Fortnightly Bulletin, 03 February 2014

 

ASCILITE NEWS

1. Reminder: ascilite Community Mentoring Program Open for Applications
2. ascilite Live! Webinar: Community Mentoring Program – What? Why? How?
3. ascilite Life Member Generously Offers Personal Library of Computers in Learning & Teaching

OTHER NEWS

1. DEANZ14 Conference Open for Proposals & Registration
2. 2014 Transforming Assessment Webinar Series Announced
3. Position Vacant: e-Learning Designer Position at the Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney
4. ALT News Digest 291

ASCILITE NEWS

1.  Reminder: ascilite Community Mentoring Program Open for Applications

This is a reminder that ascilite is accepting applications up to 21 February 2014 from prospective mentors and mentees for its Community Mentoring Program (CMP). In addition, a webinar on the CMP will be conducted on 11 February 2014 to explain the program and answer any questions. Details on the webinar are below.

Full details about the CMP are also available on the ascilite website.

2.  ascilite Live! Webinar: Community Mentoring Program – What? Why? How?

Date & Time: 11 February 2014, 12pm – 1pm AEST (1pm – 2pm ADST).

Abstract

The ascilite Community Mentoring Program (CMP) aims to provide mentoring opportunities across a number of fields including technical, academic development, learning development, faculty academics and early career researchers, graphic designers, and programmers. The program seeks to involve participants in a professional mentoring relationship built between learners (the mentees) and experienced practitioners (the mentors).

Whilst the new learners may be experienced in some areas of educational technologies, the ascilite Community Mentoring Program is a vehicle for enhancement of specific knowledge, skills or capacities in an area of developing expertise. The program has been operational since 2003 with approximately 90 members having taken part to date.

The one-hour webinar aims to provide you an insight about CMP and how it will be benefit you, either as a mentor or mentee. There will be time for Q&A during the session.

Presenter

Dr Sue Gregory, Senior Lecturer, ICT Education, School of Education, University of New England, Australia.

Dr Gregory is a Senior Lecturer in ICT Education at the University of New England, Australia. She is a long-term adult educator and teaches pre-service and post- graduate education students how to incorporate technology into their teaching. Sue has been applying her virtual world knowledge to expose her students, both on and off campus, to the learning opportunities in virtual worlds since 2007.

Sue has been involved with many national and university projects on creating and using learning spaces in virtual worlds, including three OLT projects, one as lead. Sue also received an OLT citation in 2012. Since 2009, Sue has been Chair of the Australian and New Zealand Virtual Worlds Working Group. She has over 50 publications on teaching and learning in virtual worlds.  Sue is currently a member of the ascilite Executive, co-editor of JVWR, ELVW Steering Committee member and Chief Editor of three books on teaching and learning in virtual worlds.

Registrations

To register for the webinar, simply email the ascilite Secretariat with "webinar registration" in the subject line followed by your full name and institution and whether or not you are a current member.

Ascilite webinars continue to be open to members and non-members so you are welcome to share the invitation with colleagues.

Once registered, you will receive an email with login details on the morning of the webinar.

3.  ascilite Life Member Generously Offers Personal Library of Computers in Learning & Teaching

Dear Colleagues,

I am in the process of cleaning out my library of academic books and conference proceedings that span 30+ years of computers in learning and teaching.

The extensive list of publications is available here.

I’d like to donate them to a library or researcher so if you know of anyone who may be interested, please contact me.

All the best,

Roderick Sims, PhD
knowledgecraft
rodsims@knowledgecraft.com.au

OTHER NEWS

1.  DEANZ14 Conference Open for Proposals & Registration

Registration is open now for the DEANZ14 conference, “Open, Flexible and Distance Learning, where is the ‘e’ in engagement?” DEANZ14 is the premier conference in Aotearoa New Zealand for leaders and practitioners involved in open, flexible and distance learning. The conference will be relevant to tertiary and secondary educators, including librarians, and those company trainers seeking professional and organisational development that DEANZ supports. You can get more details on the DEANZ conference website and brochure here.

DEANZ is pleased to announce the keynotes. Included on the virtual panel chaired by Derek Wenmoth are Dr Martin Oliver (UK), Professor Martin Weller (UK) and Dr Terry Anderson (Canada). At the conference we have Dr David Gibson, Professor Gilly Salmon and Dr Rhona Sharpe and invited speakers are Dr Bill Anderson and Sue Roberts.

When & Where

30 April to 2 May, 2014 at the New Zealand College of Early Childhood Education, Christchurch.

Registration

• Members: $675 inc GST (early-bird rate) which includes rejoining DEANZ for two years $120 value).
• Registrants in Member Institutions or Aligned Organisations: $625 inc GST (early-bird rate).
• Non-Members: $775 inc GST (early-bird rate).
• One-day registrations are also available: $350 inc GST per day (early-bird rate).

You may register online here.

Proposals

All for proposals is now open. Non-refereed papers, digital posters, workshops, round tables, exhibitions and refereed papers are all invited for the event. Author guidelines are available by emailing Michael Campbell.

• Refereed papers: Abstracts of 300 words are invited for review. Please email your abstract with ‘DEANZ2014 Refereed paper proposal’ in the subject line to2014DEANZ@gmail.com. Instructions for submitting full papers through the DEANZ Online Journal System will be provided to authors. Full papers will be between 3,000 and 6,000 words and will be peer-reviewed. Decisions based on abstracts for refereed papers will be made within a two week timeframe, where requested. Final refereed paper submissions due Friday 21 March 2014. Accepted refereed papers will be published in a special issue of the Journal of Open, Flexible and Distance Learning.
• Non-refereed papers: Abstracts of 300 words are invited. Please email your abstract with ‘DEANZ2014 Non refereed paper proposal’ in the subject line. Non-refereed presentations will not be published, however any slideshow or accompanying notes will be made available through the DEANZ 2014 website.
• Digital Posters: Please email a 300 word description of the proposed digital poster with ‘DEANZ2014 poster proposal’ in the subject line. Digital Posters (up to 100 MB in size) will be linked to the Deanz website with the opportunity for blog posts to be added by the author and those viewing the posters during and after the DEANZ14 conference. Authors must be able to access the website and post and reply to blogs about their digital poster.
• Workshops: Workshops of up to one hour are available. Please send an outline of your proposed workshop (including any technical requirements) with ‘DEANZ2014 Workshop proposal’ in the subject line.
• Roundtables: Roundtable sessions of up to 40 minutes are available. Please email an outline of your proposed roundtable (including any technical requirements) with ‘DEANZ2014 Roundtable proposal’ in the subject line.
• Pecha Kucha: Pecha Kucha sessions of up to 10 minutes are available. Please email an outline of your proposed Pecha Kucha (including any technical requirements) with ‘DEANZ2014 Pecha Kucha proposal’ in the subject line. A definition of Pecha Kucha is available here.

The proposal deadline is Friday 31 January 2014 and all proposals should be emailed to 2014DEANZ@gmail.com. You will be advised of the outcome of your proposal by Friday 28 February 2014. Final refereed paper submissions due Friday 21 March 2014. Selection of presentations will be based on the relevance of the submission to the conference theme and strands; likely interest to conference delegates; and contribution to open, flexible and distance learning theory and/or practice.

Conference strands

• Engaging (with) gaming – e.g. real Sims
• Engaging communities and whānau
• Engaging collaborations – e.g. work integrated learning
• Networked Learning Environment – includes design
• Engaging for e-learning excellence – includes Ako Aotearoa stream
• Engaging e-resources – e.g. e-library, e-books, OER
• Engaging (with) assessment – e.g. Turnitin, ePortfolios

Overseas delegates and teacher educators may also wish to attend the SITE International Symposium in the University of Canterbury e-Learning Lab held in the same week in Christchurch.

Further updates will be sent from time to time. We're anticipating an exciting and thought-provoking event that continues the great tradition of DEANZ conferences! Trade exhibitors please email Michael Campbell.

2.  2014 Transforming Assessment Webinar Series Announced

The Transforming Assessment Webinar series for 2014 will cover topics such as, assessment analytics, assessment design, badges, e-exams and MOOCs. The first session will be held on 5 March 2014 titled "Badges in MOOCs" and presented by Simon Cross, Open University, UK. Details of the 2014 series are available here.

3.  Position Vacant: e-Learning Designer Position at the Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney

The Sydney Medical School is seeking an eLearning Designer to perform a key role in the implementation of our elearning strategy across the full range of educational programs: Sydney Medical Program, postgraduate coursework programs and short courses. For further information and to apply for the position please visit the university jobs website.  The closing date for applications is Friday 7 February 2014.

4.  ALT News Digest 291

Association for Learning Technology Fortnightly News Digest 291 was issued on 24 January 2014.

ALT's journal – Research in Learning Technology is open access. Articles from the past 20 years are available here.