Full cup and a warm glow after some time learning and creating with colleagues.
Back at work this week. Monday we had a couple of meetings about hiring for the new Teaching and Learning Specialist. There are quite a few applicants.
In and around the meetings I picked up ‘Small Teaching Online’ by Flower Darby. She used a really good analogy and I had a small epiphany that spurred me to go and write some content in the Blackboard sampler course. I have a good vision for it and I made some notes so on Monday next week I am going to dig in and work on content and start refining the design. What I think was missing in my planning was the importance of explaining why best practices are best practices. I’ve read that the term ‘best practice’ stifles innovation but practically, you have to start with what works and innovate from there if necessary.
As I’ve already mentioned, I volunteered to host a morning radio show for the BCcampus Studio 20 conference. For that I got a free pass to the conference. Hosting the show and interacting with the participants on the event site was even more fun than I expected. Tracy and I have a good rapport and Grant Potter made everything run seamlessly.
Sadly I missed the day one keynote because I had to see my surgeon (4 more weeks of immobility but I can practice bending my knee). Each day had a theme, Day 1: Vision, Day 2: Voice, and Day 3: Active Learning. I got something out of each day and was feeling quite rejuvenated by the end. The student panel on day three was fantastic. It was a diverse panel and they shared their experiences of being students in general, and through the pivot. I am even more determined to continue spreading the word of kindness and flexibility with assessments after listening to them. For example, one trans student in a wheelchair(Aaron – who is going to make a great teacher) was describing having to write a 500 word timed answer – he types slowly as his fingers sometimes dislocate – he knew the answers and could literally scream them at the screen (paraphrasing) but still failed the exam because he couldn’t type it out. We can do better for all students. One more big takeaway that relates to accessibility was our keynote presenter Arley who described each of the images used in her presentation. It took nothing away from the content and it was like having an audio alt tag – fantastic. I think doing this would also make one think very carefully when choosing images for a presentation.
It was a very active event with opportunities to draw, make recordings, and collaborate. I was shocked that I could learn how to draw a 3D eye in such a short period of time. Participants were invited to share their creations to a SPLOT and it was cool to see the contributions coming in.
From etug last week I have a few browser windows open:
The KPU Open resources catalogue that includes ‘How to Learn online’ and ‘Academic Integrity’.
Capilano U’s ‘Student Digital Ambassador‘ Built by students for students
UBC’s Open for Learning Challenge
Teaching Without Walls from TRU
I had some email exchanges with Mike and Albert around Ultra and I shared this upcoming event with faculty: Care in Crisis: A Crisis of Care presented by Brenna Clark Gray of TRU. I found out the registration link wasn’t working when several faculty who had tried to sign up emailed me about it. I think there is an appetite for this conversation.
“They” say that you can’t pour from an empty cup, and it’s true. I am re-filled and I have a lot of ideas to put into practice next week as I work on the Blackboard course for instructors.