curriculum design

working in a group

SPaM Framework in Action

I love hearing how people are making use of the SPaM framework and the various contexts within which it is being used. I’m often asked to comment on, or support the use of SPaM and regularly I’m asked the questions:

“How do we make best use of SPaM?” or “How does SPaM fit in with our existing curriculum design model?”

I nearly always answer “There’s no right or wrong way to use it”, but there are of course some suggestions for how to use it, so here we go:

Firstly, it works best as a framework for informing and supporting curriculum design, especially where you know students will be accessing learning through two or more modes. Secondly, it can (and usually should) be used alongside curriculum design models as part of a structured process. Thirdly, it works best at a course/programme level but can also be used at a unit/module level. Ultimately it’s value is in making sure that discussions about “modality” are equally considered alongside pedagogy and subject, what I have come to call “conscious modality“.

So, now that you’ve decided to make use of it, what should you be looking for in each domain? Well, these domains are designed to get colleagues asking questions and making decisions based on the answers they arrive at.

There are three fundamental questions to be asked, one for each domain plus some example additional questions which really help get to the details:

  1. Subject: What do you want the students to learn?
    • What are the aims and objectives of the programme/module
    • What key themes/topics will be covered
    • What are the learning outcomes
    • What skills/knowledge are the students expected to evidence
  2. Pedagogy: What teaching methods/approaches will you use to enable this?
    • What learning and teaching approaches will be used (flipped classroom/problem based learning/active learning etc.)
    • What assessment types will students be expected to undertake
    • What curriculum design approaches will be used (e.g. ABC)
    • What instructional design approaches will be used (e.g. ADDIE)
  3. What teaching modes will be most effective for this (or have already been determined)?
    • What modes will student learning be faciliatated
      • In Person (On Campus)
      • In Person (Off Campus)
      • Online Synchronous
      • Online Asynchronous
      • Hybrid/Hyflex/Dual Mode

Questions relating to Subject and Pedagogy are commonplace in most curriculum design approaches, but the questions about Modality are specific to this framework and integral to ensuring that the Subject, Pedagogy and Modality are aligned. For example, an assessment designed for on campus students may not be as effective for online students and vice versa, this is where the modality influences the pedagogic approaches being taken. Additionally, where a subject might want students to understand and experience some practical skills (e.g. lab skills) the approach taken for on campus students (in person lab sessions) will be very different to online students (such as 3D lab simulations). In this way each domain influences and informs the decisions that will ultimately be made.

The extent to which SPaM is visible to stakeholders is entirely up to you. At a low level you might just use it to inform your own curriculum design, drawing upon it to structure a quality enhancement process but not make it visible to other stakeholders. Or you might decided to make SPaM very visible and centre it as a core component of your design process (the latter works well where you are designing blended and hybrid programmes).

Over the coming months I will start to collate some case study examples of where SPaM is being used (that I know of) and so if you have made use of SPaM then please get in touch as I’d love to hear how, so I can add it to the case study collection.

Dinner Party Design

Have you ever held a dinner party where everyone brings a different component to the dinner? A bit like a bring and share type of event but one which is a bit more structured and planned? Aren’t they just the best kind of dinner party? Here’s ten benefits I think this kind of dinner party has going for it:

  1. One person hosts/coordinates but does not have to take on the entire workload of providing everything.
  2. All attendees to the party get to contribute something.
  3. People can make things they are good at making or even bring pre-made things that fit well into the menu.
  4. The process of planning and bring together the menu helps everyone to see what the overall meal plan is.
  5. The variety of dishes means that everyone will have something they can eat, perhaps something new they can try and things they can choose not to eat.
  6. The conversations around the table are enriched by discussions about the food people have brought with them.
  7. With coordinated planning there will be a balance of starters, mains, desserts etc so that the balance of the meal feel right.
  8. People’s dietary requirements can be easily taken into account.
  9. The accompanying drinks and refreshments can also be a shared activity and linked to the foods being eaten.
  10. There’s a good excuse for people to go back to the hosts house at a later date to collect their cleaned dishes and have a catch-up.

I’m hoping by now that some of you have started to see some potential links here with the dinner party and curriculum design – if you haven’t then don’t worry as I’m going to set out the analogy for you below.

A key component of both the dinner party and curriculum design is that there is a person(s) who take on the responsibility of leading/co-ordinating the activity. In the case of the dinner party this will almost certainly be the host, in a curriculum sense this will be the course leader / programme director. The important consideration is that this person is the glue who sticks it all together and makes sure that the experience is coherent. After all, who wants to turn up to a dinner party where there is poppadoms and pickles for a starter and then wild mushroom risotto for the main?

Whilst the host may coordinate the event, it is the shared process of each bringing a dish to the table that enhances the experience, the same is true in course design. Each person can bring something to the table, whether that be a module they have designed, a pedagogic approach they know will work, or an understanding of the way in which different modes of learning influences the ways in which we teach, it is the collective endeavours of each person that will make the course experience the best it can be. Therefore it’s important that the right people have a seat at the table. The SPaM framework can help you identify who needs to be invited and who will be bringing which ingredients/dishes to the party. Below I have started to map some examples of the types of roles who it might be useful to bring to your curriculum design table.

SubjectPedagogyModality
Academic Staff (subject expert)
Employer(s)
Subject Librarian
External Examiner
Student		Academic Staff (learning & teaching)
Educational Developer (pedagogy)
Instructional Designer
Student
Academic Developer		Learning Technologist
Educational Developer (digital)
Instructional Designer
Content Developer

Clearly, this list isn’t exhaustive and the roles are fluid across domains and your specific context will influence the roles you have available to include in the process, but the point here is that for hybrid education it is vital to ensure that you have the right expertise and perspectives at the table and that we make the most of individuals’ specialisms. The SPaM framework can help you consider who brings what to the discussion and whilst there may be some individuals who can bring all three to the table, having a mix of voices will help ensure that a single insular view is not the one to dominate the design and in most cases these individuals will have a specialism weighted in one area more than the other.

What is critical in both the curriculum design and the dinner party is that each component will influence and inform the other. Making changes to the modality (dessert) may impact on the experience of the pedagogy (main) and the subject (starter) and so the programme director (host) must maintain oversight of the curriculum design process.

So, if we revisit our list of ten dinner party benefits they also align quite well in a curriculum design sense:

  1. One person hosts/coordinates but does not have to take on the entire workload of providing everything.
  2. All attendees to the party curriculum design process get to contribute something.
  3. People can make things they are good at making make use of their expertise and even bring pre-made pre-tested things that fit well into the menu course/programme.
  4. The process of planning and bring together the menu course/programme helps everyone to see what the overall meal plan course structure will be.
  5. The variety of dishes voices means that everyone will have something they can eat contribute, perhaps something new they can try and things they can choose not to eat can agree might not work.
  6. The conversations around the table are enriched by discussions about the food modules/assessments/modality/experiences people have brought with them.
  7. With coordinated planning there will be a balance of starters, mains, desserts approaches and activities etc so that the balance of the meal learning feels right.
  8. People’s dietary teaching requirements can be easily holistically taken into account.
  9. The accompanying drinks and refreshments discussions on teaching activities and assessments can also be a shared activity and linked to the foods being eaten a more holistic approach to teaching.
  10. There’s a good excuse for people to go back to the hosts house course director at a later date to collect their cleaned dishes and have follow-up discussions and a catch-up.

Now, admittedly some of these are more tenuous than others, but you get the idea. The SPaM framework doesn’t seek to define the dishes or the ingredients, but acts as a framework to structure the menu and to make sure all the dishes offer a coherent and high quality experience.

Now, the ultimate approach would be to have the curriculum design workshop run as a dinner party – anyone up for that?