For me, CPD is the continued relationship between the work I do at St. Mary's, and the work in the learning technology sector as a whole. Whether evaluating my own practice, feeding back into the wider HE community as part of conferences, conversations or case studies (Evidence 8), or engaging with the professional community, I try to extend my professional development on a daily basis. I keep a full, reflective CPD log (Evidence 9) to to catalogue and illustrate how engagement feeds into my work (K1, K2, K3, V1, V2, V3).

My first experience of formalising HE CPD was achieving my AFHEA, back in 2018, and most recently I achieved my CMALT (Certified Membership of the Association of Learning Technology) (Evidence 10), reflecting on my work in the field to date in a peer-reviewed portfolio, outlining my specialist interest in Digital Confidence, an area I’m interested in researching in future. I was pleased to pass with Distinction, and an invitation to share my portfolio as an exemplar. I look forward to participating further in ALT, applying to be a portfolio reviewer myself (D2vi, V3, V4).

At St. Mary's, I participate in Organisational Development courses - these expose me to varied teaching and learning methods, improving my knowledge of core software, such as Microsoft Word or Excel, and supporting my personal development, e.g. in workplace communication. I keep a brief reflective log of these. I attend the annual Festival of Teaching and Learning at St. Mary’s, facilitating my understanding and appreciation of existing teaching and learning practices and interests at my home institution, as well as giving me the opportunity to observe academic and professional colleagues in action (K1, K2).

I regularly participate in the wider learning technologist community, and am a member of groups including Mahoodle (users of Moodle and Mahara), MUGSE (Mahara user group for the South East) and the M25 Learning Technologists. I regularly attend webinars, and participate in tweet chats, mailing list discussions, and other online discourse, which provide excellent opportunity for collective problem-solving, inspiration, or investigation (K2, K3, V3).

CPD allows me to encounter, evaluate and implement innovative or more productive ways to use technology for teaching, learning and assessment. A recent example is seeing a forthcoming version of Mahara showcased at the 2019 Mahoodle conference in Gloucestershire, which encouraged me to upgrade and re-theme our version in 2019. This led to a more intuitive user experience, and a reduced support load on the TEL Team and Helpdesk (V3).

I keep up with reports and publications from the sector, such as the annual Jisc Digital Report, which is extremely useful for its overview of digital change and continuity in UK HE, and its high level panorama of predominant and emerging student expectations and experiences. Such reports also help me contextualise, in my own work, how HE itself is integrating into the wider UK, including from a governmental perspective, and in terms of its general success in preparing students for further academic or professional practice (D2v, V4).

I engage in extensive digital learning myself, from studying languages via Duolingo, to Udemy courses on Moodle, to blended learning and accessibility courses on FutureLearn, to engaging in personal interest courses on Coursera, Skillshare, Masterclass, the Open University and more - these have helped me refine and understand myself as a learner, which, in turn, has made me better able to identify my own bias and limitation in facilitating the teaching and learning of others. I’m not a particularly visual learner, for example, and will always use more words where fewer - or a graphic - might best serve the widest audience, so experiencing ways of achieving this through a variety of learning platforms has developed my appreciation of and skills in visual digital teaching and learning (K1, K2, K3, V1, V3).

References

https://www.alt.ac.uk/certified-membership

https://www.advance-he.ac.uk/fellowship/associate-fellowship