The Project

OVERALL PURPOSE OF THE PROJECT
KEY CONCEPTS
OVERALL RESEARCH STRATEGY


OVERALL PURPOSE OF THE PROJECT

The project sought to develop subject-specific conceptual frameworks to guide institutional and faculty or departmental development of teaching-learning environments. The frameworks were deployed to integrate findings from research both with the professional knowledge of academic staff and with national and institutional criteria describing high quality teaching and learning. By working collaboratively with departmental partners, ways of enhancing the system-wide capacity for research-based practice were explored and disseminated.


KEY CONCEPTS

Key concepts underpinning the project's work are as follows.

  • Teaching-learning environment This term is used to describe the whole set of teaching, learning support, assessment and administrative arrangements, as well as the facilities and resources provided within a degree course. Our particular focus is on those aspects expected to influence most directly the quality of student learning.

    Constructive alignment This term is designed to capture the ‘goodness-of-fit’ between the aims of a course and the teaching-learning and assessment procedures followed; ‘constructive’ indicates that the aims involve a focus on developing conceptual understanding and ways of thinking and practising in the subject..

    Ways of thinking and practising in the subject (WTPs) Initial work suggested that a term was needed to cover not just approaches to studying, but also the thinking processes and subject-specific skills that staff are seeking to develop in their students. Deep approaches to studying which are well organised and applied with effort are being used to indicate engagement with the courses being studied.

  • Troublesome knowledge and threshold concepts There is particular value in focusing on topics or ways of thinking that students find difficult, particularly when these act as a threshold to further learning. Examining these in relation to teaching and assessment provides a focused way of investigating influences on learning outcomes.


OVERALL RESEARCH STRATEGY

The overall intention was to explore the applicability of these concepts and previous research findings in accounting for the extent to which teaching-learning environments encourage the active engagement of students, and deep approaches to studying, in achieving high quality outcomes of learning.


The project focused on four subject areas, chosen to provide good coverage of academic disciplines and professional areas: electronic engineering, cell and molecular biology, business economics, and history. Course settings were mainly chosen in clusters of universities around Coventry, Durham and Edinburgh, where our research team was based, whilst also encompassing a variety of traditional and innovative teaching-learning environments.


The main strategy involved working collaboratively with departmental colleagues to look in detail at two target course units due to run in successive years, one at first-year level (or Scottish second-year) and the other at final-year level, using interviews with staff and students, and questionnaires with students. During the first year of the collaboration we collected the data, analysed them, and reported the findings back to the departments. Discussions of the implications of the findings for each course unit then lead to a collaborative initiative during the second year of work with the department, designed to enhance the teaching-learning environment in whatever ways proved to be acceptable and practicable.


The various outputs of the project have been brought together and disseminated through web-accessible resources, printed materials, as well as collaborative workshops and seminars. The aim is to assist those responsible for modules, courses or programmes of study to monitor, review and enhance the efficacy of teaching-learning environments by deploying data gathering and analytic tools which are evidence-based and have clear conceptual underpinnings.



ETL Project Phases: a chart of the activities of the project by phase
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