 Good afternoon everybody and welcome to the Instructure and Canvas Networking Luncheon at this year's ALT annual conference Thank you for joining us We are looking forward to sharing a little bit of an activity with everyone I know you've had an action-packed morning and This should give you a bit of a chance to kind of start to share some of the things I've probably been discussed throughout the sessions this morning kind of leveraging on experiences of using online learning hybrid blended learning methodologies Especially in this really interesting time over the past 18 months By way of introduction, my name is Sam Wilson. I'm a senior account executive here at Instructure My specific area I look after is further education skills apprenticeships and training within the UK and Ireland I've had the opportunity of working with institutions of all different stripes Learning from their experiences showing how technology can empower teaching and learning And hopefully we'll be able to kind of wrap that into some of the conversations we have with you all today I'm going to hand over to some of my colleagues my esteemed colleagues who I'm joined by today And first just going to hand over for an introduction to Marina Hi everybody, I'm Marina. I'm the regional director for the Spanish market here at campus And just like yeah super welcome everybody. So I will handle that to my colleague Alex Yeah, hi everybody. My name is Alex Vesthoff. I work as a regional director for the Benelux the Netherlands Belgium and Luxembourg Always a pleasure to have the opportunity to engage with universities higher educational institutions vocational institutions And I'm just excited to say everyone on the school for today's session but also for the conference. So Isla Hi everyone, my name is Isla I'm also regional director covering the french, italian and also the eastern european markets So alongside my colleague, I'm happy to to join you guys and to hopefully have a very fruitful Collaboration discussion today. So I hand over back to Sam Cool. Thanks everyone. Thank you for those introductions So the the kind of aim of today is to try and get a little bit interactive So what we've done as an organization is prepared what's called a mural board So I'm going to share my screen now You should see that popped up and what my colleague is going to do is share the link to this mural board Over in the discord channel the canvas lms discord channel If you navigate over there, you should be presented with this screen And this is a way for you to start as participants sharing some of your thoughts on the question of both So what challenges and what solutions have you seen over the past 18 months with using kind of online learning a blended learning approach throughout The kind of elephant in the room which is that the pandemic and how these different challenges and opportunities to grow and try new things Have affected different kind of stakeholders within an institution the teaching staff Students institutions and and just any other thoughts When you've kind of had an idea of what you'd like to share or maybe a sentiment you'd like to comment on If you go into the particular box and hit a little right click You'll be brought up with a kind of sub menu and then you can add a sticky nerve Like the example here in that first icon So give everyone a couple of minutes to just go in there maybe find an area in which they would like to start Sharing some of their experiences. So we're really Leaving this really wide and open that we want to hear from you as people that have been actively working on all things education online learning teaching with technology And it would be great if you could start sharing some of your experiences And what we'll do is as these start to appear on the mural board We'll talk through them. I'll kind of share my experiences from working with colleges in the uk I'll leverage some of my colleagues experiences as well And hopefully we'll get some kind of thought-provoking dialogue going so starting to see a few things pop up on the mural So here we go for institution tools fast enough review of data privacy and use of other emergent tools Excellent. Okay. There's loads of mouths flying around now sharing some things What I'll do is a start to see some um things materialized from the participants I'm just going to ask a question to my colleague marina. I know you've worked with a lot of institutions across the the the spanish Education sector and you have a fairly unique perspective in the fact that you actually work at an academic institution yourself Maybe you could just vocally share some of those experiences that you've had over the past past 18 months Yeah, sure. Thanks. Um, um, so I have been working as a teacher for several universities here in spain as as you said some in in one particular university We were struggling a little bit because we didn't have enough resources in this case technology we Didn't have any online campus. So when the pandemic started we had to create the online campus from scratch And obviously, uh, some of the teachers they were not fully trained. So, uh, some teachers Had a lack of uh Skills and resources just like to deliver the classes online Um, just like to cover the first month what we did is just like we use google meet to deliver the classes And we tried to like to keep the same level of uh engagement as we did in in some other classes Um, especially for students as well student had, uh, some challenges Um, just like to attend the classes, you know, just like to be right on time on the classes because online Um seem um Easy, you know, but I I don't think that all mine and vitamin or online learning is easier than face-to-face because I think that it's um Even like more difficult So even they had also issues and challenges whilst submitting assignments Just like to just like participating into discussions for example um, and so In the other university that I work Um, actually we we had everything prepared because obviously I worked only for the online university And then it was um easier, right? But again, we had some challenges with students Because it seems that they are really good with tiktok and and technology, right? But when there is the the time that they need to submit an assignment I'm sure that some of the teachers that we will have here will just like experience or had experience the same Uh challenges as I did um So yeah, we had some challenges in terms of like how to submit an assignment how to create for example like a Boston presentation How to create a video recording? So they had some troubles there. So we had Just like to give them a little bit of help them Yeah Per thank you. That's that's really insightful stuff to hear and as you were kind of going through some of your experiences marina We've seen a bunch of activity starting to pop up on the mural board and there's one that I would like to specifically Uh pick out first of all for a bit of the talking point And it's in the institution column and kind of tracks against the challenges section And it's kind of the resistant to change and I've sat around using a vle as a file repository Rather than kind of a launchpad for interactive learning and I know from my experience Speaking to institutions in the uk and island that's been kind of a common theme throughout the sector is it's quite typical from my experience to have staff and Admins just want to put the resources in one place It almost becomes kind of like a drop box environment But by leveraging a vle that the kind of the true functionality of a vle is to create kind of custom Pathways and tracks of education where learners can log in Access the materials they need to access and follow a journey Through their educational content. That's something I've heard replicated right throughout the sector So whoever put that comment if you've got anything else to share, please go over to discord and kind of elaborate We're always keen to hear some follow-ups. That's really cool. So thank you for that another one I would really like to kind of tease apart and see if anyone can share any Can he any additional kind of comments or thoughts on this over on discord is if we look in the student column And across the tools line, there is the kind of the too many tools feature That's such a common thing. I'm hearing too is we've got all these cool bits of technology And it's almost where do I go for what and what do do I go over to google for my Writing of an essay or do I use microsoft words? Do I go into my vle? Am I on zoom today on microsoft teams? And that can sometimes get in the way of having a really effective teaching and learning online strategy And I've heard that from a lot of institutions And that's one thing that we've been really conscious of when we've designed our technology Is having canvas theory as the the foundation for your learning experience and then plugging in All of those really useful other tools So it feels like it's part of an ecosystem rather than a collection of disparate Applications that you never know which one to click on and kind of guiding your learners and your faculty to the places That they need to go at the right part of the course I wonder if there's anyone out of my colleagues here who's had that kind of too many tools Kind of a challenge for students in in the past gislem. What about you? Have you had that with the institutions you've been working with? Yes, this has been also a conversation, you know, we've a couple of the students have a conversation with in france You know using microsoft team using also, you know Zoom and also other conferencing tools and try to understand, you know, how they can make like you said the ideal learner Journey or experience and try to see how having an lms could play with those existing apps, you know, they are using on a daily basis And it's always a work for us to or let's say a mission to really try to drive and to create the visions Where they can see how those all these apps can play all together And like you said to define which one is mandatory to create the learner experience Not and also enhance the capabilities from the institution institutional and the teacher perspective And basically see how all can integrate within the perfect lms Perfect. Yeah, that's great And it's definitely things that i've been trying to kind of Learn and share with institutions i've been working with. So yeah, thank you gislem There's there's something that's just kind of appeared in it seems there's a kind of a couple of comments on this and it's in the institutional Column across the best practices row And it's around training and roll out and getting people feeling comfortable with the software they're using And I think if i'm right in thinking this can take two foot forms It can be making sure students are adequately adequately trained on using things like a virtual learning environment And it can also be On second We've had the board move one of my colleagues just dragged the board back into center for us, please Thank you. Sorry. Um, yeah So it's making sure students are adequately trained on things like the tools that they'll be using in their academic journeys But also making sure teaching staff and administrators have that same level of support and training And one thing i've seen from a couple of institutions that i've been working with is actually doing online education and online delivery cpd courses Within the tools that they're actually going to have to use in the classroom. So for example from experience There has been institutions that have done Kind of online courses in canvas and they've invited their faculty into those courses to up skill and cross skill and learn new tips And tricks as a student. So they're actually a teacher but in canvas, they're a student on this course So when it comes to rolling out this kind of this technology to their students and how to submit assignments and answer quizzes And communicate and build that kind of level of engagement They can share what they learn as a quote unquote student in a cpd program back to their learners Who are going to be on an academic program? So I think the right level of training support and not only training at the front end of a new tool But that ongoing lifelong learning within an online platform is absolutely crucial to promote success Engagement adoption and what we would all hope I assume is that that would then replicate In a higher level of success on program and on provision from the courses that your students are studying on So really really value those those kind of teaching And training elements there um, we've seen Yeah, we have something on on the discord channel actually was uh, Laura just like elaborating a little bit more of where you were just come in commenting actually about the institutional Level so she posted I've tried to do some work in the past on helping staff to utilize the VLE rather than using It as a file repository but on an individual level with access to a small number of staff You are not going to be able to make that cultural shift How do we make that change happen on an institutional level? Thank you. Was that Laura who asked that question? Laura, thank you for the question. And it is such an important thing to consider. And in some of the experiences I've had, and I can only go up then, what I've always tried to do is when kind of working with institutions to think about a digital strategy, there needs to be different stakeholder groups involved in that kind of cultural change. There needs to be a senior leadership presence for the kind of strategic driving of change management. There needs to be the users. And when I say users, that's faculty members, that's student organized participation members. So whether it's from the student union or student delegate group, there also needs to be the teaching staff and faculty, whether it's a digital champion at different academic departments, the learning technologists. And they need to be collectively part of the kind of the vision, the mission and the change. And that kind of those different stakeholders, if they're all aligned on the rolling out and the hearts and minds change of a new piece of technology, and they can all hold each other to account throughout the process, we've seen a kind of a far stronger kind of adoption and roll out of technology, especially VLEs with the work that we've done with institutions. I hope that I'm sure that's nothing novel. And I'm sure all of you, Laura and all the other participants have done very similar things at their institutions. But I hopefully that might give you some additional food for thought. Please feel free to hit a comment back in Discord if you want to do a follow-on. That was great. Thank you for the question. Let's see what we've got on the board. International students, yes. That's definitely been something that's interesting. I know that there's been a bigger call kind of globally to have people kind of accessing institutional courses and materials that aren't actually based in the domestic region of that institution. And having things like cloud technology that can be accessed anywhere with an internet connection and a version of a modern smartphone allows you to kind of extend your campus beyond just kind of the bricks and mortar regional draw that you may or may not have. And yet by having kind of sustainable and robust online cloud-based learning platforms like Canvas and VLEs, et cetera, I think it allows you to really attract and deliver a high level of educational quality that you're delivering to a wider audience. So yeah, hearing a lot more about international students and how you can replicate the experience you maybe get in the local environment to a more international audience. So thank you for that. Got a couple of minutes left in our networking session. If there are any more questions, thoughts, please feel free to navigate over to Discord and share your points over there. Always up to kind of answer some more live questions from the participants. Let's see what we're going back. So best practices and in the teaching column. And we've got the gamification piece. And I know this has been kind of a hot topic across education just lately, not only in kind of academic schools, colleges and university education, but even in kind of the corporate and training sector. A chance to try and attract people to engage with their materials by dropping in things like micro awards and micro credentialing and points and lead awards. And it's definitely a kind of an emerging place within education technology and online learning. And I'm hearing more and more institutions trying to leverage that. I don't necessarily want to say competitive element, but do you know that kind of fun and interactive interaction that you can have on things like quiz scores on things like who's done the kind of the most reading of different assets on different pages and all that factoring in to the kind of overall engagement within their course. So thank you for sharing that is definitely something that's coming up more and more. Is there anything on the board that any of my colleagues have seen that they think is a really attractive point that they want to bring up in discussion? Feel free, Alex, is there anything you've seen on there that's really kind of got your mind? Yeah, especially the great feeling of the board so far. It really resonates also with the conversations that I'm having across the Merylux, especially in regards to the international students studying in different legal jurisdictions, which also ties back into the whole discussions that institutions here also having around the privacy data GDPR related to the constraints. So for me, that's very interesting to read as well. So yeah, that's it. But in the interest of time, I handed it back to you, Sam. Thank you. Thank you, Alex. And thank you for everyone's participation. We're going to be back tomorrow, same time, same people with a bit of a different theme, same kind of thing. And we're going to really start to dive into some of this stuff. Have a great afternoon at the conference and thank you for everyone's participation. Have a good afternoon. Bye bye.