students to both spend time and money on; from social media to gaming and gambling, with a variety of applications and platforms to engage with. Many offline activities have now transferred to a virtual context (for example online gambling). With more financial independence and much of the University schedule being unstructured, developing good habits and resilience with technology is a particularly important skill for students
Future-ready faculty: developing the characteristics of expertise in teaching in higher education
Get PDFIn higher education (HE), “ways of thinking and practising” (WTP) have been considered for many academic disciplines (e.g. McCune & Hounsell, 2005), but less so for the practice of HE teaching. In other professions, WTP is explored through the concept of expertise (e.g. Ericsson et al, 2006). A better understanding of expertise of HE teachers will help inform the enhancement of educational development (Kreber et al, 2005; Saroyan & Trigwell, 2015). This paper proposes a model of expertise in HE teaching based on the expertise literature, empirical research, and reflection on practice. The model is presented as three interacting aspects:
• Pedagogical Content Knowledge (Shulman, 1986)
• Artistry of Teaching: authentic, creative & improvisatory (Schön, 1982)
• Self-determined & purposeful approaches to learning and development (King, 2019
Together With Them She Went
No full textAnna Lucas and Alice Walton have been working on a collaborative strand of practice since 2016, exploring the notion of ‘alongside looking’, a looking with and in conversation. Anna Lucas makes photographs and films, Alice Walton works with found photographic images. Both have honed their understanding ofthe investment made by the viewer when an image is framed, processed, and presented. Together With Them She Went presents a two films (113, and Elektra) they have made together using Walton’s extensive found-image archive. The films are presented within sculptural installations where the use of reflective and translucent materials draw the viewer into becoming an active element of the work. The female body is a recurring subject, sometimes appearing as a sculpture, on a stage or in a rehearsal space along with the elements of drapes and windows, light and shade. The simple gesture of turning pages, creates a quietly hypnotic engagement of shared looking and touch. Sound creates space, alluding to an off-screen narrative; footsteps over the floor, a window opening -distant sounds that ebb and flow throughout