Skip to main content

Practical teaching with technology

A new online course, informed by teaching excellence at Birkbeck, is empowering teachers to effectively incorporate educational technologies into their classrooms.

A new course co-designed by the Bloomsbury Learning Environment (BLE), of which Birkbeck is a member, has launched to help educators around the world learn how to best incorporate educational technologies into their teaching.

The course, Get Interactive: Practical Teaching with Technology, will be delivered as a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) through Coursera, and will provide teaching professionals with the support and guidance required to stay up-to-date with the rapid pace of technological development in education. It is aimed at teachers, lecturers and instructors who have basic familiarity with the internet and online learning environments, but little experience using online tools and technology for teaching.

Professor Diane Houston, Pro-Vice Master for Education at Birkbeck said: “We live in a fast-paced technological world, and it can be difficult for educators to stay on top of the latest developments in Edtech tools. There’s a real need for courses like Get Interactive which teachers can go through at their own pace and in their own time.

Every stage of the development of this MOOC has been informed by the needs of teachers, and we’re looking forward to seeing how the course’s teachings are incorporated into schools, colleges and universities worldwide.”

The interactive course consists of a series of video tutorials and activities across three weeks, with each week focusing on a particular topic which is accompanied by a peer-reviewed assessment:

Week 1 – Enriching course content with multimedia:

  • The first week of the course will look at a variety of media that can be used to engage students. This includes creating images, videos and screencasts, and embedding Twitter feeds.

Week 2 – Student production of content: encouraging students to collaborate:

  • In the second week, participants will explore how to encourage students to work together and actively participate in their learning.

Week 3 - Formative assessment and feedback:

  • In the final week of the course, participants will consider their experiences in the course and how they might adapt and develop their own practice.

There are also opportunities for discussion and consolidation with their peers throughout the duration of the course.

Sarah Sherman, BLE Service Manager, said: “We are excited to launch our new course to help educators around the world take full advantage of the great technology we have available to us. This is a perfect opportunity to learn good practice and explore how to incorporate innovative methods into teaching, and engage students through technology.”

Further information

More news about: