Initial reflections and summary of sessions from Day 2 of the ALT Annual Conference, Manchester, 3-5 September 2024. The common theme I extracted from the day is about purposefully connected digital education. This is not just about connecting learners and connecting spaces, but also connecting the curriculum to professional skills through the use of technology.
Student views of digital education in 2024 and 2040
The opening panel session for the day, chaired by Megan Kime, featured students from the University of Leeds and Edge Hill University from four disciplines. Student panel sessions ground an educational conference in the purpose of why we do what we do: it’s all about students, ultimately. There were many useful insights and whilst generalisation must not be drawn, I find the ideas that resonate across disciplines and the points that students raise about their own experiences offer up alternative perspectives and questions to ask about the use of digital and online education.
In terms of benefits of technology enabled learning, flexibility, provision of teaching materials and lecture recordings were mentioned and perhaps unsurprisingly as established use of technology. However there were two specific examples that really jumped out to me. First from Josie Batley, Art and Design student, with reference to generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) the learning about prompt engineering has been a meaningful and discipline-based use of the technology. So much so that Josie described this as “a way to stretch creativity”, which counters some of the arguments against GenAI. Secondly, Weronica Targosz, Business and Economics student, referred to extra-curricular learning through platforms the university had partnered with, in this case LinkedIn Learning. The strength of this was perceived to be based on accessing learning “from the outside” relevant to develop skills and knowledge for employability.
The themes of employability and AI were returned to later when discussing if and how AI should be supported. Very clearly the panel agreed that discipline-specific training or AI activities that were embedded in the curriculum would be the most effective form of developing AI literacy. The link to how AI was being used in the workplace further strengthened the argument that students are looking for authentic learning experiences and skills for successful professional practice. This was illustrated by a mature application of AI to support learning explained by Conor Gibson, PGCE student, as purposeful facilitation and not replacement of the learning process.
“Prompting AI to prompt me back… to further improve what I want to do.”
Gibson on the use of AI to further learning
Reflecting some of the points Chris Friend made in the Day 1 keynote about transparency, the student panel challenged the idea that more technology is best. Without a clear understanding of the rationale, use of technology could sometimes seem fragmented (the case of three different assessment tools deployed) or not integrated into courses. Gibson, made the point that sometimes educators can get “hung up on innovating” but need to address “what does it [a use of technology] add to the learning experience?”
There were many other points explored, but to highlight another echo of Chris Friend’s keynote, the concept of connection and learning spaces was discussed, reminding us all of the human aspects of education. The panel tended towards learning in physical spaces away from their living spaces, to help separate work and life. Struggling to work in social spaces, spaces designed for relaxation and the positive psychological impact of co-learning in an educational environment were mentioned. This is compounded further with the distancing effect of engaging with other students through screens and I think poses some very interesting questions about learning spaces online, as well as offline. For students, are they able to separate work and social life in the online environment? Are they able to separate work and social life through the use of a single device (their mobile phone, for example)? How are spaces, and students’ ability to use these spaces, impacted by distractions (such as notifications)?
There should be more student participation opportunities at conferences.
Critical thinking in practice
For the parallel sessions I attended, I was impressed with the quality and critical thinking behind presentations. The idea of distraction and spaces was mirrored in Helen Darlaston’s session on the self-efficacy of medical professionals and their professional learning. Whilst the intention is to have protected time, the reality is professional development is squeezed in around work demands in a high pressure environment or around family commitments. Distraction from learning results in nothing more than professional development as a ‘tick box exercise’ with learners never having the time to fulfil their learning interests.
How academic colleagues are supported with the use of institutional platforms from a design-led, pedagogic and inclusive perspective resonated across many of the short presentations. Alice Jones shared the important role of learning technologists in bridging institutional strategy with on-the-ground teaching at the University of Chester. Noting that facilitating conversations is a key function of such teams, a ‘connected’ approach was adopted and enabled engagement with a new teaching and learning strategy towards graduate skills. The cycle of curriculum and course development was summarised through the following points of discussion: competency based, social learning, inclusive design, continuous embedded assessment, flexible and accessible. Amy Giles provided an overview of the roll out of Ally and the techniques to engage academic teams using data to show the impact of training and student use of accessible alternatives. A greater awareness led to an almost 50% increase in the uptake of the tool, with subsequent benefits for inclusion and digital accessibility. Rob Lowney’s presentation about Moodle Planner as a tool that provided scaffolded sub-deadlines for assessment tapped directly into ideas of personalisation and the link to well-being previously shared by Giles. The technique of supporting students with learning journeys to assessment, to time plan and consider milestones towards deadlines directly acknowledges the diversity of student backgrounds and study skills. I’d argue it also, perhaps unintentionally, develops students’ ability to plan work, with positive impacts for employability and readiness for independent professional working.
Spaces and places
User interface, user experience and iteration (see notes from Day 1) was a theme repeated in Debbie Ginsburg and Darrel Manuel’s session demonstrating the changes made to their Canvas interface based on lessons learnt from their migration from Blackboard. The use of institutional templates had varying degrees of adoption, but to address some of the challenges of this and to create a more consistent experience their work made the templates more accessible, easier to maintain and also more visually appealing for students. As a side note, we’re also focusing on the user experience of our online programmes at Leeds, drawing on the ‘Laws of UX’ and already see benefits to how students navigate complex learning spaces.
Ming Chen introduced their PhD study exploring ways that virtual or augmented reality (VR/AR) can be used to support language learning. Chen offered a key criticism of VR that such experiences require a high amount of development, and therefore are highly pre-defined. The argument being that VR is another example of knowledge consumption, possibly passive learning. Noting the limiting factor of cost and scalability of VR, Chen suggested that students would use VR creation tools to develop situations such as restaurants, conferences and other social situations where language learning could be practised. Therefore, students become creators rather than consumers of VR and in that process are able to demonstrate application of their language learning.
Connecting education, students and quality
Discussion with colleagues is always a delight and in the morning workshop on AI and accessibility run by Kellie Mote and Helen Nicholson from Jisc, the focus was on what things needed to be considered in order to make decisions about the use of certain technologies. With a provocative situation that suggested banning Grammarly for all students due to the in-built generative AI capabilities, the broader awareness of how such tools reduced some disability barriers was considered. On our table we discussed assumptions over how we support all learners, not just those who declare a disability, and how if technology is out there, regardless of whether it is institutionally provided, students will be able to access it one way or another. One of the key points raised in our table discussion was the fact that Office365 already has an element of AI in the suggestions it makes when writing emails and Word documents and designs in PowerPoint. These are authentic workplace tools, therefore we should be supporting students to use these effectively as part of their employability and transferable skills (parallels with student contributions on the value of technology in education from the earlier panel). I made the rather glib point that if we try to block new technologies we are only on a course to revert back to chalk and slate, further distancing education from workplace needs and diving into irrelevancy.
My quote for the day comes from a participant in my workshop on quality in online and digital education. With reference to the question of who is involved in quality discussion and processes, students are one of the key stakeholders who are most affected by quality decisions. Yet, they are often the least empowered… “we need to get a grip!” Thanks to delegates for attending and participating in the workshop. I have written on the theme of quality in more detail previously, with an explanation of how just two questions on outcomes and engagement can keep quality embedded through the design and development process.
The importance of professional digital educationalists
To conclude, I’m going to repeat one of my workshop messages about the role of learning technologists and learning designers as facilitators of discussion, and their capacity to be a bridge to regulatory, sector standards and digital pedagogical angles of quality. In doing so, academics focus on their subject and digital education specialists bring a professional interpretation and application of quality standards. It’s the strength of professional skill and knowledge that such roles can have which inform definitions and practices of quality that contribute to course development teams, complementing the direct experience of students and the discipline knowledge and practices of academic teams. What was evident in the sessions today was the importance of a specialist community of practice, working in collaboration and partnership with students and academic teams. As we navigate complex questions about the future of education and the integration of educational technologies, the role of the learning technologist as a critical expert remains ever strong.
Acknowledgement
My attendance at ALT Conference was funded by the University of Leeds in my role as Head of Online Learning, Digital Education Service.
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