Professor James Wisdom offered a valuable overview of how to get published in any area of teaching and learning. With the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) looming large, this was a timely reminder of the multiple benefits for academic staff to consider publishing not only on their discipline but also on how they teach it. As Professor Wisdom’s presentation showed, there are plenty of journals and modes of dissemination through which academics and any other staff involved in the teaching and learning process could share their experience, innovations, evaluations or any kind of reflections on their pedagogy.
Excellent teaching and learning often remain merely locked in the memories of students and staff. But this should not be the case. One way of leaving a trace of one’s hard work on the teaching and learning process is to write about it and disseminate it through various channels: by contributing papers to one’s institution’s Teaching and Learning Committees; by writing up articles, case study reports and reviews for the numerous journals and scholarly blogs that cover teaching and learning, assessment, student engagement and many other related fields.
For novices in the field, Professor Wisdom recommended that a good place to start exploring topics and types of journals is the valuable compilation Research into Higher Education Abstracts.
“Verba volant, scripta manent”, as the Latin proverb goes: "spoken words fly away, written words remain". So that excellent teaching and learning do not vanish into thin air, write about them. And to get you started, check out Professor Wisdom’s presentation (above) and a video recording of the session (below).
Video recording of the session: