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Evolving design: shaping our work around a service-led model
Gerald Evans ~ Head of Learning Design Since 2020 our experiences as a Learning Design (LD) team have been heavily influenced by much of our work moving online. The pandemic led to us resetting how we operated and in particular required us to find effective online mechanisms for running collaborative sessions while continuing to have…
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Going for Green: Learning Design sustainability champions
Kathleen Calder, James Openshaw, Catriona Mattews, Hayley Johns, and Paul Astles ~ Learning Designers The Learning Design Sustainability Group at The Open University has been championing sustainability at the Open University in one way or another for some time now. The end of 2023 saw a wonderful celebration of that work at the Green Gown…
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Virtually reality: Learning while we play with VR at work
Mary Simper and Paul Astles ~ Learning Designers Who knew that meeting other humans inside a virtual world could create a sense of togetherness and promote positive wellbeing. Well, it turns out that it can. The Learning Design team have been experimenting with the use of virtual reality (VR). This article will explore how it…
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The Introverted Facilitators’ Club: How to be a quiet LD in the sometimes noisy world of module design?
Hayley Johns ~ Learning Designer Back in September, I attended my first ever ‘real life’ or in-person conference (the ALT conference, at the University of Warwick – you can read about my and my colleague’s experiences here). It was a brilliant experience, and we learnt a huge amount. As well as all of the fascinating…
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Who needs superpowers when we have SKILLS!?
Clare Hill ~ Learning Designer Let’s face it, we’d all secretly like to have a superpower but do we really need one? We already have the capacity to learn how to do something and practise to get better, and in doing so we develop skills. We have all been developing a variety of skills to…
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Student Voice on GenAI: Use, Concerns and Educational Applications
Mary Simper and Eleanor Moore ~ Learning Designers Like much of Higher Education, we in the Learning Design Team at The Open University have been both fascinated and challenged by the introduction of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) tools like ChatGPT. In this blog post, we’ll uncover what our students have told us about their use of…
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Reflections on ALT conference 2023: Supporting colleagues to take practical actions to embed sustainability
Hayley Johns and Paul Astles ~ Learning Designers This blog post builds on our previous sustainability related post. You can read that here. If you have not had a chance to read it yet, do go back and check it out. The work presented by Hayley and Paul on behalf of the Learning Design Sustainability…
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Out and about with Learning Design: Learning from working with others
Gerald Evans ~ Head of Learning Design; Emilou Hayden, Catriona Matthews, and Paul Astles ~ Learning Designers In this post, we’re sharing some of the experiences of team members who have worked on external projects. As a team we periodically work with clients both inside and outside the OU to provide Learning Design specialist…