Jorum Teaching and Learning Competition at ALT-C 2011

The Jorum Learning & Teaching Competition will again run in conjunction with this year’s HUALT-C conferenceUH in Leeds, 6-8 September 2011. The panel of judges will be looking for exciting, innovative learning and teaching resources that have been created under a HUCreative CommonsUH licence to showcase at the conference. Overall winners will be presented with their prizes at the ALT-C 2011 Conference Dinner on 7 September 2011.

If you create learning and teaching resources, either individually or as a team, you are eligible to enter.

The criteria on which the resources will be judged, and details of how to enter, are listed below. Ideally, your OER should correspond in some way to the theme of this year’s conference, “Thriving in a Colder and More Challenging Climate”.

The closing date for entries is Friday 22 July 2011.

JUDGING CRITERIA

The criteria against which resources will be judged include:

Appropriateness: What is the teaching/learning problem that your resource has been designed to solve and how does it achieve its objectives?

Engagement/Innovation: What makes your resource something that other teachers/students want to use? Does it offer something that other media can’t?

Effectiveness: Is your resource an effective way for teachers/students to learn? Each submission should demonstrate how it could be embedded in teaching and learning, and how it could add value to any teaching environment.

Reusability and portability: Digital learning objects are particularly valuable when they are reusable and reconfigurable. Many different aspects may be reusable including, structure, content or pedagogical approach. In addition, how is the object described (metadata) and how is it put together (packaged)?

Note that the criteria are all about education and not about technology. Sometimes the most appropriate, engaging and effective learning and teaching resources are technologically simple; however, sometimes technology allows approaches to teaching and learning that were previously unimagined.

HOW TO ENTER

• All entries are to be submitted into Jorum by going to http://www.jorum.ac.uk; registration is required to submit materials to Jorum.
• All entries to be created under a HUCreative Commons Licence.U
• All entries must be tagged with the keyword: Jorumcomp11 and have appropriate metadata included.
• If you currently have resources already deposited into Jorum that you would like to submit as an entry, you must add the competition tag: Jorumcomp11.
• A Uuseful short videoU is available to show you how to edit the existing metadata.
• If you require help depositing your resources into Jorum, we have a step-by-step HUvidcastUH available, which demonstrates all you need to know. Alternatively, contact support@jorum.ac.uk.
• All entries should be submitted in a way that allows them to be portable and usable independently of their original development environment. N
• No individual may be named as the creator on more than three submitted resources
• Judges will rank their top ten resources, which will then feature on the Jorum Facebook page to allow for additional public voting via the “like” tag. A combination of the judges’ choices and votes from the public will determine the six final winners, based on a weighted scoring system. Further details on how to vote will be released later.
• The final six winning resources will be asked to present their resources at a special Jorum session at ALT-C (date and time to be confirmed).

PRIZES

There will be three prizes and three commended awards available. Each winner will also receive a certificate.

The six winners will be notified by 29 August 2011. The top three prizes will be awarded at the ALT-C 2011 Conference Dinner on 7 September 2011. The three commended awards will receive their prizes at the Jorum session at the conference.

WHAT PAST PARTICIPANTS HAVE SAID:

Click on the links below to hear what previous participants and winners have said about their projects and the Jorum Teaching and Learning Competition

Katy Jordan, “Opening Up Photosynthesis via Jorum” (2010)

Peter Hartley, “Creating and Sharing Open Access Resources with Jorum” (2009)

JUDGING PANEL

Sarah Sherman:

An experienced adviser and qualified teacher, Sarah has been working in e-learning since 2001, providing strategic advice to senior managers and academics about its introduction and application. As the BLE Service Manager, Sarah is responsible for the implementation, maintenance and development of the Bloomsbury Learning Environment (BLE) – a shared e-learning service used by Birkbeck, Institute of Education, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, the Royal Veterinary College and SOAS. The BLE service comprises a learning platform (Blackboard) and a suite of e-learning tools including Echo360 (for automatic lecture capture), Elluminate (virtual classroom software) and Turnitin (online plagiarism detection software).

Lindsey Martin:

The e-Learning Strategy and Development Officer at Edge Hill University, Lindsey’s role aims to achieve an institution-wide diffusion of technology-enhanced learning and teaching. It also includes responsibility for managing the institution’s eLearning systems and the Learning Technology Development Team. Lindsey became involved with e-learning as academic librarian developing e-learning modules to support colleagues and students. Her role expanded to become a hybrid of librarian, technologist, manager, teacher and researcher. In 2008 Lindsey managed the JISCfunded ReFORM Project http://www.edgehill.ac.uk/reformproject/index.htm which focused on development, reuse and repurposing of digital teaching and learning content. Lindsey is a member of the editorial board for the SCONUL Focus journal and secretary of the Heads of eLearning Forum Steering group (HeLF).

Peter Hartley:

Peter Hartley is Professor of Education Development at University of Bradford, Visiting Professor at Edge Hill, and a National Teaching Fellow with a longstanding interest in the applications of computer technology to student learning. This interest is reflected in his leadership of recent JISC projects (ELP1/2, ASEL, and ITS4SEA), his involvement in the award-winning LearnHigher resource on groupwork www.learnhighergroupwork.com/ ) and the multimedia software he has developed to support students’ job-hunting through interactive virtual learning (www.interviewer.org.uk), and his work with the information search tool developed at Bradford: C-Link (www.conceptlinkage.org/). He initiated the national interest group reviewing the use of virtual learning environments in UK HE, supported by ALT (LERSIG at http://lersig.alt.ac.uk/ ) and was Critical Friend to a cluster of projects in the JISC Curriculum Delivery Programme. He was co-editor and contributor to ‘Learning Development in Higher Education’ and co-writer of ‘Success in Groupwork’ (both Palgrave Macmillan, 2010) and is leading the NTFS Group Project on Programme Assessment Strategies (http://www.pass.brad.ac.uk/).

Joy E. Palmer:

The Senior Manager, Library and Archive Services at Mimas, Joy is responsible for the strategic direction of the Archives Hub and negotiating the funding and stakeholder environment. Part of her work involves developing proposals, initiating new projects, and collaborating with stakeholders across the sector – from local cultural heritage institutions to national bodies such as The National Archives, the British Library, and JISC. Joy has a diverse range of experience, with fifteen years experience teaching and research at the University level. She lived in the USA for this time, and it was at Michigan State University that she got involved in Digital Humanities project development and management. She is committed to the development of technology to help such users carry out their work in as effective and rewarding a manner as possible.

Mark Roche:

Mark has worked with WebCT and other learning technologies for many years. Prior to joining MMU as a Senior Lecturer in Learning Technologies, he was Learning Technology Development Manager at Edge Hill University. He has presented at national and international conferences on the use of technology in teaching and learning. His interests include using technologies such as audio, video and Web 2.0 tools to provide interactive learning experiences for staff and students, and he is currently involved in a university-wide project to explore the ways in which learning and the broader student experience are supported through online interaction and other technologies.

ELIGIBILITY

1. This competition is open to everyone within the UK. While it is expected that most entries will be from the UK Higher and Further education communities, entries from other education sectors are welcomed.

2. Learning and teaching resources may be submitted by individuals or teams (in which each member should be named). No individual may be named as the creator on more than three submitted resources.

3. All learning and teaching resources submitted to the competition should be deposited in Jorum, have a Creative Commons licence attached, and appropriate metadata included, aiding the judging process. We will accept links deposited into Jorum to an externally hosted resource, on the condition that they are truly reusable objects (i.e. they can be moved from its existing location) and have appropriate metadata attached when linking to the location of the resource.

4. Those who wish to enter should go to the Jorum website: http://www.jorum.ac.uk (registration is required for depositing of materials). If you have any trouble, you should contact support@jorum.ac.uk for details on how to enter.

5. Entries are nominally limited in size to no more than 50Mbytes. This limit may be adjusted upwards at the discretion of the judges.

6. All entries should be in English.

7. It is expected that for the six final shortlisted entries, a member of the creating team will attend the ALT-C conference in Leeds to demonstrate the learning and teaching resource during a showcase event. The top three winners will be asked to attend the conference dinner on the 7^th of September, where prizes will be awarded.

8. The six finalists will be notified by 29 August 2010.

9. No correspondence will be entered into, other than queries relating to submission of entries. These should be directed in the first instance to HUFrank.Manista@manchester.ac.ukUH with Jorum Learning & Teaching Competition as the subject line.

TIMETABLE

Closing date for entries: 22 July 2011

Closing date for public vote: 25 August 2011

Six finalists to be notified by: 29 August 2011

Winner and runners up announced at ALT-C: 6-8 Sept 2011