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On Saturday the 23rd of April I attended the #ictedu conference at Limerick Institute of Technology, Tipperary for the first time.  I had booked the conference before, but it had always fallen at such a stressful time in the secondary school year that by the time that Saturday rolled around, I didn't have enough steam left in me.  This year left me with a bit more freedom to attend, so naturally I signed up. A sunny April morning in Thurles The conference theme hinged upon the student as co-creator and attendees stemmed from across the sectors.  I knew many faces on a professional basis and from CESI events, so it was useful to be at a more intimate conference where there was time to catch up properly.  The event began with a keynote by Steve Wheeler  from Plymouth University.  I've seen Steve give a keynote before and followed him for a long time online , so I was excited to hear him again as I've found his work to be both insightful and practical. ...

Earlier this month I was at #BbTLC16 - the annual Blackboard Teaching & Learning conference, which took place in Groningen this year. I've been meaning to write a couple of blog posts about it, and what I learned there, but have been so busy since I got back! That's the downside of being at a conference, work just piles up and waits for you to return. One of the interesting features of the conference this year was the use of the mobile app, which we were encouraged to download prior to the event. As well as easy access to the programme, and the ability to build up a personal agenda, there were a couple of other features that added to conference experience (positive and negative) and ultimately had an affect on my behaviour as part of the backchannel, as well as others. Mobile Agenda There was (initially) no printed programme available at the conference. The online programme was a little tricky to navigate, with up to 6 parallel sessions each day, and I certainly didn't...

The School of Nursing and Midwifery at NUI Galway are always up to good things when it comes to prioritising the student learning experience. Recently, we spoke to John Quinlivan about a key initiative they undertook to help incoming students. Each year, new students face major challenges in getting to grips with the abundance of information available online relating to their studies. The School of Nursing and Midwifery thought long and hard, and came up with the idea of creating a Student Launchpad - a central resource to find out about referencing, timetables, course resources, online services, and more. In this short interview, John Quinlivan discusses the benefits of the Student Launchpad. It was designed with a first year student in mind but also aimed to be useful to all students for the duration of their studies. The team encompassed Block 5 Design, and faculty of the School of Nursing and Midwifery including Dr. Adeline Cooney, Damien Devane, Prof. Declan Devane and John Quin...

Tomorrow I am heading over to Groningen, in The Netherlands, for the annual Blackboard Teaching and Learning Conference . I was last at this conference in Dublin in 2014 , when I presented with two students who were developing the NUIG campus app. We won best paper at the event, and went on to present at the Blackboard World Conference in Las Vegas . I have no such ambitions this year - one visit to Las Vegas is more than enough for me! This year I am travelling a day early, so that I can go along to the Academic Adoption Day on Tuesday, led by Alan Masson. I'm not really sure what to expect, but will blog my experiences. At the main conference, I'll be presenting, along with Caroline Horan (IT Services at NUIG) about our current Online Results Entry (ORE) project using the Blackboard Grades Journey Tool. For a sneak preview, our prezi is available , though still in development.  The conference programme is big, with many parallel sessions. I haven't decided which ones to ...