Webinars... oh my!

So Jenni sent a reminder out today for our upcoming OER Fellows day long 'retreat' to meet. It'll be the first time we get together and learn together. She also reminded us that we should be prepared to share our research plan and a webinar idea we have.

So, after reading Tony Bate's blog post That Was 2017 in Online Learning, I'm re-framing my thinking. Tony writes that "There’s a long way to go with open educational resources". He identifies five key points about why OER is not as prevalent as it should be. The point that caught my attention speaks to my work as an OER Fellow:
"stop thinking of OER as something different from everything else on the Internet; all open content has value, whether it is specifically designed for educational purposes or not; this means coming up with course design models that exploit open content for the purpose of developing 21st century skills such as knowledge management, analysis of source reliability, etc."
The next point he makes is that "Instructor training in teaching remains a huge problem" with the following statement providing a HUGE aha moment for me:

"less than half the instructors based their innovation on a theory of learning or a change of teaching method to produce different outcomes, such as skills development. Without a grounding in pedagogy and a knowledge of the research into how people learn, it is impossible for most instructors to see the real potential of digital technology for improving their teaching"

I forget that what comes naturally to me, after a lifetime in the field of education, is the underlying, implicit and tacit knowledge I bring to my course design, delivery and teaching strategies. My mediation and decision making with digital teaching and learning is based on years of experience with educators of all ages and stages. This is my gift to give.

Further to this, I'm thinking there may be some ways to focus my particular skill set into the  webinars. Since eCampus Ontario managers are already doing a Bento Box series where new e-tech tools are shared, there really isn't a need for a WHAT style webinar. It's time to shift my thinking to the WHY webinar.

• Why would you integrate media into your course syllabus - the visual syllabus shared in the Catch is a model and one example.
• Why would you stop marking and grading in open learning? links to Jesse Stommel, Laura Gibbs and Dave Cormier's work comes to mind.
• Why would you post your course openly on a blog or web site? thinking beyond powerpoint presentations comes to mind; iterations of course content over time to suit learner needs
• Why should UDL matter in course design? linking in new frameworks for UDL from CAST
• Why SECTIONS should guide your decisions of tech integrations into course delivery.
• Why digital literacies should be integrated into EVERY course.

More info about the SECTIONS model is found in Tony's book Teaching in a Digital Age Chapter 8.

Wayfinding in Digital Spaces?
Media Making Matters?
PLN's and PLE's: Critical decision making in building your digital teaching persona?