Top 5 teaching and learning challenges for 2009
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on February 17th, 2009
Educause have used a wiki to identify the top teaching and learning challenges for 2009. The final list, ranked by popularity, includes:
Creating learning environments that promote active learning, critical thinking, collaborative learning, and knowledge creation.
Developing 21st-century literacies among students and faculty (information, digital, and visual).
Reaching and engaging today’s learner.
Encouraging faculty adoption and innovation in [...]
Macquarie’s Second Life
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on February 12th, 2009
I’m going to borrow a post from the Teaching and Learning Design blog of Dean Groom, LTC’s Head of Educational Development, to introduce Macquarie’s Second Life build:
MQ on Jokaydia has two spaces - a practical resource, information and teaching ‘building’ and a second area which the University can use as a collaborative space. The aim is [...]
The myth of the digital generation?
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on February 4th, 2009
Here’s how it goes. Whatever you call them - Gen Y or Z, Millennials, The Net Generation, digital natives - they learn/communicate/think radically differently from previous generations. They have grown up with laptops, mobile phones, digital cameras, hand-held games, global positioning systems, ipods, and DVD players which they use for blogging, social networking, creating and [...]
Contribute to E-learning Insights Vox Pops
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on January 15th, 2009
Edna - Education Network Australia - have issued an invitation to contribute to E-learning Insights, a cross-sectoral podcast that aims to provide academics, teachers and trainers with interviews on leading tools, technologies and issues in e-learning. The topic for the [...]
Opinions on online learning
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on December 19th, 2008
A recent exchange of letters in The Sydney Morning Herald raised some interesting questions about online teaching and learning, student attendance, student services fees and innovative teaching practices.
This letter was published on November 6, 2008:
The return of compulsory student union fees might improve services and recreation that “round out the university experience” (”Putting life back [...]
Seven trends to watch in digital learning
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on December 10th, 2008
The IMS Global Learning Consortium, an international not-for-profit organisation that develops standards for the uses of learning technologies, has written a list of seven trends to watch in digital learning. The list includes questions to prompt discussion and reflection, which are thought-provoking if you can get past the weasel words:
1. The age of digital [...]
Exit Reality - 3D web browsing software
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on October 13th, 2008
A recent article in the Sydney Morning Herald introduced ExitReality, free software which allows users to view any website in 3D (such as the MySpace page below).
Creator Danny Stefanic reckons ExitReality will be on a par with Google, YouTube, MySpace and Facebook! If so, this is definitely a technology to watch as far as [...]
Virtual Classroom Project
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on October 2nd, 2008
In the Virtual Classroom Project, teachers experiment with spaces for learning in Second Life. No more chairs, tables or blackboards! The creator of the project, Konrad Glogowski, writes:
I’ve been thinking about classroom design for a very long time but have never really been able to experiment with it until I found out about Second Life [...]
PhD comics: Architectural Styles of Contemporary Universities
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on September 24th, 2008
PhD (Piled High and Deeper) comics have been producing light-hearted scribblings on the topic of “life (or lack thereof) in academia” since 1997.
Ohio University’s Second Life Campus
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on September 19th, 2008
Ohio University’s Second Life campus promises a university where “learners thrive in an environment unbridled by space, time or the even the laws of physics … where the classroom has been not just recreated, but reinvented … limited only by your imagination…” The university has developed several teaching and learning projects on the virtual campus.
It’s [...]