Ben R. Atkinson

This week’s topic of ‘Choosing Technology for Online Learning’ was particularly interesting to me, as in my current institution, the University of Lincoln, I am the Digital Education Developer (Learning Technologist) for the College of Arts. As such, I felt there was a lot I could bring to the discussion around the choice of learning technologies, however this did mean that I sometimes found it hard to navigate a path between the knowledge of learning tech that I already had and the exploration of new tools and platforms.

Thinking firstly about the learning technologies we use on a day-to-day basis, I decided to frame my response around the core tools that we support at Lincoln. The approach that we take at the institution involves have a ‘core’ suite of tools which are supported by the University and further outer rings of tools which can be used but may not be directly supported. Information on the core tools is available on our LALT blog. As such, I focused on technologies for video (Panopto), collaboration on the web (Collaborate Ultra), marking and assessment (Turnitin) and live audience response (Poll Everywhere). My own list of tools received some good responses from my peers, with Carols Garde-Martin taking forward Poll Everywhere as a tool to pilot later in the week and both Graham and Jill pointing out that the list was ‘useful stuff to know’ (Dunn, 2019). It was interesting to see what other colleagues suggested in this forum, particularly the use of Minecraft for Education which James C recommended (James C, 2019). I knew of the platform as a game, but was not aware that Microsoft had developed a version for education which has a specific application within the creative arts. I must admit, I did download the software and had a go – but I’m afraid I just couldn’t get my head around it. Perhaps this is one technology where the students are best leading the way. Finally for this section, I found Federica’s list late in the week when reviewing the forum and have to say it is a fantastic resource covering a full range of learning technologies that could be applied to any form of teaching and learning practice (Orandini, 2019). This list is a collection of all the ideas suggested by students on the module and it proves just how many varied approaches to technology there are and how useful they can be to pedagogic practice within higher education.

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Starting off in Week 8 of this EDU720 module, there was a focus on how our thoughts about designing key considerations related to designing learning environments in HE might differ between the traditional and online. This was a great way to segue into the second half of the module and there were some interesting ideas shared on the forum. For my part, I referred back to what we had studied in earlier weeks and the prior EDU710 module to come up with a list that encapsulated ‘the approach you wish to take’, ‘how you will assess’ and the ‘kind of students’ that are being taught. For this, I took a lot from MacDonald and her advice on blending learning and online tutoring where it is important to ‘understand what it is they [the students] are expected to learn, how they are expected to get there and in what timescale’ (Macdonald, 2006). This point of understanding the students is, I feel, particularly important as it informs all other aspects of curriculum design. I was pleased to get feedback from Federica who agree that ‘it can be quite important, especially with large cohort courses, to really be confident of the full range of ‘learning styles and needs’ that might be spread across the cohort’ (Orandini, 2019). We also agreed on the creative approach of module design which can be one of the most fun aspects of the task.

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This week has been very useful in terms of helping me to further develop ideas for my flipped classroom approach and consider how to create successful podcast resources.

Thinking about the specifics of producing podcasts for the flipped learning activity, I found the resources from Katie Gimbar and Andy Peisley to be very useful in helping me to further develop my ideas for the podcasts in my flipped learning activity. As Gimbar points out ‘it’s you delivering the lecture information. Someone else is not giving the information in your classroom’ (Gimbar, 2011). I found this point to be very interesting as it suggests that there shouldn’t be a differentiation between the practitioner in the classroom and one presenting/delivering the podcast – they should be one at the same person. At first, this makes perfect sense, but when you consider in more depth there are many examples of podcasts and video resources where the presenter puts on a voice or tries to be something their not. Peisley picks up on this point in the guidance podcast for this week’s activity, suggesting that actually ‘making a bit of a fool of yourself is also helpful’ (Peisley, 2019) – it shows the students that the podcast is real, you are you and the students feel relaxed that, as Gimbar puts it, the ‘language is similar, you can say things in a way that you like them to be said. You can ensure the students relate to this’ (Gimbar, 2011).

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This week, I have learnt much more about the role of reflective practice in Higher Education. The two readings from Moon and Scales et al. were very useful in helping me to assimilate my own ideas on what reflection is, against my experiences of teaching and learning practice.

The idea that reflective practice provides some form of outlet for emotion is a particularly interesting one. It can be all too easy to have very strong emotional feelings in the time after a teaching session has finished, be they positive or negative, and as Moon points out, funnelling this emotion into the art of reflection, is far more appropriate than letting it infiltrate other areas which may not be as appropriate. Similarly, reflection should not be considered an ‘add-on’, instead, it should inform all aspects of teaching and learning practice in order to facilitate improvement and personal growth. In this way, I believe reflection is always a positive thing allowing you to see negatives in a new light and learn from them and take comfort in the positives that can be identified. All of this can be linked to the idea of ’embracing change’ as suggested by Scales et al. where reflection can only be successful when it takes place in all areas ‘in action, on action and for action’. You must be open to what reflective practice will tell you and use this for ‘development and meaningful conscious action’. All of this should be done with due consideration of emotional intelligence.

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