Nia Wearn's Research & Tech for Teaching

January is always the busiest month, I think it’s Christmas holidays creeping up – although the switch to 30 credits has already helped a lot with the festive marking bottle neck (that and being able to mark TurnItIn from the iPad)

So, I have actually been research / not teaching related academically productive thanks to my app related regime in the past few months (along side increasingly screwball teaching) I’ve actually done the following:

• Submitted things for FDG2014 (that’s the one on a cruise ship)
• Learnt a lot about the new Horizon 2020 funding (Acronym Central)
• Made some Pacman Christmas tree decorations for the faculty Christmas tree (I think this is my proudest achievement – that and the Ninja Turtle baubles I made for the office)
• Mastered Mail Merge to make badges for Global Game Jam (not yet mastered printing onto badges)
• Thought a little bit too much about Hogwarts House points and Gamification

Today alone I have done the following:

• Set up a Game Jam research group on Mendeley
• Discovered Japan’s Digra chapter have their own publication (but it’s in Japanese, and almost impossible to get hold of)
• Submitted things for CHI2014 (that’s the one in Toronto)
• Had a discussion on twitter about the products of Phd Procrastination, and if anyone had ever done a Phd on Phd Procastination – or would such a meta phd cause the universe to implode
• Written 4 blog posts about things I meant to write blog posts about last semester but was too busy to do so (this has been aided by free Wi-fi in the Hollybush in Seighford while my husband plays the guitar)

And so, with irons in the fire, many of last years modules put to bed and a renewed sense of awesomeness I’ve got some very exciting ideas for 2014. That’s If I survive January with the junior / senior alpha showdowns, The Wild Rumpus, The 4th largest Global Game Jam site in the world, and a swanky Bafta launch party to keep me occupied…

I know I’ve said it before, but I really am kicking my phd into gear this year. Having spent a lot of time floating around, first off with an idea I didn’t really gel with or think I could do (and has now been awesomely done by people who can actually code) because it fitted in with the engineering faculty of old, to being told that not caring about the making, and caring about the product, and the users was just fine to getting settled in our new home in the school of art & design to where I am now.

So now I’m studying a phd in the field of Digital Design & Technologies, specifically doing observations at our annual Global Game Jam event, on if any of what we teach the students is reflected in the compressed nature of the jam.

I’ve got an awesome supervisory team, I finally understand what I need to do for the first year of ‘modules’ for the PGCERT and I actually think its doable- it might even be fun, but it’s a long slog doing it part time alongside everything else.

I’ve also been a better student then I ever have before – if nothing else I’m super organised (on a given day I’ll use Google Docs, Dropbox, Trello & Evernote with a sprinkling on Wünderlist, Cal & any.do to keep things moving) I can get to all of my notes, at any time on my phone, my iPad or online and so far, it’s working. I can’t stress how much this has helped.

This and twitter (and Facebook) but really twitter is amazing for connecting with people in so many fields, and a massive thanks to my 2nd supervisors Katy for getting me familiar with @phdforum. And this is where the hipster phd thing comes from, people are doing work in the most awesome fields, 3d printing alloys, squishing stem cells etc – it’s so exciting to know I’m a tiny part of pushing the envelop forward.