Student Consultation on Mobile Learning: methods, messages and musings Ceri Coulby Educational Staff Development Officer Viktoria Sargent Research Officer

Poll Question When do you think students should be consulted on their OWN curriculum? –Pre-course start –Regular reviews throughout course –Post course –They shouldn’t be consulted

About the Projects University of Leeds Final Year Medical Students 14 Re-Sit Placements PDAs for Mini-CEX ALPS* 900 Mobile Devices (PDAs) 16 Health and Social Care Professions Assessment Tool *Assessment and Learning in Practice Settings CETL: Universities of Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield and York St John and Leeds Metropolitan Universities

Methods of Consultation Initial PDA trial (pre-placement) Post placement: Focus Groups and evaluative questionnaires All PRE-assessment tool being rolled out Workshop: Watched Scenario and Feedback Focus Group Simulation Exercise

Methods of Consultation (2) NO INCENTIVES OFFERED!

Video

Findings – Mini-CEX “Typing was time consuming” “I think having an / phone number for support is important. I didn’t use this, but felt reassured that it was there” “My suggestion would be to keep the format simple and the number of assessments reasonable” “I have really enjoyed this placement. As compared to other placements I think I had a clearer sense of my goals and what I wanted to achieve. I really felt supported by people on the team and felt learning opportunities were made easily available”

IMPACT Scaled project for entire final year Reduced the number of assessments Told students to use audio to record feedback Produced online training materials Revised evaluation

Findings - ALPS “If the patient wanted to say something negative…then how does that student respond to that? And who’s going to support that student to deal with that afterwards?” “The assessment is usable although I feel the wording needs to be altered. The questions were appropriate – the multiple choice answers need to be decreased as they are too broad” “I feel the assessment would work well in practice if the student had full control of their own PDA and it was not used in a way which would place the student under more pressure”

IMPACT Recommendation that assessors receive service user feedback as opposed to students Language of assessment tool Revised protocol for tool use Guidelines for mobile device use Further consultations

Negatives - Students do not always turn up! - By consulting PRE- project, it takes longer to get anything produced. i.e. Assessment tool – continuous consultations - Can only be done without time-constraints (re- sit students – finite amount of time, assessment tool – less time pressured) - PRE-project consultation...more stressful for project team –Requires more resources and time

Positives +HOWEVER – saves re-write time, and increases success chance of the first run of the project +Consulting at outset made students feel more involved – and more engaged as a result +Students feel valued- and more willing to engage in research

Reflection Consulting pre-project created a much more usable assessment tool as a result of consultation BUT it’s not always appropriate to consult PRE and POST How much student time are we able to/should we use up?