Supporting your students with their studies

Find out how your students learn in Advantage and discover how you can support their learning.

It starts with a Course Introduction Module

Each course begins with an Introduction Module. This is released to students 4 weeks before the course is due to begin.

The module prepares students for what’s to come, covering the learning outcomes, how they’ll be assessed and how to work through the course effectively.

Students should work through the module in full before the course begins, but we’ve detailed some of the key lessons below:

'How to work through course' lesson

Our digital-first courses have been designed with the very best educational practice in mind.

Workshops follow a ‘flipped classroom’ approach which transforms the traditional, passive classroom into an active learning environment. Rather than listening to the tutor all day, students are encouraged to take part in various activities, apply what they’ve learned so far and get help on the more complex areas.

This lesson introduces the course structure and helps students to plan their time effectively.

Assessments lesson

Our Knowledge and Skills assessments have been designed to improve the student experience and reduce complexity and risk of error.

This lesson outlines how students will be assessed, what the permitted materials are for each assessment and allows them to consider how their knowledge and skills may be assessed as they study.

Course corrections lesson

We’re continuously improving our courses, and this lesson allows us to refine the content without impacting students’ course progress.

We’ll summarise any known course corrections in this lesson weekly, after they’ve been verified by our Subject Matter team.

If our Subject Matter team determine a query not to be a correction, our tutors will provide clarification, offering a valuable learning opportunity for students.

We encourage students to use the Discussions to raise any queries they have about the course content with tutors.

Making the most of our Study Guide

The Study Guide is a comprehensive summary of all the key points and concepts from the course. Students can find it at the top of their course modules. This is different from the module summaries (found at the end of each lesson).

To make the most of the Study Guide, students should:

• Download it as a PDF at the beginning of the course (before they begin working through any course content).
• Have it open whenever they're working through course content or in workshops, adding to the key points and concepts already covered in the Study Guide.
• Highlight, add comments or notes using any PDF software as they work through the course.

They can then use the Study Guide with their notes as the basis for their pre-assessment revision.

How our courses are built

Courses are made up of modules and lessons.

Each module starts with an introduction to the topic and is then broken down into bite-sized lessons to help students maintain focus and motivation.

And at the end of each module, we recap everything that was covered in the Module Summary.

Features to embed student learning

We carefully considered the latest research and followed the best educational practice when designing the digital courses in Advantage.

That’s why, instead of asking students to read pages of notes in a passive way, we’ve included a range of interactive features that will keep students engaged, embed what their learning and make sure they’re prepared for the final assessment.

These features include checkers, builders and assessment practice questions. Students can reattempt these as many times as they like.

Checkers

Checkers are quiz questions to complete as students work through the course. They’ll notice them as they progress through the lessons. We strongly encourage students to complete these to help embed your learning.

Builders

Builders can be found in each module after the lesson content. These could cover any lessons in the module and should be tried once students have completed the full module. The questions are designed to build on the lesson content and help prepare them for assessment-standard questions.

Assessment Practice Questions

The assessment practice questions should be attempted once students have completed the builders. Some of the assessment practice questions will be used in workshops, so they may wish to wait until after the relevant workshop before attempting them.

Additional assessment practice questions

And for students studying Skills, the additional practice questions are further assessment standard questions that they should try after they’ve completed all modules in the course.

Workshops

Our live workshops have been carefully placed throughout the course to complement our digital course material, and take an active learning approach.

Students should come along to each workshop having covered the ‘essential work to complete’ (found in the Course Introduction Module), meaning that time in workshops can be spent deepening understanding through discussions and activities, answering any queries and covering more complex concepts.

Downloadable content

Because of the inclusion of these and other interactive features, most of the course content on Advantage can’t be downloaded as PDFs.

However, there are some features of each course that can be downloaded as PDFs, to print and annotate should students wish to do so. These are listed below:

• The Study Guide (which has all the key points and concepts from the course).
• Video transcripts (if you’d prefer not to watch a video).

For students studying Skills, they can also download:

• Assessment practice questions and solutions (apart from Corporate Finance and Modelling).
• Additional assessment practice questions and solutions.

Resources

In addition to the downloadable content above, students also have access to a range of relevant learning resources.

For example, our Knowledge Taxation course includes a pro forma, taxation rates sheets and the ICAS Code of Ethics.

Understanding your students’ progression

As students progress through the course, we’ll monitor their progress to ensure they’re on track. If we feel they may be struggling, we’ll contact them directly to inform them about the support available, including course Discussions and one-to-one meetings with their tutor. We'll do this around the end of week 5 and 7.

You can also see how your student is progressing through each course. You’ll find this alongside their course enrolment information on the ATO Portal. To find this:

1. Log into ATO Portal
2. Click the 'course enrolment' tab
3. Find the last column in the table for each course, '% completed,' which will show your students' progression.

Students will progress through the courses at different speeds depending on things like how many courses they’re studying, how much study leave they've been granted, their learning styles and how they choose to pace their learning.

To give you an idea of what ‘good progression’ might look like, we’ve shared a breakdown for each course (students are progressing well if they’re within 10% of the below by the end of each week):

Knowledge

*Knowledge mock assessment

Skills

*Skills mock assessment

Coursework for Corporate Finance and Modelling is released and submitted between week 4 and 5. This may impact progress in this course.

Learning speeds and study expectations

Estimated learning time

Each lesson includes an estimated learning time, offering students an idea of how long it might take them to complete.

However, the estimated time is a guide only. Students are encouraged to work through the material at their own pace, whether that’s more quickly or slowly than the estimated learning time.

To view the estimated completion time, they just need to click on the lesson and scroll down to the introductory information.

Planning study time

It’s important for students to recognise that dedicating time to study in the evenings and on weekends is all part of the learning time required for them to achieve the best outcomes in their assessments.

Each learning day is approximately 10 hours of study, which suggests that some learning will extend into the evenings. We also encourage them to allocate time over the weekend to enhance their understanding and complete the necessary modules and questions on Advantage.

By acknowledging these expectations and integrating them into their study plan, they’ll enhance their learning, while maintaining a healthy balance between work, studies and personal time.