UNMC570 - Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) in Higher Education: Ethics and Methods

Year

Credit points

Campus offering

Prerequisites

UNMC560 Designing and Implementing Technology-enabled Learning Activities in Higher Education or UNHE505 Technology-Enhanced Learning in Higher Education or HLSC663 Simulation Design and Delivery in Higher Education

Incompatible

UNHE503 Scholarship in Higher Education

Unit rationale, description and aim

To be professionally capable and progressive as a tertiary educator you need to inform your practice through skills of scholarship in learning and teaching. This micro-credential is designed to engage and build on the knowledge and skills that you have developed in preceding micro-credentials of the ACU Graduate Certificate in Higher Education through the development of a personalised SoTL project. You will learn key principles for research design that are appropriate for the higher education context and properly reflect the ethical considerations and constraints involved in researching with humans as defined and regulated by the National Human Medical Research Council (NHMRC). As part of your project, you will develop a research question that seeks to investigate an innovative, interesting or troublesome aspect of your practice that is theorised by adult learning and teaching principles. You will plan and justify a research approach that is founded on relevant literature and contributes to your own professional learning as well as the understandings of other practitioners in your field. Completing this micro-credential will develop the knowledge and skills you need to complete an application for ethics approval to implement your planned research. Therefore, the aim of this micro-credential is to develop your foundational knowledge and skills in SoTL and prepare you for applied research of your practice in teaching and learning in higher education.  

Learning outcomes

To successfully complete this unit you will be able to demonstrate you have achieved the learning outcomes (LO) detailed in the below table.

Each outcome is informed by a number of graduate capabilities (GC) to ensure your work in this, and every unit, is part of a larger goal of graduating from ACU with the attributes of insight, empathy, imagination and impact.

Explore the graduate capabilities.

On successful completion of this unit, students should be able to:

LO1 - Communicate knowledge of research ethics in the scholarship of learning and teaching context (GA1, GA2, GA3, GA4, GA5). 

LO2 - Apply sophisticated knowledge and deep understanding of adult learning and teaching theory and practice to a learning and teaching 'project' (GA3, GA4, GA5, GA6). 

LO3 - Demonstrate basic skills in scholarship by critically and reflectively describing and defending a research design that investigates your practice and contributes new understandings to the higher education sector (GA2, GA3, GA4, GA5, GA6, GA8). 

Graduate attributes

GA1 - demonstrate respect for the dignity of each individual and for human diversity

GA2 - recognise their responsibility to the common good, the environment and society 

GA3 - apply ethical perspectives in informed decision making

GA4 - think critically and reflectively 

GA5 - demonstrate values, knowledge, skills and attitudes appropriate to the discipline and/or profession 

GA6 - solve problems in a variety of settings taking local and international perspectives into account

GA8 - locate, organise, analyse, synthesise and evaluate information 

Content

Topics will include: 

Module 1 – Research Ethics in SoTL 

• Research ethics, including in Australian, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, and international contexts and in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. 

Module 2 – Research Design in SoTL 

• Scholarship in Learning and Teaching research including Indigenous research methodologies and the ACU mission  
• Teaching and professional practice as a scholarly activity 

Learning and teaching strategy and rationale

To maximise flexibility and engagement for all clients and therefore foster learning opportunity, client centred, self-paced learning is an underpinning strategy adopted within this micro-credential. It follows that you will be expected to interact with your peers, contribute to online discussions and contribute to a pool of shared resources. You will also be expected to keep a reflective journal within your LEO portfolio to support your ability to engage in critical self-reflection that may contribute to your continuing professional development, such as in an application for Advance Higher Education Higher Education Academy Fellowship. Engagement with teaching staff in this fully online micro-credential will be facilitated primarily through online forums and meetings. This online engagement will be supplemented by telephone and email communication as requested by individual clients. Individualised textual feedback on your formative and summative assessment tasks is provided to support your continuing development and refinement of your project as you progress in MCHE570 and prepare for MCHE580 where your project planning may be applied.  

Assessment strategy and rationale

The assessment for this micro-credential is designed for you to demonstrate your achievement of each learning outcome. Assessment for each learning outcome allows you to demonstrate knowledge acquisition, assimilation and application. This is done using a formative assessment task and a (linked) summative assessment task. In the formative task you will present your acquired knowledge of ethics in learning and teaching research practice by relating ethical principles to your planning for a suitable research method (assimilation). You will find the learning you achieve through this task is a necessary scaffold toward your completion of the summative task. In the summative task, you will develop an ethically appropriate research proposal that reflects your existing knowledge of your discipline as well as adult learning theories and applies your developing knowledge of research methods in SoTL to the design and justification of a planned research process.  

It should be noted that MCHE570 is a Pass/Fail micro-credential and as such there is no grade allocated to assignments in this micro-credential. In order to pass this micro-credential, you are required to:  

1. Submit a credible attempt for each assessment item  

2. Demonstrate a passing standard (or better) for the summative assessment task. 

Overview of assessments

Representative texts and references

Biggs, J. & Tang, C. (2011). Teaching for quality learning at university (4th ed.). New York, NY: Open University Press.  

Bell, J. (2014). Doing your research project: A guide for first-time researchers (UK Higher Education OUP Humanities & Social Sciences Study). Milton Keynes, UK: Open University Press. 

Cohen, L., Manion, L. & Morrison, K. (2017). Research methods in education (8th ed.). London: Routledge.   

Creswell, J. (2013). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. (4th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. 

Creswell, J. (2017). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five approaches (4th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. 

Mackinlay, E., & Nakata, M. (2016). Editorial. The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education, 46(2), iii-iii. doi 10.1017/jie.2017.26 

Punch, K. (2014). Introduction to social research: Quantitative & qualitative approaches (3rd ed.). Los Angeles, CA: SAGE. 

Trigwell, K., Martin, E., Benjamin, J. & Prosser, M. (c. 2011). Scholarship of teaching: A model. Retrieved from http://www.itl.usyd.edu.au/projects/scholarshipproject/model.htm 

REFERENCING 

This micro-credential requires you to use the referencing system that you use within your discipline. 

See the ‘Academic integrity and referencing’ page of the Student Portal for more details. 

ACU Policies and regulations 

It is your responsibility to read, familiarise yourself and abide by ACU policies and regulations as they apply to students, including regulations on examinations; review and appeals; acceptable use of IT facilities; and conduct and responsibilities. These are in the ACU Handbook, available from the website. 

A list of these and other important policies can be found at the University Policies page of the Student Portal. 

ASSESSMENT POLICY AND PROCEDURES 

It is your responsibility to read, familiarise yourself and abide by ACU Assessment Policy and Assessment Procedures in the University Handbook: they include rules on deadlines; penalties for late submission; extensions; and special consideration. If you have any queries on Assessment Policy, please see your Lecturer in Charge. 

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY 

You have the responsibility to submit only work which is your own, or which properly acknowledges the thoughts, ideas, findings and/or work of others. The Framework for Academic Integrity and the Academic Honesty Policy are available from the website. Please read them and abide by them. Please note in particular that plagiarism, collusion and recycling of assignments are not acceptable. Penalties for academic dishonesty can vary in severity and can include being excluded from the course. 

TURNITIN  

The ‘Turnitin’ application (a text-matching tool) will be used in this micro-credential, in order to enable: 

you to improve your academic writing by identifying possible areas of poor citation and referencing in their written work; and 

teaching staff to identify areas of possible plagiarism in your written work. 

To submit, mark and return assessment tasks through the Grademark function in Turnitin. 

While Turnitin can help in identifying problems with plagiarism, avoiding plagiarism is more important. Information on avoiding plagiarism is available from the Academic Skills Unit. 

For any assignment that has been created to allow submission through Turnitin (check the Assignment submission details for each assessment task), you should submit your draft well in advance of the due date (ideally, several days before) to ensure that you have time to work on any issues identified by Turnitin. On the assignment due date, lecturers will have access to your final submission and the Turnitin Originality Report. 

Please note that electronic marking, Grademark, is used in this micro-credential using Turnitin. Turnitin will be used as a means of submitting, marking and returning assessment tasks and so a text matching percentage will appear on your submission automatically. 

FIRST PEOPLES AND EQUITY PATHWAYS DIRECTORATE FOR ABORIGINAL AND TORRES STRAIT ISLANDER STUDENTS 

Every campus provides information and support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Students. Indigenous Knowings are embedded in curricula for the benefit of all students at ACU. 

http://www.acu.edu.au/453155  

CLIENT SUPPORT 

If you are experiencing difficulties with learning, life issues or pastoral/spiritual concerns, or have a disability/medical condition which may impact on your studies, you are advised to notify your Lecturer in Charge, Course Coordinator and/or one of the services listed below as soon as possible. 

For all aspects of support please visit ACU Info section in the Client Portal.   

Academic Skills offers a variety of services, including workshops (on topics such as assignment writing, time management, reading strategies, referencing), drop-in sessions, group appointments and individual consultations. It has a 24-hour online booking system for individual or group consultations.  

Campus Ministry offers pastoral care, spiritual leadership and opportunities for you to be involved with community projects.  

The Career Development Service can assist you with finding employment, preparing a resume and employment application and preparing for interviews.  

The Counselling Service is a free, voluntary, confidential and non-judgmental service open to all students and staffed by qualified social workers or registered psychologists.  

Disability Services can assist you if you need educational adjustments because of a disability or chronic medical condition; please contact them as early as possible.  

The Support Services web page provides links for each service. 

Online resources and technology requirements 

The LEO page for this micro-credential contains further readings/ discussion forums.