History Department Response to Student Feedback

HSTY1025 - Early Medieval Europe (2009)

Unit Coordinator: Dr Lyn Olson

Student feedback on this unit of study was very positive, especially in the criteria of overall satisfaction, development of valuable graduate attributes, responsiveness of staff to students, group discussions, learning materials including internet resources, and intellectual stimulus, where student responses were all above a mean of 4 on a scale of 1-5. To the statement of general objectives of the unit should be added ones specific to both content and assessment of the unit. Judging by the responses including comments, the main assessment aim of developing independent analysis was realised by, and in, many students. A suggestion that the analysis of a subject from a medieval primary source should be weighted more heavily, due to its higher level of difficulty, than brief comments on the historical significance of passages from medieval sources will be given serious consideration. The latter will in any case, when the unit is taught next by this lecturer, be done on a weekly basis, improving preparation for tutorials and providing immediate and ongoing feedback to students, reinstating a practice that was highly praised in student evaluations in the past. WebCT resources received favourable comments, particularly the system known as Lectopia which records the lecture with audio and visual powerpoint synchronised. Many more favourable than unfavourable comments were made about the lecturer, who will try to ensure that where lectures do jump around, the reason for these jumps is made clear. ‘Lecturer was very “into” her subject & the pleasure she obviously took in teaching it was passed on to us’ well sums up her philosophy of teaching. No criticisms were received by the three doctoral or post-doctoral tutors in this unit, only praise.