The CMALT Guidelines state that:

"Candidates should demonstrate their knowledge and skills in communication through working with others. Statements could describe the way in which your work involves collaboration, for example through participation in a team or acting as an interface to other groups."

As a teacher, collaboration is a huge part of my work - we share materials, work together to develop courses and share our knowledge and skills to create more effective learning opportunities than we could do alone. However, when it comes to my learning technology practice I’ve often felt stuck somewhere between the LT community and my teaching colleagues, which has sometimes been quite a lonely experience.

Initially, my main communication relating to LT was to ‘learn and pass it on’, where I learnt good practice through help from the PDLT team, workshops, webinars, MOOCs and my own study and then communicated this to my fellow teachers. This was positive in that I could share what I learnt with my teaching colleagues, but as my skills developed I often felt quite frustrated in this messenger role. I wanted to contribute myself rather than just pass on knowledge, and also to work more collaboratively on projects, but I felt very restricted by the limited scope of my role at the IPC. Since moving to my new role in the Learning Enhancement team, I’ve been able to collaborate more, particularly to develop study skills modules for new fully online masters programmes (see below). I’ve found it really satisfying use my LT skills to work with others towards a shared goal, and it’s nice to start giving back to the people who have helped me so much.

Initially, as I started to engage more with the wider LT community, I felt a bit of an impostor - how could I say or do anything of use to ‘real’ learning technologists? However, I’ve found that my teaching background gives me a different perspective to many other learning technologists, which gives me something to bring to discussions and projects, particularly relating to the practical application of LT in learning environments. I also find this works the other way round to engage with other teaching staff - I can show that you don't need to be a tech expert or have years of experience to get involved with good LT practice.

Here are some specific examples of how I’ve communicated and worked with others at the UoY and further afield.

I shared my experiences of using the Rubric tool with the wider university by delivering a Show & Tell session with the PDLT team. The tool is not used widely across the university, so I hope my insights helped staff in other departments see some of the benefits that the Rubric tool can offer.

Evidence:

• 4_PDLT and IPC (email showing my liaison between PDLT and the IPC)
• 4_Online marking training invitations
• 1b_Support site - setting up submission points
• 4_Rubric show and tell session (details near the end of the newsletter)
• 4_VLE training session

Online academic skills self-study resources

I'm currently working on the early stages of a large-scale project to expand the academic skills resources available across the UoY. So far, I've worked on developing study skills modules for new online masters programmes in management and computer science and also conducted a small scale project to create online resources to support a campus-based MSc programme (see Specialist Option for details of the resources themselves).

I've collaborated with others in numerous ways on the project:

Going forward with the wider project, I'll be working closely with the UoY Library team that created the existing Skills Guides provision to ensure that the content I create is consistent with existing materials. I hope that there's opportunity to co-author materials with the Library - initial conversations suggest this is the case.

Experiences in the project so far have shown that good relationships with departmental staff are key to creating effective, relevant resources. Because of this I'll try to work closely with departmental staff to understand their students’ particular needs, and use this to create general and department-specific support materials.

Evidence:

• SO_Adapted management materials (adapting subject-specific seminar materials from module tutor to online self-study content)
• 4_Liaison with IT Services (requesting feedback on draft before sending to programme staff)
• 4_Induction Module Testing
• 4_How to… Read the results section (collaboration with research methods tutor)
• 4_Sharing common queries for module FAQs

Supporting development of inclusive materials

I've shared some of what I've learnt about accessibility and inclusive design with my colleagues in the Learning Enhancement by delivering an adapted version of the TELFest workshop described below and creating or curating materials for an accessibility resources folder. See Core Area 1c for details of this.

Evidence:

• 1c_Useful resources folder (LE development)
• 1c_Inclusivity corner

In April 2019 I attended the White Rose Learning Technologists’ Forum, which focused on accessibility and inclusivity issues. For me, I learnt more about the implications of new accessibility legislation at an institutional, rather than individual tutor level, which is useful for me to better understand the broader context. There was also a practical workshop on inclusive design where I was able to share my experiences as a teacher and learn from more technically focused attendees. I reflected on my key takeaways in a post published on the #altc blog to share the session with the wider community. I found the Forum to be a useful way to learn from colleagues in different settings and so raise my awareness of aspects of issues that I may not be exposed to in my role. This will help me make changes to use LT more effectively to support learning, and in the future, I hope to contribute more as my skills and confidence develop.

Evidence:

• 1b_Support site - VLE Checklist
• 1b_VLE template site
• 4_WRTF post on the #altc blog

Collaborative workshop development & delivery

Accessibility and inclusive design is one area where I feel that I can use my teaching perspective to contribute to the wider community. At TELFest 2019, I collaborated on a workshop titled 'Inclusion for SpLDs' with Vicky Mann from the University of Sheffield. We had initially individually proposed similar workshops, so were asked to team up to deliver the session. The collaborative workshop aimed to raise awareness of barriers faced by students with specific learning difficulties (SpLDs) and introduce simple, easily implementable strategies to avoid creating these barriers (for more details of the session itself, see Core Area 1c).

Evidence

• 1c_TELFest 2019 workshop slides
• 1c_TELFest 2019 workshop materials (folder with slides and practice materials)

Future communication

Initially, I didn't feel that I had enough LT experience to be able to contribute to the community. However, based on my experiences delivering inclusive design workshops, I think that not being a tech expert is actually helpful in terms of supporting other teachers - I show that you don't need years of tech experience or special skills to get involved in LT. Also, teachers that are less technically confident might feel more comfortable learning about LT in a more applied, rather than directly technical setting.

I have a few upcoming presentations and workshops:

Inclusive design

My proposal for an adapted session on 'Inclusive Design for Dummies' has been accepted for the UoY's Learning & Teaching Forum 2020/21 workshop series. This is based on the development session I ran for Learning Enhancement colleagues (see Core Area 1c), and is pitched at a similar introductory level, but considers the needs of a wider range of students. It seemed that the previous workshop I ran wasn't very effective at helping participants learn about the difficulties faced by students, so this workshop will present this through user stories to give greater context. Based on my experiences above, I think that focusing on simple strategies has been very effective to introduce inclusive design and show the impact it can make for students’ learning, so I’ll continue to take this approach. As with ongoing support for the LE team, my aim is to help less technically confidence feel start to think about inclusivity more, and help them feel comfortable to access more in-depth PDLT training. Because of this, I purposely chose a light-hearted title and used an informal style in the abstract.

My collaborator at TELFest 2019 has also invited me to present my section of our workshop at the Innovations in Teaching in Higher Education conference in April 2020. This conference is for SpLD practitioners, so I'll focus on strategies for inclusive materials, rather than raising awareness of difficulties associated with SpLDs. Vicky has requested a very hands-on session, so I think this workshop will fit in well.

Online resources

• I'll present a poster at the UoY Learning and Teaching conference in March 2020, where I'll share my experiences of developing online self-study skills resources for the MSc PiE programme. This will summarise material presented here in Core Area 2b and the Specialist Option.

Evidence

• 4_Teaching & Learning Forum workshop proposal (Inclusive Design for Dummies)
• 4_Innovations in Teaching in Higher Education - Conference programme
• 4_Teaching & Learning conference poster (Online resources case study)