Palatable pedagogy

Introduction

Understanding the basics of learning and teaching theory helps you to understand how and why Compass was built.  The practical functionality has been designed to lead teachers and planners through steps which align with the ideas of best practice for each of these roles.

Compass was initially developed to help teachers better understand the context of their paper within a programme of study, and to provide a scaffold for the processes involved in designing, creating, and managing the delivery of those papers.  The reporting tools came later, when it was realised that such a database structure could very easily summarise and sort information for review and accreditation purposes.  The following short pages will explain the pedagogy on which Compass has been built.

Compass is a database-driven, online, software tool.  What does this mean?  The database part means it contains sets of items, each of which has a relationship to another.  The online part means that it acts in real-time, and can be updated from anywhere in the world.  You can think of it as a massive post-office; sorting information and sending it to the right people at the right time.  But before we think about which pieces of information need to be shown to whom and when, we need to talk about some basics of teaching and learning theory so that we can understand the information and the needs of the people involved.

How you go from here will depend on who you are.  If you’re planning a whole programme, please read the planner stream.  If you’re a teacher planning the assessments and activities for your paper, please read the teacher stream.

For programme planners

For paper planners and teachers