China HE20, University of Manchester, Friday 11th December 2020. Marieke Guy (@mariekeguy) & Pip McDonald (@PipMac6), Royal Agricultural University

1. China HE20, University of Manchester, Friday 11th December 2020
Marieke Guy (@mariekeguy) & Pip McDonald (@PipMac6), Royal Agricultural University
The Certainty of Uncertainty:
Transnational Online Pivot in China

2. Royal Agricultural University, Cirencester

3. The Royal Agricultural University
• At the forefront of agricultural education for 175 years
• Around 1,200 students – Undergraduate, postgraduate and
international
• Courses cover agriculture, rural land management, equine and
business
• Learning Technology team developed two fully online courses
• Digital Transformation blog: https://digitalrau.wordpress.com/

4. Partnership with SDAU
• Partnership with Shangdong Agriculture
University (SDAU) for almost 10 years
• Flying faculty
• Teach on English for Academic purposes
(EAP), Food and Real Estate Management
modules
• Approx 150 students per module, 3 classes
• Sage on stage, some group work
• Exam based assessment

5. The Transnational Online Pivot & Uncertainty
• How did we experience uncertainty?
• Uncertainty as an archetype
• The concept and practice of ‘Uncertainty Literacy’ as part of
wider skill set
• “Known and unknown” (Rumsfeld, 2011)
• Individual and organisational uncertainty
• Post digital uncertainty?

6. The Transnational Online Pivot & Uncertainty
• Planning for uncertainty. A problem shared/halved. Development of strategic
partnerships. Sharing the burden of uncertainty as part of an ongoing
collaborative conversation.
• Uncertainty as opportunity & a choice. Glass half full.
• Reflection (Weatherall, 2015: p1).
• Reflection “buzzword”, “popular mechanism in Higher Education…with a view to
improvement”
• RAU’s Digital transformation blog -
https://digitalrau.wordpress.com/category/china/

7. The Transnational Online Pivot & Uncertainty
• Bonnie and Lola’s blog.
• Collaborative transnational
reflection
• Blogs are “still a feature”
(Stirling in Coe, Waring,
Hedges & Arthur,
2017: p207).
• Lecturer contribution to reflective blog

8. 4
80%3 & 4
2
1
Tool-based:
Somewhat/Not at all
Tool 40%
Location: Somewhat/
A Great Deal
Location 40%
Knowledge, Relationship
& Pedagogy: Somewhat
Knowledge
Relationship
Pedagogy
Identity: Somewhat
Pedagogy 80%
Identity
Pedagogy 60%
Taxonomy of
Uncertainty
Results
& Discussion

9. Beyond the Taxonomy: Other Types of Experienced Uncertainties

10. How did you adapt lecture content for Panopto?
Adaption as
structure of
delivery
‘Formative’
excellent.
Clarity &
supervision for
students
really bored of
watching videos
Some editing
before live
Making extra
notes
Preparing
for online
harder
Write an entire course
to fill time, which meant
less personalisation
Discipline for
Lecturer &
Student.

11. • Accessed tool based training -
blue
• Emailed support request -
orange
• Colleague support - green
• Team teaching - red
• Adapted material for online
teaching - purple
• Testing before live teaching -
brown
• Other - pink
How did you overcome uncertainty?

12. Do you agree with the following statements?

13. How did you adapt your approach to teaching and
learning during interactive sessions on Zoom?
What types of learning
took place during
interactive sessions?
• Collaborative- blue
• Cooperative- orange
• Multimodal- red
• Differentiated- green

16. How can the RAU support Lecturers to identify strategies to
manage uncertainty with the SDAU project and more widely?

18. Further Critical Reflections

19. Further Critical Reflections 2
(Sankey, 2020)

20. Future developments
• RAU Joint Institute of Advanced
Agritechnology at Qingdao Agricultural
University, China
• SDAU Joint institute
• Retain the benefits of online learning
• More staff training
• Digital accessibility and captions

21. Bibliography
Fawns, T. (2020) 20th August. Available at:
https://twitter.com/timbocop/status/1296325643408375808 (Accessed 7th December 2020)
Rumsfeld, D. (2011) Known and Unknown: A Memoir (New York: Penguin)
Rossi, V. (2020) 2nd December. Available at:
https://twitter.com/VirnaRossi/status/1334246842176040973 (Accessed: 7th December 2020)
Sankey, M. (2020)23 June. Available at:
https://twitter.com/michael_sankey/status/1275223790503391233 (Accessed 7th December
2020)

22. Bibliography 2
Sankey, M. (2020). Putting the pedagogic horse in front of the technology cart. Journal of Distance
Education in China. 5, pp .46-53. (Online) Available at:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/341371836_Putting_the_pedagogic_horse_in_front_of_the_tech
nology_cart [Accessed: 8th December 2020]
Stirling, S. in Coe, R, J. Waring, M, Hedges, L, V. & Arthur, J. (2017) ‘Doing Social Media Research’ in
Research Methods & Methodologies in Education, 2nd ed, (London, California, USA, New Delhi &
Singapore: Sage) pp207-213
Weatherall, D. (2015) ‘Online blogs as a reflective tool the experience and support needs of a group of
international students in Higher Education’ [pdf] in The Journal of Technology Enhanced Learning,
Innovation and Change. Vol.1 Issue. 1 (Online) Available at:
https://journals.shu.ac.uk/index.php/telic/article/view/76/57 [Accessed: 8th December 2020]