@cristinacost responded to your comment and removed 1 of your duplicates #

@cristinacost I figure that communication is about moving ideas between people, and you did it so well, regardless of typos #

@cristinacost just reading your comment now, thank you so much for sharing #

@cristinacost Nice, brings back some good memories #

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One of the key themes that emerged was the idea that research should be taken down off of it’s pedestal and integrated into the curriculum as a functional, useful and exciting aspect of teaching and learning.  Dr Angela Brew established this idea in the first keynote of the first day.  That research should not be seen purely as a series of steps to be undertaken in the lofty towers of higher education, but should rather be seen as an integral part of teaching and learning.  The phrases “research-based learning” and “inquiry-based learning” cropped up regularly over the three days.

This idea that research should become part of the curriculum, rather than something tacked on, moved the conversation into another strong theme, that of the “scholarship of teaching and learning”.  In order to teach in your field, it’s no longer enough to merely know your subject.  The move towards evidence-based practice doesn’t only apply to our own niche fields, but should be applied equally strongly in how we approach the way we teach.  The concept of “communities of practice” came through strongly in this realm.

Martin Oliver’s keynote negotiated the fine line between technology in education as an all-powerful saviour, and a potentially misleading mindset that puts the technology, rather than pedagogy, first.  While e-learning was generally lauded as a powerful tool, enthusiasm should be tempered with optimistic caution.  With technology changing so quickly, it seems that a predominant focus on the tools themselves, rather than pedagogy, will be met with failure.

There were a few presentations I attended that urged educators to become more aware of students social lives, which came with evidence of the fact that they are not always as we imagine them to be.  Realising that students often have significant difficulties in almost every aspect of their personal lives can (and should) change how we relate to them.  As educators, we should understand that not only do we bring our own personalities and quirks into the higher education space, but so do our students.

Here are the notes I took while at HESS 2008:

Summary of HESS 2008 (OpenDocument format)
Summary of HESS 2008 (MS Word format)

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• Keynote: Higher education “failing the majority”: Is a four year degree the solution?
• Keynote: Education as politics
• Principles for effective professional development in higher education institutions
• Factors impacting on student learning at UWC

All in all, this was a really exciting place to be over the past few days.  I met some very interesting people and had some great conversations, which I hope will continue in the coming months and years.  It’s going to take me some time to go through my notes and reflect on what I’ve learned.

On top of that, my first visit to Grahamstown and Rhodes University was a wonderful experience and I hope to be back this way sometime soon.

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I gave my presentation first thing this morning and it seemed to go down well.  A few people had some nice things to say, which is always nice to hear.  Sometimes I think I’m so far behind what other people are doing, then you get a day like today when you realise that we’re all just trying to figure things out as we go along and that we all have a lot to learn from each other.

I think it’s a pity that we’re not doing more together.  I’m not saying that everyone should be doing the same thing, but there’s a lot of overlap where we could share ideas, discuss what’s worked, in what contexts and with which students.  I had a few very interesting conversations with people who are struggling with some of the same issues in their departments, that we have in ours.  I hope that these conversations will continue over time and that we can begin building relationships between our higher education institutions that continue to evolve and grow long after this conference is over.

Today I was lucky enough to see the following presentations:

• Keynote: Pandora’s box, cornucopia or Trojan horse? The introduction of technology in higher education
• What do our institutional leaders perceive as e-learning success?
• Creating a true community of academic practice through research based learning
• The implementation of technology-enhanced problem based learning methodology in geographically dispersed learners
• The challenges of teaching anatomy for a kinesiology context
• Teaching sociology.  What am I doing?

All in all, today’s presentations were extremely thought provoking and at the very least, interesting.  There wasn’t one presentation where I left disappointed.

I mentioned earlier that I’m staying at an old prison that’s been converted into a backpackers.  I thought I’d share a little something of the place I’ve called home for the past few days.  The building is a national monument, so the proprietors can’t make any changes to the structure, which sounds great but it does have it’s drawbacks.  Luckily this is the kind of place I quite like.

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• Keynote: Opening up spaces for research and enquiry
• Introducing the construct of “conceptual infrastructure” to support higher education development
• Developing communities of practice in large class teaching using tutorials and forum discussion
• A theoretical exploration of the potential use and benefits of social software as an emerging technology in support of e-learning in tertiary education
• A model for ensuring the quality of multimedia learning materials
• Superstars to teach large classes
• An overview of teaching and learning in geomatics
• Uniting life and education
• Computer skills for university entrants
• Implementing mentoring using ICT tools
  

When I get home from the conference, I’ll have a few days to collate all my notes and will try to provide a summary of the conference, or rather, the conference as I experienced it.

I learned a lot today, but the main thing I learned is how much I really don’t know.  The problem with these conferences is that you get to hear about all the really cool things that other people are doing, and in the end your brain explodes because you can’t do everything you want to, not matter how much you really, really wish you could.

Sigh…

Here’s a few pictures from day 1

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