In early 2020, pre-pandemic, I was asked for my opinion on using TikTok for university marketing.  At the time I honestly thought it was the cringiest idea ever, not suitable at all for “serious” educational institutions. At the time, TikTok was synonymous with silly dances and funny challenges. It still is, to an extent, but […]

Quick link to useful resources >> This year we have been celebrating 10 years of massive open online courses (MOOCs) at the University of Edinburgh, having delivered more than 100 short online courses and shared over 1000 videos as open educational resources (OERs). We have an infographic that captures these achievements, alongside an impressive number […]

We’ve had an Accessible and Inclusive Learning Policy at Edinburgh since 2013.  It was radical at the time, particularly in allowing students to audio record their teaching, but was looking rather dated even before the online pivot in 2020.  In the context of an ongoing Curriculum Transformation project, how might we change it? I’ve been […]

The Instructional Design Team have just completed a project with the OER (Open Educational Resources) Service which, as all good projects do, started with a mysterious old dusty spreadsheet. It was a record of legacy MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) that had been developed over the years; MOOCs that hadn’t been through the robust processes […]

This resource aims to help support new staff to develop a grounding in the sound technical and pedagogical application of centrally supported (and School-specific) learning technology. It does this by: Introducing the University’s centrally supported services Highlighting training (and other support) for centrally supported services Aligning to underlying strategies, policies and principles Linking to allied support Audience This […]

With an ever-increasing demand for online learning, more and more educators are relying on the power of video to share their teaching far and wide. But, before recording every possible lecture or bit of content, we should take pause and consider the ‘why’ and ‘when’ of using video. Bearing in mind that creating video content […]

The Activity Stream is a completely new feature in Blackboard Learn which is present in the Ultra Base Navigation (UBN) menu and accessible at any time. In essence, it brings together the most recent information across all your courses in a single location. One aspect of Blackboard Learn that has frustrated users in the past […]

Learn Ultra Base Navigation (UBN) a system menu giving access to information across Blackboard Learn courses, is due to be rolled out by the end of June 2022. It is the first phase of our upgrade to Learn Ultra and provides improved navigation, as well as easier UX when accessing key information, without changing courses themselves. […]

The University of Edinburgh’s free Climate Solutions course is designed and delivered by award-winning climate change experts and educators. One of them is Kirsten Leggatt, a Climate Change Consultant for Arup and a tutor on the online Carbon Management Masters at the University of Edinburgh.   Having also graduated from the same programme she is now […]

This community of practice, begun in November 2020, emerged from individuals recognising a need for anti-racist practice in learning technology. It aims to raise awareness of this but also to reduce racial inequities by helping all colleagues to be part of creating a better future. Anyone was free to join and from those small beginning […]