Donna Lanclos and I have just finished and about are about to publish our work “Listening to teachers: a qualitative exploration of teaching practices in higher and further education, and the implications for digital” We are going to be talking about this on our panel on Wednesday of Digifest (13th March) so come along and…
technology
Next generation [digital] learning environments: Community Voices

As Technology Enhanced Learning continues to develop, it is clear that some form of digital learning environment will remain core to institutional practices; the levels of integration, features and porosity will continue to change, driven, and potentially driving the behavioural shifts we see in staff and students. Digifest18 was where Jisc launched “Next generation [digital]…
Clickbait, Lies and Propaganda

So, this is not a new subject. Or a new phenomena. And what sparked me off this morning was a tweet from Eric Stoller. There are so many things going on in this tweet I actually struggled on where to start. But then I, like Eric, decided to challenge the headline; because I think it…
Thinking out loud about Next Generation Learning Environments

You know that thing, where you start a conversation and write a blog post, then do a podcast and then a whole load of people discuss it and a very bright person (Sheila Macneill) writes a blog post that references your blog post which leads you off in another direction. Yep, that thing. So I…
Today I am 50: I am birder

[caption id="attachment_8094" align="alignright" width="136"] “The Observer’s Book of Birds”[/caption] Today I am 50 years old. I am going birdwatching. I started birding (a term we use for birdwatching) in the late 70’s and I have always been an aspiring amateur naturalist. So what’s that got to do with this blog? My birding kit in the…
Something, not somewhere, and increasingly somewhen

This is a co written post with Donna Lanclos A podcast of me and Donna arguing discussing this post refereed hosted by James Clay is available over on James’ Blog “Work is something you do, not somewhere you go!” Obviously this is not true for many people – from chefs to hospital staff, work is…
Do we need new pedagogies? Really?
I was engaged in an online discussion recently, and frankly annoyed. There are a lot of commentators pushing for pedagogy to catch up with technology, or for technology to catch up with pedagogy. And don’t even get me started when someone starts throwing around things like heutagogy. So I wanted to reflect on three things…
Identity, Social Media and David Bowie

Not a new idea, but more following on from my previous post. I was struck on Friday that one of the joys of following work colleagues on social media “after hours” gives you an insight into just how talented they are outside of the outstanding job they actually do. Over the years as I’ve got…
Social media, digital presence and hen harriers

Recently in discussion with Dave White about the Visitor – Resident Model we started thinking about what we mean by professional. In creating my own VR map (below) I started to realise that we have substituted the word professional to mean what we do for work. Whilst I work for Jisc, I also work for…
Will Digital Colonialism kill pedagogic innovation?

A couple of weeks ago I was quoted in the Times Higher decrying Virtual Learning Environments. There is a wider context to this. For one thing I referred to most “Learning Technologies” and didn’t intend to single out the VLE. VLE’s were essential to confronting the serious challenges facing the online educator in 1997., They…