People who study how and why universities do what they do have been talking for awhile now about the ‘hidden curriculum‘: the etiquette, values, and expectations that underlie academic culture but which are not explicitly discussed. The hidden curriculum can create a barrier for members of the university community who are first-generation, working class, or… Read more Navigating Online Meetings With Confidence
One of my favourite things about working at a university is being able to see new ideas grow and develop. Many universities, including mine, foster this process through small grant schemes, which are designed to enable research projects to get off the ground. It was through one of these that I first heard of the… Read more Thing 18: Augmented and Virtual Reality
Back in June, I went to the third annual gathering of UK-based history librarians, which is always a wonderful opportunity to meet colleagues and continue learning about the field. Libraries matter enormously for the study and research of the past and it could be argued that the current situation is uniquely challenging for student and… Read more History Libraries and Librarians in 2020
Gentle reader, how are you doing? I hope you and yours are all healthy and safe. When I began this challenge in February 2019 I had no idea how much change lay ahead and how important digital means of learning and interacting would become. While lockdowns are shifting and changing around the world, it looks… Read more Thing 14: Audio
Well, friends, the world sure looks different than it did when I last posted. These next two things (Thing 13 is video and Thing 14 is audio) are now incredibly topical as everyone who works in a university adjusts to teaching and learning online. For thing thirteen, we are asked to choose one of three… Read more Thing 13: Video
Excited to say I am past the halfway point for completing my 23 Things for Digital Knowledge posts! It has been an educational journey and this week I am exploring the world of open educational resources, or OERs. “45th Parallel” by Shutterbug Fotos is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0 In this post I will discuss… Read more Thing 12: Open Educational Resources
A few weeks ago, an academic colleague asked me to digitise a play and add it to a reading list so all of their students could access it: It should be out of copyright (1949) by now, right? Librarian colleagues, depending on what else has happened in their day, might be laughing, groaning, snorting or… Read more Thing 11: Copyright
I am writing this post listening to the sound of Wikipedia being edited in real time. The one sound I never hear is silence, a powerful reminder of the site’s pervasiveness. The task of Thing 10 is to spend some time with Wikipedia by playing the Wikipedia Adventure Game, a tutorial designed to teach new… Read more Thing 10: Wikimedia
This post explores the use of two online platforms for meetings, teaching, and collaboration: Google Hangouts and Collaborate Ultra. My university seems to have an increasing focus on digital education as well as a growing provision of distance learning. However, neither of these tools are ones I have worked extensively with before in an educational… Read more Thing 9: Google Hangouts / Collaborate Ultra
Intro: no More I last logged into my Facebook profile in December 2015. If not for that, I would probably be writing for the ‘intermediate’ strand of Thing 8. I was a member of Facebook groups, some personal and some professional, and had found the latter a useful way to find out about conferences,… Read more Thing 8: Facebook