I met Brian at the reception who took me to their office. Brian was about to make a cup of tea when Nick came back from a meeting. We changed our plans and I went with Nick to have lunch at the refectory.

On the way to lunch …

• Nick introduced me to his head of dept. It was nice meeting all his colleagues.
• He also took me to meet Matthias who develops research-related podcasts for postgraduate students. He has released some of his podcasts on i-Tunes as well. The approach seems very interesting. I must listen to some in order to understand more.
• Nick also took me to the anatomy museum. It was a fascinating place where you can see hundreds of anatomy specimens – excellent dissection work done by previous students and staff some of which goes back a long way. Raymond and others use podcasts to make these ‘pots’ come alive. Lena’s approach to analyzing the use of podcasts in museums will be useful to analyse RVC work.

The refectory was quite busy so Nick suggested we went out to a café nearby. Nick bought lunch – thanks Nick. We discussed how we can improve communication amongst the IMPALA partners and to better use the project blog in addition to using email. Also to engage everyone to develop further research projects. I need to point this out in my next email where I’m going to discuss writing papers and conference presentations.

After coming back we planned for afternoon. I wanted to talk to all who develop / have anything to do with podcasts. These involve:

• potcasts: Raymond (head); Brian Cox (video); and others …
• lecture recorders (Silvia Janska – 1^st year student)
• research-reelated podcasts (Matthias Kleinz interviews with lot of the faculty)

What is different about RVC podcasts: different approaches; different approaches; different skills; perspectives;

Publishing: Journal of Veterinary Medical Education

Meeting with Brian: Brian showed how he develops ‘potcasts’ from the pots in the museum. He has been working with Raymond and done quite a few potcasts on the anatomy of the head. Brian and Nick then showed different kinds of podcasts available on their VLE.

Meeting with Raymond on ‘potcasts’. We had a long chat (a ‘research interview’) lasted about an hour and half. The rationale for using podcasts, or rather ‘potcasts’ were:

• Students have a lot to learn in 1^st year within a very short period of time. E.g., the anatomy of head needed to be covered in 4 weeks!
• To develop 3 dimensional thinking/imagination, how to get students to think three dimensionally from a two dimensional diagram. [somewhat similar to the issue of ‘spatial thinking’ in geography]
• Lectures, then practical sessions where 3d thinking/imagination is brought about.
• To develop students independent learning skills, a key skill as veterinary professionals.
• Students can visit these pots later on, even after they completed their first year or even university studies
• Free up staff time, having to spend personal time with individual students. They can study independently.
• A resource pool / of leaning objects / that help explain difficult concepts [conceptual understating]
• Impracticality of projecting images of specimens, 3 people required.

Meeting with Sylvia on lecture recordings by students. Recording lectures and making these available on the VLE was an interesting approach totally driven by students. Sylvia is the 1^st year student who took the initiative to do this. She explained how she began it and progress made so far. She records lectures with lecturers’ permission, does some minor editing and uploads on to the VLE. So far she has done 60 lectures. Yes good question. Any effect on attendance at lectures? No. Many students appreciate Sylvia’s work – they even ask her to make the lectures available on the same day after the lecture! Students find that understand the content covered in the lecture better after listening to them again. There is more to write about after analyzing the interview transcript with Sylvia.

I planed with Nick for some focus groups and personal interviews with students at RVC during this semester.

That was the end of a very productive day at RVC.

Thanks Nick, Brian, Raymond, Mattias and Sylvia.   

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