Ed tech must reads: column #40

First published in Campus Morning Mail, 21st June 2022

Digital transformation is human transformation from Greg Satell (Medium)

It’s nice to read an article about digital transformation that doesn’t include phrases like ‘in this time of unprecedented change’. Of course, that is because this is a pre-COVID article and it isn’t specifically focused on education but it makes some important points. Referencing research that indicated that fewer than a third of digital transformation projects succeed, the author makes a strong case that this is frequently because the leaders of the change focus more on the technology than the ultimate outcomes. In the case of education institutions, this is, of course, ideally about better learning and teaching. Satell reminds us that we need to focus on the most important part of the system – the people.

A systematic review of teacher roles and competences for teaching synchronously online through videoconferencing technology from Education Research Review

This pre-proof article echoes the Satell piece by diving into the varied skills that educators need for online synchronous teaching, via a review of 30 previous studies. Grammans et al. refine a framework developed by Baran et al. (2011) that describes six key roles for educators teaching online: pedagogical, facilitator, instructional designer, social, managerial and technical. In this roles they identify 24 competency clusters that should be considered by institutional learning and teaching units in ensuring that adequate training and support is provided.    

Leadership in Learning Development from International Consortium of Academic Language and Learning Developers blog

Something that people working in institutional learning and teaching units often wonder about is how to have meaningful influence on organisational strategies. Many learning designers, education technologists and academic developers bring significant experience and expertise to the table but for a host of reasons work more reactively than proactively. This post from two learning developers – Carina Buckley and Kate Coulson – outlines some of their approaches to making a contribution from the Higher Ed ‘third space’.

Use of live chat in higher education to support self-regulated help seeking behaviours: a comparison of online and blended learner perspectives from International Journal of Educational Technology in Higher Education

Two of the most significant issues reported by online learners are isolation and not knowing how to find help. This study from Broadbent and Lodge explores the attitudes of both online and blended students to chat tools as ways for them to communicate 1-1 with their lecturers. It finds this to be an effective tool for facilitating help-seeking behaviour but does note that teacher attitudes and potential workload issues need further consideration.