I was in Manchester this week, running various meetings and sessions relating to the Jisc HE sector strategy.
Had an excellent planning meeting with our Student Services team.
I published a blog post reminiscing about the short and sweet sessions I had developed and delivered at Gloucestershire College when I worked there.
The use of digital technologies for learning and teaching, doesn’t just happen. Staff don’t always instinctively pick up the skills and capabilities to utilise the range of digital tools and services available to them. In a similar manner the application of pedagogy to mobile, remote and online delivery is not as simple as translating in-person pedagogical practices.
Do we have a shared understanding of what we mean by digital transformation? It was on this point that I wrote a reflective piece on the digital transformation of music.
When it comes to digital transformation in education, I wonder if we can look at what happened to the music retail industry and the impact of digital over the last few decades.
I looked at how the retail music industry had moved from vinyl to CD, to mp3 and onto streaming services. So, what does this mean for education? Well don’t make the mistake of equating music tracks with something like a lecture. Digital transformation of education is not about the Napsterfication of lectures or creating an education version of Spotify. What we can learn from digital music is reflecting on the differences between the digitisation of education, the digitalisation of education and then the digital transformation of education.
I participated in the LTHEChat and Advance HE tweetchat about wellbeing in higher education.
The next day I wrote a very similar piece to my music post (I think a better one though) on the digital transformation of the television watching experience.
So to remind us, when we look at digital transformation, it becomes obvious that focusing on the hardware or technology is actually quite limiting. So when looking at the digital transformation of education, we really want to focus on the transformation of education and how digital can enable and enhance that transformation.
On Friday I attended Wonkhe and Adobe’s Education Espresso event on Pedagogy and playfulness.
My top tweet this week was this one.
So where did the sun go?
— James Clay (@jamesclay) May 25, 2022