ASCILITE NEWS

ASCILITE Learning Analytics SIG 2024 Series: Leveraging learning analytics for insights into motivation

Topic: What is the context for learning analytics and motivation?
Date: Wednesday 27 March 2024
Time: 2pm (AEDT)

Motivation plays a big part in how students engage with learning in higher education. However, there is a recent perception that student motivation is declining and, as a result, student engagement levels are also trending downward. In the 2024 ASCILITE Learning Analytics Special Interest Group series, we will take a look at how learning analytics can be used to interrogate the concept of motivation to develop insights that can help teaching staff to support student learning. Building on the ideas presented in our webinar last year by Dr Paula de Barba, across the series we will examine different theories, perspectives, and practical approaches to exploring the role of motivation in learning environments. The topics for our interactive series will include:

1. What is the context for learning analytics and motivation?
2. How do we apply motivational theories to improve student engagement?
3. What is the relationship between motivation and behaviour change?
4. How does staff motivation impact student motivation?
5. Does resilience play a role in motivation?

The series will involve interactive webinars, in-person events, and culminate in a workshop at the ASCILITE Conference in Melbourne which will give participants an opportunity to tie together the concepts discussed across the year, and focus on practical strategies to take back into their own learning design/teaching roles for harnessing the insights learning analytics can uncover for supporting motivation.

You can register here for this webinar.

ASCILITE Transforming Assessment SIG webinar: Frenemies – ChatGPT within Assessment

Date: 10 April 2024
Time: 5:00 pm – 6:00 pm AESTThis session explores the educational shift towards collaborative and co-constructive learning paradigms, emphasizing the challenge of assessing these in the context of rapidly advancing Generative AI technologies like ChatGPT. It presents five innovative assessment designs being piloted in university classes to bridge the gap between collaborative learning and individual assessment, utilizing Gen AI as both a tool and a participant in the learning process. These strategies aim to maintain the authenticity of assessments while fostering a symbiotic relationship between students and AI, reflecting a move towards assessments that support real-world, collaborative, and individual learning outcomes.

Presenter: Matthew Wysel (University of New England, Australia)

Register: http://taw.fi/10apr2024

ASCILITE TELedvisor Webinar: New year, new pathways: finding professional development opportunities for LDs / ADs / EDs / Ed Techs

Date: 28 March 2024
Time: 12 noon – 1 pm AEDT (Sydney, Melbourne time) | 11 am Brisbane time | 2 pm New Zealand

To start our webinar series in 2024, the TELedvisors ascilite special interest group are hosting a panel discussion on how learning designers / educational designers / learning technologists and others find and use professional development opportunities.

We intend to discuss formal learning, informal learning, community-supported learning, and documenting learning in your Advance HE or similar application (Area of Activity 5: “enhance practice through own continuing professional development”)

Each panel member will introduce themselves by highlighting an aspect of TELedvisor professional development that they feel is important now. We will then open up the discussion for questions and try together to expand the range of activities that could form part of our professional development.

Please watch event here for registration details.

TELAS Reviewer Certification workshop on campus at The University of Sydney

The Technology Enhanced Learning Accreditation Standards (TELAS) are a set of internationally benchmarked standards designed to assess the quality of online learning, particularly in relation to the tertiary sector. They provide institutions with the means to assess and evaluate the affordances of their online learning environments and thereby guide quality enhancements.

The next on-campus TELAS Reviewer Certification Workshop is now open for registration.
Location: The workshop will be conducted at the University of Sydney
Date: Friday 12 April 2024
Time: 9-4.30pm (AEDT)
Cost: $330(members);  $480 (non-members – includes 12 month ASCILITE membership fee).

Cost includes food.

For further details and to register, visit the TELAS website.

Please direct any queries and/or expressions of interest to admin@telas.edu.au.

Recording: ASCILITElive! Webinar – March 2024

Join 2023 Innovation Award Winners, Dr Lauren Humby (Lecturer, Criminology), Dr Trisha Poole (Academic Developer), and Mr Alex Charchar (Project Lead) to learn how the reaction toolbar has transformed online student feedback using emojis, mirroring social media interactions for immediate student reactions. This webinar highlights the toolbar’s design and its impact on enhancing digital learning experiences by creating opportunities for students to provide real-time, candid feedback. You’ll discover how this innovation fosters a more engaging and responsive online learning environment by making it more intuitive and effective.

Watch the webinar here.

Last chance to join the Contextualising Horizon Technology and Practice Workshops

ASCILITE’s 2024 Contextualising Horizon initiative continues in March with the Technology and Practice Workshops. These sessions build upon the work of the February STEEP Workshops, in which community members and affiliates identified the social, technological, environmental, economic and political trends impacting Australasian higher education sector. Participants will work collaboratively to brainstorm and identify the technology and practice trends likely to be of significance in the next 12–19 months.

We have two upcoming sessions for the workshops. You don’t to have participated in the STEEP workshops to participate in the Technology and Practice Workshops. Attendance at both technology and practice sessions is encouraged, but it is not required:

Register for Technology and Practice Session 1: Tuesday 19 March 12–2 pm AEDT
Register for Technology and Practice Session 2: Tuesday 26 March 12–2 pm AEDT

Contextualising Horizon is an ASCILITE initiative. Find out more and read the reports on ASCILITE’s Contextualising Horizon page.

OTHER NEWS

FLANZ 2024 Conference: Call for Papers

The Flexible Learning Association of New Zealand (FLANZ) is seeking submissions for the FLANZ 2024 conference which will be held between 26 – 28 August 2024 at the Grafton Campus of Waipapa Taumata Rau / University of Auckland.

Our theme this year will be Evolving Practice in Flexible Learning which will be covered under the following streams:
•    Evolutionary practice, flexible methods and pathways
•    Technologies and models
•    Professional development and training
•    Sustainable practices
•    Diversity, equity and inclusion

We invite the following types of submissions, which will be peer-reviewed:
•    Full paper
•    Practice paper
•    Poster
•    Workshop proposal
•    Work Integrated Learning Plenary proposal

All submissions are due on Sunday, 31 Mar 2024.

If you are interested in reviewing submissions, please express your interest by writing to Conference@flanz.org.nz .

Further details about the conference are available here.

Australian Universities Accord Final Report

On 25 February 2024, the Hon Jason Clare MP, Minister for Education, released the Australian Universities Accord Final Report.

The Australian Universities Accord Final Report contains 47 recommendations for Government consideration and aims to create a long-term reform plan for the higher education sector to meet Australia’s future skills needs.

The report is available here.