A pilot project entitled “Supporting transition with peer-assisted learning and digital stories” funded by the HEA, has been running this year at the University of Liverpool’s Management School. Two digital stories from the third-year Digital Champions are now available on writing assignments, which can be used as useful resources for first-year students. See more detail at: http://digilearnblog.liv.ac.uk tag: 'Digital Champions'

1. HEA
Digital
Champions
pilot
Supporting transition
with peer-learning
and digital stories
University of
Liverpool

2. Project context
Undergraduate students may be
enthusiastic, competent users of digital tools
but need guidance to use them in an
academic context.
Simon Snowden, Lecturer, Academic lead, University of Liverpool
Clickable image: https://stream.liv.ac.uk/tjcb69jn

3. Project context
ULMS211 student journal
entry

4. Project aims
The project aims to support the transition of
first-year students in their academic study
and employ them with skills that would
benefit them beyond graduation.

5. Objectives
• Engage 5 digital champions (3rd year students) to
offer peer-learning for first-year students on
making their academic study easier.
• Engage the Digital champions in creating videos in
the form of digital stories.
• Create edit and share the videos for wider use.
• Investigate students’ perspectives on micro-
certification as a way of recognising their skill
development.
• Evaluate the pilot and whether this peer-learning
model is successful for wider adoption
institutionally and beyond.

6. Recruited champions from an enquiry-based learning module
(ULMS211)

7. The Digital Champions 2013/14
Bradley Griffin Adam
Byrne
Emily Evans Laura Cash
Who makes good
Digital
Champions?

8. Intended outcomes
• First-year students
– To foster the development of digital learning
skills in students in a disciplinary context.
• Digital champions
– To gain further confidence in their digital skills
through peer-learning.
– To be able to articulate the progress they
have made in the area of digital literacies
development.

9. What happened?
• Training and support (e.g. RefWorks by Library)
• Peer-learning drop-in sessions
– In library – Friday afternoons!
– With laptop
• Digital story creation (video)
• Later: Facebook group & handout created
by students

10. Sample videos created by Digital
Champions

11. https://stream.liv.ac.uk/qcey96ab

12. https://stream.liv.ac.uk/e6ayx3q4
1

13. https://stream.liv.ac.uk/unas3adx
2

14. https://stream.liv.ac.uk/qvuczabf
3

15. https://stream.liv.ac.uk/ha6uuv8h
4

16. https://stream.liv.ac.uk/brgjpubr
5

17. Pilot evaluation
• Focus group (Champions) & Survey (Year
1)

18. Outcomes

19. Benefits for the Digital
Champions
“When you have the responsibility to
teach others,
you change your ways of doing
things.
You review your bad [study] habits
and
develop good habits.”
“Good for the CV”
“Good feeling of being
able to help students”
Skills acquired:
Digital study skills
Problem-solving
Teamworking and
leadership skills

20. Benefits for first-years
”I could really relate to
Digital Champions as they were my
age and experienced the same thing
as me.”
Advice gained on digital skills - essay writing, using
referencing software and general advice on being a
Management School student:
“[Digital Champions] made the research for my assignment
easier”
“reassuring”

21. Digital Literacies
http://www.jiscinfonet.ac.uk/infokits/digital-literacies/
developed

22. Self-perception of need
vs
“It was extremely
helpful even
though I didn’t
realise this at
first. I visited
them twice for
general advice.”
“Students are
more familiar
with the
technology and
don’t feel they
need the
support.”

23. What support would be useful?

24. What aspects of general advice
would be most useful to you? (n=37)
13
9
15
21
3
0
5
10
15
20
25

25. What DL support would be useful?
(n=37)
19 19 19
17 17 17 16 15 14
12 11 10
8 7 6
4
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20

26. Areas in most needed: those
relevant to their assignment
writing
All 7 areas of digital literacies in
need

27. Student suggestions (Y1+Y3)
• Keep doing the Digital Champions project!
• Practicalities:
–Timing: Not last thing on Fridays!
–Venue: Outside lecture theatre.
• Better introduction as to what Champions
can offer.
• Champion-led Y1 workshop - chance to
get to know them
• Online extension to reach Champions.

28. Considerations /
Recommendations
• Online access :
– considerations e.g. Champions’
workload, response time, availability?
– VLE vs Facebook?
• Training
– Extend training for Champions : e.g. media
literacy (see gap/needs list).
– ?Identify DL practices in Co/Extra/Curriculum?

29. Next year plans
• Continuing with this approach in the
Management School and
• Looking for wider institutional adoption
– Linking to existing peer-learning initiatives
• Certification and links with HEAR

30. University of Liverpool Project team
Tünde Varga-Atkins (co-lead), eLearning Unit
Emma Thompson (co-lead) & Beryl Stanley, Library
Simon Snowden (academic lead), Management
School
Dave Hocker (multimedia)
Digital Champions 2013/14
Adam Byrne, Laura Cash, Bradley Griffin and Emily
Evans
Poster credit
Lynne Crook (drawing)
Amy Jackson (typography and digitisation)
Blog: http://digilearnblog.liv.ac.uk/
Contact : tva@liv.ac.uk