Category: Community of practice

  • From email alert to delivering a talk: Unexpected scholarship

    From email alert to delivering a talk: Unexpected scholarship

    Paul Astles and Catriona Matthews ~ Learning Designers   Scholarship can happen in unexpected ways and an opportunity can present itself when you least expect it. In this instance, a colleague from the Open University Library shared a call for content at a webinar series curated by the University of Kent. The theme of the…

  • Reflections on the ALT Conference 2022

    Reflections on the ALT Conference 2022

    The in-person ALT Conference experience By Paul Astles How did it feel to be at a conference “in person” again? With the uplifting melodies and syncopated rhythms of some of my favourite bands soundtracking my journey to Manchester, not even the (at times) slow moving motorway traffic could take the shine off what I anticipated to…

  • Working together in module design

    Working together in module design

    By Amy Leon and Catherine Du Baret High quality, online and distance education materials, building on a huge legacy of groundbreaking distance education. This is what Learning Designers and editors, working alongside academic colleagues, at the Open University shape and hone during the creation of new modules. The Open University (OU) creates around 150 new…

  • Mix, stir then blend gently: co-creating a remote community of practice

    Mix, stir then blend gently: co-creating a remote community of practice

    If you read our last blog post, you’ll know that like most people, we’ve made some changes to the way we work here in the learning design team thanks to COVID19. One of these has been a change to our community of practice. Before lockdown, this was informal – members of the learning design team…

  • A virtual biscuit tin: creating a community of practice for learning designers in lockdown

    A virtual biscuit tin: creating a community of practice for learning designers in lockdown

    It wasn’t just students who faced a sudden change in how they were learning in March when the UK locked down. Learners in the workplace were affected too – including our learning design team here at the Open University. We were dispersed to our homes by lockdown and overnight, lost our ability to learn from one another.