‘Shut Up and Write’- online
This example describes a collaboration between the Library’s Research Support and Learning Services Teams to transfer ‘Shut Up and Write’ face-to-face workshops to online provision and reflect on the resulting increased participant interaction and improved accessibility.
The online education approach adopted
At the start of lockdown, we began running our popular ‘Shut up and Write’ sessions as webinars using Blackboard Collaborate. These events, previously run weekly and face-to-face, offer a 3-hour facilitated framework and supportive environment for postgraduates, post-docs and research staff to focus on their own work. The sessions are split into a series of 25-minutes blocks for writing and short breaks for social interaction between participants. The facilitator encourages participants to set writing goals, share those with others and chat with each other during the breaks. Due to increased demand and positive feedback, during lockdown, the webinars were delivered twice a week. We are continuing to run these as webinars twice a week throughout the coming year.
The positive impact on students’ educational experience
Participants reported that ‘Shut Up and Write’ sessions provided them with a much-needed structure to work on their research, allowed them to get protected time scheduled into their diaries, offered a sense of social connection and helped to maintain a research community during the lockdown period. Feedback included:
The sessions are incredibly helpful to be productive AND they offer a real sense of social connection with others in the university while we are all dispersed due to Covid.
These sessions are really helpful for me to get back on track when I am struggling with thesis writing, especially during the lockdown.
These sessions are extremely valuable, especially during lockdown. I find that social writing helps me to maintain discipline.
There were also comments from participants with disabilities who were unable to come onto campus that it had given them access to a virtual community of researchers.
The impact on my teaching practice
I was surprised at how well these webinars were received during lockdown. Lockdown has been a particularly challenging time for many of us and to be able to provide something that created a sense of social connection and community has been extremely satisfying. Prior to lockdown we hadn’t considered running these sessions online but we have found that they actually work more effectively; there is more interaction between participants (possibly because people are more willing to engage with strangers in an online environment rather than face-to-face), increased levels of peer support, e.g. sharing writing tips and offering moral support, and they have also improved accessibility, particularly for those students and researchers who, prior to lockdown, found it difficult to physically get into campus. For everyone involved in running these online sessions, it has helped to increase skills and confidence in delivering online learning and as a result, we will continue to deliver the ‘Shut Up and Write’ webinars, even after we return to campus.
For more information about our ‘Shut up and Write’ sessions please visit our workshops page. If you would like to know more about running ‘Shut up and Write’ sessions please contact Sally Dalton on s.dalton@leeds.ac.uk.
Further resources:
Skills@Library: Study and research support
By Sally Dalton, Library Research Support Team
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