First published in Campus Morning Mail 14th June 2022
Programme design and delivery through the lens of academic integrity from Quality & Qualifications Ireland
Kane Murdoch is the manager of the Conduct and Integrity Unit at UNSW and is responsible for investigations into student academic misconduct. This 18 min presentation to Quality & Qualifications Ireland encapsulates some of his experiences in the vexed space of student cheating and offers some surprising insights into what is needed in addressing this sometimes vexing issue. He questions whether the problem actually lies with students or with course and assessment design and offers some radical ideas for change.
11 digital whiteboarding apps from Lennart Nacke
Group brainstorming activities have long featured butcher’s paper and post-it notes but this is clearly less practical in online classes. This handy thread on Twitter from @acagamic steps through the basics and offers some simple comparison of functionality and features in 11 whiteboarding apps including Mural, Miro and Padlet.
Faculty perception of quality assurance in online courses (Thesis) from Theresa Mayper (Paywall)
While educators have been using online platforms to both support or entirely house their courses for some years now, the application of standards to ensure quality is often inconsistent or non-existent. Quality Matters from the US and, at a smaller scale, ASCILITE’s emerging TELAS scheme in Australia, offer frameworks to support this evaluation process but there has been little research on their impact on design. This doctoral thesis from Lamar University explores the perceptions of 12 academics in using the QM process as part of their course development. It’s dense but worthy.
As one of the pioneers of MOOCs (among other things), George Siemens is one of the giants of research in technology in education. This webinar from the Council of Australian University Leaders of Learning and Teaching showcases Siemens and UniSA’s Shane Dawson in what should be a fascinating discussion of the contribution that university learning and teaching units could and should be making in the practical education technology research space and the vital work they do to mainstream innovation in their institutions.
NFTs explained in 25 seconds. While the NFT / Cryptocurrency buzz may be fading, many of us still struggle to understand what the point of non-fungible tokens is, how they work and why they are useful. This 25 second clip taken from the tv show Patriot offers the clearest explanation that I have heard yet.