All hands on deck: A team approach to preparing year one Arts students for their first major assignment. A Practice Report

Abstract

First year student's unwillingness to access to university-wide teaching support services and low usage of tutor office hours has become a noticeable trend over the past five years. The assistance students need to succeed is available, but what is the economic sense of paying for services which they increasingly indicate do not suit the way in which they wish to learn? The solution was to create the FYE Targeted Learning Sessions, which are designed to attract students in selected large year one courses to engage with an easy-access option of discipline specific academic support. This report sets up the aims of the project and gives a systematic breakdown of the way in which course convenors, the First Year Experience program, library and Student Learning staff combined forces to offer students a new way of seeking discipline specific academic support.

A friendly destination: Normalising first-year science student help-seeking through an academic literacy Targeted Learning Session. A Practice Report

“…Gqweta (2012) Checking that I was on track. Student 4Overall, these comments suggest that, similar to the Arts students in the report by Cameron et al (2012), the MI students also engaged with a Targeted Learning Session.…”

“…Before the session, learning centre and library staff conducted more formal classes teaching key skills such as essay writing, time management, information searching and referencing. Our session was arranged nine days prior to the submission date of the assignment as recommended by Cameron et al (2012) so that it was not offered too early when students had not started work and so that students would have enough time to respond to feedback.…”

“…Unlike the Arts students in the investigation conducted by Cameron et al (2012), our MI students study all academic courses as one class, so the need to belong is particularly important. Winograd and Rust (2014) pointed out that belonging is an important factor in student academic achievement.…”

“…The context was an institute of technology in New Zealand. Our aim was to replicate and develop, in our context, the successful Targeted Learning Session held for first year Arts degree students as reported by Cameron et al (2012). Their sessions targeted a particular assignment and provided access to a number of teaching and learning support staff in one open plan space.…”

Volume 6, Issue 1

“…First year learning support is explored by Kay Hammond and co-authors at the Unitec Institute of Technology in Auckland, New Zealand. Targeted Learning Sessions, developed by Cameron, George and Henley (2012) and reported on in this journal, have been replicated in the Unitec context with a particular cohort of students. The results further the work around normalising help-seeking behaviour and eliminating the barriers between support services to increase collaboration between professional and academic staff.…”