This week I’ve been:
- Sending out Issue #225 of Doug Belshaw’s Thought Shrapnel, my weekly newsletter loosely focused on education, technology, and productivity. This one featured what learning looks like, augmenting humans, and the psychological benefits of writing.
- Recording and releasing Episode 59 (‘LA Love’) of Today In Digital Education, my weekly podcast with co-host Dai Barnes. We discussed alcohol, web ethics, encrypted chat apps, what learning looks like, typing, privacy, the dark web, team formation, and doing small things with great love. This is the last episode until after the summer break, but you can always discuss TIDE in our Slack channel!
- Spending the first half of the week in Los Angeles. I keynoted and participated in the Corona-Norco Unified School District’s Summer Institute on Digital Badging. My slides can be found here and I used Periscope to livestream/record my presentation (skip to around 03:45).
- Taking Audrey Watters and Kin Lane out for lunch at a Mexican restaurant near their home in Hermosa Beach. It was so good to catch up with them, and we ate all the things while putting the world to rights…
- Driving around LA in a Dodge Charger. Its 3.6 litre V8 engine is a bit more powerful than our Toyota hybrid back home, let’s put it that way!
- Meeting Steve Ruger and others from Educators Co-op. Not only were they great people, but it’s so encouraging to see another education-related co-operative flourishing.
- Working on case studies (to be used externally) and short videos (to be used internally across the City & Guilds Group) for Digitalme.
- Submitting one of three proposals We Are Open Co-op have planned for the Mozilla Festival (closing date: Monday 1st August)
- Booking the Eurotunnel and our first campsite in France for Team Belshaw’s month-long adventure in Europe!
- Meeting Tony Venus from The Tech Partnership about overlapping areas of interest (digital skills, badges)
Next week I’ll be on holiday. And the week after that. And the week after that. And, er, the week after that…
This week I’ve been:
- Sending out Issue #224 of Doug Belshaw’s Thought Shrapnel, my weekly newsletter loosely focused on education, technology, and productivity. This one featured childhood memories, tethered beings, and the myth of productivity.
- Recording and releasing Episode 58 (‘Tethered Cretins’) ofToday In Digital Education, my weekly podcast with co-host Dai Barnes. We discussed barefoot adventures, squabbles about education, Pokémon Go, childhood memories, big data for porn, tethered communism, open organisations, culturally contrived ignorance, and more! You can discuss TIDE in our Slack channel.
- Working one day with City & Guilds Group in London. This was my last day working Group-wide as I’ve switched to working directly with Digitalme (a recent acquisition they’ve made). I updated the Open Badges 101 course that Bryan Mathers and I created and recorded some short video clips to be used internally.
- Attending the Web Science Institute’s Ethics Symposium in London. It was an excellent event with some top-notch speakers. I was delighted to get the chance to speak in depth with leaders in the field and look forward to following that up. Many thanks to Anni Rowland-Campbell for the invitation!
- Starting work on some case studies around Open Badges for Digitalme while working from home. I spent some time digging into Sussex Downs College‘s Ufi-funded project, and created a graphic of their employability skills-related badge system.
- Feeling old as I watched my son’s achievements be recognised in his first school leavers’ assembly. We have a three-tier system in Northumberland, so he’ll be moving up to middle school in September.
- Helping Sarah Horrocks, Director of London CLC, through our ongoing critical friend sessions. I’m genuinely excited for the work we’ll be doing together (potentially through We Are Open Co-op) next academic year.
- Drafting a few session proposals for the Mozilla Festival which is at the end of October 2016. The closing date is the end of July, so get yours in!
- Creating some thinkathon proposals for potential We Are Open clients.
- Putting up our tent and new awning to get ready for our epic month-long camping trip in August.
- Packing and getting ready for my brief trip to Los Angeles to speak at the Corona-Norco Summer Institute on Digital Badging.
Next week I’m in California until Wednesday night, then working from home with Digitalme on Thursday and Friday. After that, it’s packing time! As I’ve already said, I’ll be under canvas and away from everything apart from occasionally glancing at work emails during August.
This week I’ve been:
- Sending out Issue #223 of Doug Belshaw’s Thought Shrapnel, my weekly newsletter loosely focused on education, technology, and productivity.
- Recording and releasing Episode 57 (‘Unpleasant Pokémon’) of Today In Digital Education, my weekly podcast with co-host Dai Barnes. We discussed the new UK Prime Minister, the development of We Are Open Co-op, digital strategy, the future of work, unpleasant design, blockchain, Pokémon Go, killer robots, akrasia, willpower, and more! You can discuss TIDE in our Slack channel.
- Working in London with City & Guilds. I wrote several blog posts off the back of the June 28th Digitalme event around Open Badges for employment, worked with an intern (showing them how to use badges and GitHub, and made a slide deck of who’s who in the world badges.
- Creating a new banner/header for my Twitter account and updating the theme for this blog.
- Buying all kinds of things as a result of Amazon Prime Day (e.g. Exploding Kittens)
- Preparing for our August camping trip.
- Getting feedback on our ISTE pre-conference workshop, Beyond the Badge Graphic. We average 4.5 out of 5 across the various indicators, with an 80% response rate. I’m happy with that!
- Proud of my children and what they have achieved at school this year. Their reports were, to quote one teacher, ‘exceptional’.
- Meeting with Philip Veal from Silbo about co-ops and alternative ways of working, Chi Onwurah (MP for Newcastle Central) about concerns around DWP use of blockchain for welfare, and Tim Riches about some work we’ll be doing together when I get back from holiday.
- Writing:
Next week I’m in London from Monday to Wednesday, doing some critical friend work on Thursday and Friday, and then flying to California on Saturday for some work the week after.
