The centre seeks to inspire, nurture and sustain innovations in teaching
and learning.
Our Projects
A total of seven projects were funded/part funded through the Incubation Centres Seed Fund in 2009. The projects funded were The Data and Story Archive, The Inside Story, Design Without Borders, "Tweak" Festival, Learning Innnovations, The Froebel Connection Early Childhood Training Space and A corpus-based investigation of the language of One-to-One academic support consultations
Innovation Project ‘The Data and Story Archive’
Project Champion Ailish Hannigan
Contact ailish.hannigan@ul.ie
Institution University of Limerick
Faculty Science and Engineering
Mathematics and Statistics
Summary of T&L Innovation
The objective of this project is to develop an Irish Data and Story Archive – a unique, currently unavailable resource for teaching statistics using data relevant to people living in Ireland. The data will be collected from academic researchers from all disciplines, industry, the Central Statistics Office and other government organizations which will be freely available (via the Internet) for educational purposes to all. The use of real data is vital to motivate and interest students from different disciplines in engaging with statistics. The background to why and how the data were collected, the method of analysis and the results of the analysis of the data i.e. the story of the data, help to teach students about basic statistical concepts in a way they can relate to. The archive will also contain examples of how to collect new data e.g. surveys, questionnaires and experiments referenced by different areas of application. These examples will encourage active learning, involving students in the design of studies and the collection of their own data i.e. creating their own stories.
Innovation Project ‘The Inside Story’
Project Champions Karen McCreesh and Dr. Rabia Malik
Contact karen.mccreesh@ul.ie or rabia.malik@ul.ie
Institution University of Limerick
Faculty Education and Health Sciences
Physiotherapy
Summary of T&L Innovation
Physiotherapy students require a profound understanding of human anatomy, gained through wide experience of different teaching and learning methods. Ultrasound imaging provides a dynamic means of visualising structure and movement in a living person, which makes it an attractive tool to enhance students knowledge of anatomical relationships and understanding of tissue movement. This project aims to implement, for the first time in a physiotherapy programme, the use of ultrasound imaging into the undergraduate anatomy curriculum, and to assess the impact this will have on student’s knowledge of cross-sectional anatomy, and engagement in anatomy sessions. We hope that the knowledge gained from this project will be transferable to the use of ultrasound imaging by students studying anatomy on other programmes.
Innovation Project ‘Design without Borders’
Project Champion Muireann McMahon
Contact muireann.mcmahon@ul.ie
Institution University of Limerick
Faculty Science and Engineering
Manufacturing and Operations Engineering
"Design is in everything we make, but it’s also between those things. It's a mix of craft, science, storytelling, propaganda, and philosophy." (Erik Adigard, 2005)
Summary of T&L Innovation
Design practices have contributed significantly to the world’s problems (over-consumption, obsolescent lifestyles, increased waste, resource depletion and limited life-spans of products) ‘There are professions more harmful than industrial design but only a very few of them’ (Papanek, 2000). I have come to the critical realisation that ‘design thinking’ has the potential to positively sway societal development in a more responsible direction. Instead of propagating the situation designers need to be the proponents of change by exploring and understanding the impacts of consumption. Undergraduate design education offers great opportunity to expose students to examples of responsible practice employed around the world, design is fundamentally about story telling and the more stories you can listen to the richer the experience becomes.
This project aims to expand and develop the Social Sustainability element of design education, through an international platform, which involves Cultural design; Knowledge Share; Collaboration; Interactive Participation and Diversity of Practice.Students of Design from 4/5 different international regions [Chile (Universidad de Valparaiso), Colombia (Universidad de Los Andes, Bogotá) and New Zealand (Unitec, Auckland)] will participate in a joint project to investigate how cultural diversity and the sharing of knowledge can enhance the learning experience, aswell as introduce the concepts of Social Sustainability into third level design education.
Innovation Project ‘TWEAK Festival’
Project Champion Nora O’Murchu
Contact nora.omurchu@ul.ie
Institution University of Limerick
Faculty Science and Engineering
Computer Science and Information Systems
Summary of T&L Innovation
Tweak is an interactive art and live electronic music festival taking place in Limerick City between the 21st and 26th of September 2009. Its aim is to promote understanding of the use of technology within our culture and to explore contemporary issues (social, economic, psychological, aesthetic and functional).
The festival will consist of a 5-day exhibition, (interactive artworks, robots and installations) comprising of artworks from international and local artists, 3 days of workshops and many evenings of live electronic performance.
Tweak underlines the importance of education and awareness and will hold 3 full-day workshops with leading practitioners in the field of programming, electronics and interactive design. Tweak examines the growing impact of digital technologies in the creation of art and aesthetic experience. Providing a space for Digital Artists to redefine the nature of technology within our lives, the festival intends to create public awareness of the complex nature of technology and explore the relationship technology has to our lives.
Innovation Project ‘Learning Innovation’
Awardees Roisin Lewis, Alan Keane, Peter Morgan and
Kieran Whitelaw
Contact roisin.lewis@lit.ie or alan.keane@lit.ie
Institution Limerick Institute of Technology
Faculty Limerick School of Art and Design
Summary of T&L Innovation
Our aim is to highlight the process of creativity, to help explain the thought process of the individual behind the work of art or design. While the public are usually presented with the end results of artists and designers, they are quite unaware of the various methodologies by which they develop ideas. This part of their practice is normally hidden from view.
The daily studio practice of artists and designers varies from individual to individual. It can be a period of quiet reflection as much as a rigorous, frustrating engagement with material form or systematic research of a particular (e.g. philosophical, anthropological, scientific, sociological) issue.
We have formed a committee to highlight and explore the complex process underpinning creative practice. This project will take the form of an exhibition, a series of lectures and workshops, a website and blog, and a related publication.
Project Innovation ‘The Froebel Connection Early Childhood Training Space’
Project Champions Helen O’Connor-Finn and Gerard O’Carroll
Institution Institute of Technology Tralee
Early Childhood Development
Summary of T&L Innovation
The purpose of the funding is to facilitate a project to increase the quality of teaching and learning by providing access to both lecturers and students to 'The Froebel Connection Early Childhood Training Laboratory' situated in Oakview Village, Tralee, a unique, state-of-the-art training facility equipped with developmentally-appropriate materials and furniture suitable for early childhood practical training workshops. The project will specifically address the Institute’s Strategic Plan 2008-2013, ‘Creating Our Future’ and will encompass all of the goals and priority areas, in a long-term plan for the B.A. Hons. Early Childhood Care and Education degree program.
Innovation Project ‘A corpus-based investigation of the language of
One-to-One academic support consultations’
Project Champions Brian Clancy and James Binchy
Contact brian.clancy@mic.ul.ie and james.binchy@mic.ul.ie
Institution Mary Immaculate College
Learning Support Unit
Summary of T&L Innovation
This project aims to exploit the potential of corpus linguistics in investigating the linguistic practices of tutors within one-to-one academic support consultations, by compiling and analysing a corpus of these teaching interactions. It is proposed to use the corpus findings to inform ‘best practice’ in one-to-one consultations. This model of ‘best practice’ will be formulated by examining consultations with both mature and non-mature students. This will ensure that every student is equipped with the writing strategies to overcome any difficulty in the future thereby gradually becoming an independent and confident academic writer. The teaching strategies used by the tutors in the consultations will be analysed in order to inform and enhance the service offered to the students by the Learner Support Unit. This will be extended by the dissemination of the findings of the study to the wider academic community, with the aim of improving the standard of academic writing feedback, both spoken and written, offered to students by tutors and lecturers.
