The event, led by JISC’s e-learning Programme Manager Sarah Knight also featured updates on JISC’s work in pedagogy and assessment and a number of workshops.

More on the JISC Learning and Teaching Practice Experts group

Hashtags: . . . → Read More: JISC Experts 2012 feature TEL]]> TEL’s Director Professor Richard Noss presented at 24th April’s JISC Learning and Teaching Practice Experts group meeting in Birmingham.

The event, led by JISC’s e-learning Programme Manager Sarah Knight also featured updates on JISC’s work in pedagogy and assessment and a number of workshops.

More on the JISC Learning and Teaching Practice Experts group

Hashtags: #jiscexperts12 #jiscdiglit

The £25,000 project has been funded by JISC under their call for rapid innovation projects, as part of their Open Educational Resources 3 strand. The team is . . . → Read More: New open educational resources project funding for Ensemble@LJMU]]> The Ensemble project team at Liverpool John Moores University have recently secured funding for a project to follow up on the projects’ work on semantic technologies and case-based learning.

The £25,000 project has been funded by JISC under their call for rapid innovation projects, as part of their Open Educational Resources 3 strand. The team is led by Dr. Kate Litherland (PI), and includes Dr. Fran Tracy, Simon Morris and Agustina Martinez Garcia.

The six-month project began on 2nd April and the project runs for 6 months. It aims to build on some of the demonstrators from the main Ensemble project which linked resources together through playback of videos. For a summary of the project please read the ‘project in a nutshell’ blog post.

To find out more about the project:

• Project website
• Bid information

More on Inter-Life More . . . → Read More: Inter-Life at ECER]]> TEL’s Inter-Life project will present at the forthcoming European Congress on Educational Research in September in Cadiz, Spain. The paper, entitled ‘Evaluation of the novel Inter-Life virtual world as an innovative technology to support Transition to University’ will be presented by Dr Alison Devlin.

More on Inter-Life
More on ECER

The MiGen, Learning Designer and Echoes projects were among 17 demos packed . . . → Read More: Learning with technology: what the research says]]> 30th March saw TEL contribute to a special event at the London Knowledge Lab (LKL) in collaboration with the Open University and University of Nottingham. The event aimed to forge links between those who are designing, building and using technology for learning in various sectors.

The MiGen, Learning Designer and Echoes projects were among 17 demos packed into LKL from 11:00-1:00. The event, attended by 70 academics, industry and policymaker colleagues represents a proactive attempt by academia to engage with potential stakeholders and open clearer channels of communication between academia, industry and policy.

The Department for Education’s Vanessa Pittard and TEL Director Professor Richard Noss spoke to the attendees as did the event’s organiser Professor Rose Luckin. The remainder of the time was allocating to touring the demos.

The event is one of a series which will be held over the rest of 2012 in collaboration with the Open University and University of Nottingham and supported by the Association for Learning Technology (ALT) and TEL.

More on the series

The TEL Learning Designer project’s Professor Diana Laurillard launched a new book on 30th March entitled ‘Teaching as a Design Science: Building Pedagogical Patterns for Learning and Technology’.

Extract from description: ‘Teachers in the twenty-first century, in all educational sectors, have to cope with an ever-changing cultural and technological environment. Teaching is now . . . → Read More: New Laurillard book]]> ‘Teaching as a Design Science’.

The TEL Learning Designer project’s Professor Diana Laurillard launched a new book on 30th March entitled ‘Teaching as a Design Science: Building Pedagogical Patterns for Learning and Technology’.

More

The EPSRC Shaping Capability landscape has also been completed and published in full: http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/ourportfolio/Pages/default.aspx

A rationale statement . . . → Read More: EPSRC HCI Review report]]> The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) has been conducting a review of Human Computer Interaction research in the UK over the past few months. The review has now concluded and reports have now been published on the EPSRC website:
http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/newsevents/pubs/reports/Pages/ict.aspx

The EPSRC Shaping Capability landscape has also been completed and published in full: http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/ourportfolio/Pages/default.aspx

A rationale statement which describes EPSRC’s view of the strategic direction the research is taking in more detail is also available. The statement offers guidance to help bidders prepare and review future funding applications as the new peer review panel process is implemented.
http://www.epsrc.ac.uk/newsevents/news/2012/Pages/researchportfolio.aspx

Those taking in part included policy makers, technologists and researchers. The meeting was chaired . . . → Read More: ALT ‘evidence-based policy’ report available]]> On 9th Jan 2012, the Association for Learning Technology (ALT), the ESRC/EPSRC funded Technology Enhanced Learning programme (TEL) and Intellect (the UK trade association of the technology sector) held an invited event in London to discuss Evidence-based policy development in Learning Technology.

Those taking in part included policy makers, technologists and researchers. The meeting was chaired by John Cook, Professor of Technology Enhanced Learning and Chair of ALT’s Research Committee. It was addressed by Jonathan Shepherd, Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial surgery at the University of Cardiff; and Director of the Violence Research Group. A response followed from John Naughton, Vice-President of Wolfson College, Cambridge, Emeritus Professor of the Public Understanding of Technology at the Open University; and the Observer’s technology columnist.

The aims of the day included sharing ideas on how to get more evidence-based policy making in Learning Technology, possibly drawing on parallels with medicine and policing where Professor Shepherd and colleagues have persuaded authorities to look at medical evidence in tackling crime leading to the University Police Science Institute in Wales.

A further aim was the production of a checklist that Learning Technology Researchers (LTRs) should bear in mind when designing and conducting their research so as to give their work more chance of influencing policy and, as a result or otherwise, leading to greater uptake and hence impact.

The report has six further sections covering: 1. Key points from the presentations of the two principal speakers 2. Models for evidence-based LT research 3. Methodologies for evidence-based LT research 4. Professional development of Teachers and LTRs 5. Conclusion 6. The LTR checklist

Available to download from the ALT Open Access Repository

School of Design, Engineering and Computing, Bournemouth University, United Kingdom

Two 3 year, fully funded PhD research studentships are available to work on a range of exciting research areas within the framework of a large EU funded INFER project (http://www.infer.eu).

The INFER project research programme focuses on pervasively . . . → Read More: 2 Computer Science PhD posts available]]> ( #edtech ) Smart Technology Research Centre, Computational Intelligence Research Group

School of Design, Engineering and Computing, Bournemouth University, United Kingdom

Two 3 year, fully funded PhD research studentships are available to work on a range of exciting research areas within the framework of a large EU funded INFER project (http://www.infer.eu).

The INFER project research programme focuses on pervasively adaptive software systems for the development of an open, modular software platform for predictive modelling applicable in different industries and a next generation of adaptive soft sensors for on-line prediction, monitoring and control in the process industry. One of the main goals of the project is the promotion of a paradigm shift from human labour and knowledge intensive processes of building predictive systems to autonomous, evolving complex systems.

Applications are invited for the following 2 projects:
1) Meta-level Learning in the Context of Multi-component, Multi-level Evolving Prediction Systems
2) Visual Analytics for Evolving Prediction Systems

The students will be joining the Computational Intelligence Research Group within the Smart Technology Research Centre and will be primarily based in the School of Design, Engineering & Computing in Bournemouth but will also be required to frequently visit and work at our commercial partners’ labs (REC in Poland and Evonik Industries in Germany) providing an outstanding opportunity to gain a diverse experience of both academic and commercial environments.

The studentships carry a basic remuneration of £13800 pa tax-free and a waiver of the full-time research  student fees.  There are no restrictions on the nationality of the applicants and the selection will be based on  the candidates’ qualifications and experience.

Applicants should have a very strong mathematical background and hold a first or upper second class honours degree or equivalent in computer science, mathematics, physics, engineering, statistics or a similar discipline. Additionally the candidates should have strong programming experience using any or combination of C++, Matlab or Java. Some more specific requirements are given in the descriptions of individual projects.

For further details please contact Prof Bogdan Gabrys, e-mail: bgabrys@bournemouth.ac.uk or visit the following www pages: http://dec.bournemouth.ac.uk/staff/bgabrys/PhD_Studentship_2012.html.

Interested candidates should follow the application procedure listed on the Bournemouth University web pages: http://dec.bournemouth.ac.uk/research/postgraduate_research.html.  Further details concerning the studentship and application procedure can be also obtained from the School of Design, Engineering & Computing Research Administrator – Ms Naomi Bailey, Email: nbailey@bournemouth.ac.uk.