• Thursday, 12 September 2019 - Friday, 13 September 2019
    All Day

With the opening of UTS Central, we also welcome our new world-first large collaborative classrooms. Uniquely designed for our learning.futures approach to learning, and informed by large class teachers and students, these rooms will facilitate active and collaborative learning. They will change the way our students experience large classes, making ‘large classes feel small’.

The Festival of Learning Design is open to all UTS staff interested in learning and teaching, whether you teach large classes, small classes or something in between.

The event is a chance to experience our new large collaborative classroom in action. Select from a range of workshops, from tackling transdisciplinary challenges to collaborative learning in industry studios. Lead architect, James Perry, will also speak to the design behind UTS Central’s new spaces.

Importantly, festival sessions won’t just talk to you about learning in the room, they’ll give you the opportunity to experience what it’s like using the features and technologies of the collaborative classrooms:

  • engage in collaborative, inquiry-based and creative learning designs and activities that you can adapt and use with students;
  • experience, share and create activities to help students to collaborate, build future skills and develop a sense of belonging;
  • learn how you can use the space, share ideas and give feedback on the support you’ll need.

Don’t forget to bring your own device!

Don’t have time to come to all sessions?
Come along for Thursday afternoon to experience teaching and learning in the room for the first time or come along on Friday if that suits your timetable better, or of course you can come to booth.

Are you a casual academic?
We’d love you to take part on the day. To help, there are a number of paid casual places on offer for the Festival. T&Cs below the program.

Program

The room location can be found in your confirmation email upon registration.

Thursday 12th September

Time Program Activity
12:30 – 1:00 pm Lunch and room tours
1:00 – 1:30pm Acknowledgement of Country

Welcome

Professor Shirley Alexander (Deputy Vice-Chancellor Education and Students)

Breaking the ice

Dr Adam Morgan, Institute of Interactive Media and Learning (IML)

1:30 – 3:30pm Data is the new…

Faculty of Transdisciplinary Innovation Team

What does data mean to you?  What could it mean?   What shouldn’t it mean?  In this session, we’ll collaboratively take data on journeys from collection through curation, through different lenses and new narratives to create possibilities for social impact.   Whether you’re a data novice, an expert or just curious, in this session you’ll have the chance to choose your own adventure to experiment, tell stories, create and experience how data and transdisciplinary thinking can create new insights for changing the world!
In this session, you’ll make use of the collaborative design and technology possibilities of the new classroom to engage in collaborative curation, experiencing different perspectives and creating and sharing ideas.
3:30 – 4:00pm Afternoon tea
4:00 – 5:00pm Are you entitled to your opinion?

Associate Professor Mary Coupland, Faculty of Science and Jenna Price, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Unfounded opinions and spurious arguments are all around us. Do your students have the skills to detect them? Can they spot logical fallacies and decode misleading visuals and dodgy “statistical” claims? In this session, you’ll get a taste of how “Arguments, Evidence and Intuition” helps students to develop these skills, and maybe a chance to check out your own.

You’ll use online tools to myth-check your perceptions and collaboratively inquire into controversial issues, then use the different room zones to present back your ideas.

5:00 – 5:30pm Collaborative Review

Jo McKenzie, Office of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education & Students)

How will different learning designs work in our new collaborative classrooms? What challenges can you see and what support will you need? Now that you’ve had some experiences of learning in the room, this is your opportunity to ask more questions about the space and give feedback on your experiences to inform future support.

Use the features of the room to give us feedback online, in groups and in person to help to inform future support.

5:30 – 7:00pm Designing collaborative classrooms reflection with networking drinks

James Perry, Senior Associate, FJMT studio architects and Professor Shirley Alexander DVC Education and Students

James Perry and Professor Shirley Alexander reflect on the unique collaborative process of designing the collaborative classrooms.

Friday 13th September

Time Program Activity
9:00 – 10:15am Drawing on student experience: Exploring the progressive development of student groups

Dr Adam Morgan, Institute of Interactive Media and Learning (IML) and Dr Sean Walsh, Faculty of Science

How do student groups develop over the course of their project? Do they progress as theory suggests? Using a co-constructed collaborative approach this session will explore these questions using a unique data set – student visualisations.

10:15 – 11:00am Designing Digital literacies

Ashley England, University Library

Digital literacies are crucial 21st-century competencies that our students need, to prepare for the future of work. In this media-saturated fake news world, digital information literacy skills are essential, ensuring students can locate, critically read and fact check information before using it. In this session, you and your colleagues will co-design a learning activity to develop these skills in your students, use digital tools to develop and share your ideas, and understand how digital information literacies can be scaffolded across subjects and courses.

11:00am – 11.20pm Morning tea
11:20am – 12.20pm Designing for collaborative creative discovery

Associate Professor Bem Le Hunte, Faculty of Transdisciplinary Innovation

In this session you’ll work with peers from across our disciplines at UTS and discover confluences and research questions that you’d like to explore together. You’ll use creative methods designed within the Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation (BCII) Honours stream, and maybe even find some research collaborators from across UTS for exciting cross-disciplinary future projects!

12:20 – 1:05pm Gaming academic integrity – interactive ways to engage students and staff

Dr Amanda White, UTS Business School

Everyone has had some experience with academic misconduct and often students will say “but we don’t know how to do things properly”. In this workshop Dr Amanda White will get participants involved in a range of different activities that engage students with academic integrity and build a culture of studying and researching with integrity. Experience the academic integrity game that challenges and builds students’ understandings.

1:05pm – 1:45pm Lunch and room tours
1:45 – 2.45pm CATs in a Collaborative Classroom

Jo McKenzie, Office of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education & Students)

No, not furry cats. CATs are classroom assessment techniques that let you know how your students are going with their learning. You’ll experience a range of CATs and compare which ones are most appropriate for your class.

2.45 – 3.00pm  Collaborative Review

Jo McKenzie, Office of the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education & Students)

Now that you’ve experienced more learning designs, here’s a second experience for you to tell us what you think and what you’ll need.

Casual academic attendance

This is a day for all academic staff at UTS. We have a limited number of casual academics places for the Festival sessions. Casuals interested in attending can be paid for up to 4 hours for the first day (Thursday) and 5 hours for the second day (Friday) at the other academic activity rate. these places are eligible current casual academic teaching contracts at UTS.

 

Get in touch

Got a question? Get in touch with the team by emailing LX.lab@uts.edu.au

Stay updated on Twitter @UTSfutures or #UTSldfest19

Register for this event

Your video, audio and the meeting chat transcript may be recorded or photographed. Please advise the facilitator if you do not wish to be recorded or photographed.

Bookings are closed for this event.