Paul Bailey : Activity

Timetabling and Resource Scheduling

Mon, 02 Feb 2009 13:04:39 GMT

JISC funded report on Timetabling and Resource Scheduling is now available for comment and discussion at http://elearning.jiscinvolve.org/2009/02/02/report-on-timetabling-and-resource-scheduling/

The report “offers a useful profile of current practice, challenges, use of technology, and innovation throughout the HE and FE sectors, which can be used as a benchmark summary and act as a ‘menu’ of approaches and possible use of policy, technology, process, and people ‘levers’ to develop current practice”

Please make relevant staff in your institution aware of this report.

Report on Identity management for lifelong learning

Fri, 16 Jan 2009 12:41:53 GMT

The JISC have just released a report on Identify Management for Lifelong Learning in the Further and Higher Education Sector.

A full copy of the report can be downloaded from http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/programmes/elearningcapital/imdfinalreport.doc

There is also a summary and consultation on the JISC e-learning blog, comments welcomed. See http://elearning.jiscinvolve.org/

Workshops on Learners’ Experience of e-Learning

Mon, 17 Nov 2008 11:03:16 GMT

In Their Qwn Words – Investigating the Learners’ Experience of e-Learning; What do we know? How do we know it? What do we dare to find out?’

A series of workshops to disseminate the findings from the second phase of the JISC Learner Experiences strand projects will begin on 9 December in Birmingham¹, followed by workshops in London (20 January 2009)², Newcastle (February 2009)³ and Bristol (26 March 2009).

The JISC Regional Support Centres will be taking bookings on their websites and by clicking on the location of your choice, you will be taken directly to the form. The second phase of the JISC Learner Experiences strand was launched in March 2007 with seven studies focused on different areas of the learning experience. These projects have been developing qualitative research methods and tools to capture learners’ lived experiences. The projects have sought to see the use of technologies holistically, through the eyes of learners, offering an insight into how learners experience and participate in learning in technology-rich environments.

The projects have been investigating such issues as:

· How are learners making use of their own and institutional provided technologies to support their study?

·         How can we explain the wide variation we see in learners’ experiences with technologies?
·         How can learners' skills, strategies and literacies be developed and exploited more effectively for the digital age?
·         How do learners experience change and transition through their learning journey?
·         What is the impact of course level practices and institutional strategies?

The workshops will provide:

synthesized findings from the learner experience projects, with explanation of how the analysis was conducted and illustrative examples
discussion of the implications of the findings for teachers, designers and policy makers
a pack of adaptable, reusable workshop materials for delegates to use in their own staff development and internal dissemination events.
An opportunity to hear directly from one of the 7 funded projects about their results (a different project will be at each venue)
guidance on conducting learner experience research e.g. recruiting learners and keeping them engaged, ethical practice, elicitation techniques
advice on data collection techniques for eliciting and capturing the learner experience e.g. audio logs, video diaries, email prompts, survey design

The workshops will be suitable for:

·         expert practitioners (lecturers, tutors from post-16 institutions) who are integrating technology into their teaching and course design;
·         intermediaries with a role in supporting practitioners with e-learning practice and research (learning technologists, e-learning champions, staff developers, educational developers).
·         practitioners, researchers or managers involved in implementing course or institution level research to understand the learner experience.

Places are limited to 50 for the 4 workshops and due to demand; we will be limiting attendance to a maximum of two representatives from an institution. Further details about these events can be found at: http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/elearning_pedagogy/elp_learnerexperience/learnerworkshops.aspx

Education 2.0? Designing the web for teaching and learning - publication

Wed, 12 Nov 2008 09:49:58 GMT

Teaching and Learning Research Programme (Technology Enhanced Learning) Further to presentations given by Richard Noss (Director TLRP (TEL), London Knowledge Lab) at recent JISC programme meetings, I am pleased to announce that this ESRC/EPSRC funded research programme has published its first commentary: Education 2.0? Designing the web for teaching and learning at: http://www.tlrp.org/tel/publications/

For more information about the JISC-TLRP (TEL) collaboration, please visit: http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/projects/jisctlrptel.aspx

I had a brief skim through this and it is what you'd expect, it provides a good overview of the current issues.

I was a bit disappointed to see the exclusive use of pictures of children using technology, I understood these TLRP projects to be looking at technology in Higher Education but the presentation did not reflect that - which may deter some people in the HE sector from taking it more serious.

Emerge Community Invitation for Benefits Realisation Small Projects

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:48:14 GMT

Members of the Emerge Community are invited to submit expressions of interest for Benefits Realisation small projects. Funding of between £5K and £15k will be available for small projects that help Emerge to meet the User and Innovations (U&I) programme’s aspiration for benefits realisation.

Emerge is seeking to fund small projects that are “project anchored, community led” i.e. they are anchored in a current or completed U&I Project and led by one or more members of the Emerge community and must make use of or build on existing funded projects within the U&I programme.

In addition Emerge would welcome proposals for one-off workshops or seminars which are community based around themes relating to the projects.

Total funding of around £90k is available to fund small projects starting in October and completing by the end of March 2009.

The deadline for submission of expressions of interest is 12:00 on Monday 15 September 2008.

Full details can be download here Community-invitation-BRProjects-Phase3.doc

Support to Widen Stakeholder Engagement

Fri, 30 May 2008 13:37:30 GMT

Members of the Emerge Community are invited to work in partnership with external stakeholders to widen engagement with the Users and Innovations Projects and activities within the Emerge Community (including Benefits Realisation Projects)

Total funding of £150k is available, with £25-40k per stakeholder (i.e. up to 6 stakeholders) to undertake activities that will validate, transfer and disseminate a project’s, or group of projects’ outputs to a wider audience.

Full details are available from Invitation to Widen Stakeholder Engagement-v1.1.doc or contact me for further information

Ideas should be submitted jointly between a project/consortia of projects and a stakeholder body, the first deadline will be Monday 14^th July. A later deadline will be announced in September if all the funding is not allocated. All funding and activities should be completed by the 31 March 2009.

Funding Invitation: Studies on Emerging Issues

Mon, 19 May 2008 14:34:00 GMT

Members of the Emerge Community are invited to submit expressions of interest for small scale studies looking at emerging issues in the use of Web 2.0 over the next 2-5 years. Funding of around £15k per study will be available for up to six small studies.

Full details and a proforma for application are available here: Community-invitation-Emerging Issues Studies-final.doc

Emerge is seeking to fund up to six studies in the following areas

The changing demographic of users (staff in institutions) and the impact of web2.0 on projects and services.
The impact of the semantic web on emergent issues of access to Web 2.0 practices
The impact of mobile and pervasive devices,
How institutional responses to new emergent technologies are affecting end users and their practice.

Total funding of around £90k is available to fund studies starting in July 2008 and able to deliver final reports no later than the 28 February 2009. The deadline for submission of ideas for studies is 12:00 on Monday 16 June 2008.

Managing Identity

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 08:33:46 GMT

Follwing on from last weeks excellent conference which explored online identity, you may be interested to listen to what the JISC are doing around identity management (at the more technical level). Podcast available at http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2008/04/podcast40jamesfarnhill.aspx

Benefits Realisation Day

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 13:08:26 GMT

It may not be as big as the Earth Day event we heard about on Emerging Sounds of the Bazaar on Monday evening, but we have only just started. We have the launch of the Bazaar at 4-5pm and I hope to see you all at "what not to rez" in SL later.

As part of todays activities can I ask you to share examples of Dissemination Ideas that have worked for you see the wiki in Moodle http://vle.jiscemerge.org.uk/mod/wiki/view.php?id=234. This will help emerge to know what works for you as community members be it online activities and resources, glossy publications or those things academics write for - journals.

Project Manager/Data Analyst Post

Tue, 01 Apr 2008 09:58:08 GMT

The JISC-funded e-Infrastructure Use Cases and Service Usage Models (eIUS) project requires one or more analysts to conduct interviews with selected members of the research community; and to derive use cases from the data collected.

They are seeking someone with knowledge of qualitative data gathering and analysis together with an interest in e-infrastructure services to support research. The project website is at http://www.eius.ac.uk/ (where the scoping study gives more detail about the project's methodology).

If you're interested or want more details contact Michael Fraser see http://users.ox.ac.uk/~mikef/

This project may also provide some useful information for the Emerge community, so if anyone does take on the role please do bring the project into the community.

Fri, 30 May 2008 13:29:55 GMT