The Digital Skills Development team in ISD run a series of three Excel Essential Skills workshops designed to ensure that they do.  These cover creating calculated worksheets, data management and using in-built Excel functions.  They are facilitated by fellow students in small groups of 10 – 12 in computer workrooms on campus.

The workshops take a new approach to learning by presenting students with a problem to be solved and encouraging them to use prior experience, web searches, in-application help and fellow participants to find a solution to the task.

By the end of the session students have improved problem-solving skills, an increased knowledge of the topic, a ‘suggested solution’ to the problem they worked on and some resources and guidance for further learning.

Students take the workshop at their own pace so they can leave when they have completed all the tasks and either finish the tasks in their own time or come back to another session if they don’t have time to complete.

Why not share details of our upcoming workshops with your students and encourage them to attend? Places on these workshops can be booked here:

• DSD: Excel Essential Skills – WORKSHOP 1
  Upcoming sessions: 15 February  12 pm, 10 May 11 am
• DSD: Excel Essential Skills – WORKSHOP 2
  Upcoming sessions: 21 February 12 pm, 1 March 12 pm, 24 May 11 am
• DSD: Excel Essential Skills – WORKSHOP 3
  Upcoming sessions: 7 March 12 pm, 7 June 11 am

To see our full schedule of courses for this term, see our most recent newsletter.

Alternatively, bring the Excel Essential Skills workshops to you!

We can arrange workshops specifically for your cohort and our materials are also available for you to offer these workshops yourself, facilitated by you or your teaching assistants.   Please contact us isd-digiskills@ucl.ac.uk if you are interested in either of these options.

Do you want to try something new in your teaching or assessment?  Are you concerned that your materials aren’t as accessible and inclusive as you would like them to be?  Why not come along to one of our short online* training sessions to learn a new skill, improve your teaching materials or explore new assessment methods?

Add more interaction to your course by using polling software like Mentimeter for Continuous Module Dialogue or to engage students either during class or asynchronously between sessions.  You could also Use online whiteboards to encourage student interaction or ask students to collaborate on projects using Microsoft Teams: get a Beyond Basics Overview or learn about Document Management and Collaboration.

Digital Accessibility is a vital part of making your course inclusive and we have courses on Enhancing the Accessibility of your Moodle Courses, Creating accessible PowerPoint Presentations  and  Creating accessible Word documents.  You might also want to ensure you are following Best practice for video captions and transcripts when sharing multimedia.

Liven up your course with more multimedia content by learning how to do Basic video editing using iMovie on a Mac or Record a narration over your PowerPoint on a PC to convert your  presentation to video.  You could also come on our Podcasting made easy workshop or our series of workshops for making a film using your iPhone (Planning, Filming advice and Make a short film) and pass these skills on to your students so they can create multimedia content as part of their course.

If graphical content is a challenge, our beginners courses in Basic image editing using free tools can get you started with existing content while An introduction to free graphic design tools and Creating Infographics using free web-based tools are a great way to start creating more original content without having to buy expensive software.

Finally, if you’ve never done Digital book-making, it can be great for digital storytelling and Sway, Microsoft’s modern presentation tool is another interesting option for presenting your material in new ways.  These can also open up new possibilities for your students and the ways in which they present their coursework.

We’ve cherry picked a few courses below that might be of particular interest, but for our full schedule of upcoming courses visit Digital Skills Development News on the Digital Education blog.  If you subscribe to the blog you’ll get regular updates from us and our other Digital Education teams. Click on the link(s) below to book a place or add yourself to the interest list to be informed about upcoming dates.  More details about how to book, how to join sessions etc. can be found on our Practical Course Information page.  If you aren’t sure what training you need and would like individual support and advice we also have a regular drop in during term time.

*All sessions are online via Microsoft Teams unless otherwise indicated.

Add more interaction and collaboration

Make your content more accessible

Use more audio-visual content

Create and edit graphical content

Present material in new ways

Please note that the above dates and times were correct at time of publication but are subject to change.  Follow the links provided or check our latest schedule for the definitive current schedule.

What’s on offer ISD Digital Skills Development Team has released new dates for Term 2. Most of our sessions will be offered remotely using Microsoft Teams with some also face-to-face. See our latest schedule below. We are offering a wide range of courses covering Stata, Unix, Microsoft apps (including Teams, OneNote, and Sway), and much more. New highlights include the following: DSD: Enhancing the Accessibility of your Moodle Courses DSD: User access and multiple instruments in REDCap DSD: Managing participants in REDCap DSD: Qualtrics tips and tricks DSD: Scripting Stata’s new Tables and Collections.

How to book

Please ensure you are using Desktop@UCL or the UCL VPN when booking.

Prizes to be won!

We have new monthly term-time prizes to be won by staff and students who attend and evaluate our courses.  All you have to do to be in the running to win £20 ‘Love to Shop’ Gift Voucher is complete one of our training sessions, and submit our course evaluation form. The evaluation form should take no more than 1 minute to complete. Good luck!

Find out more

For more information on how to book and join a session on the day, please visit our Practical Course Information page.

Drop-ins

We are also hosting our usual weekly drop-in sessions remotely and face-to-face for those who would like individual support on a specific issue. The dates and times of the sessions, along with the joining link, are available in our ISD Digital Skills Development Moodle course.

More digital skills development opportunities…

Learn online with a vast range of high-quality video-based courses from LinkedIn Learning.  These cover technical skills but also business, personal and creative skills as well.  Visit the UCL LinkedIn Learning page to find out more.

DigiLearn Online is a library of online videos which covers UCL IT essentials. Topics include remote connectivity, data storage essentials, Microsoft Office 365 applications, and much more. Visit the DigiLearn Online webpage to access the video guides.

Latest schedule

What’s on offer ISD Digital Skills Development Team has released new dates for Term 1. Most of our sessions will be offered remotely using Microsoft Teams.  See our latest schedule below. We are offering a wide range of courses covering Stata, Unix, Microsoft apps (including Teams, OneNote, and Sway), and much more. Highlights include the following brand new additions: DSD: PowerPoint for researchers (Windows) DSD: Software for success: Survey tools  DSD: Design an impactful research poster using UCL templates   DSD: An introduction to free graphic design tools  DSD: In a nutshell: Git version control DSD: How to look after your health at the computer

How to book

Please ensure you are using Desktop@UCL or the UCL VPN when booking.

Prizes to be won!

We have new monthly term-time prizes to be won by staff and students who attend and evaluate our courses.  All you have to do to be in the running to win £20 ‘Love to Shop’ Gift Voucher is complete one of our training sessions, and submit our course evaluation form. The evaluation form should take no more than 1 minute to complete. Good luck!

Find out more

For more information on how to book and join a session on the day, please visit our Practical Course Information page.

Drop-ins

We are also hosting our usual weekly drop-in sessions remotely and face-to-face for those who would like individual support on a specific issue. The dates and times of the sessions, along with the joining link, are available in our ISD Digital Skills Development Moodle course.

More digital skills development opportunities…

Learn online with a vast range of high-quality video-based courses from LinkedIn Learning.  These cover technical skills but also business, personal and creative skills as well.  Visit the UCL LinkedIn Learning page to find out more.

DigiLearn Online is a library of online videos which covers UCL IT essentials. Topics include remote connectivity, data storage essentials, Microsoft Office 365 applications, and much more. Visit the DigiLearn Online webpage to access the video guides.

Latest schedule

Need help with your dissertation or thesis?

Digital Skills Development and Library Skills are running six weekly dissertation and thesis clinics throughout July and August. There is no need to book, just turn up. Staff can help with formatting your dissertation, using statistical software and bibliographic referencing using Word, LaTeX, SPSS, R, NatBib, Endnote, Mendeley and Zotero.

Schedule

The clinics will take place on the following dates/times*:

13th July from 14:00-16:00
19th July from 10:00-12:00
27th July from 14:00-16:00
2nd August from 10:00-12:00
10th August from 14:00-16:00
16th August from 10:00-12:00

*Please note that if we have to cancel any sessions due to unforeseen circumstances we will update the details on our Moodle course so please check on the day before travelling/joining.

What to expect

Staff are able to help with a wide range of software but we can’t promise that we will be able to answer every question and support is on a ‘best efforts’ basis. We can respond to specific queries or guide you as to which software to use but we can’t provide individual training on how to use the software.  If you need training you will be directed to self-paced materials or scheduled courses.

We cannot provide answers to and support for academic questions, only for digital skills.  If you don’t know for example what statistical method you should be using, we cannot help you.

Please note that our usual Drop in terms and conditions apply so please check these for full details.

How to access

Our clinics will be held remotely via Moodle using Microsoft Teams (MS Teams) and we are delighted to also offer support on campus in room 501 (5th floor)  Institute of Archaeology. So you have the choice to either join the session remotely or in person at the same date and time. For more information on upcoming dates/times and access to the MS Teams session, please enrol on our ISD Digital Skills Development Moodle course and visit the ‘Dissertation and Thesis Clinics – July/August 2022’ section. 

Additional resources

Library Services have developed a useful guide to resources and support for undertaking dissertations or research projects which covers all stages of the research process.

How to book

Please ensure you are using Desktop@UCL or the UCL VPN when booking.

What’s on offer

ISD Digital Skills Development have released new dates for Term 3. Most of our sessions will be offered remotely using Microsoft Teams, however, this term there are a couple that will take place on campus. These are marked in the schedule as ‘campus based’ in bold. See our latest schedule below.

We are offering a wide range of courses covering Stata, Matlab, Unix, Microsoft apps (including Teams, OneNote and Sway) and much more. Highlights include the following brand new additions:

• DSD: Best practice for video captions and transcripts
• DSD: Explore the potential of UCL Media Central
• DSD: Scripting Stata Tables
• DSD: Scripting Stata Graphs

As a reminder, please note that most of our events are interactive training sessions and are not recorded. Therefore, we ask that you please ensure you are able to attend before booking and cancel your place if you are no longer able to attend. If you have any accessibility requirements, please let us know by emailing the ISD Digital Skills Development mailbox in advance: isd-digiskills@ucl.ac.uk

Find out more

For more information on how to book and join a session on the day, please visit our Practical Course Information page.

Drop-ins

We are also hosting our usual weekly drop-in sessions both remotely and in person for those who would like individual support on a specific issue. The dates and times of the sessions, along with the joining link, are available in our ISD Digital Skills Development Moodle course.

More digital skills development opportunities…

Learn online with a vast range of high-quality video-based courses from LinkedIn Learning.  These cover technical skills but also business, personal and creative skills as well.  Visit the UCL LinkedIn Learning page to find out more.

DigiLearn Online is a library of online videos which covers UCL IT essentials. Topics include remote connectivity, data storage essentials, Microsoft Office 365 applications, and much more. Visit the DigiLearn Online webpage to access the video guides.

Latest schedule