New podcast: Chinese student’s transition into uni
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on July 28th, 2009
Check out the latest addition to the LTC podcast series Engaging Students:
Chinese Students’ Transition into University - Liyun Huang
Liyun Huang, a visiting scholar from China, talks about issues and challenges Chinese international students may face when they make their transition into university life in Australian universities.
The talk starts with a comparison of eastern and western [...]
Video games inspire students
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on July 27th, 2009
From John Moravec at Education Futures:
From the Chronicle of Higher Education:
Will Wright, the video-game designer responsible for some of the best-selling titles of all time, says that video games are better at inspiring students to learn than actually teaching them.
Serious play
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on July 24th, 2009
This blog has previously posted on using lego for teaching. In this video, Dr. Stuart Brown says humor, games, roughhousing, flirtation and fantasy are more than just fun. Plenty of play in childhood makes for happy, smart adults - and keeping it up can make us smarter at any age:
I post links to a lot [...]
More on the Educause challenges for 2009
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on June 19th, 2009
Back in February, this blog listed the Educause top 5 learning and teaching challenges for 2009:
Creating learning environments that promote active learning, critical thinking, collaborative learning, and knowledge creation
Developing 21st-century literacies (information, digital, and visual) among students and faculty
Reaching and engaging today’s learners
Encouraging faculty adoption and innovation in teaching and learning with IT
Advancing innovation in [...]
60% of students find their lectures boring
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on May 19th, 2009
Research by Sandi Mann, senior lecturer in occupational psychology at the University of Central Lancashire, shows that almost 60% of students find at least half their lectures boring, and about 30% claim that most or all of their lectures are boring.
Bored students spend their time daydreaming (75% of students admitted doing this) - one wonders [...]
Upcoming LTC workshops and webinars!
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on May 5th, 2009
Social Media in Education Webinar - Wed 13 May, 10.00-11.00am
This session presents the current issues, opportunities and directions for education in a world powered by Web2.0, mobile, non-passive communication technologies. It is ideal for anyone trying to understand how social media impacts learning and teaching, the engagement of students, and the technologies that deliver enriched [...]
Engaging Students podcast series
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on March 13th, 2009
Check out the latest in LTC’s Engaging Students podcast series. In it I speak to Cynthia Townley from Philosophy about student engagement, ethics and her philosophy of teachers as learners.
Last year, Cynthia, together with colleagues Catriona MacKenzie and Mianna Lotz, received an ALTC citation for excellence in the development of a cross-disciplinary research-based ethics program, [...]
Students engage with student engagement
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on March 9th, 2009
Unis - MQ among them - are spending a lot of time and energy these days thinking about student engagement. But what do students think? What happens when we don’t just ask them, but we get them to do the research?
As part of a Masters Anthropology course, Lisa Wynne set a topic that allowed students [...]
Student-centred learning? Or a chance to whinge?
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on March 6th, 2009
In a Times Higher Education article that purports to ask whether student-centred learning is (a) “a sound practice based on mutually respectful shared scholarship” or (b) “a managerialist fad that fails to stretch the brightest,” the anecdotal arguments of Frank Furedi, a professor of sociology, are given top billing. Here’s what he has to say:
“It [...]
Landscapes for learning
Written by Agnes Bosanquet on March 5th, 2009
Earlier this year, the Guardian published a story on the impact of urban decay on the behaviour of school students and the morale of teachers. You can read the article here, and the blog post that stemmed from it. For more detail, you can read the report itself (produced by the teacher’s union).
It seems that [...]