The development
of multimedia learning
resources & e-portfolios
Professor Paul Maharg
Glasgow Graduate School of Law
presentation
1. Overview of interviewing learning in GGSL
2. Foundation Course in Professional Legal Skills
3. Multimedia units
4. Practice: student-on-student; student-on-SC
5. Assessment
6. Further developments: E-portfolios
7. Portrait of the tutor as designer…
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1. Overview of interviewing learning in GGSL
 Foundation Course in Professional Legal Skills:



One lecture
Multimedia units
Two two-hour workshops
 Voluntary practice


…with another student (using bank of unseen scenarios
…with a standardised client
 Compulsory Assessment


With standardised client
Assessed f2f by SC (comms & client handling skills via interview)
and tutor (legal substance, next steps, etc, via interview record
form)
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2. Foundation Course in Professional Legal Skills
Two week course on skills of:
 Legal writing, eg letters
 Legal drafting, eg contracts
 Interviewing
 Negotiation
 Advocacy
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theory, what theory?
 Very little theory of ICT use in professional legal
education, so what theory, what models?
 Foundation Course was cognitive-based, therefore
constructivist learning not appropriate: Instructional
Design was the theory base
 phenomenographical emphasis on understanding
process
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resource-based learning…
In most professions thinking about the theory-practice
relationship is still dominated by the applicative mode of use and
one or two dominant interpretative paradigms. This limits both
the potential use of theory and our capacity to interpret, refine
and improve practice. Moreover the whole process of practical
reasoning is almost totally neglected. […] When a group of
orthopaedic surgeons were interviewed about their own
professional learning, they highlighted a need to observe a
number of experts tackling ill-defined problems, each in their
own style, and for an additional commentary by each expert
explaining what he was doing and thinking at the time.
Resources of this kind are rarely put at the disposal of
professionals in either initial or continuing education.
Michael Eraut, Developing Professional Knowledge and
Competence. The Falmer Press, London, 1994, p.50
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theory informing our practice…
Cognitivist & instructional design theory of the
Foundation Course means we needed a structure of:
 Tell
 Show
 Do
(students in lectures/demonstrations)
(students in multimedia examples)
(students practise in role play and
simulations in workshops)
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3. Multimedia units
Foundation Course in Professional Legal Skills
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feedback results
The resources were easy to use...
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
disagree
completely
disagree
strongly
disagree
Agree
agree
strongly
agree
0
entirely
10
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feedback results
The resources were well integrated with the Foundation Course
lectures...
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
entirely
agree
strongly
agree
Agree
disagree
strongly
disagree
completely
disagree
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feedback results
The resources were helpful in modelling the legal skills for me...
50
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
entirely
agree
strongly
agree
Agree
strongly
disagree
completely
disagree
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feedback results – quality of content
not very
interesting
good
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
excellent
Interviewing...
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4. Practice: student-on-student; student-on-SC
 Students practised with each other on unseen scenarios
 Performance is videotaped
 Tapes sent to tutors who give feedback on performance
 Students practise with a SC
 Make an appointment
 SC gives feedback on a feedback sheet
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5. Assessment
 Digitised video of client interactions, to be used within an





online portfolio environment that would enable users to
create video files
upload files to a central server
view client assessment of their performance in the file
provide their own reflective comment upon that
performance
liaise with tutors and others on the performance
link the environment to video assets that give examples
of good and poor performances, benchmark
performances, etc.
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Consumer DV camcorder
Touchscreen 15” TFT
monitor.
Large ‘Viewfinder’
Playback monitor
Video transport controls
Bluetooth remote keyboard
& mouse
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5.2. Further developments: e-portfolio…
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© Pebble
Learning
24
 PebblePad
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lessons learned…
Don’t:
 use IT unless there’s a perceived need for it
 develop multimedia resources as an isolated strategy
 define benefits in terms of costs alone
 design without planning
 plan without student & staff training
 underestimate time, cost, energy, re-drafting
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lessons learned…
Do:
 keep development plan as flexible as possible
 centre IT learning around social learning activities
 integrate learning technology as low as possible in
teaching & learning interventions
 try to anticipate the operational (day to day) as well
as the policy and strategic needs
 make the resources part of the culture of your T & L
 use the resources as an agent of change as well as
part of the change strategy
 share vision & objectives - with everyone who’ll
listen!
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staff development issues
 Multimedia is not simply resource-based learning: it’s




more powerful and requires careful placing within the
curriculum
E-learning is different from book/video learning:
more individual paths, more opportunity for direct
modelling
Staff need to be informed of content and how the
content is to be used by students
Production of initial training materials costly, and staff
should appreciate this
Staff require to know the context that students are
working within.
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portrait of the teacher as designer
In the GGSL…?
 Shift in traditional role of staff as centre of the knowledge
web
 Knowledge and skills are distributed across webs
 Staff spend more time designing online learning with SC
trainers, tutors, postgrad assistants, trainees, student
monitors, ie design work using…
 resources
 simulations
 just-in-time learning
 salon & masterclass models of group learning
 … over whole programmes of study.
 Within and between disciplines
 Within and between institutions internationally
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contact details
Email:
karen.barton@strath.ac.uk
paul.maharg@strath.ac.uk
Blog:
http://zeugma.typepad.com
Address:
Glasgow Graduate School of Law
Lord Hope Building
University of Strathclyde
141 St James’ Road
Glasgow G4 0LU
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