The International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (ISSOTL) annual conference presents an exciting opportunity to meet with international colleagues from diverse backgrounds and situations to commune on our common interest in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL). As with every ISSOTL conference, the enthusiasm for SoTL was palpable in Los Angeles in 2016. Rich discussions took place, networks were formed, and promises to keep in touch were made. Unfortunately, previous conference experiences have taught us that these good intentions often fall short once the conference bubble has burst and the reality of daily life sets in once more. In an attempt to circumvent this phenomenon, we—seven colleagues from three different countries—embarked on a research project that enabled us to maintain the relationships and fruitful discussions we had initiated at ISSOTL16. We established Small, Significant Online Network Group, or SSONG, inspired by a conference workshop on small significant networks. As a group, we met regularly online using Adobe Connect© and engaged in significant conversations around SoTL that were private, trustful, and intellectually intriguing. This article reflects our experiences in establishing and maintaining the group. We discuss how the group was formed; its alignment with the concept of small, significant networks; and the benefits and challenges we encountered. Four key principles of the group that have emerged will also be discussed in detail, enabling readers to consider how they could adapt the concept for their own purposes.
Reception and use of information technology by lifelong learners within a “blended” learning environment needs to be articulated within a constructivist paradigm. Increasingly, the term reflective practice is appearing in the vocabulary of adult education discourse. Educators have become familiar with the concept of reflective practice through Donald Schön’s writings. Schön’s work is founded on a tradition of learning supported by Dewey, Lewin, and Piaget. As a learning group, lifelong learners are receptive to constructivist learning interventions where facilitated activities provide learners with opportunities to enact and collaboratively construct meaning as interventions unfold. This case study reviews learning enactments through an online discussion forum in an evening diploma in European Art History, University College Cork, Ireland.
The Educause Horizon Report states that while web-based tools are rapidly becoming standard in education and in the workplace and technologically mediated communication is the norm, fluency in information, visual, and technological literacy is not formally taught to most students. In the light of this we need new and expanded definitions and paradigms of Information and Media Literacy (IML) that promote mastering critical thinking as well as technical proficiency. This study, forming part of the Irish Integrative Learning Project, attempts to test an assumption that entrants to the humanities are media literate. This assumption, often made by educators in higher education, largely goes unchallenged. This paper reflects on the strengths and weaknesses of a series of media literacy workshops when facilitated in conjunction with the undergraduate History of Art course at University College Cork, Republic of Ireland from 2007-2009. It concludes with an example of how these media literacy workshops, indirectly, had surprisingly positive affects on a dyslexic student by scaffolding his learning and providing him with alternative entry points to learning whereby he was empowered to confidently articulate History of Art's signature disciplinary skills-set at a foundation level: critical visual analysis.
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