Another week gone

That was how I entitled a post I started last Friday but was so tired I didn't write anything intelligent, so have just deleted it. So I'll try again. I seem to have settled into a routine which involves going to the office, working on the next workshop (which involves reading, searching the Web, talking to people etc.), coming home and catching up on a personal life through the computer and spending lots of time exploring the internet. One of the things that is of benefit to me from this time, is the better understanding of the lure of the internet and how it can take a lot of time, and produce a lot of good stuff but a lot that is not so good.

The weekend brought an opportunity to be a sightseer with my next door neighbour, Marie. We went in search of the beach on the shores of Lake Erie. We found a lovely spot, but my Canadian colleagues discussed the merits of Lake Erie beaches compared to Bermuda and Hawaii, and decided there was no competition. However it was a very pleasant spot in the 33 degree heat which has left me melting. On Sunday Marilyn, the CTL administrator, and I went and explored Fort Malden in Amherstburg and learnt about the wars, battles and skirmishes between the Americans, British and the Native people. The original fort was built in 1796 by the British who then destroyed it in 1813 as they retreated. It was subsequently rebuilt by the Americans and the British is varying stages, but not much remains today. But what there is is interesting. I have never seek a musket loaded and fired before in genuine 19th century style.

Monday brought Nick, the next of Alan's visitors, from the University of Queensland. So my seat won't have time to get cold. Despite a limited amount of conversation with Nick so far, we have smiled ruefully at the characteristics of the academics with whom we work - in UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Again another bit of serendipity. I have been working hard on a workshop on learning spaces and why it is important to have a mixed team int he decision making process for redesign and redevelopment. One of the buildings that I have heard about for some time in the Engineering building at the University of Queensland. Then Nick turns up and says he has lots more photographs of other interesting spaces which are being developed in Brisbane. So he has got his first workshop to organise!

The thunderstorms we have been having for the past few days are amazing - the whole sky lights up, and boy can the rain fall hard. But no tornados yet thank goodness.

Marie at the beach at Cedar Creek

Being a student

Bev has said that I have the air of a student with a deadline very close by as I am surrounded by books and articles and am peering closely at the computer screen through my new glasses. Suddenly the imperative has arrived to get things done - making promises to give resources to others is quite a driver. So this is short and sweet tonight, as I return to the work required to achieve the self-imposed deadline. Is this what I have finally achieved?

Reading

I am fortunate to have been excused a lot of the conference preparation that is going on apace at Windsor, so have been able to read widely around the broad topic of educational development. I am constantly amazed (or is it reassuring and to be anticipated) that articles that are ostensibly about one topic contain ideas, references or methods which are or could be relevant in other places. To give you an example, I have three workshops in preparation at the moment - one on the institutional helps and hindrances to Inquiry based learning, another on evaluation, scholarship and research in the contest of educational development and a third on the changing roles and rewards for faculty (in the North American sense). As I browse the journals I find articles by Angela Brew that give me definitions or descriptions of IBL at the same time as giving me ideas about the scholarship of teaching and learning. An article entitled "Changes in Higher Education and valuing the job:the views of accounting academics in Australia" gives me ideas for why IBL might be hard to implement across a discipline, let alone a University. I think the concept of transferability must come in here somewhere.

The greatest pleasure I get from this observation for myself, is that the benefits of this sabbatical are likely to pop up in different ways once I am back at Canterbury because the reading I have done has covered such a diverse range of topics, and the biggest headache it is creating is how to file all these references. Endnote is not available at Windsor and I haven't done the training at Canterbury, so feel a bit overwhelmed by that software, and Refworks does not seem to provide sufficient detail for what I want, so I have an spidery systems of folders and sub-folders on the hard drive and hope that the contents will be able to be easily downloaded to a new USB stick! So some technology gains, but not yet enough.

Photo today takes us to yet another country - County Down in Northern Ireland. I just love the lighting in this picture (and the memories of my youth that it conjures up!).

General goings on

Life is fairly humdrum at the moment, except that some more New Zealand folk are passing through Windsor at the moment. Neil and Faye from Christchurch are here. Neil is the former head of educational development at Lincoln University and he is trying very hard to work out how to retire but has failed so far. He is here en route from India and the UK, and France and Germany but mainly from doing workshops across India on his learning preferences tool VARK. His experiences there have prompted some interesting discussion about the nature of giving workshops in a foreign country and should we conform top their requirements or work in our normal way and help them understand that. It is a hard compromise sometimes, but given that VARK is sensitising people to how they and others have a preference for giving and receiving information, there must be some validity in sticking to the regular way of presenting the workshop.

It is bizarre walking through the sculpture park in Windsor with someone who fits into my life in Christchurch - but it does highlight the smallness of the world of academic development as I have been getting reports of other colleagues whom we all know. Looking forward to meeting some of them at ICED in Salt Lake City soon. The little planes were practising as we walked so a picture of the event before the event, followed by two action shots!

Maybe life isn't so humdrum after all. I spent this glorious sunny afternoon on the roof of a 28 storey building watching little planes fly between and round large inflated towers. It was very impressive - the Red Bull Air Races, but no-one knew what was going on, who was winning, or who won, but as this event only happens 10 times per annum, I felt very privileged to have such a bird's eye view of the proceedings. I will put up a photo as proof, but doubt you will get a sense of the excitement. About 50000 people on the Detroit side of the river and 40000 on the Windsor side had bought tickets - not to mention the flotilla of boats on the river and people in similar locations to me and others who were just on the riverbank outside the paying area. Quite a spectacle which I enjoyed just for the moment. For those who would like more details try this website http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/June2008/01/c6976.html

Also another point of cultural difference - today is the Queen's Birthday holiday in New Zealand so colleagues there are not at work. It has been Whit Bank holiday in UK recently I do believe! How bizarre!

The chocolate speaks

As a break from thinking about and preparing my workshop session for STLHE, I went in search of caffeine. One of the few (relatively) nearby locations is in the CAW Centre (the students' union). This is "Headstart" week so the campus is alive with youth thinking about their new lives at the University. There are a multitude of booths set up in the CAW centre so I thought I might capture a good idea or two to bring back to New Zealand. I spoke particularly to the organisers of the orientation week (classes don't start till Thursday of the first week) and they are encouraging the new students to have input into the design of orientation for themselves. A good idea - will be interesting to see if they have any different bright ideas. They also talked about faculty holding get to know the profs as more than a distant face in a lecture theatre. Sounds like a jolly good idea to me, or even at a programme or departmental basis.

The other person I had a long conversation with (sorry Michael that your coffee got cold) was Michael from the Careers Education Centre. Aside from the accent and the looks, it could have been the head of careers at Canterbury speaking. "Students don't want to know about career planning till year 4; faculty aren't interested and see no linkages between their classroom and what the students might do in the future." He has tried everything that I have heard of to engage students and staff and has now decided to resort to good old word of mouth and customer satisfaction to develop his business - an exact replica of the conversation Michael and I had had about GA/TA training before I set off for the coffee.

On my return I noticed the wrapper from a Dove chocolate that I ate a few days ago. It is a bit like fortune cookies (each wrapper has some bright suggestion inside). This one says "learn something from everyone you meet."

Photo today comes courtesy of Hilary who called to visit between Berlin and Wellington. This is a favourite view of Petrin Park in Prague (she had a side trip there).

Reviewing one's life!

Time is confusing me here in Windsor. This morning I checked my Canterbury email and replied to a couple of messages. I was most surprised that the Acting Director needs to be responding to emails at 1am! Then, this afternoon I sent a couple of emails at the end of my working day to other colleagues in New Zealand and I got instant replies - they are at work tomorrow morning already! Trying to find a suitable time to call my daughters - one in NZ , one in UK has required me to go to the world clock and register my needs. So is it today, yesterday or tomorrow!!

Then tonight, in lieu of television, I have watched the video recording of the workshop session that Michael and I ran yesterday with a view to deciding how we would use this footage. I have to say, I am not quite sure, as it was genuinely a workshop, so the participants, who had no microphones , did a large proportion of the input into the session. Michael and I did the planning and gave the instructions. My reflection is - is this fair for the participants? In this instance we had billed the session as "Capturing excellence" and were quite clear that we wanted to pick their brains for the benefit of others. But how much "input" is a workshop participant entitled to receive from the facilitator, or does all the "input" come from the participants? Perhaps, the skill of a good facilitator is to have sufficient expert knowledge in the field to be able to build on participants input and to fill gaps should they form and to stand back and let it happen when the participants are fully engaged and sharing quality input. I know that sometimes I come away from a workshop and wish I had listened more and said less and then I would have learnt more. A word of warning perhaps for those of us who might like to hog the limelight. Some useful thoughts as I prepare for workshops for the ICED and STLHE conferences.
Today's picture near Almonte, Ontario. Rather English don't you think?

Other Universities

I have spent a great time in Ottawa, visiting two quite different EDCs and catching up with friends from Ireland. The last time I visited Ottawa (12 years ago) I was on a fact find about surveying education in Canada and exploring the possibilities of placements for our surveying students in the real estate practices of Canada (I fancied the opportunity to be their placement tutor and therefore be required to come to Canada.) Whilst I had an interesting time, unfortunately no placement opportunities were forthcoming and it has taken a long time for a return visit.

Not sure what to pick out as the highlights of the two visits - there are many points of contact and similarity and some different ways of looking at issues. The agenda covered Student evaluation of teaching; academic integrity; learning management systems implementation and change; institutional change and how to run an educational development centre. The formality of the academic integrity process at Carleton is forbidding but reassuring at the same time. Also interesting that the staff in the Educational Development Centre maintain their discipline teaching opportunities - it is not often you see a set of skulls decorating the windowsills in the EDC. But they also have created a most welcoming environment in their relatively new premises with super pictures. As I was being shown around Maggie let me into the main seminar/training room, and explained that they had failed to sway the designers into allowing them flexible and movable tables and chairs. A very well designed room nevertheless and able to be used in a reasonably flexible way. (see picture below) .

Ottawa University's Teaching and Learning Support Services has an extensive array of technology support activities as well as more traditional academic development. I enjoyed seeing (and hearing) a truly bilingual university at work - and observing some of the additional challenges that poses.

Today has been a busy one at Windsor, co-facilitating with Michael a workshop on "Capturing Excellence" in PhD supervision. We had a fun time and the participants engaged fully, even to the extent of putting coloured posit notes on their papers without being given a rationale. As in Canterbury, some excellent practices in PhD supervision/advising are going on and there were plenty of instances where people became aware of there being "another way" compared to their standard personal or departmental practice. This event was jointly sponsored by the Dean of Graduate Studies, endorsed by the VP Research and CTL, and is hopefully the beginning of a suite of activities for staff and students int his area. Much of the workshop planning was informed by similar activity going on at the University of Canterbury and the development of the working relationship with the Postgraduate Dean there too. Practices can be universal or at least similar and fine tuned for the location. In his opening remarks the Dean of Graduate Studies referred to Windsor's peripheral location which is sometimes depicted negatively in Canada and said that whilst there was little that could be done about that, the faculty had within their own control the opportunity to ensure that the students' have a positive master's or PhD study experience. A lesson for us all to remember.

Photos today are the seminar room at Carleton and Michael wondering about excellence this morning.