Coming Soon
Focusing for October
October 8, 2010 Leave a Comment
So, this year, pretty much everything that I’m doing is digital, so I’m starting to be a bit more strategic about what I’m doing, and allowing my projects to inform each other….
I’m really looking forward to reading @unmarketing’s book (see right), as I’ve never been a fan of marketing, it’s always been about the community, and community engagement… I’m expecting to see ideas for how to kick-start communities and the kind of tactics that need to be undertaken to push forward social media so that it feels genuine, authentic & reflects the brand.
I’m also hoping to get to a day of the Like Minds conference.
The BigBible Project
The BigBible Project is a project that I’m working on 2.5 days a week. I’m very much enjoying getting some great guest posts, but I need time to sit down and make a list… and I’m also giving 3 sessions at conference (16th Oct). I’m learning loads about content, strategy, utilising WordPress to give me what I want… I plan to use @problogger’s 31 Days to a Better Blog to identify gaps!
Super Fun Days Out
I have been working on this site since Summer 2009, and it’s been ungoing a lot of changes, with a few more to come, to make the site more usable. We have sat down for a great strategic meeting this week, and talked through what we want to achieve (and what’s manageable), so I have returned to my original plan of dealing with Adrenablog and Twitter (and bookmarking once those have embedded), which means I can focus on being more strategic, and hunt out some great stories! We have come up with some targets, so let’s see how we take off… come and visit us!
Other
As a part of my role as Blended Learning Fellow, I continue to develop the Blended Learning Blog (and other internal material, both paper and VLE based). I have great plans for @digitalfprint (but it’s a bit of a case of Cobbler’s Shoes), and continue to add material (if rather sporadically) to http://drbexl.co.uk/ and http://ww2poster.co.uk/. I am also teaching on a great new module (which is involving a lot of ‘set up’ work):
Manipulating Media
See: http://manipulating-media.co.uk/. I have around 20 more blog posts to write for this, 10 practical & 10 more instructional. We’re in Week 2 this week, I need to be ready before Week 5! We plan to have our students digitally literate by the end of the first year, but they also need to pick up a number of academic skills.
SkillsNet: Boosting Academic Skills Performance
September 22, 2010 2 Comments
“Students’ lackadaisical attitude is just one of the things that troubles Bernard Lamb, emeritus reader in genetics at Imperial College London, who campaigns to improve the use of English. He worries that students are leaving university without a grasp of the basics and paying the price in the jobs market. He says employers often reject applicants purely on the basis of spelling or grammatical mistakes in their CVs: “Their errors showed poor attention to detail, ignorance and a bad attitude.”"
Newspapers enjoy demonstrating the lack of skills that graduates have, but Ann Mroz, editor of Times Higher Education indicates that these issues should be passed back to the government, and back down to skills… : “At university, students should be broadening their minds and learning how to think and work independently.” See full story, and associated stories on employability, and “by an English pedant“.
SkillsNet: Boosting Academic Skills Performance
SkillsNet offers on-line resources, tips and information to boost the academic performance of students at the University of Winchester. Study skills and study strategies are abilities and approaches applied to learning. Good study skills are critical to success at University, both in acquiring good grades, and proving useful for learning throughout one’s life.
Who is the site for?
SkillsNet is an interactive site providing easily accessible, relevant on-line resources to help students excel in their academic work, bringing together materials from across the University into one site. Whether the student is diligently preparing preparing ahead (everyone can improve), or working to a deadline, SkillsNet is available 24-7, 365 days a year to all students with a University log-in. The external site is fully open, and in future will include exemplars of material upon the site.
What information is on the site?
Students can search for useful tips, worksheets, ideas and information on such topics as dealing with written work, presentations, group work, learning actively, dealing with assessments and jargon under the section “I want to know about”. They can also access information about face-to-face workshops, other sources to dip into, and people who they can contact through “I want to go on a workshop” and “I want to talk to someone”. We are also encouraging contributions (comments, questions and suggestion)s through the interactive features, such as the blog, Facebook and Twitter under “I want more”!
“I want to know about…”
“I’m a student in”
“I want to go on a workshop”
“I want to talk to someone”
“I want more..”
In the future we will be adding specific information for specific disciplines through “I’m a student in…”, but this requires material provided by staff across the University, and until the site is within their consciousness, this will be slow in materialising – we could only work with the material that was already available at this stage. As the site develops, there will be options for more interactive material.
How was the site developed?
SkillsNet has been under development throughout the 2009/10 academic year, and, after much discussion as to whether it should external or internal, has been built upon the internal portal (using a 5+ year old infrastructure, which is undergoing some modernising). Bex, who Project Managed this, considered other similar sites, collated material, instructed other staff as to how to construct their sections, developed social media strategies, and undertook a focus group study which allowed us to see the enthusiasm that the students have for the project, and how we can continue to develop it – they were particularly keen to see exemplars of good/bad work from different disciplines. There is much material that can go on the site, and we have plans to develop SkillsNet to other aspects of personal skills development, including those related to employability.
The BigBible Project; Housegroup… with a new media layer!
September 10, 2010 1 Comment
I have just written the following blog post to summarise the project that I am working on with CODEC this year… I came on board on the 1st July, working 2.5 days a week, and after looking around at the number of other projects that existed, and knowing that the book formed a central part of this project… this is what has now exists:
The BigBible Project is an exciting new initiative tying in with the larger Biblefresh initiative for 2011. This ecumenical project is produced by CODEC (‘Christian Communication in the Digital Age’, St John’s College, University of Durham), funded by The Methodist Church and Methodist Evangelicals Together, and supported by Premier Christian Media, SPCK and Twelve Baskets.
As the project develops, you can get first hand updates through the blog: http://bigbible.org.uk, Twitter http://twitter.com/bigbible and Facebook http://bit.ly/bigbiblefb.
What is The Big Read 2011?
Over Lent 2010, the people of Durham got together for “The Big Read“, working their way through Luke, using the first of three texts to be written by Tom Wright, using events, podcasts and housegroup materials. This was such a success, that for the second text, Matthew, the activity is going national in The Big Read 2011.
The book, published by SPCK, will be available in the shops/in Kindle in January 2011, and a subscription option will allow you to receive the materials daily. The project will then offer further opportunities for Bible Engagement: Online and Offline.
How is this different?
The BigBible Project will provide housegroup materials to accompany the daily readings contained within the book, offering items for reflection and discussion within your local group. There is also, however, the opportunity to participate in national discussions with those partaking online, whether individually or with their own housegroups, and also to upload your own material produced in response to the issues raised. Podcasts and Vodcasts will also be made available.
Why should I be using social media?
There are already millions of Christians online (note, we talk online/offline, rather than virtual/real), and there’s no need to feel that you need to join every online service! One of the joys of social media is that it tends to encourage transparency and authenticity, so if a part of your life is your Christian faith, that is likely to come through.
The more genuine indicators of our whole lives that we can give to those inhabiting online worlds, the more positive indicators of a Christian faith we can give.
A number of those Christians already online may qualify as those who are “ranty” offline, and therefore also will be so online… allow the wider world to see the range of viewpoints and the common purpose that all Christians hold.
Contribute your voice to social justice and other campaigns, such as the anti-burning-of-the-Qu’ran Facebook group and SuperBadger.
Save re-inventing the wheel by sharing ideas and inspiring and encouraging each other. Once you know how to use some of the social media tools, you can join in deeper with the housegroup materials…
Bex, who is project managing this project, has found it a real joy and encouragement to make contact with others online who challenge and encourage her in her faith journey.
I’m scared of/don’t get/don’t know how to use social media?
We see this project as a wonderful opportunity to help more Christians to experience being a part of the ‘online’ world within the context of something that most already understand – the Bible, and also to encourage a rise in Bible reading – those who spend the most time zooming around tend to be those who have smartphones – so can take opportunities to check in with online materials!
The BigBible Project is involved in the New Media Conference co-hosted by Premier and CODEC, to be held in central London on 16th October 2010, which will allow both ‘newbies’ and experienced new media practitioners to learn – both practically and theologically.
How can I help? 
The blog is intended to become a ‘crowdsourcing’ space, a term which simply means to use the ‘wisdom of the crowds’, allowing us to share our different levels of expertise (and in both the Bible and social media, there’s no one that ‘knows it all’), and our responses to the materials that we are engaging with. We are therefore looking to draw upon the experience and expertise of all.
If you are having your first go at using a form of social media, especially for Bible engagement, we’d love to hear your experience- what you enjoyed, what you learnt – and feel free to indicate those things you didn’t like as well.
If you have lots of experience in new media, or are interested in the debates surrounding theology and new media, we would love you to contribute your thoughts and your practical tips in order to allow others to get past their fears and feel confident online – no tip too small.
For now, please feed through bex.lewis@durham.ac.uk, although we are anticipating using BuddyPress shortly to provide community functionality.
Where can I find you online & how can I join in?
Remember, you don’t have to join all platforms, and can join as little or as much as you like::
- Follow the Blog: http://bigbible.org.uk, and help feed in content.
- Join the Facebook group: http://bit.ly/bigbiblefb
- Follow us on Twitter (and update your avatar): http://twitter.com/bigbible, where we are also building lists of interesting Christians that we can link up with online.
- Let us know good videos that we can favourite on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/mybigbible
- Upload responsive materials (visual, audio) to Twelve Baskets (after October): http://www.twelvebaskets.co.uk/
- Start to learn about Geocaching as we have some interesting ideas for that!
- We may also identify other social media platforms, for example, we’re in discussion with Tole-rants, and these will be advised on the blog.
- Spread the word about the project.
What will happen afterwards?
This project is excitingly new and experimental, but even in its early weeks, has already attracted a lot of attention and support. As we continue through Biblefresh for 2011, we are already identifying further texts for Autumn and Christmas, and the material deposited in 12Baskets will provide great resources for others to share.
New Site “Ready” for @bigbible
August 20, 2010 1 Comment
If you go to the page depicted above, you can find out all about the latest project that I’m involved in, and I’ve built this site over the past couple of days! My brief is to prepare online/offline materials for ‘The Big Read 2011‘, but also to look for ways to engage people further in taking up the opportunities presented not only for reading the Bible, but opportunities online… Love the fresh & simple logo produced by @sharecreative, and we have some ideas for further uses of that logo… keep your ears peeled!
Winchester’s Blended Learning Blog (2010)
August 17, 2010 1 Comment
Ever since I took on the role of “Blended Learning Fellow”, I have wanted to create a blog space, which provides a time line of developments in technology, and which is accessible to University of Winchester staff, advising them of what is going on in the e-learning world, providing them with access to useful resources and materials from training sessions. 
I started with “Blogger” as I thought it might be simpler to get people to engage, but as I am now teaching people how to use WordPress (and I’m more familiar with it), I have moved it to http://wblb.wordpress.com/.
WordPress.com or WordPress.org?
It’s tempting to move it to WordPress.org, for more functionality, but part of trying to encourage people to use the blogging software is to demonstrate what can be done for free…. so for now at least… As .com appears to be stripping out all my embedding code however, it’s a bit of a pain (I’ve just enclosed screenshots and links instead!)
Vision?
The intention is that others within the University, who are part of the Blended Learning Community of Practice, will be allocated access to WordPress and upload materials. A lot of material remains on the Learning Network (our VLE), and a Wiki will be created there for people to talk more freely about the successes and failures of projects, whilst the material that’s considered “publicly acceptable” will be on the public blog. Let’s see what happens…
Super Fun Days Out (SFDO) (2009)
September 27, 2009 Leave a Comment
Love Life, Live It!
In 2008, Yaz El-Hakim, Hugh Bassett-Jones and Dominic Northcott, all staff at the University of Winchester, had a vision for “the best, most comprehensive, most intuitive and free of charge directory for anyone wanting to take part in any extreme or adrenaline sports anywhere in the country.” . Facing stiff competition from others at the University of Winchester, Super Fun Days Out was one of only two successful businesses in the November 2008 rounds for new business start-ups, and the funding has been put to good use. Read more.
In April 2009, I checked over the website and gave the guys some advice on how it could become more interactive, and the potential for using social media to encourage repeat visitors! In July 2009, I was asked, along with Helen Owten, to come on board as social media strategist, with a particular responsibility for Twitter (at that time standing at 11 followers), setting up a blog (which is gradually coming to life), and bookmarking through sites such as a Delicious (which is still really awaiting its turn!), whilst Helen was responsible for Facebook, YouTube and Flickr. I’m really enjoying the challenge of being more structured in my approach to a blog, and looking for ways to encourage engagement… and using that knowledge in improving my other social media strategies!
Read more:
- Super Fun Days Out website / adrenablog
- Super Fun Days Out Twitter (623 followers and rising!)
- Super Fun Days Out Delicious
- Super Fun Days Out YouTube
- Super Fun Days Out Facebook
- Hugh Bassett-Jones website (Hugh undertakes all the web development)
The Gathering, Church in a Pub (2009)
September 9, 2009 1 Comment
The Gathering: An Experiment in Church
At North Winchester Community Church we’ve been discussing the idea of a ‘new’ type of service, once a month, on Sunday evening’s, around the theme of a Pub Church (within the style of Fresh Expressions).
So, welcome to “The Gathering“, to which you can find out more details on the website, launched last night! I am naturally a night owl, and gained inspiration after our inaugural test-run on Sunday, as to where I could see this website fitting in a bit more… not that any of us really know how this service is going to turn out, as the whole point is that it’s experimental, and ready to be shaped by its members! The website is therefore fairly experimental and more explicitly a ‘work in progress’ than other sites that I have done.
Blog Content
The blog is structured with 3 basic pages for static content: what is the gathering about?; who can people contact to find out more?; where can people continue the discussions? For the remainder of the blog, the expectation is that the remainder of the entries will be blog/diary entries, listed in reverse order, with strong use of keywords/categories (although as we’re so experimental, these aren’t entirely clear, but we will monitor their evolvement) to allow visitors to filter the content that they desire. Of course, it wouldn’t be one of my sites without search (apparently the online world used to be 50% search, 50% through navigation… I think that balance has tipped in favour of searchers!)
WordPress.com Theme
Pressrow by Chris Pearson, a nice clean design, which allowed me to design my own header (using a collage of images from sxc.hu), and appears to have the features we need. The current NWCC site is moving across to self-hosted WordPress, so this may end up upon here, we’ll see how transferable it is, but I think it shows up the stunning pictures well!
Multi-Author Blog
This is my first attempt at using WordPress for a multi-author blog, but we want to get at least the organising group involved in blogging on the site, and then encourage others to engage and comment upon the site – maybe we need a touch of the polemical topics!
Social Media
Other than the blog itself, we have set up a Twitter feed, a Facebook group, YouTube (no content yet) and Delicious (also no content), which seems approrpriate for a church which plans to not base itself around ‘sermons’, but other styles of discussion and interaction – including mix/match of online/offline…. as we said, all very experimental!
drbexl searches the ‘net
August 9, 2009 Leave a Comment
Purpose of this blog, first created November 2008:
- Familiarisation with what is ‘now’ on the ‘net
- Experimentation with some of the new widgets/applications
- Listings of useful websites, themed depending on my focus for that day/hour, etc. (I have a wide range of interests and like to experiment).
Built using Google Blogger, although my preferred tool has since become WordPress, this is a great and simple site – starting to miss some functionality I now am used to in WordPress though!
Research & Innovation Centre, King Alfred's College (2004)
July 5, 2009 Leave a Comment
Initially the remit was to design a site for postgraduate students, using a design that fitted in with the general College largely to provide clear information on teaching staff and courses. The remit became to design and structure a complete site for the R&I Centre, with a clear flow of information, with the same design, and to integrate the postgraduate pages within that.
- Pages already existed for the R&I Centre, but there was no structure to the site, information was out of date, and many links were broken.
- These pages were designed for use by staff and students concerned with research and funding in order to help them make the best use of the facilities and information available within the College.
- Once the basic site was complete, editing privileges were given to others, and documentation was prepared explaining the structure, styles and ‘how to’ tips for the site to ensure a consistent look for the future.
The front page is different to the remaining pages on the site, although the buttons are the same to give consistency.
- The pages were designed to be ‘fixed width’, suitable for smaller screens, again losing the flexibility of tables (although aesthetic sacrifices have to be made with tables).
- Narrow versions of pages were given for the front page of each section (to encourage the use of succinct text), and a wider version prepared for when necessary.
- In a later reconsideration of the site, it was decided that the narrow page versions (which fitted other College sites), did not allow enough space, leaving information looking ‘squashed’, and all pages became wide.
- Time constraints on other members of R&I staff mean that most of the structure and content of the site is my idea. I have been careful to ensure usability, e.g. with file sizes provided to users.
This screendump illustrates the ‘Who’s Who’ section provided for the staff within the R&I Centre (information is provided on postgraduate students, but no such ‘Who’s Who’ information).
- Key fields were provided, and ‘editable areas’ were provided to ensure that the titles remain the same, whilst the relevant information can change.
- Instructions were left as to the width that the image could be to fit within the fixed width space (with the height largely irrelevant), with this ‘Image Not Yet Available’ JPEG provided whilst awaiting appropriate photos.
The information is only available internally, although with the development of the new portal, relavant information will be extracted for the external site.
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