Presentation at the Teaching History in Higher Education Conference, London, September, 2015: http://www.history.org.uk/resources/secondary_news_2471.html

1. Jamie Wood, University of Lincoln
E: jwood@lincoln.ac.uk
T: @woodjamie99 and @MakDigHist
http://makingdigitalhistory.co.uk/

2. Our project
Context
What we did
Feedback, 2013-15
Creativity

3. Digital literacy in the Disciplines project
(HEA/JISC): 2013-14
Developing students’ digital literacies
Xerte: Open Educational Resource (OER:
http://www.xerte.org.uk/index.php?lang=en)

4. Institutional focus: students as
producers (http://bit.ly/1ljWEDR), not
consumers
HEA/ JISC focus: students as partners
Students create learning objects

5. Level 1, 2 and MA
Individual and group projects
Compulsory and optional use
All were assessed
All staff involved chose to continue
using it

6. Core L1 module
Numbers of students
 2013: ca. 100
 2014: ca. 130
 Work in groups of 3-5 to produce a Xerte object that
teaches an audience (of their choosing) about a
primary source we looked at in class
http://bit.ly/1lNNUGO

7. https://xerte.lncd.lincoln.ac.uk/play.php?template_id=2137

8. • Group-work
• Using a new technology
• Offline problems transferred online:
• e.g. writing and presentation
• Digital literacies?

9. Competencies 2013-14
(n = 81)
2014-15
(n = 90)
Team working
Ability to find and use primary and
secondary sources
Knowledge of the subject
Ability to present information in a
concise and interesting way
Ability to use the Internet for
research
67
60
59
57
33
77
67
61
53
42

10. ECSTASI: Encouraging Creativity in Students
Through Applied Student Inquiry
with Drs Marie Griffiths and Maria Kutar, Salford
Business School
Gathering data from students in 2013-14 and
2014-15
Questionnaires (students and staff; pre- and post-
surveys)
Focus groups
Analysis of ‘products’

11.  ‘person’s natural imagination’
 ‘ability to think of original ideas and concepts, not purely copying
someone else’s work’
 ‘your own ideas’
 ‘think for yourself’
 ‘pushing yourself out of your comfort zone’
 ‘creating and working something different to everyone else to
set yourself apart from them’
 ‘intrinsic to the individual’
 ‘you’re either a creative person or not, more born with it’

12. Person
is the student a creative
person and have their
learning experiences
developed their
creativity?
Process
is the process through
which the person
learnt or the product
was made creative?
Product
is the essay or other
piece of work creative?
Adapted from (Charyton et al., 2009)

13. Do you think of yourself as a creative
person?
Yes - 16
Positive (e.g. ‘a bit’) - 10
Negative (e.g. ‘not very’) - 4
No - 3

14. It has allowed me
to think in other
formats than just
an essay and made
me think more
about presentation
Not really, I think the
program was just
complicated and wasn't fair
that it was new and part of
the assessment. Don't
think that it was just me
that felt this
Thinking outside the box
more. Making more of an effort
to satisfy the audience’s needs
in creative/ interesting/
interactive ways
Yes maybe, I
could do a lot
more than I
expected

15. “Some of the students who had achieved
mediocre results in more traditional forms of
assessments managed to excel in producing
their digital objects.” (Staff response)

16. Yes: 11
Somewhat: 11
No: 2

17. Focus group
Xerte +
 offers ten different ways to
approach a source, an
essay is too structured to
achieve the same scope
 helped them see research
as “like a tree growing”,
starting from a central
source and branching out.
 “absolutely has potential to
allow people to be creative”
Xerte -
 “very inaccessible […] “it
seems like it’s still in
development […] it seems
unfinished.”
 “not very simple to use”
 more guidance needed
 problems in working in
groups
“we were creative with it because it enabled us to
explore quite an old document in a language none of
us can read and make it accessible.”

18. “It encourages them to think about the problem
from an unfamiliar angle, with a view to presenting
their thoughts and conclusions in an unfamiliar
format. The unfamiliarity was initially a little
unsettling for some, but ultimately facilitated
deeper and more effective reflection, as they
grappled with new ways of presenting
information.” (Staff response)

19. How would you measure your creativity for the artefact on a
scale where 1 = least creative and 5 = most creative?
Average response = 3.33
“group projects like the Xerte object will have to
be creative to stand out from the rest”

20. Creative elements:
Multimedia content (e.g. pictures, videos)
Varied methods of presenting information (e.g.
‘zooming in’)
 “we could have just written about it or done a poster
about it, but it wouldn’t have had the impact.”
Encouraging creativity:
Ability to reach a wider audience and application
(e.g. essays just seen by author and tutor)

21. “[…] it helped (some of) the students to
think about how they present
information to others, to consider that
they might be producing material that
engages with an audience beyond the
teacher.” (Staff response)

22. Digital objects sometimes passive: “you can take
as little or as much as you like”
“Definitely the most effective way to deliver a
creative presentation that I’ve come across”
Xerte is more engaging, but essays can allow
students to “be more creative with my ideas
because you can extend and expand them
more”

23. Key: not Xerte, but the pedagogy
Making (or creating) digital history developed range of skills
 Team working, using sources, subject knowledge
 Less impact on digital literacy
 Stress (e.g. of groupwork) aided learning?
Creativity developed across three areas, although with
challenges
 Person – certain students think they are more suited to this
 Process – problem solving and thinking in different ways
 Product – thinking about audience