Excellence Gateway
This case study was produced by JISC RSC (Regional Support Centres) South East on behalf of the Excellence Gateway.
Published: 22 July 2009
Sector relevance: Further education and Sixth Form colleges
Keywords: Improving teaching and learning, improving responsiveness to learners, 14-19, social networking, revision, creating and adapting e-learning materials, personalisation of learning, working with groups, independent learning, achievement, motivating learners, curriculum good practice, progression, collaborative projects
The debate surrounding the pedagogical and practical value of social networking websites as part of the teaching and learning process rages on. For some providers, the introduction of the likes of Facebook and Bebo into the curriculum is a non-starter, whilst others see great opportunities for engaging and collaborative online working. This case study looks at one successful implementation as Brighton, Hove and Sussex Sixth Form College (BHASVIC) begins to use a revision social networking site to help its students prepare for examinations and consolidate their learning.
BHASVIC (short for Brighton, Hove and Sussex Sixth Form College) was formed in 1975 following the re-organisation of secondary education in Brighton. The College teaches approximately 1,740 students with 90% following GCE or AVCE courses and the remainder studying a variety of one-year courses. The vast majority of its students are in the 16-19 age range and are enrolled onto full-time courses. Around 70% of advanced-level students at BHASVIC go on to read a degree at university or study a specialist course at a college of further education. In August 2008, the College's pass rates at AS, A2 and GCSE (A*-C) were 92.7%, 98.9% and 79%, respectively.
Anyone who has taught in the post-16 sector knows only too well the struggle required to get students to revise effectively. Poor (or non-existent) revision plans, lack of resources and low-levels of engagement all conspire to prevent learners from reaching their potential.
Peter Langley is a Sociology Lecturer at BHASVIC. When helping his son (who also attended the College) to create a revision timetable, it was suggested that he use a computer. From this grew the idea of creating a free and online electronic revision timetable tool. Things didn't stop there.
Whilst researching revision websites on the Internet, Langley discovered that most were populated with fairly bland and recycled old material. Langley recalls:
“Students produce some fantastic resources, so I thought about creating a website where students could upload and share electronic ‘flash' cards to help them with their revision. As the idea developed, it was only a matter of time before the concept developed into a full-blown social networking revision site.”
The result is GetRevising, a social networking website dedicated to student revision. The site provides many facilities including:
When students reach the homepage, they have a choice of five main activities:
The GetRevising website allows students to create three types of resource directly within the site: quizzes, wordsearches and revision cards. The latter are A4 PDFs designed to be folded into two-sided A5 ‘flash' cards. Visitors to the website can share URLs and YouTube videos as well as uploading other types of files (such as Word documents, PowerPoint presentations or multimedia files).
Image 1: GetRevising homepage
Image 2: The GetRevising 'creation' page
Image 3: Example of a resource created on GetRevising
Image 4: The 'top ten resources' page on GetRevising
Image 5: The GetRevising 'Study groups' page
Martin Cookson is a Senior Tutor with responsibility to co-ordinate the tutorial programme at BHASVIC. Virtually every member of staff is a tutor, which means there are around 80 weekly tutorial sessions focusing on:
Cookson observes that the students like using the GetRevising site to create their own personalised revision timetable, allowing them to block out work, social and sporting commitments, as well as prioritising subjects. At it simplest, creating a personalised revision timetable is very straightforward by using the following steps:
Cookson notes:
“In addition to saving huge amounts of time and effort, the timetables produced using the social networking site seem to be far more realistic and individual compared to the old paper-based method. The fact that they have contributed to its creation also means that the students have ownership.”
So what about the tutor's perspective? Lesley Clark is both a lecturer and a tutor at BHASVIC. She highlights the traditional difficulties in getting students to plan their revision and feels that the GetRevising site has been a great help. Users can search for resources created by other students by keyword or star rating and each has a series of feedback comments. Clark also observes:
“In particular, I like the way the site provides options and advice. In my experience, students are more inclined to take notice of a computer screen than their own tutor.”
When asked what improvements the social networking site had made to her students' revision timetables, Clark responds:
“The real question to ask is whether they even had one before? Creating a personalised revision timetable is quite a complex task, especially by hand. GetRevising automates this process so now all my tutees have actually got one…and one that will work! What is also really useful is the ease and speed of making changes.”
Clark sees real and tangible evidence that students are making good use of the site to produce and share revision resources, some of which is of a very high calibre. She adds:
“This is a great motivational tool for a tutor, particularly when trying to get students who are studying diverse subjects to focus on their revision.”
Engaging with this social networking site is not only beneficial for student revision. It is also having an impact on curriculum delivery. Computing and ICT Lecturer Ruth Hilliard has been using the site as an alternative to the virtual learning platform Moodle to provide online resources for her subject classes. Having recently changed from the AQA to OCR specification for Computing, she found she was rather short of electronic resources to support the new curriculum.
Hilliard comments:
“Students like ownership of resources and sometimes are a little reluctant to access Moodle as it feels too much like a ‘work' environment. I thought I would be a good idea to use the GetRevising site to encourage the students to create and share revision resources.”
Hilliard gave each of her students a different topic within the Computing syllabus then set them the task of producing one of three types of revision resources (wordsearch, quiz or revision cards) on their designated subject. The result was a set of focused revision resources dovetailed perfectly for the course being taught.
Hilliard adds:
“This technique also provides the lecturer with a very quick and effective way of creating additional electronic resources for teaching. By analysing these learning objects in the classroom, missing areas are efficiently highlighted allowing the lecturer to target their teaching to the most needed areas.”
Finally, what do the students think about using social networking to support their revision and studying?
Sheldon Korpet is a Psychology and Sociology student at BHASVIC. She has been making full use of the GetRevising site to find extra notes, revision aids and new websites to help with her studies. She particularly likes the way resources are ‘star' rated by other students.
“I am more likely to use a resource more frequently if it is rated more highly than others. This helps me to avoid notes which are considered less useful by the website's community. I also enjoy uploading my own resources as the rating system provides really useful feedback on the quality of my revision notes and whether they meet other students' expectations.”
For Korpet, the collaboration provided by such a social networking site is crucial:
“I think the site offers students who study similar courses and subject areas a place to help each other through the use of Groups and their discussion areas. It's really useful to be able to share last-minute tips about exams and download relevant information and documents others have used to help me understand my own subject.
“For me, the ability to share documents amongst fellow students is the most crucial benefit offered by this site. Not only does it provide me with access to additional information but also to notes taken from classes delivered by lecturers with different teaching styles or points of view. This allows users to not only broaden their knowledge and understanding of their own subject but to also see information presented with new perspectives.”
For Langley, the enthusiasm shown by the students is self-evident. Since the site was launched in March 2008, GetRevising now has 45,000 registered users and contains over 5000 revision resources.
“This isn't so surprising as revision is the one part of any course where nearly all students get actively involved at some stage.”
Summarising the effectiveness of using social networking to support revision and study, Langley observes:
“I know there is a lot of ambivalence regarding the use of social network sites in our curricula and I am well aware of the dangers of misuse. However, the implementation of GetRevising at BHASVIC seems to offer a great example of how a social network site can be used constructively to increase student motivation and engagement, offer real tangible benefits to their learning and provide teachers with a quick and practical solution to building a library of relevant and targeted electronic resources.”
Disclaimer: The Regional Support Centres (RSC) and the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS) support the development of educational e-learning. In the case study, we may refer to specific products, processes or services by trade name, trademark, manufacturer or otherwise, or link to websites or supporting material. Such references are not endorsements or recommendations and should not be used for product endorsement purposes.
You can find this page and download any referenced resources from the Excellence Gateway at http://excellence.org.uk/239196.
