module specification

This module prepares students for employability and includes ‘people’ skills (eg team working, delivering presentations, client relationships and attending meetings) and ‘environmental’ issues (eg health and safety, business ethics, IPR).
Semester: Autumn/Spring
Prerequisite: None
Assessment: Coursework 50%, Group exercise 50%
Note: This module is approved to run from Autumn 2009

None

This module aims to prepare students for employability and context building for subject. It is designed to enable students to conduct critical self-analysis and reflection and develop a range of employability skills. The module will develop appropriate skills needed by graduates to compete in the labour market. It will also link to PDP development through a reflective process. In addition this module will further develop skills in research, communication, presentation, taking initiative and working in teams. It will also develop reflective learning and action planning. This module delivers the Undergraduate Employability module requirement for London Met/Dept. of Computing.

(Indicative)

• LSEP (legal, social, ethical, professional) issues plus honesty and integrity
• Working in business e.g. managing and attending meetings, Health and Safety, managing client and customer relationships, marketing, ethics, IPR and other subject specific legal issues as appropriate)
• Presentations and public speaking
• Team work and leadership
• Job interviews, tests and CV writing
• Personal image and selling self
• Initiative, action planning, decision making
• Awareness of commercial trends
• PDP reflection

The module will be taught over 12 weeks. Teaching methods will include a range of the following: tutor led seminar discussions, student led discussions, small group discussions and exercises, individual exercises, lectures given by tutor. The teaching methods will support the main aim of encouraging independent lifelong learning. The module will be delivered by a team of staff aiming to encourage enthusiasm for HE learning and subject knowledge. Students will be given one hour lectures on generic skills. The students will then be taught in subject specific clusters for tutorials. Tutorials will be student centred using carefully graduated activities to build up student's confidence and self-esteem and will also provide the opportunity for students to demonstrate their skills and receive advice from their tutor.

Each tutorial session will be delivered in a way which reflect the context and nature of the cluster of courses. Extensive use will be made of games and case studies as vehicles to develop the specific skills shown in the syllabus, but the games and case studies themselves will be drawn from the particular context of the cluster. In this way, all students will develop a common set of appropriate skills but placed within a context related to their chose course.

On successful completion of this module students will.
 

• Demonstrate an ability to operate and communicate effectively in a variety of settings, both written and spoken. [A2]
• Provide evidence of personal reflection and evaluation on the importance of academic skills, their relationship to employability and the need to plan for improvement and future direction. [A1]
• Demonstrate the ability to work effectively and co-operatively as a team member whilst producing a group report and oral presentation. [A2]
• Understand the importance of good CV and cover letter, good interview technique together with an insight into the recruitment process of employers. [A1]
• Understand group and teamwork issues, including the need to agree team goals and review team and individual progress. [A2][A3]
• Demonstrate an understanding of the necessity of adopting a critical thinking approach to researching, and the capacity to identify, and compare and contrast, the most useful material from within the most appropriate sources, in order to construct valid and fully referenced arguments in their work. [A3]

Assessment examines personal development and employability skills. Within the personal development category:
- 10% is available for the student’s personal contribution to the class;
- 20% for researching a subject specific company and job scenario, preparing a CV and covering letter for a specific job in their chosen field taken from a newspaper, website or journal advertisement with an appropriate Action Plan that shows how they will progress to having the skills & knowledge required in the job advert; and
- 20% for a personal reflection demonstrating what they have learnt from the module and how they will apply that to a review of their personal development plan.
The group exercise, worth 50% of the overall module mark, will relate to a subject-specific scenario and test a range of employability skills including the ability to work in a team, contribute to team work (both written and oral) and give a presentation.

Feedback to the students during the course of the module identifies areas of strength and weakness and suggests action/further study to improve performance.
Subject specific tutorials allow the skills content to be delivered in the appropriate context to best facilitate assimilation. It is encouraged that delivery be made as engaging and appropriately challenging as possible with learning through games, activities and participation.
Guidance is provided appropriately during the module and students are encouraged to bring their personal development and group assignment queries to the tutorial to get feedback on their progress.

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Cottrell, S. (2003) The Study Skills Handbook. 2nd ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan Ltd.
Cottrell, S. (2006) The Exam Skills Handbook. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan Ltd.
Edenborough, R. (2002) Effective Interviewing: A Handbook of Skills and Techniques. Kogan Page Ltd.
McMillan, K. & Weyers, J. (2007) How To Succeed In Exams & Assessments. Prentice Hall.
Evans, M. (2004) Exams are Easy When you Know How. 2nd ed. Oxford: How to Books.
Levin, P. (2007) Skilful Time Management! McGraw-Hill.
Levin, P. (2007) Successful Teamwork! McGraw-Hill.
Emden, J. V. and Becker, L. (2004) Presentation Skills for Students. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan Ltd.
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