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paddling aroundthe PebblePad newsletter issue 08 - May 2010
Conference Countdown
Can you believe that in a little over three weeks the PebblePad community will be sharing their ideas and experiences at the con-ference? I guess those that are coming from afar have already started packing and getting their paperwork sorted, whilst here in the UK we’re finalising plans to try and make the event as in-formative and engaging as possible – we’ve even put a request in for some sunshine - fingers crossed hey!
The programme has now been made available online http://www.pebblepad.co.uk/conference.programme.asp so if you’re presenting you can see when your allotted slot is, if you’re coming as a del-egate you can think about which sessions you would like to take part in, and heaven forbid if you’ve not yet registered there is still a chance so take a look at what you’ll be missing!
The programme is varied, balanced and aimed at sharing ideas and improving practice. It includes:
• 4 keynote presentations from leading eportfolio advo-cates
• 27 case-based presentations from the UK and Aus-tralia
• 9 student presentations about their personal use of eportfolios
• 10 workshops (practitioner-led; skill-based and special interest groups)
• 2 expert panels and 1 student panel• 8 innovations reviewed including the iPhone app and
the vocabulary builder• 1 big preview of PebblePad 3
There is going to be terrific Australian representation: 10 Austral-ian case studies; one Australian student case study; and 12 Aus-sies making the trip to the UK to attend.
The conference is designed to maximise networking and ex-perience-sharing opportunities within what must be the world’s friendliest learning community. If you’re still not yet sold on the idea there’s also:
• A conference book of case studies• 80+ delegates from 40+ institutions... and rising• The best delegate bag you’ve ever seen
01
Practitioner Survey
Some of you may be aware that we have recently conducted a PebblePad Institution Survey. We have had an excellent re-sponse and we are currently collating the results into a prelimi-nary report, to be presented at the conference. Now it is the turn of the practitioners!
If you are using PebblePad with groups of students, staff, or pro-fessional body members, we would like to invite you to complete the PebblePad Practitioner Survey. The purpose of the survey is two-fold:
• To identify drivers of eportfolio use and common practice in relation to eportfolio implementation; and
• To gain a better understanding of where and how Peb-blePad is being used and how Pebble Learning can bet-ter support your needs (and those of your learners).
Summary results will be distributed to all participating institutions. Results will include discipline specific information about the use of eportfolios and PebblePad, as well as comparisons in practice between the UK and Australia.
The survey will only take 5-10 minutes of your time:http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/PebblePadSurvey
Introduction
Welcome to the latest edition of Pad-dling Around as we try to summarise a busy few weeks at our Pebble HQs and also look forward to the inaugural PebblePad Conference or as it is now termed the PebbleBash 2010. It is easy for us in our day-to-day work to forget to stay in touch with the Paddlers Com-munity and keep you all informed with the latest developments, ideas and stories we hear about on a daily basis. We believe this newsletter is just as important to you as it us to try and disseminate this knowledge as widely as pos-sible; so if we miss something or you would like to contribute sto-ries, ideas or case studies to be represented here we’re always happy to hear from you: [email protected]
• Morris dancing and a ‘super funked-up ceilidh band’
Most importantly, if you want to know about institutional chal-lenges, technological tensions, student stories, and shared expe-riences from engineering through to life support for medics, then this is the eportfolio conference for you. Book now – places are capped at 120: http://www.pebblepad.co.uk/conference.booking.asp
New Customers
We are delighted to welcome the University of Edinburgh and Thames Valley University as enterprise customers. Both institu-tions ran year long pilots with PebblePad to prove the suitability of the system and both are planning on expanding use in the coming academic year. We also welcome a new Professional Body to the community, the Society of Chiropodists and Podia-trists, who will be using PebblePad to help develop a culture of life long learning and in turn raise the profession’s profile and support the aspirations of colleagues both within the public and private health sectors.
02© Pebble Learning 2010
REfLECT iPhone App & Moodle Block
Over the last couple of weeks Pebble Learning have been run-ning some workshops around the UK helping practitioners un-derstand a bit more about REfLECT, which is a customised ver-sion of PebblePad used by members of the Institute for Learning. These workshops were received well by the delegates but the highlight of all these events has to be the news about REfLECTs iPhone app and Moodle Block!
Like the PebblePad iPhone app the iREfLECT iPhone Application is now available for download from the iTunes store. The application allows REfLECT users to create thoughts and abilities on their iPhone or iTouch and save them directly to REfLECT. Images and video on the devices can be uploaded straight to REfLECT and any assets you create can be posted straight to any of your Blogs or CPD Records.
There is a new Moodle Block (“Moodle Connect”) that has been developed to
enable users to export items from Moodle directly into their RE-fLECT account. Moodle Connect also enables users to single sign-on into REfLECT without having to log-in multiple times.
Conferences / Events
03 June 2010, Liverpool, UK – SOLSTICE 201008 – 10 June 2010, Shropshire, UK – 1st PebblePad Conference08 – 09 July 2010, Barcelona, Spain – PLE Conference22 July 2010, Flinders University, Australia – Australian PebblePad User Group activity
Online Meetings
If you would like to arrange a meeting, see a demo or just have a chat about PebblePad feel free to get in touch ([email protected]) and we’ll be delighted to organise an online meeting, showcasing PebblePad.
Contact us
PebblePad UK
Pebble Learning Ltd.e-Innovation CentreUniversity of WolverhamptonShifnal RoadTelfordTF2 9FT
+44 (0)1952 288300http://[email protected]
PebblePad Australia
Pebble Learning PTY LTDPO Box 148Prospect ValeTasmania7250Australia
0400 899 820 http://www.pebblepad.com.au/[email protected]
You may be receiving Paddling Around as a link from our new electronic newsletter. If you are and you don’t like receiving it in this way you can easily unsubscribe. If you didn’t receive the email newsletter or would like to share the news with a colleague you can ‘subscribe to this newsletter’.
Shane and Colin will be starting their day super early so that they can join in from the UK! A key agenda item will be a report back from the PebblePad conference and discussion of some of the case studies presented. Alison will liaise with key contacts at all the PebblePad institutions about this event but if you want to make sure you receive updates as planning progresses please email Alison ([email protected]) and you will be added to the circulation list.
Interoperability Projects
For the past few months the Pebble developers have been work-ing to further extend the use of the LEAP2A http://wiki.cetis.ac.uk/PIOP_PebblePad eportfolio standard within PebblePad to increase its relevance and use within the academic community. We have had two projects funded by JISC which are outlined below:
The first project, known as ANT (Atomised Networked Transfer), is a partnership of the CIePD (Centre for International e-Portfo-lio Development), based at Nottingham University, and Pebble Learning and seeks to extend the PebblePad export functional-ity to enable ‘atoms’ of ePortfolio data to be pulled through on request, and implemented within the SAMSON Portal http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/eportfolio/leap2a/piop3.shtml. A key benefit of SAM-SON and this project to current and future PebblePad users is the ability for them to move their ePortfolio evidence between institutions and tools promoting a sense of lifelong learning.
The second project, known as DEC (Distributing Eportfolio Con-tent), continues to extend the use of the LEAP2A specification through the further development of an open source Moodle Block that will facilitate the export of LEAP2A zip-packages from Moo-dle v1.9. This will enable any Moodle user to export Moodle items as LEAP2A assets and import them into other compatible pro-grammes or tools, for example PebblePad or Mahara.
Both projects are near completion and are in the final stages of testing, look out in future newsletters for further details.
Australian ‘Telling Stories’ Event
Plans are also afoot for a mini Australian PebblePad conference early in 2011 – an alternative for those unable to travel to the UK!! This is likely to be scheduled for late January/early February and will be an opportunity for Australian practitioners and students to share their PebblePad stories. A Webfolio Competition will be held in the second half of 2010 and winning entries will be invited to present at the ‘Telling Stories’ event. So, start thinking about the stories you might like to tell and watch out for further informa-tion about this event.
Learning Management Systems Integration
As discussed in the interoperability projects section of this news-letter we have been busy working on a fully functional Moodle Block http://www.pebblepad.co.uk/moodle.asp. We are also pleased to inform our community that the WebCT plug-in has been updat-ed to include single sign-on to accounts and draw the users sta-tistical information from the home-pad. We are also delighted to announce we are working with Stephen Vickers from Edinburgh University on developing a building block for Blackboard Learn 9. There is currently no release date for the Blackboard block, but look out for more information in future newsletters!
Australian User Group Event
Plans are now in place for the next Australian PebblePad User Group event. Flinders University have kindly agreed to host our next activity which will be held on Thursday, 22 July. This will be a half-day face-to-face meet-ing for those who can attend in person and will include a video/phone link-up for those who wish to attend remotely.
