Research Students' Blog
Access
The CPS Research Students' Blog can be accessed here:
http://moodle.essex.ac.uk/
You will be asked to give your normal university log-in and password (the
same as for your e-mail) and then you will be directed to a page which has the
link for ‘PA922 – CPS Online Research Forum’.
Purpose
The Online Research Forum has been set up for the use of our Research
Students as a way of communicating with each other, posing questions to the
staff, or to receive occasional messages and information. It can be developed,
expanded, modified, in whatever way you collectively wish. As well as having
discussions you can upload pictures or texts. It should be particularly useful
for Distance Learners as a way of making your voice heard in the CPS research
community, but also to increase ways of communicating between home and full-time
students.
The Forums
Forums have an icon which shows two faces leaning into each other in a rather
intimate way.
The News Forum should mainly be used for news that could go to everyone. I
will post things on it – but an even more useful use would be for you to post
material on it. Are there any events coming up (seminars, exhibitions, TV
programmes) which sound interesting and which other students might want to know
about? Are you about to have your viva?! Do you want to report on anything you
have been to?
The forum titled ‘Unconscious Bar’ is for any kind of use – also news,
gossip, queries, book sales, whatever you want. It will not be sent
automatically to everyone, but people can view stuff there like a notice-board.
I am looking into making it student only (ie, staff will not be able to view it)
but at the moment it is open to all.
Other forums on the site include a forum for discussing this year’s (and next
year’s) conference; and one for the Research Forum – where papers can be posted.
In fact – if anyone wants to get feedback on a paper not given to the research
forum, you could post it here as well. If anyone has any ideas for interest
groups among the students you can post a message to the Director of Graduate
Studies or the Student Rep, or better still, post the Blog.
Subscription to Forums
Everyone is subscribed to the News Forum. In other cases, I have subscribed
people initially just to get the ball rolling, but you can unsubscribe if you
wish. If you are subscribed to a particular forum, it means you will receive
messages by e-mail automatically when they are posted. If you are unsubscribed
it means you have to go to the Moodle site to view what has been posted.
When you click on the link to an individual forum, it will open up the page
on which messages for that forum have been posted. In the top right corner is a
link which allows you to subscribe or unsubscribe to the forum.
Likewise, if you post a message to the forum (by clicking on the link ‘Add a
new discussion topic’), a page will be opened on which you can write your
message. At the bottom of this page is a box which, again, allows you to receive
or not receive messages to that e-mail forum.
Where a discussion is going on in any of the forums, you can either reply to
a previous message, or post a new topic for discussion.
Participants
On the main page for the Blog, in the top-left corner is a heading ‘People’
under which there is a link for ‘Participants’. Clicking on this will reveal a
page listing all the participants on the Blog (i.e. all the current research
students). By clicking on their name you will get their e-mail message and can
post to them directly (i.e. back channel). By clicking on your own name you will
be able to ‘edit your profile’ – which will allow you to add information about
yourself (what you are working on, for instance), list some of your interests
(this is useful for finding people with shared interests), etc.