G’day
another month goes by and at least we have had a taste of summer. Blueberries are in abundance the raspberries have taken flight. Not to worry as I now have a new home garden to dig up; should be fun. The Possums appear to enjoy the Quinces that are in abundance Quince jam has already be crafted, it’s paste and Jelly next (not for the Possums)
Had a long and interesting read of the first link in this posting. Fascinating to read about those involved in the never ending debates around the concept and practice of andragogy. Even came across a word I hadn’t heard of before: Pedandragogy According to one paper
is ‘a model that promotes and encourages the development of effective learning environments where self-engaged learning by individuals of all ages can be fostered’.mmm?
In the end they are only words that keep educators employed.
As long as the learner gains knowledge and associated understanding of their subject matter from the learning environment(s) in which they find themselves, that’s all that matters.
In this edition of the eWatch there are links to Open badges, NMC report, evolution of FELTAG, Androgogy, digital literacy, virtual reality, Principal(sic) of change,G Suite, gamification, edtech chart, conferences and the odd one out.
Lots to dive into, digest , absorb and utilise.
That’s it until April brings a new shower of links.
1.Henschke, John A. EdD, ‘FOCUSING ON THE SIX MAJOR THEMES IN THE GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE OF ANDRAGOGY: A JUNE 2015 UPDATE’ (2015). IACE Hall of Fame Repository.
Really enjoyed reading this excellent paper, probably because it supports much of what I believe about education, especially where Andragogy is concerned. Well written and researched and worth the read.Be prepared to spend some time digesting the material; it’s a long paper.
Because of the way I think, I quiet liked the sentence ‘Forrest and Peterson (2006) lament that despite radical changes in teaching assumptions, management educators have continued to use the archaic term pedagogy (the art and science of teaching children) to describe their work’ Change takes time.
http://trace.tennessee.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1410&context=utk_IACE-browseall
2. All about Open Badges: Building a regional Skills network. Interesting blog on potential developments with Open Badges in Canada.
https://littoraly.wordpress.com/2017/01/09/building-a-regional-skills-network/
Have a look at a related post whilst you are perusing the site:
Open Badges, connectors for open learning.
https://littoraly.wordpress.com/2016/03/20/open-badges-connectors-for-open-learning/
3.The evolution of FELTAG: a glimpse at effective practice in UK further education and skills. Probably some good lessons and ideas to be gleaned from the latest update. As usual a high quality, valuable resource from the Jisc stable.
https://www.jisc.ac.uk/reports/the-evolution-of-feltag
4.The Principal of Change: Stories of learning and leading. Some interesting discussions and perspectives on learning from George Courus. His book. ‘The innovator’s Mindset’, is worth reading.
5.Developing digital literacy in learners: a how to guide for teachers. A useful guide with a link to a check list for developing digital literacy
http://eworks.edu.au/blog/2017/01/developing-digital-literacy-learners-guide-teachers/
You might like to explore the following ‘tutorial’ on Essentials of Digital Accessibility. Some good points and advice.
https://thejournal.com/articles/2016/12/07/essentials-of-digital-accessibility.aspx
6. The complete guide to virtual reality, everything you need to get started. An excellent article form the UK Guardian, providing an up to date overview , analysis and examples of virtual reality and where it appears to be going. Someone made some money out of it already.
If you are still interested, this article is well written and provides some useful information on the possible impact of using VR in elearning virtual reality: Could Virtual Reality Based eLearning Transform Employee Behavior and Attitudes?
7.Google Apps is Now G Suite (released October 2016) A Free G Suite Training On Demand for Teachers and Students is now available. If you are into Google tools and an avid Chrome user then this is for you. Detailed and comprehensive, provides very good information and guides to using the suite of tools and improving your skills.[Lots more useful resources on the site]
http://www.shakeuplearning.com/blog/g-suite-training-on-demand-teachers-students/
8.NMC and EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative Release the NMC Horizon Report: 2017 Higher Ed Edition.
Extract from the NMC site:
‘This 14th edition describes annual findings from the NMC Horizon Project, an ongoing research project designed to identify and describe emerging technologies likely to have an impact on learning, teaching, and creative inquiry in higher education’.
http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2017-nmc-horizon-report-he-EN.pdf
9. 15 Ways Gamification Can Be Applied to Education. An interesting article which looks at the nature of gamification in the classroom, design elements and characteristics of users and their response to the design of games. Useful as a guide for beginners.
https://hcigames.com/gamification/15-ways-gamification-can-applied-education/
10.The ultimate edtech chart for teachers: A useful chart providing a wide range of links separated into various subject areas. Saves some searching maybe and also provides links to material and resources you may not have seen before.
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2017/02/the-ultimate-edtech-chart-for-teachers.html
11.Conferences
11.1. ALT 2017: Beyond islands of innovation how Learning Technology became the new norm(al)
The 24th Annual Conference of the Association for Learning Technology will bring together practitioners, researchers and policy makers from across sectors. Together we will chart the development of Learning Technology from isolated islands of ‘Innovation’ to becoming the new norm and the challenges this entails for staff and learners alike. We will explore how we move from individual innovation to institutional integration at scale.
11.2 ASCILITE 2017: 34rd International Conference on Innovation, Practice and Research in the Use of Educational Technologies in Tertiary Education.
The ASCILITE 2017 conference will be held at the University of Southern Queensland in Toowoomba from 4 to 6 December 2017.
https://ascilite.org/2017-conference/
12 Odd one out: Wikimedia foundation. It’s always interesting when one stumbles across something that probably everyone knows about: Wikimedia Foundation. So much to explore and learn. I spent ages in Wikisource, admittedly reading most of the Limericks by Edward Lear.
It’s all way beyond Wikipedia and well worth supporting. Enjoy the journey
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Our_projects
Richard
Richard Elliott
The Eternal Macademic
Auckland
New Zealand