ASCILITE NEWS

Inaugural ASCILITE Spring into Excellence Research School

Save this date! The Inaugural ASCILITE Spring into Excellence Research School is schedule for 26 – 28 September at the Science Teaching Facility, University of Wollongong. This event, which is proudly hosted by the Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health, University of Wollongong will be facilitated by esteemed leaders and researchers in the field of technology enhanced learning.

At the end of the ASCILITE Research School participants will:

Have a sound understanding of current topical areas and methodologies for TEL research
Have broadened their professional networks
Have a well-developed and comprehensive plan for a TEL research project
Appreciate how to be successful in publishing manuscripts in journals
Be able to confidently review a manuscript against a set of criteria and provide constructive feedback to enhance the manuscript; and;
Have a strategy for identifying potential funding opportunities and developing funding application(s)

The ASCILITE Research School will be most suitable for:

Early to mid-career researchers
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SOTL) enthusiasts
Teaching intensive academics
PhD candidates seeking to expand their research in TEL SOTL
ASCILITE mentors and mentees
Anyone interested in applying for a TEL research grant
Anyone interested in forging TEL research collaborations and cross-institutional research projects
Academics seeking to incorporate research into their TEL practice and approach
Chairs of research
HDR coordinators
PhD supervisors

More information about the ASCILITE Research School will be made available in the coming weeks.

AJET Volume 33, No 1 (2017) Now Published

We are pleased to advise that the first issue of the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology for 2017 has been published. The editorial for AJET Issue 33(1) and the articles it contains are available from the AJET website.

As always, we thank the wonderful team of associate editors who facilitate the reviews and author revisions. The associate editors are: Associate Professor Shirley Agostinho; Dr Thomas Donald Cochrane; Dr Helen Farley; Assoc Prof Paul Gruba, Dr Jason M Lodge, Associate Professor Lina Markauskaite, Dr Stephen Marshall and Associate Professor Petrea Redmond.

We would also like to acknowledge the authors for their contributions to AJET and for the support we received from them in preparing papers for this issue.

Assoc. Prof. Michael Henderson, Assoc.Prof.Eva Heinrich and Dr Chwee Beng Lee
Lead Editors, Australasian Journal of Educational Technology

CMALT Support Group Launched

Are you planning to prepare a CMALT portfolio (Certified Member of the Association of Learning Technologists)? Perhaps you've been thinking about it, but don't quite know where to start?

If so, we invite you to join the CMALT support group to be included in a series of regular webinars in which we will offer practical advice and support from some of our current Australasian CMALT holders. The plan is to offer monthly webinars where draft portfolios (or parts of portfolios) will be offered advice from one of our local CMALT holders in an effort to assist participants to move closer to completion.

To join this group you must be a current member of ASCILITE, though not necessarily yet registered with CMALT.

Please complete this simple sign-up form if you are interested in joining. Alternatively, if you have any questions about joining the support group, email Mark Northover, ASCILITE Executive and CMALT Chairperson.

New Post at ASCILITE's TELall Blog

The latest post at ASCILITE's Blog is a contribution from Belinda Tynan, DVCE (RMIT) who was a Keynote at the ASCILITE 2016 Conference. In this post Belinda reflects on her time at the conference and the importance of community.

If you are interested in being notified by email whenever a new post has been published, you will find "subscribe" located on the top right-hand side of the blog pages.

You may also find some of ALT (UK)'s blog posts of interest and you can find those here.

ASCILITE Live! Webinar recording: The Role of Data in the Provision of Feedback at Scale

A video recording of the ASCILITE webinar conducted on 11 April is now available for viewing. You can read the abstract for the session and view the recording here. This webinar, which was presented by Abelardo Pardo, Associate Professor School of Electrical & Information Engineering, University of Sydney, explored how to capture and better utilize comprehensive data sets about interactions occurring in learning experiences.

Transforming Assessment (e-Assessment SIG) News

The TA-SIG's next session explores "Dialogue+: Students learning about assessment in first year" and is schedule for 3 May 2017.

This is a joint webinar organised with the Assessment in Higher Education conference 2017 secretariat. The presenters are Dr Rebecca Westrup (University of East Anglia, UK) and Prof Sue Bloxham (University of Cumbria, UK).

This webinar will outline the Dialogue+ process and explore the experiences of students, lecturers and peer-mentors. Dialogue+ supports first year students’ participation with, and understanding of assessment and feedback processes at university through the promotion of dialogue with lecturers. The intervention uses an interactive coversheet (ICS) (Bloxham and Campbell, 2010) along with lecturer and peer mentor-assisted workshops and peer mentoring.

You will find further information, times and registration details here.

Recording Available

A Recording is now available from the session "Virtual Field Trips to Enhance Employability Skills in Hospitality" held 5 April 2017. This webinar was presented by Assoc. Prof. Anoop Patiar (Griffith University, Australia), Pierre Benckendorff (University of Queensland) and Kayleen Wood (Griffith University).

The session explored how virtual field trips can be used to enhance the employability skills of students in the hospitality sector. The session looked at at the technology and outcomes from the OLT funded project "Enhancing Student Employability Skills Through Virtual Field Trips in the Hospitality Industry".

You can view and download resources for this session here.

OTHER NEWS

2nd Annual Online & E-Learning 2017 Summit

The 2nd Annual Online & E-Learning 2017 Summit to be held 20 – 21 June 2017 in Sydney will explore practical strategies, case studies and solutions for Enhancing Learner Experience and Engagement with Digital and Mobile Technologies. ASCILITE members are entitled to a 10% discount when they quote the booking code OLASCILLITE10.

The education sector is revolutionizing traditional teaching and learning; embedding online and e-learning elements into their curriculum. In this journey, the biggest focus has been around improving learner engagement, increasing retention, and managing change and conflicting perspectives about the best practices for online learning delivery.

Here is a list of some of the 30 featured speakers included in the event:

Kevin Bell, Pro Vice Chancellor (Digital Futures), University of Western Sydney
Julie Lindsay, Quality Learning and Teaching Leader (Online), Charles Sturt University
Brett McLeannan, Head of Learning Design, Content and Technology, Open Universities
Dragan Gasevic, Professor and Chair in Learning Analytics and Informatics, The University of Edinburgh
Katy McDevitt, Program Manager – AdelaideX, University of Adelaide
Michael Sankey, Associate Professor (Digital Learning Transformation), RMIT University

To find out more about one of Australia’s largest online and e-learning conferences visit the conference website.

Symposium on Stylus Enabled and Cloud-based Tertiary Learning and Teaching in STEM Courses

ASCILITE members and others are invited to attend a full-day symposium of styles enabled and cloud-based learning n collaboration with RMIT University and Microsoft Australia on Monday 19 June 2017 from 9.30am to 4.30pm at RMIT University.

Teaching faculty are also nvited to submit abstracts to support an oral presentation that focuses on evidence based best practices of how pen-enabled devices and cloud technologies can provide a means to drive student engagement, improved learning outcomes, and retention.

Further information is available on the RMIT website here.