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Archive for the 'External Learning Technology events' Category

When UCL students edit Wikipedia

By Mira Vogel, on 15 April 2015

A presentation by Rocío Baños Pinero (Deputy Director, Centre for Translation Studies), Raya Sharbain (Year 2 undergraduate, Management Science and Innovation) and  Mira Vogel (E-Learning Environments) for the UCL Teaching and Learning Conference, 2015. Here’s the abstract, presentation graphics embedded below and in case you can’t see that, a PDF version of those.

See also the UCL Women’s Health Translatathon write-up.

MUGSE 3 – London, RVC

By Domi C Sinclair, on 17 March 2015

The third meeting of MUGSE (Mahara User Group for Southern England) took place on Friday 6th March, at the Royal Veterinary College in London. Mahara is the software that at UCL we refer to as MyPortfolio, our flexible e-portfolio system.

The user group meeting had a mix of experiences in Mahara, as well as a mix of learning technology professionals and academics. The group was also lucky enough to have Don Christie from Catalyst in attendance. Catalyst are the company who are responsible for the Mahara project, and they look after the core code and carry out updates.

The session began with a group round table, with everyone having the chance to contribute problems or question and then the rest of the group offering solutions or answers based on their own experiences. After this there were a series of presentations, including help files and case studies from Roger Emery and Sam Taylor at Southampton Solent University, a look at the April Mahara upgrade from Don Christie and finally Domi Sinclair (me) talking briefly about the importance of getting involved in the Mahara community. If you would like more details about this user group please read the article from Digi Domi and follow MUGSE on Twitter @mugseUK.

 

2015 Horizon Report – what are the six key trends in E-Learning?

By Clive Young, on 17 February 2015

nmc_itunesu.HR2015-170x170Every year the NMC Horizon Report examines emerging technologies for their potential impact on and use in teaching, learning, and ‘creative inquiry’ within the environment of higher education. The report, downloadable in PDF, is compiled by an international body of experts and provides a useful checklist trends, challenges and technologies in the field and provides a useful benchmark of what is most talked about at the moment.

The key trends identified in the in the short term are

  • Increasing use of blended learning
  • Redesigning learning spaces

Longer term trends are: growing focus on measuring learning, proliferation of open learning resources, advancing cultures of change and innovation and increasing cross-institution collaboration.

Key ‘solvable’ challenges are

  • Blending formal and informal learning
  • Improving digital literacy

More difficult challenges are; personalising learning, teaching complex thinking and the ‘wicked’ ones are competing models of education and the old chestnut, rewarding teaching.

The important developments in educational technology they identify are in the short term are

  • Bring your own device (BYOD)
  • Flipped classroom – same as last year

Longer-term innovations are; makerspaces, wearable technology, adaptive learning technologies and the ‘Internet of Things’.

As usual there are useful commentaries and links throughout. Encouraging that many of these ideas are already being implemented, trialed and discussed here at UCL.

 

Online learning at research-intensive universities Part 2

By Clive Young, on 9 February 2015

The LERU paper published last year has clearly had some impact. At the LERU seminar last week Adam Tyson, Head of the Unit for Higher Education at the European Commission’s DG Education and Culture noted that EU universities did not have a clear public presence or strategy in online learning, especially in comparison where the US where much high-profile activity is based on just two platforms. Although Futurelearn has emerged as the front-runner in the UK, Spain, France and Germany all run incompatible systems and overall activity remains quite low. Universities should take advantage of funding such as Erasmus+ and Horizon 2020 and emerging notions such as the ‘digital single market’ to engage and form strategic partnerships – but no more platforms!

Prof Sally Mapstone and some of the LERU recommendations.

Prof Sally Mapstone – some LERU recommendations!

Prof Sally Mapstone, PVC Education at the University of Oxford and one of the report authors emphasised that universities should develop proactive and strategic leadership in the form of mainstream policies for online learning, based on global horizon scanning and local experimentation. Online learning is both here to stay and changing rapidly – a challenge for even the most agile university.

She noted however an increasingly mature and reflective approach to online learning across the sector. Prof Mapstone cited Kristin Ingolfsdottir’s Nov 2014 IEEE report Impact of MOOCs and Other Forms of Online Education, Philip Hunter’s Jan 15 EMBO report The virtual university and with a focus on quality and brand Chris Parr’s July 14 THE article ‘Reputations at risk as platforms fail to screen Moocs’ about quality (a recurring theme of the debate) and Stephen Jackson’s (Director of quality assurance, QAA) follow up letter. Other key discussion papers were the Oct 14 EU report New modes of learning and teaching in HE, and the OU Innovating Pedagogy 2014 report. Some really interesting questions are arising, such as who ‘owns’ the data in data analytics.

Oxford has launched a digital strategy and established working group including representatives from its museums and hospitals to promote high quality and encourage an evidence-based approach (i.e. comparing different modes). As she said “the technology tail should not wag the educational dog”; quality is essential but likewise we must not stifle creativity.

Prof Dirk Van Damme, Head of the Innovation and Measuring Progress Division (IMEP) at the OECD Directorate for Education and Skills approached online learning from the perspective of productivity. He discussed a recent Chronicle of Higher Education article The MOOC Hype Fades, in 3 Charts and pointed out that rising costs – a major worry – could be addressed by the very approaches said to be ‘fading’. He raised lot of fascinating issues that I may return to in a later post.

As if to counter the ‘fading interest’ narrative, the morning session was completed by Prof Simone Buitendijk, Vice Rector-Magnificus of Leiden University. Leiden has run five Coursera MOOCs, with others in preparation. She was very positive, for her MOOCs had changed the perception of what Leiden can do with online learning. Some of these issues reflected a post MOOCs as metaphors I wrote nearly two years ago.  Leiden had targeted research and teaching areas where the university wanted global impact. The experience had encouraged evidence-based innovation, internationalisation of the classroom, impact and outreach but had also improved the experience, motivation and retention of on-campus students. They recently produced a report on this activity. The university has also established a Teachers Academy enabling teachers and practitioners to research their own work.

The afternoon session was dedicated to a fascinating set of case studies and again they may have to wait for another posting.

Online learning at research-intensive universities Part 1

By Clive Young, on 9 February 2015

leru

LERU report

One conspicuous aspect of the advance of online learning in higher education has been the leading role of research-intensive universities (RIUs).

Blended learning; lecture capture and media use; online and peer marking; exercises, online discussion and quizzes in the VLE. Once the preserve only of e-learning enthusiasts such approaches have become unexpectedly mainstream. Many RIUs continue to be active in the MOOC phenomenon, due in part to the purposefully ‘elitist’ recruitment of partners by the main platform providers. Others focus more on SPOCs (small private online courses) for CPD and distance learning. Online learning seems to have been an opportunity for RUIs to publicly refocus or restate a commitment to innovation in teaching as well as research.

Last summer the League of European Research Universities (LERU) published an excellent hype-free report Online learning at research-intensive universities and the group met last week to discuss its finding and impact. LERU is an invitation-only members association of 21 RIUs of which UCL is an active member.

The paper had recognised that the technology associated with online learning, its “capacity to communicate knowledge widely and quickly and its capacity for innovation and creativity” often resonated with a RUIs’ research mission, increasingly measured by dissemination and impact. The global outreach potential of MOOCs, open resources and approaches, and SPOCs they considered irrefutable for both teaching and research.

The paper recommended that universities assess strategically (e.g. by scenario planning) the extent to which they wish their existing on-campus learning experiences to involve online delivery and digital materials and how much to extend their online learning opportunities to learners or co-enquirers outside their university.

Such an approach would have to consider the extent to which universities wish to work collaboratively with other institutions, or with commercial partners, how to sustain investments in financial and human capital and of course identify the reputational advantages and risks for their institution’s brand.

The follow-up LERU seminar last will be discussed further in my next post.

MyPortfolio Upgrade and User Group

By Domi C Sinclair, on 25 November 2014

Today we have upgrade the MyPortfolio system to version 1.10, you can read about the improvements this has brought on our recent post announcing the upgrade.

In addition to this the Mahara User Group for Southern England (MUGSE) was held last week. Mahara is the name of the software used to run MyPortfolio at UCL. The user group contained a number of presentations on topics such as new users of Mahara, changing the language files and up-coming improvements. You can see a full write-up of the user group on my personal blog: http://digidomi.wordpress.com/2014/11/24/mugse-2-sparsholt-college/ Please note that as this is my personal blog it is not associated with UCL and reflects my own thoughts and opinions.

The next user group will be happening in the first quarter of next year and is likely to be in London. More details will be shared nearer the time and once a location and date have been confirmed. It is also likely that the conference, which from this year will be known as the Mahara UK Hui (to reflect the systems New Zealand roots) will also be held in London, around the start of July.

If you have any questions about the MyPortfolio system please get in touch with E-Learning Environments