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Facilitating career skills workshops in Miro: a case study
How might we design and facilitate more engaging, fun and interactive learning experiences with students in an online environment? I wrestled with this question for a long time, especially after hearing from students that they are struggling with online lectures after the prolonged period of remote study. Then I came across Miro and see so…
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A shared reflection approach to learning design
Like most people at the peak of COVID, our newly created learning design team of 5 were working reactively to navigate the changing digital education landscape. We learnt many lessons and channeled them into developing a common learning design practice that was both scalable and flexible in its application. Central to this process was adopting…
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Making education better is not a nice to have: Why Business Schools need to engage in and value pedagogical research part 2
In part 1 of this blog, I made the case that pedagogical research is a third space for academic activity, one that enhances the quality of education and generates rhizomatic connections between faculty, institutions, and critical forms of scholarship in Business Schools. In this second and final part, I will explore the benefits that Business…
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Making education better is not a nice to have: Why Business Schools need to engage in and value pedagogical research part 1
Pedagogical research has a challenged and often undervalued place in Business Schools, with its worth to the mission of the School and the individual academic diminished by perceptions that it lacks academic rigour (Norton, 2021), focuses on arcane or abstract theorisation of practical actions (McDonald et al., 2012) or is a form of scholarship for…
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Entangled pedagogy, design and the messiness of education
In a recently published open access paper on “entangled pedagogy” (Fawns, 2022), I presented a diagram of a few views of the relationship between technology and pedagogy. This was an attempt to show some problems with emphasising one over the other (e.g. putting technology or pedagogy first or last). I sympathise with the desire of…
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The place we speak from: Negotiating positionality in higher education
As researchers who produce new knowledge, and as educators who communicate and build learning communities around systems of knowledge, we always speak from a particular position. This position is constructed by and through the various intersections that make up our identity, including our experience of gender, class, race, age, and ability (Crenshaw, 2017). At the…
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Can poster assignments improve the student learning experience? Benefits for students and educators
Recent years have seen increased emphasis on developing the student learning experience in business school education. In addition to understanding how students engage with learning materials in their respective units of study, attention has turned to how students develop insights about themselves and their own personal development in the learning process (Dixon, 2022; Bovil, 2020).…
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Making space for connected learning: an ecosystem approach to designing teaching spaces in higher education part 1
This two-part blog post explores the complexities and affordances of using space to make connections. The first part interrogates the structural rigidity that emerges from physical classroom design and argues that connected learning requires a different design and emotional response from teaching spaces to be successful. Studies of teaching and learning spaces and their relationship…
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Are we forgetting why we teach? The importance of reflecting on one’s ‘calling’
Teaching academics face a perfect storm, whether it is the precarious work environment or the increasing administrative burdens (e.g. online teaching). In addition, teaching has historically been perceived as a poor cousin to research. In this perfect storm, I believe that proactively and critically reflecting on one’s calling allows the educator to find meaning amongst…
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Promoting Connectedness through Peer Mentor Support
During the lockdown of 2020, promoting connections and a sense of belonging became challenging. Leading in a Post-Covid World (LPC) was an intracurricular initiative run fully online in Semester 2, 2020, at the University of Sydney Business School. The program provided opportunities for students to develop their leadership and team skills during the COVID-19 lockdown…
