Using photography for e-learning materials (exterior shots including people) may have legal implications. Is there an "advice" web address that could help?

The Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI) provides advice and guidance on the creation and use of digital image collections in learning, teaching and research. Included on their website is a section that deals with Copyright and Data Protection and in relation to this specific JISCask query, their website does state that:

“If your image includes recognisable images of living people, you should seek permission before making these images available .... In addition to the ethical reasons for doing so, there is now a legal requirement in the 1998 Data Protection Act (DPA). This governs the collection, storage and use of 'personal data', which is anything that relates to a living individual who can be identified from that information.”

In addition to TASI, JISCLegal is the authority on all things to do with using ICT for learning and teaching and has extensive sections on both Copyright and Data Protection. Go to the section with their Webcasts for some particularly user friendly videos on both topics.

I often teach mature students with no IT experience - what is available as an easily understood primer for Word, etc suitable for this type of student?

I recently came across some useful guides on using Microsoft Office Applications. Guides from Office 97 through to the newest version – Office 2007 are available on the Custom Guide website to use by non- profit making organisations.

The guides can be used online or downloaded and printed for learners who prefer to work from paper-based materials.

Do you know of an assessment/diagnostic tool for dyscalculia in adults 19+?

A screener for Dyscalculia is being developed at Loughborough University. Work on the screener is still in progress with some modifications being made after extensive trials were held in Autumn 2006. Details of these trials are contained in the presentation Clare Trott from the Mathematics Education Centre at Loughborough University made at the DDIG Conference in 2007 and can be seen on the DDIG web site

Further information relating to the Screener will be published on the DDIG website in due course as it becomes available.

Our ESOL department have a number of Smartboards which are under used. What is the best way to use them with language learners?

If it is SmartBoards ™ that you have installed the Smart Technologies website has a Teachers hub in the Education section with lessons and resources that can be downloaded and used or adapted.

SmartBoards ™ come with some preinstalled learning objects and there are also over 100 multimedia learning objects available to use from NLN which work very successfully with interactive whiteboards. The trick is to have the confidence to get your learners up to the board and get them to use even the basic tools that are provided in the software.

Why are there not MORE e-learning courses - are students still afraid of the technology?

I’m not sure it’s the students that are afraid! New research is showing that learners in general are very comfortable with using ICT and a publication from JISC last year, “In Their Own Words” provides a useful perspective of learners’ experiences, beliefs and motivations in relation to e-learning – you can download a copy from the JISC website.

I think successful eLearning courses depend on having a number of things in place. An organisation needs to have a technical infrastructure that can cope with both course delivery and the subsequent eAssessment requirements. It’s also important to have a good rationale for designing the course for online delivery with well developed policies and having clear procedures in place. Staff need to be properly prepared and be in a position to give the appropriate support to learners. That involves understanding the need and having the ability to add value to course materials and take a more collaborative approach to learning which will be new to many practitioners.

In short then getting eLearning course off the ground needs careful planning with the first steps perhaps more about enhancing learning experiences with ICT in the first instance before eLearning courses find their way into the mainstream.

How do I go about creating information in alternative formats?

There are a few free web based solutions which would allow you to convert traditional text into audio:

Spoken Text

SpokenText is a free online text to audio converter. Using it you can convert Word, PDF, PowerPoint, plain text files, web pages, RSS 2 feeds and emails to spoken audio which you can then listen too online or transfer to your iPod.

Using SpokenText it is easy to provide alternative formats for the text content you place on your web site. Using SpokenText this process is painless you just upload all of your content to our site. Text will be converted and then made available to download to your site

• Convert pdf to mp3 Convert doc to mp3


• Convert ppt to mp3 Convert txt to mp3


• Convert html to mp3 Convert RSS feeds to mp3


• Convert emails to mp3 Convert web pages to mp3

RoboBraille

RoboBraille is an email-based service capable of translating electronic documents into either Braille or synthetic speech. The user simply sends an email to a specific email account and gets the file back as either Braille or speech within a couple of minutes.

This makes the user highly independent and self-reliant, as material in Braille or speech can be obtained whenever this is required without having to rely on external suppliers. Thus, the RoboBraille service supports an inclusive information society.

With RoboBraille, you can…

• Translate documents into contracted Braille


• Translate documents into speech


• Translate text into visual Braille


• Convert text documents between different character sets


• Convert Braille documents to specific Braille character sets


• Partition documents into smaller parts

I hear about so many new technologies and software for e-learning and I haven’t time to explore them fully. How do I decide which e-learning products I should learn about?

It’s easy to get overwhelmed with what’s available. In the first instance I would suggest you concentrate on learning about the technologies that are currently available at your own institution. For example, find out what interactive whiteboards you have, check out your VLE and see if there is any resource creation software that your institution already owns.

I currently deliver a distance learning program in Computer Aided Draughting and Design. However our teaching packs are hard copy prints and as such would be expensive to send overseas via post. I have piloted electronic manuals using Blackboard and camtasia for screen recording to support the packs. Being new to this type of delivery, do you have anything (advice or delivery methods) that might benefit the students or myself in the delivery and assessment of this course.

Using your college VLE is an excellent way to support distance learning students. Making your course materials available on the VLE with supported interactive resources such as the camtasia screen shots is a good place to start. Converting traditional paper-based resources to electronic resources is a difficult task and there are lots things to consider, particularly when designing materials to support distance learners. There are a number of JISC publications which offer advice about course design. You may want to have a look at the Effective Practice with e-Learning guide which offers a good introduction to e-learning and course design.

There are resources available for educational (not commercial) use which you could add to your course site on the VLE. It may be worth doing a search for existing electronic resources in your subject area. A good place to start is the RSC website which highlights a number of sources of materials which may be of use. For example, the NLN materials provide a wealth of multimedia resources including an interactive CAD drawing tool.

The VLE also offers an opportunity to provide additional support for your students via the communication tools. As well as email, there are a number of tools which can be used for keeping in touch with your students such as the notice board. You may want to use the collaboration tools such as the discussion and chat tools to ensure your students don’t feel isolated.

Designing the course to include effective formative assessments will give you an opportunity to provide timely feedback to your students. This will have the added benefit of highlighting students who may be struggling with aspects of the course in time to allow remedial action to be taken. Have a look at the eAssessment page of the RSC website for further information.

Do you think that Web 2.0 applications will make a big difference to the learning and teaching process in colleges, and if yes, in what ways?

It’s a difficult question to answer because the rate of technological developments is so rapid. Right now there is no doubt in my mind that Web 2.0 technologies can provide the mechanics to encourage more reflection and peer review. Keeping a blog, for example, which can be designed, personalised and incorporate media like images and video, may be a more attractive vehicle for learners to use as an alternative to a paper based type of journal or diary.

The ease with which resources using new media can be created certainly offers alternatives to a more traditional way of producing work and a large proportion of learners will have access to mobile technologies that have the capacity to take images, capture video and record sound for Podcasting. New medias also offer alternatives to learners with additional support needs where an alternative to written materials improves accessibility.

Collaborative learning can be facilitated using blogs and a WIKI (an editable web site) in particular is a great method for learners to co-produce materials which could be the result of combined research. Most WIKI software keeps a history as it is developed and records who has edited pages and what they have added or changed which is important from the tutors point of view. In addition there is usually a discussion tool which learners can be encouraged to use which can demonstrate good collaboration and teamwork.

Web 2.0 technologies do present new issues that colleges have to address in terms of systems and support, but I hope I’ve given just a few ideas of the possibilities for using them for learning and teaching.

What advice can you provide for all staff producing word documents to make sure that they are more accessible to those reading them?

One really important thing you can do when authoring word documents is use the heading styles. In your document, don’t just embolden the words you want to use as headings, instead use the in- built heading structures.

This in turn allows a reader to read a summary of all your headings and sub headings within your word document using the document map. To read a document using the document map, click on view > document map. Your word document will produce a summary of all headings at the left hand side of the page.

The ability to navigate document headings will benefit all users but give exceptional benefits to a range of disabled people. For example:

• Users with visual impairments may rely on a screen magnifier for reading. A long document can be very awkward to navigate through a screen magnifier, requiring much horizontal as well as vertical scrolling.


• A print impaired user can rapidly focus on the key concepts within the text without having to negotiate large volumes of text.


• People with poorer English skills (for example, British Sign Language users or others for whom English is a second language) can extract the key concepts before negotiating the dense text.


• A motor impaired user can access the whole document with minimal keyboard or mouse movement.


• Users with learning difficulties can identify the main ideas of a lengthy document at a glance.

To learn more about structuring your documents and how to view them more accessibly have a look at the TechDis Accessibility Essentials. You might find the flash audio visual animations particularly helpful in explaining this for you.

I’ve put together a PowerPoint resource with navigation that uses action buttons & hotspots rather than the normal slide transition. I was able to stop the slide transition by deselecting both “on mouse click” and “automatically” but I’ve discovered that users can still use the scroller wheel on their mouse to move to the next slide. Is there a way to stop this?

Yes you can. By setting up the show in “Kiosk” mode the mouse is disabled. When you’ve finished creating your presentation, go to slide show; set up show; click browsed at a kiosk. This means that the presentation will restart after 5 minutes of inactivity and loop continuously but it’s useful for dealing with the mouse scroller problem that you’ve encountered.

I was looking at some terrific teaching resources available from National Learning Network but I can’t seem to download them. How can I use them on our VLE?

Every institution has two or three nominated staff with download privileges for the NLN materials, to ensure that multiple files are not downloaded to the server and they are behind a secure login. If you are unable to find out who the NLN nominated staff are in your college, please contact the RSC and we will be happy to tell you.

I am a member of staff who has dyslexia. As part of my job I have a great deal of reading to do, in particular long word documents which I find really difficult to focus on. Do you have any hints and tips to make them more readable for me?

You could autosummarise any long documents -

Did you know that you can actually summarise your long word documents to get a synopsis of the written information? It’s pretty simple to do. Basically you would just go to the tool bar, click on tools and find AutoSummarise.

You then have the choice of how you would like to view that summarized document. You can also decide how long you want that summary to be – 10% of the original document, 25% etc.

Why would you do that?

Part of the reason is that maybe 100% may be too many words for someone to assimilate when reading or making sense of a document and simply summarising a long document for some would be beneficial in getting to grips of the sense of the document before reading in more depth.

Alternatively, you could turn the text into audio -

Read The Words and Spoken Text are two free web based solutions which would allow you to convert traditional text into audio.

Read the Words can convert Word, PDF, PowerPoint, plain text files, web pages, and emails to spoken audio which you can then listen too online or transfer to your iPod.

Using these resources it is easy to provide alternative formats for the text content you place on your web site. Using SpokenText or Read the Words this process is painless you just upload all of your content to their site. Text will be converted and then made available to download to your site

I’m interested in using online assessments with my students but don’t have the time or skills to develop an assessment bank. What do you suggest?

Research identifies a number of benefits to using online assessments (sometimes referred to as eAssessment). Benefits include the fact that immediate & timely feedback can be given to students, and there is a reduction in marking time for tutors.

There are a number of assessment banks becoming available nationally such as SQA’s SOLAR project. This project is making available online Summative assessment resources. These are being developed at HN level for Computing & IT, Engineering, Health and Social Care, & Languages. For formative assessment resources, it’s worthwhile looking at the COLA resources. This project led by COLEG has produced over 250 assessments across a range of curricular areas. Further details can be found on the COLEG website or by speaking to the COLEG Named Contact in your college.

The RSC is also developing assessment workshops which will be available later this year. The workshops will be advertised on the Events page of our website.

When I'm searching the Internet, how do I know what information is free for me to use and what is protected by copyright?

You should always assume that all material on the Internet is protected by copyright even if there isn't a copyright notice on the website. Many websites will have a copyright notice which can usually be found at the bottom of the homepage. This will make it clear what you can and cannot do with the information on the website. If there isn't a copyright notice always check with the owner of the website if you wish to copy or use any of the material.

Recently, however, it has now become possible to search the Internet by filtering out material by Creative Commons license. Google have added this to their advanced search option. Creative Commons is basically a way for a website owner to let those who visit their site know what they can and cannot do with the information in simple terms.

For example, when you select the advanced search option in Google, you will see a field which says: "Usage Rights". Here you have the option to select searches by Creative Commons licence - options include materials that are:

• not filtered by license


• free to use or share


• free to use or share, even commercially


• free to use or share or modify


• free to use, share or modify, even commercially

Find out more at the Creative Commons website.

Where would I find out about training at the RSC and how do I book on to a course?

To find out what training we have on offer at the RSC go to the Events page on our website. There you will find some extra information and also a booking form for all our events.

To book onto an event simply open the booking form and either fill it in on-line and email it to us at support@rsc-sw-scotland.ac.uk or you can print it out and post it to us (but don’t forget to ask your staff developer first). You will then receive an email confirming if you have a space.

It’s as easy as that!

I have heard of ePlan run by the RSC. What is it exactly?

ePlan is a package of support measures devised by RSC Scotland South & West to help colleges develop their staff in the use of ICT within their college role.

It consists of support in developing the college ICT strategy, a bespoke Training Needs Analysis for all staff run by the RSC on behalf of the college, a range of targeted training programmes for all staff, and a benchmarking toolkit known as eScore (again run by the RSC at no cost) to help assess progress. Apart from cost recovery of training materials, these components are completely free.

Four other RSCs (Wales, Northern England and Northern Ireland) are also using this approach thus making it a UK wide support programme.

Why won’t our IT department let me use Skype on the college network?

Skype technology was developed as a peer to peer network of skype nodes much in the same way as the file sharing applications Kazaa and Napster.

This means that any Skype client left running will assess how much bandwidth is available to it and then use it for its own Skype services without the user ever suspecting what is happening to their own PC, this is called a Super Node.

In practical terms, this means that your Skype client could be routing calls for half of Europe to the US all via your desktop PC, swamping your college network, just because you left your Skype client running.

Not only that, it can also introduce viruses onto your PC which could then spread to other workstations throughout your college.

To combat this JANET will shortly be introducing a new service called JANET TALK. This is a software product that offers similar functions, services and gateways that Skype does, but without the risks and network impact.

JANET has produced a document, Skype & JANET, which details the effects of Skype on bandwith and suggests says of managing Skype to protect network availability.

I was told a student needs information in an alternative format. What does this mean and how do I provide information in this format?

Many learners have difficulty accessing printed material as a result of sensory, physical, literacy or dyslexic type difficulties. This type of difficulty is often referred to as ‘print disabled’. Other students may benefit from information in alternative formats because they have English as an Additional Language. Information can be provided in a variety of ways other than printed text on paper, and many students use technology to allow them to access this information more easily. Here are examples of different types of alternative text:
1. Braille
2. Braille Tactile Diagrams
3. Large Print
4. Audio
5. DAISY (Digital Accessible Information SYstems)

A Daisy book is a digital talking book, structured in such a way to allow the reader to move around the book as someone would use a print book

To access information in alternative formats you could try looking at Revealweb . This is a resource which is freely available and provides catalogue of information from 100 different organisations and suppliers on over 100,000 titles available in alternative formats.

I’d like to create some student activities that exploit resources that I’ve found on the Web but I don’t have regular access to a computer lab.

I know it’s sometimes difficult to organise access to computers and plan when you will require them in the context of a traditionally organised unit or course. My advice would be to keep it simple at the start and try to encourage your learners to investigate topics in a semi structured way by distributing activity sheets as “Word” documents. Feedback sessions to discuss, focus, contextualise and consolidate the topic can follow on. It is easy to insert a link to a website (hyperlink) by typing in the web address or copying and pasting the web address from the address bar in your browser. Press the space bar and the link will become active and change to blue, underlined text. A series of questions with links to appropriate information sources means that your learners will be pointed to sites that you have selected but will not be restricted to them if they wish to find others. It will allow you to exploit visually stimulating sites that can potentially include multimedia, quizzes and games if appropriate but does not involve learning a new software package or having specialist skills.

What is Web 2.0?

Well it’s difficult to give a definitive answer to this. In it’s simplest form, web 2.0 refers to technologies that enable the concept of the “writable” web where users are not just consumers but actively contribute to the content of it. The commonly used services that exploit Web 2.0 technologies are Blogs, Wikis, Social Bookmarking sites, Social Networking sites, content syndication (RSS feeds), Multimedia sharing sites and Podcasting services.

A Blog is a website that consists of paragraphs of information, opinion or diary entries that are displayed in chronological order and generally allow visitors to add comments.
A Wiki is a website that can be edited on line by anyone allowed access which can be open or restricted. It will generally have a facility to store the history of and changes made and the individuals who made them.
Social bookmarking involves using a content tagging system to create lists of bookmarks or favourite websites that are stored centrally on a remote server. Your collection can be accessed from anywhere and your list shared with other users of the system if you wish.
Social Networking refers to websites that contain a variety of elements chosen by the user which are personalised and shared with other users. Others are invited by recommendation and can be accepted or rejected as appropriate.
RSS or syndication software enables users to find out about updates or changes to the content of a site without having to visit it. Typically once an RSS feed is set up, a synopsis of any new information is collected and fed out to the user.
The development of multimedia sharing sites such as You Tube and Flickr has been possible as a result of the widespread access to and adoption of low-cost digital media technology. Millions of people now participate in the sharing and exchange of multimedia resources.
Podcasts are audio recordings usually in MP3 format which can be played on PCs and a wide variety of handheld, portable devices. More recently Vodcasts (video podcasts) in MP4 format are becoming more common and are usually associated with a syndication service which informs users of new releases.

I know that I cannot use images from web pages. Where can I find images that are copyright free?

Yes it’s tempting at times to use images from web pages, but as you say quite rightly, you are breaching copyright by using them without permission. There are sites that promise free images but in my experience they aren’t very reliable. If in doubt though check the terms of use. See if your institution subscribes to SCRAN or the Education Image Galley. Access to these collections has been negotiated though JISC and you will need an ATHENS password to access them – see your learning resources team. TASI , funded by JISC, is the Technical Advisory Service for Images and provides lots of useful information on the use of images for learning & teaching. Below are a few links to some good sites for copyright free images, but conditions of use may still apply. Always check conditions before using images. Best of all, get your digital camera out and take your own!

Microsoft Clip Art has photographic images and hundreds of collections of clipart
Brisbio is an online image resource for learning, teaching and research in the biomedical fields
ARKive has images of life on earth
Think Vegetables has some great images of common and exotic vegetables
FreeFoto has a stock of photos that can be used for non-commercial work
FreeImages is good source of general pictures

The WWW is so vast, how do I discriminate between good and bad sites? I can easily spend an hour searching and not find anything particularly useful.

Try http://www.intute.ac.uk/ - Intute is a free online service funded by JISC providing you with access to the very best Web resources for education and research. The service is created and hosted by a network of UK universities and partners. Subject specialists select and evaluate the websites in the database and write high quality descriptions of the resources.
I recommend that you click on the “Resources for FE” section of the site which is organised in familiar subject areas. Each sub-section includes a link to a subject specific search facility, a link to a subject specific tutorial and most have links to case studies which provide ideas on how to use electronic resources for learning & teaching.

How can I ensure that my electronic materials are accessible?

Materials online are almost always more accessible than paper based alternatives. It is important to produce materials electronically; as this can be a solution to many accessibility issues. For example colours, fonts and magnification are often easy to customise.

Text can usually be read out with appropriate screen reading software. Navigation can be easier than using a book (particularly for students with visual difficulties or for those with concentration difficulties).

Standard "office type" software such as word processors and presentation software like PowerPoint can positively add to the usability of resources, particularly if designed with accessibility in mind. To learn more about how you can produce accessible electronic materials, have a look at the TechDis Accessibility Essentials Series, in particular the guidance pack called ‘Writing Accessible Electronic Documents with Microsoft ® Word’ or go to http://www.techdis.ac.uk/