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Topics associated with the biological sciences form a significant fraction of the curriculum in science at primary school level in the U.K. In this methodology paper we demonstrate how a wide range of research articles associated with the biological sciences can be disseminated to a primary school audience and how children can carry out investigations associated with cutting-edge research in the classroom. We discuss how the articles and accompanying Teacher Guides benefit children, primary teachers and other stakeholders including the researchers themselves. We define four types of research articles; ones that can be used in the primary school setting without much adaptation, others where an aspect can be used and some where an analogy can be used. For other research papers, it is not possible to mirror the research at all, but the area of the research is interesting to primary aged children and can be adapted so that they can see the impact of the science on real life. We provide exemplars of each type and some preliminary feedback on articles written.

For those receiving funding from the UK HEFCE-funded Open Educational Resource Programme (2009-2012), the sustainability of project outputs was one of a number of essential goals. Our approach for the hosting and distribution of health and life science open educational resources (OER) was based on the utilisation of the WordPress.org blogging platform and search engine optimisation (SEO) techniques to curate content and widen discovery. This paper outlines the approaches taken and tools used at the time, and reflects upon the effectiveness of web strategies several years post-funding. The paper concludes that using WordPress.org as a platform for sharing and curating OER, and the adoption of a pragmatic approach to SEO, offers cheap and simple ways for small-scale open education projects to be effective and sustainable.

This paper is a response to Cotton, Miller and Kneale's 2017 paper on the current state of higher education research within UK universities. It seeks to contribute to the debate surrounding the inclusion of pedagogic research (PedR) via SoTL in the UK's Research Excellence Framework (REF) in the context of researchers who reside within a disciplinary context. The inclusion of PedR in the REF continues to be contentious, despite recommendations in the Stern Report which could make its inclusion more feasible. This paper focuses on PedR which is conducted, published and disseminated by academics situated within Life Science departments, rather than Schools of Education. The twenty-one teaching-focused academics in this study discussed their commitment to PedR integral to their academic identity, the challenges they faced in carrying out PedR, and their thoughts on REF 2014. Their opinions and conclusions give food for thought on decisions regarding inclusion of PedR in REF 2021.

Taught postgraduate students in the UK have a limited timeframe for study, with most full-time courses requiring intense scholarship, typically over a 12-month period. Many of these students face challenges and concerns with the transition from undergraduate to taught postgraduate study as they adapt to a new learning environment with higher academic expectations. In this paper, we discuss the results of a new experience survey, designed to capture a holistic view of taught postgraduate student feedback beyond traditional academic content and to also capture self-reported challenges experienced during their studies. This article also describes the development of a new collaborative support programme in response to student feedback. The programme has been designed to offer a cohesive package of workshop sessions around academic skills, well-being, support and career development. The importance of providing a targeted support framework for this specific and often overlooked cohort within the HE sector is discussed.

Enterprise education at Newcastle University, UK, is embedded in the fabric of the curriculum via the Newcastle University Graduate Skills Framework. An example of this is the "Business for the Bioscientist" module. The authors discuss this module with regard to good practice, enterprise development and the wider arena of graduate careers and employer expectations. The paper illustrates how a combination of academics, curriculum developers, enterprise educators and guest speakers can result in an innovative and interactive enterprise module. Feedback from employers has reinforced the importance of embedding enterprise skills in the curriculum: the authors examine the methodology used at Newcastle to achieve this, the approach adopted and responses from learners. They assess how such an initiative can establish enterprise as a norm in the skills sets of graduates. The paper proposes and highlights various factors that universities need to address if they are to realize fully the concept of entrepreneurial learning. (Contains 2 tables and 4 figures.)

This paper reconceptualizes Thomas Clifford Allbutt's contributions to the making of scientific medicine in late nineteenth-century England. Existing literature on Allbutt usually describes his achievements, such as his design of the pocket thermometer and his advocacy of the use of the ophthalmoscope in general medicine, as independent events; and his work on the development of comparative pathology is largely overlooked. In this paper I focus on this latter aspect. I examine Allbutt's books and addresses and claim that Allbutt argued for the centrality of comparative pathology in the advancement of medical knowledge. He held that diseases should be studied as biological phenomena and that medicine should be made a biological science. He also argued that comparative pathology should be based upon the idea of evolution, and its study should embrace other nineteenth-century sciences including neurology, embryology and bacteriology. Allbutt's writings reveal that his endorsement of comparative pathology (1880s to 1920s), his promotion of the use of the ophthalmoscope and the thermometer in clinical medicine (early 1870s), and his support of the hospital unit system (1910s to 1920s) were part of a single programme. All were grounded in his scientific vision of medicine which emphasized a research culture, a stringent nosological attitude and an integration of laboratory sciences and clinical medicine. (Contains 110 footnotes.)

The intention of this paper is two-fold. First, it makes explicit a little known and poorly understood area of human experience: transgender. Second, it explores curriculum possibilities opened up by recent legitimating of transgender people through the Gender Recognition Act (2004). The Act foregrounds the necessity for a forum in schools to debate, reflect and understand the full implications of changes to legislation. This paper proposes that, rather than approaching transgender issues through biological science or through the levelling gaze of citizenship, issues of gender identity can be understood without censure through the visual arts. Moreover, the visual arts offer a "safe place" to discuss issues around the body because they allow distance and, in offering visual representations rather than text-based work, make visually concrete what science ethically cannot. (Contains 5 notes.)

There are well documented concerns with the imposition of high stakes testing into the fabric of school education, and there is now an increasing focus on how such tests impact children's "well-being." This can be witnessed in reports in the popular news media, where discussion of these impacts frequently refer to "stress" and "anxiety." Yet, there is no work that is able to tell us about what is happening in the bodies of the teachers and children who are living this schooling in the day-to-day; whether this is best considered through the languages of "stress"; or what the implications--emotional, educational, embodied--of these experiences might be. This paper develops a transdisciplinary approach that brings social and biological accounts together in order to address the "more-than-social" of the emotionality of childhood and schooling. We seek out opportunities for transdisciplinary connectivity and for new ways of seeing and knowing about learning. We consider what these ways of seeing and knowing might offer to education.

This paper reports on how science communication final year undergraduate research projects and educational internships can be utilised to provide opportunities for students to develop and utilise key employability skills. In the current difficult economic climate, the report "Working towards your future: Making the most of your time in higher education", jointly produced by the Confederation of British Industry and the National Union of Students (CBI and NUS, 2011), recommended that universities increase the employability of their graduates by providing opportunities, both within and outside of the taught curriculum, for their students to develop key employability skills. This paper discusses how the Faculty of Biological Sciences at the University of Leeds has used ethics-themed final year science communication projects and undergraduate educational internships in order to provide opportunities for students both to develop, and have evidence of, utilising these key skills.

Fieldwork is an important and often enjoyable part of learning in Bioscience degree courses, however it is unclear how the recent reforms to Higher Education (HE) may impact the future funding of outdoor learning. This paper reports on the findings from a recent survey of 30 HE Bioscience practitioners from across the UK. Their current level of fieldwork provision and factors affecting this provision in the future were explored. The data showed that the level of fieldwork had remained similar over the past five years and this was set to remain so over the next academic year and also into the next five years (when it may even increase). Funding of fieldwork was under review in most institutions due to the increase in student tuition fees and it was found that in some cases the cost of compulsory fieldwork will be subsumed within the overall course fee. Many influencing factors were discussed, but the most frequently raised topics were that of the development of employability skills during fieldwork and its importance in attracting and retaining students. Both topics are high on the agenda of HE institutions going forward into the new funding model, suggesting that fieldwork will remain a central part of the Bioscience curriculum. (Contains 2 tables and 1 figure.)

This research paper reports the findings from an international survey of fieldwork practitioners on their use of technology to enhance fieldwork teaching and learning. It was found that there was high information technology usage before and after time in the field, but some were also using portable devices such as smartphones and global positioning system whilst out in the field. The main pedagogic reasons cited for the use of technology were the need for efficient data processing and to develop students' technological skills. The influencing factors and barriers to the use of technology as well as the importance of emerging technologies are discussed.

Undergraduate research projects in the life sciences encompass a broad range of studies, some of which may require the participation of human subjects or other activities which may raise ethical concerns. As universities are accountable for all projects undertaken under their auspices they must ensure that these projects adhere to legal requirements, use acceptable research methods, represent an appropriate use of resources, and minimise risks to all research participants. Many student projects in UK universities are not subject to external review, and individual universities have established their own internal ethical review processes. This paper discusses the risks and benefits of student research projects, considers the range of ethical review processes performed in UK universities, and provides some suggestions for proportionate, transparent and efficient review of student projects. (Contains 4 tables and 1 footnote.)

A wide range of tools is now available to enable teaching practitioners to create web-based educational materials from PowerPoint presentations, adding a variety of different digital media, such as audio and animation. The pilot study described in this paper compared three different systems for producing multimedia presentations from existing PowerPoint files. The resulting resources were tested by a group of disabled students and a group of non-disabled students. Our findings show that there were statistically significant differences between the two groups in relation to their interaction with the resources. In particular, the students with disabilities were significantly more active in using the available controls to customise the running of the presentations. The data suggest that future work on why students with accessibility issues made different uses of these resources could encourage practitioners' deployment of multimedia resources for the benefit of all learners. (Contains 4 figures, 2 tables, and 1 note.)

Purpose: This study aims to identify the current barriers to sustainability in the bioscience laboratory setting and to determine which mechanisms are likely to increase sustainable behaviours in this specialised environment. Design/methodology/approach: The study gathers qualitative data from a sample of laboratory researchers presently conducting experimentation in the biological sciences. A questionnaire, regarding sustainability in the laboratory, was developed and distributed to all bioscience researchers at Aberystwyth University. Findings: Although the majority of respondents had favourable attitudes to sustainability, almost three-quarters (71 percent) stated that they were not conducting their research in the most sustainable way possible. The factors most likely to hinder sustainable behaviour were lack of support, lack of information and time constraints. However, monetary costs and benefits, closely followed by "other" costs and benefits, were most likely to encourage sustainable behaviour in the laboratory. Research limitations/implications: There is a need to extend the present research to other types of biological research, such as field-based studies. Different biological disciplines may have different consumable requirements and waste streams, thereby changing the barriers to sustainability observed. Practical implications: The findings have immediate practical implication for higher education institutions wishing to adopt researcher-approved mechanisms to reduce the environmental impact of biological laboratory research. Originality/value: This is the first study to design a sustainability questionnaire which is specific to research scientists and laboratory users. The paper is therefore of immense value to the numerous global higher education institutions with working laboratories which seek to minimise the environmental impact of research. (Contains 1 table and 1 figure.)

The development and use of computer assisted learning (CAL) materials in the life sciences is well established and, in the UK at least, significant resources have been provided to enable this. Some years on from when the major investments took place teachers are facing the problem that the technologies used to develop and deliver the CAL programs have become obsolete in the face of rapid and constant changes in desktop computing. The content and pedagogical design of these programs were intrinsically tied to their delivery technologies such that when the technology becomes obsolescent the programs are either abandoned or redeveloped again and again at a significant cost in time and resources. The RECAL project, based at the University of Edinburgh, is developing methodologies that make use of new ways of abstracting and managing a CAL program's assets, pedagogical design and run-time components to allow for much greater longevity and flexibility of such materials. This paper is an introduction to the RECAL approach, its use of common standards and specifications for describing materials and educational activities and how this can benefit developers and users of CAL materials. (Contains 3 figures and 1 table.)