Lecture Recording at SHU: Current Position

As part of a working group investigating how the upcoming changes to Disabled Student Allowance will affect the university and our students, an overview document has been produced to outline the current methods of recording lectures (and other types of teaching session) available to staff at SHU. While the document was produced for the working group,…

A woman wearing a computer headset

Screencasts as an Essay Alternative

A guest post by Roberta E Taylor on the Assessment Journey Programme (AJP) blog has just been published and describes her experience of replacing a 4000 word essay-based assessment with a short screencast. Roberta describes the background to the assessment, the approach taken to introduce students to screencasting concepts and techniques and the creative skills that…

Create ebooks in Google Docs

Google has just added a new feature to Google Docs that should make it much easier to create ebooks for use on tablets, phones, Kindle-style devices, PCs and laptops. Google has added the option to export documents in the ePub format, which is the international standard for ebooks and so is supported by most software and…

SHU project featured in 2016 Horizon Report

Each year, the New Media Consortium (NMC) works with a panel of academics and technologists to identify developing trends in technology-supported pedagogy that are likely to have significant impact on learning and teaching over the next five years, challenges to technology adoption and trends accelerating technology adoption. The 2016 Higher Education edition was published online last week,…

Students using videoconferencing as part of assessment

James Coope of the Venture Matrix has recently posted some interesting information about the way that students in ACES, D&S and SBS have been using online videoconferencing to work with organisations and individuals around the world on real life projects as part of their assessment activities. Assessments and activities of this type help students to develop vital…

Blackboard – YouTube Mashup workaround

A recent change to their service by YouTube has resulted in Blackboard’s ‘Mash-up’ functionality breaking. Blackboard are working on fixing the issue, but the solution is likely to take some time. In the meantime, Blackboard have provided the following set of steps for anyone wishing to add YouTube videos to their module sites: Open YouTube in your…

Online screencasting software available for SHU staff

Screencasting refers to the process of recording a video of what is happening on a PC, often with narration, and making it available for students to watch whenever they want. It is commonly used for recording demonstrations of software and walkthroughs of computer-based processes, however growing numbers of staff from many disciplines are also using…