Learning | Education Technologies

International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning | Journals | Georgia Southern University

If you have an interest in teaching and learning, particularly within the context of tertiary education, this journal is worth following.

The International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching & Learning is an open, double-blind peer reviewed electronic journal published twice per year by the Centers for Teaching & Technology at Georgia Southern University. The journal is an international forum for information and research about the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) and its implications for higher/tertiary education.

Anchored in inquiry and engagement, the scholarship of teaching and learning re-conceptualizes teaching as an ongoing and scholarly process with an emphasis on bringing about improved student learning (Huber & Morreale, 2002). SoTL is a key way to support the continuous transformation of academic communities and cultures.

Source: International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning | Journals | Georgia Southern University

Free eBook – Eliminate Nonessential Content – eLearning Industry

How we write learning content is as important as what we write. For example: Complex writing makes the message hard to understand. Mixing unnecessary content with important content makes it difficult to find and remember the most critical messages. In this eBook by Patti Shank, PhD, we concentrate on five critical tactics to remove unnecessary words and content in order to make it content more learnable.

Source: Eliminate Nonessential Content – eLearning Industry

The Power of Concentration – Sherlock Holmes is the Key | The New York Times

Need to think? Sherlock Holmes provides the template.

MEDITATION and mindfulness: the words conjure images of yoga retreats and Buddhist monks. But perhaps they should evoke a very different picture: a man in a deerstalker, puffing away at a curved pipe, Mr. Sherlock Holmes himself. The world’s greatest fictional detective is someone who knows the value of concentration, of “throwing his brain out of action,” as Dr. Watson puts it. He is the quintessential unitasker in a multitasking world.

More often than not, when a new case is presented, Holmes does nothing more than sit back in his leather chair, close his eyes and put together his long-fingered hands in an attitude that begs silence. He may be the most inactive active detective out there. His approach to thought captures the very thing that cognitive psychologists mean when they say mindfulness.

Source: The Power of Concentration – The New York Times

On the Heartbreaking Difficulty of Getting Rid of Books | Literary Hub

This.

Paring down one’s wardrobe is one thing, but what kind of degenerate only wants to own 30 books (or fewer) at a time on purpose? What sort of psychopath rips out pages from their favorite books and throws away the rest so they can, as Kondo puts it, “keep only the words they like?” For those of us for whom even the word “book” sparks joy, this constitutes a serious disconnect. Still, as the weather gets warmer, many readers will tackle their spring cleaning with The Life-Changing Magic in hand.

Source: On the Heartbreaking Difficulty of Getting Rid of Books | Literary Hub

Using technology to improve curriculum design | @Jisc

It is sometimes easy to simply continue with a curriculum. While new programmes usually prompt a discussion on what should (or, sometimes more importantly, should not) be included, it is always useful to consider your existing curricula as well.

This article from Jisc is helpful in informing those discussions.

The process of curriculum design 1 combines educational design with many other areas including: information management, market research, marketing, quality enhancement, quality assurance and programme and course approval.

The curriculum must evolve to meet the changing needs of students and employers. It must change to reflect new needs, new audiences and new approaches to learning.

Source: Using technology to improve curriculum design | Jisc

“Inspirational teaching in higher education” by James G. Derounian

Is there more to teaching than the Socrative method? Of course there is. Good teachers are part expert, part counselor and part showman. If you’ve caught your class yawning perhaps the following paper might help.

This article discusses the qualities of inspirational teaching in higher education (HE). It starts by arguing how topical this subject is, given emphasis world-wide on quality assurance measures, such as the UK Government’s 2016 Teaching Excellence Framework TEF. The paper then moves to review the academic and practice literature in order to outline what comprises inspirational teaching in HE institutions. These components – in the form of key words – are extracted from the literature and then tested through primary research.

Lecturers, at an English University, agreed to circulate a short survey to final year social sciences undergraduates. Fifty-two student returns from 2010 were analysed. A comparative survey of 25 undergraduates – from the same disciplines – was repeated in 2016.

Three clear elements of inspirational undergraduate teaching emerge: First and foremost, undergraduates believe it to be motivating; second, and related – inspirational teaching is deemed encouraging and third such teaching flows from teachers’ passion for their subject. The paper presents exploratory and illustrative data and sets down a forward agenda for further research to explore aspects of inspirational university teaching linked to differing cultural expectations, potential impacts of gender, age and ethnicity.

Source: “Inspirational teaching in higher education” by James G. Derounian Mr

Beyond the National Student Survey – Student Experience Company @SXManagement

Our White Paper, “Beyond the National Student Survey” outlines key principles for improving student experience. It:

Summarises the changes and discontinuities that are shaping student experience expectations.

Overviews the changes contained in the Government White Paper, “Success as a Knowledge Economy“.

Outlines ten significant problems of the National Student Survey.

Defines six key principles for defining and managing student experience.

Source: Beyond the National Student Survey – Student Experience Company

The National Student Survey should be abolished before it does any more harm | Higher Education Network | The Guardian

English: Title page from Sarah Trimmer’s The Guardian of Education, vol. I, 1802 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The annual ritual of the publication of the National Student Survey (NSS) results has triggered fevered data dissection at universities across the UK this week. But the analysis, and the subsequent press releases and poster campaigns, represent merely a stage in a continual cycle of NSS-driven activity.

Universities now run ongoing campaigns to solicit student feedback, review practice in line with student demands, publicise changes made, and promote completion of the survey itself, in order to rank highly for satisfaction in league tables. All this time and effort comes at some expense to institutions; just the cost of rewarding survey-completers with vouchers would cover a lecturer’s salary at many institutions.The time has come to review what students, and higher education more broadly, gains from this considerable investment.

Source: The National Student Survey should be abolished before it does any more harm | Higher Education Network | The Guardian

Cortana to open up to new devices and developers with Cortana Skills Kit and Cortana Devices SDK – Building Apps for Windows

Fancy trying to create for a digital assistant? Microsoft have release a new Skills Kit and SDK for Cortana.

We believe that everyone deserves a personal assistant. One to help you cope as you battle to stay on top of everything, from work to your home life. Calendars, communications and commitments. An assistant that is available everywhere you need it, working in concert with the experts you rely on to get things done.

We’re at the beginning of a technological revolution in artificial intelligence. The personal digital assistant is the interface where all the powers of that intelligence can become an extension

Source: Cortana to open up to new devices and developers with Cortana Skills Kit and Cortana Devices SDK – Building Apps for WindowsBuilding Apps for Windows

Why you should turn off push notifications right now | @WiredUK

Most students believe that they can study effectively whilst simultaneously watching TV, checking Facebook and responding to every ridiculous interruption that appears on their phone.

They can’t.

We live in an age of interruption. Ping – you have a text message. Ping – you have a new email. Ping – you have a Facebook friend request. Ping – you have a match on your online dating app. Ping-ping-ping, all day long.

A recent Gallup poll found that more than 50 per cent of Americans who own smartphones keep their phone near them “almost all the time during waking hours”. Over 50 per cent say check their smartphone at least several times an hour and 11 per cent say they check it every few minutes. And that’s just what they’re aware of and admit to – I would not be surprised if the real frequency and intensity is much higher.

Until relatively recently in our technological history we did not have a lot of content coming to our devices. Now, we have texts, all kind of notifications and what seems like an endless stream of both personal and work emails. And it’s not just our phones. How many times have you been at your computer working on something when you get an email notification? And of those instances, how often did you stop what you’re doing to look at your email, realised that it was not that important and returned to your work – after taking a few minutes to remind yourself where you were and what your train of thought was?

At this point, it should be painfully clear to everyone that we need to be worried about the interruptions economy. What value do interruptions provide, under what conditions, and what are their costs? A little ping may seem innocuous, but there is cumulating evidence that the cost of an interruption is higher than we realise, and of course given the sheer number of interruptions, their combined effect can very quickly become substantial.

Source: Why you should turn off push notifications right now