Building lifelong learning dispositions using the ‘Learning Journeys’ approach and platform | 10 Aug

UTS Learning Journeys PDF Slides

About this Event

At UTS we place particular value on equipping students with skills and dispositions not only for academic success, but for success in the workplace and lifelong learning. Those qualities will be familiar to many of you, but can be hard to get a grip on as a learner, or educator (e.g. students’ appetite for uncertainty; level of curiosity; openness to being stretched out of your comfort zone; readiness to seek help). These qualities aren’t just for students, but are vital for our own academics and professional staff development.

These new monthly briefings will introduce what we’re learning in the Dispositional Learning Analytics project at the Connected Intelligence Centre, which launched in 2015 to assess and visualise a multidimensional construct called Learning Power. This has been developed over 15 years by Prof. Ruth Crick (in FASS/ISF/CIC 2015-19, continuing as a CIC Visiting Professor). This result is the UTS Learning Journeys website and a platform now integrated into the UTS ecosystem, which scaffold the learner in reflecting on their learning dispositions, as part of a personal enquiry project that they define.

Following pilots with ~3000 students in multiple faculties, the tool was announced to all students in January. It is particularly well suited as part of Work-Integrated Learning (WIL) placements, as a ‘wrapper’ around any existing methodology to provoke deeper reflection. For staff, as part of HR’s Capability Framework (Self Awareness > Exhibits Agility) it has been used by teams as a reflection aid to their professional development.