COMMUNITY EDUCATION STUDY SKILLS

 

 

COURSE AIMS

Studying at undergraduate level in Higher Education is a challenge for everyone.  The ways that we have learned to study in the past have seen us through thus far but there are new hurdles to be faced and we all need some advice and encouragement to help get us through.  The study Skills course aims to do both of these things, help you to learn new skills and encourage you to accept the challenge of study with confidence.

 

LEARNING OUTCOMES

 

On completion of this course participants will be able to:

 

·       Identify ways of reading in a more structured and systematic manner

·       Explore forms of note taking in lectures and with readings

·       Form study groups

·       Structure an academic essay

·       Correctly reference academic sources

·       Learn from essay feed-back

 

 

TEACHING AND LEARNING STRATEGIES

Classes will consider established thinking and ideas in relation to the topic and will also draw on participants’ own experience of study.  There will always be a chance to try skills out in class with workshop periods and case studies.

 

 

OUTLINE TEACHING PROGRAMME

 

Reading and understanding

There will be an introduction to the course and a look forward to the sessions to come as well as the assessment task.  This will be followed by a look at the skills required in reading actively and critically. It will help you to make sense of what you are reading and engage with and think about the ideas presented in order to develop your own point of view. There will also be a chance to look at the formation of study groups and how these might be supported.

           

Making Notes

This session will help you use notes to get to the bones of an argument you are reading about or hearing in a lecture.  It will discuss a variety of note making techniques and strategies to help prepare for writing essays.

 

Writing What They Want

This session will explore what you should cover when writing a good essay including answering the question asked and presenting a good, well-structured and supported argument.

           

Supporting your argument and referencing

This session will focus on using evidence to support your ideas and using your own and other people’s words through appropriate referencing.  In this session you will be introduced to the assessment task in more detail.

 

Managing the Writing Process

This session will explore how to set about the task of writing through looking at the stages in the writing process from thinking about the essay title through planning the writing process, studying the course content, taking stock, organizing, drafting and reviewing and polishing.

           

Learning From Feed-back

You will get your marked assignments back during this session and this will then allow us to discuss how you might learn from the comments you have been given on the mark sheets.

 

There will be a further session in February to consider feedback from your essays from Introduction to Community Education and Introduction to Social Theory.

 

 

COURSE READING

All of the sessions draw from:

 

            Northedge, A. (2005) The Good Study Guide, The Open University Press. 

 

We recommend this as a very useful book to buy but this and a number of other study guides are available from the library. There are also a number of good web-sites available including the Edinburgh University Centre for Teaching Learning and Assessment site to be found at: http://www.tla.ed.ac.uk/

 

 

ASSESSMENT

In order to help you develop your overall study skills we have devised a formative assessment task for you. Formative simply means that while the assessment will be marked and graded this will not be registered as a mark on your academic profile.  Look on it as a trial run but do treat it as if it were the real thing. This first experience of academic writing will allow us to see where you need help and how you can build on your strengths.

 

The assessment for the Study Skills course is based on the anthology of articles from the Introduction to Community Education course that you are taking this semester.  Please make sure you read all of the anthology, take an active part in the class discussions and then address the following task.

 

Formative assessment task:  How does the anthology help you to think about your own experience of community? What implications, positive and negative, might arise from different ways of understanding community?

 

You assignment should demonstrate your capacity to:

 

Length  1200-1500 words