Part of your learning will be compulsory attendance at seminars. These are conducted by your tutor, held live via Microsoft Teams and include a small group of students (approximately 6). The small group size allows your tutor to focus on your individual learning needs and enables greater participation for all students.  It also allows you to discuss learning and ideas with your peers; develop speaking practice and use of academic language, and work with others as you would in your taught programme.

The number of seminars and tutorials you have each week can vary slightly depending upon the timetable and assessment schedule. You will normally attend 3-4 live seminar sessions per week, as well as having a weekly individual tutorial with your tutor. 

We understand the importance of having regular one to one tutorials with your tutor and these are carefully planned into your schedule. Typically held once a week, this time with your tutor is focused on key learning and assessment elements throughout the programme giving you time to ask questions and develop a deeper understanding of the personalised feedback you receive.

Throughout the programme, you will be regularly completing and submitting tasks.  Your tutor provides you with personalised feedback on these tasks which you can then apply to further improve your key skills. The feedback and tasks are also discussed in your tutorials.

We appreciate that undertaking study which may be different from what you are accustomed to can be challenging. A core team of highly experienced academic teaching and learning professionals who understand these challenges have designed the programme and provide extra support to help you achieve your learning goals in a supportive environment. We support you in a number of ways throughout the programme from seminars to your tutorials and buddy tasks.  However, we also provide other support systems:

• Comprehensive induction to allow you to familiarise yourself with the learning environment, technology, and content of the programme. As part of the induction you will attend live taught sessions as well as access programme materials, undertake tasks and meet your tutor and other students.
• Timely topic specific forums are provided at key times in your learning to provide another layer of support where you can ask questions for further clarification.
• Class forums are used during the programme where you can discuss specific topics such as academic culture with your seminar group and tutor.
• Action plans are provided to help you organise and monitor your personal learning needs in the different key skills. These can then be used in tutorials to help focus and aid your development.  There are a range of specifically created additional resources to help you target key areas of your learning journey.
• Personal learning reflection using your own blog helps you to identify your progress at different stages of the course and which your tutor responds to.
• An opportunity to be elected as a programme representative. As a programme representative you are a leader within your seminar group and can be the link between students and the core pre-sessional team. This is an opportunity to help shape the programme through feedback by yourself and your peers. We are responsive to feedback and make alterations where possible to aid your learning. This mirrors what happens on your academic programmes at Loughborough University and Loughborough University London.
• Access to library materials with thousands of online resources and support from Academic Librarians.
• Information about the Loughborough and London campuses, the local area and some interesting aspects of British culture and language is available to help you acclimatise prior to your arrival in the UK.

We learn so much when we work with others and our understanding of a subject increases. Within the programme there are specific tasks and activities you do with your ‘study buddy’. A ‘study buddy’ is another student you work with and is allocated by your tutor. Your tutor will change who your ‘study buddy’ is during the programme to allow you to work with others and make new friends.

Independent learning is very important when studying at a UK university and is a skill that we help you to develop within the supportive environment. As well as undertaking learning within your seminar group, and with a buddy, there are many learning activities and tasks that you complete alone. You are then able to bring that learning and understanding to your seminar, study buddy or to your tutorials to get further help and guidance as you develop.

You can access a weekly syllabus to refer to which explains things such as: study focus for each day of the week; whether you have seminars, tutorials or assessments; any homework; timings for the day, etc. The timings will be based around a normal GMT (UK time) working day. Below is an example day based on students living in Asia.