PSYCHE Project Website

Presentation at ALT-C 2009

JL — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 12:00:39 +0000

The PSYCHE project was very present at ALT-C 2009, with a poster presentation, which can be accessed from here, and a presentation about online student reading. Slides available here.

Materials to be published in September 2009

JL — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 22:17:37 +0000

The project materials will be published in September 2009, linked from this site, and uploaded to JORUM. There is a great deal of material, and it will be very easily reusable and adapted by others. Here is the opening page of the materials to give an idea of what’s coming:

These resources were produced through the work of the JISC funded PSYCHE project, based in the Psychology Section at Heythrop College, University of London.

These materials are 100% reused and repurposed from other sources with appropriate permission being sought and granted for the use and reuse of all materials (see acknowledgements). The materials have also been packaged in such a way as to make them as flexible as possible such that they may be easily used, or adapted to other contexts and teaching.

This set of materials is the primary output of the PSYCHE project, and constitutes the materials used in a blended learning context for two 15-credit technology-enhanced modules in Research Methods and Statistics in Psychology. There is a great deal of material here, however development has been limited to that which could be achieved in the funded period and with the resources provided (see the final report for details of the process, and lessons learned). However, it is hoped and intended that these materials will continue to develop. Notification of any further development to these resources will be given on the project website.

What is here?

These materials cover introductory experimental design and statistical analysis in psychology. The resources include text, figures, tables (including rudimentary statistical tables), videos illustrating the use of SPSS statistical software, and interactive JAVA and FLASH applets demonstrating various statistical ideas. There are also links to one or two externally hosted materials. The materials cover the material usually taught at level 4 undergraduate psychology. For some quick examples, try:

* Description of the standard normal distribution.
* Video illustrating the conduct of an independent samples t-test with downloadable SPSS data file.
* JAVA applet to demonstrate the area under the normal distribution.
* External FLASH demonstration introducing distributions in statistics (This will only work when the external site is functioning).

How can I adapt and reuse these materials?

The focus of the JISC Psyche Project was the Reuse and Repurposing of materials for e-learning. You will thus find it very easy to take these materials, adapt them and use them yourself, for the following reasons:

* These materials are offered as a package that can be edited without any programming, using the free and open source eXe e-learning editor. Editing is simple… no really… try it! Simply download the editor for your operating system, download the psyche.elp file, load it up and you’re there.
* eXe e-learning editor can export a standalone website for uploading to any intranet, VLE, or web site. Alternatively, eXe can export in SCORM format for uploading to a VLE.

It is hoped, therefore, that these resources might act as building blocks for the production of further lessons. If you do use or adapt these materials, discover errors or have suggestions to make, please do contact the project director.

HEA New Lecturer’s Forum 2009 Dissemination

JL — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 18:49:50 +0000

...the e-learning session begins

A session being run by the project director at the HEA’s 2009 New Lecturer’s Forum provided an excellent opportunity to disseminate some of the results of the PSYCHE project, and to raise some issues with respect to copyright and IPR. Lecturers were encouraged to establish the position in their own institutions as regards copyright, to encourage clarity, and to be aware of copyright and IPR issues when creating their own resources. Furthermore, issues of interoperability and the creation of learning content were raised. Participants were directed to resources on open content and e-learning content creation.

Overall, it seemed very productive to be able to raise these issues with staff just beginning in their lecturing roles.

All About Sharing Content

Who has the right to grant access?

JL — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 16:28:06 +0000

Sharing between institutions is difficult, in part because discussions eventually boil down to the need for someone to sign something! That person needs to move from ‘Yes, that sounds good’ to, ‘Yes I have the authority to grant these rights on behalf of the institution, and I am willing to do so in writing.’ Even those responsible for copyright and IPR in an institution may hesitate, and sometimes for good reasons. The generally accepted institutional policy may not be written down, or the individual who has the right to grant permissions may not have been clearly and formally identified. In such cases, it often takes someone who is in tune enough with the culture and history of the organisation, and who feels confident to make an assertion on the institution’s behalf who will ultimately be ‘ready to sign’. Such people can be hard to find!

Aggregation of Responses to the ‘Content Cycle’

JL — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 21:28:57 +0000

I have been reflecting on the recent Repurpose day in Birmingham, and in so doing, have aggregated the comments written on the ‘Content Cycle’ diagram that was given to us then. Illegible comments, or comments which I could not make sense of out of context have been left off, but hopefully other projects will find some value in looking at this powerpoint slide, which contains the aggregated comments. Follow the link below for the file. The original photographs are here.

Aggregated Learning Cycle Comments

Dissemination: HEA New Psychology Lecturers’ Forum

JL — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 09:39:40 +0000

The Project Director has been asked to run a session for new lecturers at the HEA Psychology Section New Lecturer Forum in York in January 2009. This will be an excellent opportunity to disseminate the results of this project to the appropriate audience, making new lecturers aware of the potential for exploiting learning objects from repositories in their own teaching.

Critical Friends

JL — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 13:15:58 +0000

When these projects began, we were encouraged to establish ‘critical friend’ relationships with other projects. Certainly, it has proved useful to be in touch with other related projects, and especially with the ORM project at UWE. ORM is also a project that is interested in teaching research methods, and the team there have a similar level of experience and similar approach to us here at PSYCHE. We hope to have a closer contact with ORM through the remainder of the project period.

What are the issues for academics & publishers sharing resources?

JL — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 16:13:09 +0000

In general, academics are proud of their good work and concerned about their reputations. This is all very reasonable. At this point in the PSYCHE project we have already met a number of concerns from a range of academics and publishers which relate to allowing materials to be reused and repurposed. At least some of these concerns are quite legitimate, but they are worth noting and thinking about. So, here are four examples without any evaluative comments:

It took a lot of work to produce this, and so I don’t want to just give that to someone else.
Students might plagiarise my research work for the sake of a better essay or project mark.
I have collected these data, and so I, in preference to others, have the right to reanalyze them, or add to them for the sake of further publications. If these data are shared widely, then the reputational enhancement that is rightly mine might go to others.
Typically, we charge a fee per page per student for using materials. We are unwilling to give you the rights to share to an unknown number through a repository.

Interim Project Report Submitted

JL — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 15:30:24 +0000

The interim report has been submitted to JISC today. Writing the report prompts all sorts of reflection and course corrections… including getting this blog up to date! It has been a helpful and productive process so far.

Willingness to use research data

JL — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 18:43:51 +0000

We have heard today that the relevant individuals who needed to be consulted by the UK Data Archive have been willing for us to use their data in teaching. However, the question of how we make the data available to others further down the track needs to be resolved. This is a common theme – it seems to be easier for individual academics to get permission to use particular resources in their own teaching than it is to secure the rights to distribute things later on. The willingness to share is good news.