How will I be assessed?

APP TE is a twelve-month course, addressing a wide range of topics in teaching and learning. It is intended to prepare you for a long career as an academic with teaching responsibilities (which may include research supervision). You will work closely with a small group of about 6 colleagues on the programme, and regularly meet with the wider cohort of about 20. You will be supported by the programme leaders, and other Academic Developers from ADC.

Each month of the programme, you will complete an activity related to teaching and learning, and submit it for formative feedback. At the end of the programme, you will revise these pieces and submit them together for summative assessment and feedback; along with two teaching observation forms.

Read on for an overview of all the assessment tasks, and the possible outcomes at the end of the course.

1 What is Teaching Excellence?

What do we mean by "teaching excellence", and is this a good way to think about teaching? What impact does the excellence narrative have on students and academics?
Task: think and write about how your own teaching practice is positioned in the sector, and how you think about excellence (300 words)

2 Relationships between teaching and research

We will be thinking about research at Warwick, research supervision, and the relationship between research and teaching. Also the pastoral aspect of your role at Warwick, with some work on personal tutoring.
Task: write about the relationship between research and teaching in your own work (300 words)

3 Teaching as enquiry

This unit introduces in more detail an approach to teaching as enquiry. We will think about how we evaluate teaching, what counts as evidence in evidence-informed practice, and offer some practical support on developing an evaluation strategy to help you achieve your teaching goals.
Task: a structured peer dialogue about an aspect of your teaching

4 Design for Learning

What do we need to consider when we design activities, modules, programmes, and curricula? How do we design to ensure that students are learning the right things, in the right way, at the right time?
Task: design a module, and write a rationale for your design decisions.

5 Assessment for Learning

How do we ensure that we are assessing student learning in the right way? How does assessment influence student activity and learning? What is assessment for?
Task: write a rationale for your assessment strategy.

6 Feedback for Learning

Explore the functions of feedback, who feedback is for, and what makes it good. Thinking holistically about feedback also leads us to think more broadly about who gives feedback, including peer and self-evaluation.
Task: present some feedback and explain how your strategy and decisions support learning (500 wds)

7 Teaching in Context: Student Engagement

What does engagement mean in different teaching contexts? How can we design and implement learning that students want to be part of? We hone in on active learning, learning communities, virtual and physical.
Task: review a piece of technology you use, or would like to use.

8 Teaching in Context: Student Autonomy

Focus on autonomy, and aspects of learning and teaching practice which are particularly relevant to learner autonomy: critical thinking, academic integrity, inquiry-based learning, and structured independent learning.
Task: reflect on how your teaching promotes student autonomy, making use of pedagogical literature (300)

9 Teaching in Context: Collaboration

Learn about how students benefit from peer learning, and how to support them. Also how we can work more effectively with students, both dialogically and as partners in learning design.
Task: As a group, respond imaginatively and creatively to this section of APP TE, as you see fit.

10 Values

What matters, with regard to teaching in higher education and why? Explore the wider context of your practice, and identify what matters to you.
Task: reflect on what you care about in teaching and education and how this drives your teaching practice (300)

11 Theories of Learning

Identify the ideas and commitments that play out in your teaching, locate your own views and actions in the history of ideas about education and learning.
Task: revisit one of your earlier formative assessments and enhance it in light of what you have learned in this section.

12 Writing Up

There is no new content in the final month of the course, but instead a series of activities designed to help you to ensure that your portfolio is complete, and addresses all of the programme ILOs.
Task: submit your complete portfolio of work for summative assessment.

Critical Incident Questionnaires

As part of your engagement with the APP TE programme, you will be asked to complete a critical incident questionnaire at the end of each month of the programme. These are short surveys which should take only a few minutes to complete. The CIQs both provide us with valuable feedback on how well the programme is meeting your needs, and function as our primary means for tracking progress on the course.

Teaching Observations

At some point during your time on the programme, you will need to complete two teaching observations: one by a member of the programme team, and one by your departmental mentor (or someone in a similar role). The teaching observations are valuable development opportunities. Full guidance about the observation process, and how to get the most out of it, is provided through the course Moodle pages. The teaching observations are not directly assessed, but they can be used as part of your evidence-based practice; and they are a required part of our accreditation. They must be submitted as part of your summative portfolio.

Outcomes

When you submit your final portfolio for summative assessment, there are two possible outcomes:

Pass: if your portfolio is complete and demonstrates that the intended learning outcomes for the portfolio have been met, then you will have passed the course. You will be asked to supply some information for us to forward to Advance HE, and then you can claim your Fellowship.
Refer: if your portfolio is incomplete, or if it demonstrates that some of the intended learning outcomes have yet to be met, then your portfolio will be returned to you with detailed, constructive feedback. You will be invited to revise and resubmit. There is no penalty for resubmission.