RSCni
LR Digest
February 2007
In This Month’s Edition
Ferl and ACLearn Move to QIA Excellence Gateway
Free At Last? New History Resource Available
BBC Frames of Mind Film Competition
New Resource Provides Detailed Map Data of Britain's Geology
Know UK and European Sources Online Renewal - Trial
MyIntute Subject Alerting System Changed
JORUM’s ‘Vouchers for Vision’ – Win a £30 Amazon Voucher
JISC's Value to UK Education and Research: Report Shows
Positive Effects
Computing Tips
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Ferl and ACLearn Move to QIA Excellence Gateway
Access to information on technology for learning is set to become even easier as two Becta-run
websites are moved to become part of the Quality Improvement Agency’s (QIA) ‘Excellence
Gateway’.
The sites, Ferl and aclearn.net, will transfer at the end of March 2007 and will join the Adult
Learning Institute’s good practice database. The move comes as the agencies working in the
learning and skills sector recognise the need to streamline the way information is delivered to
practitioners.
Both of these well-used websites will benefit from this move that demonstrates that ICT is
recognised as integral to the drive for quality. Its inclusion at the heart of the Excellence Gateway
will provide the sector with a more coherent approach to developing excellent provision for the
learner.
The new home for the sites – the Excellence Gateway – can be found at: QIA - Excellence
Gateway
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Free At Last? New History Resource Available
The latest site from Education Scotland, for Intermediate and Higher Level History, explores race
relations in the USA, 1918 to 1968. From Jim Crow to Black Power, students are encouraged to
examine, interpret and evaluate a wide variety of sources on key areas such as Freedom
Summer and the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Using a timeline, students can follow the history
decade by decade and see how each event leads on to the next and how it might have influenced
the way people were feeling at the time. Interactive exercises allow for practice of exam skills or
test your knowledge with the quiz.
BBC Scotland Education - History - Free at Last
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BBC Frames of Mind Film Competition
Calling all young film-makers. As part of the ‘Healthy Minds’ campaign BBC Northern Ireland will
be running a 'Frames of Mind' short film competition for young people under 19. They are
looking for teams of two or more young people to create a 60 second film around the theme of
mental wellbeing. The films should be creative and inspiring. The short-listed films will be
screened at a 'mini-Oscars' event in the QFT in late March. The winning movie makers will win a
BBC Blast master class with a well known film maker. The competition is open now and last
day for receipt of entries is 15 March 2007.
For more information on this initiative check out the website at: www.bbc.co.uk/ni/healthyminds
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New Resource Provides Detailed Map Data of Britain's Geology
A major new online resource which makes available geological map data from the British
Geological Survey was launched on 1 February 2007. Geology Digimap provides a fascinating
insight into the earth's physical structure and substance, its history, and the processes that act on
it by delivering digital geological map data of Great Britain.
Made available by JISC Collections, through EDINA’s Digimap platform, this new resource
includes onshore geological data covering bedrock geology, superficial deposits, mass movement
and artificial ground, as well as a whole range of linear features such as faults and fossil beds.
For more information, see:
JISC Collections | Geology Digimap
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Know UK and European Sources Online Renewal - Trial
In 2004 ProQuest and JISC negotiated an arrangement whereby European Sources Online and
KnowUK was available to the FE sector as a joint package. This arrangement comes to an end
in May 2007. No parallel arrangement was made for the HE sector, although a number of HE
establishments took out subscriptions directly with the publisher.
The existing European Sources Online will continue to be partially updated by ProQuest until May
2007. After that time an archive version of European Sources Online will be available until the
end of 2007 (to be confirmed). The re-launched service will be available from January 2008.
Please note that the service may be re-launched with a new title.
In the meantime, a consultation exercise is asking for your opinion on the current European
Sources Online and on the proposed publishing arrangement whereby European Sources Online
will be published by Cardiff University at the subscription prices outlined above. Before
Supporting Colleges in Development and Use of E-Learning Technologies and Resources
responding to the consultation, you can try outl European Sources Online. Please use the details
below:
URL: http://www.europeansources.info
Username: jisceso
Password: ESOtrial
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MyIntute Subject Alerting System Changed
An updated version of the MyIntute subject alerting system has been put in place from 05
February 2007. The new system makes it possible to choose the subjects you want to be alerted
to from anywhere in the subject tree. There are also some changes to the way things are laid out
in the interface. It should now be easier to see where your MyIntute subjects are. Please see the
updated help document if you have any trouble. The new system also works with non-javascript
browsers.
http://www.intute.ac.uk/myintute/
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JORUM’s ‘Vouchers for Vision’ – Win a £30 Amazon Voucher
The Jorum Team is continually collecting as many ideas and suggestions for the Jorum Service
as possible in order to enhance the service.
If you have used the Jorum service recently the JORUM team are keen to know how you think it
could be improved. Have you thought “Jorum would be much better if it did this” or “I’d really like
to see this feature”? If so, they would like to hear from you.
Suggestions about the system (the software that Jorum uses, called Intralibrary) – how it works,
what new features you would like to see, or how the interface could be changed – are welcome.
JORUM are also keen to receive feedback about the elements of service that might not relate
directly to the software – such as training materials, user guides, and methods of communicating
with other users.
Please send your suggestions to support@jorum.ac.uk – entitling them ‘Jorums Vouchers for
Vision’. To visit the main site go to: www.jorum.ac.uk
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JISC's Value to UK Education and Research: Report Shows Positive
Effects
The use of JISC supported e-resources saves user time. For every £1 spent on e-resource
provision, the UK education and research community saved time to the value of at least £19. This
is one of the findings of a newly-published value for money report commissioned by JISC to
uncover some of the ‘hidden’ value of its activities in support of education and research.
The report comes up with some of its most impressive figures in the area of e-content provision.
A sample analysis of some 22 resources which JISC provided through national agreement in the
Supporting Colleges in Development and Use of E-Learning Technologies and Resources
year 2004-05 reveals that the total savings to the education community through national
agreements for these resources amounted to over £26m. With the annual costs for these
resources less than £1m, such figures suggest that for every £1 spent on securing national
agreements, the savings amounted to more than £26.
For more details see:
published
JISC Collections | JISC's value to UK education and research: report
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Computing Tips
Grab Images From Your Computer Screen for PowerPoint Presentations
Did you know that you can easily grab an image right off your screen and pop it into PowerPoint?
It couldn't be simpler!
Set up your screen so the information you want to grab is displayed as large as possible. Press
PrintScrn (or Prt Sc) or Shift-PrintScrn to capture the full screen to the Clipboard, or press
Alt-PrintScrn to capture just the active window to the Clipboard.
Switch to PowerPoint and choose Edit > Paste or press Ctrl-V to paste the image from the
Clipboard into your presentation. This is a great way to include things like static pictures of Web
pages, program screens and dialog boxes, or information that won't normally copy and paste in
your PowerPoint presentations.
Excel Comment Boxes Blocking Your View?
What do you do if you've commented your Excel worksheet to death and now you can't move
without popping up a comment? You can keep those comments and still view the data in your
worksheet if you don't mind hiding the comments.
If you'd like to hide a comment, then right-click the commented cell and choose Hide Comment
from the context menu. You'll still be able to view and edit the comment by selecting the cell.
Hiding the comment simply keeps it from popping up and covering the surrounding data in your
worksheet.
Supporting Colleges in Development and Use of E-Learning Technologies and Resources
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Contact Details
Mike Moran
eLearning Adviser
Email m.moran@rsc-ni.ac.uk
Web www.rsc-ni.ac.uk
Supporting Colleges in Development and Use of E-Learning Technologies and Resources