Author: Alan McGauley, a.j.mcgauley@shu.ac.uk

Author: Richard Pountney, r.p.pountney@shu.ac.uk

JISC e-Learning Activity Area: Learning Resources and Activities

Higher Education Academy Subject Centre: Sociology, Anthropology and Politics

This case study illustrates...an effect on learning, an effect on exam results, an effect on student personal development, student satisfaction with e-learning, innovation in learning and teaching, staff satisfaction with e-learning, staff personal development, a positive effect on recruitment, a positive effect on retention, use of resources

Background & Context

Why did you use this e-learning approach?

The use of e-learning has allowed me to produce a range of material available to the students on a 24/7 basis. The nature of the module Drug use in Context allows a range of teaching material to be used. The use of a dedicated website, paperless module outline, and the Blackboard learning environment alongside email contact and information alerts provide a robust and flexible format for the student and a rewarding and continuously updatable module for the tutor. What was the context in which you used this e-learning approach?

Drug Use in Context is a Level 6 Module offered in the School of Social Science and Law within the faculty of Society and Development. It is an optional module for a wide range of social science, criminologist and law students at SHU and was taken by 88 students in 2007. It has been a very successful module which has attracted a high level of student choice and engagement. The module is a cross-disciplinary one between politics and psychology and has used a range of innovatory techniques to engage the students with the academic content of the teaching. The unit takes as its main focus debates and issues relating to illegal drug use. The context of illegal drug use is examined in relation to a wide range of issues and perspectives. The unit is designed to engage students with topical debates and discourses in relation to drug use. The focus on context provides a framework that links key components of the course.

The unit is delivered through a series of lectures and seminars. Specific features include the introduction of material in semester 1 from economics, globalization studies, contemporary geopolitics and sociology and the criminal justice system. In semester 2 students focus on treatment regimes and on context and understanding the place and meaning of drug misuse. Resources used will include texts on illegal drug issues, policy reports, socio-economic data, political research, and web-based resources. The key skills students will have to develop include communication, presentation, developing forms of argument linked to policy development and the use of extensive online research materials. The relative lack of easily available contemporary published sources was an initial problem for this module and led to the widespread use of online and multimedia sources. Before the use of the online learning environment (Blackboard) the module used a website instead of a paper based module guide. The website used extensive hyperlinks that worked well. The module in 2006/7 is now paperless and the assessments are completed online with the exception of the final seen examination paper.

What was the learning design?

The e-learning model was designed by the module tutor specifically with the students' needs in mind and is a blend of face-to-face and online. This draws on Lave's situated learning that posits that knowledge needs to be presented in authentic contexts and that learning requires social interaction and collaboration. The availability of a range of relevant material underlines the contemporary and real-world nature of the work. As such the module was designed to be multimedia-based and interactive and the rationale is to engage through cultural reference and to allow students to contribute their own material and experiences to develop a community of practice.

This final year module is very popular and involves a wide age range, with a higher number of mature students than other modules, many of whom aim to work in the field of substance misuse, the police, or regeneration. They express a wish to develop a portfolio of work in this area and to understand the current illegal drugs policy issues. The activities in the module aim to meet these needs: one task asks students to work in groups to design a marketing strategy for a new drug and this is selected by other students in a 'Big Brother' type vote. Real-life material is drawn from widely used and culturally accepted sites such as YouTube. In this way learners are encouraged to challenge the accepted norms: one example of this is to debate the legalisation of heroin.

The elements of e learning have improved each year as the module tutor has become more skilled in its use and as more resources have become available. Next year's teaching for example will make more use of YouTube type resources which have not previously been used. In the future the University will be more involved in this process through enhanced technical support that can only improve the overall standards of e-learning in this module.

How did you implement and embed this e-learning approach?

The e-learning approach for the Drug use in Context module has been developed over the past six years by the module leader. There was initially very little wider support used during this time. Student feedback in end-of-semester evaluations comment on the quality and usefulness of the various e-learning elements used and have highlighted the students' positive attitude towards this method of teaching. Additional evidence is the heavy use of the website and the number of hits on the Blackboard site. Differences in the degree of take-up by students have been noted and confidence in the use of ICT appears to be a strong factor. Issues to do with the reliability of the system and the limitations of the university e-learning infrastructure and specific teaching rooms have been problems that are gradually being overcome.