2016-09-08

2016-09-08 (Thur)
15:00-16:00
503-024

Facilitator: Angela Tsai
Note-taker: Jenny Sim

Agenda

Notes 

FMHS Teaching and Learning Community

8^th September 2016

Compass Curriculum mapping tool by Dr Keri Moyle (2015 CLeaR Fellow)

Introduction

• This presentation is targeted for FMHS staff members, with a software demonstration
• I will start with an overview leaving the rest of the time for questions
• Compass is my baby and the success of the software is a credit to the help of many others

Curriculum mapping:

• is a term that has multiple definitions
• in this context, it is defined as a map to make sense of a bunch of information

Compass

• Compass is used heavily for Engineering accreditation
• There are several functionalities that were based on the needs of accreditation
• It is a huge data base consisting of:
• calendar information
• key words dictionary: these are key words associated with each course
• these key words serve as links that connect courses together thereby creating a visual map showing how courses offered within a school and by different schools and faculties are interconnected
• Once the list of key words are created, the associated assessments and courses are then linked to the key words
• This is the gist of what Compass is about

Q:      Who created the list of key words?

A:      All teaching staff can be involved and the key words can also be extracted from the competency list

Compass Navigate

• Once the key words have been linked to the assessments and courses, you can get the big picture of what the programme looks like (Slide 7)
• This is an example of student programme pathway for Engineering science (Slide 8)
• The courses are colour coded
• This map enables you to:
• identify disconnect
• shows which courses are teaching into common areas. This is particularly useful to facilitate communication of teaching staff for courses that are taught across different schools and faculties
• encourages cross course teaching
• Compass is driven by assessments as the approach is to provide evidence of learning via assessments

Compass Investigate

• Function: Investigate assessments via keywords
• if one enters the key words, the search results will be a list of assessment questions that are associated with the key words
• The database also consist of examples of student assessments (de-identified) with a range of A+ to C-
• These examples are for accreditation review requirements

Q:      Who grade the assessments?

A:      Grading is based on the lecturer’s assessment

Q:      Are the accreditation members given password?

A:      Yes, password is provided. The accreditation team are given hard copies plus access to Compass

Compass Create (Coming soon)

• Most of the features of Compass is retrospective: i.e. for accreditation or review with the aim of course improvement
• This new feature will assist staff to plan a new course i.e. how can I use the information here to plan for a new course?
• It is outcome based (links to Graduate profile) and helps you to work backwards starting from outcomes
• Design is based on Bloom’s taxonomy
• Examples:
• Mathematics students at the entry level will have some level of applied skills. As they progress through the programme, their applied skills shift from easy to high level of difficulty. However, they do not create and innovate.
• Programming students, on the other hand, would move from knowledge acquisition to writing new programmes when they graduate
• Outcome based design:
• Identify milestones and then link the assessments from the existing data to the milestones
• you work backwards: attributes => assessments => activities => formative feedback (Slide 22)

Q:      Do you use the Research Skill Development framework (RSD)*?

A:      No, Compass uses the Bloom’s taxonomy

*The RSD framework is developed by the University of Adelaide. Click here for more information.

 Compass Authenticate

• Compass is based on assessments and is evidence driven (Slide 23)
• Keywords for content can be a huge list e.g. Engineering has 1400 key words
• With this feature, it is possible to rate the importance of a key word/concept
• Thus, it is possible that a concept may have been rated very highly only to find the number of assessments for this item may be lacking

Compass Evaluate

• Enables you to look for courses i.e. ideas that overlap (Slide 28) and the corresponding assessment questions

Q:      Key words are really important. For instance, under drugs, you may have 5000 drugs. Then, there is the question do we talk about respiratory drugs… where do you start?

A:      The answer lies in knowing what you want to get out of the exercise. The key words are not hierarchical. However, the search engine does save your past search history.

Q:      Everyone is tagging assessment question so how do you get staff engagement?

A:      The act of tagging is very simple and may take 2 minutes +/-  For the amount of time invested versus the associated benefits, it is a worth the time and effort

Q:      So how do you actually resource and manage this exercise?

A:      In the Engineering faculty: all staff are involved. Some do it really well while others were a little patchy. In Science, they employ a staff to help compile the key words and the tagging is left to the departments. There is now funding for a staff to tag the courses.

We are now rolling the tool to Arts and History is trialling the tool. They are employing someone to assist in creating the key words. In a way, it is a pity as staff will benefit from doing their own tagging. The act of tagging provides them with opportunities to pause and think about their teaching.

Q:      Tagging student answers, how do you look for good or bad answers?

A:      We did not tag student answers, you look for it via assessment

Q:      What is the student feedback on this tool?

A:      We have not rolled it out yet to the students. This tool would be extremely useful for students; helping them to see connection, pre-requisites, career pathway i.e. enabling them to see the big picture view. There are of course features/information here that students will not be able to access.

Additional feature

If you are the HoD, you can see programmes overview, student workload, linkage between courses and student attributes, and also a summary of teaching staff qualifications, professional societies and PD activities.

Q:      For the purpose of accreditation review, this exercise should commence 2 years ahead?

A:      Yes

Q:      Can you track course changes and re-enter data for new course?

A:      One of the things we are doing is do update changes each semester. At the moment, the calendar data is static, so mapping and tracking the changes are a little tricky

Meeting concluded at 4.05pm