Adventures in Academic Development
Faculty Development, Hochschuldidaktik, Play and Creativity in Higher Education, SoTL
posts related to my role in academic development
A Denkanstoß Today I was reflecting on being young in age versus being young in experience with a certain skill or subject. This came about when I followed drawing instructions. And only halfway through the Pinterest tutorial did I notice that the resource stated it was from Drawing Lessons for the Young Artist. I have … Continue reading Of Being a Young Artist Again
The other quick learning guides I have been working with are SoTL Tips and Debunking SoTL Myths. I am going to share more of these on Instagram. The first SoTL Tip Tiles Text from image above: SoTL Tip 01 Always search for critique about educational models! Have you fallen for VARK (learning styles), or you … Continue reading SoTL Tips
While I have been rather quiet on here, I have been playing with various ideas, which I am sharing on Instagram (sorry not more Twitter for me, also at Mastodon) The first idea is to share bite-sized pedagogy. I am often told how difficult it is to get a handle on all the terminology and … Continue reading Bite Sized Pedagogy
Photo by Antoni Shkraba on Pexels.com Does any (or all) of the above sound familiar? Do you get decision paralysis, overwhelm, or procrastination? I tick all the above, and no strategy or mental image has helped so far. Until a conversation with a colleague clicked something into place. One visualization that was to help was … Continue reading The “Quiver of Arrows” Work Hack
Most of us have been there. The threated call! “Could you cover my teaching for me? Because, *insert valid reason here*. Here are the slides for this session.” Here is a strategy that worked really well for me. I had a look at the slides beforehand, yet some of the slides still did not make … Continue reading Tip: Covering a Colleagues Teaching Last Minute. And their PowerPoint doesn’t make sense!
Raunächte: Harsh Nights Raunächte begin at winter solstice1–today–and they coincide with the university being closed for the holidays. During this time, work is in this in-between space, it does exist and doesn’t at the same time. It’s rules are suspended waiting to begin anew in January. The twelve nights of Raunächte2 are created by the … Continue reading Raunächte: Join the End of Year Reflections
The quiz This is particularly for colleagues who either undertake SoTL (Scholarship of Teaching and Learning) project or colleagues who support it. Also if you are from social sciences, or education your perspective will be helpful! There is a persistent habit of jumping straight from a project idea to methods, regularly without even formulating a … Continue reading Can you help me break my quiz?
SoTL is Educational Research SoTL is intrinsically linked to your teaching practice. Whatever this practice may look like from traditional classroom teaching, to supporting learning, and supervision. You are a core part of this process, both in influencing pedagogy as well as in gathering data, analysing it and implementing changes. You might however, beg, borrow, … Continue reading AcWriMo2022: Debunking 4 SoTL Myths
This post is aimed at colleagues who (like I used to be) are mainly social media lurkers; who want to make the next step but are worried about it. Table of Content Introduction Remember my blogpost about the wicked problem of creating space for different voices? Particularly, the point about how to encourage participation? I … Continue reading Public Participation: An Emotional Rollercoaster
Somewhere on the wilderness of the World Wide Web I stumbled across this contemplation about comfort work by Austin Kleon. The idea was so relatable it made me contemplate not only how I work but also if framing things under this light might help with motivation during challenging times. First things first. Austin Kleon defines … Continue reading Writing is Comfort Work
Maybe not all mindfulness techniques but some of the most common: deep breathing, and body check are not as simple or risk free as you might think: How Deep Breathing Can Worsen Trauma Responses | Psychology Today It is a dreich rainy first November here in Scotland. And at 7 am I am contemplating my … Continue reading Mindfulness is NOT a panacea for anxious students
Dr Vicki Dale and I are running a very hands-on postgraduate course around creative pedagogies. One of the core messages I think we still have to make stronger: take a step back from discipline specific pedagogies. Teaching methods are in the least interdisciplinary–although I vote for transdisciplinarity! So I am making a public plea: teaching … Continue reading Looking Beyond: Thoughts on Teaching Models
This has been a very slow blogging year. I made up for it with several publications, including lead editor for an open access book and starting our oSoTL journal. The second edition was just published and edition three plus a special edition are in the works. So trying to get my blogging mojo back for … Continue reading #AcWriMo 2022
…or thinking about rivers ‘We are all tired.’ These words reverberate through higher education, no matter the country. We are all tired. Normally in October I have a plan for the academic year, the next quarter and the month. This is one of my key strategies to stay on top of the ADHD-fall out—being highly … Continue reading Why Most Productivity Advice is Pointless
Just coping, not quite fine In a conversation with my students (who are also peers and colleagues) today we were talking about how we all struggle at the moment. What emerged from the conversation is that we all felt things should be easier this year. We have pivoted online, we know how everything works. And … Continue reading Is it because the spaces never close?
Adventures in Academic Development 