The birth of our online resource: Studying on your commute
This #Take5 blogpost comes from Janette Myers, a learning developer at St George’s, University of London
Sometimes it can feel that the concept of higher education is based on students who live on Campus or who live in or near their place of study. This vision excludes many students and their experiences. Many of our students travel long distances to our Campus, and many more have long journeys to clinical placements in hospitals and community settings all over the South of England.
The students I see often talk about how commuting limits the time available for study. So I thought, why not change this perception and highlight the positives of commuting for the busy student? So I set out to normalise the process of being a commuting student by including a section on studying on the commute in Study+, our online learning development resource.
I wanted to make it simple and short, and keep visual distractions to a minimum. The resource itself is divided up into Planning, Reviewing, Thinking, Reading and Listening on your commute.
Each section consists of a transport themed picture and a short piece of text based on the themes we use across all learning development activity: active and engaged learning based on the mantra, link it, use it, transform it.
Studying on Your Commute was reviewed by our Learning Advocates, student volunteers who work with me to make, review and publicise learning resources. There was particularly positive feedback on developing flash cards as revision aids, and a group of students are organising to explore the potential of flash cards as you are reading this. A section for the sharing of peer advice has also been suggested.
Bio: I’m Janette Myers, a learning developer at St George’s, University of London and I commute 1 hour and 10 mins each way on the London Underground. We are a small, specialist healthcare university based in Tooting at St George’s Hospital – yes that’s the one in 24 Hours in A&E.
The St George’s learning development team, Rosie MacLachlan and Janette Myers, starting its commute home.