News & Events

More PMI funding for Prepare for Success

Further funding has been awarded to the team that created Prepare for Success from UKCISA and the Prime Minister's Initiative for International Education (PMI). The first phase of this project created a web-based set of interactive learning resources for international students to help them find out about academic life in the UK and the skills needed for effective study. The website was launched in the summer this year and has received 'hits' from nearly 100 countries. The second phase will enhance and expand the Prepare for Success website to increase its attractiveness whilst also using some Web 2.0 style features. This will include developing a Tag Cloud for delivery of FAQs about study in the UK to allow quick and easy information searching, and providing guided study pathways through the learning resources developed for Phase 1.

FAROES Project Workshop: Realising a Shared Repository of Language Resources for Teachers

Presentation of the prototype

The FAROES project, led by the Learning Societies Lab, at the University of Southampton and in association with the University of Portsmouth, presented and tested a beta version of the FAROES LanguageShare. The project team took the best-practice principles of Web 2.0 sites - that they are social, interlinked, evolving, flexible, visually exciting and easy to use, and created the prototype FAROES LanguageShare, a lightweight repository for language teachers to store, manage and share their resources. This day-long workshop demonstrated FAROES LanguageShare to the world.

Eurocall 2008

Adding the Missing Ingredient: A pedagogic basis for an online authoring tool

Julie Watson presented at Székesfehérvár in Hungary on the pedagogic basis of our online authoring tool (the LOC Tool).

Ed-Media 2008

The LOC Tool: Creating a Learning Object Authoring Tool for Teachers

Julie Watson, Alison Dickens and Graham Gilchrist presented at the Ed-Media conference in Vienna on the development of the Learning Object Creation (LOC) tool.

Third International Blended Learning Conference

Enhancing the experience of the international student: a pre-arrival online preparatory course, blending technologies and introducing life and study in the UK

Julie Watson gave a presentation with the above title on Arrive UK, our pre-arrival online course for international students. This included reference to new technologies that have been introduced on the online course, through the M3 Project.

Digital island-hopping: FAROES - Towards a Shared Repository of Language Resources for Teachers

Date: Wednesday, 5th March 2008
Venue: University of Portsmouth (Park Building)
Time: 10.00 – 16.00

eLanguages and the Learning Societies Lab (University of Southampton) in conjunction with the University of Portsmouth ran a one day workshop at Portsmouth on March 8th. The day included an introduction to FAROES, an exciting new project which will allow teachers to share language resources online using PuffinShare, a new form of repository that has evolved from our previous repository-based projects. There was an opportunity to see PuffinShare with its Web 2.0 features and updated search facilities. As part of the day’s activities, participants helped us to refine and simplify the sharing of online resources by teachers, so that the process is quick, easy and efficient.

Crossing Cultures and MUVEing Worlds: Exploring Aspects of Cultural Identity in Second Life

Julie Watson and Ann Jeffery gave a presentation at the third E-learning symposium organised by the Subject Centre for Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies. This presented the findings of the Cardenio project, a Second Life project funded by the Subject Centre.

JISC funding under the Users and Innovation Capital Programme

A bid for JISC funding under the Users and Innovation Capital Programme has been successful. The M3 Project (Muve, Moodle and Microblogging) project will run for 13 months and will explore the use of Second Life and a microblogging tool (Twitter) as add-ons to our established online course Arrive UK in Moodle. Arrive UK is a pre-arrival online preparation course for international students in living and studying in the UK. This e-tutored course is delivered to international students in their home countries each year before they come and join the summer pre-sessional course in the Centre for Language Studies.

Preparation for Success: an interactive pre-arrival learning resource for international students planning to come to the UK to study

A bid from eLanguages, led by Julie Watson, to the UK Council for International Student Affairs (UKCISA) has been successful. Against competition from 25 other applicants, the University of Southampton bid secured an award of £50,000 from the Prime Minister's Initiative for International Education (PMI) which will fund the development of 'Preparation for Success', an interactive pre-arrival learning resource for international students planning to come to the UK to study.