Enquiring Minds: strategies for promoting (better) research, autonomy and deployment of skills at level 3

In their paper Keith Puttick, Rhonda Hammond-Sharlot and Janet Spence (Staffordshire University) described their work on Enquiring Minds, a two year project evaluating project and other activity-based approaches to the design, use and assessment of final year law students’ research tasks.

Download the full paper (RTF file, 21 pages, 398 KB) at the bottom of the page.

The theme of our paper is student research. How do we help students become good researchers? Are we giving them sufficient opportunities to deploy research skills, pursue their interests in their final year/level 3 and assist them in becoming research competent, autonomous learners? And what are the best kinds of research task that can deliver what is needed in this important area of the skills agenda?

We argue the case for a more ambitious agenda for student research. In doing so, we generally support most of the arguments for treating undergraduates as part of the ‘community of researchers’ (Chang, 2005), and which favour the ‘research scholar’ model (Hodge, Pasquesi, et al, 2007).

For the purposes of Enquring Minds a ‘project’ is taken to mean a formally assessed activity that is initiated and managed through to completion by a student (or group of students), typically across the whole period or substantial period of a module or award year/level. While sharing some of the characteristics of the coursework assignment, dissertation or extended essay, greater emphasis is usually placed on rewarding independent enquiry, and on fieldwork, statistical enquiry, interviews etc.

We contend that the key requirement of a formally assessed research activity is that it should be effective in facilitating:

• continuing development of research and research related skills into level 3, building on developmental work at levels 1 and 2 – ie its value as a developmental tool
• deployment of those skills, and in ways that promote genuine autonomy and meet the full range of expectations of students who are about to graduate, including the need for graduates to be ‘information literate’
• effective assessment (formative and formal) of research skills, and across the range of outcomes and skill sets expected by current standards

On these criteria we believe that a project offers a valuable model (perhaps even the optimum model) for assessed level 3 student research. The case for the project is reinforced when the core design characteristics we have referred to are accompanied by rewarded elements such as presentations of research results, face to face or online dialogue around work in progress (and linked curriculum themes), or creative elements such as the production of DVDs, Facebook work or publication in journals are introduced.

We see that the incorporation of interdisciplinary aspects such as engagement in projects and fieldwork with students from other disciplines can be valuable, but we accept it is still a contentious area, particularly in the face of concerns from those who argue for a more vocationalist, ‘law’ focused approach to setting the parameters of undergraduate skills development and assessment (Edwards, 1992).

Project work can also confer important benefits on other stakeholders besides the student researcher, including students and staff – for example through the creation of a developing ‘knowledge pool’ to which they gain access. To date our evaluations have focused on the value of the knowledge pool for limited purposes such as in-course dialogic work, but other approaches highlight exciting and wider ranging applications, including Hasok Chang’s ‘mechanism of inheritance’. For law schools that support project options as an integral part of their research culture there are considerable gains to be had. They are a good way of showcasing students’ work, and contribute to, and strengthen, an institutional culture of research and scholarly activity, bringing the student and staff research functions closer.

Above all project work is effective as a means of promoting ‘autonomy’, putting research where we think it belongs – at the centre of the student learning experience.

Caroline Maughan (University of the West of England) reports:
The team put forward their case for a more ambitious agenda to encourage undergraduate students to become good researchers and outlined their work in progress on the development of research and related skills on law programmes. The Enquiring Minds project, a two year project in its first year, is evaluating current practice and developments in the design, use and assessment of research tasks undertaken by level 3 students.

The project team distinguish two types of research activity:

• type A – small scale tasks such as seminar preparation, analysis of cases and statutes, using research in presentations – in line with the acquisition/manipulation of subject content model of learning
• type B – larger scale tasks involving independent research, such as final year dissertations, individual or group projects, coursework assignments informed by fieldwork, statistical enquiry, interviews etc – characteristic of inquiry-based approaches encouraging the construction of knowledge new to the student

As well as level 3 law research activities the project is evaluating interdisciplinary research-based work and some from law programmes in Sweden, Spain, Poland and France.

The team mentioned other benefits to students besides the development of skills and information literacy – how confidence improves when work is ‘showcased’ and disseminated among the community of researchers, and the satisfaction associated with independent enquiry, collaboration and ownership of the research product and process.

The presentation stimulated plenty of discussion, for example about group research, learning and assessment. As a strong supporter of small group work myself, I was pleased to hear that the team did not find this problematic, presumably because the groups are well supervised and supported and the assessment processes perceived to be fair.

Some delegates asked why wait till level 3? Most seemed to agree that research focused activities are an essential part of undergraduate legal education – a number said their students are engaged in it as early as level 1.

About the presenters

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Keith Puttick teaches employment law, social welfare law and public law at Staffordshire Law School (SULS). He is a professional skills course assessor (advocacy and communications skills) for the Solicitors Regulation Authority and has been a member of the Bar Vocational Course assessors’ panel. Keith has a particular interest in the assessment aspects of student research.
 
Rhonda Hammond-Sharlot teaches employment law and contract law at SULS. She is actively involved in developing and assessing skills and in the client interviewing and negotiation competitions. Before working at SULS she lectured at De Montfort and organised law clinic work, developing interests in applied skills while doing so.
 
Janet Spence teaches land law, employment law and criminal law at SULS. She is the level 3 tutor on the LLB/undergraduate programme and has a particular interest in pastoral and support aspects of level 3 skills development. As she has a background in legal practice and teaches on the Legal Practice Course she has a keen interest in vocational aspects.

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Last Modified: 9 July 2010