Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026Maybe give students the choice of how to use it but say there must be a focus. It could be group work or revision, it could even be time to ensure they get a proper meal somewhere on campus 2/2 #LTHEchat 000
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A6 #LTHEchat not a straight answer unfortunately but I think where & when that hour is affects what to do with it. Unfortunately for busy students an hour set aside even to decompress & relax wouldn't look very attractive 1/2 110
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A5 #LTHEchat an initial conversation with a personal tutor or academic advisor needs to be fairly open & offer the chance to involve different players - educators, visa specialists, counsellors, academic skills tutors, depending on the reason. A big barrier is inappropriate language 1/2 100
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A4 #LTHEchat ooh I've had this q multiple times & indeed been in that position myself. Not an exhaustive list but some interactive exercise where participation's a key part of learning, an opportunity to work face-to-face with peers, hands-on sessions such as performances or science/tech labs 1/2 110
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A3 #LTHEchat ideally we'd encourage a sense of involvement & hope that students can gain tangible benefits from attending in person. Something which we should do & is v hard in practice is to manage external factors whether they are mid-term blues, competing academic pressures, or social events 010
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A2 #LTHEchat while in London there's less of a binary divide than elsewhere, because students could live in halls which are still a fair distance from teaching spaces, there are also different & sometimes contradictory needs for commuter students & those who are more university-based 000
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A2 #LTHEchat I'm about to repeat my experience from last year, teaching a relatively small group of final year undergrads from 1-3pm on Friday. Given that they're also looking for a role or further study in a tough job market & have other distractions I can't blame them for wanting to leave promptly 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A1 #LTHEchat also worth mentioning that as a postgraduate with me & peers living away from the uni quite a few worthwhile conversations took place when visiting each others' homes 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026A1 #LTHEchat realistically in a popular pub close to the University of London's main premises, so not far from Birkbeck, Senate House, etc, & as I've mentioned before in this forum in the café attached to a nice furniture shop where a few of us met at weekends 010
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 30/09/2026Hi - this is Martin from Bayes in London, where it's incredibly summery considering that October is only a few hours away. Looking forward to today's #LTHEchat 130
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026A6 #LTHEchat I'm v much not the principal player in this partly because the next step in my career involves going down to part-time next calendar year (there's an R word which I'm avoiding) but we are building an internal community for people interested in SoTL 1/2 110
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026A5 #LTHEchat I'm privileged to have worked with colleagues committed to pedagogic scholarship in my own institution both in my own school & department & in the uni's central learning & teaching function & also maintained good working relationships with colleagues in both groups 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026A4 #LTHEchat this actually relates to something I was thinking when reviewing the earlier qs. What are the tangible outputs of SoTL? Unless it's a publication or devising a new course or a v specific intiative around pedagogy these can be hard to identify & harder to relate to an individual 1/2 110
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026A3 #LTHEchat as with a lot of stuff which is regarded as nice-to-do sheer pressure of time & workload is a barrier. Also a sense that even in a teaching-focused environment it isn't always recognised as an important scholarly activity & the perception is that conventional research has more prestige 031
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026A2 #LTHEchat on top of everything that's been said about community, this is something where you could be in multiple overlapping communities, eg one within your own instution, one externally with people elsewhere with a particular interest, and perhaps one purely online such as this 031
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026A2 #LTHEchat realistically it's usually a conversation with somebody else: even if that's just figuring out the process of converting a vague idea into some sort of action 120
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026A1 #LTHEchat it's a broad range: to me the virtue of SoTL is that includes pedagogic research but covers much more as well & comes down to anything around understanding university teaching & learning in depth & analysing how it should take place 050
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 10/06/2026Hi - I'm Martin from Bayes in London joining this #LTHEchat & v interested to see what emerges from a discussion of scholarship 010
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026Thanks for an interesting & thoughtful #LTHEchat 120
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A6 #LTHEchat needed to think about that. Not really a social nicety but some procedural bits of the conventional induction week: I think induction should be structured as a v small amount of essential & memorable practical information & otherwise some real academic content so you feel like a student 030
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A5 #LTHEchat as with other areas, have conversations & learn about their world. Among the most interesting experiences for me was attending an event run by UCAS which also attracted secondary school teachers 110
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A4 #LTHEchat this is where there's a need for people who can coach & support students in use of digital tools. There are concerns which are difficult to overcome: this can get lost between digital learning professionals & study skills professionals both of whom are essential 1/2 110
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A3 #LTHEchat really interesting q: even within the conventional open day format which by its nature is large-group we could perhaps do better at offering different activities suiting different temperaments of students 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A2 #LTHEchat the other hidden or at least little-acknowledged barrier is that students are v susceptible to mid-term blues part way through their 1st term at uni & often will have put a lot of effort into adapting without yet much visible reward 230
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A2 #LTHEchat for many it's either lack of expectations of what university studying will be like or occasionally false expectations that it'll be more similar pedagogically to their experience of school 021
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A1 #LTHEchat also (though possibly jumping ahead) recruitment events are opportunities for us to learn about applicants & in the case of inclusive outreach this is particularly valuable as we can learn about potential applicants who we might not necessarily attract 130
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026A1 #LTHEchat for my involvement in recruitment & outreach, recruitment is a much broader category. I've done recruitment activities which focus on schools which already send us applicants, so are definitely not aiming to increase inclusivity, & also some aimed v firmly at underrepresented categories 010
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 27/05/2026Hi - I'm Martin sitting on a patio in London for this week's #LTHEchat 041
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A6 #LTHEchat an interesting point: perhaps being able to join a community based around open practices would make it easier for somebody to find others with an interest in education even if they don't have people to work with on pedagogy in their own practice 030
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A5 #LTHEchat a combination of the discussion going onto something where I have either tangible knolwedge or a specific need to find something out, & being around people who share the interest & are collegiate in the way that they express it 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A4 #LTHEchat particularly when I was a course director I saw part of my role as encouraging other people to take initiatives & I sought to build a climate where pedagogic innovation was valued & indeed expected 021
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A4 #LTHEchat reflecting on my own practice over the years connecting is definitely where my contribution has fitted most naturally: I worked on setting up internal events & on managing communities of teaching scholars & did a lot to bring various people with different ideas & perspectives together 130
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A3 #LTHEchat there are multiple networks within & outside my own instution. They are great for exchanging ideas & finding people to act as critical friends & perhaps most important of all providing motivation & understanding that there's some value & recognition associated with pedagogic scholarship 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A2 #LTHEchat arguably there's a continuum between activities which you might not even recognise as learning & formal scheduled CPD. I've picked up a lot through being a member of various communities of educators including this online one & if you count those as informal I've learnt a lot from them 000
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A1 #LTHEchat also on reflection before going into an educational role I'd seen people initiate learning - if anything more by fostering informal learning than by formal teaching - and thought 'I can do that' 000
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026A1 #LTHEchat not entirely a facetious answer but reading campus novels contributed to me liking the idea of an academic life! But also I found I enjoyed engaging with people who were learning, even in a previous life when it wasn't at all part of my job, and valued the chance to share knowledge 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 20/05/2026Hi - this is Martin from London though today I'm joining #LTHEchat from Aveiro in Portugal 130
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026A6 #LTHEchat probably difficult to connect the 2 empirically, even though there's a lot of literature on storytelling as communication in education & elsewhere (I'm aware of a lot about storytelling in business as being particularly effective in complex environments). So you could argue that 1/2 100
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026A5 #LTHEchat employers have particular needs which students should relate to & storytelling is definitely a way to get ideas across to them. Significantly when looking at case studies especially businesses that have grown up since emergence of the internet there's often an interesting origin story 132
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026A4 #LTHEchat opportunity is that GenAI could write & add to material & create stories, risk is that these might be rather bland - as GenAI-created music is so far - while at the same time losing the opportunities for storytelling. This is a bit like the current rhetoric about not using essays 1/2 110
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026A3 #LTHEchat 2 things at least: 1st is that it doesn't necessarily follow a simple chronological progression & could be organised around themes or personalities or even a puzzle eg me describing a day in Copenhagen & holding back that I'd discovered the local term for Danish pastries til the end 1/2 100
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026A2 #LTHEchat also a good story, like a memorable image, can help to embed a particular point in students' memory. Various IT management students learned about how to organise data when I told them about the time a bank didn't update my address despite lending me money to buy the home I'd moved to 010
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026A2 #LTHEchat the sort of flip side of my A1 is that because storytelling is so fundamental we use it a lot without recognising or identifying it as such. When we use examples to illustrate academic points especially if they're personal anecdotes - that's just storytelling 310
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026A1 #LTHEchat storytelling is fundamental to communicating ideas in a university environment. A good story includes at least some thought behind what is being told & for that if no other reason there's an overlap between storytelling & reflection 031
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 06/05/2026Hi - this is Martin joining today's #LTHEchat from home in London 000
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 15/04/2026A6 #LTHEchat within reason stepping away: take a walk, read a couple of chapters, do something different then return to reflecton. But also remembering quite what reflection is & of course remembering how to ask those big open questions 010
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 15/04/2026A5 #LTHEchat I do like the idea of multiple framing which is similar, & comes up in some of the literature on management education especially in an uncertain climate. However I recognise I could be more effective than I am in using it in my own practice 010
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 15/04/2026A4 #LTHEchat all of them but in the strict context of gathering supporting evidence for impact peer & autobiographical are probably most important. They are relevant because they capture impact over time which can be crucial 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 15/04/2026A3 #LTHEchat practice, constructive mentoring, & also coming across concepts which explain my actions & experiences to an extent that they benefit my own understanding 020
Martin Rich @martinrich106.bsky.social · 15/04/2026A2 #LTHEchat student, with the proviso that you could argue that student-centred learnng is a tautology. Nevertheless I think students must be at the centre of what we do 020