Over the last evenings I have been playing with digital and mixed media art to reflect on all the challenges faced working in higher education at the moment. In part these are responses to the irresponsible press articles demeaning online learning and teaching–it’s all just watching some videos after all, right?– dismissing the unbelievable amount […]
Category: Academic Development
posts related to my role in academic development
A Story about Becoming a University Teacher
Living by the Proverb ABSTRACT There seems to be a strong link between developing our identities and storytelling. As humans, we strive for coherence, and this coherence is found in stories (Hermans, 2001). This is an experimental paper telling a story about developing a brave, and authentic self as an educator (teacher) in Higher Education […]
#SoTLwalk August 2020
This is a non-walk SoTLwalk and rather late. I hurt my back and walking was so uncomfortable there wasn’t much reflecting going on through the process. I was so annoyed not being able to go out much during a sunny weekend, I made a ridge-walk with Munro in milk foam. đŸ˜‚ This month’s topic is […]
National Teaching Repository
It’s Official! If you ever want to understand the meaning of a Kraftakt (immense effort that goes into something) then have a look at Dawn’s brainchild the National Teaching Repository! Which is now all up and running and I have the honour to be curator for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning section! So without […]
Lockdown Adventures
This is one of the blogposts meant to go live a couple of months ago, and then things went head over heels in a thousand different directions, and suddenly it is the end of summer. Anyway, the issue I have been pondering is the relationship between our lockdown micro-adventures and pedagogy. There is learning to […]
You can find Learning Everywhere
Reflections on a summer holiday where almost nothing went as planned My granddad always said: There is always something to learn, in every situation, and in the least you will learn how not to do a thing. Writing some contributions to the Life Wide Magazine* for which the editors asked to reflect on how imagination […]
#SoTLwalk July
When life gives you lemons… This month’s theme is a chance to think about teaching and learning in difficult and unexpected situations – what strategies have you used to accept reality, realign expectations and take control? What do successes and failures look like in this ‘new light’? Does this make you feel vulnerable, authentic, brave […]
Hybrid Spaces
I am having an ADHD day from hell so to get my brain back into focus I just went down to the kitchen and made a chocolate cake and now I do what I always do to get the thinking thoughts out of my head–I write. (Okay I cheated and used a bake mix so […]
#SoTLWalk June
Identities in Crisis My reflections this month are a bit late. Too much going on. Too many directions to run into. Too much input. Too much expected outputs. Too many turn-around timelines. Too much. On all levels. But this rainy Scottish weekend, brings–unexpectedly–time. It was too wet even for us to go for a long […]
101 Photo Flash Cards for Teaching Prompts
The link below downloads a pdf document with 101 different photo flash cards that can be used as teaching prompts, for object based learning or story telling. Also available via the FigShare Link below: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.12479438.v3
#FOS201 OER and OEP
Today’s topic on the FOS201 Course was OERs my academic knowledge around OERs is rudimentary at best, an image that came to mind during the FOS201 reflection was that I use OER like the fancy coffee machine in our seminar room. I use it when we are permitted to, let my colleagues know when they […]
#ETConf20, The ‘New Normal’ and SoTL
Reflections on this year’s QAA Enhancement Themes Conference Frazzled Thoughts The reflections on this year’s QAA Enhancement Themes Conference are probably going to meander, from idea to idea, like a bumblebee from blossom to blossom. Two of my favourite phrases from the conference came from Prof Sally Krift who stated that we are in ‘a […]
Monthly SoTL-walk: Emergence
I have fallen in love with the SoTL walk. It is a great way to engage in reflective practice and with colleagues across the world. This month’s topic was more challenging than I thought. Once I began writing it grew vines and tentacles all over the place. So instead of sharing directly on the padlet, […]
Reflective Practice During a Time of Change
Reflexive Practice, Research Diaries and Witchcraft I feel at the moment I want to begin every post with: in the current situation, or during this challenging time … whilst I do not want to amplify the platitudes, the pandemic has amplified fractures, and needs. More than ever do I find solace in reflective writing, in […]
Zettelkasten–Messy Notes
Over the last years I have experimented with numerous apps, techniques and approaches of organising my notes. The last two months–which feel more like two years–have been challenging to say the least and resulted in a significant increase of note dumping. During times of poor focus I work in small bouts of sorting my way […]
