Implementing module team-led research skills-focused workshop events into a final year project module: An evaluation of student attitudes and outcomes

• Project Team: Louise NewbiggingJames MunroSimon HarrisonMaika Telga
• Subject Discipline: Psychology and Counselling
• Theme: Equality, diversity and inclusionOnline and blended tuition
• Project Aim: Enables more students to achieve their study goalsImproves and enhance the learning experience of students
• Status: Live

Investigating Psychology 3 (DE300) is the capstone Level 3 module in Psychology and Counselling with the Open University, in which students complete an independent research project over the course of the module. DE300, like many online courses, constitutes mainly pre-produced materials that students engage with independently and largely at their own pace. This structure can be a barrier to the effective learning of new project design, data collection and analysis-related software skills – crucial on DE300. Online courses suffer twice when instructing students on technology, as assumptions cannot be made about students’ abilities and experience with either the technology being taught, or the technology being used to teach.

Students studying the module necessarily have experience with online study (having completed other Open University modules) therefore it might be expected that they have adopted learning styles and skills required to engage with online courses. Nevertheless, the module recently underwent its midlife review cycle and determined that student software skills necessary for the module was an area that required improvement. This is evidenced by the latter stages of the previous presentation, where many ‘at risk of failing’ students required additional support to learn and implement key methodological skills into their research projects.

The current project involves students engaging with research methods at multiple stages. The ongoing presentation includes a new set of learning events: module team-led workshops. The workshops form part of the curriculum as bookable module-wide events and are available for any student studying the module to attend. The first workshop in each pathway introduces students to the software package and provides a walkthrough for students to follow on how they might use the platform for their projects. The second workshop provides students with a live demonstration in which members of the module team will build example projects from the ground up. The third workshop covers the analyses of data collected via the software.

At multiple time points throughout the module, both quantitative and qualitative data are collected regarding students’ self-reported progress and feelings related to the workshop content. Student grade, forum use, and retention data will be analysed alongside self-reported data to examine any effects of the workshops on student outcomes.