Writing about writing
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The first difference for me is in the audience. Autoethnography is written for academics. Memoir is generally written for a wider audience – the general public or a specific subset of the general public. The real difference is in the purpose. Autoethnography at its heart is about the analysis of the experience. Memoir is about…
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I’m thrilled to share that I’ve been accepted into the Master of Arts in Creative Nonfiction program at the University of King’s College. Going back to school is both exciting. I can’t wait to see what I’m going to learn, but also to meet amazing people. My goal with this degree is to finally write…
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There is an ongoing debate—or perhaps more accurately, a mix of debate and shaming—around the use of AI in writing. As a writer, I find myself asking: If I use AI, am I a cheat? Does it matter whether my writing was assisted by AI?
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This isn’t your typical book review. I’m not going to summarize the plot in detail; instead, I’ll share why I recommend the book and, more importantly, what I learned about writing by reading it. Because right now, I’m reading (and re-reading) memoirs with a purpose: to improve my own storytelling.
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I tried writing this morning and I found a “new” feature in my writing app, which is current Scrivener. All of a sudden, Scrivener had predictive text. This is a feature that is sometimes useful when you are writing a text or email on your phone. It helps you write something quickly when your reply…
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One of the questions my students often ask me is: How do you stay current with trends in instructional design? As someone who primarily teaches instructional design these days, staying up to date is a crucial part of my work. It’s not just about keeping my courses relevant; it’s about ensuring that I can guide…
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I enjoy listening to TV shows while I cook and relax, often doing jigsaw puzzles on my iPad. A feature I’ve found incredibly useful is descriptive audio. Similar to closed captions for the hearing impaired, descriptive audio narrates the visual elements crucial to the storyline. This doesn’t mean it describes everything; it selectively enhances understanding…
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As an instructional designer, I understand the dilemma of deciding on a policy regarding the use of AI in our courses. The options presented – either banning AI or allowing it with attribution – seem limiting and don’t fully capture the potential of AI as a valuable tool for instructional designers. Personally, I believe that…
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Feature image created by Adobe Firefly. When I ask ChatGPT about the benefits of AI for instructional design, one of the things it calls out is personalized learning. “Personalized Learning Experience: ChatGPT can provide a highly personalized learning experience by tailoring responses to the individual learner’s needs and preferences. It can adapt the content and…
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Feature image created by DALL-E 2 an AI: a female instructional designer interviewing a chatbot with a question mark in the foreground As I review and prepare lessons for the next week of class, I ask myself what value can ChatGPT add to either my class or the instructional design process that we are exploring…
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This post is a continuation on my discussion about Patient Health Literacy. The narrative that resulted from this study has been published on Amazon. See my Memoir page. The original source that I used for my study can be found at https://bcbecky.com. In reviewing the posts categorized as Navigating the healthcare system, I constructed the following themes: (1) learning…
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This post is a continuation on my discussion about Patient Health Literacy. The narrative that resulted from this study has been published on Amazon. See my Memoir page. The original source that I used for my study can be found at https://bcbecky.com
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I asked ChatGPT to write me a blog post about teaching instructional design. It clearly writes blog posts that are intended to be advertisement type material. Here is the post that it wrote: The Importance of Teaching Instructional Design: Preparing Students for a Career in E-Learning and Educational Technology Instructional design is the process of…
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This post is a continuation on my discussion about Patient Health Literacy. The narrative that resulted from this study has been published on Amazon. See my Memoir page. The original source that I used for my study can be found at https://bcbecky.com. From among the 237 blog posts, I coded 163 (68.8%) with the category,…
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I have finally taken the leap and published my breast cancer memoir: Never knew I wanted to be a breast cancer survivor. This memoir began as a Autoethnographic PhD study. I analyzed the first year of blog posts written on BC Becky, my breast cancer blog. My analysis involved constructing themes. The themes helped me…
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In September I launched Demystifying Instructional Design – a podcast where I interview instructional designers about what instructional designers do. I’ve just finished posting my 9th episode! Initially I didn’t feel like I could call myself a podcaster, because I just started. Now that I have almost a full season under my belt, I feel…
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I haven’t been blogging much lately. In part this is because I have a new project that is occupying my spare time! I can no officially call myself a ‘podcaster’. I have launch Demystifying Instructional Design, a podcast where I interview instructional designers about different aspects of their jobs. My first round of interviews focused…
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Very little is written about how to make a better instructor experience. I figured I’d share a few of my tips for instructor efficiency. What tips do you have to improve instructor efficiency when teaching online?
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I’ve been teaching online for more than five years and most of my courses involve a significant teamwork project. In my course on the Design and Instruction of Online Courses course, I highlight to my students that most students have never been taught how to work in an online team. They may have learned how…
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One of my students this semester made an interesting observation that had not occurred to me.
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The portfolio landing page (which generally is a person’s “about me” page), should have an appealing and modern aesthetic. It should be clean and uncluttered (less is more) and an intuitive interface. The navigation should be simple and well structured.
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I spend the better part of the last 9 years working on a PhD. A lot happened in that window. A lot of life changing transitions. I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I lost my father, and then a year and a half later I lost my mother. These each had a profound impact on…
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Introduction/welcome to the session topic. 10-minute breakout in small groups. Presentation / Q&A. 15-minute breakout into small groups. Debrief small group activity, close.
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1 – keep the size reasonable (4-6 works best) 2 – Find a comfortable seat …
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I listened to a great #unboundeq conversation the other day (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IG64Fx0vv8M). The thing that has stuck with me the most is that we should stop calling this sudden transition “online learning” as it conflates all the work of those of us who work in online learning. What we are dealing with is learning during a…
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I’ve been taking a course on Sociocracy – Sociocracy Empowered Learning Circles by Sociocracy For All – Sociocracy is an interesting way of governing an organization. It is sometimes also called Dynamic Governance. Why would I be taking a course on sociocracy? I recently joined an organization that uses sociocracy as its way of governing.…
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I used to see blog posts In everything I did While walking the words would come to me While showering the words would come to me While sleeping the words would come to me But today the world is silent Friends lost Parents lost There is a silence in my world All the while, The…
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Keynote Augmented Human: How Technology is shaping the new reality What might not be clear from the title is that this session was all about Augmented Reality (AR). This was presented by Dr. Helen Papagiannis who is author of the book Augmented Human. I didn’t take a lot of notes during this session so I…
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The first keynote – Sophia the robot The conference began with the initial keynote done by Sophia the robot. Honestly I would say that this keynote was not up to the standard of what I have come to expect of a DevLearn keynote. I was a little disappointed. I couldn’t help but think that this…
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I’ve been reflecting on the complex topic of hybrid video – and specially, video conferencing when there is a large group (like a classroom) face-to-face but also a group of people online. Even when the groups are not large – say 6 online and 6 in face-to-face in the same room. Making conversations work –…
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Are you a lecturer that doesn’t lecture? What do you do to present content or orient students to the lesson content?
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What time saving tips to do you have? How do you stay sane while providing students with meaningful feedback? I found myself teaching three courses in a semester. I found myself typing in the same things over and over. At first, it was my Zoom room URL, then it was certain aspects of feedback.
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Have you taught an ePortfolio / online presence course? This summer I had the privilege of designing and teaching a course that involved creating ePortfolios. I drew upon a lot of my prior experience and knowledge about open education and online learning to design the course. From a learning theory perspective, connectivism and heutagogy were…
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A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of having a conversation with Terry Greene for his podcast Gettin’ Air. It was great to spend some time chatting with him about open pedagogy, online teaching, and the Virtually Connecting origin story – from my Point of View. You can listen to the session here: https://www.spreaker.com/user/10100518/rebecca-hogue…
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An article in the BMJ blog about The transformative power of patient narratives in healthcare education crossed my stream today. This timing could not be more appropriate as I am working on the discussion for my dissertation and working through the concept of health literacy. From the article, Baines, Denniston, and Munro (2018, July 8),…
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Want an instructional designer to create a 3-week instructor led online course for you? I’m looking for a few potential organizations with some flexibility to provide projects for my students to complete. I teach a course called “The design and instruction of online courses”. As part of the course, students need to create a 3-week…
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I’m sure I could find a few people willing to let an instructional designer take a stab at 3-weeks of online course content or a multimedia project. I could, but should I? What are your thoughts on bringing in real-world projects for students to work on as part of the course?
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I have been teaching online teamwork for years. I know that my students were not taught how to work together in an 100% online format. For many of my students, this is the first time they have been asked to work in an online team. It means I need to teach them how to work…
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In preparation for a course I’m teaching this summer that involves creating a domain for the purpose of hosting an ePortfolio, I tweeted asking for help asking for any resources that would help students choose a domain name. In doing so, Terry Green pointed out an activity called WhyDomain that is part of the Ontario…
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Last week, I had the privilege of attending a two and a half day workshop on digital storytelling at Digital Pedagogy Lab Toronto. … What questions would you use to help someone create a story about themselves?
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Rather than using the quiz functionality, I implemented journals using the blackboard learn journal functionality. I am loving it. Students are writing 2-4 paragraphs about the class. They are doing much deeper reflections, connecting the content to their lives outside the classroom. But even more important, they are using the journals to have a 1:1…
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I’ve published my first Instructional Design Explainer video – in this short clip (it is just under a minute), I describe how I view the differences between pedagogy, andragogy and heutagogy.
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I’m working on the content for the first week in a class on Adult Learning Theory. It is the first time I’m teaching the class, so I’m doing a lot of exploration for both reading materials but also different ways to engage students in learning. One idea that is key in my classroom is that…
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This semester, I’ve decided to dedicate more time to providing synchronous learning experiences for my students… Another challenge I’m facing is figuring out the different activities that I can enact in a synchronous setting, and determining when the different activities are appropriate.
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Is there a relationship between oppression and empowerment? Is empowerment needed if there is no oppression? Can there be empowerment without oppression?
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In looking at health literacy from a socio-cultural and critical perspective, one of the themes I’m looking at is oppression. I had originally thought that I’d be looking at my experience and how the healthcare system (e.g. providers, insurance companies) was oppressing me – although I questioned the term oppression in part because the healthcare system…
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Have you thought about using a podcast in your teaching? Is it accessible? If not how (or do) you deal with accessibility requirements? If you are an instructional designer, do you have a favourite podcast?
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I now realize that I’m not looking at a general definition. I’m looking to figure out what my definition is.
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Last week I attended the eLearning Guild‘s DevLearn conference. This is the best conference I’ve been to for professional development for Instructional Designers that focus on areas outside of academia. The primary audience of the conference are those involved in the creation of eLearning materials or infrastructure for the corporate sector. There are several folks…
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I have felt the need to do some professional development around my work as a Lecturer in instructional design. After my last leave, I am feeling especially disconnected from the industry – so I decided that I should attend the eLearning Guild’s DevLearn conference. I had been planning to attend back in 2014 before I…
