Overview Anelda (from Talarify) invited me to an event entitled The ESCALATOR virtual Computational Research and Open Science Community Mentorship Indaba. As an organization, they are working on the development of a champions network to grow a community of practice around digital and computational skills amongst South African humanities and social sciences researchers and students. […]
Author archives: Derek
Academic Blogging
Benefits of Blogging Blogs allow you to express the essence of your research in different ways for different audiences. The blog allows you to connect with a broader network, to plug in to conversations that go beyond an immediate academic circle, to extend an academic role. Blogs are a place that offer you the opportunity […]
OE4BW – 2021
A few years ago, while scrolling through Twitter, I saw a link to an application to be mentored in the Open Education for a Better World (OE4BW) programme. I’d created many online and digital resources, but my efforts were often solitary and conversations around the work were limited to individual “client” updates. Work felt insular […]
OEGlobal20 Conference
Open Education Global (OEG) is a global, members based, non-profit organization, promoting supporting the development and advancing the use of open education around the world. Creative Commons, is a member of OEG and as South Africa’s CC representative on the GNC, and interested especially in developing, implementing and supporting open education in South Africa, I […]
Myanmar textbook authoring
Montrose is an international development project management and consultancy company providing support to clients operating in the developing world. I’ve been working with them on a project entitled “Strengthening Pre-service Teacher Education in Myanmar” and we have been redesigning the pre-service teacher education curriculum Middle school teachers in Myanmar receive four years of pre-service training […]
A brief introduction to VoiceThread & micro- teaching
VoiceThread is a cloud-based application that run in your web browser and on almost any internet connection. VoiceThread allows you to upload, share and discuss documents, presentations, images, audio files and videos into a common space for an asynchronous group conversations. Viewers can comment on VoiceThread slides using one of five powerful commenting options: microphone, […]
House keeping
Conferences, seminars, workshops, colloquia often seem to kick off with “housekeeping”. Where’s the bathrooms? Announcement of meal times. What’s the wifi password. Reminder about venue rules. Introductions of attendees. Location for the bus to take you to the social activities in the evening. This is is key orientation information, to help you to navigate an […]
OE Global 2019
I’m back home after a fabulous week in Milan. Spent my first morning back at my desk scrolling through tweets, looking at OE Global conference photographs (via Flickr) and admiring my new swag. Before ploughing on into December, I’d like to consolidate what I gained from the Open Education Consortium’s conference (26-28 Nov 2019). […]
The blended learning field guide
I’ve been working with the Department of Education Innovation at Pretoria University to design a “Field Guide to Blended Learning, intended to complement the Blended Learning Self-Evaluation app. The app uses eight dimensions (assessment, teaching and learning strategies, learning activities, content, communication, administration, design and support) as a structure for self evaluation. Academics open the […]
Course rollover*
Another semester. A new cohort of students. And for many, a re-run through the once “wired”, but now “tired” online course. The overturning of a course is usually seen as a quick copy and paste exercise, a brief interruption (hopefully) and then a return to normal service. A course rollover does not have to herald […]