A presentation from Connect More by Carmen Tomas, associate director of educational excellence, University of Nottingham. The University of Nottingham are adapting the university framework for programme design in the light of the COVID-19 emergency where they are forced to adapt to new social distancing measures for the upcoming academic year. They are planning a series of workshops to help make the transition to hybrid modes of delivery but paying attention to coordination across modules. The session presents their model to support redesign and integrating delivery and assessment in order to deliver programme learning outcomes.

1. Redesigning the
curriculum for COVID-19 times
Dr Carmen Tomas SFHEA, associate director of
educational excellence, University of Nottingham

2. First things first:
Well done everyone on getting through
the recent period and even wanting to
improve your delivery and assessment
for next year

3. Curriculum design before Covid-19

4. We specified the blocks (modules) that comprise our curricula, but
didn’t require ourselves to deliver a design for how they should fit together…
…leading to fragmented programmes, confused students, too much assessment, unintended outcomes,
strategic learning practices, low diversity of learning activities, excessive staff and student workload
etcetera…

5. This is how students studied before Covid-19
I think I am
great at
leading
others….
I will ask
someone who
did this before…
maybe I will get
feedback on my
ideas

6. Curriculum design after Covid-19

7. How Covid-19 has impacted students and learning
Mental health / stress
Distancing / Isolation
Motivation
Missed opportunities at the end of 19/20
Feeling unprepared for future and next year
Worried about: all the above + studying independently

8. Student learning since Covid-19
Mental
health
Distancing/
Isolation
….
I think I am
great at
leading
others….
I will ask
someone who
did this before…
maybe I will get
feedback on my
ideas

9. Some things to keep in mind when
designing for next year

10. Promoting student learning
• Design at programme level
• Authenticity
• Alignment (keep the end in mind)
• Reinforcement
• Student engagement (understanding expectations,
standards, practicing and reflecting)10

11. A framework
To design
For
learning
Integrated CURriculum and Assessment TEmplating

12. Express design workshop with
programme teams (by year teams)

13. Programme Title:
Year 1 plan
1 CHARACTERISTICS
2 WEEKS, TIMELINE and KEY ACTIVITIES/ASSESSMENTS
STUDENT
TRANSITIONS from 19/20
3 TELL THE YEAR BACKWARDS
4 MAP ASSESSMENTS AGAINST
CHARACTERISTICS
5. STUDENT LEARNING
OPPORTUNITIES
6. CONSISTENT IMPLEMENTATION of
delivery and assessment tools and
modes
7. CONSISTENT COMMUNICATION
8. OTHER: community building,
emotional well being, and
traditional exams
9. CONNECT plans with the other
yearsWEEK NUMBER
Characteristics
C
1C
2C
3C
4C
5C
6C
7C
8

14. Final remarks

15. Final remarks
• Pre-existing challenges to our modular designs are likely to be aggravated
in 20/21
- Load, authenticity, purpose, alignment and student engagement are
fundamental
• Keep consistency across modules (comms, delivery modes and tools)
• Opportunities to interact, ask questions and reach out
• Monitoring student well-being and stress
15

16. customerservices@jisc.ac.uk
jisc.ac.uk
Thank you
Dr Carmen Tomas
Associate Director of Educational
Excellence, University of Nottingham
carmen.tomas@nottingham.ac.uk
All the best wishes
for 2020-21…